I open my eyes and write that down. Not who he says he is. I stare at the paper. “He wasn’t who he said he was,” I whisper, and one certainty comes to me. David is how I ended up turning to him for help. I went from one evil to another. David left me. He betrayed me, but I don’t know how or why. I blink, and I’m drawing another butterfly. Why am I drawing another butterfly? It’s ridiculous. No wonder my head is starting to hurt, an unwelcome reminder that I need to go to my room and get my pills.

I push to my feet, closing my shirt around me, and exit the security hideaway to enter the bedroom. Pausing in the archway, I stare at the room that is as masculine as the man who owns it, replaying the way he’d touched me. The way he’d kissed me. The way he is somehow demanding and controlling, and yet gentle, even tender. What he makes me feel is the polar opposite of what the man in my flashbacks does, to the point where I don’t know how I could have ever considered them to be the same. I’m not sure I really did. The two of them create intense feelings in me. But David? No. I don’t understand how I let him into my life.

My eyes catch on my hoodie and I pull it on, zipping it up to hold my shirt shut. Next come my slippers, and I hurry to the door, eager to take my medicine before I end up in troubled waters again. I hurry to the door and crack it open, listening for any activity, disappointed to find only the same old moans and creaks, now becoming as familiar to me as Kayden has always been.

I step into the hallway, the chill of the castle touching my bare legs, urging me to double-step toward my room. Once I’m inside, I rush to the bathroom and grab my purse, opening it and staring at that damn gun again. “Glock 41 Gen4,” I whisper. “My father’s favorite handgun.” My hand presses to my forehead. He loves guns. Or he loved guns. I don’t know which for sure. He was—is?—a gun enthusiast, of that I know, and he expected me to be as well. He made me go to the gun range. I have a momentary flashback of myself at a target range, and him yelling at me for my horrible shooting. He got angry when I couldn’t hit the targets. Very angry, and so I got very, very good with a gun. A wave of nausea rushes over me and I double over, grabbing the edge of the sink. I start breathing hard, sucking in air with effort.

Angry at my weakness, and for other reasons I don’t understand, I straighten and open a drawer, shoving the gun inside, sealing it away, out of sight and I hope out of mind. I grab the bottle of pills and open it, popping one in my mouth and cupping water in my hand from the sink to swallow it. Then I shove the bottle into my pocket and enter the bedroom, where I grab my journal from the nightstand. I open it and stare down at the butterfly. I shut it again and set it back on the nightstand, frustrated by the games my mind is playing with me. That’s when it hits me that I’ve left the folder I’m supposed to study in the kitchen. That’s what I can use to consume my mind while I await Kayden’s return.

I’m at the archway to the living room before I remember making the decision to even leave the bedroom, which is pretty darn scary, but I am here now, and I cross to the kitchen, not bothering to brighten the lights, actually welcoming the shadows that fit my mood. I head for the table where the folder should be and stop dead in my tracks at the outline of someone sitting at the opposite end.

“Ella,” Kayden says, and this time I swear my name on his lips is blood bleeding from those wounds I’d felt in him early tonight.

My fingers dig into the chair I’d held onto before dinner and it hits me that he might be here because I was in his room and he couldn’t go there. “I can go to my room.”

“Come here.”

It’s an order, not a question, his tone low and rough, and I’m not sure if that’s good or bad. I don’t ask. I don’t care. I want to go to him and I do, rounding the table to join him. He pushes his chair back just enough to pull me in front of him, his hands branding my hips through the thin silk of my gown, my backside pressed to the table. He doesn’t look at me at first, but I feel him. Oh God, how I feel him. I am tingling all over, aware of this man in every part of me, in a way that reaches far beyond the physical. Finally, his head lifts and our gazes collide, cutting through the darkness and the connection we share, shaking me to the core, leaving me vulnerable and exposed, but not afraid as I am in my flashbacks.

I’m not sure who moves first, but our foreheads come together and we stay like that, just breathing together, every second driving the anticipation of what will come next. I cup his face and I know whatever was said to him downstairs affects him. “I don’t know what happened between you and Gallo, but you aren’t to blame for what’s happening to Giada.”

He leans back to look at me, and there are no shadows, no matter how deep or dark, that could hide the shame in his eyes. “This is my chapter of The Underground. I run it, as Kevin did before me. I am responsible for every person beneath me. I let her father take that job.”

“Did you believe he was in danger when you did, any more than you do with any other job?”

“No. I didn’t.”

“Then you are not to blame.”

He sets me on top of the table, scooting his chair closer to me, and his head drops in front of me, blocking his emotions from my sight. “There are things you don’t know or understand.”

My fingers slide into his hair. “Make me understand.”

He looks at me. “I don’t want you to understand. Not now. Not ever.” He drags me onto his lap, my legs on either side of his hips, his hand cupping my head, his breath warm on my lips.

“Kayden—”

“No,” he says, his tone nonnegotiable, dragging my mouth to his, his tongue stroking against mine, ending the chance for words, but he lets me taste the answers he will not give me. The hate. His hate for himself in the here and now that I do not understand. I want to understand. But I am still new to him and he to me, and I can tell that questions are not what he needs from me now. I wrap my arms around his neck, and telling him I am his with my kiss, I hold on to him and refuse to let go, my actions echoing his earlier words to me.

He unzips my hoodie, his hands traveling up my waist, over the curve of my breasts, and my nipples tighten and ache with a soft brush of his fingers. He twirls them, his touch rough, arousing. Then his lips leave mine and he looks at me, letting me see what I have tasted, but he refuses to speak. In a blink, his expression has become guarded, the emotion banked deep in some part of him I know I will touch again tonight.

His hand slides to my back and he leans me toward the table, forcing me to catch myself on my elbows. He holds me there, his body cradling mine, his lips a breath from a touch. “I won’t let you fall.”

“I know,” I say, and I do now. Beyond time and reason, I trust this man.

His mouth brushes mine and then trails down my jaw, slowly teasing a path to my ear, where he whispers, “I’m not going to claim to own you the way he did.” He flattens his hands on my belly, possessiveness in the touch. “I’m just going to make you wish I did.”

My lips part with the erotic promise, and he is already kissing me, licking into my mouth, his tongue a sultry, seductive promise that he can make good on his vow. And while I do not wish anyone to own me again, I want what he offers in a way that defies reason.

He nips my lips and licks away the sweet ache, and somehow I feel that lick between my thighs where I am already wet and aching. His whiskers rasp on my cheek, down my neck to my shoulder, a wicked burn that is torment and pleasure at the same time. Like he is. His hands settle on my waist, lingering there, teasing me with all the places they could go, until finally he is caressing my body, up and down, a slow, sexy, torturous exploration.