Or for
her
to ignore, it seemed. He’d felt her tense and her heart race the second his erection pressed against her ass. He had to let her know that she was safe, that no matter how aroused he might be, he wasn’t the type to use force to get what he wanted. At least not that kind of force.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he whispered, using the same tone he would use on a skittish horse before battle.
“You already are,” she whispered back, genuine pain clear in her voice.
Frank cursed himself as he realized how tightly he was holding her wrists. She had been struggling so fiercely, he hadn’t realized how rough he’d gotten. Yet another reason to keep himself under tight control. He only trusted himself with a submissive he could depend on to let him know when rough became too rough. Frank had never considered himself an insensitive lover, but being so goddamned big did have its disadvantages. One major downside being that he often truly didn’t know his own strength.
“Listen, I’m sorry,” he began, loosening his grip on her wrists.
“Security!” she screamed again, using his second’s distraction to stomp a deadly looking spike of a heel down in the center of his bare foot. Before he could say “sucker for a lady in distress”, she twisted free and ran across the room to where he knew her panic button was hidden behind a very large, obviously fake potted plant.
Fuck. He hated fake plants almost as much as he hated this job.
“Edna, calm down. Do not press that button,” he ordered. He followed her, trying not to think about the horrible pain radiating up from his wounded foot. He had to hurry and get the situation under control, while there was still a chance he could reason with her and enlist her help. At the bare minimum, he had to force her to put a lid on the hysterics before she ruined his chance to catch the sick fuck who would be here within the hour. “I’m not the bad guy here.”
“Security! I need help!” She paused for a second, listening to static from the tiny speaker. “Hello? Now would be nice, guys. Hello?”
“Edna. I promise you. I’m not the man you have to worry about.” “You’ll excuse me if I don’t believe you. Hello? Kendra? Allison? Hello?”
“I sent your entire staff home and replaced them with my own men. There’s no one out there to hear you who will move a muscle unless they get a direct order from me.”
“Who are you?” she asked, her eyes wide with fear.
“I’m a friend of a friend.” “I don’t have any friends.”
“Damn it, I knew this would happen.” Frank sighed, wishing he had worked harder to convince the queen it was a lousy idea to come here undercover. He was no actor and Edna might be wicked, but she wasn’t a fool. She had smelled a rat, and now he would have to work doubly hard to enlist her aid.
It would have been so much simpler if he had been able to approach her as the Captain of the Queen’s Guard in the first place. Surely she would have gone along with her new monarch’s demands, especially considering Edna still owed Queen Cynthia quite a hefty sum as a result of the lawsuit when Cynthia became an emancipated minor.
But the queen was eighteen, an age of willfulness, and had a taste for the dramatic. She had insisted that Frank go in as one of the Wicked Stepmother’s clients, not letting Edna know that he was there to catch her stalker until the deed was accomplished. Cynthia had wanted to save her stepmother secretly, only revealing her generosity after the fact.
From what he understood, she planned to surprise Edna with a call to the castle to pardon her debt. The queen wanted to put the last two years of bitterness behind them and be a family once more. She had a soft heart, foolishly soft, if you asked him. Frank couldn’t imagine making nice with the woman in front of him if she had put him through the kind of hell she’d put her stepdaughter through.
But then, second chances weren’t his strong point. Never had been, never would be.
If you fucked up once with Frank, you didn’t get the chance to fuck up again.
“Hello, earth to psycho! Are you listening to me?” Edna squeaked, still looking unbelievably beautiful, despite the fact that the last of her infamous cool was long gone.
Cool? The woman was anything but cool. She was smoldering, every inch of her body made for the fucking she supposedly didn’t do here in her parlor. She was a
Mistress in name only, and made it clear up front that she didn’t offer any sexual favors beyond the adoration of her perfectly shaped feet. A shame, that.
She was all legs and curves and the face of an angel, with lips that promised the sweetest type of sin. From the second she’d opened her mouth, all Frank could think about was watching those deep ruby lips sliding down over his cock. He wanted to see her lipstick smeared along his rock-hard arousal, testimony to how eagerly she had set about sucking him. He would let her set the pace, but in the end his hand would be fisted in her hair, her neck arched backward, taking the full force of his thrusts and loving every minute of it.
She
would
love every minute, he was certain of it. Even the way she called him a psycho sounded like an invitation to bend her over and fuck her against the nearest piece of furniture, to take control of her sexually and give her the freedom of complete sensual abandon. He wanted to give that to her, god help him, he did, no matter what she’d been accused of in the past.
She was ripe for the kind of night he hadn’t had in far too long. It would be almost too easy to convince her to step over to the other side of the game. By the time he’d bound her to that four-poster in the corner and used his mouth to show her how generously he rewarded his pussy for her trust, she would never go back.
How he was supposed to keep his mind on the job at hand with that kind of temptation thickening his cock to the point of pain, Frank honestly had no idea.
“Fine, if you’re just going to stand there, then—”
“Will you shut the hell up?” he asked, crossing the room. She met him with a vicious kick with one of the lethal weapons she was passing off as shoes.
“These are going to throw off your spinal alignment,” Frank said, easily catching one of her slender ankles in his hand, noticing as he did that her feet were indeed lovely. If he’d been the foot fetish type he would have been totally enthralled. Hell, he was already enthralled and she wasn’t even an out-of-the-closet submissive. “Not to mention give you killer back pain.”
“I’m going to give you killer ball pain,” she muttered, kicking with her other foot and managing to hit her target before her entire upper body crashed to the floor.
“You really are insane.” Frank groaned and clutched at his aching balls, but held tight to her ankle with the other hand.
Despite the pain that radiated through his crotch, he had to give the woman credit. Not only had she surprised him, she had taken a major fall to deliver that kick. She was still flailing about, kicking like mad, though her left arm looked to be in more than a spot of pain.
“Stop it right now. I’m not your stalker. I work for the queen and I’m here to help you.”
“The queen?” she asked, paling visibly. “Yes. Now could you give my balls a rest?”
“
She’s
the one who’s been sending the letters?”
“That’s a ridiculous question.” Frank released her ankle when she lay still, but not without a hint of reluctance. He liked touching this woman, liked it far too much.
“Right. Why would she go to the trouble of stalking me when she could just have me killed while I sleep?” she muttered to herself.
“How’s your arm?” He reached toward her, determined to ignore her last comment. Whatever quarrel she had with the queen, he was staying out of it. No good ever came from meddling in women’s arguments.
“Don’t touch me,” she said, pulling away from him. “I don’t need your help, if that’s really why you’re here. I don’t need
her
help either, and you can tell her that yourself.”
“The queen is concerned for your safety. You would be wise to be gracious and accept her help.”
“Why does everything you say make me feel like a kid who doesn’t know what’s best for me?” she asked, her face telegraphing loud and clear that the more burning question was—why did she like it so much?
“I’m not trying to make you feel like a child, I’m trying to convince you to see sense and let me help you. We both know you’re not a child, Edna.” He met her eyes and a shiver of recognition passed between them, thickening his cock and once again making her nipples visible through the leather she wore.
Damn, he wanted to tug on that thing until her full breasts spilled from the top, wanted to cup her in his hands, tease her already tightened tips with his tongue. He wanted to make her beg for him to fuck her, and then he wanted to lick her, suck her, bite her until she begged for more. Every cell in his body was cursing his lack of theatrical skills. If he’d been a better actor, maybe his earlier attempt at seduction would have worked and they would be in bed right now, waiting for the sicko to show up.
He could stake out the room as well from the bed as anywhere else, and he was the type of man who would do anything to get the job done. He’d crawled through uninhabitable wastelands and fought enemy armies when there seemed to be no chance at victory. If he had to take one for the crown by taking this woman to his bed…well, it was a sacrifice he’d be willing to make. He could use a little pleasure right about now.
She looked like she could use a little pleasure as well. No matter that she’d brought her misfortune on herself, he still hated to see that hint of despair in her eyes. He wanted to wipe it away and replace it with lust, nothing but pure, desperate, healthy lust.
“Stop looking at me like that,” she said, her breath coming fast between her parted lips.
“I can’t help it. You’re a beautiful woman.”
“I’m the woman who tormented your queen, doesn’t that turn you off?”
“Everyone makes mistakes. But I don’t really care about your mistakes, one way or the other. I’d just like to make you come.”
“Come?” He might have laughed at how wide her eyes grew, if she hadn’t simultaneously dropped an unconscious hand down to hover over her mound. She was hot, all right, hot and primed for him. He was willing to bet half his annual pension that her pussy would be wet if he slid his hand down the front of her shorts.
“I didn’t do those things she said I did,” she suddenly blurted out. “What?”
“I don’t expect you to believe me. No one believed me. That’s why she’s sleeping in the castle and I’m down here whipping people with a riding crop.”
“You made a choice to do this work, Edna, no one put a gun to your head.” Not the conversation he’d assumed they’d be having, but he wasn’t the type to support playing the victim. You were only a victim if you allowed yourself to be one, and Edna was too strong to let her mind be clouded with that kind of crap.
“Try finding decent employment when the new queen says you used to beat her and lock her in the basement for weeks at a time.”
“You’re saying you didn’t?” “Of course not.”
“Why would she lie?”
“I don’t know. Because she hated that her father loved me? Because she hated me for living after her father died? It was fairly normal stepparent-stepchild stuff. She was a teenager and she hated me for everything and nothing at all. I had no idea she’d take things as far as she did.”
Frank didn’t know what to say to that. She looked so forlorn, so completely hopeless. Hers wasn’t the face of a woman who was trying to spin lies for her own purposes—it was the face of a woman who had told the truth and had the truth fail her. And now she was trying to get by on small deceptions, like pretending she was a Domme when she was the furthest thing from it, or pretending she wasn’t aching for someone to hold her and tell her that everything was going to be okay.
He had to fight with everything in him to keep from going to her and giving her the arms she needed. No matter how much he wanted to be there for this stranger, he had a prior commitment to the very woman who she claimed had wronged her. Edna read his decision on his face and made a small attempt at a smile.
“It’s fine, I didn’t expect you to give me a chance. But will you please leave now? And take your friends with you. I can take care of myself, I’ve been doing it for a long time.”
Her knees buckled as she sat down hard on the red couch in the center of the room, deflated, and he knew she’d risked more than she would admit when she’d told him her side of the story. She’d given up hope, it was clear in her eyes, but for one second she’d thought that maybe, just maybe, she’d found a friend. It cut him up inside to see that hope destroyed, and to know that he was the man responsible.
“Edna—”
“Please, just go.” She dropped her head into her hands and her long, honey-brown hair spilled over her shoulders, all the way to the floor, looking as soft as it felt.
Frank’s cock began to throb as he remembered the satin of her hair against his chest when he’d held her close. He wanted to hold her again more than he wanted to take his next breath. Even more, he wanted to watch her hair swirl around her shoulders as she rode his cock, wanted to watch her skin flush with pleasure, hear her moan as her pussy gripped him in its slick sheath. He wanted to fist his hand in that silky mane of hers and bring her close for a kiss, then roll her over and get to work showing her how swiftly he could make her come again, this time with him on top.
“I believe you.” The words were out of his mouth before he really knew what he was saying.
Did
he believe her? Maybe, maybe not. But he needed to get her to accept his help, he knew that without a doubt. He wanted her too much to leave her alone with a madman on the way, no matter what she thought she could handle.
“You do?” she said, lifting a shocked face to his. Frank watched as a single tear slid down her cheek.
“Now don’t start that again.” The words were hard, but he knew the way he was looking at her was anything but. His own throat was actually a little tight, and he couldn’t stop his feet from moving toward her. They had a little time left and he was going to use it to take away her pain, at least for a little while.