Blood Ties (Dinero de Sangre #2) - Lana Sky Page 0,11

by whatever boldness has taken hold of me, I keep talking. “I think I’m showing the man you sold me to what he can expect once he completes his purchase.”

I wince at the intensity his eyes take on. Something beyond anger, beyond rage.

“Oh, how I will punish you for that,” he growls, lowering his mouth against my ear. “You have no fucking idea of the danger you are in. The sheer stupidity of what you’re doing—”

“Then tell me.” I’m louder than he is, threatening to break the show he’s putting on.

Touching me like this…

From the outside, I know what it will look like. Like I’m out here with his permission—that his relationship with me is cordial enough to permit him to stroke my cheek and stand so close.

But why? It’s not the expected behavior a man would show toward a woman he’s brutalized and kidnapped.

And relenting to his touch isn’t the way one would expect such a woman to act toward her captor.

I must twitch or make some move to pull away because he’s closer, using his body weight to practically crush me against the railing.

“Get the fuck inside.” His tone loses any shred of control; it’s rippling, verging on something too primal to be considered speech. “You dumb, stupid cunt. You have no idea what you’ve done. None!”

But said ignorance isn’t any fault of my own. It strikes me now that, against his demands, I have one last card to play, however fragile it may be.

I raise my hand, cupping the back of his. As a result, his nails scrape against my cheek in a silent warning—but I’m playing along.

For now.

“Then tell me,” I demand.

Finally, his eyes dart away from me, and I have my answer as to whose presence has him on edge—Jaguar’s. Whatever he sees triggers a flicker of alarm across his expression.

The next thing I know, his mouth is on mine, his hands roughly cupping my hips, pulling me into him. From the outside, it must look like a sexy, heated kiss filled with lust and passion.

In reality, his teeth seize onto my lower lip, preventing any chance I could easily pull away. With his strength, he snatches me to him, maneuvering me from the balcony and within the room in seconds.

Once we’re away from view, he shoves me so hard I go flying, barely managing to catch myself on the edge of the mattress.

“You will pay for this,” he warns, his voice ice. “You—”

“Tell me why or I’ll scream,” I croak, still stunned by how quickly he moved.

The threat, however, must slip beneath his armor. He flinches, his eyes slits as I open my mouth and suck in air in preparation.

“Tell me—”

“You aren’t supposed to know that I’ve sold you.” He says it so tonelessly. As if he’s referring to a pair of shoes and not a woman. Me. My body. My life.

Voice rasping, the only reply I can choke out is, “W-What?”

“Why would I tell you?” he adds, closing the door to the balcony with a thud. Arms crossed, he starts to pace, his back to me. Ironically, it’s reminiscent of the times I would watch him in the dark, performing this very act in front of my family’s guest house, seeming as though the weight of the world rested on his shoulders. “As far as Jaguar knows, you think I’ve rescued you from the attack that killed your boyfriend. You think you’re safe under my protection here. It minimizes the risk to him for you to be in the dark.”

He doesn’t laugh or sneer. He’s telling the truth.

In Jaguar’s eyes, I’m his simpering little fool.

“You… You unimaginable bastard.” My voice breaks. I almost can’t fathom the cruelty—let alone the thought that he’s telling the truth. That could have easily been my reality if I didn’t regain consciousness to overhear his two goons discussing his ownership of me.

He even said it himself—I aimed to use her ignorance to my advantage.

The worst part that I find truly horrifying is that it could have worked. In a different world, I could have easily been lulled into a false sense of safety, believing he was my savior. In fact, that was my first hope soon after I awoke here.

And he took great pains to reveal that hope for what it was—fragile and pathetic.

“Why?” I demand. “Why tell me at all? Do you get off on my fear?”

Or maybe he truly hates me that much. He couldn’t even endure a lie long enough to gain my trust and