ALICE: SLAVE’S FINAL REVENGE by Aphrodite Hunt Read Free Book Online Page A

inner bitch again. But when I search within myself, I can’t find her. My chest just feels leaden and heavy, as if it is clogged with irredeemable debris.
    But I’m not sorry.
    I have never been sorry before for any of my actions – perceived good or bad or something in between. And I’m not about to start.
    Yeah, keep telling yourself that.
    “ Hello, Alice,” he says.
    “ Hello, Dad.”
    He nods. “You’ve gotten what you wanted.”
    We haven’t seen each other since that fateful wedding, a lifetime ago. When I came back, I studiously avoided living in his house and checked into a hotel instead.
    “ Yes, I guess I have.” I resist the urge to say ‘You shouldn’t have done what you did to me’ or anything trite like that. He knows. He knows it all.
    “ This affects you too,” he says.
    “ It affects all of us. But I still have my trust.”
    With that, I turn heel and walk out of the door. It will be the last I will see of my father for a long, long time. I’m a pariah from my family now. I can never go back.
    I don’t need them, I tell myself fiercely.
    Then why do I feel so sad?
     
    *
     
    Gabriel is waiting for me downstairs, as promised.
    “ How did it go?”
    “ OK.” I shrug. I don’t want to talk about it.
    He looks towards the reception. The word is out now that the company has been taken over. The receptionist is chatting worriedly to a secretary from upstairs. The security guards are all whispering to one another. Now and then, they would favor me and Gabriel with significant stares. Everyone has to know my role in engineering this takeover.
    Gabriel smiles. “A celebration is in order.”
    He lifts my jaw with two of his fingers. “Why the glum face?”
    Do I look glum?
    “ I don’t know,” I confess. “It doesn’t feel as good as I thought it would.”
    “ Victory is sometimes hollow when you least expect it,” he acknowledges. “You feel badly for your family when only a few months ago, it would not have occurred to you to think of anyone else. Your stint as a slave has changed you.”
    “ Maybe it has. What did you want to discuss with me?”
    “ Ah, yes . . . the little matter I wish to discuss with you.”
    He shepherds me outside, his proprietary hand on my back. A black stretch limousine waits outside. As soon as he appears, the driver courteously gets out and opens the door for him.
    In the backseat, a beautiful naked woman awaits us. Her legs are open and she wears an iron collar around her neck. Her wrists are manacled to the collar by long chains, but she can move her hands more or less freely.
    Her eyes are a brilliant blue. In her cupped palms, she holds a blue velvet jewelry box.
    “ For you,” Gabriel says.
    “ For me?”
    Is it what I think it is?
    I’m a little dazzled.
    I take the jewelry box and open it. Inside is a diamond ring. I am usually not a person at a loss for words, but I am speechless this time.
    I did not expect this from Lord Gabriel Wolfe.
    After all, I was his sex slave. I have been used by many men and women. I have a significant trust fund, but I don’t think Lord Gabriel needs to marry for money. I have no English title.
    I keep staring at the ring.
    “ Well, don’t rush to say ‘yes’ all at once,” he says, smiling.
    I say, “Yes.”
    “ Are you sure?”
    “ Yes. But why? Why me?” That is about as honest a question as I can put forth.
    “ Because we make a good team. Because I admire your brains . . . and everything else. I don’t want a shrinking violet for a wife, Alice. I’ve been married before . . . to a milk sop, and I don’t want that. I want someone who can match me in the bedroom as well as the boardroom.”
    He pauses.
    “ I’ve never met anyone quite like you, Alice. And that’s saying something.”
    I have never met anyone like Lord Gabriel Wolfe either. And I think I never will again. Do I love him? Not yet. But then, I’m not sure I have ever loved anyone in my entire life. Not even Greg, now that I