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Kane just chuckled at that.
Ari sighed. “I think she's struggling a bit. She knows how wrong this whole thing is. I think she's afraid if she trusts me I'll hurt her and break her more.”
“But she's very obedient. That's a plus.”
“Oh, she's a dream, but she's waiting for the other shoe to drop. She doesn't think I can see it, but her face is so expressive. She's still struggling with herself for not fighting me.”
Kane was silent for several minutes. Finally he said, “Maybe Claire could meet Saskia. You should come to her private show next week. I'm having it at my estate. She's got a whole new series of paintings. You might like one. Did you get the invitation I sent?”
“I haven't gone through the mail yet. I was kind of pre-occupied.”
“Well, come. And bring Claire.”
It wasn't the worst idea Kane had ever had.
Claire founda fresh pot of coffee in the kitchen and poured herself a cup then stood next to the sliding glass door. A small gray biometric panel stood next to the glass now. It should make her feel trapped, but instead she felt safe, knowing that no one could get in or out without Ari's thumbprint.
She stared out over his endless property, watching the snow come down. She felt the heat flush over her chest as she thought about what had just happened in the playroom with Ari and the artist. Even now the place between her legs heated and came awake again at just the thought of it.
It had been all her fantasies from before the world came apart. Even as she'd arched into the hands of both men, straining toward them as their mouths devoured her, seeking more and more contact, the fear had lingered in the back of her mind. What if she had a flashback?
Not a memory. The awful memories sometimes came and drifted by like a macabre horror film. Those were bad enough. But flashbacks were different. When that happened, she actuallywentthere as though her body and mind were both transported out of the here and now, back into that basement. She felt things, and she couldn't find her way back out. It was like a nightmare you knew you were having but couldn't force yourself to wake up from. When it happened, it was like she'd never escaped. Like she was still there.
But today there was no flashback. In fact, though she still got nightmares, the flashbacks hadn't happened once since she'd been with Ari. It was as though they were afraid to surface in his presence, as if he had the power to destroy them forever.
The experience in the playroom with these two men had been nothing like what she'd experienced before. She felt like it should trigger something. After all, how much free will did she have here? Wasn't it the same? She was at Ari's absolute mercy. It was only his kindness that kept her safe. A kindness she still couldn't understand.
She'd thought it would be just like the basement. Or worse. After all, the guy in the basement had just been crazy. Ari had a legitimate grievance. But this thing with him couldn't be more different. It felt shameful to want him to touch her because it wasn't as though he were her boyfriend.
He hadn't asked her out on a date or wined and dined her. The way they'd met was far too dark for her to feel these light airy feelings whenever he was near, those butterfly stomach flips when his gaze was on her. His arctic gaze became warmer and warmer when he looked at her now. And it melted all the things that had kept her libido frozen safely in ice.
As bad as she thought it might be to want him, it felt a thousand times more wrong to love him. It had been so long since she'd loved someone that she didn't know if she was remembering it right. Maybe she didn't know how to feel real love anymore. And maybe she didn't know what it felt like to have love directed at her. This thing with Ari was twisted and wrong. All these soft feelings she found herself having couldn't be real.
She couldn't be developing actual emotional attachment to this man. Could she? Maybe it was Stockholm syndrome. But she hadn't felt this way in the basement. Whatever captive/captor attachment she'd formed for survival in that basement was very different from the way she felt with Ari.
She heard the two men talking as they moved down the hallway toward the kitchen. She felt frozen like prey standing in the light coming from the window. She should run and hide back in Ari's room, but she stood there, drinking her coffee, staring out the window.
Kane came up behind her. She jumped when he touched the middle of her back, but he didn't make a big deal of it. “Claire, I need you to get a good night's sleep tonight. You have a long day ahead tomorrow. We'll start work at nine a.m.”
“Yes, Sir.” The title fell from her lips without her conscious thought. She spun quickly to find Ari standing beside the kitchen island watching her. Was that okay? Was she supposed to call Kane that outside of the playroom? But he only nodded his approval.
33
It was eight-thirty the next morning when Claire wandered into the kitchen wearing a terrycloth bathrobe.
Ari stood beside the table, setting up for breakfast. Three coffee mugs, three forks, three plates. He didn't look up from pouring the coffee when he spoke.
“Good, you're up. Kane will be joining us for breakfast in a few minutes. He's setting up his supplies.”
“I thought he was coming at nine?”
Ari poured the last coffee just as the kitchen timer went off. He took the coffee pot back to its spot on the counter and grabbed some oven mitts to take a breakfast casserole out of the oven. He placed the perfectly browned casserole on a trivet in the center of the kitchen table, then retrieved a serving spoon from the drawer.
This man should have his own cooking show.
“He said we startworkat nine. Not that he would be here at nine. I was about to come get you. Have you showered yet?”
“Yes, Master,” she said, feeling suddenly shy.
