Screams ensue.
Glances filled with horror and sorrow fill the room.
But all I care about is the look on both Phillip and my mother’s face the moment they realize she’s dead.
That look … I could do it all just for that.
Retribution.
And then I spot him rushing into the room. Arthur. The look on his face brings me chills. He’s looking at me. Not at his mother. Me. And I’m staring back at him, frozen in the middle of the dance floor, while everyone rushes to his mother’s body.
All we do is exchange looks, but I know what he’s thinking.
I made a different choice. One he didn’t see coming; one he didn’t prepare for.
But I know he won’t hold it against me. He hates his mother just as much as I do, even though he probably won’t see it that way right now. The look on his face says it all. Surprise overtakes him, but I’m unable to identify if it’s positive or negative.
Our glances tell a story.
I did it.
I did what no one thought I could.
I became a cold-blooded killer.
CHAPTER 20
VANESSA
Present, a few days later …
Phoenix sits in his chair, gazing at me while twirling a knife in his hand. I wonder what goes through his head when he’s looking at me like that. Like I’m the prey he’s caught and now has to decide what to do with me. I’m just sitting here silently in my cage, waiting until he makes his move. I won’t fight him. I won’t disobey him. I’ll give him anything he wants … so that eventually he’ll let me be free again.
I’m not so sure that he still plans to kill me. If he really wanted to, he’d have done it by now. I’m starting to think he’s having his doubts, so I’ll make sure to use them against him. Maybe help him remember the time he used to love me.
After a while, he gets up and walks toward my cage. The smirk on his face is both irresistible and infuriating. I wrap my fingers around the bars and look up at him with my doe-like eyes, hoping it will give me an advantage.
“Stop fluttering those eyelashes, Vanessa. It won’t help you.”
I shrug as he goes on his knees and finally takes the duct tape off my face. I groan as he rips it away because it leaves a sizzling burn. “Thank you,” I say.
“Hmm …” He frowns, cocking his head. “You’ve never been very grateful. It sounds so strange coming from your mouth.”
I smile. “Well, there’s always a first for everything.”
He shakes his head, laughing. “You … you’re really a piece of work, you know that?”
“That’s what everyone says. I don’t see it.”
“Or you just don’t want to.” He clears his throat. “Turn around.”
I do what he says, and he grabs my arms and puts the cuffs on my wrists. Then he grabs a leather leash he bought and hooks it to the ring on my neck. With a key, he opens the chains around the cage and pulls it open. “Out.”
On hands and feet, I crawl out of the small prison he’s confined me to. It’s hard, considering my hands are chained together, but I manage. Phoenix pulls on the leash until my neck rises and I’m forced to sit on the back of my feet.
“Get up,” he says.
I get up slowly, keeping my eyes on him at all times. He tugs the leather fastened to the band around my neck, causing me to fall into his arms.
“Careful there, Princess.” He grins.
“You pulled,” I say, as I try to keep standing without having my hands available to hold onto something.
“I want you to feel what it’s like to be controlled by someone else,” he muses, hauling me closer with the leash. “And how does it feel?”
“It feels wrong.”
The left side of his lip curls up. “Wrong can be good sometimes.” He lifts the knife in his other hand and runs it along my cheek, making me shiver. “I like it better this way …” he murmurs. Then he cuts into my skin. I have trouble not making a sound as the blood drops roll down my face.
“So beautiful …” he whispers. “Such a shame I have to fuck it all up.”
“Why?” I ask. I don’t understand his obsession with my blood.
He leans in, his tongue dipping out to pick up a droplet of blood. “Because you won’t be able to lie anymore once you’re just as ugly as I am. Except where I’m only ugly on the inside, you’ll be ugly on both sides.”
“No,” I say. “I don’t think you’re ugly.”
He stops and looks at me for a moment, just breathing in silently.
“Liar,” he murmurs.
“No. It’s the truth,” I say. “Why else would I get so …” I smash my lips together.
“Excited?” A spark ignites in his eyes. “Hmm …”
The cut in my cheek isn’t deep, but it sizzles and burns like hell. Damn him. I can’t keep up with him; he keeps changing his behavior.
“You know. I could get used to this,” he says.
“What do you mean?”
He leans in to whisper in my ear, “You as my pet instead of an enemy.”
I suck in a breath when he places a kiss on my neck, the knife still inches away from puncturing my skin again. It’s such a double message; I don’t know what to think or feel which is exactly what he wants.
He whispers, “I think I’d rather keep you alive than let you die without having had any fun.” The blade slides down and underneath my chin. “Do you agree?”
I nod, careful not to cut my own skin with his knife.
“And I’m having so much fun right now,” he whispers, pulling the leash even tighter as if he wants to hear me gasp. “And I can tell you are, too.”
“What gives it away?” I jest as sarcastically as I can.
“Oh, don’t think you can hide your excitement from me, Vanessa. I know how much you’ve craved a strong hand like mine.” The knife drifts down my arm, almost as if he’s caressing me with it. “All those years in a dried-up marriage must have left you so hungry …” He growls in my ear, licking my earlobe. “Hungry for a real man.”
I take in a ragged breath feeling him smile against my skin. As much as I want to deny his claims, I have to admit that I’ve always wanted a strong, independent, dominant man, someone who was capable of claiming my heart without me handing it to him on a platter. Someone who loved me for who I was, no-holds-barred.
Except I don’t want him to be that man.
How could he be? After all the things we’ve done to each other?
“C’mon,” he says, and he pulls my leash, dragging me with him toward the kitchen.
I’m surprised to find a table for two already decked out. My surprise seems to catch his attention.
“Have I impressed you?” he asks, tying my leash to a wooden beam.
“Expecting company?”
He frowns, as if he doesn’t get my question. “No. Why would you think that?”
“Are you saying that you set the table for me, too?”
“Well, like I said, I thought you might be hungry.” His smirk is so incredibly annoying and sexy … god, I’m not sure if I want to scold him or smile back.
Especially when he starts biting his own lip ring … fuck, that’s hot.
Jesus, why am I thinking about this?
“Sit,” he commands, which gives me an excuse not to think about it. “On the back of your feet.”
I sit down on the floor, but he’s tied the leash so high that it forces me to keep my head up. “Don’t move,” he says. “You know what happens if you do.”
In this position, in the corner of the room, I look like a girl waiting for someone. Always waiting … waiting for him. Just like he’d probably want me to.
It’s all a game. All of this. Mind games—that’s what he’s playing. And it’s working.
With a self-indulgent smile, he walks back to the stove and starts cooking some delicious pancakes that make my mouth water when I smell them. Damn, I didn’t know he could cook this good. After thirty minutes, my stomach is killing me and so are my legs, but I can’t falter in my devotion to make him think he’s in charge. Sometimes, he briefly glances at me while flipping the pancakes, smoking at the same time. The smug look on his face makes me blush.