Chapter 5 Possessed by her
Jessica
“Everyone out.”
Michael said it once and they all moved, filing out through the door without a word, the ones who could walk pulling the injured one with them. The door clicked shut and then it was just the two of them and the broken glass and the blood on the floor and the alarm that had finally stopped screaming, leaving a ringing silence behind it.
He looked at her for a moment then pulled out his phone and said one word into it.
“Mara.”
“I don’t need anyone,” Jessica said immediately. “I want to leave.”
He looked up from the phone. “Are you dumb?”
“Excuse me?”
“I told you exactly what is out there.” He pocketed the phone and folded his arms. “I told you what happens to girls who walk out that door. Did you forget already or are you choosing not to listen?”
“I don’t care.” She lifted her chin and held his gaze even though her hand was throbbing so badly she could feel her pulse in every finger. “I don’t need you to protect me. I don’t even know you. I have survived years in captivity and I am not afraid of whatever is out there. I am not afraid of freedom.”
He laughed cruelly like she had said something genuinely ridiculous and he could not help it.
“Freedom,” he said. “You think freedom is waiting for you on the other side of that door?” He took one step toward her. “Do you know what happened to the girls from that raid? The ones we pulled out that same night? Most of them are dead. Found on streets, in cars, in places nobody bothered to look twice. Rivera’s men got to them within days.” He held her gaze. “You should be on your knees thanking me that you are still breathing inside this room.”
She said nothing.
Her jaw was clenched and her eyes were burning and her chest was so tight she could barely get a full breath in but she was not going to say a single word because if she opened her mouth right now it was not words that were going to come out, it was something she could not take back.
He glared at her.
“Let me go,” she finally said, and her voice cracked in the middle of it and she hated that. “Please. Just let me go. I will be fine. I will figure it out. I always have.”
“No.”
“Why?” The word came out harder than she meant it to. “You don’t even know me. I am not anyone to you. So why are you keeping me here? What do you want from me?”
He opened his mouth and then closed it again and said nothing.
She watched his face and he looked away and she understood in that moment that he did not have an answer. He genuinely did not know why he was still keeping her here and that should have made her feel better.
A knock came at the door and Mara stepped in carrying a small bag, her eyes moving across the room quickly, taking in the blood and the broken glass and the two of them standing on opposite sides of it.
“Get her cleaned up,” Michael said. “Make sure she’s okay.”
“I don’t need anyone cleaning me up,” Jessica said. “I am fine. I can do it myself.”
He looked at her. “Don’t be stubborn.”
“I am not being stubborn. I am not a baby. I do not need someone to wash me like I cannot manage it myself.”
He looked at Mara. “Get out. Bring the first aid kit and leave it outside the door.”
Michael strode toward her and she stepped back and the back of her knees hit the bed. She grabbed the edge of the mattress to steady herself and glowered at him even though her legs were already giving her away, already sinking, already sitting her down on the bed before she made any decision to sit. Her whole body just folded under that stare, those eyes locked on hers, steady and dark and not asking for anything, just taking, just holding, and she hated every second of what it did to her.
He went to the door, took the first aid kit from outside, came back and sat beside her and opened it without asking.
“Give me your hand,” he said.
She did not give him anything.
He reached over and took it anyway, turning her palm up, and she tensed and pulled slightly and his grip tightened just enough to hold her still. His eyes came up to hers and she stopped pulling. He looked back down at her hand and started cleaning the cut. She gritted her teeth against the sting and stared at the wall and said nothing.
He worked without speaking. His hands were careful in a way she had not expected from him, nothing rough about the way he cleaned the glass out of the cut or wrapped the bandage around her palm. She kept her jaw tight and her eyes away from his face.
He checked the scrapes on her arms next, the ones from fighting his men, dabbing at them one by one while she sat rigid and let him because she did not have the energy left to fight him on this too.
When he was done he closed the kit and looked at her and said, “You fight like an animal.”
She said nothing.
“I mean that as a compliment.” He almost smirked. “You are a lion.”
She looked at the wall.
He stood and went to the bathroom door and pushed it open. “Hot water is running. You need a shower.” He looked back at her. “You stink.”
Her head turned toward him before she could stop it.
He was not wrong. She lifted the collar of her shirt slightly and her face did whatever it did and she dropped it again and said nothing.
“Go,” he said. “Dinner will be ready soon.”
He strode toward the door and she sat on the bed and said nothing and kept her eyes on the floor and her lips pressed together and her hands curled in her lap.
He stopped at the door.
“You told me thank you last time.” He did not turn around. “Where is it now?”
She said nothing and did not even lift her head to look at him.
“Get cleaned up, Princess.”
Her head snapped up. “Why do you call me that?”
He walked out without giving her answers.
She had just walked out of one cage into another but at least he was hot.
