There’s no point in reminding him how he just got done telling me about the higher quality of people I’ll meet at this school. Why is it okay for me to go to class with these people, but God forbid I live with any of them?
Why would he rather have me live with Zeke, a man, than another girl my age? “So it would just be the two of us?”
“Yes, it’s a two-bedroom condo not far from campus. There’s a security guard in the lobby, and an alarm system is going to be installed shortly.” He sounds very pleased with himself. “I’ll rest better at night knowing you’re safe.”
I’m glad he’ll sleep easy. Me, on the other hand? Then again, it’s pretty obvious I don’t have a say in any of this. Why would it matter how I feel about the decisions being made regarding my life?
I have to push food around on my plate for a while to make it look like I’m eating before excusing myself from the table. All I want is to be alone. For him not to see what this is doing to me.
Not so fast, though. “Mia. Are you… that is, has Zeke…?”
My heart threatens to burst out of my chest, and I realize I’m holding my breath. “Yes, Dad?”
“Has he done anything he shouldn’t have? Has he been inappropriate with you?”
“No! Of course not.” What does he know? How much does he know? I wish I didn’t feel so guilty. “He’s always professional. I just don’t think… he likes me very much.”
His smile hardens a little. “He’s not supposed to like you. He’s supposed to protect you and keep you safe. So far, he’s done that job well.”
“Yes, he has.”
“And that’s why he’s the only person I would trust with the thing that’s most precious to me in the world.” Funny, but shouldn’t that make me feel good? All warm and fuzzy inside? Instead, I feel the way I always feel when he says things like that: like I’m an object. Hardly even a person. One more of his possessions.
Still, I manage a little smile before leaving the dining room and going up the stairs. Here I was, finally getting used to living here even if I can’t shake the feeling of being in a cage, and now I find out I’m being transferred to a new cage.
And my keeper is coming with me.
Of all people.
It doesn’t hit me until I’m halfway up the wide staircase that I could have given my father a different answer down there. I could have told him Zeke tried to seduce me or something, and I wouldn’t have to worry about any of this anymore. I would never even have to see him again. I wouldn’t have to be humiliated every time he looks at me with that little smirk of his. Like he remembers what a fool I made of myself and thinks it’s funny. Like my humiliation is worth laughing about.
At least here, at home, I know he’ll keep it to himself. He wouldn’t want Dad to know we were ever in that kind of situation together. He would end up getting blamed for it even though I was the one who made a move. Sure, I might get grounded for a little while or something, but Zeke would lose his job.
At least. I don’t know what my dad does for a living or how he earned all this money in the first place, but there are times when I can’t help wondering if everything he does is legal. It’s enough to make me wonder what would really happen to somebody who crossed the great Bruno Morelli.
I can’t do that. Sure, I wanted to kill Zeke for making me feel the way he did that night, but I wouldn’t actually do it. It’s not his fault he doesn’t want me. It’s not his fault I was dumb enough to think he would.
Even now, months later, the pain is so fresh. My whole body cringes from humiliation when I remember the look in his eyes. Cold and disgusted, like I was nothing but trash. Like he hated me, or worse, felt sorry for me. I’m still not sure what would be more humiliating.
And ever since, there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t know for sure he’s thinking about it. The way he sometimes looks at me—or worse, when he won’t look at me at all. I know why he won’t look at me. And it makes me want to die. If there’s one thing I could go back and change, it would be that night at the pool. I’ll never be able to live it down.
I hurry down the hall, my footsteps muffled by the thick rug running down the length of the passage. Only a few of the rooms up here are used, including the suite Dad gave me when I first moved in. It’s basically an entire apartment to myself, and I have to admit, I’ll miss it a little. I’ve done everything I could to make it mine, to add little bits of myself to it. It sort of intimidated me at first, but now it feels like home.
And I’m going to have to leave it in just a few days. No warning, but then I didn’t get any warning about the way my life would change after Mom died, either. I might as well be a leaf that fell from a tree and got carried by the wind, eventually landing on the water. And now, all I can do is float, letting the current take me where it thinks I should be.
“Hey, princess.”
My blood turns to ice the instant I hear his voice. There’s always a snicker to it now, like he’s barely managing not to laugh at me. Even if he did laugh, I know there wouldn’t be any humor or kindness in it, more like bitterness and resentment.
I turn to face Zeke, reminding myself for the hundredth time that I can’t think of him the way I used to. My eyes are in the habit of finding all his best features, though, and they never got the memo about us hating him now. That’s why I can’t help but take in his chiseled jaw and slate gray eyes. Right now, they’re almost stormy, swirling with dangerous energy. His broad shoulders and firm chest. The way his generous mouth ticks upward at the corner, his lips practically begging to be kissed or at least touched. I wonder how soft they would be.
It takes a second for me to snap out of it. This isn’t the sex god of my wildest fantasies—and no matter how much I used to want him, he’s not going to be my first. He will never be anything to me but a jailkeeper.
And he hates me. That alone is reason enough for me to fold my arms the way he does. “I don’t see any princesses around here, so I don’t know who you’re talking to.”
He only rolls his eyes. “Right. Keep telling yourself that, princess.”
“What do you want?”