Daisy struggled, her scream of panic muffled against fingers that tasted of antiseptic soap.
“Shh.” The voice was soft and measured. “Struggling will only make this more difficult. For you.”
Dr. Tannhäuser.
Her eyes widened. Thrashing and kicking, her feet came off the ground. He pulled her body back from the column, his chest fitting itself to her spine, dragging her back then pinning her against a flat bed of stone. The hard edge of his belt buckle snagged on her dress, inches above the unmistakable press of his arousal.
She bit his fingers and spit the second he ripped his hand away. “Get off me!”
“Yield.” His hand dropped from her mouth to her throat, fingers digging into her pulse in silent warning. “Your heart’s racing faster than a terrified jackrabbit. No need to be afraid, Daisy. I’ve seen you in far less.”
She jerked, but there was no escaping his hold.
“Now, now. We discussed this. Resistance only prolongs the procedure.” His thumb stroked the side of her neck, turning her jaw until her wild eyes found his. “You remember, don’t you? How thorough I can be?”
She screamed, and his hand clamped tighter, pressing against her windpipe, reducing her cry to a thin wheeze.
“I certainly haven’t forgotten. We have much more time now. No one around to interrupt us.” His free hand trailed along her hip, gathering her gown. “Let’s see how you’ve fared so far.”
His cool fingers tickled like reptiles on her thigh, sliding upward with practiced efficiency, pushing fabric aside, finding the hidden heat underneath.
“No.”
“That word doesn’t work here.”
She clamped her thighs together so hard her muscles screamed.
“Disappointing, Daisy.” His foot hooked around her ankle, trying to force her stance wider as he held her bent over the paved slab. “Be a good girl and spread your legs. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. Either outcome’s satisfying for me.”
“No!” she growled through gritted teeth, but it only took a split second for him to force her body to comply. His fingers pushed past her folds, cold and invasive, probing at her entrance with methodical persistence.
“There we go. Almost?—”
Rage unleashed inside Daisy, feral and rabid. She twisted and bit down on his wrist, sinking her teeth into his flesh with a feral, animal response that bypassed thought entirely. She tasted blood. The crunch of bone.
His hand retracted, but she didn’t loosen her bite until he shoved her away. Her arm scraped the cold stone. She rolled to her back and kicked her foot into his chest, sending him staggering into a column.
She wrenched herself forward, twisted upward. But she didn’t run away. She ran toward him, driving her knee into the soft junction of his thighs with every ounce of rage her body possessed.
The impact was solid and devastating. The doctor doubled over, then sank to his knees, collapsing on all fours. Throwing off his white mask, he dry heaved like a cat, blue eyes bulging with disbelief, mouth stretched with agony, his skin grey and slick with sudden sweat.
Daisy ran.
The world blurred into shadow as the drum of her pulse beat in her ears, drowning out everything else. The rags around her feet fell away, and her bare feet slapped against stone, grass, mud—she didn’t stop. Didn’t look for landmarks or threats. She just ran.
Groves, gardens, paths, birch trees, she ran through them all like a spooked doe in the night, leaping and lunging, never stopping despite knowing there was no way to run home.
Two hunters lounged on a stone bench, their postures the boneless sprawl of men who had finished their business and were now enjoying the afterglow—until Daisy burst from the hedges and leapt over them.
“Christ!”
“We got a runner!”
Maybe she’d run out of bounds. She honestly didn’t care anymore.
She finally found shelter behind a gardener’s shed, the wooden walls ancient and softened by rot, the door long since swallowed by ivy. Her hands were shaking so badly she could barely make fists. Her hair had completed its collapse, damp strands plastered to her face and neck with sweat and dew and tears she couldn’t recall crying.
Clutching her locket, she looked back nervously. Tannhäuser’s blood darkened the strap of her dress. Looking down at the plunging neckline, she gasped in horror as specks of red stained her skin.
