Her legs gave out, and she swung her head away from the horror of the open, inescapable space. If she went out there, it would be her ruination. She wouldn't be coherent, wouldn't be able to talk or scream without breath.
She clawed at his hands, to break his hold, to escape the door. Black bursts spotted her vision, and her heart slammed against her ribs. She panted for air and couldn't fill her lungs. Her eyes smeared with hot tears, blinding her. She fought harder, but his arms were everywhere, too tight, constricting and suffocating. Consciousness teased at the back of her mind as a blanket of warmth and aftershave swept in.
The slide of the drapes sounded, and the sunlight receded. Too late, she realized she was on the floor, curled in his lap, with her face buried in the crook of his arm.
She pushed against the hand cupping the back of her head as the rim of the glass touched her lips.
“We can do this all day.” He rolled the glass over her chin, sloshing cool water against her mouth. “Or you can drink and fall asleep gently.”
So he wanted to knock her out? Well, he could eat a dick. She sealed her lips together and turned her head. “Then what?”
“Then...we go for a ride.”
Van knelt on the bed beside Amber and drew a deep, calming breath. After three more stubborn confrontations with the sliding glass door, she'd worked herself into a sniveling, spasmodic conniption. And promptly fainted.
Shaking his head at the irony, he tied her limp arms to the headboard with the belts from her closet. Then he grabbed the drugged water from the side table.
Fainting wouldn't keep her under long enough for the thirty-minute drive, but the Roofy in the water would. Wrestling with her in front of the open door had been a gamble, but he knew the neighbors on either side were at work and the trees out back blocked the view from the other houses.
Still, it had been a risk that could've been avoided by simply pinning her down and forcing her to drink. But watching her struggle with the choice, seeing how far she'd take it, had revealed a lot about how her mind worked.
She'd convinced herself the biggest threat was out there, beyond her doors and windows, and the least amount of pain was in her house, with him. He was certain she would welcome a bullet before drinking the water, knowing the tranquilizer would result in her removal from the house. It was absolutely fascinating.
In his online research of Amber Rosenfeld, he'd validated she'd won countless first place prizes in prestigious contests in fitness modeling and beauty pageantry. Then, after a fourteen-year career, nothing. For two years, no news articles, nothing in the search results except a profile on an online crafts store selling leathercrafts. Why?
Only a year older than his thirty-three years, her firm figure and youthful face would've provided her a comfortable income from modeling. Yet, here she was, carving leather and drowning in debt. What the fuck had happened to her?
She had no social media profiles, and no friends or family mentioned in the public search results. She'd simply vanished from the spotlight with a disqualification from what might've been her fourth win in an international beauty pageant. The significance of the number four hadn't been lost on him.
He straddled her hips, anxious to dig into her complex mind and savoring the feel of her tight little body against his balls. Christ, all her struggling had wreaked havoc on his control. But he wanted to fuck her in his house, on his bed, where the surrounding acreage's dense timber would swallow her screams.
He stabbed the water with the drinking straw he'd found in the kitchen, sealed it with a finger, and trickled it down her throat.
She coughed, swallowing, and gasped awake. He had another strawfull waiting before she opened her eyes. She blinked, lips parting, and he emptied it in her mouth.
Her throat convulsed, her arms yanked uselessly at the restraints, and she angled her neck to look at her hands. Her eyes rounded, her fists clenched, and she roared, “You dirty, conniving” —she bucked her hips— “heavy-ass dick, let me go!”
He slapped a hand over her mouth and nose and howled with laughter. “I'm going to show you how dirty, conniving, and heavy my dick is. First, you need to take a long nap.”
Christ, she was cute, but it really wasn't funny. If the neighbors were outside, they might've heard her. He cocked his head and watched her struggle for air beneath the clamp of his hand. Time to get ugly.
Releasing her face, he reared back and slammed a fist into her stomach. Not enough to damage organs, but plenty of oomph to knock the wind out of her and get her attention.
She gulped silently, her body straining beneath him. Her lower lip rolled inward, trembling, as she bit down on it. Her eyelids fluttered, brimming but not quite shedding tears. When the pain faded from her eyes, she narrowed them at him.
He held out the glass and raised his brow.