She covered her face with her hands and struggled to draw long, even breaths, to surface from the despair that threatened to level her where she stood.
“It’s only been ten minutes,” the man said. She heard him rising to his feet, could feel the surge of energy as he let his powerful presence fill the room.
“Please, you need to leave,” she whispered again, keeping her back to him, not trusting her voice or her face not to give her away. She felt about ten seconds from an emotional breakdown and she couldn’t allow that to happen in front of a client.
Business was already slow. If word got out that the Wicked Stepmother had broken down and cried like a baby after failing to dominate a submissive… Well, she could handle being poor, but jail was not an appealing destination, especially not the jail that Cindy would no doubt find for her.
Her dear stepdaughter would throw her in the deepest, darkest prison in the entire kingdom the second Edna failed to make one of her restitution payments. She’d barely met last month’s deadline and was still five hundred dollars short this month. She had to keep it together and make sure her regular slaves kept coming to visit, bringing their money with them.
“If you stop by the front desk, I’ll make sure they refund your donation.” “Listen, you don’t have to do that. I think we can still—”
“No, we can’t. It didn’t work out, it happens. Just take your money and go.” “I thought you could use the business,” he said.
“I don’t care about the business. I need you to go. Now.”
Edna tried to make her voice icy, distant, and struggled to conceal the panic that made it increasingly harder to breathe. She had dropped her persona and now she didn’t know if she could get it back. She felt exposed in a way that had nothing to do with her barely there leather hot pants. She needed him to leave, needed some time alone to rebuild the Wicked Stepmother from the ground up before her midnight appointment.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he said stubbornly.
“Please,” she begged, feeling tears start to slide down her cheeks though she willed her shoulders not to shake. “Just go.”
“Throw me out,” he said. “Come on, Edna, you’ve got a reputation for eating men alive.”
She didn’t say anything in response, just squeezed her eyes closed and silently begged for him to leave, or for the floor to open up and swallow her whole. Either one would satisfy at this point.
“But maybe you’ve bitten off more than you can chew,” he added, the slight taunt in his voice finally pushing her over the edge.
“You’re right, I have. Is that what you want to hear? Is that what I have to say to make you go?” Edna spun around to face him, ashamed and defeated, not even bothering to wipe away the tears that were no doubt making long black trails down her face.
She never wore waterproof mascara, didn’t believe in it. She was the Wicked Stepmother. She had a heart of stone, didn’t even know how to cry. The only time water ran down her face was in the shower.
Edna let a little laugh escape between her sobs as she looked at the man in front of her. If she had to lose it in front of someone, he wasn’t a bad choice. At least people might cut her a little slack. It would take a hell of a dominatrix to take care of Big Baldy, as she’d dubbed him when he first walked in the door. She had hoped the nickname would help her take him a little less seriously.
No such luck.
Seeing him standing, she’d guess he was at least six-foot-four and weighed in at double her own weight. His head was completely shaved, but his impressively muscled chest and tree trunk legs sported a healthy growth of coarse, reddish-brown hair, a testament to the testosterone no doubt surging through his body. Big Baldy was imposing all the way around, from his huge hands to his ice-blue eyes to the way his bare toes curled into the carpet. Even the cream loincloth the girls at the front desk had given him couldn’t make him look the slightest bit ridiculous.
Instead, the damn thing just allowed him to showcase the perfection of his body. He was composed of pure muscle, with a chiseled face as striking as the rest of him. He was a damn attractive man, more attractive than any lover she’d ever had. He probably had a different woman in his bed every night, all more than willing to fulfill his desires free of charge.
But it wasn’t his physical presence or stud factor alone that cowed her. She knew better than that. It was the commanding air that filled his voice, radiated all around him. It had intimidated and aroused her from the second she met his eyes. He was the only true dominant in this room, and they both knew it. What’s worse, she wanted him, and they both knew that too. Her own traitorous libido had worked against her as much as his reluctance to take her attempts at control seriously.
try.
She was an idiot to have thought she could top him, to even have had the guts to
“Listen, I—”
“You’re crying,” Baldy said, his voice and eyes as soft as the rest of him was imposing.
“Yes, I am.” His unexpected compassion only made her want to sob harder. Goddamn Baldy, why did he have to choose this moment to play nice? Niceness got to her like nothing else. It was so much easier to keep up her tough girl act when the man she was dominating treated her like an object. When she was just a woman with a dangerous reputation whom her client would have liked to fuck if she allowed the Mistress role to go that far.
Compassion was the one emotion she’d never seen on a client’s face, and it made her want to run to Baldy and fall into his arms, to take comfort in his strength. She would gladly take whatever punishment, sensual or otherwise, he would dish out if he would hold her afterwards. In fact, her fantasy of being bent over and fucked from behind only became more attractive when she imagined him cradling her in his lap after they were done, kissing away her tears as she sobbed into his chest.
Maybe there, wrapped in his heat, she might finally feel safe for the first time in years.
Fuck, Edna. Get rid of this man before you do something really stupid.
“You win, okay? You’re right, I’m a complete fraud,” Edna said. Tears flowed freely down her face and her nose began to run. “Now will you go?”
“Don’t cry. We can work through this,” he said with that same commanding tone, but with a softer edge to his words. He reminded her of her high school track coach delivering a pep talk to the relay team. Just what she needed, a dominatrix pep talk.
The entire situation was so absurd that she started laugh-crying again, making a ton of unfeminine and un-dominatrix-like snorting noises that should have scared Baldy away if nothing else had already. Not only was she a fraud, she was a completely un-sexy fraud who snorted when she cried. Could she be more undesirable?
Better yet, why was she concerned with being desirable to a man she wanted out of her presence as soon as possible?
“You just need to take a few deep breaths,” he continued, crossing toward her with slow, measured steps that quickly banished her laughter.
She suddenly felt hunted, despite his kind words. The way he stalked toward her, eyes taking in every inch of her bare skin, should have been sufficient reminder that this was no track coach. This was a man who looked like he killed for a living and hunted for sport. The killing part was just plain scary. Unfortunately, her traitorous body liked the idea of being Baldy’s prey, liked it way too much.
“Think about a nice, safe, quiet place and imagine yourself there. Now start breathing more slowly, breathe in the air of that safe place.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me, Baldy,” Edna said, trying to laugh but failing miserably. She could hardly breathe with him this close, let alone laugh. His heat warmed the front of her body and her nipples tightened again as she imagined being pressed flat against him, her bare breasts smashed against his strong chest.
“Baldy?” His mouth quirked at the edges again, but his eyes didn’t hold the slightest hint of humor. Instead, they smoldered, boring into hers, telegraphing an invitation that was clearly sexual in nature.
“Do you prefer Big Baldy?” “I prefer Frank,” he said.
“Well okay, Frank, but…I…uh…” Edna’s breath hitched and her words fled when Frank reached out and let one finger trail down the side of her corset. Idly, casually, he stroked her ribs and moved down toward the curve of her waist. Even with that simple touch, he conveyed a sense of ownership, and Edna had to admit that it felt right for him to touch her, to think of herself as his to do with what he would.
“Yes?” he prompted. His fingers curled possessively around her hip and pulled her a little closer. A few more inches and they would touch, and she would know if he was one-tenth as aroused as she was quickly becoming.
“I have a rule—if I know your name, I can’t play with you.”
“Okay, but what about
me
playing with
you
?” His fingers tightened, pressing into the flesh of her hip with enough force to hurt a little, and to make her pussy gush wet heat onto her already ruined panties.
“You have to go,” she whispered, the husky tone in her voice sounding like an invitation to stay, even to her own ears. But she couldn’t indulge whatever madness was making her want the man in front of her. She’d never crossed the line with a client and wasn’t about to start now. She didn’t get paid for sex, she wasn’t a prostitute, and that distinction was very important to her.
“You really want me to leave?” He dipped his head to whisper the words into her ear. Edna felt her eyes close and a small moan escape from her parted lips. This wasn’t fair. He shouldn’t be able to seduce her so easily. Where was her pride? “I have a hard time believing you when I can see your nipples through that leather thing you’re wearing. Why are your nipples so hard, Edna?”
“It’s cold in here.”
“Is it?” He laughed, and she shivered. “I’m not cold. Maybe I can warm you—” “Goodbye.” Edna turned to leave, determined to prove, at least to herself, that she
wasn’t completely at the mercy of her frustrated libido.
“Wait,” he said. This time he snagged her elbow in his powerful hand.
“Let go of me,” she said, pulling at her arm, not at all surprised when he didn’t loosen his hold in the slightest.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t.”
“I’m having déjà vu here, Frank.” “I’m sorry about that. I hate déjà vu.” “Me too, so let me go.”
“Can’t do that,” he said, his eyes becoming shuttered, unreadable ice-blue pools that chilled her all over. How had she ever thought he was remotely nice?
“Who are you?” she asked, beginning to feel that tickle of fear once more. “I told you, I’m Frank,” he said, his face still almost entirely expressionless.
“Oh my god, it’s you,” she whispered, realization dawning a few seconds too late. “Now, Edna, Emily, whichever you’re going by today, just calm down.”
The shock of hearing her middle name on his lips made her inhale sharply. The creep who had been writing her those horrible letters had always called her Emily. Not to mention only a few people in the world even
knew
her middle name.
There was no doubt about it now, it was him all right. The sick fuck had gotten past her staff and managed to get alone with her. Now he’d no doubt do what he had threatened to do in all those letters—those hateful, psychotic letters that had made the last three months of her life a living hell.
And to think she had actually been attracted to him. Attracted to a certifiable psychopath. She was going to have to get some help—if she survived the night.
“Help!” she screamed, clawing at his arm as she tried to tear herself out of his grip. “Security! Security!”
“Stop it!” he said, quickly capturing both her hands and spinning her into him. Soon her arms were wrapped across her chest and the massive bulk of his body was glued against her back in one long stretch of unyielding flesh. Edna felt her body tense even further as the long, thick shaft of his aroused cock pressed between the cheeks of her ass. Frank was turned on by their struggle, no doubt about it.
Now, however, her previous image of being forced to take his thickness into her unprepared body didn’t seem nearly as appealing.
Edna struggled, she stomped her feet, trying to aim a well-placed high heel in the center of his bare foot, but nothing worked. He anticipated every move, breathing heavily in her ear as he continued to hold her, immobilize her, overpower her in every way. In a last-ditch effort, Edna dropped her head to his arm, sinking her teeth in deep enough to draw his blood a second time, but the man was obviously not made of mere flesh and bone. Once again, he didn’t even flinch.
But he did bend his mouth even closer to her ear and proceed to speak in the most frightening whisper she’d ever heard.
“If you want to live, I highly suggest you stop fighting me, sweetheart. And shut.
The. Hell. Up.”
The woman the entire kingdom knew as the Wicked Stepmother trembled in his arms like a scared little girl, though she didn’t start to cry again. Thank god.
When she’d turned from the window with tears in those big brown eyes and black streaks trailing down her cheeks, she had looked so goddamned vulnerable. For a second there, Frank had actually questioned his ability to complete the mission. He was the Captain of the Queen’s Guard, but he wasn’t equipped for an adversary like this one. He dealt with soldiers, with battles, not with women.
Of the three, the female of the species was by far the most terrifying.
They were entirely unpredictable, wildly changeable, with the disturbing tendency to say one thing and mean another. Edna was a prime example. She said all the right “dominant” words, but every breath, every movement, every spark of heat in her fuck-me brown eyes begged for him to take her. The last thing he had expected on this job was to run into a willing submissive, let alone be tempted to take her up on the unspoken offer.
But he didn’t play with women who didn’t truly understand the lifestyle, and it was more than obvious Edna did not. How she’d managed to fool anyone into thinking she was a Domme was beyond him. She was one of the least dominant females he’d met in years, a fact that gave him a raging hard-on that was impossible for him to ignore.