3.
For the rest of the week after the humiliating dinner, she took every measure possible to avoid Sir Grey and his son.
Of course, their evening meal was the one time she was absolutely expected to be present. That could not be avoided. Sir Grey had not gone so far again as on that evening. However, since that day she had been forced to stand next to his chair through every meal, while he occasionally ran his hands over her legs and ass.
Tonight, when he retired to the library to work, she escaped back downstairs to the kitchens - slumping into a chair before the fire, exhausted. She had been so wound up this last week, so anxious. She was so preoccupied with becoming invisible every day that by the time she fell into bed around midnight, she usually sank into the dreamless sleep of the dead until she awoke at dawn.
She wearily prepared the kitchen for the morning, before undressing and pulling on her simple night shift. She sank into her bed and drew the curtains of the alcove closed, shutting out the glow of the fire. Her eyes drifted closed.
***
It was the same as before, as every time, but it had been a while since the last...
The man was holding to her, whispering, and although she did not comprehend the words, they were comforting. Her face was pressed to his neck yet again, but this time she did not try to draw back, she allowed herself to go with the dream. She was getting better at this, this half-awareness, accepting the surrealism. Even within the dream, she recognised in herself a relief that she was here again...wicked as it was.
His warm hands were running softly down her back; light, feather touches, worshipping her skin.
The familiar heat was rising in her, coiling in her abdomen... a gentle pulse beginning between her legs. She sighed into his neck as his hands travelled lower, pressing herself against him....
*** It was not with the usual soft blurring that she came to, but suddenly, with the intense and immediate knowledge that something was wrong.
She froze, her brain racing out of its dreamy state to take in her immediate surroundings....she was in bed, still. She was warm, too warm...the sheets tangled again...it was still dark.
That was odd, she never woke before dawn. She couldn't have been asleep more than a few hours...
Then she heard it. The rustle of fabric...and breathing...deep breathing. Someone was moving across the room.
Even as her brain caught up, as she lay frozen, the alcove drapes twitched and began to draw apart, a shape silhouetted against the glow of the dying fire.
She drew in breath to scream, though she knew it would do no good, but at Sir Grey's familiar chuckle her vocal chords froze.
"Ah yes, very wise little Elise....I would stay quiet. I doubt even your outraged little voice could be heard six miles away...and you wouldn't want to annoy me now, would you..."He chuckled darkly again, leaning over her so his face was inches from her own.
She could smell the alcohol on his breath, and she turned her face away as the bile rose in her throat. Fear saturated her brain.
He roughly grasped her jaw and turned her head back towards him, leaning in and crushing his mouth against her lips. She whimpered in fear, clamping her lips shut, but his fingers on her jaw prized into her cheeks until her teeth edged open from the pain, and he roughly forced his tongue into her mouth and against hers. She lashed out at his chest with her fists, but made little impact, then his free hand grasped her wrists, dragging them over her head.
He released her mouth from beneath his and chuckled again, whispering against her ear, "Ah yes, spirited as ever..."
Still grasping her wrists with one hand, his right reached down and grasped the hem of her shift. She squirmed as he dragged it up her body, exposing her to his gaze in the glow of the dying fire.
His face was still in shadow, but she could feel his eyes raking her flesh, starting at her breasts, down over her stomach, before lingering at the thatch of hair between her thighs. He growled deep in his throat as she squirmed, trying to free herself and escape his stare, but only succeeding in improving his view.
Suddenly, he grasped her hair, spread over the pillow, and hauled her upright. She cried out in pain. He released her hair and wrists just long enough to tear her shift from her body entirely in one fluid movement, before grasping her hair and dragging her into the light before the hearth. Her hands clung to his wrist trying to lessen the pull on her hair, whimpering.
