The thought makes me want to cry again.
"Sleep," he says again, more firmly this time. "We'll talk more in the morning. About the showcase. About what happens next. About the choice you need to make."
"What choice?"
His hand continues stroking my hair in soothing motions. "Train with me willingly for the showcase—let me teach you what you need to know, let me prepare you, let me make this as easy as possible—or I make every decision for you until you break. Until you have no choice but to submit."
"That's not a choice. That's coercion."
"It's the only choice you get. The only one I'm giving you. Everything else? That's mine now. Your room, your privacy, your body, your pleasure—all of it belongs to me. This is the last choice you'll have. So think carefully."
He's quiet for a moment. "Think about it tonight while you sleep. Tomorrow morning, you decide. But Eden—whatever you choose, understand this: you're not leaving. You're not running again. You're mine, and the sooner you accept that, the easier this will be for both of us."
I don't respond.
Can't respond.
Because deep down, in a place I don't want to acknowledge, in a place I've been trying to ignore since that first night when he showed me what pleasure felt like?—
I'm starting to understand what he means.
I'm starting to forget why I wanted to leave.
Starting to accept that maybe this cage isn't a cage at all.
Maybe it's just where I belong.
Where I've always belonged.
Where some broken part of me has been trying to get to since I ran from the Sanctuary.
The thought should terrify me.
Instead, it just makes me more tired.
So tired I can barely keep my eyes open.
I close them.
And in Vaughn's arms, in his bed, wrapped in his scent and his warmth and his complete and utter control?—
I sleep.
Like I belong there.
Like I've finally come home.
CHAPTER TEN
Vaughn
I wake up before Eden does.
It's habit, I suppose.
Years of early mornings, of discipline, of controlling every aspect of my life, including my sleep schedule.
Five-thirty in the morning, like clockwork, regardless of what happened the night before.
