Sinful Surrender

by Houston Havens

  “A Star Rider, whether one hundred percent human chauvinist or an alien-alpha mix, would accept death or agree to become a eunuch before he’d agree or allow his woman to be trained in a man’s job,” he barked in her face. “Star Riders have names like Aillbhe, Zacquikaridge, Yarrow, or Tairdelbach. None of them have last names that they share.” He shot a hard glance at Drakker before returning his gaze to glide over her features as if seeing her for the first time. The admiring look in his eyes told her he found her attractive. Vulnerability prickled at her cheeks, heating her face.

  Logan leaned in even closer. “You’ve got two choices my little beauty—the easy way or the hard way. The easy way is for you to tell me where you come from. What you’re doing here and why. Or, we can do it the hard way, through interrogation. So, it’s deal with Drakker or fess up. It’s your choice.”

  Her heart beat at an erratic pace. She thrust her shoulders back with bravado. “I’m telling you the truth. My name is Fay Avalon.” She looked at Drakker for help. He winked back. Her mouth went dry. Her chest tightened. What the fuck does that mean? Is he looking forward to torturing me, or is he telling me he’ll go easy on me? Oh Lord, a beating from a man his size will kill me. She had to convince Logan she wasn’t a Dirt Dweller, but how?

  “Okay, Drakker.” Logan must have taken her silence as her answer. “Take her in.”

  “No!” Her hero, Arlo, shoved off the love seat and rushed across the room, stepping between her and Logan. “I won’t let you. Not her.”

  Logan’s brow dipped low over his vexed stare. It was easy to read the incredulousness etching heavy lines into his handsome face. “You’re protecting a Dirt Dweller spy? Against me?”

  Drakker mumbled, “He’s infatuated with her.”

  Logan shoved Arlo aside and clamped a hold on her arm.

  Fay pulled against his biting grip, but couldn’t free herself.

  “I believe her.” Arlo recovered from the push. He slapped his hand over Logan’s wrist and squeezed until he broke Logan’s hold on her then shoved him back. “Think about it. If she were a spy, she would have refused to come with us. She would have stayed with her craft instead of allowing us to take her, but she didn’t. She pulled me to my horse. She wanted to leave.”

  Drakker nodded his head. “He’s right about that. She did seem to be in a hurry to leave the crash site.”

  “I’m telling you all the truth. My name is Fay Avalon.” Her voice shook. Hoping they hadn’t noticed how frightened she was. She coughed, clearing the fear from her tone and finished. “I can’t help what someone named me!”

  “Think Logan, if she were a spy, why would she want to leave her airship?” Arlo gave her a hopeful look before continuing in her defense. “She would have delayed us or sent us packing.”

  “Or tried to kill us,” Drakker added.

  Logan’s jaw flexed as his stare hardened on her. His disbelief was evident in his rigid stance. “Did you guys ever think…just think, she might have allowed you to take her, so she could get in? Spies want in before they want out. They don’t run until they’re escaping.”

  Drakker’s pressed lips and arched brow said he agreed with Logan’s assessment.

  Arlo didn’t look ready to concede. “Yeah, but if she were a spy, a crash entry would have blown her cover. Spies infiltrate and come in as one of our own. She’d have known we’d question her about the crash.” Arlo persisted. “As a spy she would have tried to escape and reenter in secrecy at a later date. She knows her people would be looking for her downed craft to save her. Nah, if she’s a DD, she’s a runner.”

  Logan glared at her. “Well? Are you running from the Dirt Dwellers?”

  Hell yes, but I’m not going to admit it now. I’d no sooner get the word yes out, and you’d hang me by my thumbs before I could explain. Arlo’s expression willed her to say yes, and she wanted to, but her ire was up. Rex told her the history of the name Abán. It was time to use that bit of information and put this know-it-all in his place. “You can’t accuse or torture me for being a spy based on my name, Logan, or you’d have to accuse yourself as well.”

  “Yeah?” His scrutiny penetrated right through her. “How’s that?”

  “Like Avalon, Abán isn’t an original Airborne name. The name’s origin is of Druid descent.” She didn’t let Logan’s sharp intake of breath stop her from making her point. “So, does that make you a Star Rider, an Airborne, or an Old World Mole? Or maybe, you’re a spy as well.”

  Logan raised a questioning eyebrow at Drakker. At the shake of his head, both their glances slid to Arlo, whose shoulders fell.

  “Well?” Logan pushed for Arlo’s answer. “Did you volunteer that information to her?”

  Arlo’s glance fell to the floor in a silent answer.

  Logan grabbed her arm and pulled her across the small den. “Only a Dirt Dweller would know our last name.” He tossed a nasty glare at Arlo. “And her using the words as well is damn near an admission of her being a spy.”

  “No!” Arlo lurched forward putting a hand up to stop Logan’s forward movement. “I told her the name.”

  An expression of disbelief froze Logan’s features as he studied Arlo’s face for a moment. He swept his head in a slow side-to-side negative movement. “You’ve never lied to me, Arlo. Don’t start now.” He pulled at Fay.

  “I told you he was smitten.” Drakker moved in behind Logan in silent support.

  “God damn it! Where are you taking her?” Arlo smacked his hand hard against Logan’s chest then shoved him, breaking the hold he had on Fay. “I won’t let Maddog touch her.”

  Logan retaliated with a right hook to Arlo’s jaw.

  Fay squeaked, backing away in stunned surprise.

  “Whoa!” Drakker stepped around Fay to separate the two men. “We don’t do shit like this. Majority rules.”

  Logan shot glaring daggers at Arlo. “I never said I’d let Maddog torture her! I said I’d let Drakker interrogate her. There is a difference!”

  “Yeah? Not by much.” Arlo’s face contorted in determination.

  Just knowing he was trying to save her gave her comfort.

  Drakker’s shock was evident in his wide-eyed stare before his eyes narrowed to angry slits. “What the fuck does that mean?” His jaw flexed with fury.

  Fay’s anxiety rose once again.

  Arlo paused. “You’re both…sadists.”

  There was a fleeting glimpse of hurt in Drakker’s eyes, drawing Fay’s sympathy. An odd reaction considering the circumstances, but one Fay understood. She had her own secrets.

  His stare hardened. “I’m not a sadist, Arlo. I’m into dominance. There’s a marked distinction between the two. But thanks, I’m glad you think so highly of me, bro.”

  Arlo cocked his head at a contrite angle. “Come on. You know I love you, man.”

  “Then try a little respect.”

  “I respect you.”

  “No, you don’t.” Drakker got into his face. “You judge me.”

  Arlo backed up. “Well, you’re into some crazy shit—”

  Drakker stepped forward, his chest puffing with indignation. “And from where I stand, wearing your heart on your sleeve, writing love poems, and acting like a lovesick puppy around a woman you just met is plain crazy.”

  “Fuck you, Drakker!”

  “That’s it!” Logan pointed toward the door they’d come in. “Arlo, get out! You’re running at the mouth today.”

  “I swear to you, Logan. I’ll kill Maddog before I’ll let you let him near her.” Arlo rubbed his bruised chin.

  Logan jerked, trying to get into Arlo’s face, but Drakker used his large body to block his path. “Easy, Logan. Our little Napoléon’s been on the cocky side for the last two days trying to impress her. That’s what this is all about.”

  “Fuck that!” Logan shouted over Drakker’s shoulder at Arlo. “Loyalty and honor come first! Perhaps you’ve forgotten that.”

  “I haven’t forgotten anything!�
�

  “Good!” Logan backed off. “Maybe, if you’d shut that one-eyed ego down for one minute, you’d hear we haven’t condemned her as a spy, yet. The majority rules there is enough to question her.”

  As Drakker moved back, Logan grabbed Fay by the arm once again, and then stepped between them, giving Arlo’s shoulder a hard nudge with his own as he passed. Arlo spun around and latched back onto Fay’s free hand as Logan pulled her toward the adjoining door on the far side of the den. She remembered the cowboy in her mission called it a whoopee room. Arlo’s grip ripped her and Logan apart.

  “Please.” Fay rubbed at the flesh reddening from the manhandling. “I’m—”

  Logan circled his arm around her waist and yanked her back toward him.

  “Stop this! I’m not here to spy,” Fay insisted, her heart the epicenter of the quake now shaking her body.

  Drakker opened the door to the alleged whoopee room, letting Logan drag her into the adjacent area.

  Arlo followed them into the chamber. “What the fuck is this? When did we get this addition to the house?”

  Oddly, Fay’s jumbled nerves settled as she scanned the room. The decor should have frightened her. Instead, adrenaline from a secret desire soared through her body. The decor was altogether different from the country appearance of the rest of the manor. A shiny black granite floor set off the four white plaster walls. It was sparse in furnishings, and the items in the room seemed more like art than useful furniture. One of the pieces was a red X-shaped rack with fuzzy red wrist cuffs attached to it. A metal slab sat off to the right with clear tape or clingfilm on the edge of the table, indicating someone had been restrained there not long ago. The metallic cabinet stationed near the slab had a pair of large scissors lying on top.

  She crooked her head back and was surprised to see some chains and a large cage suspended from the ceiling beams. A shiver ran down her back. She shifted her gaze to a black padded chair-like device with parts of the seat cut out. Padded foot holders angled out from the front where the legs would have been. A large tray held colored ropes, neatly wrapped. The wall to her left held strange leather garments, shoes, and hoods that hung on pegs. Red and black candles where place about the room.

  This wasn’t an interrogation room. Not like any she’d seen anyway. This was what Arlo was referring to when he said Drakker was into some crazy shit.

  “Arlo.” Logan pointed to a room off to the side. “In there.”

  “Fuck you. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Arlo, if you don’t want me kicking you out of here, get your ass in that room over there. Now.” Logan’s grip around her waist tightened lifting her to her toes as he hauled her to the center of the chamber. It was then she noticed there were more chains. These were anchored to the floor. Her nerves rattled causing her anxiety to return. She shot an uneasy glance at Arlo. Pleading with her eyes, she willed him to help her. Arlo turned his back and walked away.

  A heavy pressure settled in her chest as Logan chained her wrists to the padded cuffs attached to the ceiling chains. He tightened the chains, drawing her limbs up until her arms were slightly bent at the elbows. Though her heart pounded, she wasn’t sure if it was from fear or excitement. The padded cuffs took her back to one of her first viewings as a mind traveler. The mission turned into an accidental introduction to the forbidden side of sex.

  She was to target and locate a runner’s escape route. She found it easy enough, but she never reported what captivated her and would become the foundation of her fantasies.

  At first, she believed a Dirt Dweller captured and restrained an Airborne woman in padded cuffs. But the woman put up no resistance. Without removing his clothes, the man exposed his penis then proceeded to cut off the woman’s clothing while suggestively rubbing himself against the woman’s face and other body parts until he had an erection. The woman seemed to enjoy it, and that’s what caught Fay’s attention. The man then artfully bound the woman’s breasts, bottom, and legs in colored ropes and began spanking, pinching, whipping, and fondling the woman’s privates until she screamed, and he squirted his semen over the woman’s mouth. It was debauchery. To Fay’s shock, she experienced her first orgasm while watching the couple’s foray into the dark side.

  Logan dropped to one knee, drawing her attention when he placed her left foot on his thigh then unlaced her boot. After removing it he raised her foot and rolled her sock off. He looked closer at her instep. “What does this tattoo on the bottom of your foot mean?”

  He was asking about what she had come to call her birthmark—a double circle with crossed arrows. It had been there for as long as she could remember. Being orphaned as an infant she had no idea what it meant, or who had done it to her. But if she could use it to her advantage right now, she would. “Is the tattoo giving you second thoughts about my torture?”

  “No.” He removed the other boot and sock then chained her ankles.

  “It should.”

  “Why?”

  “You didn’t answer my question. So why should I answer yours?”

  Logan cocked a brow at her. Was that a glimmer of amusement in his gaze? “What question did you ask?”

  “Are you an Airborne, or are you and your brothers Old World Moles helping the Airbornes survive?”

  “And how would you know that?”

  “How would I know what?”

  “I didn’t say Drakker and Arlo are my brothers. We look nothing alike.”

  “No, you don’t, but you slipped when you said ‘only a Dirt Dweller would know our last name.’”

  Logan smirked as he opened her flight suit then ripped most of it off before turning to Drakker. “Are you ready to use that new elixir you and Andonis have been working on?”

  “Pretty much.”

  “Then get started.” Looking back at her, Logan paused for the briefest of moments as he raked a glance over her red lace underclothing.

  The intense look of interest in his eyes confused her. She should have felt humiliation at the exposure, but her training as a spy had desensitized her to the modest, puritanical beliefs of the average Dirt Dweller. Her government prepared and warned all female spies to expect rape when captured by the Airborne barbarians, but Logan had different plans for her. Since they chained her, she had assumed she was in for a beating before the rape. Now, she knew there would be no beating.

  She shifted her gaze to the small bottle Drakker held. It was filled with a red substance. The minute he opened the lid, a fruity odor wafted over to her. Her heart pounded. Oh shit, if that’s Tabun, I’m in for a horrible death. The thought of convulsions and paralysis made her stomach roll. The back of her throat burned from bile, and she swallowed.

  Drakker’s voice was low when he spoke to Logan. “We’ve only tested this on willing mutants.”

  Logan took a deep breath as he turned to Drakker. “It’s time you find out how well it does on the unwilling.”

  Fay was sure they could hear the pounding of her heart. It hit her chest so hard even she could hear it. She swallowed the lingering bitter taste of the bile now lodged in her throat along with fear. Her stomach churned with the need to vomit when she realized she’d been chained to control the violent seizures the poison would have on her body. Terror pumped through her, deafening her to most of Logan’s words.

  “You can save yourself a lot of discomfort…it’s your choice.”

  What? What did he just say? The word discomfort stuck out in her mind. So, it is Tabun poison. What could she say to delay them and give herself a chance to escape? “I told you, I didn’t come here as a spy.”

  “So, you’re admitting to being a spy?” Logan spoke in a level tone.

  She remained silent.

  “You said you didn’t come here as a spy. So, that means you’re a spy, but you’re not spying on us right now. Do you spy for the Dirt Dwellers?”

  More silence.

  “Fine. Just remember.” Logan took a step back. “This was your choice.” His Adam’s
apple bounced up and down as he pulled a nasty-looking dagger from a sheath behind his back.

  “No!” Her blood surged, expecting a jab. To her surprise, he used the blade to cut the remaining shreds of clothing from her limbs. He then returned the knife to its sheath. She wasn’t sure which she feared more, the knife, the poison, or Drakker’s fists. Either way, this interrogation was about to get brutal.

  In spite of the confinement, her limbs shook. Her heart pounded and her breaths raced in and out of her. Fear, pure fear consumed her. She stood chained in nothing but her red bra and panties. There was nothing to use to protect herself. There was no way out. Not even a confession could stop her fate.

  “We’ll see just how smart your choice is in a minute, won’t we?” Logan turned to Drakker as he sauntered toward the room Arlo had disappeared into. “She’s yours.”

  If she baited Logan, perhaps he’d make her death quick. “Not brave enough to poison me yourself, huh Logan?”

  His back stiffened at her words. He stopped at the threshold of the other room.

  “You’re not man enough to watch the violent convulsions you’ve ordered me to endure?”

  Without turning to face her, he answered, “Who said I wouldn’t be watching?”

  Before she could taunt him more, he walked into the room and slammed the door closed.

  Chapter 4

  Logan entered the room he used when he was in one of his voyeur moods. Drakker didn’t mind or care about his secret intrusions. He’d had this two-way mirrored chamber and the outer room built for two purposes. One, to keep Arlo from complaining about hearing Drakker’s more adventurous sex romps. And two, for rare occasions like this when it suited as an interrogation room. A world with continuous bouts of war left no room for normalcy in their leader’s life or home.

  Arlo sat in the viewing room wearing a disgruntled expression, his arms crossed over his chest. His brother was young and still filled with piss and vinegar from time to time when the stupidity of youth overruled his common sense.