Total pages in book: 260
Estimated words: 245483 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1227(@200wpm)___ 982(@250wpm)___ 818(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 245483 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1227(@200wpm)___ 982(@250wpm)___ 818(@300wpm)
And I’m still puzzled by what happened with the tea. Curious, I rewind the video on the monitor to my right, keeping an eye on her on the other. I return back to the moment I gave her the tea and turned away.
I have to watch it twice before I notice what she did. My breath catches in my throat when I see: she slipped something into the tea.
Holy shit.
I watch the video over and over, slowing it down, frame by frame. Sure enough, she slipped something into the tea. Something I hadn’t noticed. Something she smuggled in here.
How? Why? I can’t be sure. Whatever it was, she must have had it on her before she was taken. I curse myself for being so fucking careless. She could easily have killed me. Whatever she put in that tea could have been a deadly poison or a strong sedative, and if I drank from that cup, I would be dead.
Careless, fucking careless. All because I let her have that fucking bathroom. If I forced her to use the bucket, this never would have happened. She wouldn’t have been able to be so fucking sneaky.
Anger rises inside of me, clean and strong. I watch the video again and again, shocked and angered that she would try and pull something like that after what happened between us.
But slowly, I begin to calm myself. She didn’t make me drink the tea. In fact, she stopped me. Whatever she had in there, she decided at the last second that she didn’t want to hurt me.
I lean back and take a deep breath.
This is good. Her sneaking something into the tea wasn’t, but her reaction was good. It means she’s beginning to feel the bond between us, that it isn’t just me. She’s beginning to trust me. She could have let me drink the tea, but she didn’t.
I smile to myself. The shock of catching her begins to wear off, and the implications of what actually happened settle in.
Grace didn’t want to hurt me. She wanted to escape, but when it came down to actually doing it, she couldn’t. She stopped herself. For whatever reason, she smacked that tea cup from my hand.
She’s dangerous. But that excites me more than it should.
I stand up and groan, stretching. I walk slowly toward her door, not sure if she’s going to listen, but I’m hopeful. I press my thumb against the pad, making the door click open.
Once inside, I stand near the door and watch her. She’s breathing slowly, not moving, and she knows I’m there. She’s trying to pretend like she doesn't notice me, but I know that she does. She’s shrewd and smart, a cunning little minx. I can’t help but smile.
She nearly killed me. But in the end, she couldn’t do it.
Now it’s just a matter of time before I take her.
“Princess,” I say gently. “Is there something we have to talk about?”
She looks up at me. “No,” she says and looks away.
“Princess,” I say, coming closer to her cage. She doesn’t move. “Are you sure about that?”
“Yes,” she says softly.
I sigh and crouch down in front of her. I decide not to tell her that I know what she did, afraid that it might hurt more than help. I can revisit that later, when I've earned her trust. Instead, I decide to concentrate on the shard.
“You have something,” I say.
Her eye twitches toward the remains of the cup and back to me. “No,” she lies.
“Princess,” I say, shaking my head, disappointed. “I know you’re lying.”
She looks away from me. “Just leave me alone.”
“I can’t do that. You know I’m always watching, but you tried to lie to me anyway. Why?”
“Please,” she says weakly. “Just go.”
“Princess. If there’s going to be trust between us, you’re going to have to tell me the truth. Do you have something you shouldn’t?”
She looks at me, her face stricken. I want to reach out and touch her, feel her full lips under my thumb, hear her moan as I caress her body.
“Yes,” she says.
“Good girl,” I say, smiling. Pride and warmth fill me. “I need you to give it to me.”
“Let me keep it.” Her voice is practically a whisper.
“Why? What are you going to do with it?”
“I don’t know,” she says.
“You don’t need it. I don’t want to see another scar on that perfect body.”
She stares at me. “It could be for you.”
I smile at her brazen response. “We both know that won’t happen,” I say softly. I crouch down in front of the entrance to her cage and hold out my hand. “Give it to me, princess.”
She chews her bottom lip, staring at me. “What will you give me in return?” she asks.
I can’t help but smirk at her. “I’ll give you whatever you want,” I say. “All you need to do is come out of that cage and give in to what we both know you want.”