Page 24 of Power and Possession

I hated Steele for making me feel this way, for making me feel desired. Wanted. Like a woman. Why did the most intense attraction I had ever felt have to be with my enemy?

I cleared my throat, breaking the sizzling tension in the air. It was clear that he was still angry over the stunt I’d pulled. He instantly broke eye contact, gesturing at the door as he moved through it. I stepped into the hall, trying not to trip in the ridiculously high shoes. My heels still ached from my botched escape, and the shoe straps, made up of thick ribbon, rubbed at the wounds on my ankles. However, they did conceal the damage. I was a bit on the tall side, so I never wore a heel this high, especially when I was with a man. But Steele was so tall that it didn’t matter if I gained an extra three inches of height. Besides, he was so masculine that even if I towered over him, I’d still feel diminished by his very presence.

“Where are we going?” I asked, following him down the stairs. At the landing, I caught a glimpse of several industrial fans blowing on an oriental rug. I refused to feel guilty about the water damage I’d caused, but I hoped that my room would receive the same treatment soon.

“You’ve lost the right to ask questions,” he said as he moved farther down the hall into a large room. “But I’ll answer you this time, just because you look so goddamn beautiful. I’m taking you to an event. I’m proving to the world that you belong to me, and no one else. After your abduction last night, it seems as if people need to know.”

He walked inside and I followed.

A fire crackled and hissed below a large stone hearth, and books adorned every square inch of the walls. A mahogany desk was placed in the center of the room, and a drink cart filled with bottle after bottle of expensive alcohol stood next to it.

“Do I get to ask what kind of event?” I said, trying to read some of the titles on the spines of the books. The more timeI spent with Steele, the more I wanted to understand the man underneath the monster.

“Don’t push me, Miss Phillips. I’m in no mood,” he said absentmindedly as he fumbled around in the desk drawers. He pulled out a black velvet case, and I instantly knew that there was jewelry inside. I stopped looking at the books and glanced at his face, trying to figure out his intent.

Steele laughed slightly under his breath. “It’s a loan. Nothing more, Miss Phillips. Think of it as a leash. You’re my property.”

He was back to using my last name, and the coldness that had melted during our passionate night together was back, and even icier and harder to survive than before. I almost slapped him again, but resisted. I was unsteady on my feet and a little worried that I would knock myself out of balance.

I moved closer to him, and he motioned for me to turn around. The coldness from the chain made me shiver, as well as the feeling of Steele’s fingers along my neck. He placed a heavy necklace around my throat, and my breath caught as he gently nuzzled my neck with his nose and placed a fiery kiss on my skin before he connected the ends of the chain. I felt the kiss all the way down my back, and my entire body tingled from the sensation. As mad as he was, he couldn’t help but react to my nearness.

“Perfect,” he said, before handing me an empty black clutch.

“What’s this for?” I asked. “I have nothing to put in it.”

“Appearances,” he replied, grabbing his tuxedo jacket and shrugging into it. “The entire world we live in revolves around the way things look, not necessarily the way things are.”

Chapter Sixteen

Steele

I led her to one of my cars, ignoring my usual driver so I could drive us myself. The more people who knew that my planned affair with Ashlynn Phillips was fake, the better chance it would fail. I opened the car door for her, and she slid in gracefully, like she had been doing it all of her life. I found her to be a little rough around the edges for a socialite here in the United Kingdom, but her high living in the United States at least provided her with class and dignity. Although, I thought, smiling, she did cuss like a seaman.

“Something funny?” she asked, her beautiful face furrowed into a classic glare. She glared at me so much that it was hard to remember what her face looked like without her mouth frowning.

I didn’t answer her, and instead pulled out of my garage, heading up the ramp to the street level. Terry, my chief of security, nodded from his position in front of the garage as I drove down the pebbled driveway and onto the streets of London.

Ashlynn kept fiddling with the necklace she wore, and I wondered if it was the fact that I’d presented her with it, or if she wasn’t used to the weight. Designed for Queen Mary, it was incredibly valuable, and one of the few pieces I’d acquired legitimately. The diamonds came from the best mines in Russia, and it was a collar just as much as a necklace.

Finally, her nervous energy got the better of me. “Could you please stop fidgeting?”

“Seriously? You dress me up like a doll and then puta million-dollar necklace on me after locking me in your basement like a dog, and you expect me to just flip a switch and pretend everything’s fine? Especially considering we slept together and then I was kidnapped—”

“Technically, there wasn’t much sleep involved—”

I caught her fist as she swung at me, the car swerving a bit. I placed her hand in her lap, moving my eyes back to London traffic.

“Where are we going, and why are you taking me?” Her eyes sparkled with curiosity, and I couldn’t help but let my eyes roam over her curves. The dress she was wearing was one-of-a-kind, the type of dress you had to know someone in order to procure. And, luckily, I knew just the right person. It fit her even better than I’d anticipated, and I’d had trouble controlling my reaction when I first saw her in it. She had a natural beauty, but once she was dressed in jewels, she looked like royalty. She’d fit right in with the other women at the party, if only she’d fix her horrible American posture and clean up her language. Men could get away with foul jargon in my elite social circle, but women couldn’t.

“I’m going to make a deal with you—if your father doesn’t come through and gives me what I want, I’ll let you earn off the debt he owes me.”

Her entire face reddened, and I knew a slew of profanities were checked just on the other side of her lips.

“Excuse me? Work off his debt?”

The light changed to red and I stopped the car, looking over at her, trying to frighten her as much as I could with my intense gaze. “I don’t care how it comes about, but I will recoup what Phillips has taken from me—both financially and socially. You are going to work your way into the circle of women at this party, and report to me any information you can find—I mean absolutely anything. I want to know who’s sleeping with who, who’s addicted to pain pills, who’s squandering money. You’ll do this for me, and once I determine you’ve found something useful, I’ll let you go. If you agree, I’ll let you out of the guestroom, give you small amounts of freedom. If not, you’ll go back in the basement and no amount of screaming will save you, and you’ll sit and deteriorate until your father turns himself over to me. You pick.”

The second I mentioned the basement, the blood in her face drained and I knew I’d won.

---