Chapter 118
A week had passed since Amelia was captured, and she was beginning to accept the horrifying possibility that Kai might not be able to find her. He had no way of tracking her, no clue where she had been taken. If there was any chance of escape, it would have to come from her and her alone.
But there was one problem: Lilac refused to free her from the chains.
Instead, she took care of everything herself, feeding Amelia, bathing her, treating her like a fragile doll. At first, Amelia had resisted, clenching her jaw, turning her head, trying to assert some shred of control. But Lilac was relentless. By the third day, Amelia stopped fighting, too drained to keep pushing back. Lilac always managed to get the food down her throat, whether by coaxing or force.
Worse, Lilac began injecting her with some unknown drug, something that left her dizzy, weak, and barely able to stand. It was always right before she unchained her and led her to the bathroom, ensuring Amelia would be too feeble to resist.
However, since the first day, when Amelia had suffered a terrible stomach pain, Lilac hadn’t tried to kiss her on the lips again. The most she’d done was steal the occasional kiss on her cheek, gentle yet unsettling.
Lilac clung to her like a shadow. She cracked jokes, tried to make her laugh, filled the silence with one-sided conversations that Amelia refused to respond to. And when she wasn’t hovering, she painted.
Portraits.
Dozens of them.
Even now, Lilac sat perched on a wooden stool, her attention locked on the canvas in front of her. One hand held a palette, the other a brush that moved in long, slow strokes. She had been painting for over two hours, humming softly to herself like they were merely sharing a quiet afternoon in an artist’s studio rather than a prison.
Lilac set her brush down at last, eyes gleaming with satisfaction as she lifted the canvas from the easel. "It’s done," she said, voice tinged with excitement as she turned it around to show Amelia. "Do you want to see it?"
Amelia didn’t answer. She remained curled up on the bed, wrists still cuffed to the headboard, her face pale and distant. Her gaze didn’t even flicker toward the painting.