Enthralled (The Enslaved Duet 1)

I jerked as Alexander’s hand slammed against the chessboard, sending gorgeously carved wood pieces all over the floor. One of the pawns landed badly on the marble foot of the fireplace and broke its neck.

“If you touch one hair on her head, I will kill you,” Alexander seethed. “I mean it, Noel. I will slaughter you where you stand.”

Noel looked shocked, and I couldn’t blame him.

“He’s been kind to me,” I found the audacity to say. My heart thrashed in the cage of my ribs, desperate to flee the ramifications of my actions.

Alexander turned his frozen stare to me and bared his teeth. “Excuse me?”

I cleared my throat twice before my voice found traction in my throat. “He has. He gave me a tour, and he’s only teaching me to play chess.”

His hand was around my throat before I could blink, squeezing hard enough for spots to explode across my vision. He leaned down to growl softly in my face, “No one teaches you anything except your Master. And who is your Master, topolina?”

“You,” I said, more breath than voice as I struggled to suck in air around his punishing grip. “You are.”

“Yes,” he hissed, running his nose down my jawline so that he could speak against my lips. “I am the Master of this body, Captain of your fucking fate. I think it is past time you understood that.”

I gasped as he sank a hand in my hair and twisted, dragging me away from the table by the force of his stride toward the door. My hands flew to his, trying to loosen his agonizing grip to no avail. Tears pricked my eyes, and I struggled even as I was forced to follow close behind him.

“I’ll deal with you later,” Alexander threatened over his shoulder to Noel as he tugged me out the door and slammed it shut.

I could barely keep up with his ground eating strides as he stalked up the staircase, heading back to my cage.

“Master, please,” I begged as a headache stabbed into each temple. “Please, stop this. I didn’t know…”

“You didn’t know? Here I thought we were passably smart, topolina. You do not, under any circumstances, spend time alone with another man unless it is Riddick, and you especially do not allow any of them to touch you. Clearly, I made a mistake by allowing you to roam. It is an error I do not intend to make again.”

I screamed as he pushed open the door to the ballroom and shoved me brutally inside. I tripped over my feet, crashing to the unforgiving floor on my elbows and knees so hard I thought for a second that they might shatter.

The clip of his shoes smacked against the marble like striking flints as he prowled after me.

I didn’t want to know what might happen if he captured me.

The ballroom was huge, and at the other end, another set of double doors beckoned me. If I could reach them and get out to the kitchens, surely he wouldn’t hurt me in front of his staff.

Painfully, I pushed up off the ground and raced toward the door.

Not one second later, the pace of his clicking shoes erupted like the ticking of a time bomb.

I was malnourished and not very athletic to begin with, but my sheer desperation to get away from the man-turned-beast was insurmountable. To make it hard for him, I zigged and zagged across the marble, my breasts bouncing painfully, the soles of my feet slick with panicked sweat so that I almost skidded.

My heart felt near to bursting in my chest as I ran harder than I ever had before. By the time I was a yard away from the doors, my lungs were eviscerated by the strain, and I practically stumbled into the heavy oak frame. My slippery fingers slid off the ornate knob once, twice and then finally, they latched and pulled it open…

I screamed so loud I saw stars as Alexander’s iron arms caged me against his chest and lifted me off the ground. I tried to kick out with my legs to leverage myself back down, but he was so much taller and broader that I only served to tire myself out.

“There is no escaping, topolina,” he rasped in my ear as I yelled and yelled, cursing him in Italian and calling for help in English. “It is the law of nature. You are the mouse, and I the falcon. No one here is going to step in to save you now.”

I turned my head and sank my teeth into his bared forearm, tasting blood as it bloomed on my tongue. He cursed viciously and tightened his hold around my chest so painfully, I could barely breathe.

With a grunt, he swung a leg forward to capture one of mine and bend it backward in order to take us both to the floor with his heavy body crushing mine. I squirmed and thrashed like the goddess Thetis in Peleus’s hold but to no available. Alexander was too strong, too indominable to evade.