"What's your background, Jansen?" Jude asked as we traipsed to our allocated practice room.
"I picked up my sister's violin when I was five and started to copy her. When I proved my skills, my parents agreed to pay for lessons."
"And you lived in Holland before you came here?"
"Yes, we moved from Nijmegen to Amsterdam when I was eleven."
"So what made you leave? Why come here rather than stay at the Conservatorium?"
"My father's senior vice president of a marketing consultancy and the company transferred him over here on a two-year contract. I could have stayed behind, but Holborn has a reputation for being the best, and I didn't want to pass up the opportunity. How about you two?"
Jude answered first. "Similar start. I played the cello at school in England to avoid gym class, and when I didn't burst my parents' eardrums, they forked out for extra tuition. But I moved here to get away from my parents, not stick with them." He paused and wrinkled his nose. "Although it's kind of quiet on campus. I'm gonna start heading out in the evenings to find out what Boston has to offer, if you'd care to join me?"
"I've never been a fan of nightclubs. I prefer my music classical. And you, Akari? Should I call you Akari? Or do you shorten it?"
In my sheltered life, I'd never met a Dutch person before. Was Jansen's abrasive tone typical of the region or down to his manner?
"Akari's fine. I started playing the piano when I was young, but I had a break for a few years, so I'm not as advanced as the others here."
"Why would you have a break?" He sounded shocked at the concept. "Either music's in your blood, or it isn't."
"Circumstances beyond my control. Now that I'm able to play again, I have no intention of stopping." I had no intention of telling a stranger about the reasons for my hiatus either. "How do you want to start the Schubert? Should we play individually first?"
I relaxed a little when I found Jansen's playing to be competent. He lacked Brigitte's flair, but he got the notes right and his tempo was spot on. Perhaps we'd survive next week's performance after all? With our impending performance in mind, we played for the rest of the morning, until our grumbling stomachs reminded us they needed food.
"What's the cafeteria like?" Jansen asked me as Jude led the way downstairs.
"Not bad. I mean, considering it's free." Holborn provided meals for each student as part of our scholarship, although I preferred to eat my dinner at home with Sofia. Having crowds of people around me while I dined reminded me of meals in Colombia, where I ate at a communal table or I didn't eat at all.
I helped myself to a plateful of food from the buffet and found a table in a quiet corner, but before I managed to take a mouthful, Jansen squashed onto the bench next to me and Jude sat down opposite.
Jansen picked at his hamburger before covering it with ketchup. "The food in Amsterdam was better."
Jude shrugged. "Whatever. Nothing beats fries."
Jansen shuffled closer until his thigh touched mine, and with the wall in the way, there was nowhere for me to go. The forkful of pasta I'd just swallowed stuck in my throat as he fixed his eyes on me.
"You like the spaghetti?" he asked.
"It's great. Delicious."
"It's overcooked." His tone made it clear he didn't believe a word I said.
"I'm just not all that hungry."
"How about I take you somewhere that serves better food after class?" He leaned over and peered at the mess I'd made on my plate, crowding me.
I shook my head as I shrank back in my seat, Jansen's touch bringing back memories I'd kept locked away since last year. As long as I avoided physical contact, I could keep them hidden in the dark recesses of my mind. Emmy had made it easy for me up until now—she'd ordered every man in her employ never to lay a finger on me, and none of them would dare to disobey. The only people whose touch didn't make me recoil were Emmy herself and her husband because I trusted both of them with my life. Not even my own family knew the full extent of my scars.
"Why not? You have to eat, and we can talk about our musical talents."
"I can't."
Nor could I stand being next to him for a moment longer. Leaving my lunch behind, I scrambled over the back of the seat as curious faces turned to stare. Jude called my name, but I ignored him. I didn't want to talk—not to him, not to anyone. A hundred eyes followed me as I fled towards the exit, breaking into a run as I got closer to freedom, then wincing as my wrist hit the door at an awkward angle. Only when I reached the safety of a locked toilet stall did I pause for breath.
What had I done?
I'd embarrassed myself in front of my classmates and overreacted at Jansen's innocent gesture, that's what. After all, he'd only offered to take me for some better food. A nice meal. So why wouldn't my heart stop pounding against my ribcage like a boxer with a grudge? A tear escaped down my cheek as I replayed the scene in my mind. The other students, the staff, they probably thought I was crazy, and I couldn't blame them, not after the way I'd shot out of the cafeteria like the fires of hell were behind me.
And not when I'd often had the same thought myself.
My fingers flew over the keys as I hammered out Scriabin's Black Mass Sonata that evening, ignoring the pain in my wrist. If I concentrated hard enough on the music, I could almost forget the whispers that had stopped as I walked into class earlier that afternoon. Jude looked away from me while Jansen simply stared. I'd slunk away to the back corner of the lecture theatre and stayed there until the literature seminar ended.
Now it was just me, a piano, and my wayward thoughts. I used to wish for a magic switch to erase the horrors of Colombia that plagued my mind, but I'd stopped doing that a couple of years back when I fell in love with Hisashi's father. I'd keep the bad memories as long as he walked among them, but I needed to learn to control them better, a skill I'd thought would get easier with time but had so far proved elusive.
I paused to gently work my wrist back and forth, trying to ease the pain. Yes, I knew I should rest, but playing was the only way to get rid of the fear and agony inside. If only—
"Late again?"
A voice came from the doorway, startling me. Lincoln walked in my direction, tentatively covering the distance between the door and the piano. I shrugged, and that sent another burst of pain shooting through my wrist.
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"Nothing."
"You don't screw your face up like that over nothing." He took another step, and I shuffled away a few inches, hoping he wouldn't notice. Thankfully, he didn't come any closer. "What happened to your wrist? It's swollen."
"An argument with a door. It'll be fine."
"Not if you keep thumping the keys like that, it won't." He drew a small package from his pocket and placed it on top of the piano. "I brought this for you. I thought you might be hungry after you left your lunch. You eat while I find you some ice."
Before I got a chance to protest, he'd gone. I snatched the paper-wrapped object off the lacquered surface, checking it hadn't left a mark. The realisation Lincoln had seen my lunchtime antics made my stomach sink. I didn't know why that mattered to me, but it did.
A whiff of chocolate fought with the nausea in the pit of my stomach, but hunger pangs won out, and I unwrapped Lincoln's offering. A chocolate brownie. I couldn't resist breaking off a piece and popping it into my mouth, then another and another.
"Didn't think you'd be able to say no."
I looked up to find he'd returned, complete with an armful of medical supplies and a smile.
"It's really good." I wiped a crumb from the corner of my mouth and tried to return the sentiment.
"Finish it off, and then I'll strap up your wrist. You should get it checked at the hospital."
I dropped the brownie and clutched my arm to my chest. My heart beat faster, the vibrations making my wrist throb more.
"No, I'll be fine."
He dropped to his knees beside me. "What's wrong?"
That action caused my breath to hitch because it reminded me of the time another man had done the same. I gulped in air, willing myself to keep control.
"I don't like people touching me. That's all. If you leave the ice, I'll wrap it myself."
Lincoln's frown deepened. "Have you ever tried doing that one-handed?"
A tear escaped, running down my face and plopping onto the remains of the brownie. "No."
"Hold your wrist out, and I'll put the bandage on. I promise I won't touch your skin, just the dressing."
"Are you sure?"
He smiled with his mouth but not his eyes. They remained dark, full of sorrow. "Trust me."
Trust him? I didn't know more than his name, and for me, trust took a lot more than that. But even so, something about his quiet manner told me he'd do as he said.
My hand shook as I held it out in front of me, and I couldn't help closing my eyes as he reached out. A plastic wrapper crinkled, and I felt him remove the silver cuff I wore, one of a pair. His sharp intake of breath told me the moment he saw what it covered.
"What the...?" his voice trailed off, but I didn't answer.
I couldn't. Words deserted me as he bandaged up the mess on my wrist, the same way Hisashi's father had done four years ago when he found me in the basement with the stubby paring knife still in my hand.
As Lincoln worked, I remembered that day, the one that changed my life. It started off like any other day in hell, with me waking at five to prepare breakfast for the sick brutes who'd held me captive for the previous twelve years. Twelve years spent isolated in the jungle with the only way in or out by helicopter or a long journey along a rutted track. I'd tried to escape several times, and I still bore the bite marks from the dogs they'd sent after me. The last time, my leg had ballooned up to the size of a watermelon, and I thought I'd die until another of the servants packed my wounds with a paste she'd boiled up from leaves and the agony gradually subsided.
After that, I stayed put, even when the boss got sick of the dogs and shot them. He'd soon have thought of another equally awful punishment. With the choice of living uncomfortably or dying painfully, staying alive just squeaked it. Besides, as I grew older, life became more bearable, or maybe my senses just became dulled to the horrors. When I'd first been taken to the compound, at thirteen, the novelty of a young foreign girl meant rape had been a daily occurrence. In my mid-twenties, I was more likely to get beaten for not cleaning well enough or burning dinner, and out of the two options, I preferred the fists.
Until he arrived. The new guard, taller than the rest with a gold tooth prominent between his thin lips. He watched me for days, sending shivers through me every time I felt his eyes on my back. It was only a matter of time before he came for me, I knew that, and at the time, I'd thought the waiting was more unbearable than the act itself would be. I'd been wrong.
He'd fucked my face, my pussy, and then my ass before forcing his gun barrel inside me in a final act of humiliation. As he twisted it around, cutting me with the steel sights, I'd never forget the look of malice in his eyes.
"Maybe I should pull the trigger," he whispered.
I lay there, helpless, my hands bound behind me. "Do it," I croaked back. "Do it."
But he didn't. His laugh flayed me as he pulled out the gun and did up his pants.
"Too much mess. Besides, who else would I have fun with during my stay here?"
That was the night I'd tried to kill myself, but I couldn't even get that right. I should have cut parallel with my arm rather than across it. Hisashi's father found me semi-conscious and carried me to his apartment, set aside at the opposite end of the hacienda to the rest of his vile family.
"Who did this?" he asked, still on his knees after he'd bound my wrists and made me drink a gallon of water to rehydrate myself.
"I did."
"You might have held the knife, but you weren't the cause."
"What does it matter? If it wasn't him, it would be one of the others."
His eyes, already so dark, turned black. "Give me his name." At six and a half feet tall, he towered over me, but the anger in his tone wasn't aimed in my direction.
"Ignacio," I whispered.
The second the name left my lips, he turned and strode off, leaving me alone in a place normally off-limits to the staff. His home contained little in the way of personal effects, the walls as blank as the persona he projected. I made it as far as the bedroom before weakness overcame me, and I collapsed on his bed, darkness shrouding my mind and my body.
A slamming door jerked me awake. How much time had passed? I looked around for a clock, but all I saw was his shadow silhouetted in the doorway. He glanced at me on his way across the room, pausing only to pull his shirt over his head and toss it into the waste bin in the corner. A metallic tang wafted towards me, and I fought to keep from gagging.
The light he flicked on in the en-suite bathroom bathed him in a soft glow, shoulders hunched as he rinsed the blood off a switchblade and returned it to his pocket. He didn't speak, but eventually I could stand the silence no longer.
"Are you okay?"
He stared past me, unspeaking, for so long I thought he wasn't going to answer, but then a single syllable left his lips.
"No."
The thought that he'd injured himself for me sent me scrambling to get out of his bed.
"I'll fetch the first aid kit," I rasped, but even before I'd finished the sentence, dizziness overcame me, and I fell to the side.
"I'm not hurt."
"But you said..."
"No, I said I'm not okay."
I'd barely spoken to him before that day, even though we'd both lived in the compound for years. He kept to himself, and now it seemed his communication skills were sorely lacking.
"I don't understand."
"I'm as much a prisoner here as you."
"How? Your father owns the place."
"My father is a cold-hearted hijo de perra. Now, you need to sleep."
I tried to get up again. "I'll go back to my room."
"No, stay." He dropped onto the other side of the bed and swung his legs up on the covers. "I won't touch you if that's what you're worried about."
He'd lied.
I woke the next morning pressed against his chest, his arm slung across my waist. Feathery breaths puffed against my cheek, and when I raised my head, I saw the frown lines he habitually wore less pronounced as he slumbered. I should have moved away, but I couldn't. Why? Because for the first time in twelve years, surrounded by his warmth, the chains around my heart loosened just a little. I saw a glimmer of hope.
Darkness cloaked me again when he died, and I thought my heart would be forever black. I may have kept breathing, but I was dead inside, my soul a broken shadow. If it hadn't been for Blackwood and Hisashi, I'd have ended it, properly that time. I'd learned from my mistakes.
But as Lincoln strapped up my wrist, his eyes narrowed in concentration, something felt different. A chink of light broke through the perpetual night, and I found I didn't want to run.