Chapter twenty-one
One morning when I was twenty years old, I was driving to campus from the palace because, unlike Liam, I refused to have a driver. The weather was getting bad, due to an upcoming winter storm, when the tire blew out on my car. Three different people stopped to offer me help. I spent more time arguing with strangers that I had it under control than it took for me to put on the new tire. I ended up in bed for a week with pneumonia, but I learned how to change my own tire. I didn’t need anyone’s help. I was capable of taking care of myself. Stubbornness: that was my toxic flaw. Although, I preferred to call it “determined.”
When I originally came to New York, I had no idea what to expect. I didn’t know the truth about why I was here. Which was why I’d packed an outfit for every occasion. I didn’tneedChandler to buy me a dress, but for some reason, I wanted him to. Something in the bottom of my belly tingled at the thought of letting this man take care of me.
He’d even grabbed take away from the restaurant that smelled like heaven when we’d walked by. I swear my stomach roared the entire walk back to his building. That was saying a lot considering all the mid-day bustle around us. We sat at the kitchen island and enjoyed a peaceful meal. No questions. No arguing. Just me, him, and the wood-fired steak that was better than sex—at least sex as I knew it. He’d even opened a bottle of wine for me while he drank a beer.
“Are you going to show me the dress?” he asked.
I cut a piece of steak. “It’s a surprise.”
He took a drink from his bottle of beer. “You seem to be full of those.”
So do you.
“Yeah? Well, here’s another one.” This had been on my mind since the minute he’d told me about the girls. My heart ached for them. It broke at the thought of anyone else feeling a fraction of the hopelessness I’d felt when I’d first been brought here. Only, the way Chandler described it, they weren’t as lucky as I was. Their villains were more like monsters. They didn’t get meals and dresses or plush beds. They got nightmares. It ate at me. Desperation gnawed at my gut. I had to do something.
“You don’t have to threaten me.” I recalled his whispered warning at the mall. “I’m not going to run. Whatever you and Grey are doing with those girls the Brotherhood is hurting, I want to help.” I couldn’t say,girls my father is hurting. That pain was still too raw.
His gaze held me with so much fierceness, so much intensity, that I was worried I would get lost in it. “There’s nothing you can do.”
“You took me for a reason.”
“Yeah, and the reason was that we overestimated your father.” He looked away, like it pained him to look into my eyes when he told me the truth. “Four more days, Princess. It will all be over in four more days.” He finished off his beer, then slammed the bottle on the counter. “If you need me, I’ll be in my office. It’s the door right next to my bedroom.” He slid his barstool away from the counter, rinsed his plate, then loaded it into the dishwasher. “You think you can stay out of trouble?”
Dick.
If he was talking about my attack on his bedroom door, or failed attempt at cooking, or hi-jacking a taxi… okay. Yeah. I got it.
“I’ll do my best,” I told him as he headed to the staircase.
I finished my meal, had a second glass of wine, then a third. I cleared my plate and put it with his in the dishwasher. Chandler didn’t seem like much of a book nerd, but he did have a few hardbacks stacked on a credenza, strictly for decoration I assumed, because the covers matched his decor. I grabbed the one on top calledIf She Knewby Blake Pierce, then settled into the sofa. Before I knew it, I was two more glasses of wine in as I turned the last page. The sun was setting, making the city lights glimmer outside the windows. My bones were achy as I stood up and stretched. It felt as though I hadn’t read a book in ages. Chandler was in his office doing whatever it was that he did. I was curled up on the sofa with a good book while drinking wine.
It was almost normal.
Day four:
Sometimes I imagine him…
Imagining me.