Caged (19 page)

“O
PEN THE DOOR, YOU SON
of a bitch!”

My palms were so sore, the rough wood from the door making my skin split, and the strength with which I had been banging for nearly an hour bruising the tender flesh up the side.

“Open – the – fucking – door! I need food. I’m starving here!”

Although, as before, I had woken each day to limited but sufficient supplies, my mind was torturing me. What if something had happened to Anderson and I was trapped down here? No one knew where I was! I could starve to death!

“Anderson!”

Shocked when I heard the bolts disengaging, I froze and stepped back a little. It swung open to Anderson’s steely gaze, his furious green eyes simmering with rage.

“Finished?” he hissed.

The anger pouring from him scared me, but not as much as the storm that controlled my mind. “I need food, you arsehole! You can’t keep me here! I need…”

I gasped when his fist grabbed a section of my hair and he yanked me through the basement doorway and into the main area of the house. My fingers instinctively curled around his as I tried to ease his unyielding hold. My legs couldn’t keep up with him as he dragged me up some stairs, my feet only just sweeping the floor with his brisk strides.

“Anderson!” I yelled, wincing when his grip on my hair tightened and my skull cried out in pain. “Stop!”

But he didn’t stop. Not until he hauled me into a bathroom where he flung me against the wall. I couldn’t catch my breath when he bunched my vest in both hands and tore it from me. My sweatpants went next, and then my knickers until I was naked, cold and scared, my body trembling in fright as I tried to curl into the wall.

Before I could work out what was happening he lifted my body and threw me into the bath which was already filled to the rim.

The freezing water crippled my lungs with shock and I gasped, my mouth opening and shutting in attempt to draw breath.

“You don’t need food!” he thundered, dipping down so his face was pressing into mine. “I fed you!”

Trying to fight, I grabbed the edge of the bath and tried to scramble out, but Anderson pressed me down, his strong hold refusing my escape. My blood froze within my veins as goose bumps tried to warm my iced skin.

“Do you still want food now?” he spat at me, the hatred on his face making me cry.

I hated that I gave him my tears, that he knew he could bring me to this level, but I couldn’t hold them back, my despair too strong to take control of it.

My heart was racing as it tried to heat the cold blood running around me. My stomach hurt and my legs ached with the physical strain on my muscles. But still he didn’t let go, his strict punishment holding me beneath the depths of the icy water.

“Do you?” he screamed at me, spit flying from him and hitting me in the face. “You selfish little bitch!”

And then he hauled me out, once again by the hair. I cried out when my numb body hit the harsh floor tiles, the thump to my hip making me weep harder.

“Please,” I begged. “Anderson, please. I’m sorry!”

Ignoring my pleas he pulled me along a hallway and into a room. I was too terrified to take note of the surroundings, my mind only full of the horrors of what was happening and what was coming.

Anderson tossed me onto a bed, my back bouncing on a soft mattress and I tried to scramble backwards. But he was on me in seconds. Forcing my legs open, he pushed down his sweatpants and forced his way into my dry cunt, one of his hands trapping my throat and one holding my leg to the side. He started to fuck me hard, my sobs doing nothing to stop his forceful thrusts.

My chest hurt under the constriction to my windpipe and my focus started to swim with the lack of air to my brain. My mouth opened and shut but no words could force their way free.

His fingers dug deep into my thigh, bruising and pinching, his jaw as tight as his grip on me. The look on his face was feral, like a crazy man had taken him over. He hissed cruel words, yet over and over, he told me how good I felt, how slick my cunt was, how everything disappeared when he was inside me. His bare chest heaved against mine, the roughness of his fingers pressed into my jugular and the wildness to his green eyes bore deep into me.

Finding some strength from the pit of my stomach I reached out and hit him, my fists that were still sore from the door finding his face, his back, his kidneys, anything I could come in to contact with.

“That’s it,” he whispered. “Harder! Hit me harder, Kloe!”

I didn’t understand him, why he was goading my attack on him. However, I gave him what he wanted, punching, kicking, biting, scratching and tearing into him and at him with a force that frightened myself. My mind slithered into some unknown realm, rage and violence taking over until I started to fuck him back just as brutally as he was me.

He flipped me over, forcing my face into the pillow. But I needed more. My body and mind were so highly strung that his vicious taking was the only thing I could concentrate on,
wanted
to concentrate on.

“Fuck me!” he roared in my ear as he pushed me onto all fours. “Fuck me, damn it!”

I screamed, slamming back onto him like my next breath depended on it, driving him deeper inside me until all I could feel was him, his cock, and the overwhelming violent pleasure racing through my veins. Heat spurred me on, flames licking my belly and driving me wild beneath him.

My muscles coiled tight, my heart rate hiked into dangerous territory and the need in me for release was making me vibrate with sensation.

His fingers found my nipple and he pinched hard as more fingers found my clit and squeezed. His cock pummelled in and out of me, and his cruel hot words sent my mind into insanity.

One more forceful thrust and he spilled inside me, triggering an almighty orgasm to take me under. My eyes rolled back, my back arched painfully and the raw scream that tore up my throat all swept me up in their brutality. Every part of me trembled with the raging inferno that whipped over me, the hum in my ears making me feel claustrophobic.

Everything stilled suddenly and all I could hear was mine and Anderson’s raging breaths and the thump of my pulse in my ears. His forehead hit my back and his sweat felt sticky on my skin.

“Kloe.” His whisper contained so much emotion that it sounded as suffocated as I felt.

I couldn’t move, the craziness of what had just happened hitting me full force. Strangely though, I didn’t feel dirty. I didn’t feel angry or violated. I just felt sad. An overwhelming misery sweeping me under and squashing every other emotion.

When a choked sob tore from me, Anderson was quick to huddle me up and pull me to his chest.

“I’m sorry, Kloe. I’m so sorry.”

I should have been furious with him, hateful for the way he had taken me. But I didn’t, I couldn’t. His arms around me felt too good, protective and strong, and as confused as that should have made me, all my thoughts centred on how good it was to be held, and to be needed with so much urgency and passion that it bordered on violence.

My body was thrumming with the aftershocks of the most intense orgasm of my life, and even though I tightened my arms around Anderson like I couldn’t get close enough, I had to wonder what kind of person gained pleasure from being taken so roughly? What kind of person felt the stirrings of something inexplicable inside them after being fucked like I had just been? I wasn’t even sure if it was consensual.

“Shh. I shouldn’t have… I’m sorry.” Anderson whispered, the pain and guilt in his voice making me cry harder.

How fucked up were we?

How sick and depraved could we go?
Would
we go?

Something inside me knew Anderson - really knew him. I connected with him. I understood him. And as much as that scared the living daylights out of me, it also made my heart beat hard and my blood rush with an excitement I hadn’t ever felt before.

Anderson was a monster. Of that I had no doubt. So, what did that make me? Because I was falling for a monster. Deeper than I would have ever thought possible.

T
HE PREVIOUS LIGHT THAT HAD
filled the room was gone when I woke and I felt disorientated and dazed as I slowly opened my eyes.

The right half of my body, and the bed, were cold and empty. I’d fallen asleep with Kloe in my arms, her infrequent sobs and her warmth and soft curves against me had lulled me into a hard slumber, something I hadn’t experienced for a hell of a long time.

Shooting up, the pressure behind my ribcage making me suck in a large breath, I scanned the dim room.

Red, who always slept beside me, was also missing. And for that reason I knew Kloe hadn’t walked out of the front door. If Red was with her then she was around somewhere.

As I walked down the stairs I had to wonder why she hadn’t just turned the key, slid across the bolts on the door and left. The way I had… the
crue
l way I had taken her earlier made the nausea in my gut twist into vomit and I had to swallow deeply to force it back down. I knew I wasn’t a good man, but fuck, I wasn’t a fucking rapist. How could I have hurt her like that? Yes, I was keeping her locked up, but that was for reasons she would find out soon enough, but I had sworn to myself that I wouldn’t hurt her. It had proven to be more difficult than I’d imagined though. Kloe Grant brought out feelings in me that hurt, that crucified me, and as well as having to face Kloe’s demons, I also had to face my own. But I’d put myself there; there was only me to blame for this shit.

Confusion had taken over though, when she’d turned her little body into mine and wept, her soul-wrenching cries making my heart pound faster than it ever had before. The deep way she looked at me, with her huge blue eyes, did something to me that I wouldn’t identify to myself.

A sound from the kitchen made me turn and head that way. Red sat in the doorway to the pantry and she shifted her eyes my way as I approached.

A deep sigh left me and for a moment I closed my eyes, bracing myself for what I prayed I wouldn’t find, but knew I would.

Kloe was frantic, her eyes scanning the shelves and the pencil she had in her hand scribbling insanely over a pad of paper in her hand. Her lips moved as she silently mumbled the contents of the pantry.

Gritting my teeth I opened a few cupboard doors in the kitchen and pulled out the few items stocked in there. Then, carrying them over to the pantry, I shoved up some cans on a shelf and placed down the items. Then I went back for more. And more. Until the shelves were so full I thought they’d give way under the weight.

Kloe, as if unaware of my presence, continued until all the items were logged in her little book. Her tongue and teeth worked over her lip when she repeated the process, screwing up the first sheet as if it told her a lie, and starting again.

“Why did you change your name?”

I caught the slightest stutter in her movements. But she carried on. However, knowing I’d disturbed her mental state, she appeared to struggle counting. Eventually she blew out a breath and turned to me, her heated eyes falling to where I sat on the step down into the pantry watching her.

“You know why?”

“No, I don’t.”

Confusion swept across her face and she frowned. “I thought you knew all about me?”

“I know the very basics but nothing else.”

Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. She scanned the shelves, her teeth chewing on her lip in frustration as I disturbed her chore. Reaching up, she moved some tins around, keeping her gaze from me. “I was nine when… and my mother had been dead for eight weeks.”

My teeth sank into my bottom lip, the taste of blood filling my mouth when I bit too hard.
Oh Christ!
No wonder she was as fucked up as me.

“You were in the attic with your dead mother for eight weeks?”

She nodded then stilled, blinking, and her brow creased. “I think I went a little crazy in those weeks.”

“I’m not surprised.”

She glanced at me and then frowned harder. “I remember the smell. She’d always smelled of fresh soap before, but…” Retching, she shook her head and blew out a steadying breath. Then she slowly turned her eyes my way. Tiny beads of tears collected on the bottom lid of her beautiful eyes, marbling the sheer blue of her irises, and she chewed her lip for a second. “I spoke to her all that time, like she was alive. Like she was in there with me.”