“You never noticed any events like this happening before you stumbled into that party? If you worked there for a year, you would’ve been privy to all of Luis’sactivities.”
She would’ve seen people coming and going from the mansion. At the very least, she must have had dozens or even hundreds of the conversations with the criminal. Maybe Luis had let something slip. Cole made a mental note to check in with the FBIagent.
“Luis is a very private man. We only talked about his son; he never spoke to me about hisbusiness.”
“So, you and Luis weren’t…” Cole gestured with his hand and shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t truly believe they’d been intimate, but he needed to hear her sayit.
“No, I wasn’t sleeping with him,” she bit out, her cheeks turning bright pink. “Not that it would be any of your business if I had been. This conversation is over. I’mleaving.”
Cole let her get all the way to the back door before he spoke. He needed to take away any foolish hope she had of leaving this place, of leaving him. He was the only person who could protect her from Luis, and this was the only place where he could reliably do it. “If you leave, my brothers will bring youback.”
She stiffened, even under that baggy shirt he’d provided for her, he could see the ramrod set to her shoulders. With her back to him, she said, “So, I am a prisonerhere.”
“If that’s what you want to call it, but I’m not letting you leave. I need you to trustme.”
Tomi spun, her tangled blonde hair flying out around her face. “Trust you? You boughtme.”
Cole shrugged. He couldn’t answer that. Not without giving away the operation. “In away.”
“$3 million isn’t ‘in a way.’ You can’t do this,Cole.”
The knowledge that he was hurting her made his chest tight, but Cole couldn’t tell her the truth. “I’m sorry, but you’re stayinghere.”
“You never told me. Where’s your friend?” Her tone turned bitter, accusatory. She started trembling. “Don’t you intend to share your slave withhim?”
Adam Wise still lay unconscious in a hospital bed, fighting for his life. That thought alone reinforced Cole’s crumbling resolve. If he jeopardized their mission now, they would lose the last remaining chance to find Tara and all of the other missingwomen.
“I don’t like to share,Tomi.”
10
Tomi curled her fingers,digging her nails into the palms of her hands. She wanted to scream. To fly across the room and slap that possessive expression right off of Cole Fury’s face. Somewhere, in the very smallest part of the back of her mind, she’d held out a fading hope that Cole was her rescuer in disguise. His questions about Luis had set that hopealight.
But the look in his eyes just now…he truly meant that. He thought she belonged tohim.
Well, if he thought she was just going to crumble and cave and give in to this insanely horrible situation, he had no idea whom he’dbought.
At one point in her life, she would’ve given anything to be possessed by him. For years, she’d dreamed of his hands on her, his commanding voice in her ear. Telling her to scream his name as he took her. His strong hands squeezing her nipples. Spanking her until she begged. But there was one essential difference: in all of her fantasies, she waswilling.
“I won’t let you touchme.”
Cole rose from his seat, his movements slow and unhurried. With measured steps, he closed the distance between them, cupping her jaw so she had to look up to see hisface.
Maybe this is all just a nightmare. Some dream I’m having on the plane toMexico.
“You’ll beg me to touch you.” His soft words sent another shiver through her body, and dear Lord, she hated herself more than she hated him at that moment, because that shiver wasn’t fear. It wasanticipation.
“Never.”
“I want three days. Three days of your willingness and submission. That’sall.”
Her brain went blank. Three days? That didn’t make sense. None of this madesense.
Cole towered over her, and his presence seemed to curl around her—overwhelming and dominating. And yet, his touch was so soft. Soinviting.
“I can’t,” she finally chokedout.
“Why not?” he asked just as softly. His thumb smoothed over her cheekbone, gentle and featherlight.
