Page 103 of Saving Grace

He laughed and it brightened his face. Somehow, I could tell he hadn’t laughed this uninhibitedly in a long time, and I felt sorry for him. I had to remind myself that this man was a cold-blooded killer.

He tucked a curl behind my ear and I tried my best not to shy away, keeping my expression neutral.

“Ah, but you’re only trying to survive,” he said. “I can hardly blame you for that.”

“Who put a hit on me?” I asked, changing the subject because I didn’t want to get sucked into his sob story and feel sympathy for my kidnapper. Avoiding Stockholm Syndrome 101.

“Take a guess.”

“Hector Vargas?”

He nodded. “You don’t have to worry about him anymore. After his own cartel turned against him and tried to destroy us, I decided to disappear. Contrary to what rumors say, I’m not blindingly loyal to him. I’ll go back to Europe and build another reputation.” He watched me carefully. “I’m taking you with me.”

“But … but …” I tried to work through the scramble in my brain.

“The flash drive will assure that Hector Vargas will remain in federal prison for a very, very long time. We’ll be safe from him.”

I had never felt loss so deep, and my chest cracked wide open with physical pain. I wanted to lash out at my captor that I was pregnant, that my baby deserved his real father. I wanted to scream that I was in love with Matt. But after what happened the last time I threw my love for my husband in his face, I opted for self-preservation. Still, I couldn’t help the tears that burned my eyes.

A shaky sob escaped me as I lowered my gaze, but The Reaper wanted all of my emotions. He caught my chin and forced me to look up at him. “As I said, I do not need you to love me, but I will own you.” His fingers skimmed my throat and cupped the side of my breast as he rubbed his thumb on my nipple, causing an involuntary shudder. “Your body pleases me,” he said huskily, lowering his head and nipping my bottom lip briefly. “When I washed that bastard’s blood off you in the shower, I would have fucked you right then and there, but my knife wound needed tending.”

His hand continued their exploration over my hips. I was wearing his shirt. And because he wasn’t very tall, they landed somewhere on my upper thighs. His breathing grew labored as he sought the valley between my legs. I squeezed them together.

“Open,” he whispered.

“Please no,” I begged.

“You didn’t complain in the shower when I touched you there,” he mocked.

No, I didn’t.

I barely felt it because I was in shock from Elliot’s bloody end and the water kept me numb.

“I was going to wait to fuck you until we got rid of that baby,” he told me. “But waiting to make you mine is only going to make you hope.”

He continued talking, but my ears started ringing after I heard his plan for the life growing inside me. Then I felt his lips on me, coaxing them to open as he tried to insinuate his fingers between my clenched thighs. I yielded to him and he groaned. He got more excited and kissed me harder. His fingers felt my dryness and I felt him stiffen. He tried to pull away from the kiss and that was when I bit him.

He roared and threw me on the bed. I saw him back away from me, wiping the blood from his mouth and I smiled.

For a second, I thought he was going to hit me. His eyes were almost black with rage. And then his lips curled into a nasty smile. He pulled open the night stand drawer and withdrew some ropes.

If he tied me down I couldn’t fight him. That was when I knew it was now or never.

“I expected this,” he said as if explaining the ropes. “Don’t think I won’t hurt you. The only thing saving you from what I really want to do to you is I don’t want you bleeding out in the middle of this Godforsaken place with no doctor to bribe. But, I am going to have you.”

I leapt off the bed in the middle of his diatribe, but he caught me easily. I kicked, and bit, and scratched. He grunted, but never hit me back. I didn’t know what he was playing at but I knew his brutality against me was only a matter of time.

He took me face down on the bed and straddled my back. I tried to buck him off but he squeezed my ribcage with his legs and deftly tied both my wrists to the scrollwork of the headboard.

I heard my shirt rip from my back.

“No! Damn You. No!” I screamed.

“I don’t want to put bruises on your body,” he growled. “Every mark on them is going to be deliberate.”

My confusion at his words morphed into clarity when a knife point hit my shoulder. It was then he began to carve.

I muffled my cries against the mattress. He said he wanted to hear me scream. I wasn’t going to give him that satisfaction.