Not until his fingers traced along the claw marks dug into the sheet metal on the back of the door.
And not until she saw the dark stains on the floor, remnants of the urine and blood she’d left behind.
“You sick, fucking bastard. You fuckingjue puta.”
Yes, now you’ve found where I was kept.
The long nights he’d forgotten her or punished her for not showing enough, being good enough. All the times she’d told him how his men had hurt her.
Sometimes, you get burned when you’re fire. But they’re men; they can’t control their desire for you. Next time, hide better like I taught you.
“Pequeña.”
Adonis’s voice forced her to open her eyes. He was sitting in the outside room, looking where the saferoom was hidden to the back of her father’s old room.
“I am not a good man; I have never tried to be. What I’ve done with these hands,” he added, lifting them, “would make you scream. But they will never be used against you. No man, or woman, will ever hurt you again as long as I breathe. Come to me,pequeña. Let me show you what it means to belong to a man like me.”
She couldn’t. Men like him just wanted to control.
“I won’t take one step toward you. Even though I know you must be somewhere in this room. There isn’t anywhere you can hide. And to see this house … I knew that scared little man had a place to hide away while others died for him.”
He was right, of course.
“I won’t make you come to me. We are inevitable, but the time of it depends on you. Don’t you want to live,pequeña? Don’t you want to see how your wings will look when you’re finally able to fly? At my side, who would dare to threaten you?”
No one.
But could Fabiana trust it? Trust a man like him?
There was war coming to Encantado, and she wouldn’t be able to stand on the sidelines forever. Not with everyone knowing of her gift with the paintings.
“See what it is to beyou. I will never ask you to be anything else.”
It was that final whispered sentence that brought her to the door. Her wolf was already going crazy just having him so close, slamming against the human bonds to break free and race to its mate. It didn’t care that Fabiana was scared or that she was scarred so deeply.
Her wolf only wanted him.
The door slid open silently, and the first tendrils of his scent pulsed through her—spicy, with an edge of dark ember. It swelled within her, entering her cells and combining until she knew she’d never be able to get him out.
Mine.
Fabiana cringed at the force of her wolf’s demand, but her feet moved anyway, carrying her closer to him, to the light where he sat. When she reached the bedroom door, he didn’t move—as promised. Only his gaze raked over her face, a non-physical touch of need and demand.
“Hermosa.”
“What does that mean?”
He smiled, a lopsided break in his face that made her swallow. “You’d hate to hear it, I’m sure. But it’s true nonetheless.”
“Tell me anyway.”
“Ah, she does have claws. Beautiful is what I said.”
“You’re right,” she answered, shaking her head. “I don’t like it. I heard it enough.”
“That’s because they weaponized your beauty; I simply want to appreciate it.” Adonis sat back, resting his arms against the chair. “Come here,pequeña.”
She blinked at the image he presented: a decadent male, sure of himself and who he was. “Does that mean ‘little one,’ likepiccolo?”
