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  After dressing in that stupid and embarrassing outfit, she washed up and went to make His Highness some breakfast. She looked around the kitchen, and sure enough, he was right – there weren’t any real sharp utensils. But maybe if she thrust hard enough, she could hurt him with a fork or a butter knife. She snorted at that thought. He’d probably incapacitate her before she had a chance to raise her arm. At exactly six, he sat at the small table as Kat put eggs and toast in front of him. He mumbled something that sounded like a thank you but then his eyes snapped up and narrowed at her. Clearly, he didn’t want to be thanking her and yet somehow, this was her fault that he had acknowledged her. He was definitely a confusing guy.

  “I wasn’t sure what you liked, so I thought I couldn’t go wrong with scrambled eggs. But if you tell me what kind of things you like, I can make them. If you have a preference for lunch or dinner, let me know. I’ve been told I’m actually a pretty good cook.” The words tumbled out of her mouth as if her mind and her speech hadn’t been in sync. Before she had time to mentally chastise herself for sounding so caring, he spoke.

  “I like variety, but I eat just about anything. Make something new and different each time and I’ll let you know if I don’t like something.” His tone was flat, but that was a step up from the cold edge the previous day. There was something her still fuddled brain was trying to process.

  He interrupted her thoughts. “I will be gone until dinner today. Do not idle. I will know if you didn’t do your work.”

  She stood pretty still, waiting for her mind to catch up with the situation, but it was no use. He walked toward the door and she tried to see what numbers he was punching, but then he swiped his damn thumb on something too. So even if she could get the numbers, she was pretty sure her thumbprint didn’t match his. At least she comprehended that much.

  “Please,” she asked before he walked out. She wanted to at least know his name; she felt like that was something she should know, the name of her captor. “Tell me your name.”

  He stopped short of the door and turned around, his eyes blazing with fury, a fire she felt in her very bones. His name. It was a simple request, but each time she asked, his anger became more pronounced. She sucked in a breath and held it, her body frozen with panic.

  “Don’t ask me that again,” he growled, his cold eyes trained on her, leaving an unspoken threat hanging in the air. They stood at opposite sides of the room, but the tension in the air made Kat feel like she was inches from his face. He narrowed his eyes, studying her, and must have been satisfied with whatever he saw because a moment later, he stormed out, shutting the door behind him.

  It took a few minutes for the dread to wear off and the anger to set in. Well, if he wasn’t going to answer her, then she could think of a few choice words to use instead of a name. Kat sighed and tried to eat breakfast even though she didn’t have an appetite. While cleaning up, it finally hit her. He was still an ass, but when she was nice to him, he responded, reluctantly, but at least he responded. Well, except when it came to his name. That was a touchy subject. Other than that, though, huh. Kill him with kindness. She could do that. She could wear him down, break down his walls, and then he’d let her go. She knew it was pretty unrealistic, but she had nothing else and if she dwelled on her current situation, she knew she’d snap. She couldn’t afford to do that, and she wasn’t about to let him see her tears. No. That was a promise to herself she wasn’t willing to break. Screw him, she thought. He wanted to play games, she’d show him games. If he was Mr. Asshole, she’d be Miss Sweetheart. She’d get him to cave; she had to. She had no other options and no other choice.

  Kat put those thoughts to rest. There was nothing she could do at the present but get to work. Even with her master plan, she wasn’t willing to defy him, and not following his rules would defeat the purpose of being nice. Cleaning the house was much easier that day. She knew where everything was and the best way to tackle the job. After a few hours, she was done. She tried to go through the mental list of things he told her to do. Make the beds, laundry. She couldn’t think of anything else. She quickly made the beds and there wasn’t enough laundry to do it yet. She figured once a week would be good. She shook her head with disbelief to dislodge her long-term thoughts.

  With time on her hands, she decided to do a little snooping. She started with his room. She looked through all his drawers, his closet, under his bed, and even in his bathroom. She didn’t find anything that could tell her about this man or how to get through to him. What was actually kind of odd was how bare his room was. He only had some clothes and a few papers here and there. As clean as he was, the ironic thing was that although everything was put away, underwear and clothes were just stuffed into the dresser and loosely hung up. Some shirts were on the verge of having their shoulders stretched from being on the hanger incorrectly. Huh. She thought that was interesting.

  She moved on to the office and she finally had time to admire the bookshelf. Damn! It had only been about two days and she already missed having the comfort of a book to read. She browsed the titles. Some she knew, some were classics, and some were ones she hadn’t read. The amusing part was the eclectic choice of books. She had expected military-style books, maybe even some history books, from someone who seemed so overpowering. Nope, he had a large selection of different genres – mystery, fiction, nonfiction, fantasy, and sci-fi. There was also a section with books about prisons and law. She pulled one of the law books off the shelf and scanned it quickly. There were notes in the margins of some of the pages and she wondered if that was his writing. She had figured out he had been in jail from what little he had said. But for what? She wasn’t sure. She wondered if he was trying to clear his name. It didn’t matter to her. All that mattered was finding some trace of who he was so she could work on getting the heck out of dodge.

  She took one last look at the books, telling herself that next time she had some time on her hands, she would start working her way through his collection.

  She looked at the time and wondered where it had gone. She would have to start dinner soon. She still had the desk drawers to look through. And as she tugged on the first one, she realized with disappointment that it was locked. And then, of course, the other drawers were too. Yep, being left alone to snoop was definitely too good to be true. If only she knew how to pick a lock. She’d have to work on that.

  She let the disappointment creep in for only a moment before she started dinner. While she was cooking, she actually started thinking about her situation. She knew next to nothing about this guy. She didn’t even know his name. All she knew was that he was pretty clean, felt he needed to get revenge against her because he thought she was involved somehow, and he left her pretty much alone most of the time. He scared the hell out of her and yet, she wasn’t actually afraid he’d do anything to truly harm her. Humiliate her, yes. Physically hurt her, didn’t seem like it. After all, when he threatened her with punishment, it was just more forms of degradation and humiliation. She had to figure out how to use that to her advantage. She tried being nice and he just left. She couldn’t use her non-existent feminine charms on him if he was never there. One option she had was to try to catch him off guard at dinner by being Miss Nicey-Nice again. For now that was her only plan. It had better work soon because there was no way Kat was going to be stuck being a slave. She might be a shy, mousy bookworm, but deep down she had her own little bit of feistiness. Oh, Mr. Kidnapper, be prepared to be played. She crossed her fingers and knocked on the wood cabinet beside her. She figured she could never be too superstitious. She finished dinner and waited. Any minute now, she could play a doting…er…a doting…kidnapee? Sure, whatever worked.

  Chapter 7

  Mason should have been working at another one of his odd jobs, but Kat had gotten to him, and he had spent the past two days drinking with Benny. How low he had sunk. He used to be a prominent doctor, but thanks to his bogus conviction, his license was gone, and no one wanted to hire him for any type of
“professional” job. Thankfully, he still had some money left from his inheritance. Most of the money he had earned himself had gone toward his legal defense, whatever good that did him. He could probably survive more or less on just what he had in the bank if he was frugal, but he couldn’t be idle every day all day. He ended up landing non-steady jobs, mostly manual labor, ranging from construction to mechanical work, even being a type of garbage man for some companies when they needed to dispose of certain types of waste. Benny had offered some, what he would call unsavory, work. Mostly keeping track of some of his illegal gambling spots, but Mason couldn’t bring himself to do that. Funny, that kind of illegal was out, but kidnapping was okay because it was justified. So then Benny had a friend of a friend who hired out for temporary jobs and that was what he’d been doing for the last year. From sought-after doctor to kidnapping garbage man. This was all Kat’s fault. The only good thing about his inconsistent work schedule was that he had plenty of time to figure out his plan for revenge. He had spent the last year, with Benny’s help, rearranging his place. “Tricking it out” as Benny would say, with the latest and greatest gadgets to ensure Kat wouldn’t be able to get out and no one would know she was there. He had spent a big portion of that time following Kat Gingham around. Watching her, waiting for a way to get to her without arousing any suspicions. He was pretty surprised when he saw she had cleaned up her act, sobered up, and appeared to have even found a boyfriend. Too bad her lying, abusing past had done a number on him. He wondered sometimes if she ever thought about him and felt guilty for lying. But if she had, wouldn’t she have come forward and set the record straight? Nope, clearly this new-found life was all about her. Selfish.

  As luck would have it, Kat and her boyfriend had broken up. She had no job, and it appeared she was about to be without a place to stay. He watched her for long enough to know she didn’t have any friends, and she didn’t seem to keep in touch with anyone. It was like Mason’s own personal sign that the time was right. Getting into her place was easy, knocking her out was easier, getting her to his place and essentially locking her up was a cinch. But being with her in the same place, torture. What he remembered of her from the hospital, she was scrawny and scratched up. Her junkie appearance was not attractive at all. When he studied her after he was out of the hellhole, it was almost like she was a different person. Her body had filled out and her face looked healthy, but she looked tired and sad and worn down. He had to keep telling himself that she was just the object of his revenge. But now she was real. He didn’t regret what he had done, but at the same time, he realized in the back of his mind that, technically, kidnapping someone was wrong. Now that she was in front of him, though, she wasn’t as weak as she had appeared to be when she was with her boyfriend. That thoroughly confused him. At the same time, she was feisty enough to exact revenge on him, so should he really be that surprised. But damn, if she didn’t look good in that little French maid outfit Benny had suggested. Her lean legs went on for days and her breasts barely squeezed into the top. Her bottom lip was a bit fuller than her top, giving her an almost pouty expression, while her big hazel eyes pleaded with him. When he looked at her, he almost believed the confusion written in her eyes. He wondered if it was possible that the drugs had done some permanent damage that caused her to truly forget what the hell she had done to him. It wasn’t unheard of, but it was pretty unlikely. Nope, he reminded himself, it was all an act. Now that she had been caught, she was trying to manipulate him with her puppy dog eyes.

  The other confusing part about all this was her almost immediate acceptance of her situation. She tried to assert herself the first day, but that was pretty much it. She followed his rules and was even nice to him. What the hell was that about? He expected her to fight him, try to hit him, even attempt to outsmart him. The most she did was aggravate him with her assertions that she didn’t remember him. This was supposed to be punishment. This was supposed to get under her skin so she felt pain, humiliation, fear, and worry. This wasn’t a fucking picnic, but she was treating it as such and it was shaking his nerves. He had left two days in a row to hang out with Benny and his buddies because he just couldn’t be around Kat. In just two short days, she had managed to get under his skin and that was not the plan. He was in control. He had the upper hand. And when he came home for dinner tonight, he would put her in her place. She thought cleaning was easy, fine. He’d make her do a ton more chores and then some. See how cheery her disposition would be then. He hated her for what she did do him, and now he was hating her for what she was doing to his damn mind. He suffered thanks to her, and she should be suffering now too. He was going to work her to the bone and get her off his mind.

  Chapter 8

  As Mason walked through the door, the sweet aroma of food almost knocked him back. He knew how to cook, but he hadn’t really cooked since before he was locked up. And he most definitely hadn’t had a good home cooked meal in forever. He looked around the place and it was spotless, just the way he liked it. He was always fond of a clean house, but he would be the first to admit that it became an obsession of sort after he was out of jail. He was constantly trying to wash away the memories of being locked up, even in his home. But he also might be exaggerating the extent of cleanliness he needed for the sole purpose of torturing Kat. He took a second to study Kat before she turned and from her profile, she was smirking. What the hell was that? Oh, he needed to step up his game for sure.

  “I hope you like baked chicken and vegetables,” she almost sang as she turned to him. This was really starting to freak him out. She wasn’t supposed to be happy. He straightened his back and walked to the table without saying a word or acknowledging her.

  She set the plate in front of him and was about to sit herself when he looked up into her deep brown eyes. He saw a slight spark of fear, which pleased him, but then he also saw uneasiness and even a bit of something he couldn’t put his finger on that he didn’t like. “You sit and eat after I am done. We are not equal. You do not speak to me like I’m your friend. We are not friends. You are here because of what you did to me. Think of it as if you are paying me back. You may stand behind the counter and wait for instructions.”

  He was waiting for her to cry, breakdown, maybe even scream at him, but all she did was purse her lips into a thin line, nod sharply, and walk around the counter. While he ate in silence, her eyes bored into him.

  “Do not fidget. And bring me a Coke.” He spoke to her after he was halfway done. He would never admit to her that she was a damn good cook. Turns out there would be some more benefits to this little arrangement than he originally thought.

  A moment later, he felt her near him as she set the Coke down beside his plate. “I didn’t do whatever you think it is I did. And you might have convinced yourself otherwise, but I have nothing to repay you for. I am essentially your slave. You might be able to boss me around because I’ll be the first to admit you could probably take me down with one hand and I don’t want to find out what happens if I don’t follow your absurd rules. But you are right about one thing. I am not your equal. I am so much more.”

  She turned on her heel and walked out of the room before Mason could even process what the hell had even happened. He just sat there for a minute with a full fork halfway to his mouth, while his jaw almost touched the floor. Who the hell was this woman and who did she think she was? He couldn’t believe that she had the nerve to talk back to him. And her words confused him. Of course she had been the one to put him in jail, how dare she sit there and play him like she didn’t know.

  He threw the fork down with such force that little bits of food splashed over the plate. He stormed after her, flinging the door to her room open, and marching toward her bed where she was now cowering against the headboard.

  “You think you can talk back to me, run away, and I’ll be Mr. Understanding? Look at you, shivering here like a scared little cat. You have the balls to attack me while I’m eating, but when I come to confront you, you can�
�t even say a word. Remember what I told you if you step out of line. You lose your privacy privileges. I should rip the door off its hinges right now. I should watch you in your most private moments so you feel only shame instead of whatever the hell little courage you felt a few minutes ago. But I have a better idea for now. Thanks to your little stunt out there,” he pointed toward the kitchen, “I’ve made a little mess. You will clean the entire kitchen from scratch, using only a toothbrush.”

  “But it’s all clean!” she interrupted, puffing out her chest a bit, finding another bit of courage. This only encouraged him more.

  “Oh and that’s not all. You will start now. You won’t go to sleep until it’s done. You will still be expected to have my breakfast ready at six tomorrow. All the regular chores will be done tomorrow, but to add to them, you will clean the bathrooms with a toothbrush as well. You will reorganize my entire room and clean my closet and drawers. I’m sure you have noticed they need a little bit of tidying up. You will rearrange my books by category and in alphabetical order. And if I don’t like the way you arrange my things, I’ll make you start over and do it a different way. You seem to think this is all fun and games. You think you can clean up the place for a few days and I’ll feel you’ve redeemed yourself and let you go. I suffered for over five years thanks to you and considerably worse than you are suffering. I lost my reputation, my job, my friends, and my life, all thanks to you. This isn’t a walk in the park, Kat, this is your new life. And believe me, I will do everything I can to make sure you realize you are not the little wifey while I’m the overbearing husband. You were right about one thing, you are my slave, and I am your master. You think I don’t realize you are playing some sort of game? You want to be nice to me, by all means, it makes my life easier. But don’t you for another minute forget that I am not Mr. Nice Guy. I will not tolerate your little outbursts or tantrums. I am going to my room, but I expect you out in the kitchen immediately, on your hands and knees, scrubbing. I will be checking on you. Now go!”