Page 21 of The Enslaved Duet

It was good to have a name to put to her face, even if it was a little creepy that she referred to herself in the third person.

Everything about this place was creepy, though, so I resolved myself to get used to it.

Mrs. White lathered her hands in spicy scented shampoo that almost perfectly matched the aroma of the bath water. Something nudged at the back of my mind, telling me that I should recognize the distinctive smell, but the pleasure of her hands sinking suddenly into my locks and rubbing firmly at my skull erased my unease.

“We haven’t had a girl here in absolute ages,” Mrs. White was saying when I clued in enough to understand the thick lilt in her speech. “It will be good to have some young blood in the house again to invigorate us.”

“Us?” I asked innocently.

“The staff have been idle too long,” she tutted as her strong thumbs rubbed the shampoo into wide circles over my scalp. “We used to be a great hub of society here at Pearl Hall, you know? Why, we’ve hosted every generation of the Royal Family since the days of Queen Elizabeth I. Of course, I don’t blame Master Alexander for being away from home doing his duty to this family and their various enterprises. I’m grateful they’ve the means to run a full household when most great families these days have to turn their grand estates into gaudy hotels and wedding venues,” she finished, aghast.

“How horrible,” I sympathized, eager to develop a rapport with the loquacious woman.

“We are one of the few remaining private estates in the country,” she told me proudly as she pushed me forward gently in the tub and used a pitcher of warm water to rinse out my hair. “Pearl Hall has been a jewel in the architectural crown of the United Kingdom since its construction in the 1500s.”

“And Lord Thornton?” I asked.

It shouldn’t have made much of a difference, but I preferred to address him as Lord Thornton, a title that others were also forced to address him by, than as Master Alexander.

Mrs. White might have called him that too, but I had no doubt it was for an entirely different reason than my own.

“Oh, well, he went to Eton with Prince Arthur, though he was a few years above the boy. It’s the king, really, who has a soft spot for our Master Alexander. They hunt together every fall at the Royal estate in Scotland.”

I stared at my bony knees, trying to understand how a man so close to the king of bloody England could be in a position to buy a woman for sex.

Why do it?

“You don’t seem surprised that a man like Lord Thornton would keep a woman shackled to the floor of his ballroom like some beast he snared and dragged back from safari,” I said demurely, my tone such a direct contrast to my accusation that it took a moment for the lovely Mrs. White to understand.

When she did, her round face froze and her right eye twitched.

“Yes, well…” She cleared her throat and pulled me back against the lip of the tub so she could run conditioner through my hair. “Sometimes it is better not to know the details, but to trust in the result. I’ve known Master Alexander since he was a wee one, and if he has you here, it is for reasons known only to him, but reasons still that I have trust in.”

I twisted like an eel through her hands and snatched one of her wrists. “Listen to me, Mrs. White. You seem like a good woman. Whatever reasons Lord Thornton has me here for arenotnoble or good. He has already pushed me to near starvation, kept me senseless in a dark room, and used me for his sexual gratification. Those are not the actions of a man with a noble quest, but the crimes of a monster no longer masquerading as a man. Please,” I begged, my eyes so wide with beseeching sincerity that I felt they would fall out of my head. “Please, help me.”

“Help you how?” she asked, her voice suddenly sharp against my skin as she wrenched my hand off her arm. “You made an agreement with Master Alexander. It is your choice to be here, and it is up to you how you decide to endure this servitude. If you want to go on being ungrateful, living in a dark and drafty ballroom when you could have access to a home most would call a palace, so be it. But do not pretend for one moment that your destiny is not still firmly planted in your own hands.”

I stared as she stood and moved to a small vanity that had appeared sometime while I was asleep to retrieve a plush towel the colour of crushed poppies.

Her words rang in my ears.

Hadn’t I resolved to make the most of this situation last night when I’d allowed the man to defile my mouth without knowing much more than his name and station?

Clearly, Mrs. White was a devout servant. There would be no luring her to my side of this story, so I needed to adjust my point of view.

I didn’t have to be the victim.

I could endure, survive the way I’d been forced to for the past eighteen years by using my looks and my body to get by.

And each act against me I would add carefully to the heap of kindling growing in my soul until the inevitable day that Lord Thornton, Alexander Davenport, made a mistake, and after however long of learning his ways, of being his perfect little mouse and slave, I could exploit that to my own advantage and set his world on fire.

Then he would be the victim, and I the victor.

Mrs. White returned holding up the towel and I stepped out of the tub so she could dry me carefully with the soft fabric. She led me to the intricate vanity, sitting me in the chair so she could brush out my hair with a silver comb.

“Master Alexander expects you to be presentable when you attend him at dinners. Bathed, made up, and wearing the outfit of his choosing,” Mrs. White lectured me.

I stared at my reflection, taking in the strange golden ocher of my irises and their thick fringe, the way my full mouth tipped down uncharacteristically at the corners and how my skin was more pallid than I’d ever seen it.