Chapter 20: Chapter Twenty

Saffron let out a whimper as he grabbed her arm and led her back to her prison cell without a word.

“How long are you going to be keeping me here for?” she queried, as she wrapped her arms around her midsection. “I’m not worth anything, you know. There is no one to pay for my ransom if that is what you are aiming at.”

“This isn’t about ransom,” he scoffed, glaring at her as if he was wondering how stupid she was for even thinking that in the first place.

“Then what is it about?” she asked, choking back a sob. “I told you—you have the wrong person, I promise.”

“Your promise means nothing to me, neither does it to them,” he sneered as he walked out of the cell, locking the door after himself and leaving her in solitude.

She listened to his footsteps as they faded away, wondering if he was either going up or down to the torture chambers he had mentioned.

He went up.

She released a long sigh when silence fell in her cell once again, her gaze finding the camera in the corner of the room, wondering who was out there watching her at this very moment.

Was it the Alpha?

Ivan or Alaric Vaughn?

Or was it someone else the Alpha had roped into keeping her here and extracting information out of her?

After all, there had been six men in that room that fateful day. And though she hadn’t seen Alaric Vaughn in the room when she had snooped, she was sure that he had either been there hidden somewhere while she had looked in, or he had arrived shortly after she had run away.

Acting as any normal, scared person would do in this situation—which wasn’t hard to do, considering the fact that she was indeed scared of what was going to come next—she went towards the door and looked out to the corridor through the bars.

She knew that there was nothing to see out there, but if they were monitoring her as closely as she thought they were, then she needed them to believe that she was looking for a way out.

It beat her purpose of not wanting them to find out that she was trying to escape. But it also provided her with a leeway in finding an actual escape.

If she stayed in her cell without attempting to plan an escape, then they were going to know that something was up. And, she would like to keep the charade going on for as long as possible.

She had to let them think that she still had that fire inside of her, even though they had thwarted her first attempt at earning her freedom.

Letting her shoulders slump, she retreated to her pathetic excuse of a bed in the corner of the room and sank into it, the hard form of it digging into her shoulders.

She curled up into a ball and pretended to cry herself to sleep.

This charade would have them thinking that they had beaten her and that she knew she couldn’t escape.

The fact that neither of the two men had come for her cemented the thought that they were keeping her alive for a reason.

If they wanted something from her, then what could it be?

It couldn’t be just about the fact that she had seen the Alpha kill someone in the privacy of his home now, could it?

No, it had to be about something else. Something either related to what she had seen or totally unrelated to it.

But what could they hope to gain from questioning her if it wasn’t related to her eavesdropping?

Because she had no doubt about it—they were going to be questioning her, sooner or later.

The timeline didn’t matter. It seemed like they were happy to wait.

What for? She had no idea.

Just like she had no doubt about the questioning, she also knew without a doubt that torture was in her near future.

Why else would they be keeping her in a cell like this? And an underground one? It sure wasn’t for a sleepover.

Nope, they wanted something far more nefarious, something that they thought she knew. She was willing to bet her entire life that they planned to torture that information out of her.

And that was not something she was keen on experiencing now, or ever.

The guy who had visited her earlier seemed like he wasn’t entirely on board with keeping her in the cell. She had to exploit that, see if she could use it to somehow draw him to her side.

Perhaps seduction wasn’t always going to work with him. She had seen the way he had analyzed her naked body clinically, without an ounce of desire.

But when she had begun to cry and act like a damsel in distress—which for all intents and purposes she truly was—she had seen a crack in his shell.

Something told her that he was going to be her ticket out of this hell.

For now, all she needed to do was whimper and cry her eyes out, look terrified, and deny any knowledge about the Alpha’s morning activity.

She was just Saffron, an innocent girl with dreams of becoming a dancer, who had been sold to the Alpha to do his bidding.

It was the truth, so there was no manipulation needed. All that was to be fabricated was her crying, pleas for help, and shivering.

Though her real tears dried during that first week on the island. She knew that there was no need for crying over spilt milk.

The deed had already been done, and there was no way out of it.

But now, there was an opportunity for going after that dream of hers. And if it meant crying, pleading, and seducing her way out of this underground cell, then she was sure going to take it with both hands, even if it meant losing a part of herself in the process.

It was the lesser of two evils.

She could either lose her dignity or lose her life entirely.

And for the first time since she had found herself in the Alpha’s crosshairs, she chose to live.

She chose to see another dawn. It didn’t matter what she had to do. She was going to get out of here by rain or by hellfire. She was going to fight tooth and nail for her freedom.

They left her alone long enough that she was able to take another quick nap. It helped in kicking the rest of the drugs out of her system and the remaining haziness when she woke up once again.

She rose from the cot and began to pace the room anxiously, hoping that it might attract her guy’s attention, so she could begin with the first phase of her new plan.

When she heard footsteps making their way towards the corridor, relief flushed through her, as she readied herself to play the innocent confused victim once again. But her relief was cut short, as it quickly morphed into fear when she came face to face with her worst nightmare.

The Alpha was here.