Damian's home was beautiful, but it was a cold, naked beauty. Nothing was hidden. Everything could be seen. She could see into his bedroom from the main floor because the floor of his room—the ceiling of the main floor—was made of the same thick glass.
The house was an open floor plan where one large room flowed into another on the main level without any walls between anything. The house felt like an art gallery, or maybe the art itself. It had been an appropriate place for an art show's private after party.
Shannon was sure the only reason the floor on the main level wasn't that same see-through glass was because the entire basement level was a dungeon/kinky play area. Damian obviously wouldn't want just anyone to see what was underground—unless they were into the same things he was.
She found the guest room easily. Once inside, she happened to catch Damian's gaze as he glanced up at her from the kitchen. He flipped the omelet again.
Seeing through the floor was unnerving. Even more unnerving was the way the room she was in looked like it might fall into the sea at any moment. His enormous home seemed perched precariously on rocky ground, and when she moved to the far wall to look out the clear glass panes, she could again see the waves crashing on rocks below.
There were actual moveable windows set into these larger glass panes, and she opened one, letting in the crisp salt air and the sounds of the waves and seagulls screeching overhead. The windows each had tightly woven screens to keep bugs and birds out of the house.
In spite of everything, that cool salty breeze and the ocean sounds felt soothing.
Shannon went to the closet and found a pair of jeans in her size and a soft gray T-shirt. The shirt was brand new but it was made in that stone-washed rumpled worn way as if it were a favorite shirt, decades old. It was soft, and the large scoop neck would hang off her shoulder. She opened a drawer in the main room and found comfortable-looking white panties and an equally comfortable-looking bra. Sporty, casual. Not slutty.
The last thing she wanted after last night was slutty. She wanted to feel and look like a normal person, not the kind of person who'd participated in last night's party among strangers. Even though that was exactly the kind of person she was.
She wondered how many of Damian's guests had paused in their fucking and kink games to watch her under the spotlight. She'd been too wrapped up in the moment to be able to pay attention to them, only noticing them again when all the porn movie sounds had stopped and she'd been engulfed in the silence of her own experience.
Somehow Damian's watchful gaze on her at the after party had been more unnerving than Lindsay's because she didn't know Damian in the way she knew her master. She didn't know if Damian would judge her or start treating her like a whore.
She felt the blush creep into her face. She was about to drop the wrap to get dressed, but caught Damian's rapt gaze on her again as if he were waiting for the show. She kept the wrap in place tight around her body, gathered up the clothes, and went into the hall bathroom. The bathroom broke the pattern of glass beneath her feet with a gray granite floor. The bathroom walls were mottled glass all the way around, like shower glass.
It was enough privacy to make her comfortable enough to change clothes. Shannon locked the door behind her. The bathroom was an elegant little sanctuary—a place she felt safe and unexposed for the first time since she'd arrived at the glass house.
She carefully folded the wrap and laid it on the counter. She wanted a shower, but she didn't want to keep Damian waiting, so she quickly put on the clothes and finger-combed her hair until it looked a little less like she'd just rolled out of bed. Though he, like most men, probably found that look appealing.
She was right about the neckline of the top she'd chosen. It strayed off her shoulder, hanging halfway down one arm. A few of her scars were visible, but Damian had already seen them. He'd gotten an up-close-and-personal look at them last night under the spotlight in the dungeon. Was that why he hadn't touched her after the party?
Shannon had been so tired, but when Lindsay had left her with Damian she was sure that meant he was about to fuck her. Alone. Without the safety Lindsay provided. Once Lindsay had left, she'd been so scared she'd almost dropped to her knees to beg him, but Damian had told her she needed rest, cutting her off before she could embarrass herself. She wasn't even sure what she would have begged for him to do or not do. She just knew he was still so much a stranger.
Shannon pushed away those thoughts and looked in the mirror, her fingers straying to the collar at her throat. Somehow the thin glittering collar really did go with everything.
Her feet were still bare when she emerged from the bathroom and went back down the stairs. Once again she gripped the railing as if for her life even as the rubber grips under her feet steadied her and reassured her of her safety.
Damian had already set the table when she joined him. He didn't comment on her hiding in the bathroom. It was ridiculous. She knew it. He'd seen everything. But it was different when Lindsay was with her.
“Lindsay loaned you to me for the weekend. I'll take you to his office Monday morning. He'll have the clothes he wants you to wear waiting for you there,” Damian said when she joined him at the table.
“Why?” She'd understood she was staying overnight, but three nights?
Damian raised a brow. “Is my company that offensive?”
“No,” she said quickly. “I, I just don't understand why he would give me to you for the weekend.”
It hurt a little. Didn't the doctor want her anymore? Was he bored already? Did he want to spend time with other women at the house instead? Maybe she was cramping his style and he was rethinking having a girl all his own. Her fingertips strayed again to her collar. In less than a day it had already become an absent-minded nervous habit.
“No, Sir,” he corrected.
“I'm sorry, I'm confused,” Shannon said, still not giving him a title. Of course she'd called him Sir in Lindsay's office that day, but it felt wrong without the doctor here, like she was giving up pieces of herself—little bits of submission—to another man. Like she was betraying Lindsay even though he'd abandoned her here.
“Eat your breakfast,” Damian said, digging into his own omelets and bacon.
She took a bite of the omelet and then followed it with a sip of juice. “It's very good. You're a good cook.”
He laughed. “It's just an omelet, don't get too impressed yet.”
She was used to Phyllis cooking at the house. It was intriguing and maybe kind of nice having a man cook for her. It felt normal and domestic. It brought into sharp focus just how abnormal so much of her life had been for nearly a decade.
“I wanted you,” Damian said. “I find you... intriguing.”
She startled when he echoed the same word that had just been bouncing around inside her own mind. She took another sip of juice to help push the food down.
Damian didn't comment on her jumpiness. The phone rang. “Yes.” He wasn't answering a question. That was just the way he took a call. “One moment.” He passed the phone to Shannon. “It's Lindsay.”
She took the phone, glancing around, searching for a private place to talk to him—as if there could be any privacy in this house with all the glass and open space.