He’d made me sleep with dogs.
He played with my head.
He didn’t give a damn about me.
Why was he so clever? So perfectly designed for this game?
I struggled to sit up. The two men holding my wrists let me go, and I shot into a sitting position, wrapping arms around my torso.
The hot sparkly burst that made everything so inconsequential faded with every rapid heartbeat. It was like being in the eye of the storm. Jethro granted me silence. He’d shared his heavenly silence and quieted my mind from everything I was feeling.
But now the storm gathered strength, howling, twisting, sucking me back up the funnel of horrors.
Eyes.
So many eyes upon me. Paintings and real. Men who’d seen me naked. Men who’d licked every inch. Men who didn’t care if I lived or died.
You let him control you.
You let your body rule your mind.
You let yourself down.
Crushing grief swamped me. I couldn’t be there another moment. I couldn’t sit there with residual sparks shivering in my core. I couldn’t pretend that everything was acceptable.
Jethro smirked, his breathing calmed as he dragged large hands through his hair. My heart broke into shards. How could he give me something so incredible all while hating me? His mercurial moods, his unreadable face—it confused me. Even worse, it upset me.
Visceral repulsion and horror howled through me as the storm grew in strength. My lungs seized as I flew up the dark wall of wind.
The compliant prisoner disappeared under a tsunami of rage. This wasn’t okay. None of this was okay. This is not okay!
Balling my hands, I scooted off the table. Keeping my distance from Jethro, I bared my teeth at him—the first male to drive me up a mountain I’d never leapt off before.
Him.
He’d had no right to make me come. To give me a gift not out of kindness but control. He’d proven a valuable lesson. He could make me do anything he wanted, and there was nothing I could do about it.
His eyebrow quirked; chin tilted with arrogance. He didn’t say a word, moving to lean against the door with his hands jammed in his pockets. He gave nothing away. No hint at how he felt watching other men use me. No clue as to what he was thinking when he made me come.
I was his to repay this horrible ludicrous debt. But he didn’t seem to care.
And that was what broke my heart.
He didn’t give an arse about what happened to me. Everything I’d hoped—the secret plan to make him care or at least tolerate my company—was smashed to dust. There was no pleasing a rock like him. No appealing to his compassion.
He has none.
Tearing my eyes from his, I glowered at the table. Standing tall, I embraced my nakedness. I throbbed with righteousness. I trembled with indecency.
I hated what I wore. It covered nothing and was theirs. I wanted nothing to do with them. I wanted to refuse their food, spit out their water, and burn their clothes. Not that they’d offered me any.
With suddenly steady hands, I tore the French maid’s cap off my head. I threw it down the table. The satin wood let it slide all the way to the centre where it rested like a stain, a sin—a simple innocuous thing screaming of wrongness.
The men didn’t move.
Fumbling at the ties around my neck, I pulled the hated pinafore over my head and balled it up. Standing proud, naked—showing off my bruises from vertigo and tongue smears from bastards—I spoke. “Look at you. Look at how masculine and powerful you are.” Pointing my finger around the table, I growled, “Look at how scary and dominating and strong you are. Look at how proud you must be. You proved you’re invincible by taking advantage of a woman brought here against her will. You used a girl who has to live her worst nightmares to protect those she loves.”
Stabbing myself in the chest, I whispered, “Wait…I got it wrong. You’re not the strong ones. I am. You’re weak and disgusting. By doing what you did, you gave me more power than I’ve ever had before. You gave me a new skill—a skill at ignoring you because you’re nothing. Nothing. Nothing!”
“And you!” I swung my arm, gaze zeroing in on Jethro. The one man who held my life in the palm of his hand. He was nothing. Just like his brethren of bastards.
Jethro stood taller, a shadow darkening his face. His hands came out of his pockets, crossing in front of his large chest.
“You…” I seethed. “You think you’re the baddest one here. You think I’ll cower. You think I’ll obey.” Running both hands through my hair, I shouted, “I’ll never cower. I’ll never obey. You’ll never break me, because you can’t touch me.”
Spanning my arms, I presented my naked form as a gift—the gift he’d hinted at wanting but hadn’t taken. “I’ll never be yours even though you own my life. I’ll never bow to you because my knees don’t recognise your so-called power. So do your worst. Hurt me. Rape me. Kill me. But you’ll never ever own me.”
Breathing hard, I waited.
The room had remained silent. But now it filled with rustling of leather as men shifted in their seats. The atmosphere went from shocked silence to heavy anticipation.
My overworked heart kicked into another gear, sending my vision a little grey, a little fuzzy. Please, not now.
Planting my legs, gripping the soft carpet beneath my toes, I locked my knees against a wave of vertigo.
Mr. Hawk was the first to move. He placed his elbows on the table, linking his fingers together. “I was wrong. You’re nothing like your mother. She had a brain. She was smart.” His voice dropped the chivalrous country man edge, deepening into violent snaps, “You, on the other hand, are wilful and stupid. You don’t see that we are your family now. The moment you slept under my roof you became a Hawk by means of acquisition.”
I laughed. “I’m still a Weaver then because I didn’t sleep under your roof.” My kitten claws sharpened. I’d never been a fighter, but something called to me. Something intoxicating and lethal.
He leaned forward, anger etching his face. “You will learn your place. Mark my words.”
I wanted to fight. I’d listened to their damn history lessons, it was time they listened to mine. “I may not have records so perfectly kept as yours, but I do know my family is innocent. Whatever happened back then was between them—not us. Leave it in the past. My family created a business of making clothes. We dressed the royal court but also donated to the poor. I’m proud of where I’ve come from and for you to—”