Page 91 of Royal Games (The Royals of Monterra)

He didn’t remove the gag.

I saw two men with him and recognized one of them as the man who had mugged Rafe. “You were at the club,” I tried to say. I didn’t know if they could understand me.

“No one’s interested in anything you have to say,” John-Paul replied, as he pushed me toward some bushes. “Get changed. And don’t even think about running. Because we will catch you, and then I’ll have to punish you.”

All that time in the trunk had messed with my ability to think or to plan. Instead I went behind the bushes and hurried to take off my clothes and put the dress on. I knew the kind of punishments he was capable of.

“Do you know how long I’ve been watching your sinful life? How easy it was to find you after you paraded yourself around on television for the whole world to see?”

I had been so stupid to go on that show. So careless. I had thought myself untouchable. My temporary rebellion had stripped me of my loved ones. And my freedom.

“As if I didn’t raise you better. I sent you messages. To let you know that I was watching you. I gave you a chance to repent. But instead you flaunted that man in my face. I was going to teach you a lesson the night you went into the city with him. But we weren’t able to follow you because Simon got our car towed. Just know that that night, you were supposed to have been mine.”

The night I decided to give Rafe another chance. A night that had been special and meaningful to me was now tainted by John-Paul.

“And then there was your self-indulgent party, where you made yourself the center of attention. Do you know how easy it was for me to sneak in? To leave you that picture? I was there. In that room with you. And you didn’t even know it.”

I hadn’t even sensed him. I had been so caught up in Rafe and my friends that he had stood in the diner with me and I had been completely unaware. I dropped my head into my hands. I had finished dressing a while ago, but I really didn’t want to get back in that trunk.

John-Paul crashed through the bushes, pointing his knife at me. “Your salvation is my responsibility, and it is up to me to make sure you obey and live a sinless life.”

“Please don’t put me in the trunk,” I tried to say, as he put the zip ties back around my ankles and wrists. One of the men came over to help him pick me up, and although I struggled and fought, arching away from them, they threw me back in the trunk, slamming the lid shut.

I cried and endured panic attack after panic attack. I felt like I was drowning. Like someone had dropped me into a washing machine, turned it on high, and I was stuck in a dark pool of agitating water, being thrown back and forth, never able to find my way out or catch my breath. For hours and hours.

In the midst of that, someone slammed on the brakes, throwing me forward. My head hit something hard, making me go dizzy. I thought I heard yelling and doors slamming, and then somebody messing with the trunk. Sunlight blinded me, and I held my hands up to shade my eyes.

All the voices around me sounded so far away. One voice kept trying to get my attention, calling me by name. I couldn’t understand what it was saying.

There were flashing lights on cars behind us. My fingers and toes felt completely numb, my whole body shaking. People were tugging at me, trying to get the restraints off.

I was lifted out of the trunk, and I passed out.

“She’s gone into shock,” I heard someone say as I came to, all the sounds still muffled, my vision blurry and hazy.

A face came into my sight line. “Genesis, please. Say something.”

It was Rafe. How could it be Rafe? Was I dreaming? Was I still in that trunk and imagining being rescued? I blinked, trying to focus. It looked like we were in an ambulance. And I was on a gurney.

“Rafe?” My voice sounded like a kitten’s mewl, with no strength at all behind it. What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I talk?

He hugged me, and it sounded like he had been crying. “He is never going to hurt you again. I promise you. Never again.” His words echoed around me, bouncing off my ears. I squinted and put my hands up to prevent sound from coming in. He was so loud.

“How ... how ... Am I still in the trunk?” It hurt to talk. It hurt my chest, my head, and my mouth was so dry. What kind of dream was this? Everything was so fuzzy and removed.

I heard the words “tracker” and “key.” My mind attempted to put it all together. “There’s a tracker on my keys?” I tried to feel for my keys in my pocket. I needed them to cut my bindings. But my fingers weren’t cooperating.

For some reason, a tracker on my keys felt extraordinarily bad. Wrong. Like a broken promise.

“You’re just like him. Like John-Paul. You want to own me.” I flinched. I didn’t mean those words. I didn’t even want to say them. But they came out. As if someone else was in charge of my mouth.

It was like an out-of-body experience. I was watching the dream, removed from it, but unable to control what was happening. My stomach doubled up in pain, and I groaned, trying to curl myself into a ball. I heard yelling and beeping.

Then I was in the coal bin, with John-Paul standing outside of it, yelling at me while he slammed on the wood. “Tell me you don’t love him! You don’t love Rafe!”

All I wanted was to escape. I would have said anything. “I don’t love Rafe! I don’t love him! Let me out!”

The coal bin swirled away, and I was back in the bright ambulance.

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