Elise rode in a daze along the road, this time taking her time. She allowed Lovely to walk around, barely conscious of what she was doing. Her mouth and throat were dry when she thought about Annalynn, wondering if it was linked to the other murders. It made her think of Julian again, but she tried to push that thought away. She didn’t want to think of him as dangerous, despite what she had seen in his mind.
Elise screamed when something stepped out of the woods at her, and Lovely bucked with a loud whinny. Elise felt herself sliding back but managed to hold onto the reins, trying to catch her breath. She tried to pull herself up but didn’t have time before the man put his hand on her hand and she got a flash of his thoughts. They were nothing but blood—a wall of blood, thick and red, coming in a wave toward her. Elise snatched her arm away, looking wide-eyed at the man. He grinned at her and she felt a shiver run through her spine. He wasn’t a handsome man, but he wasn’t ugly, either. His face was almost disturbingly plain, so unremarkable that it made him look uncanny. Without saying anything, she urged Lovely on, and the horse began to gallop as quickly as she could toward the direction of home. She didn’t stop until she got there, handing her horse over to Potts so that he could take it to the stables. Elise went inside, trying to calm her heart.
She sighed when she saw Julian standing in the sitting room, not wanting to deal with him or tell him what had happened. She tried to walk past him, but he took her arm, pulling her close.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, looking into her eyes.
Elise snorted.
“My lord, this job would be much easier for me if you stopped pretending that you care about my well-being,” Elise said, pulling her arm away from him.
“What are you talking about?” he asked her, but she didn’t answer, instead going upstairs.
“Elise,” Julian said, following her. She could feel his eyes on her back as she went into her bedroom, shutting the door behind her. It opened a moment later and Julian slipped inside.
“What is going on, Elise?” he asked. “What happened?”
“With all due respect, my lord, that’s none of your business,” Elise said. She didn’t want to tell him about Annalynn, about the man on the road, about any of it. Elise knew that if she told him one secret, one thing that had happened to her, the rest of it would have to come out. She couldn’t bear the thought of him knowing about her powers. She also had to consider the things that she had heard about Julian, and it only reinforced to her that staying quiet and trying to solve things on her own was what was best for everyone. “What I do on my day off is none of your concern.”
He stared at her, searching her face.
“Tell me what happened,” he said.
“Fuck you,” Elise snapped. She hadn’t meant to. It wasn’t like her to be so vulgar, but the longer he stood there in her room, the more she remembered what had happened between them last time he was here, how shameful it had been.
“Excuse me?” he asked, raising his eyebrows. She saw his jaw tighten. “What did you say to me, Elise?”
“You heard me,” she said softly. There was a dangerous look in his eye, one that made her hot and cold at the same time. She knew how much he hated to be disrespected, but in that moment, Elise didn’t care. He took a step toward her, stalking like a predator.
“You will apologize,” he said, his voice sending a shiver down her spine.
“No,” she said firmly, holding his eye with her chin up in defiance. “No, I won’t.”
He grinned then, scraping his teeth over his lip.
“There’s only so much I’m going to allow you to disrespect me,” he said in a silky, dangerous voice.
“What are you going to do, my lord? Fire me? Send me back to the brothel?”
Something flashed through his eyes then. He reached out to take her jaw in his hands, and what she saw in his mind made her whole body feel like it was going to melt with how bad she wanted him. He was imagining her in the most scandalous way she could imagine, bent over on all fours with her bare backside in the air. Her breath caught in her chest when he squeezed her jaw, pulling her toward his face.
“I could punish you,” he said. “I would be well within my rights to punish an unruly servant.”
“You keep saying that,” Elise said, her voice trembling,. “And yet you’re too weak to follow through with it.”
He gritted his teeth, staring heatedly into her eyes. “Apologize. Or I will punish you.”
Elise shook her head, otherwise frozen as he stepped close to her body. Her eyes were on his lips and she was trembling all over, desperate to be touched. His tone of voice drove something wild within her, though for most of her life, she had never considered letting a man speak to her that way. But there was something about Lord Ashton that was commanding in itself, and mixed with the tone in his voice, Elise felt like it was nearly impossible to resist doing what he said.
Julian leaned in then, brushing his lips over hers. She tried to kiss him, giving in immediately, but he pulled back slightly and spoke against her lips.
“You have one more chance, Elise,” he said, nipping on her bottom lip. “One chance to apologize with respect. I think it’s in your best interest to do so.”
“Why?” Elise asked, her body automatically molding to his, feeling how hard he was against her belly. She was brought back to their moment together last time, how he’d licked her sex, how he’d ignored her afterward. She opened her mouth to apologize, wanting to push him away from her, to keep her distance, but instead she found that she was wrapped in his big arms as he turned her around and bent her over the bed. Elise was frozen, her face pressed to the mattress as he lifted her skirts above her waist.
“My lord—“ she said as he started peeling her underclothing off. “What—what are you going to do to me?”
“I’m not going to fuck you,” he said as she looked at him over her shoulder. “That wouldn’t be much of a punishment.”
Elise felt disappointment flicker through her, especially when his palms cupped her backside, squeezing it, running his big hands over her skin and her hips. She gasped in surprise the moment he brought his hand down on her, smacking her backside with a stinging palm. Elise held her breath as he did it again, trying to squirm away from him, almost as angry as she was aroused. She felt herself only growing wetter, wetter than she ever thought possible. He spanked her again and Elise whimpered, arching her back, lifting her hips higher instinctively. He chuckled behind her, smacking her reddened skin, and Elise sighed deeply when his fingers found the needy spot between her legs.
“This isn’t working, is it?” he asked, stroking her slit up and down with the tip of one finger. “You actually love this.”
“No,” she breathed, even as she felt herself start to hump helplessly against his hand, unable to control her movements. His finger started to trace her bud, flicking it lightly, stroking it in just the way that she liked.
“What are you doing?” she asked him, squirming against him as he pressed a finger inside of her. She bit her lip, trying not to moan, her eyes squeezed shut as he slipped another finger inside.
“There’s only one other way I can think of to punish you,” he said, curling his fingers deep within her, rubbing the spot inside of her that made her almost squeal with pleasure. Elise’s hips started began to move frantically in a rhythm with his fingers while he rubbed her bud with his thumb.
“Tell me when you’re about to come, Elise,” he said softly, bring his free hand down hard on her backside. Elise moaned, unable to help herself, looking back at him over her shoulder with pleading eyes.
“I’m—I’m going to come,” she said, losing control of her hips completely. She felt the need building within her, tightening, threatening to snap. He pumped his fingers in and out of her until she felt herself clenching around him, felt herself start to come. He pulled his fingers out at that moment and Elise was so desperate that
she tried to back against him, tried to take him again so that he could finish her off.
“What?” was all she could say, just one word as he bent down and picked up her underclothing. She turned around and stood up to put them on.
“Feels horrible, doesn’t it?” he asked, giving her a sly grin. “Don’t you hate it?”
She stared at him, her body overwhelmed with frustration.
“My lord—“
He put his finger to her lips.
“That was your punishment, Elise,” he said, looking into her eyes. “And if I have to do it again, I will. I will do it as many times as it takes to get it through your head that you have to respect me as your lord and employer.”
Elise couldn’t say anything. Her throat was dry and her whole body felt like it was throbbing. All she could do was glare at him, which made him laugh.
“Good night,” he said simply, then left her behind, her whole body trembling with need and frustration.
Chapter 19
Julian stood at the base of the stairs, dressed in his finest whites, with long tails on his coat and cufflinks that sparkled with real diamonds. He felt his heart beating fast in his chest as he waited for Elise, who was still upstairs with the lady’s maid he had insisted upon giving her for the night. He had hired the girl to attend to Elise before she left for the party, to help her into her gown and set her hair. Julian wanted Elise to feel like a princess, royalty, the most elegant woman in the room. He knew without a doubt that she would be—there was no competition in the world for Elise, no woman who came half as close to charming him as she had.
Julian hadn’t seen Elise since the incident in her room during their fight. His cock got hard every time he thought about it, and it had been distracting him almost every moment he had been away the day before. He had plenty of work to catch up on after the fire, but he found himself too distracted even to listen to his people, thinking about and imagining Elise bent over again, desperate for him. He closed his eyes as he thought about it, trying to force his body to calm down before he saw her.
By the time he opened his eyes, though, it was too late to still his heart. Elise was at the top of the stairs with the little lady’s maid behind her. She gave him a shy smile as she came down the stairs, and Julian looked over her body, drinking in the perfect vision. The gown she wore was emerald green velvet, stretching up to her throat, where a thick choker of diamonds sparkling on her neck. Her dress, too, was studded with jewels that glittered and shone as she moved through the lights. The silhouette of the dress was intoxicating, almost scandalous in the way that it showed the shape of her body and ended just above her slender ankles.
“What do you think, my lord?” she asked, looking down at her body and frowning. “I didn’t know it would be so—revealing.”
“It’s perfect, Elise,” he said. In fact, it was better than perfect. The way it fit her, the way it made her eyes glow the most vivid green he’d ever seen, was enough to make him want her desperately. Julian was tempted then to take her upstairs, to carry her to his bed and stop caring about all of the secrets she held. But instead, he took her hand and, looked down at her face. He saw her blush and smiled, wondering what she was thinking about.
“We need to put on our masks,” Julian said, taking them from the lady’s maid. He lifted Elise’s and positioned it on her face, tying it around the back of her head. When he looked at her, she looked even sexier before, the very essence of mystery and seduction. She gave him a flirty smile as he put his own mask on.
“Now we’re total strangers,” she said,. “Which means I get to be a lady.”
Julian bowed to her, taking her hand and kissing the backs of her knuckles. He let his lips linger there for a moment before he grinned at her, leading her out of the mansion and into the carriage. They sat next to each other, and Julian felt himself riveted, mesmerized by her beauty. Her lips were painted a shade that was almost purple, outlining the shape of them perfectly. He stared at her and she met his eye, chewing on her lip.
“What should I expect from this evening, my lord? You haven’t prepared me at all.”
“I thought it’d be best for you to experience it yourself,” Julian said. In fact, part of the reason that Julian hadn’t told Elise many details about the masquerade ball at the palace was because they were generally tawdry affairs and he didn’t want to scare her. He knew that if they were together at the party, he could at least guide her experience in a way that made her comfortable.
“Will you have a lot of friends there?” Elise asked.
Julian chuckled.
“Friends is not the word I’d use,” he said. “Perhaps acquaintances.”
“Why am I not surprised that you don’t have many friends?” she asked, and when he looked at her, her eyes were sparkling with mischief, a small smile on her lips. She was teasing him, trying to provoke him—Elise had enjoyed getting under his skin since the beginning, and Julian knew that he’d had no choice but to let her the moment he’d first seen her glaring at him at the brothel.
“I do have friends. You’ve met my friends,” Julian said.
“The girls at the brothel?”
“Some of them,” Julian said to her.
She rolled her eyes.
“If that’s your definition of friendship—“
“You know very well that I didn’t touch most of those women,” Julian said, looking at her face. “You heard the rumors.”
“Not all rumors are true,” she pointed out.
“The one about my mouth is true, isn’t it?” he asked her. She flushed in the dark, her lips parting to respond, but no words came out.
Julian chuckled.
“Most of what you’ve heard is probably true,” Julian said. He wasn’t surprised that Elise had been told about his experiences with the girls at the brothel and had never truly expected them to keep quiet about it in the first place. It was merely a hope that he could retain some mystery, and he knew that many people would think it strange that a nobleman would take out a whore just for company.
“Not everything I heard was good,” Elise said. Julian felt his heart speed up, wondering what she had heard. He had never spoken to anyone at the brothel about his family, the two who lived upstairs or Julian’s dead wife. He had hoped that the rumors about her hadn’t traveled that far—they were far darker than stories about his sexual preferences, and not something that he’d ever wanted Elise to know about.
Julian kept his face calm in spite of what he was feeling, raising his eyebrows at her.
“And what did you hear?”
“I heard that you’re very hard on your maids. Unrelenting.”
A smile spread over his face.
“I’ll admit that one’s true,” he said. “Have I been too hard on you, Elise? Too rough?”
Julian watched her face, able to see her expression in her eyes despite the fact that half of her skin was obscured by the mask. There was heat and desire and need there, no sign that his treatment of her had put her off in any way. On the contrary, she seemed to be reveling in it, and Julian could almost see the memories passing through her mind as she looked at him with slightly parted lips, not speaking.
“How do you plan to introduce yourself this evening?” he asked, giving her the opportunity to get out of answering the question with her lips. He had learned all he needed to know from her eyes—she had loved the punishment, wanted more of it, and Julian was overcome with the desire to give it to her.
“You’re really going to let me introduce myself?” she asked.
Julian nodded.
“Unless you’re going to be belligerent about it,” he said.
“I would never,” she pouted, and Julian found himself leaning in to kiss her, wanting to taste her lips. She didn’t let him, but pulled back with a sly smirk on her lips.
“Rotten girl,” Julian said, grinning at her. “Who are you going to be tonig
ht, Elise?”
“You’ll see,” she said mysteriously.
“Oh, no,” he said. “No, I’m not going to let you surprise me on this. That’s a terrible idea.”
“Yes, you are,” she said defiantly with a wicked smile. He shook his head, exasperated, but didn’t have time to further press her before the carriage began up the drive toward the palace. Elise parted the curtain and leaned backward outside, looking up at the house as she gripped the seat of the carriage to hold herself in.
“What are you doing?” Julian asked, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her back in. “You’re going to fall.”
“I wouldn’t have fallen,” she said, trembling under how close he was. He had pulled her against him in the process of bringing her back into the carriage and their mouths were almost touching. She licked her lips, looking into his eyes before she smiled. The carriage stopped then and Julian climbed out, helping her down. She was wearing black silk gloves, but it seemed like he could still feel the heat of her bare skin on his own. She let go of him as soon as they were on the ground and led the way into the palace as if she belonged there. Julian had no choice but to simply follow her; he had no idea what her intention was or what she was up to, but he had a feeling that it was going to get one or both of them in trouble at some point in the night.
Julian caught up to Elise, wrapping his arm around her waist and guiding her in through the massive arched double-doors of the palace. He watched her face as she looked around—it was a spectacular place, gloriously decorated with riches beyond even his imagining. Julian’s mansion was no shack, but it was nothing compared to the opulence of the palace. When Elise turned her eyes to his, they were wide and full of wonder.
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