Instead of a house in the suburbs and two-point-five kids, my future now holds a heavily guarded compound near the Amazon jungle and a man who both excites and terrifies me.It’s impossible for me to imagine having children with Julian, and I dread the fact that in a few short months, the three-year birth control implant I got at seventeen will cease to be effective.At some point, I will need to bring up this issue with Julian, but for now I’m trying not to think about it.I’m no more ready to be a mother than I was to be a wife, and the possibility of having that choice forced on me makes me break out in a cold sweat.I love Julian, but raising children with a man who thinks nothing of kidnapping and killing?That’s a whole other matter.
My parents and friends back home aren’t helping.I spoke once with Leah, telling her about my hasty marriage, and her reaction had been shocked, to say the least.
“You married that arms dealer?”she exclaimed incredulously.“After everything he’s done to you and Jake?Are you insane?You’re only nineteen—and he should be in jail!”And no matter how much I tried to spin everything in a positive light, I could tell she got off the phone thinking that my abduction left me a few cards short of a full deck.
My parents are even worse.Every time I talk to them, I have to fend off their probing questions about my unexpected marriage and Julian’s plans for our future.I don’t blame them for adding to my anxiety; I know they’re worried sick about me.The last time we had a video call, my mom’s eyes were red and swollen, as though she’d been crying.It’s obvious that the hastily concocted story I told them at my wedding has done little to alleviate their concerns.My parents know how my relationship with Julian began, and they’re having a hard time believing I could be happy with a man they see as pure evil.
And yet Iamhappy, my fretting about the future aside.The icy emptiness inside me is gone, replaced by a dazzling abundance of emotions and sensations.It’s as though the black-and-white movie of my life has been redone in technicolor.
When I’m with Julian, I’m complete and content in a way that I don’t fully understand and can’t quite come to terms with.It’s not like I was miserable before I met him.I had great friends, a loving family, and the promise of a good, if unexceptional, life ahead of me.I even had a crush—Jake—who gave me the proverbial butterflies in my stomach.It makes no sense that I somehow needed something as perverse as this relationship with Julian to enrich my life and give me that which I was missing.
Of course, I’m no shrink.Perhaps there is an explanation for my feelings—some childhood trauma that I’ve repressed, or a chemical imbalance in my brain.Or maybe it’s just Julian and the deliberate way he’s been molding my physical and emotional responses since those early days on the island.I am cognizant of his conditioning methods, but my recognition of them doesn’t alter their effectiveness.It’s strange to know that you’re being manipulated, and at the same time enjoy the results of that manipulation.
But enjoy them I do.Being with Julian is thrilling—both frightening and exhilarating, like riding a wild tiger.I never know which side of him I will see at any given moment: the charming lover or the cruel master.And as messed-up as it is, I want both—I am addicted to both.The light and the dark, the violence and the tenderness—it all goes together, forming a volatile, dizzying cocktail that plays havoc with my equilibrium and makes me fall even deeper under Julian’s spell.
Of course, the fact that I see him now every day doesn’t help.On the island, Julian’s frequent absences gave me time to recover from the potent effect he has on my mind and body, enabling me to maintain some emotional balance.Here, however, there is no respite from the magnetic pull he exerts on me, no way to shield myself from his intoxicating allure.With each day that passes, I lose a little more of my soul to him, my need for him growing, rather than decreasing with time.
The only thing that keeps me from freaking out is the knowledge that Julian is drawn to me just as strongly.I don’t know if it’s my resemblance to Maria or just our inexplicable chemistry, but I know the addiction works both ways.
Julian’s hunger for me knows no bounds.He takes me a couple of times every night—and often during the day as well—yet I get the sense he still wants more.It’s there in the intensity of his gaze, in the way he always touches me, holds me.He can’t keep his hands off me—and that makes me feel better about my own helpless attraction to him.
He also seems to enjoy spending time with me outside of the bedroom.True to his promise, Julian has begun training me, teaching me how to fight and use different weapons.After the initial rocky start, he turned out to be an excellent instructor—knowledgeable, patient, and surprisingly dedicated.We train together nearly every day, and I’ve already learned more in these couple of weeks than in the prior three months in my self-defense courses.Of course, it would be a misnomer to call what he teaches me self-defense; Julian’s lessons have more in common with some kind of assassin bootcamp.
“You aim to kill every time,” he instructs during one afternoon session where he makes me throw knives at a small target on the wall.“You don’t have the size or the strength, so for you, it’s all about speed, reflexes, and ruthlessness.You need to catch your opponents off-guard and eliminate them before they realize how skilled you are.Every strike has to be deadly; every move has to count.”
“What if I don’t want to kill them?”I ask, looking up at him.“What if I just want to wound them, so I can run away?”
“A wounded man can still hurt you.It doesn’t take much strength to squeeze a trigger or stab you with a knife.Unless you have a good reason for wanting your enemy alive, you aim to kill, Nora.Do you understand me?”
I nod and throw a small, sharp knife at the wall.It thuds dully against the target, then falls down, having barely scratched the wood.Not my best attempt, but better than my prior five.
I don’t know if I can do what Julian says, but I do know that I never want to feel defenseless again.If it means learning the skills of an assassin, I’m happy to do it.It doesn’t mean I will ever use them, but just knowing that I can protect myself makes me feel stronger and more confident, helping me cope with the residual nightmares from my time with the terrorists.
To my relief, those have gotten better as well.It’s like my subconscious knows that Julian is here—that I’m safe with him.Of course, it also helps that when I do wake up screaming, he’s there to hold me and chase the nightmare away.
The first time it happens is the third night after my arrival at the estate.I dream of Beth’s death again, of the ocean of blood that I’m drowning in, but this time, strong arms catch me, save me from the vicious rip current.This time, when I open my eyes, I’m not alone in the darkness.Julian has turned on the bedside lamp and is shaking me awake, a concerned expression on his beautiful face.
“I’m here now,” he soothes, pulling me into his lap when I can’t stop trembling, tears of remembered horror running down my face.“All is well, I promise…” He strokes my hair until my sobbing breaths begin to even out, and then he asks softly, “What’s the matter, baby?Did you have a bad dream?You were screaming my name…”
I nod, clinging to him with all my strength.I can feel the warmth of his skin, hear the steady beating of his heart, and the nightmare slowly begins to recede, my mind coming back to the present.“It was Beth,” I whisper when I can speak without my voice breaking.“He was torturing her… killing her.”
Julian’s arms tighten around me.He doesn’t say anything, but I can feel his rage, his burning fury.Beth had been more than a housekeeper to him, though the precise nature of their relationship had always been something of a mystery to me.
Desperate to distract myself from the bloody images still filling my mind, I decide to satisfy the curiosity that had gnawed at me all through my time on the island.“How did you and Beth meet?”I ask, pulling back to look at Julian’s face.“How did she come to be on the island with me?”
He looks at me, his eyes dark with memories.Before, whenever I would ask these types of questions, he would brush me off or change the topic, but things are different between us now.Julian seems more willing to talk to me, to let me more fully into his life.
“I was in Tijuana seven years ago for a meeting with one of the cartels,” he begins speaking after a moment.“After my business was concluded, I went looking for entertainment in Zona Norte, the red-light district of the city.I was passing by one of the alleys when I saw it… a screaming, crying woman huddled over a small figure on the ground.”
“Beth,” I whisper, remembering what she told me about her daughter.
“Yes, Beth,” he confirms.“It wasn’t any of my business, but I’d had a couple of drinks and I was curious.So I came closer… and that’s when I saw that the small figure on the ground was a child.A beautiful baby girl with red curly hair, a tiny replica of the woman crying over her.”A savage, furious glint enters his eyes.“The child was lying in a pool of blood, with a gunshot wound in her small chest.She had apparently been killed to punish her mother, who didn’t want to let her pimp offer the child to some clients with moreuniquetastes.”
Nausea, sharp and strong, rises in my throat.Despite everything I’ve been through, it still horrifies me to know that there are such monsters out there.Monsters far worse than the man I’ve fallen in love with.
No wonder Beth saw the world in shades of black; her life had been overtaken by darkness.
“When I heard the full story, I took Beth and her daughter with me,” Julian continues in a low, hard voice.“It still wasn’t any of my business, but I couldn’t let this type of thing slide—at least not after seeing that child’s body.We buried the daughter in a cemetery just outside Tijuana.Then I took a couple of my men, and Beth and I came back to look for the pimp.”A small, vicious smile appears on his lips as he says softly, “Beth killed him personally.Him and his two thugs—the ones who helped murder her daughter.”
