The man set the cases on the bed, rifling through their contents before snapping on gloves.
Wincing when he touched her face, Brenya closed her eyes and reminded herself to breathe.
“Had Jacques taken the time to pay attention to what was going on in your head, you would have been locked in this room ages ago.”
The prick of a needle entered the swelling flesh of her check, a shock of stinging injection that left her trapping a groan in her throat.
Sweet numbness followed. Until he pricked a new spot, and then another.
When the pain subsided enough that Brenya might unclench her jaw, she answered, “I have always enjoyed the color red.”
A hint of a smirk came to the man threading a curved needle with wire. “As have I.”
The Bernard flag was red. Commendations came on red ribbons. That is where her mind went when the first stab of the needle pierced her flesh. Though painless, the tug and pull of suturing skin was unpleasant.
Yet, Jules Havel proceeded quickly, as if he had sewn skin to skin many times in the past. Knotting his second stitch, he asked, “What did Jacques whisper in your ear?”
“That I was to lay back… and think of him.”
“What else?”
“That this would be a short-lived inconvenience.”
With a dry laugh, the man began another suture. The hooked needle delved back into her skin, she continued to bleed.
Trying to remain still so he might continue, Brenya asked, “Will it be?”
“That depends on your definition of inconvenience.” The final knot was tied. “You are my wife as of me stamping my claim as Commodore upon the contracts—”
“First wife,” she corrected. If he was like Ancil, he could claim a Beta as well.
Finished assessing his work, those terrible eyes bore into hers. “I will not be taking another wife.”
She had no response.
“I own you in the sense of Bernard law. But I possess you in the sense of your spirit, and I am disinterested in setting you free. Which means I cannot kill Jacques Bernard.”
Five people had died of Red Consumption in her precious home. Ancil had been slaughtered before her. Brenya could only sum up such a cold question to shock. “What happens if Jacques Bernard dies?”
His answer was direct and equally uninformative. “You will discover that for yourself the next time you see Lucia.”
Outside the red room, the sun had begun to warm the sky, Brenya taking in what was an even more remarkable view while iodine was blotted on her cheek.
“Are there other injuries that I have not seen?”
Sighing, Brenya felt exhaustion roll over her so suddenly she lurched. “Nothing Lucia didn’t already see to.”
“It seems the nature of our pair-bond is more physical than those I have observed in the past. What you are feeling is the sensation of Jacques being sedated. I can’t have him running wild, murdering my people in a tantrum over losing his favorite toy.”
It was an apropos comparison. “He told me you would give me back after you were done.”
That subtle smirk was back. “Did he?”
She needed this to be over so she might find a few hours of sleep;, otherwise, she was going to crack. “I would like to be excused from taking you down my throat until my cheek has healed. Kindly tell me, would you prefer that I brace on all fours. Or lay on my back. I was told earlier that I am expected to touch the male inside me, and I will strive to do so if that is what you wish.”
Stripping off sterile gloves, Jules Havel commanded, “Take off your dress, Brenya Havel.”
The name caught her even as her hands moved to reach buttons she would not be able to unfasten without help. Once she processed that in less than a year she had gone from being 17C, to mon chou, to Brenya Perin, to Brenya Havel she found nothing but that damn necklace in the way.
Lowering her hands to her bloodstained lap, she confessed, “I cannot take this dress off by myself.”
It should have registered sooner that he already stood between her legs. That he had been cradled there the entire time he had sewn the wound on her face—but the intimacy of the position only just sank in.
That was how tired she’d become.
Far too tired to resist when he reached around her neck to unclasp the necklace, Jules tossed it to the side as if it were nothing but rocks on a string. When he began on the buttons down her spine, she felt the fabric frill release her aching neck, and Brenya pulled in a full breath that was sweet with the scent of a hungry man.
Deft fingers undid one closure at a time until the gown parted and could be pulled from her shoulders. It was not her breasts he looked to when her dress pooled at her waist. It was the subtle swelling of her shoulders, the scratches from an Alpha who preferred to tear clothing from her skin, the fingerprints and bruises.