of a funny joke, but at some point it needed to end.
“I’m not doing anything until I speak with Franklin. I won’t put on a damn uniform for you, for Edward, or for Callan. I’m not sure you all know who I am, but when Mr. Rose finds out about this-“
Gretchen grinned, the line of her mouth like a freshly honed blade.
“Save your breath, Lisbeth. Mr. Rose is well aware of your situation, seeing as he was the one who put you in this room. It appears we know who you are, but you have no idea who runs this house. I’ll be sure to fetch you a directory when you’re finished being a spoiled brat. It’ll save us all a lot of time. Until then, enjoy...” she wiggled her fingers at my feet, “...bleeding or whatever it is you’re doing to establish dominance. We’ll all be on pins and needles to see what you have in store for us next.”
Hating the tears that kept falling, I slapped at them and refused to believe a word out of this bitch’s mouth.
“Get me my uncle,” I demanded, my voice ratcheting higher until it cracked under the strain. “Now!”
Gretchen must have been built of pure steel, not so much as flinching at the way I screamed. She merely tightened her smile more, that blade of a line so sharp it could cut you to the bone.
“You’d do well to mind your manners in this house. I’d hate for you to learn what happens to petty little brats who believe themselves larger than they are.”
With that, Gretchen left the room, the door shut, the lock thrown in place, and I was left to cower against the wall where Callan had left me, a puddle of blood forming beneath my feet as my mind fought to make sense of all that had happened.
Callan
Sweat dripped down my body as I locked the bar on the uprights, the metallic snap of the two pieces coming together doing nothing to help bleed away the rage simmering beneath my skin.
Two hours had passed since I stuffed Lisbeth in her new room, and I’d spent them driving my body in ways that tore at my muscles and weakened my bones, yet I still couldn’t shake her voice from my head, the past blending with the present.
Intermixed with the indignant shrieks she’d made while pounding on a locked door in the servant’s wing were the insults she wrapped for me in pretty red bows, the abuse she’d delivered on the glimmer of sterling silver trays. Lisbeth was the toxicity that ran unfettered within my blood. She was the painful pulse that threatened my arteries.
My hatred of her was a war cry in my head, but I made a mistake when I touched her. I made a mistake when I stared into a set of angry blue eyes and accepted the challenge of taming her.
Lisbeth was frightened when she first saw me, that emotion bled from her with a sweet aroma that I longed to taste, but then, just as quickly her anger surfaced, an acrid memory rising to the surface that chased bile up my throat and tore at my skin, my blood running cold as she lashed out with her threats and demands.
I’d stood outside her door and absorbed every cut, every scratch, every blistering remark so that I could wear them like a brand.
But it wasn’t hatred that had pulled every muscle taut over my aching bones. It wasn’t fury that heated my skin. It was a deep-seated need to break her in ways that I never could’ve imagined in the ten years she was missing.
Her poison was what had driven me to this room, her voice screaming through my head as I pushed my body to a point of breaking, my hatred for her leaking out of me with each bead of sweat. My desire to tame her only increasing.
Frustrated, I sat up and grabbed a towel to dry the sweat dripping down the back of my neck as Franklin strolled into the gym, his brow furrowed, suit impeccable and eyes held in a hard stare on me.
“I thought we were going to discuss your decision regarding Lisbeth prior to you dragging her through the house on bloody feet and shoving her into a room.”
My lips split in a feral grin. The memory of her screaming played through my head so many times in the past few hours that they had dug a channel through my brain