Chosen: Part Two (Allure)

by Litton, Josie

  Had she dreamed of someone? A lover I didn’t know about?

  My jaws clenched against the stab of jealousy that went through me like a ragged knife

  I had long since accepted my own dark nature, or so I’d thought. But with Grace, the carefully maintained scaffolding that held my life together was in danger of crumbling.

  To prevent that, I had to bend her to my will, even if that meant breaking her. At the same time, I wanted to keep her safe from any harm, no matter what the cost.

  That would not do. I knew my duty; how could I not when it was bred into my blood and bone? I needed to pause, regroup, and find a more effective way of getting what I wanted from her.

  In the meantime, the need to deal with family matters had me in a foul mood, reminding me as it did of the remorseless role that duty played in my life. While I was otherwise occupied, Grace had a reprieve. I could only hope that we wouldn’t both come to regret it.

  With a final glance at the monitors, I walked out of the office.

  Chapter Seven

  “Marilyn” had brought me a soft pair of drawstring pants, a sleeveless cotton shirt, and simple cotton underpants. No shoes but I couldn’t hope for everything. Just having clothes again was relief enough.

  When I was dressed, I towel dried my hair, using the time to decide what to do. So much could go wrong before I got more than a few steps away but I couldn’t dwell on that. I had to take my chances and hope against hope that my desperate plan would work.

  Walking back to the cell, I stumbled a little. “Marilyn” responded as I’d hoped, putting an arm around my waist to steady me. As we got closer, I sagged. She faltered, struggling to hold me up.

  Before she could have any inkling of what I intended, I grabbed hold of both her shoulders and shoved hard, pushing her into the cell. She cried out in surprise as I slammed the door shut. To my great relief, it locked automatically, trapping her inside.

  “Mio Dio,” she screamed, whirling on me, “sei pazzo? Che cosa stai facendo?”

  I wasn’t crazy, not yet any way, and I was doing the only thing that I could. But I wasn’t going to try to explain any of that. Time was of the essence. If the hooded man was watching the monitors, he would already have realized that I was trying to escape.

  The thought of being caught by him sent me running down the hallway to the heavy metal door. For a sickening instant, I feared that it wouldn’t open. If it was locked from the inside, “Marilyn” had the key. I couldn’t open the cell door to try to get it and she’d never hand it over voluntarily. My plan would be over before it had barely begun.

  My palm, slick with sweat, slid around the knob uselessly. A sob broke from me. I bore down harder, gripping with all my strength. With agonizing slowness, the knob turned. The moment the door was open, I flew through it. It banged shut behind me, the heavy sound reverberating so loudly that I was certain someone would hear it.

  Beyond the wall immediately on the other side of the door, a large space stretched out ahead and to both sides. There were no windows but lights hanging from the ceiling revealed a cellar that looked much older than the area where I had been kept. It also appeared to be empty although in the distance I could make out rows of wooden racks laden with wine bottles.

  My gaze skimmed over them as I searched frantically for a way out. Finally, I spotted a narrow flight of stone steps leading upward. I took them two at a time and slowly eased the door at the top open. To my great relief, no one was in sight.

  I stepped through, already shaking from my efforts and gasping for breath. As I dragged in air, a flood of tantalizing aromas struck me. At once, my mouth flooded with saliva and my stomach rumbled. After days of nothing but porridge, I was suddenly so hungry!

  Off to one side, I heard the clatter of pots and voices speaking in a medley of English, Italian and a language I couldn’t identify. By the sound of it, a large staff was preparing dinner.

  At any moment, someone might emerge and see me. Or the hooded man himself might appear.

  I ran, headlong down one hallway and another. Ahead of me, double doors led out onto a stone veranda. Once outside, I had no choice but to stop, if only for a few moments. My legs trembled from the unaccustomed exertion. Only the adrenaline coursing through my bloodstream kept me standing.

  A full moon was rising to the east. In every direction that I looked, shards of light struck water. It took me a few moments to realize what that meant. When I did, my spirits plummeted. I was on an island. Getting away would be hard enough anywhere but surrounded by water, what hope did I have?

  Before despair could take hold and cripple me, I focused on the bright cluster of lights gleaming on the other side of a dark swathe of water. They didn’t look more than a mile or so from where I stood. Renewed hope filled me. I’d steal a boat if I had to. Failing that, I’d swim. Nothing was going to stop me from getting away.

  Unless I lingered too long where I was. Fueled by desperation, I took off running, heading for the water.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~

  “The guests are at the dock.” Rolf fell silent, listening again through his ear bud. After a moment, he added, “They will be here shortly.”

  I shot the cuffs of my tuxedo jacket and nodded. The marbled entry hall of the house was empty except for the two of us. Elsewhere, the staff would be making final preparations, assuring that every detail down to the smallest was executed perfectly. Beauty and luxury had their own intrinsic value but they were also a useful reminder of the power that could call them into being.

  My guests would grumble at being denied the use of the island’s airstrip, instead being ferried over from the central island of Malta, then driven up to the house. But I took pleasure in reminding them that our forebearers had always arrived from the sea. They should be honored to uphold that tradition.

  As they would uphold others in the coming days. The old rituals still had their use, particularly when it came to discerning whose loyalty was less than absolute.

  Before I plunged into all of that, I succumbed to temptation and checked on Grace. I’d routed the feed from the monitors to my phone. It came up in an instant, revealing--

  Maria, sitting on the ledge in the cell, her hands folded in her lap and a resigned expression on her face.

  Bloody hell! Shock and rage roared through me. At once, I dismissed the possibility that Maria had let Grace escape. Passing the note to her had been a lapse of judgement. Going so much further would have been a betrayal, one with dire consequences not only for Maria but even more so for Grace herself.

  No, this was my fault. I’d judged my captive to be too weak, in body if not in mind, to try to flee. Had I ever in my entire life been guilty of a more serious miscalculation? Or one with potentially disastrous consequences.

  Beside me, Rolf’s gaze sharpened. “Is something wrong?”

  “Miss Delaney has managed to slip away. Tell the men to look for her but discretely.”

  In a rare show of surprise, he raised an eyebrow. “Of course…”

  “And keep our guests occupied until I get back.”

  “You’re going--?”

  We both knew that I needed to stay where I was, give no hint that anything was wrong, and let others deal with Grace.

  But how could I when I was suddenly awash in memory, back in the grip of that devouring beast that lived in the strait between my island and the rest of the world, feeling my life ebb as it pulled me under. The thought of losing her to it, or in any other way, was intolerable.

  Without another word, I walked quickly from the entry hall. By the time I reached the nearest side door, I was running.

  On three sides of the house, cliffs fell away toward the sea. That left only one way she could have gone. Even as my eyes tracked along the driveway, seeking any sign of her, I glimpsed a pale shape cutting through the grove of ancient olive trees nearby.

  In an instant, I was after her.

  She was fast, astonishingly so given what she had been through in r
ecent days. But I was a hunter; the chase was in my blood, and this particular prey drew me as none other. I had the best of reasons for pursuing her. And the basest.

  At the thought of dragging her under me, my body hardened. I wanted to hold her as she struggled, hear her gasps and cries, and savor the moment when she realized how ensnared she truly was. Anticipation of her surrender ran hot and fast through me.

  Just then, Grace stumbled. I cursed, remembering that she had no shoes. The ground was limestone, covered only by thin, dry soil. Her feet would be bruised by now, even cut. If she fell, she could be injured even more.

  Instead, she managed to catch herself and glanced back over her shoulder. If she hadn’t been aware that she was being followed, she was now. Her body recoiled with shock and fear. I couldn’t make out her face, we were still too far apart, but I didn’t have to guess at her desperation. Or what it could drive her to do.

  Sprinting, she topped the hill beyond the trees and ran on toward the narrow sandy beach only a few hundred yards away. My chest clenched. If she got that far--

  I hurtled over the hill and let myself slide down the other side, heedless of the thorny branches tearing at me to the point of drawing blood. At the bottom, I jumped up and I looked around quickly.

  She was racing along the beach away from me. I hesitated. If I stopped chasing her, surely she’d have the sense to try to find a boat or some other way off the island rather than risk swimming off a beach where she didn’t know how strong the currents were. Unless she was too frantic to even think of the possible danger.

  Above the rhythmic pounding of the waves, I called, “Grace, stop! There’s a rip current!”

  She didn’t hear me. But she did realize that I was still behind her. Before I could get any nearer, she turned, paused just long enough to strip off her pants, and ran toward the surf.

  Chapter Eight

  The water was cold enough to shock. I gasped, sucking in air, and forced my limbs to move. I hadn’t wanted to do this, had hoped against hope to avoid it. But whoever it was that had come after me was too fast and too strong. I couldn’t outrun him. The best I could hope for was that he wasn’t as good a swimmer as I was.

  Across the dark swathe of water, the distant lights of a town gave me hope. I could do this. I had to.

  As a child, I’d confided to a teacher that I wanted to be a mermaid when I grew up. That had never seemed like a better goal than it did right then.

  After the initial shock passed, I fell into a steady rhythm, each stroke propelling me farther from shore. I didn’t dare to look back again but instead kept my sights on the opposite shore. It really wasn’t far, less than a mile.

  Under normal circumstances, I could swim that without difficulty. But the ordeal of the past few days had worn me down. Too soon, I had to pause and let myself float for a few moments until I was strong enough to go on.

  When I started swimming again, my body moved more reluctantly. Each motion of my arms and legs required more effort. As much as I hated to admit it, what was left of my strength was fading fast. I had to slow down and pace myself.

  But when I did, I glimpsed the wake of another swimmer heading directly toward me. Whoever he was, he wasn’t slowing down. On the contrary, he cut through the water with long, powerful strokes. At that speed, he was going to catch me and quickly. A bolt of fear shot through me. Forgetting the need to conserve my strength, I struck out frantically.

  Almost at once, the feel of the water changed. I was suddenly aware of moving faster than my own efforts could take me. Worse yet, a quick glance confirmed that I was no longer heading toward the other shore. Instead, I was being carried away from it, out toward the open sea.

  I’d been warned about rip currents all my life but I’d never encountered one before. As I realized what was happening, I told myself not to panic. I knew what to do.

  Don’t try to swim against it; I’d just end up exhausted and drown. Go with it instead and wait for it to dissipate, as it likely would in just a few hundred yards. Contrary to what my brain was screaming at me, I wasn’t going to end up in the ocean. I’d be all right as long as I kept my head.

  That might work for most rip currents but this one was so powerful that when I tried to relax into it, I was pulled under. The instant the water closed over my head, all thought of not panicking vanished. The primal terror of drowning burned through me. I struck out for the surface desperately, only just managing to claw my way to it.

  Dragging in air, I floundered against the overwhelming force of the water. Almost instantly, it pulled me under again. I clamped my mouth shut and kicked frantically. By the time I broke through once more, my lungs were burning. My limbs felt weighted down and my muscles throbbed. Distantly, I knew that my oxygen level was dropping. Already, my mind felt sluggish and my vision was beginning to blur.

  A bitter sense of irony filled me. I could have stayed safe and snug in my little cell waiting to discover what the hooded man had planned for me. Now I was going to die within sight of freedom.

  I tasted salt but I didn’t know if it came from tears or the enveloping sea. It didn’t matter, the grief was acute in either case, so powerful that it overrode even my terror. There was so much I would never get to do--fall in love, have sex, get married, have children…

  A sudden flash of memory stirred in the depths of my mind. I was stepping out the door of Haven House. Across the street, a man lounged against a sleek black car. A frisson of pleasure went through me as I ‘watched’ Adam straighten and come toward me with long, easy strides.

  “Grace,” he said.

  Except it sounded more like, “Grace!”

  Why was he shouting? Adam didn’t shout. He possessed an Old World reserve at once impenetrable and compelling. A dark part of me longed to find out what would happen if all the steely control ever shattered.

  But I was so tired…so very tired. My body kept moving, still fighting to survive, even as I numbed to the realization that the struggle was over; I’d lost.

  A wave broke over my head. Water rushed into my mouth and down my throat. I coughed but only weakly.

  It was over, I was done. But I still couldn’t accept that. With the last of my strength, I flailed against the sucking weight of the water. My hand reached out, grasping for air, for hope. For life.

  “Grace!”

  Above me, through waving bands of green and black, I saw the silver disk of the full moon. So beautiful! My vision narrowed, squeezing down to that single circle of radiant light. Darkness closed in around it but before the light could vanish altogether, strong arms seized me.

  I was hauled upward and against a rock hard body, my head blessedly out of the water, air rushing into my lungs.

  “Breathe,” a man ordered, his voice deep and powerful. Familiar in a way that confused me.

  “Damn you, breathe!”

  Though my chest burned with pain, I obeyed. Sweet, blessed air filled my lungs. I sobbed with relief.

  “That’s it,” he said. “Hold on!”

  His strength was far greater than mine but even so the rip current kept sucking us under. Again and again, he fought his way back to the surface. Distantly, I wondered why didn’t just let go of me. Surely, he would stand a better chance of surviving without my weight to pull him down.

  At the thought that he might do so, I clung to him all the harder. Tiny white lights shone behind my eyes, a lingering warning of how close I had come to dying and might still.

  Finally, the force of the water began to ease. Limp and exhausted, I laid back, cradled in powerful arms that despite the terrifying circumstances made me feel overwhelmingly safe. What seemed like an eternity later, sand scraped under my back and legs as he pulled us both onto the beach and collapsed beside me.

  We lay, side by side, our chests rising and falling. Neither of us spoke but after a few moments, he reached out a hand and clasped mine. His fingers curled around mine, squeezing gently.

  Confusion filled me. The
only other person I’d seen in my frantic flight was the shadowy figure pursuing me. If this was the same man, he’d chased me down, driven me into the water, and then rescued me from certain death at immense risk to himself.

  Who was he--my captor or my savior?

  I felt him shift beside me and fought to open my eyes. But my body wouldn’t respond until the back of his hand brushed lightly over my cheek. Then all my senses came suddenly, vividly alive.

  Over the rush of the surf, I heard a voice, rasping and harsh from the ordeal we had both endured but unmistakably filled with concern. “Grace, look at me. Are you all right?”

  I did open my eyes then. The moon was riding high in a crystal clear sky. Its light poured over the beach, illuminating the face of the man above me. Gazing up at him, a jolt of raw shock and disbelief roared through me. I could hardly grasp what I was seeing. Who I was.

  “You!” Every moment of the last few days exploded in my mind--all the fear, the pain, the dread. Taken from the illusion of safety, left naked in the dark, forced to relive memories that terrified and sickened me. All because of him?

  In an instant, shock and fear burned to ash. Only white hot rage remained. I had never been a violent person, not remotely. But every vestige of control I possessed shattered. Only the most primitive impulses remained. Nothing mattered except the raw need to make him pay for what he had done to me.

  Snarling, teeth bared, I hurled myself at Adam Falzon.

  Chapter Nine

  Sweet heaven, was there no limit to this woman? After everything she’d been through, she could still come at me for blood, if not a hell of a lot worse?

  I only just managed to seize Grace’s wrists before her nails raked down my face, assuming that they weren’t heading straight for my eyes. Undeterred, she tried to sink her teeth into my throat. I held her off but only barely.