My Love Forgive (14 page)

Risa had examined the chain and manacle, obviously looking for some way to unlock it. That wasn’t going to happen. The only way she’d go free against my will was if she stole the key out of my locked drawer.

Dinner was a solitary affair. Risa had eaten in her room and I had eaten in the dining room. It was nothing like I’d imagined when I first thought of bringing her here.

No matter. This was where we were at now. Locked in stalemate.

Things, however, were on the upswing for me as of this morning. When I’d brought her breakfast of waffles heaped high with bananas, whipped cream, chocolate syrup, and nuts, Risa had sat up and watched me intently.

Although I’d swept my glance over her once, I vividly saw the longing she had for me. It was the same haunted look she wore so often when she thought I wasn’t looking.

I didn’t acknowledge her by word or deed. I just placed her tray on the antique bedside table before going into the closet and pulling out another dress, this one a long-sleeved black knit. Once I placed it on the bed, I left as silently as I came in.

That was three hours ago.

Impatience gnawed at me. I craved her capitulation almost as much as I craved the taste of her. I’d been buried deep inside of Risa not even 24 hours before, but it felt like 23 hours and 59 minutes too long.

Just come my way, Risa. I know you love me. I love you. Why is it this damned hard?

Ironic given my past. I’d had more than my share of bad love affairs. My understanding was that a woman in love wanted nothing more than to be with the man she loved. My problems before were that I didn’t want to be with them.

Risa doesn’t want to be with you for the same reason. She doesn’t love you. Not like you love her. You were a pleasant enough distraction in her life, but now you’ve become a liability.

I abruptly stood up, slamming my laptop closed. My shaft ached for Risa and my instinct demanded I storm into her room and force her to my way of thinking.

But I couldn’t.

I had to take care of her feelings, the very same ones I trampled on so ruthlessly when I chained her up like an animal and not the woman I loved more than anything or anyone in the world.

Still, if this was me in love, I’d hate to see what I could do to someone I despised.

Inhaling deeply, I glanced at my wristwatch. Lunch was coming. I’d make Risa one of her favorite comfort foods and top it off with a freshly baked brownie. And maybe, just maybe, she’d finally be able to see that all the little things I did for her meant something coming from a man like me.

It was a weak hope but right now it was all I could hold onto.

I’d left the movie, a dramatic romance starring Sandra Bullock and Harry Connick Jr., running while I paced in front of the window. Damian hadn’t said word one to me since yesterday and I hated it. I’d already cried more than I liked and I missed him to the point of sickness.

He, on the other hand, gave me the same cursory attention he would’ve given to a cat he was feeding as a favor to his neighbor. As someone who needed his fixation to an unhealthy degree, it was hell.

It had already gotten to the point that I got so excited when I heard the door unlatch only to be bitterly disappointed when Damian deposited my food on the coffee table and left.

The distance was wearing me down so quickly.

Chaos broke my thoughts into tiny pieces. I couldn’t concentrate on any one thing long enough before Damian’s beautiful face rose in my thoughts. The maniacal bastard was keeping me here against my will, so why was I so hurt because he couldn’t be bothered to interact with me now that he had me?

Worse, I yearned so badly for Damian last night as I tried to fall asleep. I’d gotten so used to cuddling up next to his large body that I felt lost and cold in the large bed last night. After waking up next to Damian the first time, I found I couldn’t sleep without him. I’d once driven over to his apartment at two in the morning just so I could wake up beside him four hours later.

Had that only been three weeks ago?

This need for him was an ache that didn’t let up. Exhausted, unhappy, and lost as to what to do next, I barely ate the food he’d brought me this morning. Waffles piled high with my favorite toppings, so sweet it might as well been a dessert. I’d only been able to stomach a few delicate bites before my appetite fled.

Much like I wanted to do, only now I didn’t know if it was away from Damian or towards him. I didn’t understand why my stance on the wrongness of this wobbled. I was still so furious with him for doing this to me, but now I’d begun to question if Damian was possibly right in his justifications.

No. I can’t let myself think this way. Not right now.

I heard Sandra’s character say how people fell in love and then fell right back out of it.

Although I’d watched this particular movie a thousand times, the futility of those words hit me hard. Desperation rolled right over me. I couldn’t stand for that to be true. Not about this. Not about him.

Which meant I still had hope.

I had hope that somehow, someway we could fix this. That the last month of learning to love this softly spoken, socially blunt man hadn’t been a mistake. That Damian wasn’t insane and I wasn’t a victim who’d fallen in love with her captor because it was easier.

Wild-eyed, I reached down and lifted up my chain. I twisted it, letting out a high-pitched cry of frustration when it remained defiantly intact. Throwing the metal links to the floor, I whirled about looking for something, anything that would get me out.

As long as Damian kept me on the chain against my will I’d never be able to be on equal footing with him. It had to come off, even if it was just long enough for me to plead my case and hear his verdict.

Escape would come either way. Whether it was into his arms or not.

That’s when my gaze alighted on the window. It was overcast outside, the grey sky of winter dulling the sky canvas. The more I stared at it, the faster a crude plan formed and took shape in my mind.

If Damian was the man I hoped he was, he’d be forced to move me. If he moved me, he’d have to unlock the chain.

Do it now.

I didn’t give myself an out. Picking up the chair, I rushed the window and slammed it against the glass. Not surprisingly it shattered after three or four strikes.

Please, Damian, don’t let me down.

Approaching Risa’s room with tray in hand, I heard the delicately violent sounds of breaking glass. My feet ate up the remaining distance and I hurriedly unlocked the door. The sight that met me chilled me more than the first time I’d seen my first murder.

Risa stood in rough circle of glass. She was bent down, hand reaching for a jagged shard. Crimson exploded in my vision. I threw the tray to the ground and before I knew it, I’d hit her wrist with the flat of my hand with nearly all my considerable strength.

Risa’s harsh cry of pain barely registered. Fury and fear throttled me. I snatched her off her feet and strode over to the bed. Tossing her violently, I snarled less than an inch from her snow-pale face, “Don’t you
fucking
move, Risa.”

I waited until she gave me a stingy nod before stalking through the door connecting our suites. In less than a handful of seconds, I came back with the key. There was no way I could keep her here, not with hundreds of glass daggers at her disposal.

The thought that Risa would hurt herself to escape me…that she would actually break the window just so she could take the glass and press it against her wrists or maybe even her neck…

Agony razed through my carefully constructed mental gates.

Damian Black disappeared.

Damian Konstantinov emerged.

Damian unlocked the manacle from my leg and yanked me back into his arms. “You want to die so badly, do you?”

The tone he delivered those blunted words in was so, so soft. So, so cold.

My startled gaze fixated on him, trying to read the clues for what had changed. Damian’s expression was a beautiful mask. Rage would’ve been welcome but there was nothing there. I was afraid by the emptiness staring back at me.

Danger prickled my spine. Too late I realized I’d miscalculated how Damian would’ve reacted to my plan. I jerked my head back and forth. “N-No!”

He grinned, malevolent. It ratcheted my obvious fear. “I think you must,” he purred. “Here, let’s see for sure.”

“Damian, what you are going to do?” I whispered as he lifted me up. Everything was moving too fast. I couldn’t slow us down.

“Ssh!” He strode to the window. “You want to jump, Risa? Is that what you want? You want to die so badly to escape me?”

My small hands pressed against his chest. “That’s not true. I wasn’t trying to leave…I just…” My words disappeared as we stood by the broken window. A blast of cold wind blew in to whip my hair. We were three stories up and it was a long way down to the gravel driveway below.

Again the question of where we were and how did he afford such a palatial estate tugged my curiosity long enough to wonder whose house this really was. And if it really was his, what other secrets had he been keeping from me?

Obviously, now wasn’t the time to ask him. I wondered if I’d ever get the chance to ask and would he really answer me.

Damian placed me in front of him. He hugged my body from behind, chin resting on my shoulder. His embrace mimicked that of a tender lover. However, Damian’s vicious words broke the illusion.

“Take a good look, little girl. You see how far it is? You jump and your bones will break. This beautiful body will look like someone took a bat to it. Depending on how you fall, your face will cave in. If you don’t care about how I feel, how do you think Richard and Lila will take it? Hmm?”

“You know my parents’ name?” Strange how that was what I focused on.

“Of course I do. You are…special…to me.”

Damian’s finger traced along my collar. I suddenly imagined him cracking the bone. I shivered from the darkness of my thoughts.

“I know everything about you, Risa. I know about the speeding ticket you got last year. I know what high school you graduated from. I know that you changed your major from Sports Management to Marketing your sophomore year in college.”

“You had me investigated? Why would you do that?”

Damian tutted. “Because I wanted to. You’re an open book to me, Risa, and now you want to close it. It’s a shame. You’re my favorite story.”

My rigid body twisted against Damian. He tightened his arms until the breath squeaked out of me. “I wasn’t trying to kill myself. That’s not why I broke the window.”

“Then what were you doing? Can you tell me the truth or will you spin a lie?” His interrogating growl made my legs weak. I would’ve appreciated the tone if only the situation weren’t so dire.

“I needed a change of scenery?” Predictably, my joke went over like a lead balloon.

“Lie then. Look, Risa.”

Damian walked us even closer to the window. His shoes broke and ground the glass deeper into the hardwood floors. Dimly, I wondered how deep the gouges were bound to be. Damian’s large hand cupped the back of my head. He pushed until my face was just on this side of the ragged glass hole.

“Do you see?”

Licking my dry lips, I rasped, “See what?”

“You wanted a view. Tell me what you see.”

I swallowed past the growing lump in my throat. “I don’t see anything.”

“Are you sure?”

Damian’s mouth was so close to my ear. I shivered as my senses heightened with each pass of warm air. “I’m sure.”

“That’s right. There’s nothing out there. Nothing at all. But in here, Risa, here is everything you could ever need. And I’m trying to give it to you. You’re just too damned blind to see it. Like always.”

“Like always. What do you mean?” I couldn’t control the indignant edge even though I’d gotten what I wanted. Damian had freed me. He was finally talking to me. This was my chance to reset the last day and instead I was fighting with him.

But as with my attraction to him, I just couldn’t help myself.

“It all goes back to the beginning, Risa. The night you saw Gretchen changed the trajectory of us. You didn’t trust me enough to believe that I wanted you.”

“I’m not that shallow.”

“Maybe not. Maybe yes.”

“There is no maybe. I know you wanted my body even though you couldn’t stand the person attached to it most of the time.” Hurt warbled through my voice. “Oh, and let me point out that you’re no prize yourself. You’re so emotionally closed off that even God himself would have a hard time getting a bead on you.”

Although it was snippy, I still felt better for saying it.

“Maybe so but I liked you enough to stay with you, to bring you here.”

“I should be flattered then? Sorry, Damian, but I don’t care for this kind of bondage.”

He exhaled long and slow. “You hate the chain, do you? You think I’m treating you like a slave? Well, let me tell you something about the world out there, Risa. A slave wouldn’t have me cooking for her, serving her meals on the finest china, and she wouldn’t be staying in a beautiful room fit for the wife of a very wealthy man.”

“Stop.” I tried to look at him, but he refused to let me. His poison-true words continued to seep deeper, diminishing my indignation.

“A slave wouldn’t have me laying out clothes for her twice a day and she wouldn’t be sleeping on sheets of the highest thread count.”

“It’s not the same—”

Damian cut through my weak protests easily. “Exactly. You are
not
a slave, Risa. If you want to really know what it’s like to be a slave then I’ll throw you in the basement. Should we go now?”

I flinched. “No.”

“Are you sure?” Damian strode over to the door and set me down. Standing there in the open doorway with my head craned back, I suffered the immense difference in our sizes immediately.

“You know I don’t want that.” My fingers twisted over themselves.

He looked me over once. “I actually think you
would
like that.”