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I shut the door, my mind going into overdrive.

Who would have removed that stuff? I left my room and went down to the kitchen. Searching in the cupboards, I came up empty. I went to the laundry room and grabbed the first aid kit I’d seen on the counter. Opening it, I found that the painkillers weren’t there. The only things left in there were antiseptic creams and Band-Aids.

Next, I hit up John’s fancy study. It was the kind of place that should have a well-stocked bar.

Nothing. Nada.

Next, I went into the kitchen pantry and raided the medicine drawer. It had been similarly censored of anything useful. No flu medications or painkillers.

What the hell?

Just then, my phone vibrated in my pocket. An unknown number.

Don’t bother looking for anything to pop. Those days are behind you, heathen. Be good until I get home.

I nearly dropped my phone in shock. How was he texting me this, when he wasn’t here to see me searching? I stared up at the corner of the room, and there they were. Plain as day. Small, discreet security cameras. I glared at one, picturing Brody on the other end, smirking. CCTV cameras inside the house? Rich people were so fucking weird.

With a stifled scream of frustration, I whirled around and headed back to my room. Had he been touching things in there, too? I immediately checked the ceiling for a camera. Thankfully, there wasn’t one. Maybe it was just the common areas?

I opened a few drawers, not sure what I wanted to find. I paused, taking an inventory of the things I thought I had put in there, then went through everything else. Stuff was missing. I opened the wardrobe and nearly fainted. Only my mother’s “elegant clothes” she’d just bought me hung there. No ripped jeans, no T-shirts, no underlayers. No leather jackets. Nothing that was me. None of my current uniform. Not one thing that told men to stay back remained.

I moved to my bedside table, anxiety growing as I pulled it open. My prescription bottles were gone. I had a whole collection. Pills for depression, for anxiety, pills to make me calm, pills to make me sleep. All gone. I’d also had a stash of blunts that I used to take the edge off the world and try to sleep. Just a bit every night. Gone. Next was the collection of pills I’d amassed at parties over the last year. I’d promised myself never to pop anything when I was already drinking, though I’d broken that promise the other night. Usually, I just held on to the things people gave me. I wanted to know I could escape whenever I needed to. Gone.

I reached for the small silk bag I kept at the back. It had been removed.

He’d even taken my vibrator. I sank down on the floor beside my bed. Horror and shame collided with fury. Despite my past, my body still got turned on and needed release. It couldn’t be stopped, or helped. I’d had enough therapy sessions to try and not blame my body for that biological reality, but honestly, it still coated me in shame. In the end, the only way to deal with it was to take care of it alone. It was just biology, after all. I took care of my body’s needs, and I never needed to go near a man to do it.

Now, Brody had my humble little toy, the only one I’d been able to afford in California. It felt violating somehow. It made me vulnerable. It made me feel hot and frustrated all over.

I got to my feet slowly. If this asshole thought he could bully me, he’d find that he had a fight on his hands. With that in mind, I strode through the bathroom and tried the door on his side. It opened easily.

Either he was too trusting, or he really didn’t think he had any dirt I could sling back at him. His confidence pissed me off.

His room was similar to mine, but there were books and photo frames dotted around the space. A huge wall of bookshelves dominated one side, and a large desk. Everything was organized with military-like precision on that surface. Not a single scrap of paper to be found, just a small holder with four mechanical pencils in it. A closed laptop, which was password protected, of course. I went to his closet and ripped all his clothes off the hangers, then tossed them around the room. I dragged his mattress off his bed and threw the pillows around. He had nothing in the side table beside his bed. Which only meant that he’d planned for my coming in here, clearly. Nobody had nothing personal in their rooms at all. It wasn’t possible.

Then, there were the pictures on the wall. A large, framed newspaper from when Sinclair Industries went public.

There were a couple of hockey shots, him and his brother celebrating a big win on the ice. Then there was a photo that gave me pause. Brody and Cal and a woman standing in the middle. No, not a woman. She was older than them, but not that old. She wasn’t quite smiling at the camera. She looked sad, somehow, despite the curve of her lips.

Brody clung on to her by the waist, holding her close, even though he was very young. Who was she? There was so much I didn’t know about my new family. I went to put the photo back on the wall, having taken it down to examine it.

It fell gracelessly to the floor. A small crack splintered across the glass. I tried again to put it up and this time succeeded. I stared at the fracture, then stepped back to leave it.

I glanced around his room again. There was nothing there to steal in retaliation, and my fury had abruptly run out. My stuff wasn’t here.

The good news was that the desperate urge to find that cough syrup, or some kind of spirits, or a pill to pop, had passed slightly. For now, anyway.

I was taking that as a win.

Brody

As soon aswe got home, Cal disappeared to the sauna while I went to the kitchen for my prepared protein shake. The training went around and around in my head. It hadn’t been nearly as bad as I’d thought it was going to be. With time, we’d make a killer team.

Then what? You’ll get scouted and leave Sinclair Industries to be a pro? Dream on.

I stuffed that thought deep down inside. I didn’t need to play professional hockey. Just having a stellar college career would be enough of an achievement, before I got more serious about leading the company. That was my purpose, myraison d’être.

It was what my father had raised me to believe, at any rate, and now, it was lodged so firmly, I wasn’t sure where his plans stopped and my dreams started.