I smirk at her. “Believe what you want,” I say casually, straightening the lapel of my suit jacket.
“I believe you’re a good liar,” she points out, “but your ability to hide your feelings is atrocious.” Her smile stretches; her dark eyes sweep over me deviously, as if she’s picking me apart, trying to figure me out and knowing she’s doing a fine fucking job at it. Well she’s crazy—I don’t have feelings for Izabel; I’d rather…(I swallow hard and round my chin)…in Izzy’s words: I’d rather it burn when I piss.
Another crack! zips through the air.
I get up from the sofa.
“Emilio,” I call out, approaching him from behind, “why don’t you let me show you how it’s done.” It was an insistence, not a question; I reach out my hand to him for the whip and he stares at me with a deadly combination of humiliation and rage. It was my plan all along, telling him he could punish Nora for me; I wanted another opportunity to show Emilio up in front of his sister. And it couldn’t have come at a better time: I need to reverse the weakness Francesca thinks she found in me—feelings for Izabel—and I need to get the hell away from Izabel. More importantly, the heavier I step on her brother’s toes, the less inclined she’ll be to listen to his opinions; and since Emilio is closest to her and the one who distrusts me the most, it’s vital I continuously prove I’m the alpha in the room.
Nora stands facing the wall, her arms raised high above her head, her palms pressed flat against the white paint. Two angry stripes, red and swollen, lay across her back, the newest ones amid a myriad of old wounds and still-healing ones. Her long white-blond hair covers most of them. I take the whip from Emilio’s hand, ignoring the looks of hatred he’s shooting me with, and step behind Nora, the whip in my hand pressing between her naked thighs. I reach up with my free hand and move her hair away from her back, gently draping it over her right shoulder. “Remember that day,” I whisper against her ear from behind, my chest pressing against her back, “in that room surrounded by walls, just you and me and an old scar that you dug your fingernail under, twisting and moving, until the scar peeled away from the skin and blood ran down my chest?” I shove the whip upward between her legs so she can feel the rigid leather between her nether lips. Then in a voice that Emilio can actually hear, I say to Nora, “Answer me,” and then pull away from her ear.
“Yes, Master, Aya remembers her mistake with the girl. Aya shouldn’t have humiliated you.”
I step away from her. Farther. Farther. And then I crack the whip against Nora’s back. Again. And again. And again. Nora never moves, never makes a sound, and I have to wonder if beating her has affected her at all. I stop at five lashes because, like I said earlier, I’m here on business and don’t want to waste time with other issues.
Placing the whip in Emilio’s hand as if he were like any other slave girl in the room, I approach Nora again, just like before, my mouth against her ear. “I should sell your ass to these crazy people—you’d fit right in,” I whisper so no one can hear but her. “I don’t know what my brother wants with you, or why he brought you into our Order—don’t fucking tell me it was Izzy’s decision, because I know that’s bullshit; even if she wanted you here I know you wouldn’t be here if my brother didn’t want you to be. I know him better than anyone.” Fitting my hand around the back of Nora’s neck, I squeeze with aggression, shoving the side of her face against the wall—she doesn’t flinch. “I may hate him for what he did to Claire, your sister, but he’s still my brother and I still watch his back.” I trace my tongue down the shell of her ear, move my hand from the back of her neck and to her throat, squeezing. “And nobody fucks my brother over but me. Nobody will have their vengeance on my brother for any wrong he’s ever done, but me.” I release her harshly.
I have to wonder if that’s why Nora is really here—to get back at Victor for killing her sister. She could’ve killed him and even Izabel by now already, but who’s to say that’s her way? Revenge can be dealt in many forms; and the easiest, less satisfying way of exacting it is to just get it over quickly. Nora Kessler doesn’t strike me as the getting-it-over-quickly type.
“Naomi,” I say, “bring Aya her dress.”
Izabel gets up from the sofa with the dress in her hand, and as we pass each other moving in opposite directions we lock eyes briefly, accidentally, and then look away just as fast.