Captured

It had been three days, and Katherine still wouldn't speak to him. She was lying facedown on the bed, her wrists tied to the headboard. Around his faded sheets, her skin was bruised like a twilight sky, alternately indigo and violet. Her hair was a tumbled snarl of dark silk. Even the slump of her spine spelled defeat.

He had tried to speak to her. He had offered water, and even bread. She took nothing, said nothing, wouldn't even meet his eyes. He felt shame but he wasn't sure why—was it because he had let his temper best him, let himself ruin this perfect gentle creature before him? Or was it because he was supposed to be interrogating her, and instead he was tracing the line of her spine with his eyes, feeling remorse and guilt and lust, but no unkindness? He was unused to feeling this way. It didn't suit him.

His superiors were growing frustrated with him, but it didn't bother him yet. He was Killian Canavan. He did not fail, and he did not disappoint. No one had reason to doubt him.

He looked around the honey-colored walls, but his eyes fell back to the still small figure on his bed. She had lavender handprints stamped around her arms. Sometimes he would have found this erotic and lovely. Now he wasn't sure. Half of him wanted to pour cool water over her milky skin. The other half still wanted to warm her ass for being so stubborn.

She turned her face toward him, feeling his heavy gaze on her back. Her full lips were cracked. The circles under her eyes were deep and smoky. "What are you going to do with me?"

"Has her Highness decided to speak?" Killian's rough voice fell flat, concrete on gravel.

She stared at him. Candlelight danced across her cheekbones. "I'm going to make you tell me what you know," he said wearily.

"Why have you let me rest, these three days?"

"Let's get on with this." He moved to the bed and put his hand on her bare shoulder. He hadn't felt the cool silk of her skin in three days. "I'm going to untie you. Are you going to run?"

Katherine hesitated. "How far is the nearest village?" She half-laughed, but her lips were trembling. He hadn't realized how fragile she looked.

"Farther than you'd get, even if I wasn't behind you."

"No, then."

Killian untied her wrists. They were bruised and bloody. She sat up, rising like a sleeping princess, blinking like an owl.

"You're going to do as I say," Killian assured her, his hand hard and firm on her china jaw. "You understand?"

"As you say," Katherine allowed tiredly. Her eyelashes dipped as if they were too heavy for her to carry, as if her eyelids had been painted with lead.

"Come. Sit." Killian wrapped her in a shirt of his, old enough that it had faded to the softness of tissue paper. He dressed her like a child, fastening each mismatched button with care. Her nipples pressed through the thin fabric and Killian resisted the urge to bite them through the cloth. He wanted to kiss her smooth inner thighs, pull them apart, run his tongue down her smooth, hot slit. He imagined her leaning back in her chair, her back arched as he gently sucked and bit those smooth pink pussy lips. He wanted to taste her, soothe her, worship her. He wanted her sighs, her tremors, her smooth little hand against his skin. God, but he wanted her.

Instead, he heated water in a bowl and brought old cut up cloths to wash her skin. He touched her feet, her glossy calves. He washed the tears and dried blood from her hands, her throat, her high proud cheeks.

She raised her hand to her matted hair. "May I wash it?"

He nodded. He filled the large copper tub with kettle after kettle full of hot water and watched her climb in, her thin shoulders shivering in delight at the warmth of the water against her beaten skin. "Oh!" Her cheeks blushed a little. Her skin was luminous, polished marble. She was so beautiful then, so pure and sweet. She sat down and drew her knees to her chest and he poured water carefully over her long hair. It glowed like obsidian then, plastered to the svelte curves of her perfect little body. Her breasts gleamed, her nipples puffy. Between her bent legs he thought he caught a glimpse of her sweet little snatch.

He wrapped her in his towel and set her down before the fire. The cool September blew through the cracks around the door, and he watched her shiver, imagining her tiny pink nipples hardening beneath the heavy folds of his towel.

She looked up at him. "Killian?"

"Yes?"

"If it hadn't been you." She twisted a lock of raven hair around her fingers. "Would someone else have come for me? Would I be... taken... anyway?"

Her little face was so serious in the light. "Yes," he told her honestly. "Several volunteered. I was chosen." He thought of the others—Stark, who favored switches and rods, Grey who cut off fingers, O'Hanaghan who was the cruelest of all. He wondered if she would prefer one of these others. He knew they'd be salivating for this job, wanting their cocks in her pussy, their bruises on her alabaster skin. The thought of it made his blood boil. He didn't want anyone else touching her. He wouldn't allow it. She was his, his to bruise and his to bathe. He'd find a way to deal with the others. He wasn't going to let her out of his sight, no matter what.

"I want to know if you're going to kill me," she said at last. "I'd rather you do it sooner, if you're going to." Her feathery eyelashes were shielding her eyes; he couldn't read her expression.

"I'd rather not," he said shortly.

Her lips trembled. "Please," she said. "I'll do whatever you ask, but I can't tell you anything about my father. I won't change my mind. I've thought about it these past three days."

Her eyes were sparkling pools of tears. Her strawberry lips were shaking. Her silver eyes were like moonlight on a June evening. The sharp lines of her collarbones were set firmly. "I mean it," she said, firm and fragile as a thin glass blade.

And then he knew. That he wouldn't turn her in. That he would run to the ends of the earth with her, but he wouldn't be trying to break her. It was like trying to break sunlight. He wouldn't do it.

He was on his knees before her without realizing he'd left his chair. His hands were on her ankles, his head in her lap. "I won't kill you," he said. And then she was crying. Great fat tears fell down her smooth cheeks, splashed down over Killian's head, baptizing him in her vulnerability and his own guilt. She was dawn personified, so full of soft light.

When Killian reached up to her face, it was to brush the tears from her cheeks. He could taste the salt of her relief on his tongue. His towel had fallen down around her lap, and he could see every line of her perfect body. But he didn't touch. He told himself he wouldn't touch her until she asked him to. He wondered if he was even capable of keeping such a promise.

He fed her and watched her brush her hair, watched her dress shyly, pulling on his shirt over her willowy body. Her full breasts strained at the buttons. He could see the curve of her hips, the sharp indent of her waist. She fell asleep that night with him on the bed beside her. He stayed awake all night, never moving from her side. She rolled into the curve of his strong body, her head on his chest. Her hand drifted to rest on his thigh.

For three weeks they went on like this. He pacified his employers again and again, feeding them lies and false hopes every so often. During the days, Katherine was cool, but every night she slept in the cradle of his ropy arms.

One morning she kissed him on the cheek. He began to think that they could overcome this, that she could forgive him for taking her, beating her, humiliating her. He began to think that she could really be his.

And just as he was beginning to believe this, there was a knock at the door. Just as he was beginning to believe this, his whole carefully constructed world fell to sharp, bleeding pieces at his feet.