For a moment, she just stares at the ceiling, confusion written all over her face. Then she turns her head and sees me. Her eyes widen. Her breath catches in her throat.
"Good morning, angel," I say softly. She scrambles backward so fast she almost falls off the bed. I catch her wrist, pulling her back toward me.
"Let me go!" she shouts, yanking against my grip with surprising strength. "Angel, calm down..."
"Calm down?" she screams, her voice rising to a pitch that makes me wince. "You kidnapped me! You drugged me! Where the hell am I?"
"Germany," I say calmly, keeping my grip firm but not painful. "About an hour outside Solingen. In a house I bought for us."
"For us?" she repeats, her voice going even higher. "There is no us! You kidnapped me!"
"I brought you home, also you drugged me first," I correct, my tone patient.
"This isn't my home!" she says completely ignoring the second part of that sentence.
I sigh, releasing her wrist. She immediately scrambles to the other side of the bed, putting as much distance between us as the mattress allows.
"You can't keep me here," she says, her voice shaking with fear and anger. "My family will find me. They'll..."
"No, they won't," I say simply, sitting up and leaning against the headboard. "I made sure of that."
"They'll look for me. They'll tear this country apart looking for me."
"They can try," I interrupt, my voice still calm. "But they won't find you, plus they aren't exactly in the good graces of the German mafia. This house is registered under a shell company. There's no paper trail leading back to me. And even if they somehow figured out where you are, they'd have to get through my men first. Dozens of them. All armed and loyal."
"This is kidnapping. This is illegal."
"So is half the shit your father does," I point out reasonably. "But you don't seem to have a problem with that."
"That's different," she snaps.
"How?"
"Because he's my father!"
"And I'm the man who loves you," I say, my voice softening. "The man you admitted you love too. Or did you forget that part?"
She flinches like I've slapped her. "That doesn't give you the right to kidnap me."
"Maybe not," I concede with a slight shrug. "But I did it anyway. My love, I'm done waiting. I'm done being patient. I'm done pretending I can live without you."
She wraps her arms around herself, her eyes filling with tears that she's fighting to hold back. "We're toxic for each other, Ilay. We destroy everything we touch."
"So?"
"So?" she repeats, her voice incredulous. "So that's not healthy! That's not love!"
"It's both," I say firmly. "And I don't care which one it is as long as you're mine."
She shakes her head frantically, her hair falling across her face. "I can't do this. I can't be with you. Not like this."
"Why not?"
"Because I want a normal life!" she shouts, her voice breaking. "I want peace! I don't want to be part of this world. The violence, the blood, the constant danger. I just want to be a lawyer. I want to wake up every morning without worrying about who's trying to kill who. I don't want this!"
"But you love me," I say softly, watching her carefully.
"That's not enough!" she cries, tears finally spilling over. "Love isn't enough when you're threatening to kill my family. When you're dragging me into a war I want nothing to do with. When you're kidnapping me and drugging me and..."
