I’d shredded the paper that contained the number in front of him.
But I couldn’t have a job, not without risking men from Lucas’s world finding out—women working was not allowed—and sometimes this house and my life became very mundane when Lucas was gone during the day.
So I’d finally given in.
Now I e-mailed him the titles and authors’ names of the books I wanted from his own e-mail address, and he bought them for me.
Once the e-mail for new books was sent, I scrolled through the list of his unread e-mails, looking for any he had flagged and unlocked for me to read.
I straightened in the chair and smiled when I saw three from William, the subject showed they were just a few of many replies in the chain of Recipes for Briar e-mails from William’s women.
I scrolled through until I was at the beginning of the new ones, and printed out two recipes, then scanned the conversations from today.
Lucas, it has been weeks since we last saw Briar. Let her come over!
We love you.
All of us.
No. You can come see her.
I rolled my eyes at his terse reply. It wasn’t any of their faults I couldn’t stand being around William.
A chime sounded through the computer, and I glanced around the large screen until a small conversation window popped up in the corner after a delay. All it said was ‘Hello?’ but I couldn’t see who it was from. There was only a gray circle with an X through it as the sender, so I exited out of it and went back to finishing the e-mail.
Always so grouchy, Lucas! Karina has now grabbed the wooden spoon; you have been warned. If that is how you must be, let William know what day we can come see her. Sahira wants to know if Briar would like us to schedule a spa day at your house, and we all want to know if she is pregnant yet. We need a grandchild to play with now that all of the children are grown and gone.
I knew I had to look horrified as I stared at the e-mail.
Pregnant? Kids with Lucas?
Of course I’d wanted to be a mom. I’d wanted that for so long, to be someone as nurturing and kind as Nadia had been to me before she abandoned me. I thought that coveted future was going to be a reality sooner rather than later. But then everything I thought I’d known had been torn from me, and I’d learned that while I’d loved before, I’d never loved wholly.
And now I had that love . . . but I couldn’t have children. Not with Lucas.
I was sure—I was so sure that he loved me too, even if he refused to understand he was capable of loving someone. But I knew that despite that love, and despite how different we were from the rest of the people in his world, he still had every intention of buying another girl. And another. And it would destroy me when that time came, destroy what we had.
If we had a child, it would just push my heart and my mind into thinking we could have more than this; that we could have everything. And I wasn’t reckless enough to not take his words to heart; I knew we couldn’t.
“No. No babies,” I whispered numbly, and tried to ignore the aching in my chest as I exited out of the e-mail.
I took the last bite of the sandwich, and started to roll away from the desk as I dragged the cursor up to shut off the computer when two chimes sounded through the computer. After another delay, the same conversation window popped up.
X: Are you there?
X: Briar?
I jerked back in the seat, and stared at the screen like the words would attack me. After nearly a minute passed, I clicked on the box and let my fingers hover over the keyboard for another moment before responding.
LH: Yes.
X: Briar Rose Chapman?
The full name came within a split second of my reply. Fear coursed through me, making my heart beat faster. Part of me screamed to shut off the computer, but I was afraid of what would happen if I didn’t address the name.
LH: No, I’m sorry, you have the wrong person. My name is Briar Holt.
I bit nervously at my bottom lip as I waited for a reply, but didn’t have to wait long.
X: Briar is a pretty unique name. But it’s okay. I know who you are and I’m here to help you.
Get off the computer, get off the computer, get off the computer! I screamed at myself.
LH: I don’t know who you are, and I don’t need help. Goodbye.
X: I can get you home. I can get you back to your life.
That familiar ache flared at the thought of returning to everything that was familiar but was followed by a stronger one. Because as I’d known for some time now . . . it wouldn’t be much of a life without Lucas. Instead of responding, I clicked on random parts of the window to try to figure out who this X was.
X: You don’t have to say anything. I know you’re scared. I’ll get you out of there, but I’m going to need your help.
LH: I don’t need your help. You have the wrong Briar, and you are what’s scaring me. Leave me alone.
X: Do you know what Stockholm syndrome is?
My eyes narrowed, but again, I didn’t respond.
Of course I do.
I’d taken a psychology class in college, and while I didn’t remember everything from that class, I remembered fragments. The lectures on Stockholm syndrome being one of them.
And what little I remembered of it was half of my reasoning on why I’d first let Lucas touch me all those months ago. It was why I’d tried to keep Lucas at a distance afterward, even when it became so clear that my feelings for him had been shaped from who he was as a person, and not because I’d formed some twisted bond with him because he’d kept me locked in a room or had saved me from his mentor.
I had finally found the e-mail address linked with X, which was really just a bunch of random letters that looked like a spam account, when he sent message after message of long definitions for Stockholm syndrome.
My eyes darted quickly over what he had sent me but nothing triggered. Nothing made me question my love for Lucas or my want to be with him. I was acutely aware of what we would look like to someone on the outside of Lucas’s world. I knew what we looked like on paper, but this person didn’t understand my relationship with Lucas at all.
Hostages express sympathy . . . have feelings toward captors . . . defend . . . identify with . . . mistake lack of abuse for kindness . . . strong emotional ties . . . one person harasses, abuses, threatens the other . . .
“William and his women,” I mumbled to the screen once I finished reading.
That’s who those words described. And even though I hadn’t met anyone else, I had no doubt those definitions would fit the bonds between the other men of this world and their stolen women.
LH: Thank you for the lesson, although it wasn’t necessary. Leave me alone.
X: Think about it, I can get you out safely.
I immediately pulled up Lucas’s e-mail and started a new one to him. I flagged it as urgent, put nothing but exclamation marks in the subject, and only five words in the body: