Enthralled (The Enslaved Duet 1)

My heart soared into my throat, and before I could stem it, I was squealing and jumping on the bed with joy even as I carefully kept the phone to my ear.

“Sebastian, you gifted man,” I shouted through my happy tears. “You beautiful, talented man! I could not be happier for you.”

We laughed together as we talked about the particulars, and he recounted local gossip before handing me over to Mama and Elena who both nearly chatted my ear off with their own material.

I spoke with my family for well over an hour and only rung off when another maid entered the room with my dinner tray. When she took the phone away, I almost attacked her, but I held myself back on the thought that I might be rewarded the privilege again.

It seemed giving up my virginity granted me new living quarters and the connection to my family I so craved.

Later that evening, after I finished a supper I was sure Douglas had prepared because it was a delicious speciality from Napoli and after I’d showered away the remnants of sex from my body, I lay in the dark curled up beneath the most luxurious covers I had ever known more troubled than I had ever been.

I wasn’t truly religious, but my parents were Catholic and a quote by Job from the Bible rattled around like a loose screw in my head.

“The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”

Only, I had no God in this new home of mine. My religion was servitude, and my lord was my Master. What he took from me, he rewarded me for, and in return for this unhealthy symbiosis, he expected me to worship him.

I didn’t.

But the thing that kept me up late into the night when the brain was murky but thoughts were horrifyingly clear, was that I could imagine a time when I did. When the ritual of my everyday life of a slave wore me down as surely as the generations of feet against the stone steps in this house. When looking to him for orders was route and worshiping his body like a deity felt akin to taking prayers. What was faith if not the engrained instinctual and spiritual belief that there was a higher being out there looking over you?

After five years of serving Master Alexander, was there really any doubt I would revere him even if I feared him still?

“I want to teach you about obedience.”

“I thought you were,” I retorted drily as he led me up the third-floor staircase and turned us into the Hall of Mirrors.

I was a vain woman, so I’d spent some time here on my daily wanderings, staring at the money eyes that had gotten me into such trouble. I knew from my tour with Noel that it had been added after the fourth Earl had visited Versailles and fallen in love with the opulence. I’d never seen the French palace, but the gold gilt, floor-to-ceiling mirrors and the pink marble floor certainly seemed over the top enough for the French.

Alexander moved over to a red velvet ottoman and a small table set up in the middle of the space and beckoned me forward with a crook of his finger.

Each step felt like one inch closer to a tragic death by guillotine, only I knew it was my pride on the line and not my life.

Because even as I hated him for ripping my virginity out at the seams the day before, it seemed that he had emptied out my lining only to stuff me full of something else. Something velvety and dark, something with a scent like musk and honey, something that lived for sex.

I could feel my pulse settle between my thighs and beat like a gong.

“Your lessons will never cease, topolina. You are a submissive slave but not a weak one; therefore, my work will never be done. Come and stand before me.”

I didn’t stop until our toes were touching, a small act of defiance that made Alexander hum darkly. He moved back an inch, then clasped my chin firmly to lift my eyes to his.

“This is lesson two, bella. I am your Master, yes, but the game of Domination and submission is not the only one we play. We also play the one of life and death. If you cannot learn to obey me when you must, forces beyond my control will certainly kill you and probably me too.”

“What kind of game is that?” I asked breathlessly.

He tightened his hold so that I had to strain on my tiptoes to keep my neck from snapping back. His mouth moved next to mine, his lips so close to my own I could feel the distance like a tangible thing, like a kiss itself.