Decadent Master (16 page)

D
ierk looked at the clock for the tenth time in the last hour. It seemed like every morning Olivia was returning home later and later, yesterday barely making it back before sunrise.

He was not jealous. He was not angry. But he was a little worried. With his venom pumping through her veins, exposure to sunlight would cost her a great price. She wouldn’t be destroyed like he would, but she would suffer some side effects, none of them pleasant.

The lock rattled. The doorknob twisted.

He could go to bed now. She was home. He started for the stairs. She looked rumpled, a satisfied smile lighting her face.

She was freshly fucked.

Saying nothing, he turned and continued up the stairs.

He supposed she was disappointed in his reaction, or rather, his lack of a reaction. Even though she didn’t love him, he knew she still wished to know he noticed and cared about her on some level.

He did. Just not on the level he would if she were another woman. A very special woman.

Still, this new arrangement they had agreed upon, which was only a slight adjustment to the first—a fact for which he was grateful—would suit them both. They would live together from this point on, but even after they married, they would not share a bed. She could fuck any man she liked. And Dierk would take any submissive he liked. There would be, however, and could be no lovers, no affairs that involved emotional commitments or feelings. That was the line they agreed would not be crossed.

On the surface, it seemed fair enough. They each had satisfied their obligation to one another. In time, he expected it would be good enough.

Olivia followed him, pausing at her bedroom door.

He glanced back at her.

As usual, her hair was a mass of tangled waves, and her makeup, usually perfect, was smudged around her mouth and eyes. Her clothes were hanging from her body but they weren’t fastened, revealing slivers of skin and black lacy underclothes beneath.

To the average man, he supposed she looked sexy, with those kiss-swollen lips and come-hither eyes. But to him, she looked used and tired and a little sad, and he realized then that maybe this arrangement wasn’t enough for her either, that fulfilling an obligation was worse than the consequences of failing.

“Hello, sweetheart,” she slurred. “Still awake, I see.”

“I am. Would you like a drink before retiring?”

“Sure, why not?”

They headed back downstairs together. She accepted a glass of Guignolet, a cherry liqueur she developed a taste for while living in France, and sat on the couch. He poured himself a scotch and sat across from her, in an armchair.

She took a sip from her glass and set it down. “Do you suppose we’ve delayed the inevitable long enough?”

“It seems,” he agreed, fully aware of where this conversation was leading. There couldn’t be another reason for her coming to him now.

“Every year, you propose we get married, and every year, I ask you to give me more time.” She leaned back, curled the fingers of her right hand over the arm of the couch. “This year I will not ask you that.”

“Then you’re ready to set a date for our wedding?”

“Oh, I didn’t say that.” Olivia stood, and confused, he watched as she finished the rest of her glass then walked to the bar to refill it. Once she returned to her seat, she continued, “It has been a very long time since you met me and so much has changed. Thanks to you, I’m not the frightened, destitute young girl I once was. I’ve gained wealth, power, and a great deal of wisdom since then. Who wouldn’t, after living for over two hundred years?” She chuckled, emptied her glass for the second time, and set it on the table. “You proposed out of a sense of duty, and I respect you for it, and for the many kindnesses you’ve shown me all this time, but I am ready now to reclaim my mortality and make my own choices.” She stood again, nodded. “There, I’ve said it, and I feel so much better. I didn’t think I would ever find the courage.”

Shocked, he immediately rose to his feet. He didn’t dare believe he was free. It would be too wonderful. “Olivia, are you sure? I won’t turn my back on you if you need my support, and the thought of your growing old—”

Olivia pressed her hand to his mouth. “Please, Dierk. Your venom has allowed me to outlive my sisters’ children, their children, and the children of their children. I’ve watched everyone around me grow from mewling infants to frail old men and women. And I’ve waited all that time for the one thing you have denied me: your love.”

“Olivia—”

“No. Don’t say it.” She turned from him. “I know you love me, as a brother does a sister.” When she faced him again, her lip was quivering, her hands trembling. “But that wasn’t what I wanted, what I craved.” She took his hand in hers. “Try to understand. I want true passion, a love that cannot be suppressed for fear it might destroy me if I hold it back. That kind of love I will never share with you, especially now that I’ve seen you feel it for another.”

“Seen? You couldn’t have seen anything, because I have done—”

“Please, Dierk.” She released his hand. “This is the time for truths. Don’t lie to yourself now.”

He stared into her eyes. They were dear eyes, and he saw so much in them. Respect. Appreciation. Gratitude. And encouragement. They belonged to a very dear and trusted friend and a woman who had once needed him so desperately, she’d been happy to accept a loveless match. But that wasn’t the case any longer.

Ironically, he wasn’t happy to accept a loveless match anymore either. Because, as Olivia had said, he had given himself to someone. He did share a love like she had described—how had she put it? A love that couldn’t be suppressed.

She pulled his engagement ring off her slender finger. “Don’t worry about me. I have everything I will need to live the rest of my days comfortably, thanks to your generosity. And I still have a young face and body and an irrational hope that I might find what you have.” She handed him the ring.

He gazed down at it, still unsure whether he could believe this was happening. When he’d made his promise to Olivia’s father—to support his daughter, to provide for her, and to eventually wed her on the day she agreed to marry him—the colonies were fighting for independence from the king. That was a long time ago.

Since then, the world had changed drastically, but he continued to keep his promise. He kept her comfortable, provided her with a handsome income, as many houses as she cared to own, along with all the servants she would need to run them, and jewelry, furs, gowns, everything she desired.

Never had he expected the onetime penniless youngest daughter of a bankrupt baronet to one day decide to walk away from it all.

“Will you write to me?” he asked.

She smiled and nodded. “I will, if you like.” She hugged him, and he held her for the last time, loving her more than he ever had, for giving him the most precious gift anyone had ever given him. His freedom. “Good-bye, my dear Dierk. And thank you.”

He managed a final thank-you as she stood at the front door and waved good-bye.

“So, tell me.” Wynne was sitting on the edge of her seat, literally, waiting for Rolf to explain why Dierk was engaged to a woman he didn’t love. Who did such a thing these days, who agreed to marry someone out of duty? “Why is Dierk engaged if he doesn’t love this woman?”

“Because he promised her father he would marry her.”

“Okay.” She sat back. “So that’s it? He promised and so it’s done. I thought you said it was a long story?”

He chuckled. “I did. I’m just getting started.”

“Ah. Okay.” She positioned a throw pillow on the couch, and settled in nice and comfy, ready to hear the whole story. “Spill it. I’m ready.”

“Let me see. It’s been a long time since I told this story to anyone….” Rolf grinned when she shot him a warning glare. “Impatient?”

“Naw.”

“Her father was a baronet.”

“Baronet?” she echoed.

“It’s a title of honor, given by the king of England.”

“You mean queen? England has a queen,” she corrected.

“Or queen.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, her father suffered a run of bad luck and found himself in debt, but he found his daughter a profitable match—”

“Profitable match, like a business partner?” she asked, somewhat confused.

Rolf cleared his throat again. His eyes twinkled. “Not exactly.”

“I don’t get it.” She studied his face. He was looking all too cheerful for it to mean something dreadful, but still a very disturbing possibility kept creeping into her thoughts. “Tell me he did not literally sell his daughter to pay his debt.”

“He did, in a way.”

“That’s outrageous! I can’t believe anyone would do such a thing. Was she a child?”

“No, she wasn’t a child.”

“Well thank God for that.” She actually felt herself exhale with relief. “I suppose many shocking things are done behind closed doors. I’ve…watched a few Lifetime movies to have some notion.” At Rolf’s shrug, she asked, “So, Dierk agreed to accept this baronet’s daughter as payment for some kind of debt he was owed?”

“No. He wasn’t owed any money and wasn’t part of the original agreement. Another man was. But one night there was a misunderstanding, and that quarrel led to a fight, and Olivia’s intended was killed. Dierk didn’t mean to kill him—”

She felt herself gaping. “Dierk…
killed
a man?”

Rolf’s expression turned grim. “It was an accident, one my brother has paid for dearly. Once he heard about the baronet’s daughter, he felt obligated to provide what he had taken from her family. Thus, he agreed to take the other man’s place and take her as his bride. But Olivia, being a woman with romantic notions, told him she would remain his fiancée until the day she had decided upon a date. I think she has been waiting for some sign from Dierk, a sign he hasn’t given yet. It’s been many years, and still he waits for her to tell him when they will be married.”

After a pause, she asked, “And that’s the full story?”

“It is.”

“Wow.” She stared down at her hands, not for any reason, other than to be looking at something inconsequential so she could concentrate on absorbing the details of what she’d just been told.

It was a sad, tragic tale, one that would have easily been extracted from a book or movie. And one that seemed so out of place in the world she lived in, where debts were paid with credit cards or taken into bankruptcy court, not paid by handing off one’s offspring. But she supposed, having lived a somewhat sheltered life, anything was possible in certain parts of the globe. She knew so little about the world outside of the lower-middle-class American Midwest life she’d been born into. Both Dierk and Rolf spoke with a slight accent. It was possible—no, likely—they’d lived in a foreign land where things were very different from Michigan.

“He won’t break the engagement because he feels indebted to the baronet,” Rolf added.

“I understand now.” Not sure how she felt, she lifted her gaze to Rolf. In some ways, what he’d told her gave her more appreciation and respect for Dierk. To step into another man’s place and take a wife he did not love, out of a sense of duty, was remarkable. And to take a commitment seriously, even though his fiancée had put him off for years, was even more extraordinary. Yes, he scened with women in dungeons. He’d scened with her, and she knew she wasn’t the first or the last. And he had almost lost control that one time in his house, but never had he made love to her.

As far as she could tell, he had remained faithful to his fiancée since she’d met him.

She could just imagine what kind of self-control and dedication staying true to such a commitment had taken, especially if he’d been waiting years and years for his fiancée to agree to marry him.

Rolf glanced at the clock and stood. “I should get going. It’s getting late.”

She hopped to her feet. “Okay.” She grabbed his hand and gave it a little squeeze. “Thank you for telling me about Dierk. I’m not sure how I feel about everything, but I think it helped.”

“You’re welcome.” He slipped out the door, but before he walked away, he gave her one last doleful look over his shoulder. “Good-bye, Wynne.”

W
ynne slowly strolled down the aisle, her gaze hopping from one book cover to another. In the paranormal romance section now, she wasn’t finding anything new or interesting. Vampires. More vampires. Bleh. There was a werewolf. Another. Yawn.

She wanted something new, fresh, a story about some foreign mythos she’d never heard of, an obscure but really interesting legend or a unique take on something that’d already been done to death.

She checked her cell phone. It was almost seven. The store was closing in about ten minutes, and Rolf would be here any minute. They had made plans to check out the pub a couple doors down. It wasn’t a date-date, just a meet-a-friend-for-drinks thing. Kristy was supposed to meet up with them a little later, after she finished up at Twilight.

Out of desperation, Wynne picked up a vampire novel that looked semi-interesting. The little bell hanging above the door clanked, signaling the arrival of a customer, maybe Rolf. She turned, stepping out from behind a tall wall of shelves, and checked the door.

That wasn’t Rolf.

Her heart did a somersault. She turned right around and practically dove behind the bookcase again, hoping Dierk hadn’t seen her. She didn’t want to talk to him. She didn’t want to hear his voice. She didn’t want to look into those dark eyes.

“Hiding?” he said, his voice light with laugher.

She kept her gaze lowered, knowing if he was smiling, she would be enthralled, and then she’d make an idiot of herself. “No way. I dropped my book. Gotta go.” She took a step in the opposite direction, but he stopped her with a little tap on the shoulder.

She was so freaking weak.

“Wynne.”

God, she loved the way he said her name.

“Huh?” she asked, still refusing to look at him. Didn’t he realize what she was trying to do here? Couldn’t he give her a break and leave her alone? She understood about the engagement, and she felt a little sorry for him that he was probably suffering, too, wishing he hadn’t made that promise so long ago. But for both their sakes, he needed to let her be.

If only she could find her tongue so she could tell him that.

“Wynne, I’ve been looking for you.”

“Oh? I’ve been busy lately. In fact, I really need to go now.” She pointed toward the door. “I’m meeting some people….”

He placed two fingers under her chin and lifted it, and she couldn’t help it, her eyes lifted, too. Up, up, up they went, her gaze gradually climbing up his body. To his knees, thighs…skipped right over the groin…his stomach, chest, shoulders, neck. Face. “We need to talk. I have something very important to tell you. Can we go somewhere private?”

“I…I…”

The door thingy jangled again. Someone coughed. “Wynne. Dierk?”

“Rolf,” they both said in unison.

Dierk jerked his hand away.

Wynne took a couple of stumbling footsteps backward. “I was heading to the checkout.”

“Excuse me,” the store’s owner called. “I have to close up in a couple of minutes.”

“Sure, sorry.” Wynne hurried up to the counter and handed the grimacing woman the book.

“Sorry to rush you.” The woman punched the buttons on the cash register. “My son has a doctor’s appointment.”

“Again, I’m sorry.” Wynne handed the woman the gift certificate Dierk had purchased for her. “I lost track of time.”

The store owner smiled as she stamped the certificate and handed it back to her. “Thanks for being understanding.”

When Wynne turned around, Rolf was waiting by the door and Dierk was nowhere to be seen.

“So there I was, flogging this girl, and she was loving it, and some dude who thought he was a Dom came strolling over and tried to tell me I was doing it wrong!” Kristy busted into a belly laugh. “I mean, ohmygod, I was ready to tell him to wait his turn and I’d show him how wrong I can do it.”

Wynne stirred her drink and smiled.

It wasn’t easy pretending to be completely riveted by the conversation. Rolf and Kristy were swapping Dom/Domme horror stories and she felt as out of place as a virgin at an orgy. But that wasn’t what was making the situation so painful. It was Dierk.

One thing had always made her crazy, no matter who did it. That was coming to her and saying something along the lines of “We need to talk” and then leaving her hanging. Girlfriends, boyfriends, parents, whoever. Those words always set off alarms in her head.

What could he possibly want to talk to her about?

“Wynne, what’s wrong?” Kristy gave her shoulder a nudge. “You’re in outer space tonight.”

Wynne glanced at Rolf. “I ran into Dierk in the bookstore, and he said he needed to tell me something important.”

“Ooh, interesting.” Kristy turned a pointed look at Rolf. “Any clue what that might be about?”

“No way. My brother doesn’t talk about his personal life, not with anyone.” His brows dipped. “I’m heading over to Twilight later. I could try to get something from him if you want. I make no promises, though.”

Kristy patted his shoulder. “You’re a doll. Thanks.” She beamed at Wynne. “Rolf’ll find out what the deal is. In the meantime, how about we take a walk down the street? This place is borrr-ring. An absolute snooze. I heard about another club a couple of blocks away. Haven’t checked it out yet. Wanna go?”

Wynne was not in the mood to scream over loud music and chase Kristy as she weaved through sweaty bodies gyrating on the dance floor. “I don’t think so. I’m not the best company tonight. You’d probably have a better time without me.”

“Oh, Wynne.” Kristy looked genuinely disappointed. She bit her lip and visibly inhaled. “I’m trying here, I really am.”

“I know.” Wynne gave Kristy an encouraging smile. She glanced at Rolf. He was staring down at his glass, and she couldn’t help noticing how quiet he’d become. Now, she felt even worse. Rolf was a nice guy and he had been so happy when she’d agreed to meet him tonight at the bookstore. She was ruining it for him. Or rather, she was letting Dierk ruin it for all of them. “Okay, I’ll go. But only if Rolf agrees to go with us.”

They both looked at Rolf.

Rolf perked up. “I’d be very glad to accompany you. But I need to settle our tab first.”

“We could flag the waitress.” Kristy stood and started searching the increasingly crowded pub. “Wow, when did all these people come in?”

“Don’t worry about it.” Rolf stood. “I’ve got to go to the john anyway. I’ll take care of it.”

As he was swallowed up by the burgeoning throng, Wynne and Kristy both watched him.

“He’s a good guy and I can tell he cares for you.” Kristy checked her glass then took a couple of swallows.

“Yes, he is. He’s a very nice guy. I wish we had chemistry, but it’s just not there.”

“Not even in the dungeon? You scened with him a couple of times, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I did. And I can’t say there wasn’t any spark. There was when we were scening, but it wasn’t the same as when I was with Dierk. Nothing’s the same as it is with Dierk. I wish I could stop thinking about him. It sucks so bad. If I let myself, I could totally become a stalker chick to the man. You have no idea how hard it is not to go up to Twilight to try to accidentally run into him. I’m trying to be mature about this, to give him his space and let him have what he wants. But it hurts.”

“And it doesn’t help when he comes to you.” Kristy emptied her glass.

“No, it sure doesn’t.”

Rolf stepped out of a gathering of tall guys huddled next to their table. “The tab’s been paid. Ready to head out, ladies?” He offered each of them a hand, and they both accepted one, and the three of them headed out into the cool evening.

The first chance he got, Dierk was going to kiss his brother.

It wouldn’t be much longer. The wait would be over soon, and ohthankgod, Wynne would be his. His heart thumping heavily in his chest, Dierk steered out onto the street, driving toward a local nightclub.

He couldn’t tell Wynne there. He’d take her somewhere quiet and romantic and then he’d beg for her mercy and throw himself at her feet.

In the dungeon, he was her Master, but in all ways, she had bound him, his heart and soul, to her. He belonged to her, and he could not live another day without seeing her, touching her, holding her.

He couldn’t get there fast enough, but he somehow managed to obey the speed limit. By the time he pulled into the pub’s parking lot, his nerves were so tangled, he wasn’t sure he would be able to speak. His hands were literally trembling.

He found an empty spot, maneuvered the vehicle into it, cut off the engine, and ran into the building. Hot air, cigarette smoke, loud music, and people closed in around him. So many people. Everywhere he looked.

Where was she?

He searched the area around the bar then moved out from there, slowly working his way toward the packed dance floor.

There. He caught a glimpse of her hair. He pushed his way through a wall of men and women only to find she was gone. He changed tactics, this time looking for his brother instead. Rolf was taller, easier to spot in a crowd, and he would be with her.

He did a full three-sixty, looking all around him. It was too fucking crowded.

The music changed. A ballad started playing and people left the dance floor in a rush. He saw her then, standing on the fringe of that crush, chatting with her friend, Raven.

His gaze locked to her, he pushed his way toward her, excusing himself as he wended between small groups of men and women.

She saw him just before he reached her. Her eyes widened.

He took her hand in his, that sweet, delicate, beautiful little hand, and kissed every fingertip. How long had he waited for this moment? How many times had he dreamed of it? He pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

If she was shocked, her surprise didn’t last long. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back, and his head started spinning. She tasted delicious. She fit in his arms so perfectly. And she smelled absolutely delectable, and he couldn’t get enough of her. Couldn’t kiss her long enough. Couldn’t hold her closely enough. Couldn’t pull her scent in deeply enough.

But even though he was sure he would drop dead if he pulled his lips from hers, he made himself. “Come with me.”

Heavy lidded and looking well kissed, she nodded. He started the long walk toward the exit, her hand firmly grasped in his.

Finally they were outside, free of the oppressive stink and noise and crowd.

“What’s going on, Dierk?”

“Please, don’t make me tell you here. Can you wait just a few minutes? I’d rather go somewhere private.”

She nodded and followed him to his car. “Okay. But it had better be minutes. Not hours. Not days and definitely not weeks.”