by Gemma James
“I thought…” I trail off with a nervous swallow. Liam embodies the spirit of a man in control of his urges and desires, but he also seems like the type of man that wants you at his beck and call, available upon command. “I guess I thought you’d want me to share your bed.”
Jerking me to a stop two feet from the door, he takes me by the chin in what I’m learning is his signature move. “My brothers might wish to share their bed with you, but I’m not a masochist.”
I’m unprepared for the pang of hurt that goes off in my chest, and I respond before weighing my words. “You don’t want me?”
“Who wouldn’t want you, my sweet girl?” He dips his head, bringing our lips a few inches apart, and I breathe in his spicy scent. “But I know my limits when it comes to keeping you pure. Until you are crowned as my queen, I’ll have my way with your mouth, but I won’t have you in my bed.”
Chapter Three
The ride to the top of the tower is excruciatingly slow. I’m barely holding on to my composure. By the time Selma shows me to my private quarters, I’m full-on shaking. I dismiss the maid before scurrying inside, desperate for a moment alone so I can process what just happened on the first floor of this circular fortress.
I don’t realize the hot mess of my face until Faye rushes to me, eyes wide with alarm.
“What did that bastard do to you?”
Her vehemence, her unwavering support—it makes me buckle on the spot. I sob into my hands, knees meeting the floor. I’m not even sure why I’m falling apart.
Because Liam Castle got under my skin with a single blow job? It makes little sense. All I know is I’m reeling, and I can’t seem to stop.
“Novalee! Talk to us. What happened?”
“I don’t know if I can do this.” I stare at my ladies through the flood of tears escaping my eyes.
“Was he mean?” Elise asks, cautious hesitation sharp in the lines of her porcelain skin.
Faye is more direct. “Did he hurt you?” She narrows her brows, purses her lips with protective, ball-busting intent. “Because if he hurt you…”
She’ll do nothing. We’re women in a foreign place that doesn’t afford us the same rights as men. They’ll say we’re weak and not as smart, but at the core of my heart, I know that’s not true.
Because it takes true strength and wit to survive a group of men like the Zodiac Brotherhood. Especially with a man like Liam at their head.
“He didn’t hurt me.”
Faye stands in a fluid and graceful motion, though the harsh angles on her face are anything but. She helps me to my feet. “Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“But something did happen?” Faye never side-steps the blunt questions—the ones that drag you kicking and screaming to the center of the bullseye. I’m pinned there now, unwilling to share what happened with my ladies, but helpless to find a graceful way out of it.
“He made me…” I hold her gaze as Elise stiffens. The two of them are the closest I’ll ever have to sisters, and we’ve talked about sex in the past, but the idea of confiding what Liam made me do, down to the last dirty detail, has my cheeks flaming.
Faye takes my hand. “You know you can tell us anything.”
“He asked me to…go down on him.” Though he didn’t ask, and I’m too ashamed to admit how powerless I was in the moment.
Faye raises a dark brow. “Did you enjoy it?”
“It didn’t…completely…repulse me.”
Elise exhales as if she’d been holding her breath for the last minute. “Don’t tease us. What was it like?”
Internally, I cringe at her noticeable excitement, but that’s Elise—always smiling and keeping things positive. From the day she came to live on our lands three years ago, she’s always been a glass-half-full kind of girl. Though I’ve never had the experience of a broken heart, Elise would be the first to offer a pint of chocolate ice cream and a collection of chick flicks.
Faye would be too busy kicking the ass of the man who’d hurt me to join in on the movie marathon. Between the two of them, they have me covered. I dart my gaze between my closest friends, taking note of their expectant faces, hearing their mutual silent question.
What was it like pleasuring a man like Liam Castle?
Scary.
Exhilarating.
Rough.
Arousing.
Shameful.
“I need to prepare for dinner,” I say, sidestepping the subject altogether.
Faye’s sigh of exasperation disrupts the dark curl teasing her left eye. “Fine. We’ll shelve this conversation for later.” She wants to needle me for more info on the art of oral sex, but she doesn’t. Instead, she turns to Elise. “Lay out a dress for the queen. I’ll draw a bath.”
“Something in black, please,” I tell Elise as I follow Faye into the en suite bathroom. The color’s appropriate for a rebellion, suitable for a funeral. The perfect camouflage to face twelve predatory men over dinner.
Several minutes later, I’m sinking into hot water with a relieved sigh, suds rising over my breasts. My nipples poke through the bubbles, over-sensitive from the change in temperature, and the chancellor plays on my mind like flashes on a picture reel.
The confidence in his touch.
The command in his voice.
The surrender on his face when he came.
A strong, foreign urge to touch myself ignites inside me. I glance at Faye, who’s taken a seat at the vanity, waiting to offer her help should I need it.
What I need is privacy.
“I can dress on my own tonight for dinner. You and Elise should settle into your quarters and get ready.”
Through narrowed eyes, she studies me as if searching for everything I’m not saying. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine. I just need some time alone.”
“Of course.”
After she leaves me alone with my lustful thoughts, I waste no time in pushing a hand between my legs. I’ve never felt so decadent and sinful. Steam rises off my slick skin, and I close my eyes as my fingers explore, increasing the rhythm once I press on the spot that feels especially good. I let those stored pictures of Liam play in my head. Hear his voice in my ears. Pretend the touch of my fingers are his. I flush even hotter, my heartbeat pounding behind my breastbone.
I’ve never been so close. Instead of shying away, like I did the last time I touched myself, I increase the pressure and speed, imagining the chancellor bracing above me, bare chest grazing my nipples.
He unlocked something deep inside me when he used my mouth the way he did. Something naughty and primal. A yearning that wasn’t there before—the need to know what it’s like to surrender to oneself.
To surrender to someone else.
I push two fingertips inside my pussy and envision his cock there instead. “Liam,” I moan, the plea for more rumbling off my lips.
And that’s when someone sucks in a harsh breath.
My eyes flick open.
The man of my fantasies is standing at the foot of the tub, his toffee eyes reduced to slits. Both hands form fists at his sides.
I veer upright, hands covering my chest, and water sloshes everywhere. “What are you doing in here!”
“I live here.”
“But these are my private quarters.”
“You won’t find a place on this island I don’t have access to.” He rounds the tub and hauls me out of the water to stand before him in stunned mortification. “Did you come?”
My cheeks flame even hotter. “N-no.”
Water runs in rivulets down my skin, dripping from my hair, soaking the plush mat under my feet. Blood throbs between my legs, a wondrous itch I can’t scratch. As displeasure darkens his beautiful features, I can’t help but grieve for the climax that didn’t happen. What would it have felt like to tip over the edge?
“Orgasm is a gift,” he says, his grip tight on my wrist as he pulls me out of my suite of rooms and into the shared space
of the penthouse. “You’re never to take it without permission.”
I’m shaking as he drags me into his quarters. The dip of the sun toward the horizon casts the space in shadow, and the heavy furnishings give an undertone of masculine virility. A bed designed for a king sits atop a platform in the middle of the room, outfitted in midnight blue. A color fit for royalty.
He ushers me away from the bed and gently shoves me into a seat at a small table in front of a set of French doors. Beyond the glass, I spy a balcony. “You’re not to come in here unless I instruct otherwise. Do you understand?”
“Y-yes,” I say, teeth chattering. “Why am I here?”
“Lay your hands on the table, palms up.”
I obey, knowing now is not the time to question him. With a decisive nod, he strides across the room and pulls something down from a rack on the wall. My stomach drops upon his return.
“Do you know what this is?”
A hard swallow precedes my answer. “It’s a riding crop.”
“Do you know why your hands are on that table right now?”
Without thinking, I yank them back.
“Do not move them.” The leather end of the crop makes a harsh smack on the table, punctuating his command.
I inch my hands back into position, every fiber of my being urging to me to take flight. But how far would I get? Out of this room? Maybe I’d breach the penthouse door before he catches up with me. Maybe I’d make it into the elevator, then I could streak through the tower as naked as the day I was born.
“Do you understand why you’re being punished?”
“Because I was touching myself?”
“Because you did it without permission.”
“You’re not being fair. I didn’t know it was against the rules.”
“Discipline is how you learn, Novalee.” He gestures to my vulnerable, exposed palms. “If you move your hands again, I’ll have no choice but to take you to our enforcer for punishment. Trust me, neither of us wants that.”
His threat collides inside me, a fatal crash of anger and fear. Trust him, he says. I want to laugh and cry and scream at the irony in that demand. As he steps back and raises the crop, an ominous preamble, I remind myself that I’ve been through worse.
I needed medical attention and a soft cushion for a week after Uncle Rowan unleashed his whip on my backside for trying to escape.
“You’ll receive five strikes to each palm.” His hand twitches, a millisecond away from inflicting pain, and our eyes lock. “Brace yourself, my sweet girl.”
Smack!
I jump, suck in a breath, and another notch of anger forms on my armor. He brings the crop down on my left palm.
Then the right.
Back and forth, reddening my fair skin.
Causing my eyes to water.
I glare at him through my unshed tears.
Before the fifth and final set, he stops to take a deep breath, and my arms quake on the table, hands burning from his abuse. My soul brims with rage, but underneath that, I’m hurt. I hate that my heart throbs with the traitorous emotion, throat aching from the toll of holding it back.
Because I thought he was different, believing we had a connection despite the reality of our power exchange. Did he not feel it too, back in the library with his cum still lingering on my lips?
He issues the last two strikes, making them count, and my teeth grind from the intensity of the sting. My toes curl with it, muscles stiff.
I don’t dare move my hands.
I don’t move at all.
“It’s over.” He sounds relieved, which is ludicrous because he wasn’t the one suffering a physical punishment. Setting the crop aside, he pulls me to my feet. “I’m not a sadist,” he says, sliding his hand along my cheek. “I don’t enjoy inflicting pain.”
“You get off on the control.”
The corners of his mouth twitch. A hint of a smile? A scowl? He’s so hard to read. “That’s probably true, but next time you’ll think twice before touching what’s mine.”
His words slide over me like a physical caress, and I clench my thighs in response. The hue of his gaze deepens to raw umber.
I swear he knows the effect he has on me.
“I believe you when you say you didn’t come.” His thumb traces the outline of my lips. “Your skin is flushed with the need to orgasm.” He sends a cursory glance at my chest. “And your nipples are begging for my mouth.”
A whimper escapes onto the soft pad of his thumb. I can’t resist darting my tongue out to taste him.
“Jesus, must you test my control?” He pushes his thumb into my mouth, and I suck on it, reminiscent of the way I serviced his manhood. “So innocent, but so responsive. You’re an anomaly, a vibrant orchid in the dead of winter.” He dips his thumb into my mouth three times, playing on my tongue before withdrawing. “Do you touch yourself often?”
“No.”
His nostrils flare. “Have you ever had an orgasm?”
“What do you think, Chancellor?”
“I think you’re going to end up over my lap for refusing to use my name.”
That mental image doesn’t inspire fear in me as it should. “I don’t mean to disobey you.”
“Then answer the question.”
“I’ve never had an orgasm.”
“You’re very responsive for a woman who never learned to pleasure herself.”
“I tried once.”
“Did you not enjoy yourself? Because you seemed to enjoy yourself just fine in my bathtub.”
“It felt awkward then.” I lower my gaze. “Today, it didn’t.”
Today, I had the memory of blowing him as inspiration.
“You’re not to pleasure yourself without my permission again,” he says, gripping me by the chin. “Is that clear?”
His command shivers through my bones. “Yes.”
“Your first orgasm belongs to me. Your pussy is off-limits to your fingers until I decide to give that gift to you.”
For the first time since I learned of my fate six years ago, I experience a thrilling sense of anticipation.
Chapter Four
After dressing for dinner, we arrive on the first floor. The silk skirt of my black dress swishes against my legs as Liam takes me by the elbow and leads me down a wide hallway. I’m entranced by the huge portraits on either side, gawking wide-eyed at the larger-than-life forms of what I assume are the Brotherhood’s ancestors.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“How did the Zodiac Brotherhood begin?”
He stalls in the middle of the hall, attention on the portrait that has captured me so.
“That’s Evangeline Castle. She was my grandmother by several degrees of greatness. And I mean that in every sense of the word.” Letting go of my arm, he tangles his fingers with mine, and I hide a wince because my palms are still tender from his punishment. “She was only eighteen when she set sail with a group of explorers. They would have never discovered the island without her unusual skills.”
“Unusual?”
He nods toward the portrait of his ancestor. “She knew the nighttime sky better than most men. The constellations and planets, and their position depending on the season. At first, the explorers believed she was a superstitious soul, but after she predicted two potential catastrophes, they started listening to her.” He sends a cursory glance down the hall. “She led them here, and by doing so, they escaped certain death in a storm. Got rich in the process too, because the island was uninhabited and abundant with gold.”
He wanders down the hall a few paces, pulling me along until we’re staring at a portrayal of a group of men from what appears to be the 17th century. “Are these men the explorers?”
“Yes. Evangeline was a progressive thinker. An Amelia Earhart of her time. But they couldn’t deny there was something special about her.” He tilts his head, and our gazes lock. “There were twelve explorers, one for every zodiac sign.”
“That’s quite a coincidence.”
“We don’t believe in coincidences, Novalee. The explorers didn’t either. Evangeline became their prized queen, shared among the twelve but locked away in a tower.”
“Why did they lock her up?”
“She wanted to leave the island. They didn’t.”
“So she was their prisoner?” Sickness rises in my gut at the thought.
“Their prisoner, their queen, and the mother of their children.”
I gape at him, my mind spinning through the implications of what he just said. “She’s not just your ancestor, is she?”
“No. All twelve of us are descendants of Evangeline Castle.”
“But you bear her surname.”
“She took the last name of the explorer born under Aries. Legend has it she favored him the most.”
“So you’re telling me this entire island was founded and bred from one woman? What about incest?”
“Evangeline’s direct descendants have always brought in outsiders to marry. It’s tradition, just as it’s tradition to compete for a queen’s hand in marriage at the start of a new Brotherhood.”
“And how is the new Brotherhood chosen?”
His lips curve into a grin. “You’re full of questions, aren’t you, my sweet girl?”
“I’m just trying to understand it all.” Slowly, we move down the hall once more.
“The Brotherhood shifts power every twenty-five years or so. Each house bears the duty of producing a male heir born under its zodiac sign. Once all twelve heirs come of age, the tradition renews, and a new virgin queen is found.” He gives me the side-eye. “This is privileged information.”
“It sounds like a tradition based on superstition.”
“Men have tested the tradition over the years. The outcomes were never good.”
“How so?”
“Disease and death, mostly. When we follow tradition, we prosper. When we don’t…”
A shiver takes hold of me. Or was that an actual cold draft hitting my back? Suddenly, I wish I’d chosen a dress that wasn’t backless—or at least left my hair down. Gooseflesh erupts on my skin.
“Why is the queen always a virgin? Evangeline wasn’t a virgin to all twelve.”
