Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 68004 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68004 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
I could stay here and feel sorry for myself, or I could go explore the boundaries of my cage. Jafar said I have access to the top two floors, but he also said he owns the whole building. I’m sure someone will stop me if I try to move outside my confines, but I have to try. If only to see exactly where the perimeter of my limited freedom stands.
None of the dresses are suited for casual wear, but my only other option is the robe, which doesn’t cover nearly enough of me. Yes, Jafar and I will be exchanging words once he comes back to the penthouse tonight.
I finally dress in the least revealing of the bunch, which really isn’t saying anything. It’s a deep purple dress that clasps around my neck like a collar and hugs every inch of me in the front, leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination. It dips low in the back and, like the red number, it has slits all the way up almost to the top of my hips. Sexy? Yes. Appropriate? Not in the least.
I step into the elevator and press the button for the bottom floor.
Nothing happens.
Second floor.
Same response.
I narrow my eyes. That son of a bitch. I start punching numbers, but nothing happens until I get to the nineteenth floor—the one directly below the penthouse. “I’m going to kill him.”
The nineteenth floor is a smorgasbord of things designed to entertain. I find a small theater room with comfy reclining seats and a selection of movies large enough to keep me occupied for years. There’s a small bar with a vast array of alcohols. A gym. A library. And a pool.
What it’s noticeably lacking is people.
“A cage, indeed.” A feeling in my chest, a fluttering like a bird that’s had its wings clipped. Trapped. I am trapped. I may have been able to ignore the truth for the last eighteen hours or so, but I can’t do it any longer.
I am worse off with Jafar than I was with my father.
Chapter 6
Jafar
“Explain to me again how you lost Ali for the second time.”
Seth winces and looks like he wants to be anywhere but standing in front of me, delivering this particular bit of bad news. “We underestimated him. After he escaped the coup, we tracked him to his apartment. But when we broke in to collect him, he slipped away.”
Fuck.
Fuck.
I keep my expression cold, letting none of the frustration through. Seth might have fucked this up, but he’s still one of my best men. “Find him.” The longer Ali remains free—remains alive—the greater the risk to Jasmine. If he was going to blow out of town, he would have done it by now.
No, he’s looking to reverse the coup.
And he needs Jasmine to do it.
“Yes, sir.” He ducks his head. For such a big man, he manages to occupy a small space in this moment. “I already have my men searching him out. He won’t be able to evade us for long.”
“Don’t fail me.” I wait for him to bob a nod. “Go.”
“Yes, sir.” He hurries from the room, leaving only Jeremiah.
My second shakes his head. “This isn’t ideal.”
“I know.” I wait for him to point out that if we’d kept with the original timeline, none of this would be an issue. Five years of working my way close to Balthazar, close enough to strike, close enough to actually accomplish what I set out to when I came to Carver City, and I let my fury get the best of me when it mattered most.
Jeremiah doesn’t say anything.
Of course he doesn’t. He knows there’s nothing he can say that I haven’t already said to myself. I endangered my ambition because the thought of Ali getting his hands on Jasmine—of what he might do to her—made me lose my fucking mind. She’s mine. She’s been mine since I laid eyes on her.
I wouldn’t do anything different.
“Find him, Jeremiah. I want you on this separately from Seth. He botched the grab the first two times. If he does it a third time, I don’t want you to worry about extraction. Put a fucking bullet between his eyes.”
“I’m on it.”
There’s nothing more I can do for the time being. At least on Balthazar’s side of things, I have everything locked down. Most of his men were only too happy to jump sides. He made the cardinal mistake of not taking care of his own people, of looking to his wealth first and theirs not at all. It’s why I chose him when I came to Carver City. There are other players that move just out of sight of the everyday world, some of them with more territory and more power than Balthazar, but he was the only one prime for the picking.
The fact that I laid eyes on his daughter and wanted her for mine barely came into the decision.