Her eyes glazed over, jaw going slack.
I glanced over at Joseph. He was watching us, his face flushed in temper.
He knew I was touching her under the table. I saw it in his tight-lipped anger, saw the disapproval in his eyes, the jealousy.
Good. This lesson was primitive, but it needed to be taught, uncouth as it was.
I was feeling far from civilized.
I had an overwhelming need to stake my claim. Mark my territory.
All of these animalistic impulses overpowered so many of my normal inclinations. Normally I sheltered her. But for him, this f**ker that questioned my ownership, I wanted to put my possession of her on stark display.
I drew the meal out. I'd had the cook make burgers and fries, an unusual request for me, but perfectly suited to the occasion.
I pulled my hand away when it was time to eat, catching her eye so she saw me lick my fingers clean.
She shuddered, her breath panting out of her harshly.
I devoured my burger with gusto, slowly savoring each bite, watching them the entire time—her reaction to me, his fixation on her.
One by one, each of the staff finished eating and excused themselves to go back to work.
All but Joseph.
I shot him a cold glare, and reached a hand over, gripping a hand into Bianca's hair. I leaned close and pulled her the rest of the way, and gave her a long, hot, bruising kiss.
I pulled slightly back and brought her ear to my mouth. I took a few deep breaths, inhaling her before I spoke.
"You smell like me. Like you belong to me. Because you're mine. Go strip down, get in bed, the other bed, and wait for me. I'm going to tie you up and make you suck me off. And that's only the start, love. I'll come inside of every part of you before this night is through."
She pulled back, studied my face for a few pregnant moments, and then left.
I didn't watch her leave. I was too busy watching him watch her leave.
I gave him a cold smile when he finally realized I was staring at him.
I waited until I was sure she was out of earshot to speak. I leaned in. "That's my wife you're casting those lovesick stares at," I growled at him.
He glared back, looking outraged. "I'm well aware. I'm also well aware of the way you treat her. Like an object. To abuse. I see the marks you leave on her. I see it all."
That had me barking out a laugh, at his expense. "Oh that is rich," I told him, cold disdain in every syllable. "A prude, working for me. How about this? You keep your prudish mind out of my bedroom, and off my wife, you bastard."
I had to clench my fists to keep from attacking him, because attacking him was not what I needed to do here.
I needed to get him to talk. I'd love nothing so much as for him to give me any excuse to fire him, something I could use that was more substantial, in terms of evidence for Bianca, than the way he looked at her.
I sneered at him. "What did you think, that you would sweep in and save her from me? She's mine. You think I abuse her? Then wrap your mind around this: She is in absolute bondage to me, chained to me for life, and the things I've used to chain her to my side are beyond your ability to break."
He didn't say anything else, though I could tell he badly wanted to.
Instead, he got up and walked away.
It was not what I'd wanted him to do and completely unsatisfying.
"I thought you decided a long time ago not to do any of that in anger," Bianca told me later.
We were soaking in a bath. I snagged one of her feet and started rubbing at her arch.
I was trying to relax, to get over my rage, but even several orgasms and a hot bath didn't seem to be curing me.
I was bad at relaxing, always had been.
"I said I wouldn't do it when I was angry at you," I told her finally, kissing the bottom of her foot.
"Are you really going to try to say right now, with the way you've been acting all afternoon, that none of this anger is directed at me?"
I gave her very steady eye contact. "Yes, that is what I'm telling you. Not an ounce of my anger is for you."
She sighed. "It's Joseph, isn't it? You can't fire him over something so silly. You know you can't. That's insane. He's worked for us for years. You can't fire him just because I painted a picture of him. That's what I do. I paint things. I paint people. It's not even his fault. I asked him to pose."
"That's not why I'd fire him."
She gave me a genuinely confused look that went a long way towards making me feel better. "I don't understand."
I watched her face, wondering if she really didn't know.
If somehow she didn't, I wasn't going to be the one to tell her. I didn't want to see her reaction to his feelings for her.
What if she was tempted? What if she had feelings for him?
Without another word, I got out of the bath and went to bed.
I approached Stephan about it, a few days later, wanting his take on the situation, and his opinion on how to handle it.
We met up for lunch at his bar in my casino. I got right to the point.
"Joseph's become a problem," I told him bluntly.
He grimaced. Clearly, he knew just what I was referring to. "Bianca sees him as a friend. A good friend. You can't just fire him."
My jaw clenched. That didn't help.
"Does she know he's in love with her?" I asked quietly.
He didn't look surprised by the information, but he shook his head. "No, no I don't think so. If she had a clue how he felt, she wouldn't be so open and friendly with him. She wouldn't spend so much time with him."
I cringed. "She spends that much time with him?"
"No. Stop. Don't do that to yourself. She doesn't spend an excessive amount of time with him, just, you know, he works at the house, he takes her around. He's her bodyguard. That's his job. But you've got nothing to worry about. She would never . . ."
I knew I was in a foul mood when even Stephan was agitating me. I couldn't remember the last time I'd gone to him with something and not had him make me feel better about it.
"You find that situation to be acceptable?" I asked him bitingly. "You think this is going to end well? It's escalating, I can tell."
He didn't disagree with me, but he didn't have a solution, either.
I went to Clark about it next.