CAUGHT: A Hitman Romance (15 page)

I take my eyes off of her and turn back to the group, trying not to give even the slightest clue about what had kept me so occupied.

I hear Pete's fiancée sighing next to him.

"Is she being awkward again?" she whispers.

"Who?" Will asks innocentl
y
—
and too loudly. Sandria rolls her eyes at him, suggesting that most people in our circle were not supposed to be aware of their exchange.

"Elizabeth," the blonde, Lucia, says. "Our little sister."

I gulp at that revelation but try not to let it show too much.

"Oh, I don't think I have met her?" Will adds.

"That's her over there," Sandria says, nodding towards the brunette beauty. "She is a bit... special. She doesn't socialize well. You don't need to talk to her.”

"Sandria...," Pete hisses. "Don't you think we should introduce her?"

Sandria casts him an annoyed look, but nods. "Yes, darling."

"And she's just standing there, all by herself," Will adds. "We really should call her over. Family shouldn't be left by themselves."

The two sisters exchange a look, but eventually Sandria frees herself from Pete's arm and scurries over to the dark-haired beauty, who had just turned her narrow back to us.

My eyes follow her as she reaches the girl and taps her on the shoulder, her motion distant like that of a stranger. She says something to her, but I don't see the girl respond anything. Instead, she just nods and follows her sister as they return to our little group.

LEONARD

"Elizabeth, my father-in-law to be, Mr. William Bishop," Sandria introduces. "William, my younger sister, Elizabeth."

"A pleasure to meet you, young lady," Will exclaims as he reaches out to shake her hand. "It's so good to finally meet all of my daughter-in-law's family."

She doesn't speak but gives a slight nod as she shakes his hand. Now that she is standing close to her sisters, I notice a faint resemblance between them. All three of them display the same delicate nose and full lips, topped off with big eyes, framed by thick, dark lashes and the pale skin of the noble class. The Barringtons have three perfectly beautiful daughters, that’s for sure.

But that is where the resemblances between the three of them end. Elizabeth is much taller than her sisters, her hair is darker and her eyes...

I grit my teeth as she turns around to me and we are formally introduced. She looks up at me with those dark, iridescent eyes. Just like her hair, they are a lot darker than those of her sisters, but that is not the only way in which they differ. The color of hers appears to be a mix of both of her sisters, seemingly changing from a dark blue to dark green, depending on where she is looking.

They are flickering, moving like the wild sea.

It drives me insane.

As does her touch. I expected her handshake to be soft and weak as it is with most women, but I was wrong. Her hand is cold, but her grip is strong and engaging, almost as if she was trying to pull me closer.

She is not, though. As soon as our hands met, they part from each other and I watch her as she takes a step back, deliberately standing about half a foot outside of our circle as if she didn't belong.

However, if she is one of the Barringtons' daughters, she belongs just as much as the other two, despite so many signs that say otherwise.

I wonder what is wrong with her. I am intrigued by her even more, now that she is standing so close. She radiates something. Something dark. Her motions are careful and sophisticated, unnatural, in a way. As if she had practiced every gesture, every look she casts around. Even the way she is standing doesn’t seem natural. If her movements didn’t have that elegance and flow about them, I would almost call her robotic.

I also wonder what it is that causes my insides to growl and my cock to involuntarily rise to attention as I look at her.

"The youngest and the tallest," William makes a helpless attempt at small talk.

"And the darkest," Lucia adds. "Our parents keep joking that the blonde is gradually dying in our family, as illustrated in the three of us."

"Elizabeth likes to add the killing blow, though," Sandria adds, casting Elizabeth a nasty smile. "She would be a little lighter if she didn't put all that glop into her hair."

Elizabeth doesn't show any reaction to what her sisters are saying and displays a helpless smile as she looks at William, then down on the floor, then back up, turning to me.

"Oh, so this is not your natural hair color?" Pete asks.

She looks at him and finally utters her first words.

"It is not," she says. "As Sandria pointed out, naturally my hair would be a little lighter."

Her voice is airy but deeper than I expected. She doesn't speak in high-pitched resonance like her sisters do, but in a very soft tone that is barely audible.

She's not a screamer, I bet.

"Sandria tells me you just returned from college?" Pete interrogates.

She nods. "Yes. I graduated a few weeks ago."

"What was your major?" Pete wants to know.

"It doesn't matter," she replies. Her face is stern, frozen in an unreadable mask.

A few moments of awkward silence follow before Sandria takes a deep breath to scold her sister.

"Elizabeth," she breathes. "What an odd answer to give. You can tell him! Don't be embarrassed."

Elizabeth's eyes narrow as she casts her sister an evil look, but again, she doesn't say a word.

"What does she have to be embarrassed about?" I ask, talking about her in the third person while directly looking at Elizabeth herself.

She turns toward me, returning to the same indifferent expression she has shown most of the time since she was forced into our little circle. Everything about her is calm, except for her eyes. They appear to be on fire. Dark green-blue, looming fire.

She is hiding something underneath that pale, apathetic mask. A shadowy beast, screaming to be freed.

The left corner of my mouth rises just the slightest bit as I reciprocate her gaze. Of course, she doesn't react to it. She just looks at me, unwilling to talk.

That quiet, disclosed exterior. That perfect beauty. I want to smash her to pieces. Everything about her begs to be broken.

Speak
.

"Nothing," she breathes. Finally.

A normal person would have continued that statement with a short clarification as to what her sister was referring to, but not Elizabeth. Apparently, she thinks that one word to be enough of an explanation and decides to take another sip of her champagne while a soft fall breeze flies by, causing her doll-like hair to dance around the delicate shoulders.

The image of her is maddening.

She lowers her eyes and looks down at my hands. I have been clenching my fists without even realizing it. Now that her eyes are on them, I am terribly aware of it. Instinct tells me to relax my hands, but I fight it.

Let her see this. Let's see if she dares to react to it.

She doesn't.

"Well, she refrained from joining the Ivy League club," her other sister Lucia finally says, unable to stand the silence that must have become awkward for everybody else around us.

Out of courtesy, I turn around to Lucia, looking at her questioningly as does Will.

"It's only a Liberal Arts degree," Lucia explains. "She went to a liberal arts college instead of entering Yale or Brown as she could have."

"Like us," Sandria adds in a reproachful tone.

"Oh, you were accepted at Yale and Brown as well?" Pete asks, sounding genuinely impressed.

Elizabeth takes a deep breath. I watch as her chest rises beneath her light dress, the outline of her breasts clearly visible. They are bigger than her slim frame suggests at first, but not much more than a good handful. A perfect fit for my palms.

"Yes, I was," she says, now looking at Pete.

"Impressive!" Pete exclaims, much to the dismay of his betrothed, who rolls her eyes at him.

"Yes, she is quite a smart one," Lucia adds, but it doesn't sound like a compliment at all. If anything her remark has a sarcastic touch to it.

"No. Just diligent and rich," Elizabeth objects.

"And what school did you chose to go to?" Will continues the interrogation, completely ignoring her awkward statement.

"Williams," she says. "It's a-"

"Private liberal arts college, I know," Will finishes her sentence. "And the best of the country, I might add! It outranks the Ivy League schools in some aspects, you know."

He scans the little group to see if all of us heard this revelation.

"There is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of," he comforts Elizabeth, tilting his head to the side as if he was feeling sorry for her.

"I know," she hisses. "Like I said: I have nothing to be ashamed of."

Sandria and Lucia snort, exchanging a telling look.

"Will that be all?" Elizabeth asks, startling everybody with the question. "If so, I'd like to excuse myself for another drink."

She doesn't wait for anybody to reply but turns around and hurries away, aiming toward the French door to enter the house.

My eyes follow her, scanning her dainty body as she walks away. She is wearing thin and barely visible pantyhose beneath her dress. Through the thin fabric, I can see the marks around her ankles. She has scars on both sides, encompassing almost her entire ankle on each leg. Faint, red stripes. Cuts, maybe. In fact, that is my first assumption. But they are a little too wide and too trivial for that.

They look more like rope marks.

"In fact," I say, directed at no one in particular. "A drink does sound good. If you would excuse me for a moment."

A round of empty smiles and nods lets me know that I am free to leave the group.

I turn around and follow the path of the youngest Barrington daughter, hoping that she hasn't disappeared or started a conversation with someone else.

Neither fear comes true. I spot her alone at the bar, placing her empty glass on the table and replacing it with a new one.

I approach her with wide steps and place myself next to her, nonchalantly reaching for a glass so close to her that our arms brush.

She flinches. Ever so slightly. That little touch sends shivers through her graceful body.

I look at her, expecting her to turn around direct those beautiful eyes at me.

But she doesn't.

Instead, she makes a move to get away from me. She turns around and is just about to flee when I stop her by saying: "Does it hurt?"

She freezes mid-motion and hunches her shoulders. Her feet are pressed together, shifting one in front of the other as if to try to hide the marks.

"Excuse me?" she asks, looking back at me over her shoulder.

She is so charmingly awkward.

"Your ankles," I say in a low and husky voice. "Looks like you're hurt there."

She slowly turns around to me, her eyes turning up to me.

"I think most people would consider that quite the impertinent question," she utters.

"Are you most people?"

She frowns and takes a sip of her champagne. Her signature move it seems, especially when it's her turn to speak.

"What happened to your ankles?" I press.

"Nothing," she lies.

She wants to run away and escape from this conversation, I can feel it. But I won't let her. I am enjoying her discomfort way too much to let that happen.

"Well, I'm pretty damn sure you're lying to me right now," I whisper.

She throws me an innocent look and shakes her head. "I don't lie. Ever."

"Tell me what happened then," I probe.

"Nothing happened," she insists.

"I thought you don't lie?"

"I don't," she says. "Nothing
happened
to me."

She smirks and catches me off guard with that expression. It's the first time that her face shows anything but apathy or indifference.

I quickly check our surroundings. There is no one I know within earshot. William and the little gang surrounding his son are still outside on the terrace, probably talking about the weather or wedding preparations. The Barringtons are still guarding the door, and everybody else is nothing but a mass of stranger's faces to me.

She is giving off vibes. That smirk. The way she is looking at me. Expectantly. While just a few seconds ago it seemed as she couldn't get out of my reach fast enough, she now looks at me with expectation.

Yet, I cannot risk it. I cannot talk to her the way I want to. I cannot do the things I want to do to her.

Not here. Not now.

For now I'll have to leave her with her obnoxious family and let her return to that casket of safety.

"Alright then," I say. "I'll believe you."

I turn around without waiting for her to reply anything and walk away. The knowledge that her shimmering eyes are following me as I leave makes me growl on the inside.

I want her.

She needs to become mine.