* * *
I linger in the bar for another drink, checking out the scene. A few women approach me, eyes obediently trained on the floor, but I politely send them away.
I’m still rattled from seeing Isabelle here. My two worlds colliding. And I don’t like it at all. She’s nowhere to be seen now, and she never even saw me, thank God.
But I’m supposed to be watching out for her. And I know something wasn’t right.
Reluctantly, I slam down my glass and head off down the hallway, towards the private suites. Some doors are ajar, inviting, but she’s not in any of the scenes.
Then I hear a cry, coming from the end of the hall.
Noises are common here. Moans of pain, screams of pleasure. But there’s nothing pleasurable about this sound.
“Stop, please, Brent.” I hear her voice clearer. “You’re hurting me!”
Without thinking, I charge down the dark hall and throw open the door.
THREE: ISABELLE
Before I was Isabelle Ashcroft, I went by a different name. A thousand miles away from the penthouse apartment and designer boutiques, a place I swore I’d never think about again.
But crouched here on my knees, my wrists cuffed to the bedposts, it comes back to me again. Not the memories, but the feeling. Desperation and hurt. That I let myself be treated like this.
That I had trusted someone who didn’t care about me at all.
Brent brings the flogger down against my naked back with a grunt. I flinch, even though I don’t feel the physical pain. For all the hours he spends preening in the gym, he doesn’t have the strength to really hurt me.
No, my pain is deeper than that.
“Stop,” I beg again, my tears running hotly down my cheeks. “Please!” I can’t stand the humiliation, the eyes I feel on my back while I lay here, helpless.
“She likes it,” Paxton’s voice comes from the corner, where he’s watching, pants down, rubbing eagerly at his pale, flaccid cock. “Give it to her again. Harder.”
My whole body tenses as Brent hits me again. I tug at my restraints, but it’s no use. He buckled them too tight, and now every movement makes the leather bite painfully into my wrists.
“Brent!”
Suddenly, there’s a crash behind us. I twist my head around as a strange man charges into the room.
“Don’t you fucking touch her.” His voice is low with rage, a Scottish accent, but I can’t see him, I’m tied too tight.
“Who the hell are you?” Brent demands. A moment later, I hear the shocking crack of a fist making impact with bone. Brent’s body goes flying to the ground.
“Now wait a minute—” Paxton blusters from the corner.
The stranger ignores him. He comes straight to me. “It’s OK,” he says. I try to turn, to see him, but I can’t move. All I can hear is his voice, low and soothing. The kind of voice you can trust. “I’ve got you now.”
He swiftly unbuckles my wrists, freeing me. I lunge back, moving my hands to cover myself. I’m in my lingerie, my dress crumpled on the floor where Brent stripped it off me.
“Who are you?” I demand, my head spinning with panic and shock.
In the dim light, I can’t make out his features. He’s tall and broad-shouldered, towering above me. But his touch is gentle as he shrugs off his jacket and wraps it around me.
“A friend,” he says. “You can trust me.”
There’s a groan from the floor. Brent is crawling to his knees, nursing a bloody nose. “I’ll fucking sue you for this!” he rages. “Animal! Do you have any idea who I am?”
The stranger doesn’t even look over. All his focus is directed on me. His eyes are dark, and filled with compassion. “We’re leaving now,” he tells me softly. “You’re safe.”
I give a shaky nod, scrambling to grab my purse from the table by the bed.
Then the stranger lifts me effortlessly in his arms, and strides out of the room without a backwards glance. I hide my face against his chest, remembering all the people in the bar, but he turns a different way instead, toward the back of the building. He opens an unmarked door, descends a staircase, and then we’re in the alleyway.
“My car is just down the block.”
I try to get down. “I can walk,” I insist, even though I feel shaky as hell. But the stranger doesn’t release me, and I have no choice but to be carried: pressed against his solid chest, crushed safely in his arms.
He stops beside a classic black Bentley, opens the door, and gently places me in the passenger seat. After buckling my seatbelt he crosses around and gets in the driver’s side.
In the dashboard light, I can see his face properly for the first time. I startle.
“I know you!”
“Cam,” he says, and I see his jaw is clenched in tension. “Cameron McCullough. I worked for your father.”
“At the company.” I’m reeling now. I would see him around the office, his intense blue eyes always looking at me with disapproval, like I was just a vapid waste of space. But if I’d visit and didn’t see him, I’d always leave disappointed.
I can’t believe he’s the one who just rescued me.
“I...” I take a deep breath of air, trying to figure out what to say. “Thank you. For coming in back there.” Those blue eyes are looking at me now, with compassion.
“Of course. He was hurting you.”
Cam starts the engine. It purrs, low and almost silent. “Where can I take you?”
I start to give him my address but then stop. I can’t go back to my apartment, Brent is living there. He’ll be furious about what happened tonight, and worse, he’ll think it’s all my fault.
“I don’t know,” I lean back against the seat, suddenly exhausted. “A hotel, I guess.”
Cam drives away. I stare out the window at the dark city blurring past. My humiliation and upset are fading, and anger is forming instead, a tight knot in my stomach.
I can’t believe Brent would do that to me. I thought he cared about me, that I meant everything to him. That’s what he would tell me, sneaking into my room every night after the summer I turned sixteen. I’d always looked up to him, so I couldn’t believe it when he said he was in love with me. It made me feel so special, like I was the center of his world.
Looking back now, I wonder if he ever meant it. Or did he just love being adored? There was nobody else in my life. Our adoptive father, Ashcroft, was always working, and his wife had passed away from cancer. It was just me and Brent, us against the world. And our younger brother got out of the house as soon as he could.
I realize with a shock that it’s been four years now. I’ve been his plaything all this time. His dirty little secret, he would call me, no matter how much I told myself it wasn’t true. We aren’t related, but I could just imagine the whispers and gossip if people knew the truth.
I sneak a look over at Cam, feeling sick to my stomach that he saw me like that. I know people go to that club for kinky, erotic thrills, but there was nothing sexy about the way Brent treated me, nothing exciting about being used like a cheap toy.
He betrayed me. He doesn’t love me. Tonight was the sharp blade that cut me away from him. How could he denigrate me like that?
I’m never going to trust him again.
The car comes to a stop. I look around. “Where are we?”
“My apartment,” Cam answers. “You can stay here with me until we figure something out. You’ll be safe, don’t worry,” he adds.
“I know,” I reply without thinking. But it’s true. There’s something about this man that inspires trust. And it’s not just his broad shoulders, the confident way he moves, or his take charge attitude, although those certainly help. I also remember how my father was always singing his praises, saying how smart, how driven, how reliable he is.
Cam comes around and opens the door for me. “Are you sure it’s OK?” I ask, following him up the front steps. It’s a brownstone building on a tree-lined street on the Upper East Side. “I don’
t want to be any trouble.”
“It’s no trouble. I don’t want Brent getting anywhere near you,” he says, and I can see the anger that’s still in his eyes.
The elevator takes us up to the penthouse floor. Cam lets us inside, flipping on the lights. “There’s a couple of guest rooms. You can take your pick,” he says. “My sister was here visiting last month, so there are nightclothes she left behind that you can wear.”
I hug my arms around myself and take it all in. Clean, modern, crisp. The huge apartment is open-plan, with a formal dining area, sitting room, and den all visible from the main hall. Cam strides down a hallway, and emerges a moment later with an armful of fresh towels and some clothing.
“Thanks,” I say again, reaching for them. His jacket sleeves slip down to my elbows, revealing my wrists.
His face darkens. “You’re hurt.”
I look down. My wrists are bruised and tender—I didn’t even realize I was struggling against the restraints so hard. “It’s fine,” I say, self-conscious.
Cam just gives me a look. “Go sit down in the kitchen.”
I want to protest. I’m tired, and I just want a hot bath and then bed, but there’s something in his tone that won’t be denied.
I do as he says.
The kitchen is all dark marble countertops and gleaming appliances. Cam joins me at the table with a first-aid kit.
“Fucking amateur,” he curses, examining my wounds. I blink. “Not you,” he adds quickly. “That bastard brother of yours. He doesn’t know the first thing about bondage.”
And you do?
I bite back my reply, looking at Cam with new curiosity. I didn’t even stop to think what