Chapter five
Trust was earned.
I’d been kidnapped and dragged across an ocean, then dumped in the apartment of a man I didn’t know. All this, after I was told I was coming to New York to experience new cultures.
No. I didn’ttrustGrey Van Doren. Not anymore.
And I certainly didn’t trust Chandler Carmichael—whoever he was.
So, he said I couldn’t use the elevator or the stairs. But I still had my phone. I rushed to the kitchen island in a burst of inspiration, only to end up shattered when I discovered my phone was gone. Grey must have swiped it and pocketed it while I was busy looking out the windows like this was a vacation.
Stories were whispered in the hallways all the time about royals being taken for ransom, or retribution, or whatever other gritty reason they felt was justifiable. It was the reason we had guards. It was why my father had never allowed me to leave Ayelswick without him or Liam. I’d heard those stories and taken them in stride. I never thought it would happen to me. Maybe that was why I believed Grey when he said my father would be here. They were supposed to be friends. Da trusted him.
I shouldn’t have trusted him.
And what about Sadie? Did she know it was all a lie? My insides twisted at the thought of her betrayal. She gave me a journal, for crying out loud. Surely, she didn’t know.
What would Liam do when he found out? I imagined him and Da in a room full of policemen and detectives, pacing and angry. And then I heard my mother’s voice, telling me how important it was to be able to save myself.
Grey warned me not to go looking, so that was exactly what I did. I rattled the knobs on all the locked doors and opened the ones that were left unlocked. Every square inch of this penthouse screamed masculinity.And overcompensation. The guy was impossibly organized—from the way he stacked little plastic containers of fruit in his refrigerator to the way he arranged his dishes in the cabinets according to size. So far, all signs pointed to anal-retentive control freak with an incredibly thorough cleaning staff and unimpressive penis.
Why was I thinking about his penis?
He had to be at least forty and single. He probably wore khakis, parted his hair to the side, and calculated the Pythagorean theorem for fun.
One by one, I continued searching room of the penthouse. Only one door upstairs was left unlocked. That room was less masculine than the rest, but still clean and crisp with soft gray walls. There was a black dresser with an antiqued finish and platform bed covered in plush white bedding. On the other side of the room was an open door that led to a private bath with a dark stone vanity and chrome fixtures. The shower was a monstrosity with glass walls and faucets coming from every direction, including overhead. Right now, that shower looked like heaven to my aching muscles. A large wall of glass separated the shower from an oversized tub. In some warped part of my mind, I had to admit, as far as prisons went, this wasn’t so bad.
I walked out of the room and kept searching. Luxurious or not, if I was going to escape this prison, I needed to learn as much as I could about it and the man who lived here.