“Take a taxi. It’s not safe for you or for anyone else on the road if your blood sugars are off.” Samantha’s mind worked frantically. She would prefer her sister just stay put until she could get to her, but knew that that wasn’t likely to happen.
Beth was too kindhearted for her own good. She would feel the need to be at their mother’s side.
At least if Samantha could get to Beth, she could spell her off, give her sister some rest so that she didn’t get seriously sick.
“Are you at Three Sisters?” Samantha named the biggest hospital in the small city in which she’d grown up. “I’ll be there as soon as I can, Bethy.” Wedging the phone between her ear and her shoulder, Samantha dug her fingers into her purse.
There.
The check that Elijah had written her—the one she had felt wrong cashing—was still there, though by now it was creased and slightly tattered along one edge.
Samantha cringed as she thought of how angry Elijah would be when he found out.
But if she told him, he’d insist on going with her. That was just the kind of man he was.
She would rather die than have him see her back in the place where she’d grown up. For someone who valued control so highly, what would he think of her mother’s failings? Beth was the only good thing about that part of her life. Everything else she’d worked hard to leave behind.
“Only if you’re sure.” Beth’s voice held a small note of pleasure, which only solidified Samantha’s resolve.
She would do anything for her sister. Anything.
Even if it meant possibly losing the man she cared for more than she dared to admit.
Hanging up the phone, Samantha bit her teeth into her lower lip and rapidly ran through her options. Though he was going to be pissed beyond belief, she couldn’t tell Elijah. If she did and then tried to leave without him, she wouldn’t put it past him to chain her up until she changed her mind.
He would see her the moment she left the bathroom, would intercept her before she was able to make it out the front doors of Veritas.
She looked around the room, her stare landing on the big window. The window was high, but plenty large enough to get through. It was on the main floor, so she’d be safe jumping out.
Looking down at her bare feet and slinky scrap of dress, she realized that she was more in danger of flashing an innocent passerby than anything else. She cringed as she remembered that not only were most of her belongings back in Cabo, but all of the things Elijah had bought for her were upstairs in his apartment—and she had no key.
“Shit.” With a bracing breath, Samantha tugged the ornate stool that sat in front of a vanity over to the window and climbed up, levering open the glass as she did.
She would hop in a cab and get the driver to stop at a bank machine. Then somewhere she could buy some decent clothes. She’d look funny until then, but this was Vegas. Surely there would be stranger sights than she.
Bracing her arms on the sill, Samantha hefted herself up and out the window. There was a narrow ledge outside, and she balanced precariously on her knees as she righted herself and prepared to drop down to the ground.
Only her eyes were above the sill when someone entered the bathroom. The stealthiness of the person’s movements caught Samantha’s eye, and she paused for a moment to watch.
The slender woman stopped just inside the door, looking around as though expecting to find something that wasn’t there. She lifted her eyes to the window, locking stares with Samantha for a brief moment.
Rather than surprise, the woman’s face showed sly triumph.
Samantha cursed as she dropped to the ground.
It had been Charlotte, the submissive who had tried to take Elijah away from her the first night they’d come to Veritas. From the look on her face, it seemed she had heard part of Samantha’s conversation with Beth—enough to suspect that Samantha was sneaking out—and she’d have to know that Elijah wouldn’t be happy about it.
Helplessness washed over her as her toes touched the ground and she felt grass scratching the tender soles of her feet.
Her heart hurt—actually hurt—as she thought of the betrayal she was about to undertake. Her feet slowed as she tried to come up with an alternate solution. But her thoughts kept bringing her back around to the same place.
Her mother had drunk more than usual to land herself in the hospital. An upswing in Gemma’s alcohol consumption usually coincided with contact from Stanley. Since he’d called her mother recently, it was a safe enough assumption that the man was sniffing around her again—why, Samantha couldn’t understand, but then, their relationship dynamics had never made any sense to her.
But Stanley was bad news, and Elijah was observant as hell. It would kill her to see the all too familiar combination of pity and disgust in Elijah’s eyes, of all people.
She was going to be with her sister. That was what she did—she took care of Beth. She could only hope that Elijah wouldn’t hate her when she got back.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“M
aster, I beg your pardon, but I have news that I think you will want to know.”
Elijah scowled down at the lithe, nearly naked blonde kneeling on the floor at his feet. His gaze had been so focused on the bathroom door that he hadn’t seen Charlotte approach.
He wasn’t at all pleased to see her before him. He was sure he’d made himself perfectly clear when he’d handed her over to Luca for punishment earlier in the week.
“You’re pushing your luck, Charlotte.” He didn’t hold back, letting his anger color his tone. He had no use for submissives who manipulated and tried to top from the bottom in devious ways. No matter what Charlotte thought she saw in him, it was never going to happen.
And
where
was Samantha? She’d left Angie and headed to the washroom nearly fifteen minutes earlier.
“I assure you that you’ll want to hear this.” Charlotte looked directly up at him—forbidden behavior for a sub who was supposed to be repentant—and ran her tongue over her lips. Elijah imagined she thought the gesture was seductive, but as it came from her he found it only off-putting.
“You’ve worn out my patience, sub.” Assuming a bored expression—the worst kind of reaction for a sub like Charlotte, who craved attention—Elijah turned back to the bar and reached for his glass of wine.
Charlotte rose from her knees, popping up in front of him with her hands clenched tightly.
“Samantha went out the bathroom window. She’s going to visit her family and didn’t want you there.”
Elijah’s first response was to deal with the inappropriate behavior in front of him, despite the feeling of betrayal that coiled in his belly. He curled his fingers around Charlotte’s shoulder, his fingers digging just hard enough to get her attention.
“Luca.” He spoke quietly, but felt his repressed anger and, more than that, hurt welling up. “I do not have the patience to deal with this sub right now. She needs to be punished for disobeying my orders, for spying on another submissive, and for behavior unbecoming to her station.”
Charlotte sputtered as he continued to hold her but otherwise paid her no attention.
“I can’t say I’m overly interested in spending any time with her myself,” Luca said. Elijah watched as Luca narrowed his eyes and cocked his head, studying the woman, considering. Finally he raised his hand and gestured in the air. “Mistress Cathryn.” Luca waved the blond Domme over to the bar area. She approached with a sway to her hips, her exhausted and happy-looking submissive trailing on a leash behind her.
“Master Luca. Master E.” Cathryn cast a wicked grin in Elijah’s direction. “Have a good session?”
“Indeed.” Elijah knew he needed to deal with Charlotte, but his mind kept straying to Samantha. He didn’t doubt Charlotte’s words—the woman wasn’t creative enough to make up a story like that.
She’d left, then. And the only reason she would have snuck out was so that he wouldn’t see her.
He wasn’t concerned that she was embarrassed of him, or what they did together. No, he was quite certain that, if she was being sneaky about going to visit her family, it was to protect the secret that she was trying so desperately to keep hidden.
His mind turned that over as he watched Luca converse with Cathryn.
“This one has developed an unhealthy and harmful interest in Elijah’s submissive, Cathryn.” Luca growled. None of the Dominants looked at Charlotte, and Elijah could feel the anger radiating off her. Well, he was angry too. He would have found out about Samantha regardless, but the way she had run up to him just to tattle had been designed to hurt.
“E and I are done with her. I was wondering if you would be so kind as to take on the responsibility of punishing this one.”
Cathryn’s eyes lit up. Her submissive, clearly still feeling the aftereffects of subspace, just smiled dreamily.
“You know, Danny seems to be done for the night, but I think I have another round left in me.” Cathryn’s eyes raked over Charlotte, who wore a bustier, a G-string, and nothing else. “How do you fancy some time on the fucking machine, girl?”
Charlotte’s skin drained of color, and Elijah felt a twinge of sympathy that he quickly quashed.
The fucking machine was one of the most popular pieces of equipment at Veritas. Many submissives begged for it as a reward. Others, like Charlotte, dreaded it, knowing that it would attract quite a crowd, and that any pleasure she found on it would be undignified and very impersonal. The fact that it would be a female Domme and not a male Dom at the controls would only embarrass Charlotte more, since the sub had eyes only for handsome, wealthy Masters.
Given that she had tried to take away Samantha’s dignity as Elijah’s sub, he felt that it was only fitting.
He didn’t say anything as Cathryn led the woman from them. His mind was still on Samantha—what the hell was going on?
Nodding a quick good-bye to Luca, Elijah exited the playroom, his emotions far darker than he cared for them to be.
He had thought they were making progress tonight. Damn it—he
knew
they had. She’d wanted to share everything with him, to submit completely, and he’d had no doubt that she was on the right path.
Charlotte had said that Samantha had taken a call from her family—her sister, surely—and then had climbed out the bathroom window. He was not happy that she hadn’t come to him.
It was with sickness in his gut that he realized that this relationship between them was never going to work. No matter what he felt for her. And as he saw their relationship going up in flames, he realized exactly how much it was that he felt.
The little redhead had caught him off guard when she’d entered his life. She’d worked her way into his heart, even when he’d been sure that his ex had destroyed the parts of him that were capable of a relationship.
In short, he loved her. And she’d run from him.
When the great wooden doors at the front of Veritas loomed before him, Elijah gave in to his frustration and slammed his fists into them. From the corner of his eye he saw a small group of Doms and Dommes eyeing him with alarm, but he pushed through the doorway before any of them could approach him.
“You’re going to have bruises on your fists.”
The voice was quiet, barely discernible, and Elijah thought he was imagining it. But as he turned his head in the direction from which it had come, he saw that his ears weren’t playing tricks on him after all.
Samantha stood just outside the doors to Veritas, her arms wrapped around her torso as if she were cold.
She was such a welcome sight, he had to physically restrain himself from striding to her and wrapping her in his arms. After her betrayal, he couldn’t just show her such affection.
“Why are you still here?” His voice was flat, at odds with the storm of emotion taking place inside him. She shivered. Silently he unbuttoned his shirt, peeled it off, and handed it to her.
“Thank you.” Samantha shrugged into the pale blue button-down, which covered her slip entirely and made her look very young.
“Well?” Elijah hoped she had a damn good explanation.
“I left out of habit. I’ve spent years hiding this, you see. It’s a hard habit to break.” She looked at him, those green eyes wide, and Elijah felt his breath catch.
“I told you that you don’t have to hide anything from me.”
“I know.” She said it softly but firmly, and when she raised her chin he saw the pride and stubbornness that were as bone deep in her as dominance was in him. “But I’m not going to lie to you. I’m trying to open up. I knew that if I came straight to you you would insist on coming with me. I need to go back home. And I don’t want you to see all of that. I don’t even want to visit it myself.”
Elijah couldn’t have felt more shocked if Samantha had hauled off and slapped him across the face.
“I see.” And he did, with clarity.
He should have trusted his first instincts, that she wasn’t capable of full submission.
He could have saved them both a lot of heartache.
“Are you going, then?” His voice was cold even to his own ears, and when he saw the hurt pass over Samantha’s face he wished he could stop. But self-preservation had kicked in, and he felt himself withdrawing even as he stood there.
She nodded, looking stricken. “Elijah, I have to. I—”
He held up a hand, cutting her off. Anger was a black force descending on him. He wanted to haul her upstairs and lock her in chains in his bedroom until she came to her senses.
Maybe even if she didn’t. Damn it, he
needed
her.
But as in all Dominant/submissive relationships, the bottom was the one who held all the cards. And she was telling him no.
“I’ll let you upstairs to pack a bag and will call a car for you,” he said.
And then he would open one of his ludicrously expensive bottles of wine and welcome the oblivion that would come with booze. He had a feeling he was going to need it for some time to come.
• • •
E
lijah had gone back to the bar at Veritas, an untouched glass of wine in front of him. He had selected a bottle from the owners’ private rack himself, snarled at Luca to leave him alone, and retreated to a corner of the bar.