CHAPTER 5
Piper
The door to the office is mocking me. Silent mocking, sure. I mean, it’s not sentient. But I can tell, if it wasn’t an inanimate object, it would be sneering at my cowardice. I’ve made every excuse under the sun not to go into the room and review the documents I know will explain everything about why I’m here, who saved me, and what I’m expected to do next.
Nothing in life is free, I’ve known that since I was just a kid. That experience warns me there will be a steep cost for this moment out of time. The months I’ve spent in this luxurious condo, with no contributions required of me beyond participating in therapy, aren’t free.
If it seems too good to be true, that’s a sign, right? In my entire life, I’ve never had a safe place to just exist. Aullie promises there are no expectations. Once I read the file in the office, I can choose what happens next. I want to believe she’s telling the truth as far as she knows it.
Because I know she’s wrong. There’s a voice, deep inside me, that warns the price for all of this will be steep and unavoidable. Aullie may say I can walk out of here a free woman if I want to, but she’s not here when the silence gets heavy with his presence. I feel the weight everywhere I go in this place, and it tells me I’m being observed. It feels like what I assume having a parent as a kid would have felt like.
Sometimes, I watch TV too late at night, and suddenly, the screen will fade as the system powers itself down. My toiletries never run out. If I forget to turn up the air conditioning in the evening when I start to get chilled, the gas fireplace turns on and the thermostat gets adjusted. There are always, always vegetables in the groceries that are delivered.
Most of the time, it feels like I’ve got a steady daddy watching over me. In my cam girl days, I used to have subscribers who liked to pretend to be in charge, sometimes. They’d tell me to change into my jammies or brush my teeth before climbing into bed and touching myself. It could have felt creepy to have someone bossing at me like that through a computer monitor, but it mostly felt comforting. Like someone out there cared about whether I was looked after.
In my imagination, the mystery person watching over me now is the same man who carried me out of that warehouse hell. Whoever he was, his arms were strong enough to cradle me so easily it felt as if he could carry me forever. His chest had been wide and firm, with a finely woven suit jacket covering his broad shoulder. He’d tucked my head under his chin and held my face against his throat, blocking my sight of the carnage. Later, I found out from the investigators the room outside the one where I’d been kept had been littered with the bloodied heaps of my captors’ bodies.
I don’t know how my rescuer and Aullie didn’t face legal consequences for their roles in saving me. In all honesty, I don’t really want to know. I probably would have continued in oblivion if I hadn’t accidentally come to the realization Aullie truly was there. It wasn’t until I overheard her cackling maniacally while playing a videogame she and Jaythan had brought over that I’d fully made the connection.
I’d long suspected Aullie was the woman I’d heard taunting my captors, but my mind had been so hazy and traumatized I couldn’t be sure. That laugh, though. I’d only heard that mixture of confident bravado and unhinged wildling once before. The night Aullie and my mystery man found me.
My mind seems to spin out more and more every day, thinking and piecing together the foggy events surrounding that entire time. Slowly, it was coming together, the days before I was taken, the terrifying eternity I’d spent locked in that room, and even the first week or so afterward, though that week in the hospital was mostly a blur of medical tests, interviews with law enforcement, and fear.
I’d been afraid of the men who took me, unable to close my eyes without reliving the sensation of their hands pushing me around. Hearing the disgusting things they’d boasted would happen to me soon. Medical exams convinced the doctors I hadn’t been violated, but I know that’s only because I was being kept for whoever they’d sold me to.
Then Aullie had shown up at the hospital, appearing in the room like a ghost brought to life, and my had panic receded. Knowing she’s connected to the day I was found, as well as connected to this place, feeds my fantasy that the man who carried me to safety is who I feel watching me here. I’m so screwed if it’s not him. I think that’s what finally gives me the push, after all this time, to brave the office door and the secrets I know can be revealed on the other side.
“I’m ready.” My voice is the only sound in the condo, aside from the soft whir of appliances and the faraway hum of traffic on the street outside. I’ve gotten in the habit of thinking aloud lately. I’d call it talking to myself, but there’s no use pretending I don’t want to be heard. No reason to act as if I’m unaware he’s listening.
I think… I think I’m ready for what comes next. Instinct tells me the other side of the door is where I’ll find more than the answers Aullie promises are waiting for me. The door swings open silently, the room beyond as well decorated as the rest of the condo. My feet move me forward to the desk that dominates the space. Dark wood and heavy lines lend an unmistakable masculine feel. The books on the shelves appear well used, and there’s more technology in here than in the rest of the condo combined.
It dawns on me that I’ve been living in someone else’s home all of this time. This office, more than any other room here, feels inhabited. I tip back my head and close my eyes, halfway convinced I can smell his citrus and sandalwood cologne and feel his energy here beside me. There’s a temptation to snoop through the drawers to see if I can learn anything about the person who owns this place.
Before I can get up the courage to pull on a single shiny brass knob, my eyes snag on my real purpose here. Centered in the middle of the rich burgundy leather blotter is a pristine yellow folder. My name, my real full name, is written in precise blue ink on the tab at the top.
“Open it, Piper. Open the folder and accept your future.” The words are spoken from some hidden speaker above me in a dulcet bass that croons over my frazzled nerves like the caress of a lover. My eyes shoot to the ceiling to search for the source as though it will give me some clue.
In my heart, I don’t need any hints as to his identity. It’s the man I’ve dreamed of since the first night I slept without night terrors of my time in captivity. I could never forget or mistake the deep rumble of his reassurances and promises as he’d cradled me and carried me out. The confident command in his directive just now is the same as I recall him using to order around the first responders as they arrived.
I do the only sane thing. I grab the folder and hightail from the room. My mind scoffs at my scaredy cat antics. Just because I heard him speak in the office, a room I haven’t set foot in a single time, doesn’t mean he can’t still see and speak to me everywhere else in the place. Logic has no place in my mental process at this point, and without conscious thought, I race into my bedroom and throw myself on the bed. I whip the duvet over my head and clutch the folder to my chest as if I just made off with the crown jewels.
Maybe, I really have lost my mind, because I swear I can feel his amusement vibrating through the air even though I’m one hundred percent positive I’m alone.