Page 237 of The Enslaved Duet

“You know, of course, that your favourite flower is used to create the infamous opium,” he said softly, conversationally.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, but I gave no outward sign of discomposure as I hummed my response.

“Well, it’s a little-known fact that the seeds of the poppy…” He pulled a basket of the blooms off one of the windowsills and showed me the small bowl full of seeds he had harvested. “Can be used to make a tea that mimics the effects of morphine. They call it a ‘twilight slumber.’”

I chewed my lip as I watched him crush some of the seeds and then mix them with some herbs before putting the mixture in a sieve on the mouth of a teapot.

“So, your master plan is to put Noel to sleep at the table?” I asked.

He shot me a look. “No, ducky, my plan is to make him a wee bit more pliable. They’ve used morphine in studies for truth serums, and it’s been found to loosen the tongue. Not to mention, it’ll make him a little loopy and out of his senses. Hopefully, it’ll make whatever he has planned post-supper a tad more tolerable.”

I laid my hand over his on the pot and gave it a squeeze. “Thank you, Douglas.”

“Anything for you. Now, I won’t tell you to break a leg because I’m afraid Noel will actually do that, but I shall wish you the best of luck, love.” He pressed a kiss to my cheek.

His affection and loyalty shone through my dreary future like a crack of light in the dark. As I followed the butlers up the stairs with the platters of food, I tried to keep my sight focused on that sliver of hope and not on the sucking black abyss of dread that threatened to overtake me.

Alexander and I had rediscovered each other, committed to our relationship for the first time, and taken down an entire corrupt secret society.

I refused to believe this was the end of our story.

The hero dead before the happily ever after, and the heroine murdered by the villain.

I had to believe everything I’d learned over the course of my ordeals had led me to this moment, a moment when I would outwit the smartest, cruelest man I’d ever known and—I looked down at the tea tray I held filled with poppy seed tea—give him a taste of his own poison.

Cosima

The dining hall was darker than ever before, limned only in the weak golden glow cast from dozens of gleaming candelabras set throughout the room. The effect made the entire gilt room feel like the inside of a tarnished treasure chest filled with priceless trinkets and diamonds accumulated over the centuries of Davenport canon. The way Noel looked at me as I entered the long, narrow hall made me feel like the most expensive treasure of them all.

There was glory in his eyes and a smug tension to the set of his shoulders beneath his customary bespoke suit that conveyed his wicked excitement.

He was eager to play the final moves in this game of his. I was the last piece remaining on the board, a pawn who had somehow returned as a queen. He would take such deviant delight in cutting me down, and I knew the feeling surpassed his annoyance at my resiliency.

Rodger wasn’t present, and his absence concerned me. Like a mother with her child, I felt more at ease having him within sight because who knew what he would get up to without supervision.

“Ruth,” Noel called out just to hear his voice echo through the high hall. “Come to your Master and present yourself.”

Each step was leaden with dread, but I made it to his side without vomiting. He was so insidiously clever, Noel was, to recreate every scene of my capitulation to Xan. It confused and sickened me enough to have my body and mind swaying nauseatingly off-balance as a neophyte on a ship.

“She looks like a queen, but she is a pawn,” Noel murmured happily as he looked down at me by his side, knees bent, head bowed, hands pressed together as if in prayer to him. “Now, feed me.”

So, I did.

I tried to empty my mind of thought, to focus on the sound of my breath flowing in and out of my body, but Noel made sure I was an active participant in his dinner. He hummed around my fingers, sucking on the tips and biting into the pads as I passed food from the plate into his mouth with my hands. At one point, he pressed my free hand on the burgeoning swell of the erection trapped beneath his suit pants, and I shuddered so hard in revulsion, I dropped Cornish hen on his trousers.

He made me eat it off his lap without the use of my hands.

As I recovered, knees quaking and eyes leaking tears, the dinner plates were taken away and the tea service was placed on the sideboard. I swallowed the thick bile on the back of my tongue and made to get up to retrieve the tea.

“Crawl,” Noel demanded as he leaned back in his throne-like chair to watch me.

I crawled.

My mind clung to questions I would ask Noel once he’d imbued the tea.

Answers Alexander had deserved his entire life and never received.

If he was truly gone, the very least I could do was glean them for both of us.