Part 37 (1/2)
”I'll leave first.” S0ren released her from his arms. ”Wait a few minutes and then go straight to bed.”
He kissed her quick on the lips and walked to the door.
At the door he paused with his hand on the k.n.o.b.
”Little One, you should know something else.”
She sat back on the bed and pulled her knees to her chest.
”What is it?”
”What you know of me, what you've seen, this is only one small part of me. There are far less likable aspects to my character than what I've allowed you to see. If you don't believe me, you can ask Kingsley.”
”What should I ask him?”
”Ask him to tell you why you should be afraid of me.”
”What will he tell me?”
”Nothing. But ask him anyway.”
She nodded although she didn't understand.
”Try to sleep. I'd like you to come to the funeral tomorrow. You'll meet Elizabeth, so prepare yourself.”
”Is she okay? I mean, after all that happened to her.”
S0ren crossed his arms over his chest.
”She wants to have children,” he said. ”More than anything. I doubt she'll ever date or marry, but she does want to be a mother desperately. She was doing well until recently. Medical tests revealed she can't have children. What our father did to her, it had consequences.”
”She can't have kids?”
S0ren shook his head.
”She did not take the news well,” he said and she heard a deeper meaning in his words. ”But I have faith in her. Try to have compa.s.sion for her.”
”I do. I will.”
”Good girl. Go to sleep.”
”Yes, sir. Sir?”
”Yes, Little One?”
”Will you say it again? Please?”
He smiled at her. ”In Danish or English?”
”You already said it in English. Let's go for Danish.”
S0ren walked back to where she sat on the bed. He took her face in his hands and kissed her long and deep.
”Jeg elsker dig, min lille en.”
He kissed her again, told her good-night and slipped into the hallway.
Eleanor collapsed back onto the bed. Staring up at the ceiling she ran her hands over her upper thighs, feeling the new tenderness in them. Touching the bruises left on her by S0ren and lying in the bed where he'd penetrated her with his finger was like lying in a bed of fire. She slid her hand into her shorts and started to tease her c.l.i.toris again. S0ren told her to wait a few minutes before returning to bed. Getting herself off while imagining S0ren f.u.c.king her would certainly take a minute or two. She came again quickly, quietly, trying not to moan aloud as her cervix bucked inside her and her v.a.g.i.n.al muscles contracted onto themselves.
She dragged herself off the bed and left the room as quietly as she could. In the doorway she glanced back at the bed and had a vision of it burning. That was what she'd felt lying on it-fire. She shut the door behind her and crept down the hallway.
Careful of the darkness, she headed toward her room. As she pa.s.sed into the main hallway, she heard voices. Next to a window, she made out the outline of two people. Hiding in the shadows she moved in closer. She saw S0ren and a woman speaking softly, their heads bowed as if in prayer.
”I'm not sorry,” the woman whispered. ”I know that isn't much of a confession, but I'm not. At most I'm sorry I'm not sorry.”
S0ren crossed his arms over his chest as if wanting to hide behind them like a s.h.i.+eld. He looked up into the woman's eyes.
”I'm not sorry, either.”
Eleanor didn't know what she heard, only that she shouldn't have heard it. She turned back and retreated into her room. She slid into bed, where Claire lay sound asleep. Her entire body trembled as visceral memories of her time with S0ren in his bedroom flashed across her mind's eye.
He'd ordered her to go to bed and she had. But she didn't sleep, not until dawn.
Groggy and sore, she reluctantly threw the covers off her when Claire nudged her awake.
”I'm up, I'm up,” she said and started to stand up.
”Holy c.r.a.p, what happened to your legs?” Claire asked, staring wide-eyed at her. Eleanor glanced down and saw the bruises S0ren had left on her were already turning purple.
”Um ... I was walking in the hall last night and ran into something. Some table or something. It was dark,” she lied and disappeared into the bathroom.
Once in the bathroom she splashed water on her face and stripped naked. Before stepping into the shower, she gazed at herself in the mirror.
”Oh, my G.o.d ...”
With his bare hands and nothing else, S0ren had turned her upper thighs black. She turned around and lifted her hair. On her back were four black bruises about the size of her palm. She had bruises on her right breast and one on her shoulder. She counted two more on her upper arms, one on her forearms and four finger-mark bruises on the side of each hip and a black thumbprint on the top. If she had seen a naked woman with the identical bruises, she would have a.s.sumed she'd been raped.
Eleanor leaned back into the wall and put one leg up on the bathroom counter. While looking at her bruises, she brought herself to o.r.g.a.s.m. She couldn't help herself. She'd never seen anything more erotic in her life than the marks S0ren had left on her.
Luckily she'd packed a long-sleeved wrap dress for the funeral that covered both her back and her legs down to her knees. She and Claire ate a quick breakfast before the guests started to arrive at the home. They entered some sort of dining room-Claire called it the morning room. About forty people were packed into the room, drinking tea and coffee and whispering to each other. Still, the effect of forty people whispering all in one room sounded almost deafening to Eleanor's ringing head. She'd slept only two hours the night before. She'd never felt better about feeling s.h.i.+tty her entire life. Funeral, she reminded herself. No s.h.i.+t-eating grins allowed.
She spotted S0ren across the room in a black suit, white s.h.i.+rt and black tie. A woman-young and lovely-stood next to him. Claire took her hand and dragged her over to them.
”Who is this?” the woman asked, giving S0ren a fragile smile.
”This is Eleanor. She's a friend of Claire's.”