Page 68 of Her Viking Master

“Who are you?” I asked, my voice cracking a little as I began to weave my deception. “What organization is this? Where’s Camille?”

Marmareus regarded me for a long moment before answering. “We’re an organization dedicated to preserving order and protecting society from threats most people never even know exist. As for your friend, she’s safe. She’s being held in another cell, similar to this one.”

I glanced around the small room, taking in the smooth stone walls, the narrow bed I sat upon, and the toilet-sink combination in the corner. It was Spartan, but not uncomfortable—a far cry from the opulent luxury of Beaumont’s chateau, yet somehow less menacing.

“Why haven’t you given me any clothes?” I asked, suddenly acutely aware of my nakedness. I resisted the urge to cover myself, knowing it would be futile. “Are you… are you just as bad as… as him… as… Monsieur?”

Leo’s expression softened slightly, though his eyes remained sharp and assessing. “I’d like to think we’re a lot better than Beaumont,” he said. “But it’s our practice not to give clothes to girls like you, at least not initially. It’s part of our culture and our process.”

At those words, my heart raced with fear and a familiar, currently very unwelcome, stir of arousal. I found myself oddly drawn to this agent of the enemy, even in these terrifying circumstances. Something about his manner, the quiet confidence he exuded, definitely and startlingly reminded me of Sven.

“What do you mean, ‘girls like me’?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady. “And what process?”

The man who had called himselfLeoMarmareus—as if the words constituted a title rather than a name—advanced further into the room, his movements fluid and controlled. He stood before me, close enough that I had to tilt my head back to meet his gaze. “Girls who have been trained in submission,” he said softly. “Girls who respond to authority, to dominance. Girls who hold valuable information in their pretty little heads.”

I swallowed hard, feeling heat rise to my cheeks, even though this was going to plan so far in the intelligence department at least. “I do,” I told him as coolly as I could, even as my body betrayed me with a shiver of helpless arousal. “I have information I’m guessing you really need.”

To my dismay,LeoMarmareus smiled. Worse, the next thing he said caught me completely off guard. I had expectedLeo, or Marmareus, or whatever-the-fuck his name was, to ask me about what I knew immediately, and to demand the crucial information I’d overheard. Instead, he went in a completely different direction.

“Tell me about the night you were kidnapped, Mary,” he said, his dark eyes narrowing slightly. “I want to hear every detail.”

My heart raced as I scrambled to recall the cover story we’d been given. For a moment, panic threatened to overwhelm me.

“Why?” I demanded. “I mean… I mean I… I don’t want to think about that… and…”

LeoMarmareus cut me off.

“I don’t want you to have the wrong impression, Mary,” he said, his voice calm but edged with iron. “My organization will do nothing we judge to be harmful to your well-being. Butwewill decide what harms you and what helps you—and, of course, what helps us.”

I swallowed hard, feeling my eyes widen as I looked into his too-handsome face.

“You’ve had a taste of discipline, I know—and I know that not just from the cane marks across your pretty backside, not to mention the state of your vagina and anus when we examined them while you were asleep.”

I couldn’t keep it back, and my instincts told me I shouldn’t; I let out a little whimper as I felt my traitorous pussy clench at his words. The idea that they had conducted a thorough, intimate examination while I had lain unconscious—that they had found the evidence of the brutal, terribly pleasurable fucking I had had from Beaumont and Georgy and clinically noted it for future use… it stirred the part of me I absolutely did not want stirred at this delicate moment.

“Y-you…” I stammered. “How… how could…”

“We examined you for your own well-being, Mary. But we also did it because we wanted to, and because we could. That’s beside the point, though. I know that you’ve experienced the kind of discipline girls like you need. I promise you that if you lie to me, you’ll have a great deal more of it, and more painfully, than you’ve received so far.”

My jaw had gone slack. I closed my mouth and swallowed hard, my thoughts whirling in my head, desperately looking for a branch—a twig—of the version of the world tree I apparently had somewhere inside me… something that I could hold onto, to tie me back to the man, theHerraI loved, and the mission he had given me.

“So,”LeoMarmareus continued, his tone softening a bit, “I’m going to decide what we talk about, and at the moment I’d like to talk about your kidnapping by the traffickers who sold you to Beaumont.”

I blinked, and I took a deep breath. Abruptly, I felt a strange calm settle over me, as if I had found the connection I sought, and Yggdrasil itself was steadying my nerves. I took another breath and began to speak.

“It… it was at a party,” I said, letting my voice tremble slightly. “Off campus, in this old warehouse. Camille and I, we… we’d never met before that night.”

I paused, lowering my eyes as if overcome with shame. When I looked back up atLeoMarmareus, I saw that he had taken a handheld out of his jacket pocket. His brows knit slightly as he looked down at it, and then back up at me. When our eyes made contact, he spoke, his voice neutral, telling me nothing at all about how my story had come across so far.

“Go on.”

“We were both so drunk,” I continued, the lies flowing more easily now. “I don’t even remember how much we’d had. But we got to talking, and…” I trailed off, biting my lip.

“Go on,” Marmareus prompted, his voice softer now, but insistent.

I swallowed hard, forcing myself to meet his gaze. “We told each other we were virgins,” I whispered, letting my cheeks flush with embarrassment. “And we… we dared each other to get laid. God, it sounds so stupid now.”

As I spoke, I found that I could access the pretended feelings with surprising ease. The shame, the regret—it all felt so real. To my dismay, though, I also felt myself getting even more aroused as I recounted the fictional events.

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