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He and Garrett start putting us through our paces. Joshua takes Fletcher and Paul aside and watches them with the intense concentration of a hawk, and at the end of our session, my stomach twists as Fletcher and Paul stare at him with huge eyes.
“Better,” he says to them calmly, then walks out of the room without a word. I see them start to breathe again, and I realize that my hands had clenched into fists. They high-five each other, and Astrid breaks out into a smile of relief.
When he said that single word, I saw the tiniest quiver of his jaw, then I saw him flick the quickest of glances in my direction. He was lying to them. He thought they were awful. But he spared their feelings. Because I asked him to.
And I realize that I can do this. I can be with him. Iwillbe with him. Whatever it takes, I’ll do it. Joshua will never be whole, he’ll never be sane, he’ll always be a psychopath. But he’s my psychopath. He’s pledged himself entirely to me, and he’s changing as much as he is capable.
He joins us for dinner that evening and sleeps in his own bed again afterward. But the next morning, he eats breakfast with us all, then he takes me into his bathroom again.
Days pass by, stretching into a week, falling into a routine.
Every morning after breakfast, Joshua cuffs me in the bathtub. I remember how I fought it when Joshua first kidnapped me. It made me feel so exposed and vulnerable to be chained up and splayed open. Now it’s a ritual I’ve come to crave. It’s a time of peace for both of us. We’re silent when he bathes me, and I drift off into my own world. The pure sensual pleasure of him running the sponge over my naked body, the light fragrance of the bath suds… and the way he’s entirely focused on giving me pleasure.
After he bathes me, we end up with me on my hands and knees on the fluffy bath mat, with him lapping at me from behind until I cry from frustration and beg him to fuck me. Or I’m on my knees, taking him into my mouth and glorying in how the swirling of my tongue wrenches cries of pleasure from him.
Then we have sex. It’s not making love, because neither of us want that softness or tenderness. It’s raw, hungry fucking. He pounds into me, and I come explosively every time.
But that’s the only time he gets close to me. During the day, he’s there in body, but I feel as if his mind is somewhere else. He spends hours poring through computer programs, tracking down private flights, train and bus passenger lists, car rentals, border crossings, facial recognition programs, anything that might give him a clue as to where his brother is.
He’s withdrawn and not speaking much. The only time we have sex is in the morning. He walks with me sometimes in the afternoon, making conversation. And he yawns a lot these days. I see him doing it, but I don’t ever dare bring it up.
A dull resentment is starting to brew inside me.
I realize that when he kidnapped me this time and swore he’d make me his, part of me was angry, but part of me was expecting the full court press. I thought he’d try to seduce me. Woo me. Talk to me all night and day, drown me in flowers and chocolates, open himself up to me as he’d never done before. I remember how passionate he was the first time he took me. This is a man who could make love to me half a dozen times in a day, who never seemed to tire of pleasuring me. A man who wanted to know every part of me, my mind and body.
This ismyman.
I can’t deny it to myself. There will never be another man for me. It’s Joshua or nobody.
Who could replace him? The madness that he calls up in me, the intensity of our relationship, the swooping highs and terrifying lows, have opened me up to a new kind of feeling that I can’t even name. And I thought he felt the same way about me.
So why isn’t he fighting for me?
I keep waiting for him to snap out of it, but instead he’s more and more remote with each passing day.
One morning, he snaps at Fletcher again while they’re sparring.
Fletcher freezes where he stands. Astrid flashes Joshua a look of hurt and confusion, and the girls look at us in bewilderment.
“Joshua.” I clench my fists and stalk over to him. “Whatever the hell is bothering you, don’t take it out on Fletcher!”
Joshua turns and walks out of the room without a word.
“I’m done for the day,” Fletcher says miserably.
We all finish up early and head back to our rooms.
At lunch, Joshua doesn’t join us. Garrett tells us that Joshua won’t be taking part in the training anymore.
He disappears for the rest of the day. I end up sulking in my room, boiling with frustration. Is it going to be like this forever? Is he growing tired of me and is too chicken to say so?
Before dinner, his butler-slash-bodyguard comes and tells me Joshua wants me to have dinner with him out in the garden.
I join him at a round table inset with colorful mosaic designs of salamanders, under trees that are festooned in tiny twinkling lights, and we eat prime rib and steer clear of talking about what happened earlier today.
“Any progress at all on your brother?” I ask him.
He shakes his head. “Nothing at all. He’s gone to ground.”
