CHAPTER 125: 125 - SWEET MEAL

125

~Lisa’s POV

I wiped my damp hands on my apron, though they wouldn’t stop shaking. My legs felt like they belonged to someone else as I stood up. I didn’t dare look back at the others.

The triplets wanted to see me. Why?

What did I do now?

The guard didn’t slow his pace, and I had to hurry to keep up, my feet slipping a little against the polished floors. My heart thudded in my ears. Each step felt heavier than the last.

The maids’ whispers still clung to me like smoke. She used her body... that’s why Damon helped her... I swallowed hard, wishing I could scrape their voices out of my head.

The hall stretched longer than I remembered. Or maybe it was just my nerves. My palms were damp. I wanted to ask the guard why they wanted to see me, but his face was like stone, and I didn’t dare.

Finally, he stopped in front of a large set of doors. My breath caught. I knew this place. This was where the triplets stayed.

The guard pushed the door open and gestured for me to step inside. My feet felt rooted to the ground.

"Go in," he ordered.

I forced myself forward.

The room was wide, filled with gold and deep crimson. Luxurious, intimidating. My eyes landed on them immediately—the two brothers, lounging as if they owned the world. Of course they did. I thought Damon would be there but he wasn’t.

I lowered my gaze, pressing my hands against my apron to stop them from trembling.

"She doesn’t look like much better. Still the same Lisa, right, Kael?" Rowan muttered, his tone like a knife.

Kael tilted his head, eyes roaming over me. "Maybe Damon sees something we don’t."

Heat rose to my face. I wanted to disappear, to melt into the floor.

"Tell me," Kael’s voice broke through, commanding, "do you know why we sent for you?"

I shook my head quickly. "No," My voice was barely a whisper. I didn’t even know why I sound so nervous. I stood up against them before but I didn’t know what came over me.

He didn’t give me time to consider his words as he shoved me against the desk in their room. With a strong hand between my shoulder blades, he pressed my chest against the surface. I gasped out a cry of pain as the sharp edge bit into my hip bones.

"Spread your arms," he commanded. So stunned by the pain, so familiar with brutality, I complied, smoothing my fingers over the cool mahogany. Closing my eyes, I counted the petticoats beneath my heavy skirts. They’d soften the sting of the strap at least. With a breath pinned in my lungs, I braced for the first blow. Instead, I felt the whisper of cold air against the back of my knees.

"No." The hoarse objection ripped out of me once again as I reared back and did my best to twist away. His hand clamped on the back of my neck, slamming my back over the desk with such force, my cheek ground against the grain. Terror pierced me more than the pain. He wanted to raped me again.

What had I done to evoke such a malevolent reaction from him? How could I take it back?

"Please." Fighting to remain calm, I struggled to lift my neck. "Let me up. You’re hurting me."

"Do you think I will release you just like that?" His question was punctuated with hard consonants, as though he’d spoken them through his teeth. If I slid my eyes all the way to the side, I could just make out his shadow over me.

"I...I.." I stuttered.

The unwelcome heat of his breath on my cheek should have warned me. The moist path he left across my cheekbone evoked such revulsion, I had no time to react before my arms were tangled in the layers of skirt and petticoat he’d tossed above my waist. Stunned, I desperately tried to decide what to do.

Should I fight him? Should I scream? Should I plead for his mercy? Or give in to the tears stinging my eyes and nose and hope they softened his ire? Should I submit to the lashing and be done with it?

"You must be enjoying our company," Rowan murmured as he watched, and that was when I remembered that he was still in the room. He smiled wickedly, mocking me.

He used his body, then, to pin me to his desk. Shaped it to mine. Torso to torso, hip to hip. "Be still," he panted, his serpentine voice thicker than before. "Or I’ll not be responsible for what you drive me to do."

I became a wild thing, bucking and rearing against his solid strength. Frantic noises I had intended to contain words broke from me. I had meant to command him to stop. Then I tried to beg. But to my everlasting vexation, the sounds escaping seemed to only contain different forms of the word "no." I said it in every language I knew.

I screamed it as he reached between them to grapple with his trousers. "Fight me all you like," he breathed into my ear as he found the convenient opening in my drawers. "This won’t take long." And it didn’t. I watched my rhythmic breaths spreading over the wood of the desk in a fleeting vapor. They disappeared with every painful inhale. Perhaps I could just stop breathing. This won’t take long. It didn’t have to.

I stood there frozen, my whole body trembling as I watched him pull his clothes back on, his movements careless, like what had just happened meant absolutely nothing to him. Rowan caught the look on my face and smirked, his laughter cruel and sharp like a blade against my skin. He turned to Kael, his voice dripping with mockery.

"So, how does she taste? Like she’s some kind of sweet meal?"

Kael didn’t even bother looking at me. He adjusted his shirt and gave a short laugh, shaking his head as if I wasn’t even human. "I don’t know what is so special about her," he said coldly. "She’s still the same. Nothing different."

Their words cut deeper than the act itself. My heart sank as the two of them walked out of the room, leaving me broken, discarded, like I was some kind of object they had used and didn’t care about anymore. I just stood there for a moment, unable to move, feeling the shame crawl over me like a heavy blanket I could never throw off.

When the door finally closed, I sank to the floor, tears slipping down my face in silence. I couldn’t even sob loudly, I didn’t have the strength. That wasn’t the first time they had forced themselves on me, and the bitter truth was that I knew it might not be the last. Every time it happened, I was helpless, my body betraying me, my voice stolen by fear.

Slowly, painfully, I dressed myself, my hands shaking as I pulled the fabric over my bruised skin. Shame clung to me like a second skin, and no matter how hard I tried to fight it, I couldn’t wash it away.