Chapter Two
Milah was going to get out. She would find a means of escape.
And so it began.
It started with breakfast being delivered at exactly seven-thirty. Not a moment before. Not a moment later. Lunch was served at twelve. Again, on time, always. Dinner was at six. Same time, all the time. The women changed for each serving, but they remained the same throughout the first week. She counted how long she had been there by the meals.
She was onto her third week, and still, Damon De Luca hadn’t visited her a second time. Just that once where he’d held her tightly, letting her know without a doubt who was more powerful.
He may have strength, but Milah had a great deal of patience with nothing to do all day than sit and stare at the door, to watch who came through, to see what was on the other side. It was like watching a movie more than once. You stopped watching what was right in front of you and started to see what was going on in the background.
There were always two guards that were visible. One who opened the door, the other behind each serving woman.
Milah felt that was a little sloppy. She’d be able to hurt the first man while the second reacted, and she’d already be on the attack. It would have made more sense to have three men. Did De Luca not think she was worth a third man?
The meals were all sloppy, and none of them required a knife. It didn’t take a genius to work out that De Luca had done this on purpose. She had no doubt he’d planned this.
The bedroom. The bathroom. There were no weapons, nothing for her to use to help herself. She was all alone.
He couldn’t control her thoughts though.
Milah looked around the bedroom and knew there would be cameras. Only a fool would put the enemy in a room with no cameras. It was why she always changed her underwear beneath a towel. A new change of clothing arrived with her food. Always neatly folded, and again, picked with no way for her to fight back.
When she wasn’t looking at the door, she moved toward the full-length doors that opened to a balcony, only they were locked. She couldn’t escape from there, but the view told her she was at least three stories from the ground. Any jump would injure, if not kill her.
So, after three weeks, she had no choice but to go for the attack.
The women never spoke to her. They didn’t even look at her. The food had to have been spat in, she was sure of it. She only ate what was needed to keep her strength up.
By the end of the third week, she had enough of playing the perfect captive and waited by the door, tense, counting the seconds. She heard the flick and waited as the tray was pushed inside. The only weapon was the silver food cover over her plate. While the woman pushed the cart, Milah lifted the food cover, shoved her as she came through, and then slammed the metal into the first guard’s head. By the time the second one reacted, she had already grabbed the spare gun from the first guard, removed the safety, and shot the second guard in the leg. He went down, and Milah ran, jumping over him. She didn’t have a pair of shoes, and so had no choice but to make her escape on bare feet.
Not the most ideal of situations, but one she intended to do.
She heard the cry of warning, saying that she had escaped. Once she’d made it down two flights of stairs, she had no choice but to escape into a bedroom. Glancing around, she saw it was unmade, a spare room, and she didn’t wait around, charging forward. She tried the doors that led out onto another balcony. She didn’t understand De Luca’s obsession with them, but she wasn’t going to argue with them if they were means of escape. There was no way she’d be able to make the jump without damaging her body, but she saw a plant trailing up the side of the house. There was a means for her to climb down, but it also meant she had no choice but to leave the gun.
She put the safety on and threw it over the balcony. She didn’t waste any time to see where it landed.
Climbing over the stone balcony, she grabbed the trellis, hoping it was sturdy enough to take her weight. She started to climb down.
She was near the ground when she heard the guards. Another alert, which could only mean the ground-floor guards had been told of what was happening.
With her feet on the ground, she had no choice but to run. She took her chances, heading toward the garden. She stumbled as she had to walk over rocks, which dug into her feet, but that didn’t stop her, even as she felt one sharp edge pierce her flesh. She kept on running.
One glance over her shoulder, and she saw men had spotted her. She expected them to raise their guns to shoot, but they never did. She ran with all her might, trying to escape, to get free and clear.
She had already passed the gun but decided to leave it. There wasn’t enough time to bend down and get it. She had to keep on running.
She was close to a thick line of trees when she was tackled from the right and thrown to the ground. As she tried to fight, her arms were slammed above her head, stopping her from moving.
Screaming, she tried to push off the man who stopped her, but he held her immobile. She looked up to see Damon himself was there.
She didn’t stop fighting.
“Let me go!”
“You have been a very naughty girl.”
“You have no right to keep me here.” She tried to push him away, but he wouldn’t move. Damon was a brick wall in comparison. She tried to wriggle from underneath him, but it was useless.
“Report,” Damon said.
Milah didn’t look away but sensed the guards approaching.
“She shot one guard in the leg. The maid serving her lunch isn’t injured. She was pushed to the floor. The other guard has a bruised face.”
“Is anyone dead?” Damon asked.
“No.”