Chapter 10: The Morning After the Second Claiming
She clutched the blanket to her chest, the fine linen a poor shield. Her body felt used, raw, a territory he’d mapped twice now. The words he’d spoken—full of my cock—echoed in the silent room, making her skin prickle with shame.
Ron stood at the foot of the bed, his naked back to her as he reached for a robe of dark silk. The muscles in his shoulders shifted, a landscape of power and casual disregard. The cabinet beside him, the one that hummed, held the tea. He’d been explicit about it.
“Tea?” Leila asked, her voice small in the vast space. She didn’t know what else to say. It was the only instruction she had, the only clear task in this bewildering new world. She imagined a bitter medicinal brew, something to clean her out, to fix whatever had been broken inside her.
He paused, one arm in the robe sleeve. He turned his head, just slightly, his profile sharp against the grey light from the window. He looked at her. Really looked. She was curled up, her dark hair a tangled mess around her shoulders, her eyes wide with a confusion so profound it bordered on emptiness. She wasn’t coy. She wasn’t scheming. She was asking about the tea the way a child might ask about the weather. She had no idea. No concept of the consequences of what he’d poured into her.
Such staggering innocence.
A strange, hollow feeling bloomed in his chest. It wasn’t pity. It was something more possessive, more final. The idea of the tea, of the mechanical, preventative ritual he imposed on every other woman in this house, suddenly felt crude. An insult. To her? To his own unprecedented act of keeping just one?
He changed his mind in the space between one heartbeat and the next.
He let the robe fall back onto the chair. “Forget the tea,” he said, his tone altering, becoming smoother, almost conversational. He walked back to the bed. “It’s just a herbal tea the others drink. You don’t need it.”
He leaned down and scooped her up, blanket and all. She was so light. She yelped, her arms instinctively wrapping around his neck for balance. He carried her, not with tenderness, but with a firm, utilitarian grip, into the adjoining bathroom. Steam was already rising from the deep sunken tub; a servant must have silently filled it.
He stepped into the hot water, sinking down and taking her with him. The heat was a shock, engulfing her sore muscles. He positioned her between his legs, her back against his chest. The water turned cloudy. He took a cake of sandalwood soap and a soft cloth.
“Be still,” he muttered, his breath against her ear.
He washed her. Methodically. His hands were strong, thorough, moving over her shoulders, her arms, between her breasts, down the curve of her belly. He was cleaning away the evidence of himself. The act was strangely more intimate than anything that had happened in the bed. There was no passion in it, just a stark, deliberate claim. He washed between her legs, his fingers impersonal, clinical, and she squeezed her eyes shut, trembling.
He washed himself just as efficiently. Then they simply sat, submerged in the silence and the dissipating heat. His chin rested on the top of her head. She could feel the steady, powerful rhythm of his heart against her spine. She didn’t understand any of it.
Eventually, he lifted her out, wrapping her in a thick, warmed towel before doing the same for himself. He led her back to the bedroom, where fresh clothes were laid out for him: a crisp white shirt, dark tailored trousers. He dressed with quick, precise movements.
She stood by the bed, holding the towel around herself, watching.
When he was finished, he came to her. He cupped her face in one hand, his thumb brushing over her cheekbone. He leaned down and kissed her on the lips. It was brief, dry, but it wasn’t violent. It was a seal.
“Be good,” he said quietly. His eyes held hers, no room for misunderstanding. “I’ll come for you again tonight.”
Then he was gone, the door closing with a soft, definitive click.
Leila stood there for a long time, the imprint of his kiss lingering, the words be good looping in her mind. She finally moved, finding a simple silk slip that had been left for her. She put it on. It felt alien against her skin. She sat on the edge of the monstrous bed, in a room that smelled of him, and waited. For what, she didn’t know.
Downstairs, in his study, the morning light was harsh, businesslike. Ron stood at the window, a cut-crystal glass of whiskey in his hand despite the early hour. The head maid, a stern Japanese woman named Aiko, waited just inside the door, her hands clasped.
He didn’t turn around. “The girl in my room. Leila.”
“Yes, sir.”
“No contraceptive tea.” His voice was flat, devoid of inflection. “She is not to have it. Not today, not any day. Is that clear?”
Aiko’s silence was brief, but it was there. A fracture in her professional composure. She had served him for five years, managed the discreet rhythms of the guest wing. This order was outside of all precedent. “Sir,” she began, a hint of caution in her tone. “The protocol—”
“The protocol is what I say it is,” he interrupted, finally turning. His gaze was cool, impenetrable. “She does not get the tea. Ensure the other women do not speak of it to her. I do not want her hearing the word. If she asks, it is a herbal tea she does not require.”
Aiko bowed her head, masking her thoughts. “Understood, sir.”
“See that she is fed. She stays in my rooms unless I am with her.”
Another bow. “Yes, sir.”
He dismissed her with a slight turn of his shoulder, his attention already shifting to the stock reports on his desk. The decision was made. It was logistical now. A change in the household orders. But the weight of it, the monumental shift it represented, hung in the air of the study long after Aiko had left, silent as a ghost.
He took a long drink of whiskey, the burn a familiar anchor. He had taken her village, her family’s safety, her body, her innocence. Now, with a few words to a servant, he had taken her future, too. All of it. And the quiet, savage part of him, the part that had been so inexplicably sated by her alone, settled deeper. It felt right.
He had work to do. Ships to move, deals to solidify before the war blew everything apart. But a low, constant hum of anticipation threaded through his thoughts now. A focus.
Tonight. He would come for her again tonight.