The Blonde Samurai. Jina Bacarr

interest me, my dear wife, though your plain looks repelled me at first.” He continued his exploration of me, his words as well as his actions no doubt designed to make me uneasy. “I’ve since discovered your face reflects a distinct exterior which contradicts the passion and excitement raging inside you.”

      “James, please—”

      I tried to push him away, but he possessed a strength I never imagined, keeping me tight in his grip while he lifted my wet cloak and ran his hands up and down my midriff, then, with a boldness that surprised me, he cupped my breasts, lingering on the twin mounds outlined in red velvet. I cried out when he squeezed them before circling his hands around my small waist, setting off a rather unsettling contraction in my pubic region.

      “And your figure is magnificent,” he said.

      “Why waste your time trying to seduce me?” I asked, finding my courage. “I’m immune to your charms. Or lack of them.”

      My words angered him. He pulled up my overskirt and pushed his hand into my crotch, squeezing it. Hard. I fought back a scream and tried to pull away from him. I couldn’t. “You had best watch your step, my dear wife,” he said, “or I shall bed what is mine without delay.”

      “You have nothing to gain by such a foolish move,” I said, composing myself, the realization that the more he taunted me to feel the kiss of fire from his whip, the more compelling my disdain for him became. Which made him desire me more. “You need my fortune to maintain the habits of your bachelorhood.”

      “You leave me no choice but to seek other women since you see fit to deny me my marital rights.”

      “Why should I allow you into my bed when you resort to debauched games to stimulate and tease poor defenseless girls and paid whores?” I challenged him with a directness he’d never faced before, though a chill of fear made my shoulders shake, my fingers stiff, my limbs waver.

      “Man is a hunter,” he said casually, “and I find the pursuit of my prey most enjoyable, whether it be a pretty maid bending over and pulling down her drawers for a caning or the saucy young wife of Sir—exposing her breasts for my pleasure.” (I leave it to you to speculate the identity of the gentlewoman I’ve left unnamed. It will make a delightful afternoon parlor game before tea.)

      “You can’t fool me, James. You fuel your physical needs by unholy acts because you see yourself as only half a man,” I shouted back at him, so angry I was I abandoned the sensitivity I was careful to maintain around him, creating drama where I shouldn’t have, the question of his manhood never before uttered under my breath.

      “Don’t you ever say that to me again. Ever.” His mocking tone was gone, his anger fueled by my rash statement.

      Before I could stop him, he grabbed me by the throat, choking me so I could do nothing but sputter guttural sounds. I panicked, flailing my arms about, light-headedness taking over my power of reasoning. I had touched on something peculiarly vulnerable in him that made him even more dangerous, as if I’d wakened something hostile and vicious in him and intent on hurting me.

      “How I’ve longed to put my hands on you, my dear wife,” he continued, his eyes glowing with a purpose I didn’t understand, “Stroke you, touch you, tease you with maddening caresses until you begged me to strip you naked, then lay the whip upon your quivering buttocks before I fucked you.” He paused, his breathing hard and fast. “Yet I never dreamed how much more I would enjoy holding your life in my hands—”

      He made the statement with an undeniable confidence aligning itself with his malignant behavior. I realized then I was experiencing an intimate moment with my husband, more intimate than the coupling of our nude flesh, his cock probing me, thrusting into me, filling me. He had put away his mask and transformed into a madman in front of me. A frightening, dangerous, pathological man obsessed with controlling me.

      Why, why?

      Would I ever know?

      “You’re…a…fool, James,” I sputtered, knowing I had to make him stop. I choked, spit up phlegm, my chest heaving. To my surprise, he released the pressure on my throat enough for me to gasp a breath.

      “I, a fool?” he said.

      “Yes. If you kill me, you’ll lose everything.”

      “Who said anything about killing you?” he scoffed, his tone arrogant and manipulative. “The night is dark, the winds fierce. My distraught young wife drinks too much wine, loses her footing on the crumbling cliff, crashes below on the jagged rocks.” I looked hard into the night, trying to see his face, but the blackness of his words hid it from me. “Who will dispute the word of Lord Carlton?”

      “You wouldn’t dare…”

      He didn’t answer me, but instead grabbed me again around the neck, his fingers tightening around my throat, then he laughed, a cruel, echoing laugh. Before I could resist, he swept me up into his strong arms, his footing steady, firm. I pummeled his chest with my fists, fearful and scared but not giving in to him.

      “Put me down, James. Now.”

      “Why should I?”

      “You can’t fulfill your lust if I’m dead.”

      He hesitated, then to my relief he set me down, but he continued to hold me tightly around the waist, crushing my face, my breasts against his hard chest. I could smell the sea spray wetting the fine wool of his lapels and hear the beating of his heart. I couldn’t stop a perverse rush of fear taking hold of me when I heard him say, “Our bargain holds, but I promise you this, my dear wife, before this journey concludes, I will bed you.”

      On the carriage ride back to San Francisco, James prattled on about the upcoming sea voyage and how he resolved to ease the boredom by gambling and drinking with his fellow passengers, no doubt losing a goodly sum since he was a poor cardplayer. This time I made no wry comment about his remissness with my father’s money and remained silent, my Irish wit abandoning me as fear gripped me as surely as if I faced the devil himself, so absorbed was I in assimilating his threat into my psyche. I had never been so frightened as when he threatened to throw me over the cliff and onto the rocks below.

      Get ahold of yourself, Katie, me girl, I need you, I could hear Da saying to me as surely as if he rode next to me in the grand carriage, giving me renewed confidence in myself. I vowed I would protect my family’s interests in a strange Oriental culture, but I would never let my guard down around James again. Never. My life depended on it.