Page 47 of The Gilded Cuff
—New York Times, September 12, 1990
Another shower. Sophie had taken one only a few hours ago, yet so much had happened since then. She looked a wreck. Soot blackened her nose, forehead, and neck, and her eyes were red from the smoke. She still wore her exercise clothes from tennis that morning. It marveled her that Emery had wanted to touch her, let alone kiss her. The man was unpredictable.
And hot. Burning hot and dangerous. She wanted him bad, so bad she had the shakes, like an addict during withdrawal, when he wasn’t nearby.
If Cody and Hans hadn’t come in…they might have done the horizontal tango on the library carpet.
Damn Cody. Then again, did she really want her first time with Emery to be on the floor, sweaty and covered in ashes?
No.
Sophie showered quickly and did her best to style her hair. Naturally it didn’t want to cooperate. It had to be a universal truth: a woman’s hair never cooperated when she was about to meet the parents of the man she was seeing. Well, she wasn’t technicallyseeingEmery. Howwasshe supposed to define their relationship?
She imagined the look of horror on his parents’ faces if she said, “Hi, I’m Sophie, I’m letting your son seduce me and in return he’s telling me about the worst moments of his life.”
Yeah, bad idea. Perhaps she should leave the explanations to Emery.
When she left the bathroom she was surprised to find a midnight blue dress lying on the bed, along with a pair of red flats with silver buckles on the toes. She picked the gown up and couldn’t help but admire it. The cut was A-line and the skirt flared out like a dress Grace Kelly might have worn, only there wasn’t a scratchy crinoline underneath. Instead it had a built–in, multilayered, silk underskirt. The bodice looked fitted and the waist would be trim. Sophie checked the tag and blushed when she realized it was her size. Who had purchased the clothes? And more importantly, how had they known her size? It was then she noticed the small note tucked inside one of the shoes.
She pulled it out and read it silently.
Sophie,
The shoes and dress are my gift to you tonight. Wear them and nothing else. It will please me. Disobey and you will face punishment. I have been lax in letting you take control. Tonight I will remedy this.
~Master Emery
Master Emery. It sounded so dark and sinful. It reminded her of that first moment she’d met him in the club. Domineering, sensual, powerful. She eyed the note thoughtfully. So he didn’t want her wearing anything underneath the dress?
A smile curved her lips and she fought off a giddy little laugh. She glanced around the empty bedroom, then hastily dropped her towel and donned the conservative black bra and panties she’d retrieved from her suitcase. So he thought to order her around. Well, he had another think coming. She wasn’t going commando under this dress. If he found out and punished her? Well, she did like the spanking and wouldn’t mind at all if they repeated that little activity.
She slipped into the dress and was relieved to find the material stretched a bit, which meant she could reach back and tug up the zipper herself. Once done, she peered at her reflection in the full-length mirror, surprised to find she looked good. Really good. Emery’s gilded cuffs gleamed against her skin. She touched them, admiring the way the light from the window caught the bracelets and they glinted with promise. He’d put a sign of his possession on her. For some insane reason, she was happy. Another unexpected smile snuck up on her.
She wanted to find Emery and thank him for the dress. No one had ever spoiled her before, or treated her like this. It made her feel girlish, hopeful. Like a woman her age should feel. But she hadn’t felt this young and happy…well, ever. Sometimes she worried she’d spent so much of her life trying to fix past mistakes that she’d never given herself a chance to have a life, to just be herself without any baggage weighing her down. Unable to resist giving in to one small temptation, she swirled around in a slow circle, watching her skirt poof out in a blue cloud around her knees.
With a delighted sigh, she left the bedroom and wandered down the hall. Rather than going back down to the kitchen or to Cody’s command center, she took a new route, picking a hallway at random. Some force inside her pulled her in this direction like an invisible string, drawing her closer to something important. The farther she walked the dustier the paintings and side tables were. Tiny cobwebs hung on the high wall sconces lining the hall. Why hadn’t the maids cleaned this part of the house? It looked abandoned.
She paused in front of one door, the only one along the long hallway that wasn’t closed. The force that whispered silkily in her mind entreated her to look within. She set a palm against it and pushed. The door creaked on its hinges as it opened, revealing the sight within.
Her heart shot up into her throat and her blood chilled.
Emery stood only a few feet away, between two twin beds. One lay bare, the other was strewn with toys and knickknacks like small marbles and baseball cards. Sophie held her breath as Emery knelt on one knee and set the single tennis shoe at the foot of the bed that was covered with toys.
It’s a shrine. For the brother who’d died.
Without looking at her, he spoke. “A part of me always expected him to come back. I kept our room the same, but…” He bent his head and rested his forehead in his palms. “He’s never coming back. I’m a damn fool for hoping otherwise. He’s dead.”
Sophie was too upset to breathe or to make a sound. He was hurting, a kind of hurt she was intimately familiar with and it was breaking her heart to see him like this.
Finally he got to his feet and faced her. Dark circles hallowed his eyes, making his features look gaunt and haunted.
“Don’t you want to know how I know he’s dead?” The edge in his voice was razor thin.
“How?” she croaked out on a harsh breath.
“Because I left him to die. Fenn distracted our captors while I escaped. I was outside the house when the shot rang out. I was thecowardwho ran and left him behind with those monsters.” The raw agony in Emery’s eyes ravaged her soul, but he kept talking, even when she didn’t want to hear anymore. His hands were clenched into white-knuckled fists.
“You know what they say about twins. There’s a connection. When the gun fired, I felt it. Like it exploded out of the back of my own skull. The pain was so bad that I tripped and busted my chin on a rock.” He ran a finger over a small scar on his chin; it matched the placement of a wound she’d seen in a photograph of him when they’d found him.
