Page 63 of Sigma

“Hysterics would do no good. Did you want me to scream and cry and…I don’t know, run away? Try to attack you?”

“Yes.”

“If you had tried to harm me, I would have made you pay for whatever you did. Don’t think I’m defenseless.”

“If you are anything like your mother, I would expect not.”

“I am like my mother. And my father. And I’ve learned self-defense from some of the most dangerous people on the planet.”

“So I should step carefully, is what you mean.” A wry smirk.

“Yes.”

“Yet, when I held a knife to you, you didn’t react in self-defense.”

I shrug. “Once you go on the defense against a knife, you’re going to get cut. You threatened, but that’s it. I took my chances that you weren’t going to actually try to maim or kill me with it. Correctly, it would seem.”

“So if I had done more than nick you, or cut your clothing away?”

“I’d have gotten cut, but so would you have.”

“You also allowed me to force you into nudity without argument.”

“Lesser of evils, I guess,” I say. “It was embarrassing and humiliating. But it didn’t hurt me. I’ll get over it—Iamover it. It’s just nudity. Better to allow that than force a fight. Even if I won a physical fight against you, I’m not sure of my chances of getting away. I don’t know where I am. I don’t know how many goons you have hiding here, and what they’d do to me in the name of recapturing me. I don’t know where I’d go or how I’d get there. What Idoknow is that you haven’t harmed me so far, and that my family is coming for me. And no matter what or who you can bring to bear, you won’t win. Not against the people you’ve pissed off by taking me, let alone my mother.”

“Your mother found her way free. I’ve allowed her to go, for now.”

I snort. “You’ve allowed nothing, Apollo. You really, really don’t understand what you’ve done.”

He stands up, takes a few steps away. His hands go in his pockets. “If they attempt a rescue of you here, it will not go well for them. This is not merely a large house, Corinna. It is a true castle, with a castle’s defenses.” A glance back at me. “I’d rather not have to resort to those methods.”

“Then let me go.”

“That would not do.” He turns back to me. “You should not be embarrassed by your nakedness, Corinna.”

“Why not? We’ve already talked about this. I didn’t have a choice. I didn’tchooseto let you see me naked. You presented it as a choice between being hurt or stripping. And that’s not a choice. We are not lovers. You are my captor, Apollo. However gilded the cage, it’s still a cage. So yes, stripping for you was humiliating. Having you cut the dress off me was scary. Having to wear your clothing because I had none of my own was embarrassing.” I step closer to him. “Just because you think I’m attractive, it doesn’t mean I’m not going to be embarrassed when I’m forced to be naked in front of a stranger—and not just a stranger, but a man who has taken me hostage.”

He doesn’t respond for a long while.

Consuela comes, places plates, silverware, a large bottle of beer, and a pair of glasses on the table, and leaves without saying a word.

When she’s gone again, he turns and strides over to me. He doesn’t stop until he’s an inch from me, staring down at me. His chest rises and falls heavily. His brow is furrowed. Jaw clenched.

“I do not find you attractive.” His eyes are fixed on mine, blazing like black fire, fierce yet unknowable, only the intensity readable

“No?” I arch an eyebrow. “The way you look at me says otherwise.”

He swallows hard. His jaw grinds audibly. “Attractive? No, Corrina.” His fingertip traces my jawline from earlobe to chin. “I amconsumedby you.”

His touch is exquisitely gentle. Yet, it sends a line of fire trickling over my skin, makes me shiver down to my toes.

“Could have fooled me,” I whisper.

“Am I fooling you, Corinna?” Instead of his finger on my jaw, he now touches the pad of his thumb to my lips. “Can you not read the obsession in my eyes?”

“I can’t read a damn thing in your eyes.” I have to pause, suck in a breath; his nearness, the intensity of his eyes and the wild ferocity of his presence, the molten heat of his touch on my lips—my breath is scorched away. It’s terrifying. “Why would you be…consumed by me?”

“It was a miscalculation,” he murmurs. “I thought I could use you. I thought I could hold you hostage and use you for leverage against your parents.”