Page 70 of The Enslaved Duet

“There you fucking are,” a man crowed from the inky dark immediately in front and to the right of me.

I spun in the opposite direction and cried out as two strong arms banded around my hips. The man lifted me into the air as I kicked and screamed, my fingernails scratching at his arms until they bled.

“There you fucking well are,” the first man crowed in delight as he appeared in front of me, highlighted silver in the moonlight.

It was Ashcroft, the same man who’d used my mouth in Pearl Hall.

My scream doubled over, exploding through my lungs like a train speeding off the rails.

“Shut your fucking mouth,” the man holding me ordered as he fell into me, pushing us both to the ground.

I choked on the mulch, the earthy soil filling my mouth as I sucked in another lungful of air to scream.

The stranger wrapped his arms and legs around mine and flipped over like a beetle so that I was strapped down on top of him.

“Take her already,” he jeered in my ear as Ashcroft undid his trousers.

“Should’ve shagged you when I had the chance.”

“You take me, Alexander will find you andmurder you!” I screamed.

God, was there ever any end to this madness? Was I to be ordered around, assaulted, and manipulated until my dying breath?

Ashcroft bent over to ruck up my muddy shift, and I spat in his eye.

“You fucking little bitch,” he roared, going to one knee and roughly pulling out his cock.

There was a flash of movement in the dark behind him and then a bass thud. Ashcroft trembled slightly and then fell to the side, out cold.

“What the—” the man grunted as two hands reached out of the dark and wrapped tight around his neck.

I could feel the fight go out of him, his limbs loosening around mine until they fell off. Adrenaline flooded through me, and I shot to my feet before the other man could grab me.

“Cosima,” a steady voice said into the wind.

The sound of my name warmed me like a velvet cloak.

I paused, tense and ready to spring forth.

“Cosima, settle,tesoro, I just want a word with you.”

I recognized the skipping lilt of his muddled accent, the crisp cut of an upper crust English accent made lyrical by the sounds of my homeland.

“Edward.”

There was a pause, then the soft, sucking tread of boots through the muck. I spun to face him with my hands raised and my legs bent, the muscles shaking with exhaustion.

His hard-cut face, so like Alexander’s but darker and carved a tad more crudely, went soft as he looked at me.

“You look knackered.”

I realized my breath was coming too fast, wheezing in and out of lungs like a billow. “What do you care?”

“I care very much.” He raised his hands out to the sides, palms up in surrender. “You don’t know me, but I care very much indeed.”

“I don’t believe you,” I said wildly, my eyes searching for an exit as he moved closer. “Stay away, Edward!”

“Pace, Cosima,” he murmured. “And please, I don’t go by that name anymore. I haven’t in a long while, and if I had it my way, I wouldn’t again during my lifetime. My name is Dante.”