Chapter Eleven
I arrived to dinner first, my eagerness to get off on the right foot overriding any trepidation at seeing Dad again.
Besides, my desperate need to be near Emma was utterly mind-controlling.
If I had likened it to a drug craving before, then I was a fully-fledged addict now.
My entire being buzzed with awareness as it waited on its next fix, hanging on to her next touch, her next look, her next good word in my ear. ..
As the door opened, announcing their presence, I stood to greet them.
I didn’t need to try hard to offer up a welcoming smile, I just had to think of Emma.
Only, I couldn’t see her, not properly, she was hidden in Dad’s shadow, giving me glimpses of her free-flowing hair and a knee-length emerald sun dress.
“Good to see you’re on time tonight, Abi,” he said, acknowledging my presence with a dip of his head.
“Good evening, Daddy,” I responded, working to keep my eyes on him, rather than look past him. “I did promise I would be.”
I was referring to the text I had sent him this afternoon following Emma’s suggestion. Thankfully, he had acknowledged it with a simple “Glad to hear it”, which was enough to tell me that we were at least still on speaking terms.
“So you did,” he said, pulling out his seat as Emma finally stepped out from behind him.
I watched as she took up the same chair she had used yesterday, my heart pounding in my ears as I tried to douse the excited stirrings in my gut. But they died of their own accord when she failed to even look at me. Not once.
Did she not feel the same draw as me? Surely even the briefest of looks would have been impossible to resist? Or was she making sure I didn’t address her directly, making certain we didn’t attract any negative attention from Dad? Whatever the case, she didn’t seem right.
I tried to tell myself I was being overly sensitive and reading too much into it, but as I sat back down and her eyes remained purposefully averted, her entire demeanor reticent, I could feel a spark of panic.
She really wasn’t the same woman she had been that morning.
It was more than a desire to evade Dad’s wrath or not needing to set eyes on me. She seemed ... broken.
Something must have happened between then and now, the question was what?
“I didn’t say you couldn’t speak to one another,” Dad ground out, breaking the prolonged silence, his gaze flitting between us as he lifted the wine bottle already open in the middle of the table and poured himself a glass.
“Good evening, Emma,” I said, my mind pleading with her to just give me one look, no matter how brief, but there was nothing. And the more I studied her, the more anxious I became, her unusually heavy makeup doing a poor job of putting color in her cheeks. She looked practically ghostly.
“Abi?” Dad said, offering up the bottle.
“Please.” I smiled politely as he poured me a glass.
He then looked to Emma and poured her a glass without asking. I wished he had asked, more out of my desire to hear her speak than out of courtesy.
Setting the bottle down, he pinned Emma with a glare. “Cat got your tongue, dear?”
He was being deliberately obtuse and I hated him for it, I had to grit my teeth to stop myself coming to her aid, but then she didn’t need it. The look of hatred that she abruptly threw at him, floored even me.
Was she crazy? Did she want to anger him further?
“Oh, come now, Emma,” he said with bored indifference. “Let’s have a nice dinner, you must need it after the afternoon we have just had.”
I sensed Emma shudder, her eyes dropping to her plate, and a cold trickle ran down my spine as my suspicions were confirmed. Whatever that afternoon had entailed it must have been truly awful for her to behave so out of character.
I looked back to Dad, but he was already tucking in, relaxed and unfettered by the atmosphere that was close to suffocating me.
“I’m not hungry,” Emma said after a pause.
I looked at her, my eyes begging for hers to make contact. “You need to eat,” I coaxed.
“Too right, you need to eat!”
Dad’s angry interjection made me jump, his words delivering a direct order rather than a thoughtful suggestion. Last night he had requested Emma stop eating for worry over her “weight problem” and now he was ordering her to dig in. The irony wasn’t lost on me.
Turns out it wasn’t lost on Emma either as she glared at him. “Eat! Don’t eat! You want to make up your mind?”
I froze, my whole body posed for an eruption.
But it didn’t come.
I chanced a glance at my stepfather.
He leaned back in his chair, wine glass in hand, and met her angry gaze with one of calm contemplation. Then he smiled, the gesture slow and chilling. “You really have more spirit than I ever realized, darling.”
Emma was positively vibrating, her eyes throwing daggers, her breathing ragged.
Count to ten ... count to ten ... I mentally begged her. Hadn’t she been the one telling me to try and behave normal? Then she goes and loses it!
“Do you know, I think we’ve actually reached a very agreeable place in our relationship,” he continued, his eyes still upon her. “I’ve had more fun in the last twenty-four hours than I’ve had in any previous relationship.”
“Fun?” Emma asked in disbelief, her voice almost a whisper.
“Why, yes ... and it can only get better, don’t you think?” His eyes danced as he took momentary delight in the effect his words were having. But then he stilled, his mouth forming a grim line as his eyes hardened and he leaned toward her. “Now eat, before I bloody well make you.”
Emma started, alarm widening her eyes as they returned to her plate. Without a word, she reached for her cutlery and with shaky hands, started to fork up her food. I was left to watch in sickening fascination, finding her cowering obedience far more horrifying than her outburst.
“That goes for you too, Abi.” He looked to me and I shriveled inside. “I pay good money to have you ladies looked after, so you will eat, God damn you.”
I looked down at the hearty pasta dish, Dad’s favorite, and what appetite I had, if any, went out the window. My head swam and my tummy turned. I stabbed the pasta with my fork and did as I was told.
I chewed each mouthful with excessive care, keen to avoid it sticking in my fear-constricted throat. I couldn’t stop my eyes flitting back to her, my worry magnifying with each stolen glance. What had he done to her?
Conversation ceased completely, emphasizing each chink of glass or cutlery on china. Dad refilled our wine glasses and requested another bottle be brought, remarking that we were both very thirsty that night.
Thirst had nothing to do with it. The wine acted as a lubricant to get the food down and the alcohol eased the top-to-toe tension.
I felt like a robot going through the motions of dining.
Dad, on the other hand, ate his dinner with gusto and it was no surprise he’d cleared his plate before we’d even got through half.
Wiping his mouth with the napkin, he eventually looked to us both.
“Following all that’s been said and done recently, I don’t think I need to worry over a repeat of yesterday’s scandalous affairs, do I?
” He gave a sadistic smile at the frozen faces his words summoned.
“No, I didn’t think so ... in that case, I shall leave you ladies alone to finish up, I have a conference call to tend to. ”
Thank God! I had to work hard to stop the relief shining through.
“The conference call shouldn’t last more than an hour,” he continued, pushing himself up from the table and looking to Emma as he waited on her for a response.
She didn’t give one. Her eyes didn’t leave her plate, her manner giving no indication that she had even heard his last few words
He didn’t like her ignorance, not one bit. I could see it in his prolonged gaze upon her, as he silently demanded her to look back at him. And when she didn’t, he threw his napkin onto his plate and stepped around the table. His fingers reaching to grasp her chin and force her face up at him.
My throat clenched as I heard her swallow a gasp, his fingers inflicting pain as they held her still.
“I’ll come and find you afterwards, darling,” he said, his hardened stare raining down on her. “I think we should pick up where we left off this afternoon.”
I saw the flicker of panic in Emma’s face and I couldn’t ignore it. Desperate to divert his attention, I blurted, “I was hoping we could talk more of Daniel tonight, Daddy.”
He rewarded my suggestion with the briefest of looks and no sign as to whether he believed my idea to be genuine. “I don’t think so, Abi. We can talk tomorrow.”
No sooner had he said it, than his focus was back on her and I had to watch as he bent to whisper intimately against her ear.
Taking up my drink, I washed down further words that would only incite trouble and reminded myself he would be gone soon.
But whatever he said, it had her body tensing up and her head turning away in distaste.
He gave a merciless laugh and yanked her face back to his, crushing her mouth with a horrifyingly invasive kiss.
For fuck’s sake!
A cough erupted from within me as the wine caught at the back of my throat and he tore his mouth away to toss me an amused look.
“Aw, Abi, not jealous, are we?”
I tried to give him a look of discomfort, hoping to mask the true emotional turmoil ripping through me.
But the effort was wasted; he was no fool, he knew exactly how I felt.
I could see it in his sneer-like smile as he turned his attention back to Emma, his hand still fixing her head in place, the brutal pressure of his hold making the surrounding area swell unsightly around his fingers.
“I can’t really blame you,” he said impassively, his eyes scanning her face in a proprietorial fashion, his palm slipping around the back of her neck.
“I mean, she really is an alluring specimen,” he continued, his voice full of stomach-churning appreciation now as he started to toy with her hair, twirling it playfully about his fingers. “She’s a feisty one for sure, both in and out of the sack.”
I could sense danger on the horizon, could see it in his whimsical manner and the rapid flaring of Emma’s nostrils in her otherwise motionless body.
“Such a delightful little vixen, wouldn’t you agree, Abi?”
He sent me a fleeting look and I wanted to say something, do something, anything to stop whatever was to come.
But it was all too late.
As his attention returned to Emma, his hand twisted in her hair and he yanked back hard. There was an anguished cry that could have come from me or Emma, I was so distressed I couldn’t tell. And he loved it. His sinister smile growing ever bigger.
“But you see, Abi,” he said, as he surveyed Emma’s unnaturally arched form, her quivering mouth and half closed eyes, “you’d be surprised at just how tame she can be once she accepts who’s really in charge ... isn’t that so, Emma?”
His fist tightened in her hair and she winced, her lips parting on the sound.
He raised his chin a fraction. “I’ll take that as a yes.”
My eyes stung as I refused to blink, not wanting to leave Emma unguarded for a second. Not that I was any help right now...
Please just go! I wanted to scream.
“So as you can see, Abi, Emma is my whore and mine alone.” His eyes flicked to me and I could read the challenge I saw there. “She does as I say, when I say. Is that clear?”
I nodded, words failing me completely.
“Good,” he said, his pleasure ringing through as he finally released Emma’s hair and gave her chin a dismissive flick. “I’ll see you shortly, now be good the pair of you.”
He laughed on the last, loving how they were wasted words in his view — as if we would dare to be anything else — and turning on his heel, he strode out of the room, the door closing quietly behind him.
I let go of a shaky breath, the word “bastard” coming with it.
My blood was boiling with anger and yet I was immobilized by fear. Had he really gone or was this some cunning ploy so that he could return and catch us in the act? Either way, there was one question burning a hole in my brain that I just couldn’t hold in.
“What the hell did you ever see in him?”