High Stakes (The Kingdom Book 2) (33 page)

“I need air,” I whisper. Denham gives me a curt nod, and I don’t waste time in getting out of there. Am I using my old defense mechanism of running from the problem?

The corridors echo with the sound of bleeps, whirrs, and the sobs of loved ones. It’s a place full of emotion, yet so clinical and cold.

I step through the heavy double doors and drop back against the wall, filling my lungs with the night air. I don’t know what time it is, too late, or too early depending on the way you look at it, but I don’t care. The time of day doesn’t change a single thing. In this instance, the daylight wouldn’t make tonight’s events any more bearable. The more air I breathe in, the more clarity my head gains. My past has tainted more lives than just my own. Ignorance made me pass off the coincidences. Tara. Spike. Even the trouble with Amy. It all comes back to one person, and his obsession to possess me.

There are no coincidences, Arianna. I’ve controlled every situation you’ve been in, even the ones you can’t quite remember yet. I always have done. Always will do
…

Why me? What is it about me that makes Jonny so determined to ruin not only my future, but risk other people’s lives and destroy them in the process?

I barely register the black sedan that pulls up in front of me through the mascara-streaked tears I’m crying. The tinted window slides down, and the engine keeps running.

When my blackened tears slow, and my eyes clear enough for me to see, I know what I have to do.

The handle clicks under my fingers, and the door opens easily. I hesitate for half a beat, but the vision burned into my brain of Spike lying on the sidewalk covered in blood makes me more determined to do what I’m about to do.

I slide onto the passenger seat without looking at the driver. I know who it is.

“It’s about time, beautiful girl,” he says, sliding his hand across my thigh.

“Fuck you,” I spit, knocking his hand away.

He laughs, and then pulls away.

We drive out of the city. I don’t know where we are going and I don’t care.

My life is over.

When I left Jonny and started again, I thought it would be okay. I had never judged the depth of his obsession for me, and if I did have an inkling, I ignored it.

Stupid Girl.

He was right all along.

How
did
I think I could be free?

I was never free; he just gave me that illusion for a while, so the pain would be greater when I eventually came back.

He was right. Physically, he never
made
me come back to him. I came of my own free will. I walked to his car. I opened the door. And I got in without a second thought.

But mentally, he backed me into a corner, and dragged me kicking and screaming. At every turn, I am tied. I am bound, gagged and helpless against the invisible ties he has imposed. Silently blackmailed into giving myself to him, with no way out. I would rather die than relive a life with him. But I won’t be the cause of someone else’s family being torn apart. I don’t want to be the reason that Spike is lying in that hospital bed fighting for his life. But I am. And I won’t let anything else happen.

I know Jonny was the cause of this. I know he has been behind every underhanded situation that Denham has found himself in since he met me. The whole mystery with Tara was his doing too. And it stops here.

The thought of Denham’s worry when he realizes I’m gone chokes me.

But the thought of the hurt and pain I could cause, the damage I’ve already caused, threatens to suffocate me.

His family is everything to him. And I’m just a crazy girl he met just weeks ago, who flipped his world upside down.

Classical music plays quietly in the background, and the bright city lights fade, flashing past as we drive away from the only happiness I’ve ever had.

JONNY TAKES ME TO
a condo outside of the city. It’s fairly non-descript, just a house. A shelter to lay my head. Jonny has given me the spare room, which is the one thing I’m grateful for. But how long it will stay like this, I don’t know.

Days pass. Time is determined by the rise and fall of the sun, but even that has no significance to me now. I don’t know where he’s taken me, and I don’t care. I’m numb. From top to bottom, inside out, there is nothing left but a broken shell. He’d taken my cell, and sent a message to my mom. I don’t know what he told her, but he told me she wouldn’t come looking for me for a while, by which time we’d be hundreds of miles away, apparently.

The questions in my mind were still there, but nowhere near as loud as before. How is Spike? Is he even alive? Is Lottie coping? Does Denham think I’ve just left and abandoned him? Is Beth cursing my name for leaving the boutique without a word?

Too many questions. White noise in my head.

The door to the room creaks open, but I don’t turn. Instead I focus on the view of the yard outside of the cushioned window seat where I sit with my knees tucked up into my chest. The same view I have looked out over for however long I’ve been here. I haven’t left this room. It’s minimal. There’s a bed, a leather high-backed chair, and a small table and two chairs. I don’t bother to eat, I can’t, and I sleep when my eyes won’t stay open a minute longer. I delay sleep as long as possible; reality is less painful than my dreams, because when you wake up, each time, you have to deal with the searing pain that the happiness you imagined isn’t, and will never again, be real.

“You need to eat,” Jonny says softly, placing the tray of food on the table.

I look toward him, but through him, then turn back to the idyllic view.

“You can’t keep this up forever, baby. Sooner or later, you’ll need to speak.”

Again, I ignore him. I haven’t said a word since the ‘Fuck you’ in the car the night I left. I have no desire to talk to him, no wish to interact. “Arianna!” he yells, slamming his open hand down on the tabletop. My whole body jumps and tenses. Instinct prepares me for a physical assault, but it doesn’t come. In fact, he hasn’t laid a finger on me the whole time I’ve been here. He’s been so different from the man I left behind nearly two years ago. I’ve been silently testing his patience, pushing his tolerance to see how far it will stretch. Determination makes me hang on to the very last piece of my strength. He’s surprised me by not rising to it; he hasn’t pushed or bullied me. He’s spoken to me kindly. Given me space. And not touched me once.

“I didn’t want to have to do this. But you’ve left me no choice,” he snaps in a sharp, clipped voice, and the air around us tenses. Shit.

I brace myself ready for a fist to come at me, or for my hair to be yanked from my head, but it doesn’t happen. Instead, he pulls out his cell, taps a few buttons, and tilts the screen in my direction. My stomach feels like it drops through the floor, and I feel my mouth fall open. It’s a picture of Denham at the hospital, sitting next to Spike’s lifeless body, still lying in the hospital bed, still hooked up to countless machines that are keeping him alive. I take in Denham’s handsome face, so tired. The handsome face that I’ve tried to shut out every second of every day that’s gone by. But he’s there when I close my eyes, and again when I open them.

He must hate me. I expect he detests me for what I’ve done to his family, and for breaking his heart. I left him when he needed me most. I just vanished from his life almost as fast as I crashed into it. Maybe I was never that important to him. Maybe he doesn’t really care, and never did … I’m not sure what thought hurts the most.

“His little empire is falling down around him,” Jonny sings, watching carefully for my reaction. I try to keep my expression neutral, it’s all a game, but I can’t pretend it’s not hurting me. How did he get that image?

“What have you done?” I whisper.

“Ah, she talks,” Jonny says, coming to sit beside me. “I thought you would have learned by now that I always get what I want. I thought you would use your brain, and realize that you are no good to me as a broken shell. So, you see Arianna, for all your stubbornness over the last couple of days, you’ve done more harm than good. For every time you ignored me, every time you refused a meal, you hammered one more nail in his coffin. Your poor boy has been having a hard time of things.”

“But, you’ve got me, you’ve got what you wanted,” I say on a broken, disbelieving whisper.

“No, Arianna.” He moves closer, so his breath is in my face. “I have a shell. Where’s the fun in that?”

I whimper, and turn my head from him, scrunching my eyes together to block him out.

I’ve done more harm than good …

“So, you see … The only one that can put a stop to all of this …” He pauses to let his words take effect, then whispers in my ear, “Is you.”

Something inside me breaks, and I snap my head around so fast I catch his cheekbone with mine. He pulls back, his eyes harden and turn black, but a knowing smile dances on his lips. He knows exactly how to play me. This is what he wants. He wants a fight.

“Fuck you,” I spit. “You’re a fucking sick bastard.”

I leap up from the seat, and everything I’ve ever wanted to say to him comes pouring out like water over a broken dam. Words that I’ve held back, that have choked me for years, hurl themselves toward him at velocity speed. “Don’t you dare put this on me. You … You can stop it. It’s all your doing. You’re sick in the fucking head. If you were an animal they would have put you down with a bullet to your twisted fucking brain. I’m not yours. You don’t own me. You never have, and you never will. You want my body? Fine, have it. I really don’t fucking care anymore. But, you won’t have my mind, and you’ll
never
have my heart.” My throat stings with the words and the level of my voice, I’m screaming at him, and he’s stunned. “Because they are mine to give, and I choose not to. So do what you will.” I hold my arms out, welcoming him to do his worst. “If there is something you want from me, take it. You want me to give you my body? Have it. But you’ll never have my mind. You’ll never have me. So what now, you beat me? Maybe re-break a few of my ribs.”

“No,” he whispers, stepping towards me. “I’d rather taunt you with the pain of others.”

I drop my shoulders, exhausted from unburdening years of hurt and pain and the fresh weight of new ramifications, but also knowing there’s no way out. I can’t read the expression in Jonny’s eyes. But I don’t care. I’m done.

When he comes to stand in front of me, he tilts my chin up with his forefinger.

“My stupid, beautiful girl.”