Chapter 1
The heavy velvet drape of silence inside the luxurious marble hall was broken only by the ragged, painful breathing of the young maid cowering against the wall.
Thirty-five-year-old Jaxson stood frozen in the center of the foyer, his dark grey overcoat swaying slightly as his tattooed hand maintained an iron grip on the black braided leather whip.
Victoria’s chest heaved beneath her crimson red velvet dress, her haughty expression contorting instantly from vicious aggression into absolute, trembling disbelief.
Her manicured fingers hovered uselessly in the air where the handle of the whip had been just a fraction of a second earlier.
"How dare you interfere in private household discipline?" Victoria hissed, her voice vibrating with a mixture of aristocratic outrage and sudden, bubbling panic.
Jaxson did not flinch, his slicked-back dark hair and stark neck tattoos framing a face carved from sheer, unyielding granite.
He slowly lowered the black whip, his dark eyes shifting downward to examine the crimson welts crisscrossing the young maid's navy blue uniform.
Twenty-five-year-old Chloe pressed her back harder against the cold marble wall, her messy brown hair falling across her bruised face as she tried to make herself invisible.
May you like
"Why are you holding that?" Jaxson demanded, his voice dropping an octave into a cold, menacing register that echoed off the vaulted ceiling.
Victoria took an involuntary step backward, her high heels clicking sharply against the polished floor as she searched the empty corridor for her security detail.
