Chapter 8 #2
Mr. In-charge is leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets.
He’s still watching me. After this morning, I don’t really want to be in a bedroom with a strange man, to be honest, but it is what it is.
Hopefully his boss will come soon, and I’ll be able to convince him that I’m an asset who shouldn’t be locked in a bed cage.
I sit on the chair and fold my arms, putting my head down on the table, looking at the bed. The sheets are black. Satin. I scrunch up my nose at them.
‘Why does the bed have a cage under it?’ I ask with interest.
‘It’s something Mr. Sauvage is into.’
‘Oh… Does he need to lock himself in? Like a werewolf? Does he sleepwalk?’
‘What?’ He shakes his head at me again. ‘No. It’s for his…partners. He likes them…contained.’
I stare at him blankly, not sure what to ask next because I don’t really understand. ‘Business partners?’
Mr. In-charge puts his head in his hands. ‘Sexual partners.’
I stare at him. ‘Are you having me on?’
‘What?’
‘Are you…messing with me?’ I amend, realizing I just said something the way that Douglas, the oldest Blank, would have said it at The Heath.
‘No.’
‘In case his sexual partners sleepwalk?’ I ask, mostly trying to entertain myself to keep the fear at bay.
He opens and closes his mouth, and then looks away, no longer engaging with me.
‘But…there’s no pillows,’ I continue. ‘No blanket. That can’t be comfy to sleep in.’
‘I don’t think it’s supposed to be comfortable.’
I frown at him and then look at the bed again, trying to work out why someone would want that. Maybe it’s like when Shade spanks me. It’s not comfortable, but I still like it. And there were definitely some pieces of furniture I didn’t quite understand in the Dark Lounge.
‘Why are we in here?’ I ask.
‘Because this was where I was told to bring you.’
I look at the bed again and decide to ask the question out loud to see what he says.
‘Is Sauvage going to put me in that cage under his bed?’
Mr. In-charge doesn’t answer for a moment. He just watches me.
‘Do you want to be?’ he asks finally.
‘No.’
He lets out a long breath through his nose. ‘He won’t. We’re in here because he likes his captives afraid, and downstairs didn’t work. He thought this might.’
I nod. ‘Thanks for telling me,’ I yawn, all at once feeling like I’ve run a marathon.
I guess I was going to crash at some point. Maybe it’s because there’s a bed in here. My brain doesn’t seem to realize that this bedroom isn’t much safer than the one in the Novelle house.
‘Am I keeping you up, tiger?’ he snorts.
‘It’s been a long few days,’ I mutter, closing my eyes for a second.
‘Mon Dieu, she sleeps?’
‘Yes, sir, for about an hour now. Crashed out not long after I brought her in.’
I sit up with a sharp breath in, looking around the room and wondering where I am for a second as I wipe a little drool from my mouth.
Mr. In-charge is still by the wall, but he’s standing up straight now. In front of him is another man. Tall and lean with dark hair and a little bit of gray at his temples. He’s wearing a tailored and expensive looking suit and has quite broad shoulders.
When he turns to look at me, his eyes are dark and assessing.
I blink at him and straighten.
‘Go.’
Mr. In-charge goes out of the room immediately, leaving me alone with the new man.
‘Are you Sauvage?’ I ask.
‘Who asks?’
‘My name is Daisy Evans.’
He snorts. ‘Non. You are Marguerite Novelle. I know who you are.’
I shrug. ‘I go by Evans. The Daisy part should be self-explanatory to you, Monsieur.’
His eyes are hard as he walks slowly across the room toward me.
‘So, Mademoiselle, you wish me to believe you wanted to be picked up by my men?’
‘I did.’
‘Alright. I’ll play this silly game. Why did you want to be captured by the wolf, chéri?’
‘This isn’t a game and it doesn’t matter what you believe,’ I state. ‘I needed to speak to you. I didn’t know how else to do that except to have your men pick me up the way you’ve had Shade, Mav, and Blake picked up before.’
He tips his head back, surveying me. ‘Oui? And why does the Novelle princess need to speak with Monsieur Sauvage?’
I take a deep breath. Here goes nothing.
‘To help you,’ I reply. ‘I’m hoping you’ll help me in return.’
He laughs at this. ‘How will you do this? What do you know of my problems, petite fleur?’
‘Envy.’
He shrugs and says nothing.
‘Mav can’t make it. I know he’s tried and failed.’
His eyes narrow. ‘What is this trick? Did your stepbrother send you here? What do you know of this?’
‘He doesn’t know I’m here. But I can make Envy for you instead of Mav,’ I say again.
Sauvage shakes his head and mutters something in French. ‘Forgive me, little girl, but I was not born yesterday.’
‘I can prove it.’
The door opens. ‘Sir, I found these in the lining of her bag.’ Mr. In-charge holds up the bag of green pills. ‘Looks like Envy to me.’
‘Where did you get these?’ Sauvage asks, gesturing to the bag. ‘Did you steal them for your deception? Buy them? Or perhaps they are pretend, to convince us that you speak the truth. Do you believe you can come here and demand payment for nothing?’
He tuts, pursing his lips. ‘So entitled, these Americans.’
‘I made them, but you’re right. That isn’t Envy.’
Mr. In-charge gets one out of the bag and smirks. ‘Looks like Envy to me.’
He pops one into his mouth and my eyes widen.
‘Oh!’
Sauvage laughs. ‘Soon we know the truth, petite menteur little liar. Are you afraid now?’
I wince at Mr. In-charge. I sort of like him. Regardless of the cattle prodding, he did tell me that Sauvage wasn’t intending to assault me, which, lately, means he’s pretty much a good friend.
‘I’m very sorry,’ I say to him sincerely, ignoring Sauvage. ‘I should have labelled them, maybe. I made those ones to look like Envy, but they won’t give you a high.’
‘What will they do?’ he asks, sounding a little more uncertain now I think as his eyes dark to Sauvage and then back to me.
‘You might want to find a bathroom. Within about twenty minutes.’
He looks at Sauvage. ‘What? Why?’
‘Because you just took a very powerful laxative, Mr. In-charge.’
He scoffs and rolls his eyes. ‘Yeah, okay. Cute story, sweetheart.’
Sauvage waves him out and then sits down across from me. ‘I have had you checked out, Miss Novelle. You do English Literature at the university.’
He gives me a small, condescending smile. ‘Do you wish to change your story? Tell the truth and perhaps I have my men take you back to the club where they found you. You go on your way and forget about this little…interlude.’
I frown. ‘If the information you have under the name Marguerite Novelle says that I do English Lit, perhaps you should check on Daisy Evans and you will find that I’m actually doing Physics and Chemistry.’
Sauvage’s shoulders shake with an incredulous laugh. ‘You continue to dig yourself deeper into the hole, chéri. You expect me to believe you are le chimiste who invented the drug?’
I shake my head. ‘I didn’t invent it, but I’m the one who fixed the formula so that it would do what it’s supposed to. I’m the one who’s been making it for all these weeks until the club lab was destroyed. I’ve come here to make it for you.’
‘Why? If you can do this, why do you come to me?’
‘You have a lab,’ I say simply. ‘It needs to be made. I can make it.’
Sauvage lets out a sigh. ‘You’re telling me, petite fille, that if I put you in my laborioatie at this moment, you could simply make my pills. Just like that?’
I nod.
‘You truly believe you can succeed where your friend has failed?’
‘Yes. I just need your lab. And supplies, of course. I can give you a list.’
‘And you just expect this. You are…intitulé entitled. A little rich girl.’
I shrug. ‘Mav hasn’t been able to make it. Don’t get me wrong. He’s a gifted chemist, but Envy is temperamental. Do you really lose anything by letting me try?’
‘Fine,’ he snarls after a moment. ‘But when you fail, you will regret wasting my time, chéri. Come.’
He leads me out of the room quickly without any further discourse.
‘Where is Thomas?’ he asks one of the men standing outside the door.
‘He had to run to the bathroom, sir.’
Sauvage glances at me and snorts. He leads me down the corridor to the elevator I came up in, his two other men following.
We go down. When the door opens, it’s at the same level as I started from, I think.
I follow him out, his men behind boxing me in, but he takes me in the opposite direction.
Down a dingy cement hallway, he opens a door that leads into another room with a large, square hatch in the floor and gestures with his hand.
I look at the hole and then at him, trepidation creeping in.
‘An oubliette?’ I ask.
He laughs loudly, seeming genuinely amused. ‘Not yet, petite fleur. I will go first if you wish.’
I nod and he descends some stairs. I hear him flick a switch and light glows up from below.
I peer over the edge and see that it’s not as deep as I feared. I go down the steps carefully, my leg aching worse than it was earlier from the Stinger’s intense zaps over the past couple of days.
I need a decent night’s sleep and some food. But I doubt I’ll be getting anything until I’ve proven my worth to the Frenchman.
At the bottom, I see a small foyer and another door, which leads into a gleaming white lab.
My gasp is audible.
‘It’s beautiful,’ I whisper, limping around the space slowly.
It’s easily twice as big as the lab in the club. Everything looks new and shiny. There’s a pill press in one corner that looks like it’s top of the range.
‘Everything a chemist needs is here,’ Sauvage says, emphasizing the word chemist for some reason and gesturing at the cabinets.
I nod. ‘Give me ten to twelve hours. The first batch will be ready by then.’
‘We shall see,’ Sauvage says with narrowing eyes.
He turns to his men. ‘You two stay in here with her in case she tries to destroy my lab as well.’
I frown. ‘I told you it wasn’t me who did that stuff.’