She looked up at him, pleading in her eyes. “Leo, please, I’m sorry. I won’t ever do it again.”

“Answer me.”

“I can’t stand you with them,” she blurted. “I can’t watch this. Let me go. Let me leave this place.”

“I can’t.”

“Can’t or won’t?” She chanced a look into his eyes. His expression was hard.

“Won’t. Besides, what would you do now? Your job is long gone.”

“I’ll find another one. I’m very qualified for what I do. I’m young. And I have savings. I’ll be fine.”

“I’m sure you would be. But you aren’t leaving here.” Leo crossed to the intercom box. Faith struggled to stand and sat on the edge of the bed.

He watched her briefly, then turned and pressed the white button. “Demetri?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Would you please go untie Miss Lin? I shouldn’t leave her alone like that. Instruct her to stay in the dungeon and wait for my return.”

“Right away, sir.”

Leo turned back to Faith, his arms crossed over his chest. “Now. What are we going to do about this situation?”

“What situation?”

“The situation where I want you and you want me and neither one of us is happy.”

“You still want me?” She sounded so needy. It was mortifying that he’d found her crying over him. And now to pathetically beg for reassurance that the man holding her hostage still wanted her. Maybe she had that Stockholm thing.

“I do.”

Faith started pacing. He was everything she could ever want in a man except for one thing. Every guy had that one thing. But this wasn’t a minor irritation like random scratching or belching at the table or refusing to throw out the socks with holes in them.

She rounded on him, fed up and frustrated and lost. “Why can’t you be normal?!”

It was the wrong thing to say. He came toward her full of purpose and force like a freight train, backing her against the wall. He pinned her.

“Why can’t you be kinky? You’re submissive, now why can’t you be a good little masochist?”

Her breath came out in sharp pants as her bravery deflated, leaving her staring at the floor again because she couldn’t take his intensity for longer than a few moments at a time.

She cried out when his hand came up in her peripheral vision, but he only brushed her hair out of her face and wiped away the few stray tears on her cheeks.

“Mei down there is submissive and a masochist. Do you know how hard it’s been for me to find a genuine sub and masochist? Someone who doesn’t play at being one or the other? Should I not be happy?”

“No,” Faith said, under her breath. “The man keeping me prisoner shouldn’t be happy. Let me go and live happily ever after with her. Tell Angelo I’m not a threat and release me. Please. I’m dying here. Please.”

He ignored her begging, speaking more to himself than to her. “Part of me thought I could train Caprice to be submissive. When she was here, we had a few moments where I thought maybe I hadn’t tried hard enough to break through her walls. But deep down I knew I could never trust her. She’d be a danger to you so I sent her away. Mei isn’t a danger to you.”