Page 33 of The King (Masterpiece Duet 1)
“What can I do?” the woman asks.
It makes me wonder if she’s Damon’s girlfriend. His lover. His prostitute? I don’t know how he deals with women, except to pay them. She must be close to him if she was in his house.
“Blankets,” he says. “Every single one you can find.”
That sounds practical, but I don’t feel cold. I don’t feel anything, really.
Damon carries me upstairs and lays me down on a large bed. His bed?
He pulls back the covers, settling my wet body into the middle. Part of me recognizes that it must be comfortable—the way I sink into the mattress, the velvet drapes hanging from a thickly carved bedframe. I’m disconnected from my body, though. As if it sank to the bottom of the water, landing on hard rocks.
And my mind kept floating along.
“Damon,” I whisper, surprised to find my lips cracked and hard. How can they be dry after almost drowning? Everything feels upside down, inside out.
His eyes look pure black. “I’m here.”
“Don’t leave,” I whisper, swallowing hard to get the words out. “Please.”
“Not yet.” It’s a promise, both to stay and to go. I have him for now, which is more than I ever thought I would have. More than a peasant girl deserves with a prince.
“I’m sorry.”
He swears. “Don’t.”
“You found them. Tell me you found them—”
“Yes, your breadcrumbs. My smart girl. My beautiful girl.” He presses a kiss to my forehead. I know his lips are touching my skin. Some part of me registers that fact. But I don’t feel anything. Not pleasure. Not fear. When he brushed his knuckles against my cheek at the diner I’d felt the echo of his touch for days. And now I can’t feel anything.
The woman comes into the room with an armful of quilts and blankets. She’s older than me but not by much. Very beautiful. It wouldn’t surprise me if they were together, but she doesn’t look jealous. She looks worried, about me.
Damon reaches to the neckline of my uniform. There’s no warning before he rips it away.
I should feel something. Embarrassment as I’m exposed, naked and bruised. At least I should feel cold as the air touches my damp skin. I’m still separate from my body, unable to feel a thing.
“What are you doing?” the woman asks, concern plain in her soft voice.
Damon gives her a hard look. “Fucking her limp body. What do you think?”
It’s the same voice he used years ago. What would I want with a puny kid?
And then he unclasps his belt. It makes a whip-like sound through the air as he pulls it off. The old me would have flinched at the sound. Now I just stare, unblinking, unfeeling.
“I can do it,” the woman says, moving as if to undress.
A cold laugh. “As much as I’d love to see the two of you in bed together, I don’t want to see what happens when Gabriel finds out I saw you naked.”
“You saw me naked at the auction,” she says.
“That doesn’t count. You weren’t his then.”
So they aren’t together. I can’t even feel relief, not with the word auction hanging in the air. Is that what would have happened to me? And as horrible as that sounds, wouldn’t that have been better than this?
Anything would be better than this.
Damon pushes the damp white fabric from his shoulders, revealing hard packed muscle and lines of ink. I hadn’t expected to see tattoos beneath that expensive suit fabric. None of it peeks out onto his hands or neck. It’s all perfectly contained to his chest, his abs. Ancient scrollwork and dragon scales over a modern man.
What’s the point of getting such beautiful artwork on skin no one can see?
“I’ll go find Anders,” the woman says.
Damon’s voice is a drawl, closer as the bed dips in his direction. “Really intent on making this a threesome, aren’t you?”
“He’s a doctor.”
“He lost his license,” Damon says, his touch burning hot as he pulls me into his arms. Oh God, I didn’t feel anything. I didn’t want to feel anything, but he’s like a flame. I’m consumed by him.
I want the girl to be worried about me now, to help me get away from this.
To pull me out of the fire, but she seems content to leave me there, especially as Damon smooths a wet lock of hair away from my cheek. He probably looks gentle, but she can’t see how it burns.
Only Damon’s eyes are cold, black stones that give nothing away.
“Gabriel said it was fine,” she says. “Anders stitched his gunshot wound.”
Damon glances at her. “Gabriel was shot?”
“Grazed. On his neck. The bullet was meant for me.”
“You don’t know that,” says a new voice, male and gravelly.
The girl sounds surprised. “You shouldn’t be standing.”
“And you shouldn’t be in Damon’s bedroom.”
“This is his bedroom?” she asks, uncertain.
So this is his bed. And this is his house.
