9
Isa
Iforced my eyes open slowly, the coolness of the bed at my side alerting me to the lack of Rafael’s presence even before they’d fully focused. I stretched a hand over despite my best intentions, touching his pillow and dragging it closer.
His scent filled my lungs as I inhaled, then shoved it away immediately after in my anger at my own ridiculousness. Instead of feeling grateful that he was gone, I was left with an unfortunate emptiness within me that I wishfully attributed to the newfound reality that I wouldn’t be able to get off the island.
That escape would be impossible without help, because the last I’d checked I’d never even been on a boat before coming to Ibiza. Let alone driven one.
Sitting up and dragging a hand over my forehead, I squinted at the fabric bandage that touched my skin as my eyes adjusted to the bright sun shining in the windows. With a swallow, I pulled the fabric back slowly to reveal the torn mess of skin on my hand. Spots had already scabbed over where the scrapes went deeper, puncture wounds in the areas that the glass from the lantern had stabbed me.
There was no doubt certain spots would scar, but the majority of the wounds on my hands were superficial. Nothing but the road burn of falling on the street. Painful and stinging, but without lasting effect. I pulled the blanket off my body, unraveling the bandage around my knees as well and feeling satisfied that the covering wasn't necessary for those.
A glance down to my feet made me shudder. The repeated abuse they'd suffered since waking up in Rafael's bedroom meant they were a torn mess beneath the bandage, confirmed by the pain as Rafael had cleaned them when we came back in the middle of the night.
I wanted to hate him, but it felt impossible to do it when he took care of me nearly as well as he scared me.
I knew the most logical thing would be for me to spend the next couple of days healing, but I'd never been one to lounge in a bed. I'd been a terrible hospital patient after the accident, driving my nurses crazy with my insistence that I couldn't be stationary. Nothing had changed in the years that had passed since then.
I stood from the bed, making my way into the closet and grabbing a comfortable dress to pull on over my head. My back stung as the fabric slid over it, a reminder of the night before and the brutality of Rafael’s thrusts inside me as he claimed me in the dirt.
It was filthy. It was instinctual, as if his very being called to him to mate and to make me his in a way that was animalistic.
As if the clean lines of his suit and the breathtakingly handsome face were an elaborate disguise for the beast that lived within him. He knew what words to say. He knew exactly how to lure me right into his trap.
And all along, I’d been nothing but his prey.
The man I’d known hadn’t ever really existed. He’d made me fall in love with a gentleman tinged with darkness, when he was really the devil in a suit.
I grabbed a pair of lacy underwear out of the drawer in the closet, scowling at all the delicate fabrics and feminine items meant more for him than they could ever be for me. Tugging them up my legs, I nearly tumbled over in my rising frustration.
I wasn’t a doll he could dress up in designer clothes and smooth silks, waiting to strip me down when he wanted to fuck me. I wasn’t a toy to be locked away in his bedroom until he felt like gracing me with his presence.
After using the bathroom and rebandaging the wounds on my feet, I made my way to the door and tried to turn the knob. It refused to turn, locked from the outside.
Fury rose in my throat, knowing there was no reason to lock me in a bedroom when the entire island was a prison in itself. His cruelty knew no bounds. I banged the side of my fists against the door, screaming his name in the hopes that he was close enough to hear me.
Maybe I could annoy him until he let me go. That was always a possibility. If I couldn’t force myself to smother him in his sleep, then perhaps I could just smother him until he grew tired of my demanding antics.
My eyes turned to the corner, glaring at the camera I’d seen sitting where the wall touched the ceiling the day before. I hauled the end table up off the floor where it had landed when I’d thrown it, positioning it beneath the camera before turning back to the bed.
Tearing the pillowcase off his pillow, I stood on the table and stretched to swing the fabric over the camera. When it hung from it the best I could manage, I carefully lowered myself to the floor and moved to stare out the window and wait.
If nothing else, I’d find out how often Rafael watched me on the cameras. The sun had long since risen over the water, leaving me with a breathtaking view of the sparkling Mediterranean. It only made me miss my view of the neighbor’s house a mere feet away back home.
Our cramped and crowded house seemed far more welcoming than all the luxury that surrounded me, knowing I was just another piece of property to Rafael. My family lovedme.They would miss me as soon as they realized I wasn’t coming back.
That was what a home really was, and I hated all the times I’d taken it for granted.
He didn’t make me wait for long before the locks clicked on the bedroom door and he stepped into the room. A man followed at his heels, carrying the chess board I recognized from Ibiza into the space. He didn’t so much as glance at me as he deposited it onto the end table and moved it to the front of the sofa.
Rafael dismissed him with a nod after he set the pieces on the board carefully, lining them all up and depositing the bag into his back pocket. Once the door was closed and the man was gone from sight, Rafael grabbed the cushioned chair from beside the bed and dragged it into the little sitting area. Claiming the side with the black pieces, he slowly unbuttoned his suit jacket and draped it over the back of the chair.
I didn’t know where he’d gone during the morning while I slept, but he was back to the immaculate appearance of a businessman. Dropping into the seat carefully, he turned playful eyes my way after raising his brow at the covered camera. “Did you really think that was the only one I had in here?”
I swallowed back my fury, leaning against the window as I faced him and looked around the room. With none of the others easily visible, there would be no chance of me knowing if any corners were safe from prying eyes. No chance of me obscuring his view of me when he insisted on locking me away.
“Why would you need cameras in your bedroom at all?” I asked, narrowing my eyes on his intent gaze. The thought that maybe I wasn’t the first woman he’d watched on those cameras unsettled me, turning what the darkest part of me hoped was a twisted obsession into something far more common. If Rafael was just another powerful man with a complex for raping innocent young women, then I was nothing more than a statistic.