Page 4 of The Queen (Masterpiece Duet 2)
Damon Scott is a businessman, one who deals in flesh and crime.
And my father does work for him, in the way of some old-fashioned indentured servant, one unable to leave. What sort of work he actually does has always been secret, one I’ve never wanted to know, because it pays for my tuition here at school.
“I’m so glad, too,” I say softly, because it’s here that I became a woman.
I may have felt older than my years before, pretending I stood a chance in the urban jungle that was Tanglewood, lifting my chin to the black jaguar that was Damon Scott. Only coming here showed me what a wide world waits outside the city limits.
Only here did I learn that not every man wants you as his prey.
“I don’t want to make you uncomfortable,” he says, turning slightly toward me, and his words have the immediate opposite effect. I like him distracted and academic. I like him focused on something else. When he turns to look at me directly, it makes the air rush from my lungs. “But I do feel like I should say this before you make a decision. I see you as more than a student, Penny. Even more than a research assistant.”
My lips form a shocked O, but I’m unable to speak.
“You’re an uncommonly smart girl.” He makes a wry expression, waving his hand at the books, some of which he’s authored, at the proofs and calculations strewn around the office. “And I’ve made something of a life search for the singular and unique in this world, at least in the confines of dusty shelves. I think perhaps you’re the best find I’ve ever had.”
My heart pounds, hard and fierce, a drum of warning. But I can’t help but be warmed by his words—I think perhaps you’re the best find I’ve ever had. Coming from a man with multiple academic papers and accolades, and even a few patents to his name, it’s a wild compliment.
“I’m not sure what to say.”
He moves as if to touch my knee. It’s something he’s done before, but it takes on a new meaning as he reaches now. But he seems to catch himself, his hand hovering instead. “Only think about it,” he says finally. “I know you’re young. Younger than most students in your position.”
It’s been three years since I left Tanglewood for the first time. I’m nineteen now, but I feel more young than when I left. More aware of all the things I don’t know. All the things I haven’t done. Things like sex.
“I think of you as more than a professor,” I tell him.
And like before, it’s not quite a lie.
I do think of him in a sexual way, these strange and feverish thoughts that come to me at night. I think of him, having become a woman. I was just a child when Damon Scott visited me in my bedroom, when he held himself away from me. When he gave me my first kiss.
Professor Stanhope gives me a crooked smile, and I have a glimpse of the playboy he could have been had he a less focused mind. Handsome and intelligent and kind.
You’d be safe with me, that smile seems to say.
But I’m not sure I’m ready to resign myself to his dusty shelves, more an intricate proof than a partner, a cherished volume that he would run ink-stained fingers across. I would never go back to Tanglewood. There would be nothing left to hold me there. The thought brings a strange ache to my chest, as if I’ve lost something I can never get back.
Chapter Two
I get to the Emerald late that evening, the sun streaking over sloping hills of dark moss. In the morning the sunlight will sparkle off the dew, which is what gave the house its name. Originally built as a vacation home for a powerful industrialist and a real-life Spanish princess, the house was eventually converted to a luxury hotel.
And then purchased by Gabriel Miller as an outright gift for Avery James.
A place for her to be safe and comfortable while she continues her graduate studies. A place for her to call home, to replace the one she lost. The hotel is still operational, only the top-floor penthouse reserved for Avery.
Gabriel still has a mansion in Tanglewood, but this is owned by her.
When I first came to Smith I lived in the dorm rooms with all the other freshman, but I have a hard time relating to the girls with their platinum credit cards and prep school backgrounds. Avery offered me permanent residence in one of the other suites, but that wouldn’t feel right either.
Instead I started working in the kitchens and found a room reserved for on-site staff members. I’m much more comfortable among the waitstaff and line cooks and maids than I am upstairs.
