Trapped in Their Manor, Twin Dukes Keep Me Captive

Chapter 16:Souvenir

“I want you to train Miss Ludwigs Edmund of the Duchy of Württemberg.”

The Earl’s French rolled off his tongue as smooth and elegant as always, yet the words he spoke were utterly absurd. It was as if unseen hands had triggered the elaborate hidden machinery inside an opera house, and the attendants burst out into uproarious laughter.

“Alternatively, Miss Ludwigs Franchemont Edmund from England would serve just as well, though Franchemont hardly sounds like an English surname. Lieutenant, which of the two do you believe fits the role of a European bride better?”

His voice never rose above a moderate volume amid the buzz of snickering and chatter, yet it sent a chill crawling over my skin, as if a frigid serpent had coiled itself all around my body.

“I beg your pardon, My Lord. Forgive my dull wits, but I fail to grasp your meaning.”

I spoke flatly and instinctively stepped backward. A footman standing directly behind me instantly clamped a firm grip onto my shoulder.

The Earl crooked one finger to beckon me forward. His loyal hounds shoved me across the floor. As I drew nearer, I fought back out of raw reflex. A brutal force crashed into my back, sending me sprawling hard onto the carpet before his chair.

The sudden rough treatment caught me off guard. I glanced over my shoulder and spotted an unfamiliar footman. I could not tell if he had acted on his own malice or simply craved his master’s approval.

When I turned my gaze back toward Earl Iain, a streak of blinding silver flashed across my sight. Bone-deep terror, forged from years of nightmarish suffering, threatened to freeze every inch of my body.

It was the whip that had brought me endless agony.

The Earl had clearly watched every flicker of fear cross my face, and he let out a mocking scoff.

“It seems you still remember this thing, Lieutenant.”

The supple silver leather slithered around my rigid neck just like a snake and looped once. Without warning, the Earl tugged hard, yanking me across the space separating us.

“Ugh!”

For a split second, I truly believed he intended to strangle me to death on the spot.

A searing burn spread across my throat. I clawed frantically at the leather noose wrapped around me and coughed violently.

Someone seized my hair and forced my head upward. Tears blurred my vision from lack of air, and I met Earl Iain William Hagens’s blue eyes—bright with amusement, curiosity, and overflowing, unmasked malice.

“Baron Fred told me he was fortunate enough to meet my lovely English bride, the one with dark hair and brown eyes. How curious. As the master of Colleck Manor, I had heard not a single word about her existence.”

He spoke in a soft, gentle tone, tapping my cheek lightly with the whip’s wooden handle.

My plan had unraveled. I’d assumed the Baron, fascinated by other people’s secret trysts, would keep his encounter with the supposed bride to himself. I never expected him to speak so freely of it in front of the Earl.

Looking back to that night I stumbled upon the Baron’s rendezvous, and how he had mistaken me for the Earl, everything made sense. Presumably, Earl Iain turned a blind eye to dalliances between his female attendants and guests. Or perhaps these women carried duties far beyond merely entertaining him. After all, to nobles, loyalty and chastity existed only within old books and legends.

“I told the Baron the transatlantic liner did bring me a beautiful young lady, possessed of flawless breeding and fine manners. Her name is Ludwigs, a pleasant name to the ear. She is meant to be a surprise for my dear elder brother, a birthday gift from his younger sibling to mark his twenty-fifth celebration a month from now. What say you, Lieutenant? With your breadth of experience, do you believe such a gift can fully convey fraternal affection and respect?”

I stared straight at him.

This had to be the most outrageous scheme imaginable. Earl Iain William Hagens, a barbarian raised in the New World without proper noble education or a shred of aristocratic honour, cast every rule aside. He cared nothing for the damage his whims might inflict upon his own house. Merely for fleeting amusement, on the back of some vicious sudden fancy, he planned to use threats to force a noble-born woman to pretend she was a proper young “miss.”

A barbarian. A madman. A monster.

Even the most patient soul could not endure such humiliation and deranged fantasy.

“My Lord, if you long to indulge in little girls’ games of dressing up dolls and playing house, your attendants would be thrilled to fit you with gowns. If you wish, I would even gladly hold your train.”

The Earl laughed at my provocation. He tightened his grip on the whip and forced my face higher.

“You are striking, undeniably beautiful. No wonder Fred was fooled. Lieutenant, has anyone ever told you that you possess features fairer than most women? I suspect they have. Perhaps powerful men have even sought your favour.”

To hell with that so-called favour.

For the first time in my life, I wanted to cast aside every scrap of noble decorum and curse every ancestor of the House of Hagens, maternal and paternal alike.

Among our class, being called a fashionable dandy or an idle gentleman was praise. Idle leisure and the pursuit of elegance were our calling, just as farming belonged to peasants. But to claim a noble looked like a woman was an unforgivable insult. Any honourable person would toss down a duel gauntlet in response—not to mention the crude, insinuating undertones lacing every word he spoke.

The noble circles built around endless pleasure hosted all manner of bizarre vices, and what he described was far from unheard of. I knew townhouses run by ladies that supplied handsome young men to those with peculiar tastes. I had even heard whispers of nobles at Ludwigsburg Palace who craved being flogged by their lovers. But I swear before the Virgin Mary, I held no such twisted inclinations, and I had zero desire to experience them firsthand.

“You speak of these matters with such familiarity. I suppose you learned all of this from personal experience?”

I knew this retort bordered on suicide, yet I shot back loaded with sharp sarcasm.

The hand tangled in my hair pulled harder, twisting my head toward Anne.

Two towering enslaved Black women stood behind the weeping girl. The Earl leaned down and breathed terrifying words against my ear in an unnervingly intimate tone.

“You may wield your sharp tongue all you like. But I urge you to pause and consider what fate awaits Miss Anne. Do not forget, you still owe me forty-five lashes. If you wish it, I would happily extend that same punishment to her.”

I drew a ragged breath and glanced at Anne. She sobbed uncontrollably, her makeup smudged beyond recognition, gazing back at me through tear-blurred eyes.

“You cannot treat her this way! She has always been loyal to you. She has done nothing wrong.”

“Such words ring hollow coming from your lips.”

“You!”

I took several deep breaths. Logic warned me abandoning Anne was the safest choice for my survival. Still, I had no choice but to yield.

“Any person with basic common sense can see these ridiculous accusations for what they are. Even if there were truth to them, you do not begrudge others plucking blossoms growing inside your garden. If that is so, why worry whether a rose bears thorns?”

Whether Anne and I shared an inappropriate bond mattered little. Within high society, “loyalty” carried a negative weight. It described a fool ignorant of the unwritten rules of dalliance. That law applied equally to everyone in this world, man or woman.

“How touching,” the Earl drawled in that infuriating, haughty tone unique to aristocrats. “You reject my kindness, yet humble yourself for Miss Anne. There is a clear difference between flowers I choose to give away freely, and blossoms stolen from my garden without permission. Furthermore, this thief did not merely pilfer my flower. She snuck into the rooms on the right wing and stole precious treasures beloved by my poor elder brother. Tell me—what ought I do once I catch such a thief?”

My eyes twitched violently.

“This fan looks extremely valuable. Where did you get it?” “I found it inside the storage chamber on the right wing…”

Anne. Anne had truly stolen items out of the right wing storage room.

I abhorred cruel torture, yet I understood how harsh justice operated. Even in Paris, celebrated as the heart of civility, stealing merely three francs could send a thief straight to the gallows. Worse still, even as one of the Earl’s attendants, Anne remained legally enslaved. If this crime was proven, he possessed the authority to hang her entire family.

“This is truly most regrettable. I believe a perfect European bride would be ample recompense for your sorrow and apology. I have no doubt Count Elvis, upon receiving such a gift, would feel the depth of your fraternal devotion.”