Underground

3

I stirred hearing voices over me. Female voices. My eyes fluttered open and I saw two females dressed in short Chinese styled dresses each having a black dragon on them. I sat up in the bed and they just stared at me. Wait...bed?! I looked around the cream colored room and literally drooled over its design. The room was big enough to fit a whole family.

"You're awake."

I looked at the door way to see Duchess standing there and wave the two women away. Behind her was a butler who was pushing in a cart loaded with food. She headed straight for the balcony and I silently got out of the bed, following them. "Who were those men that attacked me? Where am I? What do you want?" I flung question after question at her and she just sat down in one of the chairs at the table and looked up at me.
"How about you sit and I answer your questions one at a time?" She suggested with an eyebrow raised.

I reluctantly obeyed and then looked over the balcony ledge. From where this room was, it had a beautiful view of a garden that stretched far to a meadow and then a lake as clear as the sky. It was quiet and peaceful. "This is Dragon's Keep?" I asked in a whisper.
Duchess looked over the grounds and smiled. "Yes. A sight isn't it?" She nodded to her butler who started serving the tea.

"Today for lunch we have grilled salmon accompanied by Japanese white rice and biscuits to compliment the tea," he said confidently as he poured the tea. Duchess nodded

"Is his name Sebastian?" I asked smiling at myself.

"How did you know?" Seriously?!

Duchess picked up her cup and stared at me. "I've had my men watching you, Justine. You aren't much of a social bird. You work long hours at the café and after that you return to that dump of a motel—"

"Hey—!"

"—Moreover, anything I wanted to know about you I was able to ask from anyone that came into contact with you," she continued without acknowledging what I said. "You moved here when you were eighteen...attended South Thames college until you could no longer pay tuition. You were homeless for a year before Clara Peters allowed you to stay at her motel as a tenant with monthly rent. In that same year, Steven offered you a job and you've worked for him for three years. Have I missed anything?"

Bitch. She knows damn near everything about me. "Why do you know all of that?" I hissed.

"I come from a very wealthy and influential family. All of London knows of me and when I want to know something I will," she said as if this was something I should have known. "Why didn't you go back to New York?"

I stared at her. "I didn't want to."

"Why?"

"I ran away."

"Why?"

I took a deep breath and looked at my hands. "I wanted more than my old life had to offer. My mother wanted me to be a doctor or lawyer...I wanted a life in the arts," I whispered. I knew Duchess heard me because she told Sebastian to serve the food. I felt exposed to her and I didn't like it. She was just some aristocratic bitch who wanted to feel better than me.

"I have an offer for you."

Say wha?

"You can stay here. In this room, in this mansion with me and I will be your mentor and patron," she continued. "I will show you the ways of the aristocratic world and in return you will do something for me."

I was so caught up by what she was saying I didn't bother to look at my food. "My mentor and patron?"

"You want to go to college, right? I will pay your tuition," she said cutting into her food. I held my hands up. "Wait! You are going to spend money on me? Why? What for?!" I asked in disbelief.