Captive Cupid

I moved into my brother's apartment and discovered he'd chained up a beautiful blind man.

Naturally, I fed the poor captive, supervised his baths, walked him at night, and called him a good boy.

Then my brother saw the apartment over video and screamed, "Chloe, I moved months ago. You just broke into a stranger's home."

I fled before the man could learn my name.

Unfortunately, Adrian Vale got his sight back—and the powerful heir had no intention of letting his favorite criminal disappear.

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Three weeks after graduation, I arrived in Harbor City with two suitcases, one job offer, and a plan to save enough money that rent would stop feeling like organized theft.

My older brother had offered me his apartment while he was away on business. He'd even told me where he still kept the spare key: under the cracked blue flowerpot outside the door.

"Make yourself at home," he'd said. "And look after the new dog. Little black thing. Shy around strangers, so I keep him tethered indoors. He's spoiled and mean. If he acts up, smack him."

I had visited the old residential complex once, years earlier. The stairwell still smelled faintly of damp concrete and somebody's dinner. The blue flowerpot was exactly where I remembered it. The key turned. The apartment layout hadn't changed.

I set down my luggage and made the kissing noise people used to call pets.

"Here, puppy. Come meet your new favorite person."

Something moved in the bedroom.

I smiled, pushed open the door, and said, "Who's a bad little boy who wants his sister to scratch—"

The rest died in my throat.

A man stood beside the half-drawn curtains.

He wore a thin black shirt and loose trousers. A monitoring band circled one ankle, its tiny screen pulsing red. His black hair fell over a face so pale and sharply beautiful that he looked carved rather than born. His eyes turned toward me, but they didn't focus.

Blind.

Too thin.

Tethered by a device at his ankle.

"Who are you?" he asked.

His voice was low and rough, the kind that made a sensible person answer immediately.

I was not sensible. I closed the door in his face, pulled out my phone, and reread my brother's messages.

New pet.

Black hair.

Shy with strangers.

Kept tethered inside.

Bad temper.

Every clue matched.

It took me thirty seconds to accept that my brother had lost his mind.

He hadn't adopted a dog.

He had imprisoned a blind man.

I should have called the police.

That was what a normal person would have done.

Unfortunately, the suspected kidnapper was my brother, the man who had paid my exam fees, mailed me care packages through four years of college, and once ridden an overnight train because I had the flu. Also, my new job started in two days, and I had nowhere else to live.

So I chose a compromise no lawyer would recommend: I would keep the captive alive until my brother came home, then force my brother into therapy and turn him in if necessary.

I went back into the bedroom.

The man hadn't moved.

"I'm the new housekeeper," I said.

"Get out."

His temper was understandable. Kidnapping rarely improved a person's manners.

I called my brother from the kitchen and lowered my voice. "What's your guest's name? I want to take good care of him."

"Are you sick? His name is Dog. Call 'dog' and he comes wagging. Even you can't mess that up."

My stomach dropped.

They had taken his name, too.

"He has dignity," I whispered. "You can't call a human being a dog."

My brother hung up after telling me to feed the animal and stop being weird.

I searched the cabinets for anything useful. In a drawer beneath a stack of unopened mail, I found an identity card.

The man in the photograph looked healthy and imperious, his dark eyes clear and direct.

Adrian Vale.

Registered residence: Kingsbridge, thousands of miles away.

My brother hadn't just abducted someone. He had apparently transported him across half the country.

I checked the refrigerator. Empty. The wine rack was full, but there wasn't so much as an egg in the kitchen.

No wonder Adrian was gaunt.

I pulled on a cap and mask before going to the grocery store. The complex was old enough to have blind spots between its security cameras. If my brother was arrested later, I preferred not to appear in the documentary.

Two hours later, I set three hot dishes and a bowl of soup on the dining table.

"Dinner's ready, Mr. Vale."

He emerged slowly, one hand following the wall. The screen on his ankle flashed: IRRITATED.

"Didn't they explain the rules to you?" he said. "I didn't ask for food. Leave."

They.

There were more kidnappers.

I tightened my grip on the soup bowl. My brother had joined an organization.