Revealed (11 page)

“Anything,” she whispered.

Rex gave a dry laugh. “Tell me what you would do to convince me to believe you.”

“Anything,” she repeated, her voice catching with a vulnerability he loved.

“I don’t believe you.” Rex leaned his hips on the desk and watched her. He wished he wasn’t so tempted by those breasts. He wished he wasn’t too angry to trust himself to discipline Amy the way she deserved.

But it had to be done, and immediately.

Which meant the discipline had to be delegated.

Amy opened her mouth and shut it again, evidently realizing that she didn’t have permission to speak. That was an improvement.

“I’ll give you a chance to prove it to me, though,” he said and she watched him with suspicion. “Crawl here, and beg me to give you to Rick.”

Her shock was tangible.

Rex let her worry about that for a moment. He went around the desk and took a sip of coffee he didn’t want. When he turned back to face her, her consternation was clear and her face was flushed.

“I don’t see you crawling or hear you begging,” he noted. “Do you have a question, Amy?”

“You’d give me away to be disciplined?”

“Yes, because I think you want to be punished, and that you expect the punishment to be inflicted by me.” He shrugged. “As a submissive, you are a participant, but you’re not in control. This game isn’t yours to arrange. That’s a lesson you need to learn.”

Her eyes flashed, but he lifted a warning finger. “You do
not
have permission to speak. If you defy me now, you will get more of what you don’t want.”

She shut her mouth and glared at him.

Rex pointed to the floor. “Crawl here and beg me to give you to Rick.”

Amy took a breath, looked away, glared at him again.

“You’ve just doubled the duration of your punishment.”

She gasped in outrage, but still didn’t move. She did, however, bite back whatever she wanted to say to him.

“I assume you have another objection to make,” he said, cutting her some slack because she was trying to control herself.

“It won’t be an adventure, not the kind I’m seeking,” she said. “He’s just like Eric.”

“Rick isn’t just like Eric, but there’s certainly similarity in his tastes,” Rex acknowledged. “He likes to overwhelm his submissives and take them captive. He likes to bind them tightly and forbid them to orgasm. He likes to compel them to pleasure him over and over again, while he keeps them frustrated. When they inevitably lose control, he punishes their disobedience severely.”

“Sounds familiar,” Amy said through her teeth.

“And that’s the point,” Rex said, once again allowing her defiance. “You walked away from that kind of power balance. I don’t blame you. It’s simplistic and doesn’t begin to explore the nuances of domination and submission. What you did last night showed your experience clearly.”

She was listening intently, but she shook her head slightly, not understanding him.

“It was about power. It was about overtaking your victim and forcibly having what you wanted. That’s the impulse behind rape and every act of violence known to mankind. A good dominant and submissive relationship is much more complicated and nuanced. As a result, it’s more intelligent and more thrilling.”

Rex knew he had her undivided attention. “I could teach you that.” He shrugged and settled into the wing chair Athena favored. “You decided against the simple play of power and chose to come here. That was a promising sign, but last night you took a big step back. I’m not sure you should stay.”

Her face fell.

“Unless you prove your submission to me by choosing that simplistic role-playing again, even knowing what it will be like,
especially
knowing what it will be like. In so asking for what you know I want to give you, you will learn more about complicity.”

Her eyes narrowed slightly.

“If you choose to do it, I want you to remember throughout your time with Rick how you asked for it, how you entreated me to give you to him, and how you insisted that only this punishment would do.”

Confusion lit her eyes. “But I didn’t.”

“Not yet.” Rex glanced at his watch. “You’d better get started. You have a lot of begging to do before I even consider giving you another chance.” He leaned back in the chair, sipped his coffee and waited. “Of course, you could use your safe word and just walk out the door.”

“Forever,” she said through gritted teeth.

“Forever,” Rex agreed.

He was very proud of his new submission. It took Amy less than five seconds to cede the battle, and crawl across the floor. She laid her cheek against his foot, left her still-pink butt up in the air, and began to beg very earnestly to be given to Rick.

Rex smiled and sipped his coffee, letting her work for it.

When his coffee was gone, she was hoarse from her entreaties. “Very good,” he said and kissed her forehead. “Now go and tell Rick that he has permission to use you as he sees fit until Athena returns.”

She looked at him with surprise.

“Hurry or I’ll make it longer.”

Rex watched her butt as she hurried across the floor, liking very much that he’d found the perfect way to motivate the delicious Amy. He reached for her laptop, thinking he’d review those believed-lost pictures of Joanna, then caught himself. Instead, he turned on his camera and reviewed the pictures he’d taken of Amy in the past couple of days.

There was no doubt in his mind—that audacity meant she’d easily be able to obliterate her sister from his memory.

If he let her.

Instead, he needed to concentrate on his relationship with Michelle. He checked the time and decided to call her.

* * *

The limo stopped at the small terminal at the heliport and Athena spotted him immediately. Of course, there was no one else in the small terminal other than the man stocking the vending machine. He wore a hat pulled down low and had his back toward her. He stood then spared the slightest glance over his shoulder at the idling car, before returning to his work.

Athena would have recognized that butt anywhere.

It took her only a second to make a plan. The simple truth was that the best and easiest way to find the Count was to befriend the hunters he had set upon her.

She had, after all, never had any use for subtlety.

Her chauffeur opened the door and she shivered a little at the bite of the wind. “Please take my luggage for me, Rafe. I’ll be there in just a moment.” Athena didn’t wait for his reply, but swept out of the vehicle and strode toward the man she had already come to call the Lone Wolf.

He made no indication that he was aware of her, but Athena could feel the prickle of his attention. The small room could have been filled with an electrical charge. She stood behind him, as if considering the chocolate bars offered for sale. He didn’t turn around, continuing to organize inventory in his carrying case. She dropped a pound coin deliberately so that it fell right in front of him.

“Oh, how clumsy of me,” she said softly.

He showed the tiniest moment of hesitation. Athena found that deliciously revealing. Then he picked up the coin and offered it to her, the brim of his hat keeping his eyes hidden from her.

He had a wonderful mouth, though. Firm lips. Sensuous. Possibly a dimple if and when he smiled.

And a subtle vertical cleft in his chin.

“Thank you,” she said, accepting the coin, then grasped his hand with her gloved fingers. He looked up, only a glimpse, and she smiled into those eyes.

So pale a blue that they were almost silver. Again, she was reminded of a wolf.

He dropped his gaze and turned back to his work.

“Budget cuts?” she asked mildly, then let the silence hang between them. “It must be budget cuts,” she repeated, then sighed.

“Are you speaking to me, madam?” he asked, as if unable to imagine it were so. His Irish accent was feigned, but not badly done. Someone less observant than Athena—or less focused—might not have noticed the slight inconsistency in his vowels.

The Midwest was there, lingering like a shadow behind his words.

“Well, I’m not speaking to the machine,” she said with humor in her tone. “If I was, I should say something entirely different. I should ask it why every single confection offered for sale is so very sweet. It’s foolish, you know, to fixate one’s taste upon a single possibility. If one only tastes sweet, then sweet loses its appeal.”

“Really?” he said, the word almost an exhalation.

“Really. My partner likes to wax eloquent about contrast and nuance, and while I don’t share his enthusiasm for intellectualizing sensation, he has a point. Sweet becomes less pleasurable if there’s no bitter or tart to contrast against it. A good piece of bittersweet chocolate at intervals, one perhaps filled with a ganache glorious enough to stop your heart, and milk chocolate with caramel tastes all the more luscious.”

He spared her a considering look. “I will pass along the suggestion, madam.”

Athena held his gaze. “If I were talking to you, however, I would not that there must be jurisdiction issues.”

“I don’t understand…”

“Of course you do,” Athena interrupted. “Isn’t it basic spy craft that people are more readily recognized from behind? I should have to be much less observant than I am to have failed to realize that you passed me in front of my home not two hours ago, albeit without the uniform. That you should be here, where I’ve arranged my flight, is beyond the possibility of coincidence.”

He remained crouched before her but watched her features with care.

“Yet you are American, or I am a crumpet.”

A fleeting smile curved his lips, all the more enticing for its brevity. “Is that a crime?”

“No, but it does raise the issue of jurisdiction, since I’ve learned that some legal authority is trying to discern the details of my business. I’m not stupid and neither are you.” She leaned down and heard him catch his breath in a most satisfactory manner. “And I don’t want my government wasting money in the pursuit of law-abiding taxpayers.”

His eyes narrowed. He packed up his case and stood to leave.

Athena put her hand on his arm and he froze. “Our goals aren’t that different,” she said quietly. “You want inside. I want to prove our innocence. There’s a very simple way to accomplish both.”

He said nothing, simply fixed his silver gaze upon her.

Oh, he was something special.

“I find I have a need for a personal assistant. That individual will have to apply to the club like anyone else, and make a good argument for his skills.”

His tone was wary. “A
personal
assistant?”

“Extremely personal,” Athena clarified. “We have a rigorous application process at The Phoenix, including a number of contracts to be signed and medical qualifications to be fulfilled. It’s not easy to get a job with me, although it does have its reward.” His gaze flicked to hers again, and away. “But if you think about it, such a role would be the only way to be truly sure of what was going on.”

He was thinking about it.

She would fantasize about it.

Athena spun away from him, pausing only for a final comment. “In the meantime, let me make your surveillance task easier. I’ll be back in five days, at roughly the same time. In the outside chance that we are going to be working together, I’ll be able to offer you a ride back to the house.”

She strode away, knowing his gaze was fixed upon her and liking it a lot.

Let Rex be the one who planned and schemed behind the scenes, who calculated risk and moved with caution. Athena was his opposite in that, charging into the midst of conflict and throwing caution to the winds each time.

In truth, it was the only time she felt fully alive.

She was tingling with anticipation in this moment, and it wasn’t just about the preparations at Windswept. He stayed at the terminal, watching as the helicopter lifted into the air. Athena didn’t wave, even though she knew he could see her.

It would do her Lone Wolf good to worry a bit about his application.

* * *

The next erotic novella in The Phoenix Series is

Harnessed