Chapter 1
“Tessa. What else did I order?”
Her lips parted.
Daphne’s hand tightened around her phone.
That tiny movement told me the answer lived inside it.
Tessa stared at me as though she were deciding whether the man in front of her was safer than the voice she had heard through a speaker.
That angered me more than the bruise.
“Look at me.”
She did.
“You ordered me not to speak to you.”
The ballroom disappeared.
“What?”
Her breath shook.
“The recording said if I approached you without permission again, Miss Daphne could discipline me however she wanted.”
Daphne stood.
“That is ridiculous.”
I did not look at her.
Tessa continued.
“It said I stole from the wine room.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Then why did you accept punishment?”
Her eyes filled.
“Because it was your voice.”
There.
Simple.
Devastating.
I had spent years building a house where my word ended arguments.
Someone had discovered the obvious weakness in absolute authority.
People obey the voice before they question the source.
“What punishment?”
Tessa pressed her bruised wrist against her apron.
Daphne had made her stand in the cold pantry with both wrists bound together by a service sash for almost an hour.
Non-graphic.
Still cruelty.
For theft that never happened.
My jaw tightened.
Tessa whispered:
“There was another recording yesterday.”
Daphne moved.
I turned then.
One look stopped her.
“What did that one say?”
Tessa’s voice became barely audible.
“That every employee who trusted you more than Miss Daphne should be removed before the wedding.”
Silence.
I finally held out my hand toward Daphne.
“Phone.”
She smiled.
“You don’t seriously believe a maid over your fiancée.”
Wrong calculation.
I spoke more quietly.
“Phone.”
She did not move.
Then from three tables away, my senior house steward stood.
“Boss.”
I looked toward him.
His face was pale.
“I heard one too.”
Then another employee stood.
And another.
May you like
Within thirty seconds, seven people in my own ballroom admitted they had received orders in my voice.
Orders I had never given.
