The Whipping Maid of House Calley - Chapter 137

The moment they collided, he knew. That it was Sheila.

Cedric quickly grabbed the staggering woman’s wrist.

For someone who had only just come of age, Sheila’s body was far too light.

“I-I’m sorry.”

Sheila hurriedly bowed her head.

Since becoming Judith’s maid, Sheila looked worse with each passing day. Where her bright, sparkling light once was, only a desperate will to survive as a maid remained.

Whenever he ran into Sheila, Cedric’s eyes would unconsciously follow her.

It wasn’t enough to explain it as mere responsibility for having placed Judith in her care. When had he ever paid attention to a maid’s circumstances?

As Sheila straightened up and tried to step back to create distance, Cedric suddenly grabbed her wrist.

Then with his other hand, he lifted her chin.

“Ah!”

Sheila’s face was in worse shape than usual.

Her tear-streaked face was swollen red.

There was no need to ask who was responsible.

Cedric examined her closely with burning eyes.

Through the maid uniform, its buttons torn open as if she’d been grabbed by the collar, he could see scratches along her collarbone.

Seeing maids beaten by Judith wasn’t anything new. Even so, at that moment, Cedric was seized by a strange feeling.

It was unfamiliar, and that unfamiliar sensation stirred irritation within him.

At that moment, the maid opened her mouth. Feeling his gaze, she covered the front of her uniform with her hand.

“Th-this is….”

He wanted to hear what she was about to say.

But at the same time, he didn’t want to hear it.

“Get lost.”

He instinctively suppressed the unfamiliar urge to listen to her.

Sheila said, “C-could you please let go of my arm….”

Only then did Cedric realize he was gripping her wrist tighter than necessary.

Startled, he let go.

Sheila staggered again. Seeing the imprint of his hand left on her pale wrist, Cedric’s heart lurched once more.

Only then did Cedric realize what this feeling was.

Desire.

‘No!’

For a moment, Cedric felt his own desire was filthy.

This unfamiliar urge was raw and unrefined, and to Cedric, who was always rational, instinctive impulses felt like something to be suppressed and eliminated.

For a brief moment, a sense of dread even crossed his mind, wondering if he too had inherited his parents’ blood.

Just moments ago, he had been thinking of Bernard and Marisa as vermin, driven by filthy instincts and draining the estate’s finances.

Cedric had always believed that instincts and base emotions had nothing to do with him.

He had always been perfect and coldly rational.

Cedric glared at Sheila with a stiff expression.

Meeting his gaze, Sheila straightened her posture. Watching her do that made Cedric feel dizzy.

“Stay out of my sight as much as possible.”

After saying that unilaterally, Cedric hurried past her.

Inside him, something akin to anger surged.

***

But the problem didn’t end there.

The next morning, after a deep sleep, Cedric felt an unpleasant dampness in his lower body.

Realizing the cause, his brow twisted sharply.

Just before waking, in his dream, he had been riding Sheila like a horse.

Straddling her bare back as she lay face down, he whipped her ass.

The whip in his hand had been his belt.

The amount he released in his first nocturnal emission was so much that Cedric threw the underwear he’d changed into the trash.

While the servants emptied the trash and changed the bedsheets, Cedric trembled with embarrassment and shame.

From that day on, whenever he ran into Sheila, she desperately avoided him as instructed.

Sheila had no idea that even the way she thoroughly obeyed that order aroused him.

Every time he saw her avoid him even from a distance, Cedric felt the urge to control her every move.

Compared to beautiful, high-born ladies, she was infinitely plain and shabby. And yet, she was the only one who caught Cedric’s eye.

That wasn’t all.

He wanted to strip Sheila naked and bind her tightly with rope, and then strike the parts of her skin that stood out between the bindings.

If marks remained on her pale flesh where he struck, it would surely be a sight to behold. Just like when the imprint of his hand remained on her white wrist….

Whenever such thoughts surged uncontrollably, his lower body would swell on its own.

Cedric was utterly bewildered.

He had received sex education long ago. And he knew that the desire he felt was far removed from the ‘normal’ intercourse he had learned about.

Cedric couldn’t accept that part of himself.

He had never walked a path that wasn’t proper, and he considered instinct inferior to cold reason.

But the instinctive desire he felt toward Sheila raged regardless of his self-control. And the fact that this inclination was perverse deepened his despair.

Cedric was confused beyond explanation.

It felt like the person he had known himself to be was no longer him.

At times, he resented Sheila for making him like this, and at others, he trembled with anger toward her.

At that time, with his study abroad approaching, Cedric postponed his engagement after much deliberation and left as scheduled.

And in the course of that life abroad, begun with that confusion, encountering Club Elaina was inevitable.

Cedric quickly established his position within the club as a strong dom.

He thought that if he understood the nature of his desire, he could free himself from the confusion consuming him.

His expectation proved only half true.

Through his activities at the club, Cedric began to accept that there were others who shared desires like his. On the other hand, he was never once free from his desire for Sheila.

In the end, Cedric concluded that he could relieve the desire that had built up by forming a D/S relationship with Sheila.

From that point on, he began to manage Sheila in earnest. Cedric drafted employment contracts for all the staff of House Calley, and he sent a letter to Alfonso, who acted as his right hand, to prevent any strange men from approaching Sheila.

By the time his studies abroad were nearing their end, when he began planning a secret room for Sheila, he was so excited he couldn’t sleep.

Unlike the women he met at the club, Sheila wasn’t a natural submissive but a vanilla, so he needed a different scheme to have her.

And proposing the role of a whipping maid to a maid who cared about money wouldn’t be a bad deal for her either.

He thought simply that he could compensate her with money as much as he exploited her.

Even then, Cedric’s feelings toward Sheila weren’t particularly good.

To him, she was simply someone who brought him confusion. A stone that sent ripples through a once calm lake, a sudden bump that appeared on a smooth road.

Of course, she wasn’t at fault in any way. Cedric knew that as well, but when it came to Sheila, he always strayed far from reason.

Deceiving her and dragging her into the punishment room, taking her as if punishing her, none of it had anything to do with reason.

“At the very least, I plan to endure five or six years in this estate.”

The reason Cedric was able to leave for his studies abroad without worry was because of those words he had happened to overhear. Without knowing what kind of feelings she had when she said them….

Only much later did Cedric realize what kind of story lay behind the words she spoke so calmly to another maid.

***

“Sheila, get up. It’s time for a walk.”

At Molly’s words, Sheila slowly pushed herself up. Then she sat on the edge of the bed and let out a sigh.

At the physician Adriana’s recommendation, she didn’t skip cleaning and a walk once a day.

‘What a bother.’

Everything felt like a bother to Sheila. But she also knew her current state wasn’t normal. And she couldn’t live like this forever.

“Let’s go. At this hour, we won’t run into anyone,” Molly added, knowing Sheila still avoided meeting people.

‘I know. That’s why I’m getting up like this.’

Sheila replied briefly, as if conveying that meaning, “Yeah.”

Sheila stood up.

Sheila felt nothing, like ash that had completely burned out. But whenever her thoughts deepened or she faced someone, irritation rose and everything seemed negative.

At least it wasn’t like that when she was with Molly.

Normally, she would have been overwhelmed with gratitude and guilt toward Molly for taking care of her, but now Sheila depended on her without even feeling those emotions.

At that moment, Cedric entered the attic.

Molly hurriedly greeted the Young Count, and Sheila turned her head away, avoiding him.

He had been coming every night, not even letting her sleep, rambling about how he was wrong and whatever else, yet Cedric hadn’t come to the attic the previous night.

Then again, having even been slapped by a maid, it was no surprise he didn’t come.

Even though he acted unfazed after being slapped, he probably wasn’t actually fine.

After all, he was the arrogant Cedric Calley.

So Sheila didn’t feel particularly disappointed that he hadn’t come.

But why was he here again…?

She found him even more unpleasant to look at today than yesterday, but it wasn’t like she was sulking….

“From today on, I’ll be the one to take you on walks.”