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