Thousands (Dollar 4)

I might not have muscles to overpower evil, but I did have a strength of mind that ensured I wasn’t beaten. I no longer wanted to be Pimlico, the mouse. The girl who might have teeth but was still happiest not using them.

I wanted more than that.

My teeth had grown to fangs.

And although I was free from my past, I was still trapped.

Elder was now my master, and I was still in a cage.

I want out of that cage.

I didn’t know how we’d taken on the roles we’d been custom designed for, now that I’d opened my eyes, it was painfully obvious.

I might be in a cage of his doing, but he was in a cage of his own making. A cage he was born into just from the way his brain had formed from the womb. It wasn’t his fault, and I had to remind myself not to take his surliness or pig-headedness personally.

My theory that he thought in threes—my concept based on watching his fingers dancing and the common waltz whenever he did something…was dying to be tested.

If he’d just heard me out, I would’ve given him my hypothesis. I would’ve listed all the reasons why I thought it would work. I would point out that whatever he was doing was discounted easily the moment he hit that magic number.

Obsession had laws too.

I just needed to learn more about his to convince him.

“Over two years and you’re finally home,” Elder murmured, his shoulders rounding as he sank deeper into the moleskin jacket he’d thrown on. The tan material turned darker with little circles as the mist steadily turned to rain.

I’d also dressed in a jacket—mine down to my thighs with a large wraparound belt and oversized buckle. Clothing was no longer optional but wanted—especially to ward off the familiar chill in England.

“Yet it doesn’t feel as if I’ve been away a day.” I kept staring at the horizon, refusing to look at him. My heart hiccupped at the truth. Everything that’d happened and the reason I’d been away for so long was suddenly nothing more than a single paragraph on a long letter of my life.

Two years was nothing.

It could be scribbled out or erased or torn from the page and burned.

England meant nothing to me because it had taken everything I’d cared about and cast me out. The only thing I wanted here was locked away out of reach.

You couldn’t scribble him out, though.

Looking at Elder, I didn’t think I could ever erase him or scratch off the letters he’d written on my heart. No matter how much or how little time we spent together.

He was permanent. Inked. Tattooed.

And if he didn’t start trusting me to share his life and help him, he would also be thrown overboard.

His lips locked tight as he peered at the harbour and the other vessels moored along the shore. There were no steam-propelled boats or coal-powered cargo ships these days, but the haze of working-class toil painted South Hampton in a dreary light, no matter the new glitz and glamour of restaurants and cafes intermixed with warehouses that’d stood tall for centuries.

A massive clock, housed in its coal-blanketed brick tower, chimed the time at two p.m.

Elder quickly glanced at his watch, a scowl painting his face. “Shit, we’re late.”

“Late?”

“The Hawks ball is tonight.”

My heart raced. “Tonight, tonight?” I looked down at the black pea coat I wore, hiding the simple long-sleeve navy dress beneath. I looked the part of sleek heiress arriving on her floating expensive island, but beneath the rich fabric and heavy wool, I wore no underwear.

I was still a little wild. Still a heathen at heart. Wilder than I should probably be and slowly relearning who I was. I might not be Tasmin and might be growing out of Pimlico, but I still didn’t know who I wanted to be.

I had opinions. I wanted to voice them.

I had dreams. I wanted to live them.

I had desires. I wanted to enjoy them.

I had fears. I wanted to slay them.

Was I so different from everybody else, or was I normal? Was I sane in my desire to put my safety on the line to prove a point with Elder? Would any woman in love do the same for a chance to fix the one she wanted? Were there other girls who hated the restriction of elastic and lace? Who never finished university? Who’d been initiated into sex in the worst possible way, only to find that on her own terms, she was a hot-blooded female who needed sex in her life? Who needed to be touched and kissed and to feel a man filling her?

Am I so different?

And if I’m exactly alike what makes me custom designed for Elder?

Why did I think I had the right to fix him? Why did I believe I could test a silly theory? Would another woman do such a thing?