Captive in the Dark(11)

She scowled at him, injecting as much loathing as was possible into a look. Caleb resisted the urge to smile. He guessed she no longer thought he was cute. Good. Cute was for pussies.

Summoning her strength, she pressed the heel of her hand into the carpet and straightened her elbow. Her breath was labored, her eyes winced with pain, but her tears had dried up. Forcing herself onto all fours, she attempted to stand. Fully upright, Caleb reached for her, ignoring her staunch protests. She tugged her arm loose from his grasp, but kept her eyes trained on the ground. He bristled, but let it pass and guided her without touching toward the bed.

She sat precariously on the edge of the bed, her hands covered her breasts and her head tilted forward hiding her in a veil of tangled ebony waves. Caleb sat next to her. He resisted the urge to push her hair away from her face. She could hide from him for now, just until she calmed down.

“Now,” he said pleasantly, “would you, or would you not, like some ice for your face?” He could almost feel the chilling anger rolling off of her. Anger, not fear? He could barely reconcile it in his mind. While he did expect some anger, he did find it particularly odd that she had yet to acknowledge her stark nudity. Shouldn’t she be more frightened than angry?

Shouldn’t she be begging her way into his good graces? Her reactions to him refused to fall between the usual and predictable lines. It was as bemusing as it was intriguing. “Well?” Finally, between clenched teeth she forced herself to say the words, “Yes.





Please.” He couldn’t help himself, he laughed. “Now, was that so hard?” Her jaw visibly ticked, but she remained silent, her eyes fixed on her bruised knees. Good, Caleb thought, he had made himself perfectly clear.

Standing, he turned toward the door, though no sooner had he taken a step than he heard her strained voice at his back.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked hollowly.

He turned, a wry smile playing across his lips. She wanted a reason. Serial killers had reasons. Reasons made no difference.

She continued, “Is it because of that day on the street? Is it because I…” She swallowed hard and Caleb knew it was because she was trying not to cry. “Because I flirted with you? Did I do this to myself?” Despite her noble effort, a fat tear slid down her right cheek.

In that moment, Caleb could not help but regard her as he would any strange creature –

objective but insatiably curious.

“No,” he lied, “it has nothing to do with that day.” She needed him to lie; Caleb understood.

Sometimes a gentle lie was enough to remove the weight of a harsh truth.





It’s not your fault.

Perhaps he needed to lie to himself too, because he remembered wanting her that day, and not for reasons having to do with his mission.

“I’ll go get you some ice. And you could probably use some aspirin too.” They both started at the sound of a key being turned in the lock.

Jair casually entered the room and Caleb made no effort to disguise his anger. “What the f*ck are you doing in here?” Jair was obviously drunk and that made him more dangerous. Jair’s eyes flashed with anger before striding toward the girl cowering on the bed. His eyes raked over her naked body and his lips curved in a covetous smile. “I see the little slut is awake.” The girl was scared, really scared. She’d huddled all the way to the top of bed, covering herself with her hands and hair – trying to pull the comforter up from under her body. He was struck by the fact that she hadn’t reacted to him that way while they were on the bed together.

She had seemed more pissed off than frightened of him, but only after the blindfold came off and she realized who he was. It could mean one of two things: one, she felt like she knew him based on their very brief encounter, or two, she didn’t find him threatening. Either way, her thought process seemed asinine.

Caleb glared at Jair who was eyeing the girl as if he wanted to simultaneously kill her and f*ck her. Given what he knew of Jair, it was possible that’s exactly what he wanted.

There was a test here.



Captive in the Dark CJ Roberts Caleb forced himself to regard Jair as if he mattered, “Well, I’m not sure that’s the name I’ll go with, but yes, she’s awake.” Caleb glanced coolly at the girl over his shoulder, just the barest of looks. He quickly noticed her pleading expression, and added, “And quite spry.” He smiled.

Need and lust were unchecked on Jair’s face, and Caleb knew all too well what men like him fantasized about doing to scared girls. Without hesitation, Jair staggered toward the bed and wrapped his filthy hand around the girl’s ankle and pulled. The girl screamed and clung to the bedpost.