Page 10 of Currency in Flesh

“Please, rise,” she commanded. As Anna got to her feet, Lady Cora’s lips pressed against my neck and I had the feeling she was marking me as her possession.

Anna, apparently shared that thought, dropping her sky-blue eyes to the floor rather than meeting mine again.

“Grace is my guest,” Lady Cora said in a tone that implied much more than she had stated. “I wanted to give her a tour of the Underworld, let her see the meadows and their inhabitants.”

Without raising her eyes, Anna replied. “It is a great honor to meet you, your lady Grace?—”

“It’s just Grace,” I interrupted, but Lady Cora’s hand tightened around my waist, pulling me against her so firmly that I could feel her sharp pelvic bone pressing my ass.

“Thank you, Anna,” she said in dismissal. “Grace may visit again, please do not hesitate to make her feel welcome.”

The girl’s head dropped in another bow. “I will treat her with infinite care.” And she walked backwards a few paces before turning and disappearing back into the people of the city.

“Why did you do that?” I asked. She hadn’t let go of me, and even through the corset I imagined I could feel the heat of her hand. My fingertips moved over the skin of the pomegranate, memorizing its texture.

Her words ruffled my hair. “Do you wish for them to mistake you for one of them?”

“I don’t see why it would matter.”

She used her free hand to trace the line of my jaw and the sensation made me dizzy with a confusing amalgam of arousal and annoyance. She knew what she was doing, and I was certain she had not forgotten the feeling of me, slick on her fingers. I wished I could push her off and walk away, but between fear and desire, I was stuck still in her close proximity.

“You aremypet, darling. Those in the meadows are accustomed to being provided with anything they wish. I can assure you many, many of them wish for something just like you.”

I scoffed. “If they can have anything they want, I’m sure they’d ask for a woman who looks like you long before they settled for me.”

Lady Cora’s fingers flew from my stomach to my throat, spinning me around to face her with unflinching demand. Her eyes bore into mine, their slightly elongated pupils narrowing in the light. The breath stilled in my chest and all I could do was stare right back. There was a challenge in my eyes, daring her to assert her power over me again. I wanted her to. My body responded to her grip on my throat—heat pooling between my thighs where they grew slick against each other. I felt my short fingernails break through the flesh of the fruit in my hands, juice the color of blood dripping to the ground between my feet.

“Look me in the eye and say that again,” she growled.

I bit the inside of my lip, refusing to reply. She didn’t get to embarrass me. The only person who could make me feel like that was myself. She tightened her hand, cutting off my breath almost entirely. My lips parted, and I tried to steal what little air I could. In an instant, the meadow fell away. Instead of the cheery little town, I stood in a dimly lit room with a black marble floor. It was warm, and I thought I could smell the vaguely familiar mineral scent of a hot spring nearby. Behind Lady Cora was a sprawling round bed with what looked like slept-in black velvet sheets. In the matter of seconds it took meto scan the room, I came dangerously close to passing out. My vision went dark at the edges, the room closing in like the conclusion of a silent-era film.

My knees buckled and Lady Cora let me collapse, landing before her with my palms pressed to the tile. The pomegranate had split in two when it fell, its crimson juice splattered across her bare feet. Whether it was anger or indignity, the feeling that curled through my hands and heated my face prevented me from looking up at her. I looked like a penitent worshiper, I hated it.

But deep, deep down, buried beneath all my independence and self assuredness, something else began to unfurl.

“Lick them clean,” Lady Cora ordered, voice cold.

Without looking up, I replied. “What?”

Her right foot stepped directly between my hands. Thin rivulets and freckle-small specks of pomegranate juice spread across her pale, unblemished skin. “I said, lick them clean.”

My eyes filled with tears. White-hot shame coursing through me with such strength it turned my stomach. She couldn’t mean it, couldn’t really intend for me to debase myself like that. I felt my arms begin to quiver, my entire body shivering despite the balmy air in this chamber.

“Do not try my patience, pet,” Lady Cora said. When I still failed to move, she bent just enough to push her pointed nails through my hair, grabbing a thick handful of the soft brown strands. She forced my head down until my nose pressed against her cool flesh.“Lick.”

The tears spilled over. My humiliation was palpable—rolling down my cheeks in hot lines. Her fingers twisted, pulling my hair more firmly as she ground my mouth against the fine bones of her foot.

I licked.

Once I had begun, whatever dignity remained within me shattered and I shed the hesitation and shame—exchanging itinstead for an odd sense of calm. All the weight of my own emotion lifted from my shoulders. I felt like in this moment I had found a purpose, even one so insignificant as cleaning smears of pomegranate juice from the feet of a deity. She released my hair, smoothing it back down with a gentle touch. “Good,” she said in a near-whisper.

When I looked up at her, my tongue was still gliding across her now spotless skin. Her eyes seemed to glow with fire, and I wasn’t sure if it was my imagination. She bent to pick up one of the pomegranate halves, the red arils inside looking like garnets nestled in her palm. She plucked one tiny glistening seed from the fruit and held it out to me between her nails. Lifting my chin from the floor, I stuck out my tongue and held it there without breaking her gaze, and she placed the little gem in its center.

A muffled sound of pleasure escaped me when I closed my mouth and allowed the seed to burst between my teeth. It was sweet and juicy. It tasted like wine and I felt drunk on the flood of sensation. My eyes had shut at some point, and I opened them to find Lady Cora looking down at me with quickened breaths and clenched hands. She struck like a viper—pulling me roughly to my feet by my wrist and shoving me toward the bed. I tumbled backwards into the twisted velvet sheets and she followed, crawling over me and pinning me to the bed with her body.

I didn’t know what was wrong with me, couldn’t explain why I felt like this, butfuck,I had never been more desperate in my life.

CHAPTER EIGHT

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