Inescapable by Saskia Walker

the fact the place had obviously been empty a while. She glanced around.
    “How long am I going to be stuck here?” She stood with her back against the old-fashioned Victorian radiator warming her hands and legs and stared around the strange bedroom while she tried to make sense of everything that happened over the course of the evening. The witness protection officer, Seth, had taken charge as if it was his god given right. He’d been so high-handed and arrogant that her back was well and truly up. She balked at following his instructions, and she expected at least a modicum of respect—
    especially if Adrian and she were such highly valued members of the public that they needed his protection. He riled her. Then there was the fact she’d accidentally gotten intimate with
     
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    him, which apparently had given him an excuse to act as if he owned her. Was he that way with everyone?
    The question made her remember each and every detail of what had happened between them, and her response to the memory was physical as well as mental. Tossing her hair back, she pushed the memories away as best she could. One thing was for sure, she wanted her phone back. She had to get in touch with her flatmate. Andrea would be worried sick. They worked together, and they had a business to run. Andrea knew she was out on a date but if she wasn’t there in the morning Andrea would have to bring in a temp, and they couldn’t afford that right now.
    After a moment she gathered her resolve and listened at the door. Clicking it open, she found that the hallway was now in darkness. Across the corridor light poured out of an open doorway. She could hear the sound of the television and the two men exchanging comments.
    Somebody laughed, and for a moment she was tempted to join them. On principle, she denied herself that luxury.
    It’d been hard, because her curiosity was raging—about both of them. Adrian, the man who she had been so intimate with online, and Seth the arrogant man who was now in charge. Phone , she reminded herself. As her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom she could see that the two phones were still sitting on the hall table, where he had left them.
    Opening the door a little wider, she winced when it squeaked. Squeezing through the narrow gap, she took a deep breath and darted across the hallway. She had the phone in her hand when a tall shadow blocked the light from the sitting-room doorway.
    “Don’t even think about it.” Seth was beside her inside four paces, his expression overcast and inscrutable. He removed the phone from her hand, flipped it over and showed her the back panel.
    Lily’s mouth tightened when she saw that he’d removed the SIM Card. She glared at him. He’d left the phones there as bait, the bastard. “I suppose you think that’s funny.” A half-smile broke the stern look on his face, and that only served to emphasise his dominant hold over her. Lily didn’t want to hear whatever smart remark was about to come out of his mouth. Turning on her heel she went back to her room, but when she went to close the door she found it blocked by the weight of his body. Her pulse tripped and then raced on.

     
     
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    Seth stepped inside, closing the door behind him. It was then that she was reminded of exactly how large he was. His physique was solid and strong. He’d abandoned his leather jacket and the shirt he wore was closely fitted, revealing the breadth of his shoulders and the narrowness of his waist and hips.
    “What do you want?” She issued the question sternly and then folded her arms across the chest, every pulse point in her body aware of his presence. The way he was looking at her—with a slow and obvious up-and-down perusal of her body—left her in no doubt of what he wanted. Great, I kissed the man, and now he thinks he has rights.
    “We need to talk.” He was so still, so contained, and yet everything about him suggested action. “I need your compliance. I want you to do as I