by Jen Davis
The way I saw it, I had two choices. Either I did what he said, hoping like hell someone would find me before it was too late—or I fought him. I wasn’t completely clueless. I knew the window of being able to find a kidnapped woman in this country wasn’t open for long. The longer I sat there, the slimmer my chances of being found became—and I wasn’t even sure exactly how long I’d been here. So my only other option was to fight. To fight him around every corner, to show him I wasn’t this weak little mouse that he thought I was.
My mom used to tell me what a strong-willed child I was. No one was able to debate with me, to sway me when I already had my mind made up—which was why my mom didn’t even try to stop me when I decided to go to New York. She knew no matter what any of them did, I wouldn’t stay.
So where was that woman now? The strong-willed, courageous woman whose only goal was to prove to everyone that she could stand on her own two feet?
I needed to pull my shit together and show Castello I wouldn’t be easily broken. That I wouldn’t play the part of the helpless victim, in turn giving him exactly what he wanted. I saw it in his eyes, his need for power—and because I seemed to be the root of his need for revenge, he needed that power to come from me.
Well, fuck him. I wouldn’t give it to him.
I grabbed the hardened loaf of bread and climbed to my feet. My stomach growled, and every instinct inside me was telling me to eat the bread, no matter how old it was. But I wouldn’t. I would no longer be the scared little mouse.
I tore off a piece of the tattered rag that hung just above my knees, swallowed hard, closed my eyes, and reached down to where I knew the finger was. The second I felt it between my fingers through the fabric, I gagged and groaned. I quickly wrapped the cloth around the finger, grabbed the box it came in, and stuffed it back inside.
A rush of air expelled from my lungs, and my body went numb as I sat on the bed. Everything was still so surreal, like I would wake up in my bed in my apartment at any moment now. Wishful thinking.
With the bread in my hands, I started to break it into tiny pieces, placed it inside the box with the finger, put the lid on, and carried it over to the wall where I knew the hidden door was. After placing the box on the floor, I glanced around the room, knowing he was probably watching me.
I climbed on the bed, my stomach still rumbling, urging me to grab the box and eat the bread. But I kept hearing my mom’s voice over and over and over again in my head.
“You are the most strong-willed girl I have ever known…”
Her voice gave me the strength I needed. Not the goddamn two-week-old loaf of bread or the God-awful vinegar-water. And if hearing her voice inside my head wasn’t enough, the fact that the bread was in there with a human finger was reason enough for me not to want to eat that damn bread. No, I wouldn’t eat.
Castello needed me to be physically strong so he could torture me and break me, extract the revenge he needed from me without me wilting away before he had his fill. I’d be strong, all right, but not in the way he expected of me. If I wanted to win this war, I needed to fight him with his own weapon…me.
Chapter 7
Castello
I leaned back in the chair, watching Tatum on the thirty-two-inch monitor. I had a state-of-the-art security system installed once my mind was made up about what I wanted to do.
Wanted…needed…had no fucking choice. Same damn thing.
It had been hours since she tore up the bread and placed it with the finger in the gift box. I had to admit, I did not think she would have the guts to go near that finger, let alone pick it up. But yet again, Tatum managed to surprise me by proving me wrong.
After placing the box in front of the door, she got onto the bed and hadn’t moved since. She just sat there against the headboard with her legs pulled up, leaning her head back or on her arms. She didn’t even cry anymore, and I noticed her body had stopped shaking.
The entire time I watched her, I kept wondering if I had been wrong about her. When I put this plan in motion, I thought for sure I had this woman all figured out. She was the creative type who easily lost herself to the depths of her mind. For months I had her followed, and all she did was work at the art studio by day and drown herself in a bottle of scotch at night while her mind took her to places that involved colors and paint and everything bizarre. There were a few nights she spent with friends, only having a drink or two. But when she got home, she cracked open the bottle and consumed her weight in alcohol. From where I stood, she already seemed broken, which was supposed to make my job easy.
But maybe I was wrong.
More time went by. Every now and then, she would glance at the box in front of the door but then look away.
She had to be hungry. She hadn’t eaten in days. All she had was the vinegar-water she licked up from the floor.
God, that was a show to witness, seeing her on her hands and knees, licking up every drop she could find like a thirsty little kitten. While I watched her on the monitor, I found myself wanting to be inside that room, to hear the sound of her tongue lapping up every drop, to hear her moan as the liquid coated her dry throat. The twisted son of a bitch in me even got hard watching her crawl around like a pet. My cock swelled, the monster roared, and my blackened soul wanted so much more. I wanted to see her sit at my feet. I wanted to hear her sweet whimpers as I stroked my fingers through her hair, brushing my hand along her naked shoulders. I would touch her, caress her…hurt her until finally she would beg me to give her the release her body craved.
I shifted in my seat, rubbing against the painful hardness in my pants. What the fuck was I doing, sitting around having twisted fantasies about the woman who was the epitome of everything fucking evil in my life?
Pushing back the lustful thoughts that had no place in my mind to begin with, I continued to watch her, study her, to try to figure out who the hell she really was.
It was amazing what the human instinct for survival would make you do, yet she denied herself food. Why? If her modus operandi was to starve herself to death before I had the chance to take her life, why would she drink the vinegar-water? Why would she crawl on the floor like a pet in search of more water but wouldn’t eat?
I tried to wrap my head around it, to figure out what was going on inside her mind. This was, after all, about to become the mother of all mind-fuck games. For hours, I watched her but couldn’t figure it out. Until she gave one more glance toward the box…and it hit me. When I was in there earlier, I didn’t tell her to drink the water. I told her to eat. I demanded she eat. That was it. She was defying me, showing me one giant “fuck you” by not doing what I had specifically told her to do.
Motherfucker.
I smiled. The little mouse I caught seemed to be a fighter after all. I had indeed underestimated her. Lucky for me, unlucky for her, I loved a challenge, thrived on it. It made me push my limits, made me stronger, gave me power.
With the press of a button on the keyboard in front of me, the lights in her room went off, casting her in complete darkness, so dark she wouldn’t even be able to see her hand in front of her face. But I could see her. With the night vision camera, I could see her small frame huddling on the bed as she pushed her face deeper into her arms and legs.
The little mouse wanted to play…so let’s play.
***
Tatum
The lights went off, and my heart got lodged in my throat. I saw nothing but black around me, and my lack of vision made the panic inside me spike. I never even realized I had the privilege of light until it was taken away.
Now here I was, trapped in a room…in the dark. I had no way of knowing what his next move would be, why he felt it necessary to have me trapped in the dark. But something told me this was all part of his game. A dangerous game I hoped I had the courage to play.
I pulled my legs closer to my chest and buried my face between my arms. I would make my own darkness by closing my eyes and hiding my face, rather than endure his.
Rocking back and forth, I tried my best to ignore my fear and the hunger pangs that plagued my insides. I’d never hated my body this much. The way my stomach growled, my throat burning with thirst. I was so damn hungry and thirsty, I felt like I could become a savage at any moment. But I refused to eat. Fuck him. Fuck everyone.
Before he cast me in complete darkness, I glanced over at the gift box filled with bread. My body urged me to grab the bread and stuff as much as possible into my mouth. But with every last shred of self-control I had, I kept myself contained. Secretly, I was thankful for the darkness, that gift box no longer able to taunt me with the promise of feeling full again.
I shifted down and huddled on the mattress, hoping sleep would take me, that I would wake up and this would all be gone. But the more I tried to sleep, it seemed less likely that it would happen. There was too much adrenaline pumping through my veins, my hunger too strong to ignore. I couldn’t concentrate on getting some sleep.
But honestly, what woman who had been kidnapped with the promise of being murdered would be able to fucking sleep?
The longer I lay there in the dark, the more my mind drifted into crazy, scary directions. I tried to find a focus point, a happy place, as people called it. I imagined myself in my art studio, listening to music, painting, getting lost in my own little world. The colors, the way it all came together, gave me a sense of tranquility. After Carlo left—which was what I thought back then—I threw myself into my work. The only difference was I added a bottle of scotch into my creative process. The more time passed with Carlo being gone, the darker the colors got, the angrier the canvases became. I used my pen and my paintbrush as a way to get rid of the pain, rather than a knife or a razor. With every stripe across the canvas, I imagined it was a cut through my heart. The paint would bleed down the white background in drops of angry tears, just like the blood would bleed from my body.
After my parents discovered the scars on my skin, they saw me as an addict crying out for help. They forced me to see therapists, tried to figure out what went wrong in my life. But it wasn’t anything like that. Most people got addicted to alcohol, drugs, cigarettes…the slice of a blade, because they needed something to help them escape, something to ease whatever it was that ate at them from the inside. My addiction to pain wasn’t because I needed an escape from a fucked-up childhood or a screwed-up past. Even though I had to live in the shadow of my father, being the daughter of the famous William Linscott, I had a fairly good childhood. My parents loved me. I had a life of excess and privilege and never wanted for anything. My addiction to pain was purely because I craved it. It wasn’t something that could be explained. There was no rhyme or reason for the intense need I had to experience pain, to control my body by pushing my limits, by proving to myself that my mind was stronger than my body was. It was just…me.
I tightened my grip around my legs, trying not to think of it, trying not to think about how good it felt to see my body bleed, reminding me that I was alive. Not only did it give me the best kind of relief, but the euphoria I experienced along with the pain was something I couldn’t describe to anyone. No one understood it. Everyone saw it as a psychological flaw, a switch inside my brain that no longer worked right. In reality, they were probably right—in their reality. My reality was something far different than everyone else’s.
I didn’t know how long I lay there, lost in my own thoughts—thoughts of my life, my family…Carlo…the lies. So far, everything pointed to Carlo being a liar, deceiving me by pretending to be someone he wasn’t. But why would he do that? Why would he lie? Even if he was like all the other men, only pretending to love me to get access to my family’s wealth, why would he pretend to be someone he wasn’t? It didn’t make any sense.
Thinking about it let a sadness drop over me like a veil of black. Everything about Carlo and me was a lie. There was no truth in it, no truth in the words and the promises he made.
Damn him. Damn him to hell.
The light flicked on. I jerked up and opened my eyes, closing them as fast as I had opened them, the light stinging my eyes.
“Hello, little mouse.”
My eyes slowly flickered open, adjusting to the light. Castello was standing by the door wearing another one of his designer suits, a whirlwind of power and confidence swirling around him.
“I trust you slept well.”
I sat up straight and rubbed my eyes, which were still sensitive to the bright light. “Like a fucking baby.”
“Now-now, Miss Linscott. There’s no need for such language.”
“There’s no need to keep me here like a goddamn prisoner, either.”
“Oh, yes, there is, believe me.”
He stepped back, disappearing from the door for a few seconds. I leaned forward, narrowing my eyes, wondering what he was up to.
Then he came strolling into the room pushing a trolley with four silver domes. The second he came to a standstill with the trolley only a few feet from me, I smelled it.
Oh my God.
Food.
There were so many different aromas that I couldn’t distinguish between any of it. It all smelled so goddamn delicious that I had to fist my hands, pushing my nails painfully in the flesh of my palms to stop myself from launching forward to grab anything and everything off that trolley.
“Are you hungry, Miss Linscott?” Castello smiled before glancing over his shoulder to the gift box with the stale bread pieces and human finger. He turned back and shrugged. “I guess not.”
Pulling the chair closer, he took a seat beside the trolley and pulled off a silver dome from one of the plates.
I couldn’t stop myself from pushing up straight, stretching my neck as far as it would go to see what was on the plate.
Castello leaned over the dish, inhaling. “Ah, doesn’t that smell delicious? Eggs Benedict is probably the best breakfast dish in the world, wouldn’t you agree, Miss Linscott?”
He eyed me curiously, studying me like he was trying to assess my every move. I didn’t answer. I was too afraid to open my mouth since the scent of food had already completely filled the room, aggravating the hunger pains already consuming my insides.
Castello placed the napkin on his lap before he looked up at me. “It’s a shame you’re not hungry. There is so much food here.”
I watched as he started to lift the other domes one by one to see what was underneath.
“We have some bacon, sausage, fresh fruit salad, some pancakes”—he looked up at me—“which are smothered in syrup, by the way”—then lifted the last dome—“and of course, some warm, buttered toast.” He glanced at me with a cocked brow and a smug grin. “You sure you’re not hungry?”
I bared my teeth at him like a fucking animal, like I was about to go head to head with him for the tiniest morsel of food. The hunger pains intensified threefold, my stomach feeling like my throat had been cut. But I still didn’t answer him.
He shrugged. “Suit yourself, then.”
He picked up a glass of what looked like freshly squeezed orange juice, and he brought it to his lips, allowing a stream of orange liquid to enter his mouth. My gaze zeroed in on his throat as it moved while he swallowed the juice. I imagined what it tasted like. Was it sweet with just a hint of tang? Or was it more tang with just a hint of sweet? And while he sat there drinking the juice, the air of dominance paired with sophistication surrounding him, there was a part at the back of my mind, a very dark part, that wondered what his mouth would taste like with the sweet tang still on his tongue. What would it feel like to lick traces of that orange juice from the inside of his mouth, to experience the taste through him?
My throat burned, my body ached, and my head pounded with the need to consume something, anything to get some relief from the torture. But amidst all the torment in my body, there was a heat that coiled inside my belly, and I hated it—hated him the second I felt it.
“Why are you doing this?” I whispered, unable to hide the contempt in my voice.
He grabbed the knife and fork and sliced through the Eggs Benedict, and I watched as the egg yolk oozed out, covering the English muffin it was set on.
I groaned and immediately clutched my stomach as the pain threatened to tear me in half. This was agony at its worst, the way my body ached in its demand for food.
He placed a forkful of food into his mouth, and like the masochist I was, I watched, unable to take my eyes off his face, witnessing the delight that spread across his features as he tasted and ate the delicious-looking and -smelling food.
He swallowed. “I assumed because you didn’t eat the bread I gave you earlier that you weren’t hungry. But if you are, just say so, and I’ll happily share this buffet with you.”
The dark glint in his eyes, the way his mouth curled up in the corners, warned me it wasn’t going to be that simple. Nothing with this man seemed simple. He was a predator, a vicious hunter who had the power to entice, ensnare, only to let you meet your doom once he had you in his clutches. Yet he made me curious, wanting to know what exactly would happen if he managed to bait me, to lure me into his trap. Would I be strong enough to survive him? Or would I shatter like glass once he applied the pressure in order to force the life out of me?
He placed the knife and fork down on the plate then turned to fully face me. His dark eyebrows slanted inward, and he licked his lips.
“Go ahead, Tatum. Ask me.” He leaned forward. “Beg me, and I’ll feed you. I’ll give you every last piece of food on this table if you go on your hands and knees and beg me for it.”
That was it. That was his game. He wanted me to submit, to beg and grovel like a slave so he would give me what my body needed to survive. Just like I had suspected, this was all a power trip for him, to see me broken and battered, crawling on the floor like I was worth nothing. I couldn’t let him have that, let him have that kind of power over me. If I did, I’d be as good as dead.