THE WOMAN BEFORE

Chapter 28

I S L A

     I DON’T REMEMBER the time I fell asleep. I awake with a startle when I turn my head and find Parker sleeping beside me. I try to move, but that action is immediately hindered by the ropes bound around my legs and hands. It takes a while for my brain to remember everything that has happened so far. Rosina is a con artist. Parker betrayed me. He placed me here.

     It feels like a nightmare. Parker is the last person I expected this betrayal from. I don’t understand how I could be so stupid not to have noticed. I was blinded by his veneer of deception. His lies.

     I had seen him as a brother, a confidant, but he is a psychopath. And I hadn’t seen that. It’s a scary world now. At first, you could easily know a bad person, but now it’s so difficult. Even the ones with the nicest faces are deadlier than the viper.

     My eyes meet his when I tilt my head. He’s awake. I have awoken him.

     “Morning, sunshine,” he says.

     I can’t stand his voice. I wish I could cut his throat, so I don’t hear his voice.

     He moves his hand toward me, tucking strands of my hair behind my ear. There were moments when I found nothing wrong with this gesture. But now I want to bite off his hand just for touching me.

     “Please,” I sob. “Let me go. I promise I won’t tell anyone.”

     He scowls. “Why do you want to leave? Don’t you like our new home?”

     Our new home? What’s he talking about?

     “You can’t keep me here forever. They’ll find me if they start searching.”

     “Trust me, they won’t. I bought this place just for us and no one else.” He jerks up and rests his chin in his palm. “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for this moment.”

     My stomach churns. It feels like speaking to a pole. There is no way I can reach his heart, only if he has one. He is not going to let me go. I’m trapped, but it’s difficult to accept that.

     I will use another ploy. “I want to use the bathroom.”

     He frowns, but he gets up and starts unbinding me. My entire body is racked with pain. I watch as he takes off the rope, darting my eyes time and again for any weapon. In vain, I let my eyes stray across the room, certain I’m not going to find a weapon here. Even if there is a weapon, I’m sure he has hidden it well. The room is quite large. I don’t recognize anything in it. Where are we?

     Parker helps me get to my feet and guides me to the bathroom. When we reach the door, he says, “Don’t try anything. You’re only going to get yourself hurt.”

     I pretend I didn’t hear it and step inside the bathroom. I pace around the place, looking for a window—searching for a sign that escape from here is possible. The only window here is too tiny for even a kid to pass through. I deliberately open the tap and let the water gurgle into the sink. I don’t doubt he’s standing close by.

     I walk to the small window and climb onto the table by the wall. Peering out, I look outside and my heart sinks when I see a vast land with no sign of neighboring houses. I’m in the middle of somewhere, which is not close to the city. I’m sure this is the only house here. Parker never mentioned owning an isolated house far from the city. To the best of my knowledge, he couldn’t stand solitude. He lied to me about that.