Sinful Palace: Ruthless Rulers Book 2

by Hart, Stella

  My cheeks warmed with a blush. “I… I like it sometimes. When we—”

  “Fuck?” he interjected, eyes flickering with amusement at my embarrassed restraint.

  I nodded, face aflame now. “Yes. I like it then,” I murmured. “But the rest of the time….” I trailed off again and bit my bottom lip. “I’m just not one of those girls who can roll over and act like a submissive slave twenty-four hours a day. I’ll never be like that. Never be like some sort of mindless robot. I can’t.”

  “I see.”

  I raised my palms. “I’ve tried. Really hard. You know that, right?”

  Logan’s lips flattened into a thin line. “Yes, I’ll give you that one,” he said with a curt nod. “I do see you, Willow. I know you’ve been trying.”

  I drew in a short, sharp breath. “I don’t want you to hurt me. I don’t want you to hurt my brother, or anyone else I love. So I do my best. But no matter how hard I try, I always seem to mess up.” I bit my lip again and shook my head. “I just can’t live under your rules all the time. It’ll drive me crazy.”

  Logan’s brows furrowed. “Just keep trying, Willow. That’s enough.”

  My eyes widened. “It is?”

  He nodded. “I know we can’t live with this friction forever. At the same time, though, I need to be able to trust you. You haven’t exactly made that easy with the constant manipulation and escape attempts.”

  I swallowed thickly. “I know.”

  “If we can get to a certain point of trust in our relationship, things will change. You won’t be locked up all the time. You’ll be able to come and go as you please. See your friends and family. Have a phone and computer again.” He paused, frown deepening. “I just can’t trust you with any of that yet. I need to know you won’t try to leave me again.”

  “So you just want me to do my best? I don’t have to be a perfect robot all the time?”

  “That’s right.” He rubbed his chin, a faint smile curving his lips. “You’re fiercer than I gave you credit for at the beginning. I guess I have to accept that. But if you can follow the rules and try to be good, as much as you can, we’ll be able to build to that final level of trust. That’s what I want to happen.”

  “Okay.” I nodded, insides warming as I realized I was finally getting somewhere with him. I didn’t even need to manipulate him with orgasms. I just needed to be brave enough to tell him the truth about how I felt in this pressure cooker of a relationship.

  If you could even call it a relationship…

  He reached out and trailed his fingers along the top of my head in the possessive way I simultaneously loved and hated. “So you’ll stop with all the bullshit?” he said. “You’ll do exactly what I tell you from now on?”

  “Yes.” For now.

  “Good.” He turned around and switched the shower on again. “Get in and clean yourself up,” he said, gesturing toward the pearly smears of cum on my chest and abdomen. “Then get dressed.”

  “Are we going out for dinner instead of ordering in?” I asked, eyes widening. I hadn’t left our room in three days now, and I wasn’t sure I was ready. Not while all the drama surrounding my mother’s administration was still raging on and on.

  Logan smiled thinly and shook his head. “No. I changed my mind about that,” he said, smile transforming into a playful smirk. “I’m taking you to your first Wonderland party.”

  9

  Willow

  I anxiously smoothed down my short crimson dress and checked my teeth for lipstick in the mirror on the elevator doors. Logan punched a code into the keypad on the console, and there was a short hum as we dropped two levels.

  The doors opened into a foyer lit by ancient-looking lamps, and a young woman wearing a thigh-skimming black dress approached us as we stepped out. She was holding a silver tray with several sparkling champagne flutes. A dazzling smile made her pretty face glow.

  “Drinks?” she asked in a pleasant tone. Though she sounded polite, I didn’t miss the way her lustful eyes lingered on Logan while ignoring my presence entirely.

  He shook his head. “No, my fiancée isn’t drinking tonight,” he said, striding right past her without a second glance.

  I couldn’t help but feel a little smug at the expression of surprise and annoyance on the woman’s face. Logan might be an ass, but at least he wasn’t going to humiliate me by flirting with anyone else right in front of me.

  “This isn’t what I expected,” I murmured as he led me through the foyer. The floors were covered with thick, luxurious carpet, and the walls were lined with beautiful marble statues and oil paintings. Between each piece of art was a door with a golden handle and a number.

  Logan arched a brow. “Why?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “It’s just not how I pictured it.”

  “You were expecting something gaudier, right? Trashier?” he said.

  I blushed. “Maybe.”

  He chuckled and led me over to a set of double doors on the far-right side of the foyer. The atmosphere shifted the second he opened them and pushed me through to the party beyond.

  The foyer outside felt safe with its quiet elegance, but this new room seemed dangerous and thrilling at the same time. I felt lost, frightened, and excited all at the same time, like Alice when she went down the rabbit hole.

  The party room was enormous and dark as a nightclub, only lit by flashing strobe lights in the middle and deep red lamps along the edges. Dense fog from a smoke machine hung above our heads, glowing red from the lights, and the rich scents of perfume, cigar smoke, and liquor filled the air. Music piped through the space; a low, rhythmic beat designed to entrance.

  The walls were black with thin silver Art Deco fan prints, and the soaring windows were draped with dark red velvet curtains. A wide raised platform ran down the middle, splitting the room in two, and a long mahogany bar stood on one end.

  Silver cages sat on top of the platform, each one containing a scantily-clad dancer. Their movements were frenetic and mesmerizing, eyes heavy-lidded and lost to the music. I stared up at the one closest to us, watching her sway her hips and thrust her pelvis back and forth. Her silver thong caught the light with each seductive movement, almost hypnotizing me as it flashed and shimmered.

  “This way,” Logan said, leading me farther into the room. I tried my best to breathe, but my lungs refused to cooperate. The closer we got to the action, the more nervous and awestruck I felt.

  All around us, club members and women were engaged in all kinds of debauchery. Screams, grunts, and strangled cries echoed throughout the space along with the music.

  The people closest to the bar and platform were simply drinking and dancing, but around the darker edges, they were playing much harder. Naked couples, threesomes, and foursomes openly fucked, licked, and sucked each other on and around the dark furniture lining the walls, while lecherous men stood by and watched with their pants undone, stroking their cocks.

  That brazen fucking and voyeurism was the tamest part.

  One woman I passed was trussed up in thin black ropes, whimpering as a man fisted her ass. Near her was another woman suspended from a high beam, moaning blissfully as a man whipped her tits with a black flogger. Across from them, in an area sectioned off by red ropes, two lithe girls performed a show with two long, thick dildos, facing away from each other on their hands and knees and thrusting as the dildos slid back and forth between their asses and pussies.

  I gripped Logan, nails digging into his forearm. My body felt hot and cold at the same time, jumbled with fear and arousal.

  “This reminds me of an Order party,” I said, practically needing to shout my words over the throbbing bass and pleasured groans. The only major difference between this place and the Order Hall parties was a lack of masks.

  Logan nodded. “That’s because the staff and escorts for the Order parties are hired right out of Wonderland,” he explained, pulling me toward the bar on the far side where things were slightly quieter.
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br />   I peered around the room again, eyes wide as saucers. My gaze settled on a blonde woman restrained with chains on a black bench. A man was standing in front of her, watching with narrowed eyes as another man gripped her hips and relentlessly pumped himself deep inside her. Her lips parted with pleasure, and the man in front of her smirked as the other finally finished, spraying her back with pearly ropes of cum.

  Logan chuckled and slapped my ass. “Stop staring.”

  My cheeks felt as if they were on fire all of a sudden, and I lowered my eyes. “Sorry. I’m just trying to figure out what happens here.”

  “It’s a Wonderland Club party. Anything goes,” he replied.

  I raised my brows. “Anything?”

  “Within reason. Obviously you can’t whip out a machete and start murdering people, but beyond the general ‘no killing or maiming’ tenet, there’s only one rule.”

  “What is it?”

  He hooked a finger under my chin, gently stroking it down my throat. “You have to ask people,” he said. “To watch, to touch, to fuck. You can’t just walk up and start doing whatever you want. Permission must be sought.”

  “Does that apply to us?”

  He smiled thinly. “You know I don’t need your permission for anything I decide to do to you,” he said, lowering his lips to the shell of my ear. Goosebumps exploded all over the delicate skin of my neck and shoulders.

  My heart began to pound. “Wait… are we actually getting involved with this tonight?” I asked, my voice coming out in an anxious squeak as I waved my hand toward the outskirts of the room. “Like we did at the first Order party?”

  His smile grew wider. More dangerous. “Why do you think I brought you here?” he said. “It wasn’t to stand by a bar and drink cocktails. If I wanted to do that, I would’ve taken you to one of the other levels.”

  “But…” I shook my head. “Someone could recognize me. My family can’t take any more scandals right now.”

  Logan laughed. “Do you really think I’d let that happen?” he said. “The beauty of this place is that all club and staff members have to sign an ironclad non-disclosure agreement before they even step foot on the premises. No one is allowed to tell anyone what they see or do here.”

  I swallowed hard, still unsure. “I was told the same thing about the Order, but someone went ahead and revealed my confession anyway, didn’t they?” I muttered.

  He tilted my chin up again, forcing me to look at him. “That was different. It won’t happen here. Look.” He gestured toward the other side of the room. “See that guy with your friend?”

  I followed his gaze to see Myla standing at the edge in a black PVC dominatrix outfit. She held a crop in one hand and a chain in the other. The chain was attached to a bridle-like device affixed to a bald man’s head. He was on his hands and knees below Myla, letting her lead him around like a pet. Aside from the bridle and a butt plug with a long, flowing tail sticking out of the end, he was nude.

  When Myla saw me looking over at her, she gave me a smile and a wave. Then she frowned at the man beneath her and whipped his ass, issuing some sort of rebuke I couldn’t hear from my spot.

  “Do you recognize him?” Logan asked.

  I squinted, trying to place the subservient man. Then my eyes widened. “Is that Spencer Ackerman?”

  Logan nodded. “Yup. Do you think he’d risk coming here if there was any chance someone might leak this to the media?”

  I shook my head. Ackerman was a recently-appointed Supreme Court Justice. His short tenure had been mired in controversy since a series of nasty accusations were made about him after the nomination. While the accusations had been found to be utterly false, the media still loved to roast him, and they were constantly searching for so-called scandals that involved him.

  A few months ago, a newspaper had published an interview with a former schoolteacher of his from all the way back in the late seventies. The teacher claimed he was a problem child with a terrible attitude who liked to eat glue. It was a laughable attempt to make him look bad, but if that was the sort of desperation the media had when it came to smearing him, then there was no way something like this would be kept quiet. Not unless the NDAs here were as serious and binding as Logan claimed.

  I’d never heard a single peep about Ackerman’s sexual proclivities, so clearly, what happened at Wonderland actually stayed at Wonderland.

  “Let’s go,” Logan said, taking my arm again. My nerves spiked as adrenaline flooded my veins, and my mouth dried up. He was leading me over to a black X-shaped frame not far from the bench with the shackles I was staring at earlier.

  “Arms up,” he commanded when we arrived.

  I didn’t want to argue with him, not after I already made him angry earlier, but I was scared. Not because of the possibility of humiliation—we’d already established that wouldn’t happen—but because of the fear of the unknown. I didn’t know what he wanted to do to me right now, but I did know I didn’t want him to hurt me. Not badly, anyway. I certainly didn’t want him to tie me up and shove his fist in my ass like that poor woman I saw earlier.

  “Do as I say, Willow,” Logan repeated, eyes narrowing.

  I swallowed thickly and raised my arms, letting him cuff my wrists to the top of the frame. He used one knee to force my legs apart. Then he shackled my ankles to the bottom of the frame. I shivered despite the heat and energy coursing through me, still afraid of what might come next.

  Logan stepped out from behind me and pulled a box out of his pocket. He opened it to reveal an oval-shaped device with a small curved protrusion on one side. A clit-tickler, if I had to guess.

  Relief instantly flooded my system. He wasn’t going to hurt me. He was going to make me come.

  He smiled wickedly and stepped behind me again, settling the hand with the toy near my lower back. His other one slid under the skirt of my dress, probing between my legs. He ripped my panties down in one quick movement, and then he pushed the ovoid device into my pussy. I was already primed from my earlier attempt at sex, hot and ready to explode, so the toy slid in easily.

  Logan smirked as he stepped back around to my front. He pulled something else out of his pocket; a tiny black remote. When he clicked a button on it, the toy began to vibrate inside me and against my clit. My mouth fell open with a gasp as my body sagged against the cross.

  “Thank you,” I murmured, eyes shuttering with bliss.

  “Don’t thank me,” Logan replied, moving his mouth to my left ear. “This isn’t what you think it is.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Remember when you said you thought I should mix things up, punishment-wise?” he asked. His voice was low and dangerous. “So you wouldn’t get used to the box.”

  “Yes,” I said breathlessly.

  “This isn’t a reward, even though it seems like one right now. This is a punishment for your little manipulation attempt earlier.” He forced my chin up again, eyes glittering with a mixture of lust and anger. “You didn’t think I’d let you get away with it just because we talked about it for a while, did you?”

  “I… I don’t understand,” I said, squirming against the cross.

  “You will.”

  Pleasure stirred and rose in my lower belly, and my limbs felt weak and loose as I hung in place on the cross, toes curling. I still didn’t understand how this was a punishment. Every inch of me was tingling and pumped for more, dying for release.

  Logan clicked a button on the remote again, and the jolting vibrations dulled to a barely-there buzz. It was enough to keep me turned on and desperate for more, but not enough to make me come. No matter how much I squirmed and tried to make myself reach that point, the pleasure only built to a certain level before fading away again.

  “Don’t do this to me,” I whispered brokenly, forehead scrunching as my body ached for release. Logan was right. This was torture.

  “Have fun, princess,” he said, smacking me on the ass. He placed the remote for the toy on an em
pty bench right next to the cross, and then he stepped away.

  “Wait, where are you going?” I asked, panic rising in my voice. “You can’t leave me here like this! Please!”

  He turned his head over his shoulder and flashed another wicked smirk at me. Then he shook his head and headed over to the bar. He ordered a drink, took a seat on a leather stool, and completely ignored me.

  “Please!” I whimpered. “Logan!”

  I wasn’t sure why I bothered making a sound. He was close enough to see me if he wanted to, but the music was so loud there was no way he’d hear anything I had to say.

  I let out a strangled cry and arched my back as the vibrations suddenly picked up for a few seconds. My heart was thudding so loud I could hear it as my pussy clenched around the toy. I squeezed my eyes shut and groaned, trying to push myself just a little closer toward climax.

  The vibrations slowed again, yanking me back from the edge. Frustrated tears stung my eyes and slid down my cheeks. I’d never felt so desperate before. Never felt so empty and unsatisfied despite the fact my pussy was full and my clit was being stimulated. It just wasn’t enough. I was so close yet so far.

  I drew in a deep breath as the vibrations intensified again, pulling me back to a heightened state. My legs wriggled, and I used my inner muscles to pulse around the toy, hoping that would be enough to make me come.

  It wasn’t. The vibrations died down again only seconds later, eliciting a strangled cry from my throat as the pleasure slipped away.

  Deciding to change tactics, I forced my mind away from the situation. I pictured myself doing basic activities that weren’t supposed to bring sexual pleasure. Walking through a quiet forest, drinking a cup of tea, reading a book. Anything but this.

  That didn’t work either. Try as I might to ignore the arousal pooling in my core every time the vibrations picked up again, I couldn’t do it. The jolting sensations were too intense, making my clit and nipples ache with the need to come, and heated tingles shot through me every time I moved. I couldn’t pretend I was anywhere but here.