She shrugged.
I pointed toward a door past her shoulder. "You'll sleep through there."
She marched straight in like she owned the place. A quality I usually found attractive in a woman. If that female weren't evil incarnate.
I followed her into the room after she had a moment to look around. I was decorated in shades of blood red and black.
She ran her hands over a curtain panel. "It's a pretty prison."
I clenched my jaw and met her eyes. "Unless I'm mistaken, a price was named and paid. This isn't a prison and I'll thank you not to act like you didn't have a choice."
"And what was my choice? Let you takeover everything, and kill everyone, including me? A choice between living and dying is never really a choice." An edge to her tone now. Indifference a long-lost memory.
I waited until she finished and turned back to the room. "It might not be a choice but it's the one you've made so get fucking used to it."
The only answer she gave me was a clenching of her arms around her waist.
I turned to leave. "Dinner is at six. I expect you at the table by then. The cook will make changes if you don't eat certain foods."
"You have a cook?"
I paused in exiting not looking back. "Did you picture me at the stove, slaving away to make sure you're fed?"
"I didn't picture you at all. Let alone in the kitchen."
I slipped out and closed the door before I said something she would regret.
Bringing her into my house was a risk, but I'd rather deal with any revolutions she might try to start before they got off the ground.
I stripped out of my jacket and undid the top buttons of my dress shirt. I'd rather be in a t-shirt and jeans. But I learned early, when sending a message, looking the part made a difference.
I heard her careful footsteps behind me before she spoke. "The closet is filled with clothes."
Turning to face her, I let her look at the ink on display through the stark white of my shirt. "So is the dresser."
"Why?"
"During our arrangement I will be attending events. You'll be with me when I do."
She took another tentative step toward me, "why?"
I held my breath against the subtle scent of her perfume. "So I can keep an eye on you at all times."
Some indescribable emotion crossed and cleared her features in seconds.
"For tonight it's dinner and settling in."
"What about my home, my things there?" It was the first time I heard the trickle of something softer in her tone.
"You'll be provided everything you need. And until the time comes when I trust you, and your word, they will all be waiting for you."
The clench in her jaw grated on me. I already knew she was a woman who spoke her mind, a woman accustomed to being obeyed. "If you have something to say, then get it out."
Those soft brown eyes flashed to mine, looking more amber in the overhead lighting. "Are you expecting me to fuck you?"
There was the direct woman I spent months researching.
I shuffled forward until a few inches separated us. “I could force you,” I said while I ran my hand up her pale silk-covered bicep. “It wouldn’t take much effort.”
