Desire

by Mia Madison

  “Crown Prince Lucien told me to show you to your rooms. He said you should make yourselves at home and he’ll see you later.”

  She indicates that we should step inside then walks ahead of us through the expanse of room. It’s like walking across a beautifully decorated football pitch, with luxurious thick rugs underfoot and gold leaf covering almost everything.

  “This is the drawing room,” she tells us. “The family don’t use this room much, it’s mostly for receiving foreign dignitaries. We had Her Majesty here in October.”

  I don’t ask which Majesty because I’m too beside myself with embarrassment and overwhelm to speak. Already today I’ve gone from being the well-off daughter of a financial prince back in Chicago, to a pauper’s daughter about to be living on the streets in a foreign land, and now I’m living in a palace, until we go home on Thursday at least. Plus I’ve been snarky and then slutty with a crown prince of Europe.

  I follow the maid numbly up the wide staircase each step shallow with extra wide tread so climbing is more like ascending to the heavens than going upstairs. It’s lined with pictures of old men and women in jewel colored dresses.

  “Who are all these people?”

  “Ancestors of the Max-Callander family,” she tells me. “You’re in the yellow room, Miss Summers.”

  She throws open the double doors on a room that’s decorated not at all in the smiley face hue I was anticipating. Soft primrose yellow silk curtains billow gently at the open windows. They look down across the extensive gardens and lawn to the blue sea. I can’t wait to have a look at the amazing planting outside.

  I turn back and look at my high bed, on a kind of platform with a golden coronet above it and more curtains at the headboard corners so I can hide myself inside. Luscious flowered rugs cover the floor and there’s antique furniture, gilt chairs and tables.

  “A room fit for my princess,” my father says.

  “And you’re just down the hall in the blue room, Sir.”

  Daddy throws me a wink and follows her.

  I lay back on the bed and notice all the cherubs playing lutes in the clouds painted across the ceiling by some Old Master. Jesus, who lives in a house like this? I do – for a couple of days at least. What a blast it’s going to be to tell everyone when I get back home.

  Behind some silk hangings is an opulent painted wooden door covered in molding. When I turn the ancient handle, it gives with a bit of a squeak. I hear low voices on the other side but tapestries make it hard to hear what they’re saying.

  “Things aren’t quite as I told you back there. I just didn’t want Kennedy to know how bad it is.”

  It doesn't take me a moment to recognize my father’s voice My ears prick up and instead of quietly closing the door, I lean imperceptibly forward craning to hear the response.

  “I figured that much.”

  Ohmigod that was the Prince.

  I can’t hear what they’re saying. They’re both pacing up and down the huge room so that when they’re at the other end it’s impossible to hear. Eventually they move closer.

  “No, I can’t do that,” Daddy says. “There’s no way.”

  Damn I can’t hear them. What can’t he do? What’s the Prince trying to force him into?

  I crane in harder, desperate to hear. Finally they move around closer to the secret door.

  “So I give you fifty thousand and you’ll give me your daughter,” the Prince eventually says.

  My heart lurches when I hear that. He’s trying to buy me from my father? Taking advantage of his hardship? And treating me like a prize camel.

  I almost storm right into the room and punch him but I hold back to hear more, mangling his priceless old tapestry in my fists. They’ve moved away again and the next thing I hear is Daddy saying: “No, no that won’t do.”

  And then nothing more.

  Chapter Six

  Lucien

  I pace up and down my room, which affords me a good long distance to stride and rage. Even though this is nothing like a regular size bedroom, I’m still turning round and round, penned tight as a tiger in a cage. I never dreamed that Kennedy would be a woman like that.

  I always pictured a silly girl like the nubile little nymphets that populate the beaches on the Cote d’Azur which is all I’m used to. But my friend’s daughter is a stunning, headstrong, independent little queen with curves like Cleopatra. And a mouth to match.

  I’ve learned to smile my way through everything but Kennedy’s jibes have me speared. No woman has ever looked at me with such disrespect. Okay, I can think of a few shriveled old dowagers that have, but no one under eighty has ever pressed her body against me while clearly despising me at the same time.

  Part of me hungers to put her over my knee and give her the hardest spanking she’s ever had and another part can’t help but think she’s right in her opinion. I am a playboy that treats women like toys for his amusement. And aren’t toys meant to be for children? She may have leaned her body into mine against her will and she’ll never look at me as a man now.

  Why is that so damn important to me?

  She’s definitely impressed by my upper body and once she gets her hands on the lower half she won’t be able to resist. She’ll be an amusing plaything while she’s here and then her father will take her home and I’ll carry on with my ridiculous life. Breaking her down will be interesting, watching her submit beneath me will be better.

  And such a tasty morsel of revenge which is long past due.

  I throw back the doors to my suite and stalk down the wide hallway to my dear old friend Cooper’s room. Coop and I have got a little catching up to do.

  There are the pleasantries to be endured, the groveling thanks for saving his ass again. Then I get right to it.

  “So how deep are you in this time?” I ask, leaning casually against the wall with my arms crossed.

  “It’s bad. And I can’t go back home for a while because the feds want to speak to me. The Securities Commission have started an inquiry. It’s a fucking mess.”

  “And Kennedy has to go back to school next week.”

  “She’s still in school?”

  “Final year. Botany degree, specialist program.”

  “Smart girl. And very beautiful,” I say.

  “I know. But I don’t know how I’m going to pay the fees.”

  He moves at viperish speed these days. He must have noticed the attraction and figures tossing Kennedy into the pot will sweeten me up. I decide to act the rich doofus and see how far this financial manipulator will try to take me.

  “Yes. And you can’t go back and face up to it? Take what comes?”

  Be a man.

  “No, I can’t do that, there’s no way.” he says.

  There’s a surprise. He drops his voice to a whisper hiss. “They’ll probably put me in jail this time.”

  “Hmm.”

  Coop looks at me with the begging eyes I’m used to seeing from supplicants wanting something from me. Eyes I hope to see in Kennedy’s face but doubt it will happen unless I make it.

  “So what are you asking?”

  “A repeat of our previous deal?”

  “That was a joke you played me with. I’m not sixteen years old now.” “I can tell you like her,” he urges.

  “So I give you fifty thousand and you sell me your daughter?”

  “There’s been high inflation since back then,” he comes back immediately. He really takes me for an idiot. Like I don’t know what world bank inflation rates are. “Compound,” he adds.

  “So you don’t want to accept another fifty thousand of my money. Interest free?”

  It won’t be a drop in the bucket of his debts but I know he has no intention of paying them anyway.

  “No, no that won’t do.”

  I turn and head to the door. I’m not messing with this dude. The only thing that’s kept me interested is Kennedy’s future – helping out with the college tuition. But I’m not going to be played by h
er father.

  “She’s still a virgin,” he blurts out as I reach for the door handle.

  That peaks my interest, like he knew it would. I don’t know whether I believe him. How could he possibly know for sure? I can tell he wants to get his hands on some liquid cash flow more than he wants to eat.

  “She seems worldly but I’ve kept her very protected,” he says. “Make it a hundred K.”

  This fucker really has no morality. I'm glad Kennedy isn't hearing this. I’d like to keep her safe from her father while she’s here with me at least.

  “And same deal as before,” I inform him. “I can do whatever I want with her.”

  He nods. Not a flicker of remorse for selling his daughter off again. He ought to put her on the open market. He’d make a fortune. I guess he’s not as smart a shyster as he thinks he is.

  “But you won’t tell her?” he suddenly has a thought. “You won’t tell Kennedy that I know anything about it.”

  “You don't want Darling Daddy's image tarnished any further?”

  “I love my daughter very much.”

  Yeah, I can tell.

  “Fine. You can be innocent this time.”

  “Send her to my room. I’ll tell her I’ve thought of a plan that will help out her father.”

  “What if she says no?”

  As if.

  I grin at him with a confidence he’ll never know.

  “Oh right, no woman ever says no to Crown Prince Lucien,” he says, sarcasm barely disguised.

  I grin harder.

  “But Kennedy isn’t like other women,” he insists.

  I believe that’s true but I get the feeling he’s just working another angle.

  “Then you’re on your own,” I tell him and walk out of the room without another word.

  I pass the doors to the yellow room, Kennedy’s room, on my way to my suite and almost barge right through them. I’m not accustomed to knocking and waiting for permission. I’m the Prince, I can do what I want. But I restrain myself because I want to see her humble herself. I need her to submit to the inevitability of the negotiation I’ve closed with her father. Maybe it’s time she knew the real man.

  She will not look at me with those disdainful eyes again. Mostly because there’s a massive bulge in my pants just thinking about all the things I’m going to do to her curvaceous little body now I’ve made her mine at last.

  “Bring Miss Summers to me,” I tell the footman that comes to my suite when I pull the long velvet ring cord.

  We still live in the traditional style here. Although when I’m King I have every intention of upgrading. I may even put that Alexa thing in every room and tell the machine to do what I want.

  I stand in the middle of the room with my hands on my hips, legs spread wide. I move to the window and lean up against the frame, arms crossed, one foot over the other, casual, like I don’t give a damn. I turn to look out of it, even better, giving her my back, making her wait. Fuck. I move around the room striking a pose here and there to find the right one for her entrance. What in the devil’s name is wrong with me that I’m nervous about a twenty something girl coming to see me?

  If it had been any other girl standing trapped between my arms with her back leaning into my chest, I’d have let her keep control of the boat while I took control of her body. Any other girl I would have released the wheel and placed my hands on the curve of her hips, tugging her ass back onto the steel hard shaft and sitting her there while my fingers slid around front to delve into her wetness.

  I know she was dripping wet and she’d better be now when she gets here. Because there’s no more waiting around. It’s been almost twenty five years since the first time she was promised to me and now I intend to make good.

  Chapter Seven

  Kennedy

  After closing the door quietly on the adjoining suite, I lean back against it with my heart thumping against my throat.

  Has my father has been hiding more than I ever realized from me? I’m not too sure whether it’s been entirely for my benefit but I can’t focus on that now. The only thought filling my head is that Lucien just tried to buy me.

  He wants to own and possess me like one of his bimbo playthings. In my head I’m mad as hell about the presumption on his part, but I lean my head back into the door and without any volition of my own, my hand travels over my tummy and down into my crack.

  My panties are soaked through and the swollen throb is unbearable. I want him so much it’s actually painful. I slide under the fabric and my entire body sighs as I stroke circles around the hard clit point.

  Oh my god, it’s Lucien’s hard fingers I need between my folds. I don’t have to do this for myself. He can take care of my O and I’m sure it would be astounding.

  I run around the room looking for my luggage, but of course it’s still back at the hotel. I have to go see him and make this happen, but all I’m wearing is this old sundress that was twenty nine dollars at Forever 21 and a pair of dripping wet panties.

  “That’s not going to be a problem though is it, Kenny,” I tell myself in the mirror as I pinch my cheeks for some color and try to comb out my hair with my fingers.

  I look a mess after the boat ride and I have nothing but a lipgloss in my beach bag.

  “Resistance, remember? Boundaries. You are not, repeat not, going to give in to this playboy. I don’t care if he is Crown Prince so and so.”

  One more glance in the mirror. Hmmm. Well, I’ll have to do. He’s not getting me at my best but it doesn’t seem to have put him off so far.

  “No, Kenny,” I remind myself, hissing as I walk, half run, down the hallway to his room pointed out by a sentry standing in a doorway. “He’s not getting you at all.”

  I knock then barge straight into the huge opulent bedroom with attached living area.

  “Ah, I expect you’re wondering why I had you brought to me,” he says, standing in the center of the room with his fists on his hips, his thick thighs spread wide.

  Brought to him?

  So full of himself.

  Christ if only he weren’t so damn freaking hot.

  “To practice for your part in ‘The King and I’ at the Christmas musical you put on for the servants?” I say, doing my best to keep a straight face but not that well.

  He frowns, like he’s pissed at me teasing.

  “That’s good,” I say. “That’s how Yul Brynner did it in the movie, that stern intimidating glare. “You remember how the American Governess broke him down in the end though?”

  “I’m surprised you remember. That movie is like a hundred years old.”

  He loosens his stance and relaxes into a smile. He’s even more handsome when he’s not being a dick or acting like a royal potentate.

  “I took an American Classics class last semester,” I tell him.

  “The King and I counts as a classic?”

  “Sure, Rodgers and Hammerstein are legend.”

  “Then no, I didn’t bring you here to play musical theater critic. I have a proposition for you.”

  “Oh?” My. God. He’s just going to come out and tell me he owns me. I thought there’d be some subterfuge to his game. I really need to get out of these soaked underwear which are even wetter since I came into the Prince’s bedroom.

  “Do you always offer propositions in your bedroom? Don’t answer that – dumb question.”

  “This is perfectly above board. I want to help your father out of his little predicament.”

  Hmm mm, sure you do. You’re all about the altruistic endeavors.

  “Oh that’s awfully nice of you,” I say in my poshest voice. I even sound a little English.

  “I need you to marry me.”

  “What?” I blurt-choke.

  If he’d offered me a refreshment, his exquisite upholstery would be covered in the spray.

  “Not really, of course.”

  Oh.

  “Of course.”

  “No. My father would never approve of tha
t obviously.”

  “Obviously.”

  “But I’m being bombarded with bimbos as you call them and the press are hounding me, at my father’s behest, I have no doubt. The country needs an heir.”

  “You want me to have your baby?” I squeak.

  “That won’t be necessary. I just want you to play my fiancee so that the magazines have a few features to run and will get off my case for a while. At least until my musical opens.”

  He’s funny. I like him way more when he can laugh at himself than when he’s being that cocky arrogant playboy surrounded by jiggling bare breasts.

  “And how does my father benefit from this?”

  “I’ll give you a hundred thousand dollars for your services.”

  “Wow.”

  He upped the price. At least he thinks I’m worth more than he bartered me for. I ought to act outraged and tell him to take a hike. I would, excep for the blood rushing around my body carrying tingling pressure with it. I thought he’d have me naked and spread open for him by now. I’m a little disappointed.

  “And if I refuse? I’ll get dragged down to the dungeons, I assume.”

  “Be careful what you joke about,” he quips.

  His eyes won’t stop traveling up and down over my body, alighting at the spots that interest him, particularly my breasts. I’m sure my nipples are rock hard little pellets, trying to entice him.

  “My Grandfather, also Crown Prince Lucien Leopold Max-Callandar had two wives. One he kept chained in the attic. The suite is still intact up there.”

  “You’re joking,” I say.

  “Are you tempting me?”

  “A hundred thousand is a lot of money,” I say quickly trying to change the subject from the idea of his ancestral dungeon, an antique red room.

  My clit is pulsating with yearning to know what toys he keeps up there. Shackles and whips from the Middle Ages maybe.

  “It is indeed so I’m going to need some guarantees of your behavior.”

  “My behavior?”

  “You haven’t shown yourself to be very docile so far.”