“I’m not a servant.”
“I’m aware of that but thank you for the clarification.”
“You have a housekeeper,” she pointed out. “Someone you actually pay to clean the house.”
“I’m aware of that as well.” I shuffled some paperwork around on my desk.
“So why are you making me do this?”
“I already told you, and I’m not in the habit of repeating myself unnecessarily.”
“God, you are infuriating.”
I didn’t respond, and she didn’t leave. For two minutes, she stood there, staring at me while I continued to work.
“I want you to text Birdie,” she said.
“Fine. What would you like to say?”
“SOS. Trapped by a psychopath. Come save me.”
I reached for my phone and began typing. “Anything else?”
A flash of white flooded my vision as she rushed forward. “Wait, don’t send that. It was a joke.”
My finger hovered over the send button. “I told you I don’t joke.”
Her eyes pleaded with me long before her lips finally did. “You can’t, she’ll worry about me.”
“You seem to think that everything is a game, Gypsy. I’ve explained the rules very simply, yet you refuse to follow them. So, give me one good reason I shouldn’t send this.”
Her body caved forward, and it was the first time she ever showed how truly sensitive she was. “Because it will upset her.”
“Then you shouldn’t have told me to send it.”
I moved to press the button, and her hand captured my wrist. Gunmetal gray eyes collided with mine, and her voice was the softest I’d ever heard it. “I’ll clean.”
I held her gaze for five long seconds before deleting the text. It was not in my best interest to barter with her because it would establish in her mind that everything had the possibility of compromise. But she loved her sister fiercely. She wanted more than anything to protect her, proven by her current circumstances, and I’d already exploited that wound enough. There was no need to add salt.
“Very well.” I put the phone away. “You may go then.”
She let go and walked into the hall.
“Gypsy?” I called after her.
She turned, her glossy brown hair cascading down around her shoulders. “Yes?”
“Put the sheet back on the bed where it belongs.”
MY FORMATIVE YEARS HAD BEENone humiliating chapter after another, and degradation was an old friend of mine. But cleaning Lucian’s house in my panties and a bra I’d fashioned out of the fabric scraps in the garbage felt like the most ridiculous, unscripted form of porn that one could create.
I expected him to come and perv on me, but he didn’t. He didn’t leave his office all day. But it was nearing dinnertime, and I assumed he’d be making his way back to this part of the house soon enough. I was hoping to be finished by then, but my luck had run out. He appeared out of nowhere at the ill-timed moment I was on my hands and knees, scrubbing his stupid kitchen floor.
He walked past me without a word and grabbed his meal from the fridge, popping open the container and leaning against the counter while he ate his salad.
“You missed a spot,” he said between bites, pointing with his shoe at a scuff mark on the tile.
I glared up at him, another choice word on the tip of my tongue. I didn’t use it because I wasn’t prepared to lose another pair of shoes. “Don’t you have anything better to do?” I asked.