Series: Lee Savino
Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 63295 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 316(@200wpm)___ 253(@250wpm)___ 211(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63295 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 316(@200wpm)___ 253(@250wpm)___ 211(@300wpm)
I force myself to focus on eating, but it’s a struggle not to watch Paloma. Three courses in, I dare to look at her again. She’s sitting with that hardened look on her beautiful face. If I hadn’t seen the bruises, I might think her snobbish.
But now I think it’s a result of abuse.
Her head bodyguard leans forward again. “Eat,” he orders her. She subtly shakes her head, but he reaches over her and cuts her steak like she’s a child. He forks a piece of meat and holds it in front of her lips.
A muscle clenches in her jaw. “No,” she mutters. “I’m not hungry.”
“Stop.” There’s bear in my growl. My outburst attracts the table’s attention.
Paloma’s gaze jerks to me.
Thom and his conversation partners go silent. I half rise out of my chair before I know what’s going on. I face off with the bodyguard. “The lady said no.”
Paloma locks eyes with me and a current of energy runs between us. “I did say no.” She sounds surprised that I heard and heeded her no. Which is fucked up. Thom must be a controlling bastard.
“It’s getting late. Perhaps you’re tired,” Thom says to his daughter. He doesn’t wait for her to respond. “Take her to her room.” He gestures to her bodyguards. The same asshole who was trying to feed her draws her chair back and takes her limp arm to guide her away. She glances back at me over her shoulder as she walks out.
Does she want me to intercede? My bear roars to life. He is apparently ready to kill on her behalf. Not a normal reaction for the animal I have kept caged since I was a teenager.
I forcibly keep him down, tightening my muscles to keep from jumping from my chair to follow her.
My alarm bells clang. No one else seems to think it was odd, but I am weirded out by the whole interaction between Thom’s unhappy daughter and her controlling bodyguards.
Something rotten is going on in this mansion, and I intend to figure out what.
Chapter Two
Paloma
I expect to find myself locked in my bedroom all day while so many guests are in the mansion, but the deadbolt slides open at six a.m.–the same time it does every morning. I assume I’m free to follow my normal Saturday routine.
Thom probably figures he instilled enough fear in me to keep me in line.
He’d be right.
After my escape attempt the night before last, Thom told me point blank that if I didn’t fall into line and do everything he told me to do, Wren would meet a horrible accident. A horrible accident like our parents’.
I wasn’t sure until then that he’d been the one responsible for their death. That it hadn’t been a random car accident. Now I know for certain–he orchestrated it to get me under his roof.
He’s as horrible a man as I suspected.
The first few years under his guardianship hadn’t been bad. Wren and I were grieving, but he provided us with every luxury, including a therapist to help us cope.
A therapist I now realize brainwashed us to be his little robots.
I rebelled when he pulled me out of school to work long hours. That’s when he sent Wren away to a Catholic boarding school where she’s not allowed a cell phone or unsupervised internet. He made my contact with her a punishment or reward. I misbehaved, Thom revoked my privilege of my weekly video call with her. If I wanted her to come home for Christmas, I’d better keep my quotas up.
What he doesn’t know is that Wren has a special knack for psychic linking. Sometimes when I’m falling asleep at night, she appears in my dream state, checking in on me. Telling me a joke. Acting like a goofy seventeen-year-old. If I didn’t have those moments with her, I would go nuts.
I have to be careful he never finds out, though, or he’ll think of some devious way to put her gift to use as well.
I pull on my khaki riding jodhpurs and a fitted red top, don my boots and hat, and head to the stables to see Starlight. Riding her is the only pleasure I have here. Starlight and Sunday video calls with Wren.
My mare whinnies softly when I open the door.
“Hey, sweetness. I missed you yesterday.” I look over my shoulder at the two bodyguards trailing me. “They wouldn’t let me out to see you.” I stroke her forehead and lean forward. “Pendejos,” I murmur in her silky ear.
I still swear in Spanish–despite Thom’s disgust of it–because it reminds me of my dad–my real dad–who spoke English at home except when he swore. I'm sure that it was to protect our delicate ears, but instead, he just taught us to swear in his native tongue.
Cas, the Dutch groom, appears at my back, carrying her saddle. “I’ll get her ready for you, Miss Paloma,” he murmurs, avoiding my eyes.