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“In the cage in my closet. Hold onto this. Go to her if she pushes the button.”
Brian didn’t have to see inside the office to know it was a black receiver box.
“When will you be back?”
“I have a few appointments. If I’m not back, let her out around noon.”
Brian continued down the hallway and detoured through the cafeteria. He took a secondary staircase to the second floor. Lindsay’s door was unlocked, no doubt so Gabe could reach Mina if necessary, but it also gave Brian access. His day off could wait.
As he approached the closet, he heard her crying. He slipped inside the darkness, shutting the door before she could look up. She went deadly quiet, like she had downstairs with him the night before. Did she know it was him?
She saw what he was in a way few others had. Sure, they were all afraid of him, but usually only after they’d been given a reason to fear: being sent down for a punishment, observing the reactions of other girls, rumors at the lunch table. By contrast, Mina had reacted like a frightened doe the moment she’d seen him—even when he wasn’t being particularly threatening. Her instincts unnerved him.
He’d thought he wanted her to be afraid, but the marks on her back were like a mystical shield of protection. It put her on his team. It made her his co-captive in need of justice and protection. Brian didn’t know what to do with these thoughts and feelings. He’d never had them before. He didn’t welcome them, but he couldn’t push them away. He couldn’t pushheraway.
When he managed to stop the circle his thoughts ran around, the darkness of the closet engulfed him, and for a moment the room went hot, and he couldn’t breathe. He was trapped under the stairs again. He gripped a shelf that held Lindsay’s casual khaki pants. Mina gasped at the sound, clearly working to hold in her own panic.
He tried to steady his breath, tried not to hyperventilate, tried not to be that weak, scared child again crying out in the dark for someone to help and protect him.
He’d wanted to come in under cover of darkness. He’d wanted to touch the side of her face and have her lean toward him through the bars, not knowing it was him. He’d never wanted a woman to come to him willingly, to trust him. He’d never cared and thought any woman who trusted him was foolish and deserved whatever she got. But Mina was different. He wanted to know what one moment of tenderness given or received could feel like even as he berated himself for the thought.
But the darkness swallowed him. He wanted to flee, but he couldn’t bring himself to leave her behind.
He took a slow, shuddering breath and flipped the light on. Just a normal walk-in closet. Everything was fine. He was large and strong. Six foot four. Broad. Even grown men walked the other way when he moved down the street. Nothing could hurt him anymore. He composed himself and turned toward her.
Mina scooted as far as she could into one of the back corners of the cage, which admittedly wasn’t very far.
He approached and sat cross-legged next to her. When she started to edge away, his voice stopped her.
“There’s nowhere for you to go. I’ll be annoyed if I have to chase you around the cage.”
She stopped her retreat, still trembling. “P-please, Sir… I didn’t push the button. I didn’t push it.”
“I know you didn’t.”
She wouldn’t stop shaking.
It bothered him more than he liked to see her huddled in the cage. Some sinister part of him rebelled, wanting to hurt her for whatever it was about her that made him feel compassion for a woman he didn’t even know. But the greater part of him—for possibly the first time ever—rebelled against that notion so strongly that the thought of it almost made him physically ill.
Instead, he found himself saying, “Do you need anything?”
Her face was guarded, as if she were looking for the trap. He didn’t blame her. If it had been any other girl, the trap would have been set and waiting. But there was no trap this time.
Brian raised his voice. “When I ask you a question, I expect an answer. Do you know who I am?”
“N-no, Sir.”
“No you don’t need anything or no you don’t know who I am?”
“The latter.”
Interesting. She still had no idea of his role in the house. Why would Lindsay bring someone here that was so damaged? Did he really think he could find someone suitable to buy her? This girl was too far gone—not fit for anyone. And she couldn’t be released back out into the wild. If Lindsay had wanted her for himself, he should have taken her, rather than engage in this charade.
“Do you need anything?”
“B-bathroom,” she whispered.
He input the code on the cage. When the door opened, he reached inside to take her hand.
