The earlier dread came back a thousand-fold.
“Now,” he said. “Come with me and behave or I’ll let Brandon fuck you until you bleed. Then I'll bleed him.”
“Asshole,” Cole snarled.
“Shut it.”
To my shock, Cole did.
I believed him. So did Cole.
Guess I was going to see the doctor.
“Do you have a name?” I asked him as we descended the stairs.
“Yes,” he said. “Pray you never learn it.”
I swallowed around the lump in my throat. The “doctor” in the drawing room wasn’t the one I half-wished it could be. I didn’t know him, but the minute I saw him—all I wanted to do was flee. But I couldn’t. Surrounded on all sides and locked in a house of horrors.
The only one missing was the master of them.
CHAPTER 10
EMERSYN
Doctor Schuitevoerder’s icy presence didn’t ease one ounce of my apprehension. In fact, the lingering look he pinned on me through his glasses just added to my discomfort. Nothing about his bedside manner seemed even close to supportive, much less sympathetic.
“One of you may stay,” the doctor said abruptly as he rose. “The others get out.”
It shouldn’t have surprised me, but tall, dark, dangerous, and promising to be deadly was the one who stayed. He didn’t even have to say anything. The others just left. Including Cole, who blew me a kiss before he left. Repulsive douchebag.
“Strip,” the doctor said once we were alone. Well, alone except for the guard now standing in front of the double doors, arms folded.
“No.” I folded my arms. Granted, I wasn’t wearing much, but Doctor skater-vorder wasn’t getting any of it off. “Who are you?”
The doctor focused on me and removed his glasses instead of squinting over them. “You do not recognize me, Miss Sharpe?”
“Nope.” Though everything about him made my skin crawl. Apparently, that was a prerequisite for being in this house. “And since I’m eighteen, I get to decide, so—the answer to me getting naked is not only no, it’s hell no.”
Tapping one of the earpieces to his glasses against his lower lip, he studied me. “You have injuries and they need to be inspected. You also received something of a shock a couple of days ago.”
“And someone threatened to rape me fifteen minutes ago. I’m still not getting naked.”
He glanced at our chaperone—guard dog—whatever the hell Mr. You Don’t Want To Know What My Name wanted to call himself. I didn’t. I could make him out in my periphery. I still refused to acknowledge him as in charge. What little control I still managed to claw to myself, I would not surrender.
Honestly, I couldn’t believe my uncle wasn’t here and that I hadn’t seen him since I vomited all over him. Not that I had any desire to see him. But he’d never had me so thoroughly caged before. Not like this.
I’d never escaped him for so long before either.
“Let’s start with your hands and then we’ll talk,” the doctor said with a sigh, when it appeared that the guard dog wasn’t going to do him any favors.
“What kind of doctor are you?” Honestly, I didn’t want to get anywhere near him. Doctors couldn’t be trusted. I’d made the mistake of trusting two of them.
One was dead.
The other just didn’t want me.
“A busy one,” he said. “Now let me see your hands.” After tucking his glasses back into place, he closed the distance between us. The fact we were in a formal sitting room just added to the overall weirdness. The room had windows that looked over the garden in the back just like my room did, but they were all shuttered and closed.
The scant few seconds he spent getting close to me, I was debating striking out. But there was nowhere to go. Even if I knocked him on his ass, the bulldog was right there. So, when the doctor grasped my wrist. I let him pull my right hand to him and he studied the burns. It was only then that I realized he wore gloves.
Well, that was something, though he’d been messing with his glasses and reading something on his phone, so clearly he wasn’t all in on the sanitary conditions. With a hum, he motioned for my left hand.
“Are you in much pain?”
Yes, but for some reason, I really didn’t want to tell him anything. Trusting my instincts, I shrugged. “I’ll live.”
“Clearly.” Apparently, he wasn’t impressed by me. Well, that made two of us. “The report indicated you took a fall and landed on your back.”
“It’s fine.” I’d gotten worse bruises in training.
“I’ll be the judge of that. Turn and let me see.” The very last thing I wanted to give this man was my back or access to my skin.
“Just do it,” the bulldog said. “The sooner you cooperate, the sooner this is over.”
I hated to admit it, but he had a point. Turning away from both of them, I reached for the hem of my shirt, but the doctor had already shoved it upward and caught the cami beneath it and pushed it higher. The pressure on my back wasn’t remotely comfortable. I tried to curl my hands into fists, but my palms added their protests to my back.
“Deep contusions. Definitely looks like you landed on something. The color is good. I don’t see anything here to—”
He shifted and almost immediately, I knew he’d spotted my tattoo. I yanked my shirt down and moved away from him.
“What is that?”
“None of your business. It definitely had nothing to do with my fall.”
“Miss Sharpe, belligerence isn’t helping your case.”
“What case would that be?”
“Your assessment,” the doctor said, his frown brought out the wrinkles in his face. The salt and pepper hair did his pale features no favors. Without his glasses, the bags beneath his eyes were clearly visible. Honestly, he looked a bit like a zombie. There was a thought I wished I could unthink. “Your uncle is very concerned about you. Your whole family really. Especially after your ordeal. The fact you tried to hurt yourself so soon after coming home has just emphasized those concerns.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“You’ve been through a trauma,” he said. “Your uncle has had to take precautions to make sure you don’t try to harm yourself further.”
Harm. Myself.
"It’s understandable. But… we need to address these concerns immediately.” He had his phone again. “The best way to do that would be for you to talk to me…”
“Talk to you.”
“Yes,” he said with a smile that never reached his eyes. “I’m here to help you.”
“I’d sooner gargle with household bleach.” Every instinct I had said to get the hell away from him. “So, if you’re done with your exam. I’ll just go back to my room.”
I made it halfway to the door before the doctor sighed.
“Your uncle was afraid you wouldn’t be ready to talk.”
“What do you know, he got something right.”
The bulldog didn’t move and I paused a couple of feet away. All the bravado in the world didn’t seem to hold a candle to the arctic chill surrounding him.