Happy for the first time in weeks, I took my pretty lingerie, deciding not to think of it as a gift from Lucien as that would spoil the fun, and ran to the powder room to start the fashion parade.
Chapter Seven
The Punishment
Lucien walked into the kitchen from the garage and halted.
Edwina was busy at the sink scouring pots and pans. The living area looked like an exclusive boutique exploded in it. Red tissue paper, ribbons and black boxes were scattered everywhere, mounds of the clothing Lucien purchased for Leah were smoothed out on the backs and arms of furniture. On the countertop of the island bar were three used martini glasses all with silver toothpicks resting in varying states of martini remains. One still had a half-eaten olive on it.
Edwina turned to him with a bright smile on her face and he instantly knew she was intoxicated. He saw it and he smelled it.
This surprised him.
In the forty years she’d worked for him he had never, not once, come to his concubine’s home to find it a mess, to find the kitchen not sparkling clean, to find Edwina inebriated while on duty.
He’d seen her that way, of course, during parties or celebrations where she attended as a guest. For instance the birthday parties he threw every year for his concubines past and present. And the first anniversary of The Bloodletting which it was a tradition to celebrate.
Any other time, never.
“You’re here!” Edwina greeted happily, a huge drunken smile on her face.
Lucien’s eyes scanned the room again and went back to Edwina. “What happened?”
She glanced over her shoulder at the mess, lifted a hand from the sink and waved it around, slopping soapy water and bubbles on the floor, the counter, her shoulder.
“We had a fashion parade,” she explained bizarrely, ignoring the mess she made and went back to scouring. “Leah’s up in your bedroom.” Her voice dropped to a happy murmur, “Such a sweet, beautiful girl.”
Lucien studied his housekeeper.
Leah was hardly a girl. She was forty years old, for God’s sake.
She was, of course, beautiful. But sweet?
“How is she?” Lucien found himself asking and he had no earthly idea why.
He had also, in the years he’d employed Edwina, never requested such information.
Then again he’d never needed to.
“Oh, she’s fine. Settling in. She’s so cute. You should have seen her tonight. She was hilarious.”
Fascinated by the idea of a cute, hilarious, sweet Leah “settling in”, Lucien tired of the discourse with Edwina and headed for the stairs.
“Good night!” Edwina trilled gaily behind him.
Lucien didn’t reply.
Five strides into their room, Lucien saw Leah exiting the bathroom. He again halted.
She was wearing the lingerie he’d sent.
He saw he’d been wrong in his thoughts when he’d watched the stick thin model sashaying down the short runway displaying it at his personal showing when he was ordering Leah’s wardrobe the day after her Selection.
He had, in his mind, expected it to look far better on Leah’s generous curves.
However, he had not anticipated it looking that much better.
She was wearing her robe over it but the robe had fallen open at her sides exposing the camisole and pants. The cups of the camisole hugged her full breasts, the silk ending just above the nipple so a tantalizing hint of the aureole peeked through the lace, a chill in the air obviously causing her nipples to harden against the silk. It hugged her midriff and stomach like it had been made for her. The hem of the camisole left only a glimpse of smooth skin above the underwear. Her long legs went on forever beneath the lace of the panties.
He felt his body’s immediate response to the sight of her and he liked it.
Her face had been averted when she walked out of the bathroom but it snapped around, she focused on him and cried, “Lucien!”
Lucien only had a moment to brace before she flew at him, running flat out across the room and at the last instant launched herself full body at him.
Stunned and unsure of her intent, he caught her in his arms, his hands cupping her ass as she wrapped her long limbs around him.
Instead of attempting, however pointless such an effort would be, to tear him limb-from-limb, she caught his gaze and he noticed she, too, was under the influence.
Very much so.
“Hello, darling, how was your day?” she purred cheerfully, if drunkenly.
“Interesting,” he replied truthfully, this exact moment being indicative of his interesting day.
He was on guard, not certain what her game was.
His day had been interesting. Starting with the roller coaster ride of their morning and ending with Leah’s current behavior, it included an afternoon meeting with her aunts. A meeting where they explained their concern that they hadn’t heard from Leah after The Bloodletting. A meeting where he declared his intentions and ascertained their tentative allegiance. They were hesitant, considering what it might mean to the future of their family, indeed to the future of all concubines. But they were also not willing to defy him.