“I’ll never ask you. That moment never can start.”
“Fair fiend, don’t try me too far. I want to want you. I desire desire.”
As his fingers closed around Dolores’ throat, she was weakened by the thought of strangling. She could not speak, either to deny or implore.
“And you,” he rasped, “shall want me to want you until you’ll pray that your mind may burn to ash from its own ardor. Or will you teach me willingly—inspire me as you best know how? I prefer to be your lover—to miss not a nibble of that smooth cheek, my luscious nectarine. But I am also your legal lord. And I have tutored too many legal lords of Earth in their brutalities to miss my divine right now. I am your master. Ask me to kiss you, slave.”
Dolores strove for the sort of courage that had enabled her before to repel him. Just one strong, good thought might release her. From the least likely source—his clutch of her—it came. Baby fingers had clung tight about her throat a few hours since. She was a mother, and a mother was enslaved only by her motherhood. She freed herself of his grip; struggled to her feet; started across the room.
“My wager did not include wants of my own,” she defied him. “You ask more than I can pay.”
“More? I haven’t begun to ask!”
From the closeness of his voice she realized without glancing back that he was following. The strength of her good thought was scattered by panic. All she could do was to flee.
She hurried to the windows, but found them shuttered against the storm. Behind object after object of the room she took a stand, only to desert it on his near approach.
He, like a fate evil, leisurely, sure to overtake, pursued. He laughed from excess of exhilaration when the inevitable occurred. Her long tulle-like veil caught about the winged foot of an illusion of Mercury. As though by jealousy of the speed god she was tripped; was about to fall. He caught her.