Page 5 of Gilded Locks
She stripped from her wet clothes with shaking fingers, modesty abandoned in favor of survival. The sweater cascaded to her knees, sleeves dangling past her fingertips like a child playing dress-up. The wool socks transformed into thigh-high stockings. And when she wrapped the fur coat around herself, the sensation transcended mere warmth into something approaching rebirth.
The silk-lined fur was impossibly soft against her skin, and whatever magnificent creature had donated its pelt must have been enormous. The coat enveloped her completely, heavy and warm and scented with something masculine. Cedar and amber and something indefinably wild, reminding her of the untamed forests and hidden dangers she’d trekked to get here.
For the first time since fleeing Whitmore, she felt like she might actually live and allowed herself a moment of pride. Anyone who knew her would never imagine her capable of surviving what she’d been through in the last several months, let alone the last few hours.
She nearly laughed. Was she a badass? Maybe.
Up until recently, even she would have said that wasn’t true. Marigold Calder was a sheltered appendage of her family name. But that wasn’t true anymore. She was no longer Marigold. She was Mary Fuckin Langford, and she liked it.
Her stomach growled, disrupting her first true moment of cocky victory, then cramped with such fierce hunger that she doubled over with a sharp gasp. She couldn’t remember her last substantial meal. Terror had murdered her appetite, but she wasn’t afraid anymore. At least not to the degree she’d been. Now, it was all about survival and meeting her basic needs.
The kitchen, when she discovered it, existed on the same impossible scale as everything else in this strange palace, built from folklore as much as luxurious modern conveniences. If she was dreaming, she no longer cared. She planned to indulge in every opulent amenity she found.
Commercial-grade appliances gleamed like surgical instruments while the pantry could have stocked a gourmet restaurant. Unease teased at the periphery of her mind. If there was this much food, there had to be someone here. Maybe more than one someone. But she hadn’t seen a single trace of life since she’d arrived. Only once-living-creatures, now stuffed and displayed throughout the great halls, watched her trespass this empty lodge.
“Don’t judge me,” she said to the stuffed fox staring her down from atop the cupboard.
Hunger outweighed her worry as she used the sweater as a basket to gather pilfered food.
She found bread—real bread, with substance and weight—not the processed, plastic-wrapped foam masquerading as nutrition in supermarkets. Whoever called this place home clearly didn’t believe in half-measures.
Dumping her stolen items onto the table, she quickly unwrapped the packaging, taking frantic bites before even chewing what already filled her mouth. She groaned in satisfaction as the fresh food awakened the neglected taste buds on her tongue.
The cave-aged cheese wrapped in wax smelled like sophistication and privilege, nothing like the bland food they’d forced down her throat at Whitmore. The cold cuts tasted like they’d been cured by artisans who’d perfected their craft over generations. Her desperate, chilled hands carved off thick slices of cheese with a knife made for culinary masters.
Moaning almost sexually, she devoured the food, too impatient to make an actual sandwich as she stood at the massive granite table. She feasted, tearing into every offering like a creature possessed.
Her hunger ran deeper than missing meals. Weeks of barely eating while planning her escape. She suspected they drugged the food at Whitmore, so she abstained as often as she could manage while keeping her strength. Then, once she’d escaped, she’d spent days hiding from her family. Fear massacred her appetite. The closer she came to death, the less she thought about eating. This was the first time she actually allowed herself to feed a need other than basic survival.
When she’d finally silenced the worst of her starvation, her stomach cramped in a different way. Too much too fast. And the memories of the Whitmore facility weren’t helping. She rushed to the sink, fighting back the urge to hurl, as she breathed through the onslaught of sickening memories.
She could still feel the orderly’s hands on her as Willum’s weight crushed into her. Smell the tang of his sweat over the overpowering scent of his minty gum. The disinfectant. The taste of rubber. The feel of being strapped down.
Marigold shoved her fist against her lips as bile rose, forcing it back down with the growing panic that accompanied her nausea. She didn’t have to think about Whitmore anymore. She was free. No one knew where she was. She was Mary Langford now.
She needed a distraction if she planned to keep her food down, and she needed that nourishment in her body, so she decided to explore the rooms she hadn’t visited yet. Brushing off her fingers, she carefully wrapped the cheese, bread, and meat, returning them as close to how she’d found them.
This place defied every expectation she’d harbored about wealth and power. The sheer opulence was staggering, but something else lurked beneath the surface. An edge to the luxury that she couldn’t quite define.
Her wandering led her through rooms designed for adult entertainment, but the entertainment they had in mind was clearly sophisticated beyond her experience. One room was lined with bottles with labels written in languages she couldn’t decipher, using letters never encountered. Another held furniture that didn’t immediately make sense—chairs with unusual angles, benches with mysterious attachments.
It wasn’t until she opened a door and found herself in what was unmistakably a dungeon that vulnerability slammed into her. Understanding slowly crystallized as she crept over the threshold.
The room was a study in beautiful darkness. Black leather and polished wood with fixtures mounted to the walls that looked both gorgeous and terrifying. Afraid to blink in such a place, she looked up at the chains where silk-lined cuffs dangled from the ceiling like jewelry. There were benches and crosses and devices she couldn’t begin to identify, all crafted with the same attention to luxury and detail that characterized everything else in this mysterious palace.
This wasn’t just someone’s home. This was something else entirely. A private club, perhaps. The kind that catered to very specific tastes and a wealthier clientele.
Heat that had nothing to do with the fire or the fur coat bloomed across her cheekbones. She retreated from the room quickly, sealing the door behind her. But the images lingered, stirring something deep inside her that she’d rather not examine too closely.
Whoever lived here enjoyed power. Her mind declared the owner male, and once again, weakened by her female identity, she felt the infuriating stab of injustice. What if they were cruel? What if they caught her trespassing and decided to turn her in, or worse, punish her in that dungeon?
She couldn’t stay here, but she also couldn’t leave. Not yet.
The storm still raged outside, and she needed rest. For now, this strange place would have to do. But she wasn’t sure if she’d willingly broken into a sanctuary or another prison.
The adrenaline that carried her through the night in her desperate search for shelter was finally abandoning her, leaving her hollow and shaking. Exhaustion struck her all at once, crashing over her like a tidal wave. She needed sleep. Real sleep, not the fitful dozing she’d managed on the boat while nightmares chased her across dark water.
But she also needed a safe place to hide. Sleep would leave her vulnerable, so she searched for a resting place off the beaten path, following a hidden stairwell up to the third floor, where there appeared to be guest accommodations, though they were grander than any hotel suite she’d ever imagined. She tested the first bed—king-sized and topped with pillows that looked like clouds. But the mattress was too firm, unyielding beneath her weight like sleeping on marble. Too hard.
