“Norway,” I whisper. “I have a friend from England.”
His arms do that tightening thing around me again. “I’m not your friend, little rabbit.” His voice has dropped an octave. “I am a fox.”
I make a little slurred noise like I can’t help scoffing at his comment. I can already work out he’s not my friend. “I have been with a Hell’s bastard of a man my whole life. I know the difference between a low-life human being and a good person.”
What more could these people do to me that hasn’t already been done? What could a fox do?
“You may be sly and cunning, but I no longer fear you.” I know my mistake when his arms tighten around me. I hiss in a breath when my shoulder gets squeezed into my body too much.
“Well, you should because I eat little rabbits.” I inhale his coffee-scented breath when his head dips again.
I try not to fold inside myself at that comment. He wants to frighten the life out of me, but I am past the point of caring tonight. I know I should care, but maybe it would be better if I had been shot dead. I try to get a handle on my emotions. I am only alive, because Mathias’s orders are to bring me in that way, and he has been trying hard to keep it that way, but I also know a phone call is all it would take to have me executed. I’ve witnessed what he is capable of.
I decide to challenge him to answer my questions. “Mathias, what did you shout at that girl in the hangar when she was already dead?”
He doesn’t answer me straight away and keeps walking.
“Who told you my name was Mathias? Because I sure as hell didn’t.”
Fuck. I have to think! I can’t get the doctor in trouble.
“The girl in the hangar… she also told me to stay away from Kane.”
“She was correct. He was going to shoot you dead when you ran too. He thinks with his gun and not his head. You will also forget that you have seen our faces because it will only end your life. If he knows, then you have no more lives left. I won’t be able to save you from him. He will take you out without a second thought. Do you understand me?”
I nod. I know how to bide my time until I can work out how I can escape. “What about Kane?”
“Leave him to me. He knows what is good for him, and your escape and seeing our faces will only get all three of us killed on the spot.”
“Why are you doing this? My friends would pay you to walk away from this madness. Kane is gone. It’s just you and me. Please. I didn’t do anything to deserve this, and you don’t need to do this. You have a choice right now. We could both disappear. Just a phone call to my family and you could leave me and disappear.”
“Shut the fuck up,” he roars in my face. “You have no fucking clue about me and what I choose. There is no choice. Do not utter another fucking word.”
Mathias carries me in strained silence. We don’t meet another soul on the way back. I can feel myself falling back to sleep with the rhythm of his pace, when he says quietly, “I called her a stupid little rabbit, because we are all foxes, and don’t you forget that.”
MATHIAS
I’m posted inside the girl’s room, sucking on a hot coffee and trying to get comfortable in an uncomfortable, hard chair. Her window is locked, and she has her left ankle cuffed to the bed railing. She looks harmless enough and in no condition to make another great escape, but I’m not taking any chances.
The doc’s eyes were filled with fear, a total giveaway when I walked in carrying a half frozen, unconscious, bleeding female in my arms.
To the outside world, she ran her own legitimate medical business by day in the city, and when called upon, she would be here in this fully equipped setup in one of his many properties. It was a front for a printing business and came with a small skeleton medical staff, who were all on the payroll.
The doc’s behavior was more a nervous panic, with her eyes darting back and forth between Whisper and me, which only tipped me off to her own guilt. There was a reason this girl was able to escape. She didn’t achieve it all by herself, and she was so close to pulling it off. Only a couple of blocks were between her and freedom.
If I had been by myself, I may have played ignorance. After all, it wasn’t my fault she escaped. The gods were on her side, and then she had to go and flee in the wrong direction.
Stupid little rabbit.
There is nothing more enjoyable to Dickwad-Kane than killing. Just give him a reason. She presented one on a platter for him.
I had been shown to the room by the good doctor for a much-needed rest, but I needed some fresh air and a walk and didn’t want anybody knowing that.
Kane had a similar idea. He was out getting himself some fresh air and a coffee, unbeknownst to me, and I was out stretching my legs, getting a coffee and something to eat. What can I say? The doc supplied shit coffee.
I decided to take the longer walk back, giving myself some much-needed alone time, when Kane and I unfortunately crossed paths. I could have done with a break from the fucker. We kept on walking and all, but barreled into her. Our slow reaction time was enough to allow her to make a run for it because we sure as hell didn’t think we were going to bump into our prisoner on the street.
The determination she has to escape can only bring her trouble, especially when he gets his claws in her. She is too headstrong and a fighter. She would have been tame once, and now she is wiser to life and no longer able to be brainwashed.
Being free for that small amount of time has taught her she will do anything not to be held captive again.
Anything.
And that means taking on freezing cold temperatures in fucking Alaska in the middle of November, wearing virtually nothing but a blanket for warmth.
The doctor had to push it by questioning me why I wasn’t asleep, tucked up in that bed she had offered me. Nobody’s fucking business why I hadn’t quite gotten around to getting into it, and now I was going to forego any proper rest to keep this girl out of more harm.
I bided my time until the doctor re-stitched the female’s shoulder and set her wrist before I slammed her up against the wall, my forearm pressing down on her throat. I didn’t care that Whisper saw me attack the doctor; it would do her well to be reminded of what I was capable of. Things were getting out of hand, and that needed to stop real fucking fast.
I saw the terror in both their eyes. The doctor pleaded ignorance to it, and so did the girl. She was exhausted, but she still did her best to raise her voice to me, pleading it was all her idea, and the doctor just stood there letting her take the blame.
I knew better.
The doctor had cracked, and the guilt from the role she played among his minions had gotten to her. Hell, I was feeling bad about my role with this girl. She was so freakin’ innocent; I could see that.
She had already told me a little about escaping from a life that was taken from her, and she had people who cared for her and they would be looking for her. She was a good person. If you were stolen as an infant, became a pet to a man for twenty years, and you had no identification, no worldly possessions, you were a nobody unless somebody helped you to become a somebody. Yes, she had people who would miss her and be looking for her now.
He was playing with fire with this one.
I’d released the doctor and took her aside, away from prying ears, and told her to run and stay hidden once we left the premises.
I told her if she valued her life she would need to burrow into the ground and stay there. She didn’t even try to lie anymore. I knew she was thinking about her own safety and what the value of her life would mean to him. If you agree to be put on the payroll, don’t expect to live a long life under his thumb. Whatever made her agree to taking his money is on her head now, because it was going to come back to bite her if she didn’t heed my warning. It would probably bite her anyway.