Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 130048 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 650(@200wpm)___ 520(@250wpm)___ 433(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130048 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 650(@200wpm)___ 520(@250wpm)___ 433(@300wpm)
A jewel.
He kept walking until he joined us, oblivious that he stepped in my disgusting confessions oozing all over the floor. With a teasing smile at Roland and a wink at me, he bowed deeply at Victor, not raising until Victor touched him kindly on the head.
“Hello, Peter,” Victor preened. “Your timing is rather unfortunate as I have more to say to my new friend here, but…I will let you take her. Her name is Ily.”
Take her?
What the fuck?
Peter rose from his bow and smiled at Ily. “Hello.”
Ily backstepped and crossed her arms, the gold around her wrists clinking against each other. She didn’t return the greeting.
“How many are playing?” Victor asked, checking his diamond-encrusted Rolex.
“Ten are currently serving, Sir V,” Peter murmured. “Five are in the bathing chamber, six are being prepared for when their Masters awaken, and seven are still sleeping.”
Jesus Christ, is he talking about slaves?
Twenty-eight?
There are twenty-eight prisoners here?
Wait, twenty-nine. With him, it’s twenty-nine.
My gaze snapped to Ily.
No, thirty.
She’s number thirty.
I didn’t know why that made me hard or why I shivered with every awful secret I’d just shared. It sounded sick in my head, but having the words fly around this sinning foyer was a thousand times worse.
Goddammit, if Q knew…
I straightened my spine.
He doesn’t need to know.
What I did in the name of freeing these thirty slaves was not his concern. It was bad enough that he’d thrown me in here. If I managed to free them, then he owed me a fucking medal, no matter what I did in the process.
“Fine.” Victor nodded and dropped his arm. “Please oversee Ily’s initiation. Take her to see Dr Belford, and then a trip to the bathing chamber is in order. Once she’s clean, inside and out, you may feed her a small smoothie, but that is all.”
“Yes, Sir V.”
Moving toward Ily, Victor cupped her cheek and added, “She mustn’t faint at breakfast. I have a feeling this morning will be full of surprises. I want her alert and willing.”
“Let me go,” Ily breathed, her fight fading beneath the reality of her situation. “Please…I just want to go home.”
“There, there.” Victor kissed her forehead before taking her hand and placing it in Peter’s. “You are home, my sweetling.”
She shivered as the tall, lean male clasped her tightly.
“You know what to do.” Victor nodded at Peter. “See that it’s done.”
“Yes, Sir V,” Peter said. “I’ll bring her to the gardens soon. Any clothing preference?”
Victor pondered for a moment before saying, “Nothing.”
“Understood.” Peter tugged Ily’s hand. “Come on.”
“Nothing? Wait.” Ily pulled against him. “I don’t want to go. I—”
“I thought you said I had first rights,” I growled. “I want her to stay by me—”
“Enough, Henri. If you keep throwing your caveman bullshit around, I’ll break my promise,” Victor snapped. “Ily needs to prepare. And you…” He looked me up and down. “You are in for a treat.”
Chapter Ten
………………………….
Ily
“IS THERE ANY CHANCE YOU could be pregnant?”
My eyes snapped to the doctor’s.
When Peter dragged me away and marched me through opulence to the back of the castle where the ceilings lowered and the salacious tapestries no longer watched, I refused to say a word.
I’d allowed his cool hand to encircle mine and kept pace with his smooth but elegant walk. Our matching cuffs and collars bridged a fragile connection, but I couldn’t understand him.
If he was imprisoned like me, why obey Victor with such…dedication?
How could he help enslave me when he already knew the horrors of being enslaved himself?
I choked on those questions as I watched him out of the corner of my eye, studying his soft brown skin, clean-shaven cheeks, full sculptured lips, and thick, seductive eyelashes.
If I didn’t know any better, I’d say he had Indian blood. And as much as I didn’t want to find comfort in this house of horrors, a tiny part of me breathed a sigh of relief. He was familiar. A total stranger held the tiniest memory of home.
I wanted it to be true so badly my pulse skittered by the time he tugged me to a stop outside a heavy wooden door carved with images of ducks and pheasants in full flight.
He let me go to knock, and I couldn’t stop myself. “Kya aapaka naam sachmuch peetar hai?” (Is your name really Peter?)
His fist fell away from the door. He gawked at me.
Our eyes locked, and the dark depths of his gave me somewhere to hide and be safe, just like Krish’s did. “You speak Hindi?” He pursed his lips and cocked his head. His gaze studied my face, no doubt trying to figure out who the hell I was. Then again, I couldn’t work him out either. With his English accent and worldly eyes, I didn’t know if it was a mask he wore or true origins.
“I’m—”
The door swung open, and a female nurse ushered us inside. “Come, come. We’ve been expecting her. No time like the present.”