"No," he says simply. "Nothing makes that better. The operation went wrong. Victor exceeded his instructions. It wasn't supposed to happen that way."
I watch him, searching for signs of deception, finding none. "Then how was it supposed to happen?"
"A frightening but ultimately harmless encounter. Enough to justify bringing you here, but without bloodshed." He meets my gaze directly. "I don't expect you to believe that, but it's the truth."
Strangely, I do believe him. Not because I trust him, but because the cold efficiency I've come to know in Gage Blackwood wouldn't include unnecessary violence. It would be... inefficient.
"That doesn't change where we are now," I say.
"No, it doesn't." He leans back in the chair, his expression thoughtful. "When I was a child, after the worst nights, mymother would sit with me until I fell asleep again. Just her presence was enough to keep the shadows at bay."
The image is startlingly human—Gage as a frightened child, his mother standing guard against invisible demons. I try to reconcile it with the controlled, calculating man before me and find I can't quite bridge the gap.
"Where is she now? Your mother?" I ask.
"Gone," he says, the single word heavy with meaning. "When I was fourteen."
Another piece of the puzzle that is Gage Blackwood falls into place—the loss of his buffer against a harsh father, the boy forced to grow up too quickly in a world without gentleness.
We sit in silence for a while, the atmosphere between us shifting into something I don't quite understand. Not friendship, certainly not affection, but perhaps a fragile truce built on shared vulnerability.
"Would you like me to leave?" he asks eventually, making no move to rise.
I should say yes. Should maintain the emotional distance that keeps me focused on eventual escape. Instead, I find myself shaking my head.
"No," I whisper. "Stay. Just... stay there." I gesture to the chair, establishing boundaries even in this moment of weakness.
He nods, settling more comfortably. "I'll stay until you fall asleep."
I lie back against the pillows, pulling the covers up to my chin. The remnants of the nightmare still hover at the edges of my consciousness, but they seem less threatening with another person in the room, even if that person is the architect of my captivity.
"I used to have nightmares about my father," I find myself saying, eyes fixed on the ceiling. "About disappointing him. About never being good enough, no matter how hard I tried."
"William Everett is a man who thrives on the inadequacy of others," Gage observes. "It's how he maintains control."
"Is that so different from you?" The question emerges sharp-edged, my momentary vulnerability giving way to renewed awareness of our fundamental dynamic.
"I prefer competence to inadequacy," he replies, seemingly unbothered by the comparison. "Your strengths were what interested me, Penelope. Not your weaknesses."
"Yet here I am, caged by your authority, my independence stripped away."
"Temporarily constrained," he corrects, the familiar reframing that never changes the fundamental reality. "Until trust is established."
I turn my head to look at him, finding his gaze steady on mine. "Will that ever happen? Really?"
He considers the question with unexpected seriousness. "I believe so. Not through force, but through time and shared experience. Through moments like this one."
The raw honesty in his voice catches me off guard. For the first time, I glimpse what might be genuine belief behind his words—that he truly sees our future unfolding toward some kind of functional partnership, that this isn't merely about possession but about something more complex.
I close my eyes, suddenly exhausted. "I don't want to argue philosophy tonight."
"Then we won't," he says simply. "Rest, Penelope. I'll be here."
The surreal quality of the moment settles over me like a blanket—Gage Blackwood, who orchestrated my capture and controls my every waking hour, now standing guard against the nightmares he indirectly created. The contradictions should keep me awake, but instead, I find myself drifting, my bodysurrendering to exhaustion even as my mind continues to puzzle over the enigma sitting across the room.
The last thing I remember before sleep claims me is the sound of his breathing, steady and calm in the quiet room, and the strange realization that for the first time since my capture, I feel almost safe.
When I wake in the morning, he's gone, the chair empty, the room bathed in early sunlight. Only the faint impression on the cushion suggests he was ever there at all, that the night's strange intimacy wasn't just another dream.
