Chapter Five: No Way Out
1480 Words
The first escape attempt came three days after the slap.
Elena waited until midnight. The house was quiet, blanketed in a hush so complete that even her bare feet seemed to scream across the marble floors. She crept down the back staircase—one she’d memorized after wandering the estate restlessly night after night. It led past the wine cellar, down to the underground garage.
Damien hadn’t spoken to her since that night. He hadn’t looked at her either. She thought he might have her under constant surveillance, but there had been no locks on the doors. No armed guards. Just silence and distance.
She told herself it meant she still had a choice.
But she’d underestimated Damien Blackwell. Again.
She reached the garage. Her heart thudded as she approached one of the black cars lined along the walls like soldiers at rest. She’d taken a valet’s keycard earlier that day, during one of her walks near the staff wing. It had felt like a victory, like power in her palm.
She slid behind the wheel, inserted the card, and—
“INVALID.”
Her stomach dropped.
She tried again.
“INVALID.”
A metallic voice followed. “Unauthorized use detected. Security dispatch in thirty seconds.”
Elena yanked the card out and threw it across the car.
She bolted from the garage just as motion sensors clicked on. The lights turned harsh above her, flooding the corridor in white. She ducked behind a staircase, holding her breath until the mechanical whirring stopped.
She never made it out that night.
---
The second attempt came during a charity brunch in the city.
Damien had arranged for her to attend as a solo representative of the Blackwell family—his punishment, she assumed, for daring to raise her voice. She sat through two hours of painfully polite conversation with women who wore diamonds like birthrights and called poverty a “character-building exercise.”
But the event was hosted in a luxury hotel—one that opened directly onto a bustling street. And for the first time in weeks, she was away from the estate.
Elena excused herself under the pretense of a phone call. She slipped out through a side hallway, down a narrow marble corridor, and through the doors into the open world.
The sun hit her like freedom.
She ran.
She didn’t look back. Didn’t stop to think. She tore off the heels as she reached the sidewalk and sprinted barefoot across the pavement, down the block, weaving through crowds.
She didn’t know where she was going.
She didn’t care.
She just needed distance. Space. Air.
But within five minutes, a black SUV pulled up beside her.
“Mrs. Blackwell,” a man said calmly from the passenger seat. “Please come with us.”
Two other men in suits stepped out of the vehicle.
Elena backed away.
“I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“We’re under orders not to harm you,” the man said. “But we are under orders to return you.”
She turned and ran.
She didn’t make it past the alleyway.
One grabbed her wrist—gentle, but firm.
The other stood blocking the exit.
“You can’t keep me like this,” she hissed.
“You’re not a prisoner, ma’am.”
“Then let me go!”
But they didn’t. They escorted her into the SUV and drove back to the estate in silence.
When she got back, Damien was waiting in the front hall.
His arms were folded, his expression unreadable.
“Did you enjoy your exercise?” he asked dryly.
She slapped him again.
This time, he caught her wrist before her hand made contact.
“Once was a mistake,” he said, his voice low and dangerous. “Twice is a habit. Don’t test me, Elena.”
She yanked her arm back.
“I’m not your pet.”
“No,” he said coldly. “You’re my possession.”
---
The third escape was bolder.
She bribed a maid.
It was stupid. Desperate. But she had to try.
She approached Sofia, the youngest staff member—barely out of her teens—during laundry rounds.
“I’ll give you ten thousand dollars if you help me leave,” Elena whispered.
Sofia blinked. Her hands trembled. But she nodded.
That night, she left through the kitchen entrance.
They made it all the way to the fence.
Sofia handed her a duffel bag—money, passport, everything Elena had gathered over weeks.
“You’re sure?” Sofia asked.
Elena nodded. “I’ll wire the rest when I’m out.”
She climbed the fence, ripping her palm on the metal spikes. Blood smeared across her wrist.
But the moment her feet hit the other side—
Floodlights.
Sirens.
Security poured from the shadows like an ambush.
They grabbed her before she could run.
Sofia screamed.
Someone radioed Damien.
Elena didn’t cry. Not even when they dragged her back inside.
She was placed in a glass room. It felt like a zoo exhibit.
She waited.
And eventually, Damien came.
He didn’t yell.
He didn’t raise his voice.
He simply stared at her, then said, “The next person you bribe will lose their job, their family, and their future. You are free to be angry. You are not free to be reckless.”
Elena stood. Her voice was steel.
“You’re a monster.”
“Then stop acting surprised when I behave like one.”
She stared at him for a long time.
Then whispered, “I wish I’d never met you.”
His face didn’t change.
But his eyes did.
For the briefest moment, something flickered—regret, maybe. But it vanished before she could understand it.
He turned and left.
---
She stopped trying after that.
Not because she had given up.
Because she needed to think.
To plan better.
Because now, this wasn’t just survival.
This was war.
She began to document every camera in the house. Every staff member’s rotation. Every locked door, every blind spot. She mapped the estate in her mind until she could walk it with her eyes closed.
And every time Damien dismissed her…
Every time he silenced her with a look or a command…
Her hatred burned hotter.
She didn’t speak to him anymore. Didn’t sit with him for meals. When she was summoned for events, she went mute and mechanical, doing only what was required. Never more. Never less.
She no longer wore the dresses he had tailored for her.
She wore black. Every day.
A silent protest.
---
Julian noticed.
He found her in the garden one afternoon, curled on a bench with her knees drawn up, staring at nothing.
“You look like someone who’s about to commit arson,” he said.
She smiled faintly.
“Don’t tempt me.”
He sat beside her.
“I heard about the hotel.”
“Let me guess,” she said. “Damien told you?”
“No. He doesn’t talk to me either. But the staff whisper louder than they think.”
She looked down.
“I can’t stay here, Julian.”
“I know.”
“I’ll die if I do.”
He said nothing.
But she felt his presence like warmth in the cold.
“You could come with me,” she said quietly, not knowing where the words came from.
Julian turned to her, startled.
She didn’t mean it romantically. Not yet.
She just meant—you see me.
But he didn’t answer.
And the silence felt heavier than any rejection.
---
That night, Damien entered her room.
She froze.
He hadn’t entered her private space in weeks.
He looked at her—really looked. Then walked to the desk and placed a folder on it.
“What is this?” she asked.
“A new contract.”
She didn’t move.
“You want to renegotiate your ownership?”
“No. I want you to know what your life looks like without me.”
Her chest tightened.
“I’ve listed every account in your mother’s name. Your brother’s tuition. Your healthcare access. If you leave without fulfilling the terms of our agreement, those lines vanish. Tomorrow.”
She stood, trembling.
“You’re disgusting.”
“I’m practical.”
She threw the folder at him.
Papers scattered like snow.
Damien didn’t flinch.
“Why are you like this?” she asked.
He turned to her.
And this time—this time—there was no ice in his eyes.
There was pain.
Real, raw pain.
“Because love is a lie,” he said. “And I don’t waste time on lies.”
Then he left.
---
She cried that night.
But it wasn’t from weakness.
It was from rage.
Because even in his brokenness, he still held all the power.
And she was still the one bleeding.
---
- Writer
