“Oh, it’s already alphabetized,” Daniel said as he ushered them inside the house. “I’m just not sure which alphabet. Certainly not the English one.”
Eleanor glanced around Daniel’s home as they made their way to what she guessed was the drawing room. The house seemed vast but warm and would have been cozy but for its enigmatic master. In the presence of such pain, Eleanor doubted she could ever feel at home.
Daniel gestured toward a chair and he sat down. One glance from him brought her to her knees at his feet. In private she always sat at his feet. That she was to take the standard submissive posture in front of Daniel meant only one thing—Daniel was one of them. Or had been, at least, before his wife died.
“Could I offer either of you a drink?” Daniel asked, taking a seat on the sofa across from them.
“No, thank you.” Eleanor let him speak for her. “I really must be going. My flight leaves in three hours.”
“Back to Rome again?” Daniel asked.
“Again,” he said, sounding tired of it all.
“I’ll walk you out.”
Usually he would never leave her without a long and intimate goodbye. But this time he merely stood, brushed a finger gently across her cheek and chin, and left her alone in the room. She waited on the floor although she desperately wanted to run after him and beg him to take her with him. But she was far too well-trained to break a submissive posture for the sole purpose of engaging in what she knew would be a futile emotional outburst.
After a few moments, Daniel returned to the drawing room. He said nothing at first and Eleanor could only keep her silence and her eyes lowered.
“Please, sit,” he said, his voice kind and quietly amused. “In a chair.”
“Oh, a chair. How extraordinarily generous,” she said, unable to maintain her submissive comportment now that she was truly alone with Daniel.
“I understand that you’re upset with this arrangement.”
Eleanor smirked. Upset?
“I get it,” she said as she sat in the armchair behind her. “This is good cop, bad cop, right? Bad cop works me over and leaves and then good cop comes in and offers me the milk and the cookies and the nice comfy chair. How cute.”
“He warned me you were smart. He neglected to mention you were a smart-ass as well.”
She had to give Daniel some credit. He was impressively unimpressed by her sarcasm. Tougher even than he looked.
“He may live to be a hundred and the word ‘smartass’ will never pass those perfect lips of his and you know it,” she said.
Daniel half laughed. “He is a bit too proper for that, isn’t he? I suppose he would say you were—”
“Impudent,” she suggested.
“A fair assessment, I think. He could have warned me you were impudent.”
“I guess he thinks it goes without saying. Since you’re playing good cop, should I expect a big dinner now? A massage maybe? Or how about the sob story about your poor dead wife and how you’re so sad I should blow you nine ways to Sunday?” she asked, deliberately trying to get a rise out of him. But he still seemed unmoved. That scared her even more than an emotional reaction would have. His pain was too deep to be touched. It made him seem far beyond her.
“I think we’ve left the kingdom of impudent and entered the realm of bitchiness.”
She almost laughed. Bitchiness—another word she would never hear him say.
“A fair assessment,” she said, repeating Daniel’s words.
Daniel inhaled and exhaled heavily. She could tell he was considering his next words.
“I won’t burden you with a sob story,” he said. “But you deserve some explanation for your presence here. I was married, blissfully, for seven years. My wife and I were as you and—”
“If you want to get on my good side, please don’t say his name. I’ll make it through this week a hell of a lot easier if I don’t have to hear about him or talk about him.”
Daniel nodded. “As you and he are,” he continued. “She was more than my wife. She was my property, my possession … and my best friend. She died three years ago. I have been with no one since. When I confessed this to S—to him, he insisted that some time with you would be therapeutic. As you belong to him, there is no threat of romantic entanglement. And as you are already familiar with the specific requirement of the lifestyle—”
“I’m kinky. You don’t have to resort to euphemisms.”
“Then the transition from celibacy back to sexuality would be far smoother.”
“So you do plan to fuck me then?” she asked although she knew the answer already.
“When you’re ready and if you have no objection.”
“I’m here, aren’t I? Nobody’s got a gun to my head.”
“Force is for amateurs. I will sleep alone for eternity before I would ever take an unwilling partner to bed. He has shared you with others before, hasn’t he?”
“Yeah, of course. But—” she said and took a breath “—he was always there.”
“I understand. As I said, when you’re ready. And not until then.”
“So what now?” she asked after a moment’s pause. Daniel stood up and went to the door. She quickly joined him.
“I’m sure you need to unpack and rest. So I suppose for the night I’ll simply send you to your room.”
“Send me to my room? After what a bitch I’ve been?” Eleanor scoffed. “From good cop to cop-out. Fine, I’ll go to my room.” She moved to take a step but Daniel caught her by the chin. She gasped at the sudden unexpected movement, shocked by the sudden change in his demeanor.
He forced her to meet his eyes.
“I haven’t played this game in years,” he said, his voice low and forbidding. “That does not mean I’ve forgotten how.”
Eleanor didn’t dare to blink or breathe. Daniel loosened his grip on her chin but did not let her go.
“I may not touch you again for the rest of this week,” he said. “Or I may fuck you blind, deaf and dumb. But you will be respectful of me while you are here no matter what the sleeping arrangements prove to be. Understood?”
Eleanor blinked and nodded. “Yes, sir,” she said through trembling lips.
“Good. Your room adjoins mine. It is at the top of the stairs, the second to the last room on the right. Your bags are already there.”
“Thank you,” she said, her voice little more than a squeak.
Daniel smiled but it was not a kind smile. It sent a chill into her stomach even as his fingers against her skin made her uncomfortably warm. “You flinched,” he said. “This must not be how he usually gets your attention.”
“It isn’t. He grabs my neck. Or my wrist.”
“Which do you prefer?”
She shrugged. “I hate them all the same.”
Daniel’s eyes momentarily brightened with suppressed laughter and Eleanor was struck again by how handsome he was. This was going to be a long week.
“Go,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Relieved to be dismissed from his unnerving presence, Eleanor practically bolted toward