Roped In

by Crystal Green

  “Russell.” Candace smacked her lips, considering the color on them in the mirror. “And better bullets than bras with him.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m approaching this as I’d approach a job. They didn’t call me the Enforcer for nothing at my desk. I had my executive’s life in precision order.”

  Candace was puckering her lips now, seeming just about as innocent as Rita Hayworth in a red dress. Nicki had no doubt she was the most efficient enforcer in history.

  Nicki cocked her head. “I’m getting a vibe about your ‘interest’ in ‘Russell.’”

  Candace snapped the lipstick back in its tube. “Okay. I admit that there’s something about him.”

  Sitting down on the bed, Nicki thought about the businessman. Sure, she could see how someone so dapper might appeal to a city girl like Candace. Russell Alexander was suave, nicely put together. He looked as if he might smell of cocktail hour bourbon and money.

  “I’m not surprised,” she said, “that a classy guy like him would get to you.”

  “It’s not the ‘classy’ thing.” Candace crossed one shapely leg over the other, her yellow sundress belling around her. “There’s just something about him that makes me want to rip off that suit and get at what’s underneath. Know what I mean?”

  Memories of pulling open Shane’s shirt last night thrummed through Nicki.

  Yes, she knew.

  She took a breath, clearing her head. “I can tell you why you’re interested—he seems hard to get. You like that in a man. You always have. I remember Josh Tanner—that cowboy we had on the ranch when we were in high school. He was out of college, but you set your cap for him, anyway….”

  “Because he wouldn’t look twice at me, even though I caught him doing just that during the spring rodeo in town once. Your point is made.”

  “But that’s what kept you interested in him—that one look.” Nicki hoped Alexander hadn’t given Candace too many of those. This had to be about business, not, as Candace had said, bras.

  “Wouldn’t a look do the same for you?” Candace lifted her brow as she deftly changed the subject. “Speaking of getting a look…or copping a feel… Are you seeing Shane again?”

  Nicki smiled.

  “Bra-vo.” She got out of her chair, came to the bed, started fussing with Nicki’s hair.

  “What…” Nicki shooed her off. “Again with the hair?”

  “We’ve got to go with another style tonight. Can’t bore him with the same old thing.”

  “I wasn’t going to. I mean…” Nicki bit her lip.

  “Tell me,” Candace said. “Come on.”

  Nicki hadn’t said anything to Shane about it, but she had something else in mind for tonight. And why not? She had a lot of time to make up for.

  “I’m all for the outlaw games,” she said. “But… He asked me last night what other fantasies I had. And I started thinking…”

  Candace gave her that “And…?” look.

  “Well, I started thinking that I can have anything with him.” Her gaze went a little bleary with sensual greed. She couldn’t remember any other time when there hadn’t been any constraints on her.

  And now, the world—and Shane—was her oyster.

  How many people in life would pass judgment on what got her going? Shane didn’t. Actually, he seemed up for anything, and all that had been stopping Nicki before was herself.

  Nicki’s gaze brushed over the room’s second-hand furniture, beaten wooden floors and carpets that needed replacing…

  She hadn’t had it all in life, but now she had the chance to be rich if she wanted to, just like one of the strong women who controlled hearts and destinies in her books. She had the opportunity to be as sinful, wealthy or decadent as she pleased, even for a night.

  Candace stood, going to her closet, where a burst of colorful clothing waited. She started to go through the offerings.

  “Since you can have anything,” she said, “what’s it going to be? A Hollywood star from the forties who plucks a gorgeous fan from out of the crowd? A prim, proper heiress who seduces the chauffeur? We can go to the city before your rendezvous time to get whatever you need if I don’t have it here.”

  But Nicki already knew what she wanted—and she doubted even Candace would have all she needed in that closet of hers.

  NICKI AND CANDACE had returned from a trip to the city just after eight o’clock. It allowed Nicki enough time to shower, then give herself over to the cosmetically awesome talents of Candace.

  By midnight, Nicki was all dressed up with someone to do.

  Now, as she sat on an old milking stool in the abandoned barn, which had been kept clean and tidy enough for the kids to play games in it by day, she smoothed her flowy, ankle-length crimson skirt over her lap. They’d found it at the Goodwill store in the city, along with a nearly sheer, tight, sexy peasant-type top that laced up the front. At a costume store, which had been filled with customers for Halloween, they’d discovered a half-corset, and it was making Nicki’s breath come short.

  She was also wearing stockings—Candace had suggested that she rip them to go along with the fantasy’s scenario—and Nicki’s otherwise bare feet rested on one of the blankets she’d laid out on the dirt, along with some white picnic blankets she’d used to cover some hay bales, which were supposed to be makeshift beds. Above her, she’d hung a couple of lanterns, too, hoping they would add to the illusion that this might be another place, another time.

  A pirate ship in need of a pirate.

  She glanced at her outdated cell phone—11:56—then tucked it behind a bale, out of sight, out of modern mind.

  Then she heard a sound outside. Someone moving.

  Someone coming in.

  She saw him in the doorway—Shane in his hat, his cowboy outlaw gear shadowed by moonlight. Shane, rogue and reluctant good guy…

  She lay down on a makeshift bed, spreading her unbound hair over a pillow.

  Tingles whirred up and down her body, settling to a vibrating gnaw between her legs. She already felt ready, plumped and damp.

  Shane stepped into the barn, drawing the door closed behind him. It was dim where he was standing, and that dimness allowed her some courage that she’d only had in business, not romance, before now.

  “Take off the hat,” she said. “Then the bandanna. There are some things by the door for you.”

  He laughed, low and oh-so-manly. “Looks like you’re awake tonight.”

  “Tonight’s different. For one thing, you’re not the same outlaw.” And, tonight, she really was awake, in more ways than one.

  “What’s going on, Nicki?”

  She shifted on the bed, stretching out on her side, letting her skirt ride up one stocking-torn leg. “Next time you look at me, you’ll think of how I’m sleeping peacefully. You’re going to see a woman you brought here against her will and she’s exhausted. But that’s not going to stop you.”

  He didn’t move, but she went on, undeterred.

  More excited than ever.

  “You’ve just walked into your cabin to find her…me…in your quarters,” she whispered now. “I’m the spoils of your ship’s attack on a town off the Spanish Main.”

  As she half-closed her eyelids, she saw him take off the cowboy hat, the bandanna. He spied what she’d left for him near the door, heard him laugh to himself.

  She squeezed her legs together because the pierce of need in her clit was pure agony. Just watching him was agony because she knew what was coming, anticipated it until she wanted to scream.

  No remorse, she thought, no regrets. Not about anything anymore. Tonight was what it was, and she would finally have everything she wanted from him.

  Everything…

  Untucking the shirt from his pants, he said, “You really think I’m the eye patch type?”

  “There’s no eye patch there.”

  “But there’s this.” He held up a red sash, then a fake rapier.

  She “sleep
ily” rolled to her back, arms above her head. With no bra, her breasts would be outlined against her blouse, her peaked nipples making her desire obvious.

  He must’ve noticed, because she heard him groan softly. Then, from the corner of her gaze, she saw him tie the sash around his waist. But he dropped the rapier to the ground.

  As he sauntered over to her, he undid one button on his shirt.

  Then another.

  “Is this what you had in mind?” he asked.

  In response, she dove into the fantasy all the way, sitting up on her pallet, cowering, as if she’d just awakened to see him walk into the cabin—the pirate king she had watched from afar as he’d pillaged and plundered.

  Her captor.

  “What are you going to do with me?” she asked.

  No remorse, no regret…

  A side-smile tilted his mouth, his blue eyes sparkling. He was into it.

  “I haven’t decided just yet…wench.”

  “My name is—”

  “I don’t want to know your name.”

  In one stride, he closed the distance between them, reached out, grasping her ankle, looking mighty entertained by all of this.

  “Come off that bed,” he said.

  She shook her head, her pulse flittery. It was his voice—commanding, gruff. It made her go even wetter.

  He pulled her off the pallet, sweeping her to a stand, bringing her flush against his body and making the breath leave her entirely until she somehow got it back. She could feel how stimulated he already was, the bulge in his jeans hard against her belly.

  Her breathing sawed through her, and he smiled down at her, as if he’d claimed another victory.

  As if she had nowhere to run and he was utterly in control….

  But then, as if merely having her in that position had been enough, he let her go, backed away, until he was in the shadows again, this time, much nearer to the pallet.

  “You’ll do as I say from now on, wench,” he said. “Is that clear?”

  She shook her head, just as she would’ve in real life. It was instinctive. No one had ever ordered Nicki around before, and she wasn’t sure she liked it now.

  Or maybe she did. A lot.

  In the dimness, she could barely see him lowering himself to a near-sit, a predator.

  “First,” he whispered, “you’ll take off that damned thing around your waist.”

  Her corset.

  She wasn’t about to fight him on this—the thing wasn’t comfortable to wear, anyway—so she unlaced it. When it was untied, her breasts lowered from their precipitous height, but she breathed easier, even though it still felt like ice was in her lungs—refreshing, bracing.

  After she slid the corset up and over her head, she tossed it his way. In the near darkness, he caught it in mid-air, his hand fisting around it.

  “What are you wearing under that skirt?” he asked.

  “A woman never tells.”

  “She will tonight.” He gestured with his hand. “You’re going to lift it up for me.”

  This was getting intense, but she did it. In the back of her mind, she almost thought that he might spring out of the shadows at her if she disobeyed, but the fact that she could do so actually empowered her in a way she’d never expected.

  She inched up her skirt, and it rustled with every move. When she had revealed her ripped stockings, he spoke again.

  “Take those off.”

  Swallowing, she propped her foot on the pallet. Then, feeling a twinge of ye olde decadence, she bent over, putting her hands on her ankle, sliding her fingers up her silk-covered calf, over her knee, her thigh.

  She just about thought she could see the shine of his gaze in the dimness, devouring her.

  Then, deliberately, she pushed down the thigh-high stocking, which used some kind of sticky stuff to stay up. Then she repeated the performance with the other.

  “Are you done having your way with me?” she whispered, putting some disgust into her voice, the type of superior dismissal she imagined a lady who’d been kidnapped from her beautiful mansion on the cliffs might use with the man who’d taken her away from luxury to…this.

  Her pulse quickened.

  His tone was gravelly. “Your top. That needs to come off next.”

  By now, her mouth was dry, her heart kicking, her blood tearing through her.

  But she obeyed, anyway, tugging on the lacing that held her blouse together, parting it, allowing the material to rest on her shoulders, offering only a peak of cleavage.

  The linen brushed against the tips of her breasts, making her feel so wanton.

  Before she knew it, he was on his feet, out of the shadows, taking her in his arms, face to face, mouth near mouth.

  But he didn’t kiss her.

  No—he was fevered, almost even angry for some reason, and he ran a thumb over her lips, tracing the outline.

  “I hate what you do to me….” he said.

  Driven by his words, she parted her lips, taking his finger into her mouth, sucking on him.

  She thought she heard him curse again under his breath, urgently, as she kept sucking, languidly using her tongue now.

  For the first time in Nicki’s life, she had a man where she wanted him, fantasy or not, and she took his hand from her mouth, guiding it downward so it dragged over her chin, her neck, lower, until he came to her breasts.

  Then she let go of him, and he coaxed his fingers over one of her nipples, sending tickles of heat through her, melting, making every part of her liquid.

  “Damn,” she thought she heard him say again as he cupped her in his palm. He used his thumb to explore, bringing her nipple to a pained, pleasured nub.

  She reached up, wanting to feel the features of his face, to touch its contours so she could always have some image in her mind of him, even beyond these games they were playing. Maybe those mental pictures would even last after he left her for good.

  But before she could touch him, he leaned her back, using just one of his arms. Then he bent to her, taking her other nipple into his mouth, tonguing, laving, gently biting. It was all Nicki could do to shut up and take it while she arched into him, encouraging him.

  So real, she thought. This felt like it was really happening, but not like it had after she’d woken up from her dream last night.

  This felt as if it could be anything but a fantasy.

  Turning his attention to her other breast, he worshipped her, making her feel like she was his one, his only, the mere reason he had laid damage to her town tonight—the reason he had lit everything on fire.

  To spirit her away.

  Only her.

  She threaded her fingers through his thick hair, and another stray thought intruded.

  Not a pirate.

  This was Shane.

  How many times had she wished for this?

  But, long ago, her fantasies had been so much more innocent. And far less…oh…like this…

  He sucked her breast, kissed the skin between them, then lower, lower, making her squirm.

  Then he was coaxing her to her back, easing off her skirt and tossing it to the floor, leaving her only in her blouse and a pair of drenched undies.

  With one practiced move, he parted her legs, and she took in a shaking breath, heard him laugh, as if he knew how excited she was, how close her nerves were to singeing.

  His breath came hot and damp against her as he slid her legs over his shoulders.

  She was about to whisper his name, but she couldn’t say it.

  Not tonight.

  Maybe not…ever…

  When he pressed his mouth against her covered sex, she bit her lower lip, keeping herself from whimpering. But when he started to gnaw through the cotton of her undies, she went and did it anyway, unable to restrain herself.

  Her tiny sounds of delight seemed to push him onward, and he went at her harder. Then, as if teasing her wasn’t enough for him anymore, he drew aside the crotch of her panties, still keeping them on,
and tasted her with his tongue.

  She bucked at the needling pleasure in her clit, and he laughed.

  “Want more?” he whispered.

  In response, she reached for her undies, fumbling with them to get them the hell off.

  Torturously, he divested her of the material, tossing it away, too.

  Before he bent back down to her, he whispered, “After tonight, I’ll…”

  “Throw me overboard?”

  She’d stepped out of the fantasy with a joke, of all things, and she knew why. It was because she’d come to want something else from him besides this—she wanted truth. Would she always want that from Shane, even though she didn’t actually know him and he didn’t know her?

  He rested his fingertips on her belly, and her muscles clenched, making her feel the maddening tension in her sex, as well. She was so wet for him, and when he edged down, over the curls on her mound, she almost dug her nails into his scalp.

  Restless, Nicki did something she’d never dared do in real life—she took control of a man.

  She sat up, her breath coming in rasps as she ran her hands up his jeans-clad thighs, and slipped a palm between his legs, nestling his penis, which strained against his jeans.

  He grunted, maybe both in surprise and pleasure.

  “What’re you waiting for?” she whispered, stroking him, teasing him as he’d teased her.

  As if having to remind her that he wasn’t a man to be trifled with, he reached behind her, threading his hands into her hair, grabbing on.

  The slight roughness of his gesture turned her on even more.

  Alive…awake.

  No turning back now, Nicki went for what she wanted the most—a kiss from her childhood crush.

  A sign of real affection from the man who’d always had her heart from the very first time he’d been her hero.

  6

  SOMEWHERE ALONG THE WAY, Shane had lost the upper hand.

  It was time to get it back.

  As this woman—this fantasy version of a captivated lady—brushed her lips over his, he toyed with her again, drawing away, making her moan in what he thought to be frustration.