Lily wiped the perspiration from her forehead. The crazy asshole was playing with the heat again. It was a favorite tactic of Mad Max. A few years ago, Lily had gone to a sleepover where she and her friends had binge-watched all the Mad Max movies. She couldn’t remember all that had happened but did recall some nightmarish figures. Her Mad Max would have fit in nicely in all that madness. The nickname seemed perfect for her captor.
Max loved being in charge of everything. There was no thermostat that she was able to access, just as she had no control over the air-conditioning. It was a power thing for him. He was like this creepy spider, and she was an insect in his web. The asshole didn’t even try to hide his monitoring of her through his spy cameras. In fact, it seemed a point of pride to him. During his visits, he liked to drop comments on what he’d seen her doing. Not that there was a hell of a lot she could do. The bastard could even control what she watched on TV, changing the channel whenever he wanted. And playing with the volume to annoy her. She was his TV show. There was no privacy from him.
She raised her hand and flipped off the camera nearest to her. His response was to turn on the air-conditioning to high. Bastard.
Lily wasn’t sure who was worse, Tío Leo or Max. At least with Lie-o it had been all about the money. It wasn’t as easy to figure out Max’s game, but that didn’t make him any less scary.
Although it was late, Lily resisted trying to sleep. Max usually waited until she was in a deep slumber before revealing himself. She’d awaken with the sense that something was wrong, and something was. The perv would be standing at the foot of her bed, staring at her. Staring. She never knew how long he stood there watching her, whether it was minutes or hours. The jolt was in opening her eyes, and finding him there. She had screamed the first two times, and he’d laughed, almost like he was getting his rocks off.
Maybe he was. Mad Max had an agenda, even if she didn’t know what it was. That scared her.
Last night he hadn’t awakened her, but Lily wasn’t sure if that was better or worse. Max had left calling cards behind, images he had positioned around the room. They were all different, but similar. The girls in the drawings resembled Lily. They had her dark hair, fair skin, and large green eyes. Most wore sheer gowns. The young women were human, but there was an otherworldly quality to them.
In some of the images, the women were bathing in the outdoors, their bodies embraced in the reflected light of the moon shimmering off of the water’s surface. In some others, girls her age were happily swinging from the moon, or serenely perched in the middle of a crescent moon. Not all of the drawings were modern. She suspected some of the images came from old paintings.
Lily gathered all the images of her look-alikes, and put them away in a drawer. She wanted no part of these moon maidens. She wanted no part of Max, but there was no getting away from him. Awaking to the images only confirmed her worst fears. Chance hadn’t brought her to this prison; her captor had been looking for someone like her. He had been seeking his moon woman.
Max had said she was his guest. Max had lied.
Lily wondered if there had ever been a prison like hers. The bars might not be visible, but she was completely confined, hidden behind the darkened windows. There was only one door in her suite, a heavy steel security door. Max had told her that he was on the other side of it. There was a slot in the door that opened from his side for the purpose of sliding food through, just like how prisoners in movies got their food delivered. That was much more preferable to Max delivering it in person.
Her living space had been stripped down to its essentials, with everything bolted down, from the lamps to the television. There were no utensils and no tools. The prison had been designed so that there was no potential for weapons or projectiles. There was nothing sharp or heavy. It wasn’t enough to put her in a birdcage. They’d also clipped her wings.
The room was getting colder, but Lily resisted covering herself in a blanket. She didn’t want to give Max the satisfaction of thinking he could control her every movement.
There was no clock to tell Lily what time it was, but she suspected it was after midnight. The Las Vegas lights drew her close to the window, although her fear of heights kept her a few feet away from the glass. Lily avoided looking down, but instead took in the distant lights. They twinkled like stars. And they were just as unreachable, she feared.
She thought of the film Tangled. This was her high tower. In the movie Rapunzel had seen distant lights in the sky that she had thought were stars, but after discovering they were floating lanterns, she yearned to follow them. As much of an asshole as Tío Leo was, most mornings he let the girls watch Disney movies. Lily knew he hadn’t done that to be nice; it was how he kept them occupied and controlled them, but it was the only good part of their day. The three other girls he’d been trafficking hadn’t spoken English, and Lily didn’t know much Spanish, but they’d still found a way to talk with one another. The girls liked singing the songs from the movies, even though they didn’t know what the words meant.
Lily hummed softly under her breath. She didn’t want Max to hear. But looking at the lights, she thought of Rapunzel singing “I See the Light.” It had been one of their favorite songs. In a whisper, she sang, like Rapunzel had, of how blind she’d been.
Too bad she didn’t have long golden hair like Rapunzel’s. But even if she had, Lily knew there was no one out there waiting to climb her hair. She was by herself. That made everything worse.
Lily went to bed, but not so much for sleep as to hide under the covers. She wasn’t going to let Max see her tears. It was only under the covers that she could express her feelings without the need of putting on a front. Where she could admit to herself that she missed her old life.
After a time, Lily cried herself to sleep.
* * *
It was not a prince who came to her.
The loud bang caused Lily to awake with a start. She threw up her arms to ward off the perceived threat.
Max was wearing workout clothes, a black-and-white yin-yang sweatshirt and sweatpants. But the yin-yang fish had been transformed into the faces of black-and-white snarling wolves.
“It’s a beautiful night to dance, is it not?”
Lily was too scared to answer, but that didn’t seem to make a difference to Max.
Laughing, he backed up half a dozen steps, then ran at the window, throwing himself at it again. The impact knocked him back, but he landed on his feet. His toothy grin, pale face, and dark beard confronted her.
“Would you like to dance with me?” he asked, clicking his long thumbnails together, like a crab brandishing its claws.
Fighting her trembling, Lily shook her head.
“Such a shame. But at least we can have a late-night snack together. I took the liberty of ordering some of your favorites.”
“I’m not hungry,” she said.
There had been a few times when Lily had eaten with him, only to fall into a deep sleep afterward. She didn’t think that was a coincidence and suspected Max of drugging her.
“Suit yourself, Nataliya, but I still expect you to join me in the next room while I dine.”
Lily felt the hairs on her arms rise. Nataliya. He had called her by that name again. And now Lily remembered where she’d heard that name before. It was Karina who had said that Lily looked like her friend Nataliya. That couldn’t be a coincidence, could it? What else had she said? Lily struggled to remember. And then it came to her. Karina had said Lily’s eyes were just like Nataliya’s.
Shit. That explained why Max was always studying her face. It was like he was trying to look into her skull. But now she knew it was her eyes.
Lily took a seat in the living room, trying to keep as much distance between herself and Max as she could. The creep’s eyes were on her now. She refused to meet them. What had happened to Nataliya? She wanted to ask the question, but was afraid to.
Max gestured to the food in front of him. “You really should avail yourself of the cuisine we have. Our kitchen employs some of the best Chinese chefs in the world. Their baozi is unsurpassed, not to mention the shou mian.”
He pointed to some noodles that were laid out on a plastic sheet and said, “We have patrons who travel many thousands of miles to partake of this dish.”
She watched Max eating with his plastic fork. All the food was delivered precut without silverware or even plates. Her choice was to eat with her hands or with a plastic fork.
He was looking at her, expecting her to say something. “No thanks,” she said.
“That is your choice, of course, but I think it to be an ill-advised one. The English translation of shou mian is ‘noodles of longevity.’ If I were you, I would make a point of eating them.”
Despite being afraid, Lily looked into the black holes of his eyes. He smiled and said, “After all, it wouldn’t do to tempt the fates.”