I lift her hands to the wrought iron bed frame and reach for one of the belts I left in the room when I untied her earlier.

“NoNoNoNoNo,” she begins to chant, her face tightening with panic.

Wrapping the soft leather around her wrists, I tie her to the bed frame, then bracing my hands on either side of her head, I glare down at her. “Stop!”

Her body instantly stills, and she stares at me with wide eyes.

Christ, she’s breathtaking.

“The last thing I want to do is babysit your ass. I’ll keep you tied to this bed if I have to. It doesn’t matter to me whether you’re comfortable or not. I just have to keep you alive,” I bite the words out past the attraction and irritation whirling in my chest.

Her lips are parted, breaths exploding over them, and the sight only turns me on more.

“Do you understand, Ariana,” I demand.

She quickly nods.

Pushing away from her, I stalk out of the room and yank the door shut behind me.

“Worst job of my fucking life,” I mutter as I head to the security room while trying to ignore the way she made me feel.

ARIANA

My heart is racing a mile a minute as I stare at the closed door.

Crap, he’s strong. I put everything I had into fighting him.

Tilting my head back, I look at the belt and try to yank my hands free, but when the leather bites into my skin, I slump against the mattress and glance at the door again.

I’m not even going to try and lie to myself – Demitri terrifies the hell out of me.

When he was on top of me with that dark glare, only one word came to mind. Hellhound. It looked like he wanted to tear me to pieces. I was a second away from having my life flash before my eyes.

Eventually, my racing heart starts to calm down, and I try to wiggle my hands free, but after a while, I give up and let out a miserable sigh.

I try to listen for movement in the house, but there’s only silence.

With nothing else to do, my thoughts turn to the past day and how quickly my life changed from happy and carefree to terrified and tied to a bed.

I have no idea how I’m going to escape. I have an appointment to do a lady’s makeup, but she’ll probably just think I canceled on her.

I’m not close with any of my neighbors, so none of them will notice I’m missing.

Last year, when I had the flu, I skipped three weeks because I didn’t want to give it to my mom, and the nursing home staff didn’t contact me at all.

Crap.

This is so bad.

I’ll probably be dead for days, if not weeks, before I’m reported missing.

The suffocating hopelessness returns in full force, making me choke up.