“I know.”
I terminate the call and the line goes dead.
“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” Doctor Black says when I cut off the call.
“You’re my secret,” I tell him. “And I have no interest in you ever being harmed. But these men who think they can use my woman as leverage? They will learn the error of their ways.”
CHAPTER 13
Laura
I wake up in a comfortable bed. I’m not sure what happened. I almost think it must all have been a dream, except for the fact I am not at home in my apartment, and I have no memory of getting home either. My memory of the previous evening is hazy. I have a faint memory of getting on a bus, and then… I don’t know.
“How are you feeling?” Sam is by my side, a faint frown on his face.
“Weird,” I say. “Why are we at your house? I thought people were trying to kill you.”
“They’re not trying to kill me. They’re trying to control me,” he says. “I’m far too useful to be killed.”
I sit up.
“Don’t get out of bed,” he says. “You’re not well right now.”
“Why aren’t I well right now? What happened?”
He sits down on the bed and puts his hand on my knee. “You were abducted.”
“By you?”
“No,” he says. “Not at first.”
“Not at first?” I repeat his words with a question because what the hell does that mean?
“You were taken by some people who have ties to the government, but also international bodies. Unfortunately for you, I am not merely a professor and a stalker. I am an asset. The kind of control they want over me does not allow for someone like you.”
“Because I’m too young? Too stupid?”
“Too free,” he says. “I cannot have anybody in my life who can be used to leverage me.”
“So you’re breaking up with me?” I feel tears pricking my eyes.
“Absolutely not,” he says. “There’s no way I will live without you, Laura. You have become the center of my world in a way I never expected. My plan, initially, was to enjoy you anonymously and send you on your way with a good grade and a scholarship to the school of your choice. I was always going to look after you. But things have changed.”
“Why?”
“Because you followed me to Los Angeles, and they were watching. You made a spectacle of yourself.”
“I did? I asked some questions and went to your room…”
“You came in a disguise and spent the rest of the evening and morning in my room. I did not think I was being watched at the time, but obviously I was wrong. They clocked you, and now they’ve assessed you.”
“And?”
“And this will be your world from here on out,” he says. “You are going to have to stay away from the world, lest the world come for you.”
“This is the captive thing again,” I say.
“You were taken and drugged and left for whoever might find you,” he says. “If the people I know get their hands on you again, it will be worse. It won’t just be a matter of being drugged. You will be hurt badly, perhaps turned into an asset and used. There are roles pretty young women can play in this world, and I can promise you that you do not want to play them.”
