Stealing Her Read online

  Stealing Her

  Alexis Abbott

  © 2018 Pathforgers Publishing.

  All Rights Reserved. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imaginations. Any resemblances to actual persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental.

  This book is intended for sale to Adult Audiences only. All sexually active characters in this work are over 18. All sexual activity is between non-blood related, consenting adults. This is a work of fiction, and as such, does not encourage illegal or immoral activities that happen within.

  Cover Design by Wicked Good Covers. All cover art makes use of stock photography and all persons depicted are models.

  More information is available at Pathforgers Publishing.

  Content warnings: BDSM, Daddy Dom, Kidnapping, Dark Romance

  Wordcount: 57,000 Words

  Contents

  Introduction

  Lila

  1. Lila

  2. Lila

  3. Lila

  4. Chains

  5. Chains

  6. Lila

  7. Chains

  8. Lila

  9. Lila

  10. Chains

  11. Lila

  12. Chains

  13. Lila

  14. Chains

  15. Lila

  16. Lila

  17. Chains

  18. Lila

  19. Chains

  20. Lila

  Next from Alexis Abbott

  Also by Alexis Abbott

  About the Author

  Connect with Alexis

  Romance Novels to your Email

  Get an EXCLUSIVE book, FREE just as a thank you for signing up for my newsletter! Plus you’ll never miss a new release, cover reveal, or promotion!

  Lila

  I’m going to be late for class. I cannot be late for class.

  I can’t breathe, and the first thing I worry about is class.

  A hand is around my face. A cloth is blocking my nose. My mouth. I can’t see the person behind me. Panic is rising in me, and all I can think about is not being irresponsible.

  The world is already so dim and eerie this time of morning, and through the veil of panic descending over me, I can just barely make out the gently waving dark arms of trees against the pale gray sky. Dawn has not even broken yet, the clouds intact before the streaking rays of sunrise could splinter the colors into a kaleidoscope above my head.

  I usually love this time of day. Early, empty mornings between the last dregs of party kids trundling back to their dorms to conk out for a few hours of drooling sleep before an eight-AM math class and the soft, slow awakening of the daybreak people. The early risers and go-getters briskly jogging across campus with their enormous thermoses of stale coffee, a low-calorie power bar crumbling in their other hand.

  The type-As.

  The perfectionists

  The late-to-bed-and-early-to-risers.

  That is the caste I most neatly fit within. That is the descriptive category to which I most clearly belong. It’s evidenced by every teacher report my father has ever received on my behalf. Lila Hawthorne is a tireless worker, a brilliant student, a joy to teach.

  Sometimes, in my darkest, loneliest, most hopeless pits of despair, I replay those phrases over and over again in my mind, shouting them with a bullhorn in an attempt to drown out the low, fiendish chanting of my insecurities.

  Not good enough.

  Not smart enough.

  Not strong enough.

  Obey.

  Listen.

  Be quiet.

  And now, I can add, not attentive enough. I never even heard the person sneak up behind me. I never saw even a shadow or heard the crunch of dull leaves beneath their shoes. Thoughts rush through my brain.

  Why me?

  What’s happening?

  I try to scream, but it’s no use. The cloth muffles the sound, and the man behind me pulls me closer to him, my head pressing against his body. How tall is he? I move my head slightly, trying to feel the ridges of his form, get an understanding of how much taller he is, and I figure he has at least a foot and a half on me.

  My hand lashes out, groping for his hip, but he’s too fast and sidesteps me. He doesn’t make a sound, not even a grunt as he moves. He’s like a specter, and my world is getting dimmer.

  The cloth must have something on it. Something that’s making my head foggy. I don’t have a lot of time. My eyes dart around, praying for a jogger or a professor to be walking nearby, but there’s just the eerie stillness of the early morning.

  Serenity surrounds me as a red-hot fury takes hold of me and I thrash, but my motions are weak. The drug is doing its job, slowing my body down. Slowing my mind to a crawl.

  The image of my father flashes in my mind. Everything I’ve done to perfect myself has been to please him, to find some way to make him see something special in me. To see me at all. But no matter my good grades, no matter how many glowing reports make their way to his office, no matter how many days I wake up at 5 in the morning to get a jump on the day, he never seems to notice.

  I need him to approve. I need him to love me.

  No matter where I am currently falling in the crests and crashes of life, there is that one solid constant: everything I do, everything I am, everything I ever will be— it’s all to impress him. To make my father believe that I am worth his investment. I need to be an asset. I refuse to be a liability. It’s my number one fear: letting him down.

  And perhaps that is why, even as the leathery, gloved hand clasps violently over my mouth and nose, closing up my airways, I am less afraid than I should be of whoever it is wielding the glove, and more afraid of what my father will think. How disappointed will he be when he finds his careless daughter has been…

  Has been what?

  My mind goes blank for a second, the drugs making everything so… fuzzy.

  I hold my breath, trying to hold onto consciousness longer. How long has it been? It feels like days have passed, but something within me says it’s not even been a minute. How long would the drugs take to work? Longer than my captor would want. Shorter than what I need.

  My captor yanks me close, my back pressing against his taut, powerful abdominal muscles. His free arm coils around me, his enormous hand grasping my shoulder, keeping my arms pinned down. He’s powerfully built, muscle upon muscle upon malice.

  What does he want with me?

  What does any man want with a girl like me?

  Judging by what Daddy has told me, men move through this world with only two intentions: to own a woman or to break a woman.

  I may only be twenty years old, but I’m more than old enough to know that he’s not just being cynical. He isn’t just trying to scare me straight like some childhood book of morals. He tells me the truth. I trust in him even more than I trust in myself, in my own instincts.

  The gloved hand slides up on my face. All my air supply has been slashed. The stale air in my mouth tastes acrid and bitter. It tastes like death. The man jolts me from my place on the pathway. He pulls me off the trail and behind a cluster of oak trees. The branches arch down around us almost like the loving arms of a mother.

  Not that I have any real idea what that might feel like. I killed my mother, or rather, my birth killed her.

  I hold my breath instinctively, seizing up and trying to turn my diminutive frame into as much dead weight as possible, even as the lack of oxygen flow makes me dizzy. It’s difficult now to sort out my thoughts into clear patterns. It all crisscrosses and superimposes and blends together into a mass of colorful panic, stars bursting behind my eyelids as my body weakens in the arms of my faceless captor.

  Suddenly, a thought slices through the fog in my mind
like a machete through the jungle green: I should scream. I should kick. I should make myself difficult to take.

  It goes against all of my instincts, of course. I’ve always been taught to be quiet and soft and easy. A young woman should be pliable. She should be affable. Obedient. Seen and not heard. I should listen and follow, never speak up without prompting.

  But surely this is different, isn’t it? Surely my father would understand. He would never want me to be captured and dragged away to meet some grisly unceremonious fate in the gnarled bushes of the MIT campus. I have to fight, even though the fairer sex is never meant to fight.

  Still holding my breath, I summon up every tiny shred of my strength and courage, letting my lungs seize control of what little air is left to them. I wrench away from my captor’s grasp just long enough to free my lips momentarily. I gulp down a gasp of delicious, precious air and fill my chest with it, reveling in the freedom of breath.

  I have to scream.

  I open my mouth and tilt my head back, begging my body to catch up and do as I say. Please. Just this once, disobey. Do not be silent. You must fight back.

  Some pathetic, half-strangled disaster of a scream rips from my throat. The sound of it actually frightens me, as it more closely resembles the cry of some wild animal with its leg in a vice than anything remotely similar to human speech. It is the cry of a wounded prey animal, desperately calling for someone to rescue it before death can creep into the clearing.

  My hope, what little there was, is cut short. The gloved hand shoves a fist into my mouth, aching my cheeks and making my jaw click painfully. I shudder and try my hardest to bite down on the gloved hand, but whatever material the glove is made from is more than enough to withstand my attempt. It smells of leather, and behind it, there is that softer, muted scent that misleads me into a sense of comfort. It’s like cologne oil or aftershave. Something vaguely peppermint, vaguely musk. The distinctive scent of a well-groomed man.

  I find myself suddenly desperate to know the shape and shadows of his face. But I can’t know that. No matter how violently I try to pull away, to twist my body around and face my attacker head-on, he’s too strong. He keeps me facing the tree. My eyes glance around frantically as the early morning sun gradually starts to illuminate the campus in pale gray patches between the trees. I know enough from watching true crime documentaries about kidnappings and murders that it is vital for me to memorize as much as I can of the scene unfolding all around me, of which I am the unwilling star.

  But there is nothing much to take in. The campus is barren this time of day. It’s the reason I’m out here in the first place. I like to go for long walks in the early morning, before the campus is overflowing with competition. I like the silence, the ominous rush of branches swaying in the breeze over my head, casting devilish shadows on the paths.

  I should have known better. I should have been smarter.

  Of course, it is dangerous to walk here alone during these hours. In this moment, all I can feel is anger toward myself. How could I have been so stupid? There is no one to save me. No one to even witness the attack. I’m alone. Just my captor and me and the tree.

  He hastily slips that fabric between his gloved hand and my face. I’m able to catch a faint whiff of the cloth this time, and my mind goes haywire with panic. The cloth feels strangely cold and wet, but I know it isn’t ice water.

  It’s chloroform. Of course it is. How did I not realize it sooner?

  Don’t breathe. Don’t breathe, I remind myself. Hold your breath for as long as it takes.

  But I know it’s futile. If I hold my breath too long, I will pass out. But if I give in and gasp for air, the chloroform will knock me out, too. How long will it take? How much is already in my system? There’s no way out. There’s no way free. I just have to acquiesce to whatever dark purpose my attacker has in mind.

  I buck my body again, but it’s hopeless. It’s all hopeless.

  The last thing I see before the stars explode to black and the world collapses in around me is the intricate texture, the jagged lines and shades of the oak tree bark millimeters from my face. Mingled with the perfume of musk, leather, chloroform, and panic is the piney scent of a forest. As my body goes limp and the curtain falls across the stage, all I can think about is how much I’m letting him down.

  I’m sorry, Daddy. I tried my best.

  My eyes open slowly, one at a time. I can feel my body quaking from side to side, and at first, I assume I’m having some sort of slow-motion seizure. I have no control over where I go or what I do. My legs are bound together. My arms are twisted and bound behind my back. My every muscle aches and twinges with the pain of being held in the same position for too long. I’m not sitting still, though, that I know for certain. I’m going forward somehow, and when my head lolls back, my neck too weak to hold it up, I realize that I can only catch faint, blurry glimpses of light and dark. There are no images, no treetops, no buildings, no sky to speak of. But it’s not because the world has dissolved away. It’s because someone has tied a blindfold around my head. I try to open my eyes, but my eyelashes just bat against the inner cloth of the blindfold uncomfortably. I close them again. There’s no point. It’s too tightly secured.

  Besides, I have an inkling that I would not recognize my current whereabouts even if I wasn’t blinded with a cloth. I have no idea how long I was knocked out.

  I am so tired.

  My body is weak from the chloroform, from sitting in this uncomfortable position, from being so constantly afraid.

  That is one thing I’ve learned over the course of my life thus far: pain and fear are exhausting. The heavier the burden you carry, the more slowly you must go along. Let’s just say my father has given me burden after burden to bear on my shoulders, ever since I was a child.

  It’s a form of love from him. He wants me to be strong. To be better than any other girl. I have to be beautiful and clever and perfect and I have to work harder than anyone else. I have to be the best, and there is no burden heavier than that one.

  But perhaps it is a gift, because now, under what one would probably categorize as “extreme duress,” I am not in a full-blown panic. In fact, I am trying to remain as calm as one can under such circumstances. I have to be analytical about this. I cannot see anything and I cannot move, but that leaves me with scent and sound. All I can smell is the musty cloth around my eyes and the pungent leathery scent of perhaps a recently-detailed rental vehicle. I listen intently, holding my breath, and judging from both the bumpiness of the ride and the volume of the engine’s roar, it’s a large vehicle. Probably a minivan or an industrial work van. I assume, because I am a captive, that the van is windowless. Or perhaps the windows are just very darkly tinted. I don’t know for sure, but it seems like a fair guess.

  I don’t hear other cars passing by, so I guess that we’re on some back road away from the prying eyes of civilization. In New England, there are lots of places that fit the bill. You can be in the center of a city and still be only a short drive from the middle of nowhere. And again, I have no clue how long I was unconscious. Minutes. Hours. Days. I could still be within a mile of the campus or I could be halfway across the continent by now. I have no way of knowing.

  And I am so, so tired. I drift off to a restless, fitful sleep.

  When I wake up, I hear the whine of the vehicle engine as the van rolls to a stop, crunching over what sounds like gravel. My heart starts to pound mercilessly as the dark recent events come flooding back to me. I have to pee so badly. My stomach aches. My entire body twinges with cramps. And I can feel goosebumps poking up on my flesh as the doors of the van slide open with a scraping sound.

  I try to recoil from the sound, folding myself up as small as I can manage despite the weakness of my muscles.

  It’s pointless.

  A pair of heavy, calloused hands grab hold of me and drag me out of the back seat. I can feel the slightly cool air touch my skin. I can smell dampness. An earthy smell that reminds m
e of blind worms tunneling underfoot. My captor guides me without a word, my tingling feet crunching over dewy grass and muddy soil as he marches me along. The feeling slowly returns to my legs as I walk, the sensation of pins and needles nearly as torturous as the kidnapping itself.

  He prods me in the small of my back and I shiver. I open my mouth to say something, only to realize there’s nothing I can say. What could I do? Ask him his name? Beg for my life?

  I know enough about the world to understand that no man alive wants anything good for me. Nobody but my father cares about me, and even he has a strange way of showing it. No, it’s better for me now and always to simply obey without a word.

  Don’t cause a fuss.

  Don’t do anything that would cause them to hurt me.

  Don’t say anything that will make this worse.

  In the movies, everyone always yells at the heroine to not run up the stairs, don’t go with him. Always struggle. Always scream.

  They don’t understand that smart girls do whatever it takes to survive, and sometimes the smartest thing is to not give them a reason to hurt you.

  Bide your time.

  Plan to live another day. Another hour. Another minute.

  I let this mysterious hulk of a man prod me along the soft, wet earth until we stopped momentarily. For a split second, I thought perhaps I should run. But I realized quickly how stupid it would be. I couldn’t get very far, and besides, I had no idea where I was.

  Where would I go?

  What direction?

  I can’t approach this scattershot. My best chance for escape was at the campus, and the man who took me was too powerful for me to run from. Running now would just give him a reason to think I was going to be trouble. That he should be careful with me.