Tower: A Dark Romance Rapunzel Retelling (Ever After)

by Measha Stone

“I do. When I stay at the house, Sergio comes with. He’s part of my personal security team.” Peter turned to the man in question. “She’s not to leave the box unescorted for any reason. Have a bottle of wine brought to her table and a bread and cheese platter. She didn’t eat very much dinner.”

  “She is right here, and she isn’t very hungry,” Azalea said.

  “I’ll be in my office but will join her shortly.” Peter continued to address the mammoth.

  Azalea rolled her eyes.

  “Yes, sir.” Sergio turned his attention to Azalea. “After you.” He gestured for her to walk back down the hall she’d just entered.

  “Azalea.” Peter’s hard tone stopped her a few paces in. “Be good for me. Don’t make me punish you again today.”

  Her stomach clenched and her face heated, more so when she realized Sergio had heard.

  Not trusting her voice to remain steady, she chose not to respond. Turning on her heel, which thankfully wasn’t too high, she made her way down the hall away from him.

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  “Sergio says you gave him no trouble.” Peter startled her with his sudden appearance, making her jolt. His hand rested on her shoulder, stilling her. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you,” he offered.

  A gentle smile perched on his lips.

  “I was watching…” She shrugged, unable to say what she’d been so enthralled with before he joined her.

  She had no idea how long he’d been in his office working, but she’d managed to polish off three glasses of wine and too much of the crusty bread and cheese he’d had brought to her.

  Peter glanced up at the main stage. A woman remained suspended in the intricate weavings of shibari bondage. Azalea knew the term because they had announced it when the couple began. Did Peter have the same skill as the man on stage?

  “I thought you might like tonight’s show.” He took a seat beside her. A server placed a drink before him, and Peter thanked him before waving him off. Everything sort of appeared for him when he wanted it.

  “I—” She shook her head, deciding not to ruin the casual ambiance with any more snark. “Yes. It’s been entertaining. This is the second time he’s tied her up. The first was like a spiderweb with her cocooned in the middle. Amazing, and beautiful.” Azalea took another sip of her white wine. “And it takes so much time, so much patience.”

  “It does, yes. On both the part of the Top and the bottom.” He brushed her hair from her shoulder. “If they weren’t doing this as a performance tonight, Jerry would have her bound tighter, her breasts more prominent, and he’d be taking a flogger to her. She loves it best when she’s bound tight with no wiggle room.”

  Azalea turned to him. Though there was a slight tilt to his lips, giving her the impression he enjoyed the topic, he wasn’t teasing her.

  “A flogger to her breasts?” she asked sincerely.

  “Oh, yes. And binding them makes them a bit more sensitive. It’s perfectly safe, Azalea,” he assured her.

  She didn’t comment on that. Even after he proved what an ass he could be, and after all she knew about the Titon family, she didn’t doubt what he said.

  She focused her attention on the couple who were ending their performance. Jerry brought his playmate down from the suspension binds with as much care and gentleness as she had been put in them.

  “I was thinking.” He cleared his throat before taking a sip of his drink.

  She bit back another dig at him and drank wine instead.

  His grin expressed his knowledge that she was trying at civility. Maybe at some point he would return it and let her go home. Or at the very least, explain why he wouldn’t.

  “You haven’t questioned me about a cell phone, or worried about your mother calling you. Why?” He finished his drink. The ice clunked against the crystal glass.

  “I’ve never needed a cell phone.” No harm in telling the truth about it; he already knew her mother had been overprotective. “I usually had Santos or one of his men with me if I left the house.” Which was pretty rare. And it wasn’t like she had any friends to call even when she managed to get out of the house without an escort.

  Peter tapped his finger against his chin, seeming to consider what she said then smiled a bit wider. “And now? When she calls home looking for you? Santos isn’t around, from what my men have found. He ran away.”

  “Of course, he did.” Azalea wouldn’t expect that coward to stick around to feel her mother’s wrath when she returned home to find her daughter kidnapped right from beneath his nose.

  “Any idea where he would have run to? A different home? A vacation spot?” Peter pressed her, pushing her glass of wine out of her reach. The warm buzz of the alcohol worked its way through her, but she didn’t need him to tell her when she’d had enough.

  “No. We weren’t exactly friends.” Santos despised having to babysit her as much as she hated having him around.

  Peter continued with his questions. “And your mother? Will she come home when she calls and no one answers?”

  She shook her head and stood, taking a few steps to the railing where she looked down at the floor below where couples moved to the erotic beat of the music. She could almost pick out which women in the crowd were there for work and which were playing out pleasurable fantasies.

  His body pressed against her from behind, his aftershave enveloping her.

  “Do you know how to dance?” he asked.

  “I do.” Her mother had brought instructors into the house once a week during her teen years to teach her the art of dance. She knew some ballet, but mostly she’d been taught to dance at social gatherings. It had been one of the small shimmering lights of hope that her mother would allow her to be a normal woman and enter into society when she was old enough.

  Without a word, he linked her hand with his and led her down the stairs to the main level and onto the dance floor.

  At his gesture, a new song sprang to life from the bandstand next to the main stage. The crowd moved aside, giving Peter the room he seemed to demand.

  Turning to her, he released her hand and offered his arms. She stepped into his embrace, holding his left hand with her right at shoulder height, and felt his right splay across her shoulder blades.

  Apparently, he’d taken a few lessons himself.

  Peter flashed her a smile and guided her into the first step as the singer began.

  Azalea forced herself to focus on the paces, enjoying the fact they weren’t dancing to any ballroom melody that her mother had forced upon her. But Peter wouldn’t be ignored. His fingers touching her bare back reminded her with every step that he controlled her. Not only the dance.

  “You took lessons?” she asked when his stare became too much to bear in silence.

  “My mother’s fault,” he said with a hint of sadness. “My father couldn’t dance to save his life and it was something she enjoyed. I was the next best thing, so she taught me.”

  Azalea imagined a young Peter dancing in a living room, dancing on a mother’s feet. “Do your parents live far away?”

  His eyes clouded, and he looked over her shoulder, turning her with a slight dip before answering. “My mother passed away a long time ago, my father right before her.” His lips tightened as he spoke; his entire body beneath her touch tensed.

  He spun her again, reeling her out and bringing her back in, closer to his body as he moved her along the dance floor.

  “You didn’t answer me about your mother,” he said when she spoke again. Apparently, the topic of his family was off-limits. “Will she come running home when she calls and no one is there to answer?”

  She took note of his set jaw and the firmness of his hold as the music continued. Reminding herself she’d decided to play nice with him in order to get answers, if not freedom, she answered him. “She’s at some meeting and won’t be home for a few more weeks. She rarely calls me if she’s away for business, so she probably doesn’t know I’m not at home. If she’s been in contact with S
antos and he didn’t tell her, she most likely won’t know until she arrives home.”

  Peter’s eyebrows shot up. “She doesn’t call you while she’s away? What sort of business is she in that she can’t call her daughter?” The accusation in his questions wasn’t lost on Azalea, and she couldn’t blame him. From what little he’d told her of his own mother, of course, it would seem odd to him.

  “I don’t know what her business is, actually. She’s always told me it’s complicated.” Azalea looked away from him, not wanting to see the disapproval in his features anymore.

  “So, she won’t know you aren’t home for a few more weeks.” He turned them again and picked up the steps to match the tempo of the music.

  “Maybe I can be home before she gets back.” Azalea took a chance. Either he would continue speaking freely with her, or he’d become agitated that she brought up her freedom again. “Maybe we can spend the next few weeks together, and I can go home before she returns. She promised we’d start looking for my own apartment when she was done with this meeting.” She could hear the hope spring into her own voice.

  He didn’t react to her proposition. The dance continued, and he held her close as they made their way around the floor. The crowd had thinned once Peter began their waltz.

  “If you spend the next few weeks with me, behaving, doing as you’re told, and giving over to me, when your mother returns home, I’ll let her know where you are. When she comes for you, we will decide what will happen then.”

  The song ended and with the last note, Azalea stopped dancing.

  “What do you mean, give over to you?”

  “I mean give me everything. Power, control, your submission. Give me all of you and when your mother returns, we’ll decide what to do.”

  “I still don’t understand why you won’t just let me go. I don’t understand why you took me in the first place. Can you at least give me that?” She searched his features, looking for a small beam of light. Something for her to latch onto that he wasn’t a monster.

  “I can’t, no. I can give you my word you will be safe. I will never harm you—even when I hurt you.”

  They stood while dancers filled the floor, surrounding them. The band struck up a fast-paced song.

  “When she returns. You promise?”

  “I swear it.” He held her hands and gave them both a squeeze, his stare boring into hers.

  She swept her gaze over the alcoves overlooking the dance floor. The moving artwork of submission and dominance. Another couple was taking the main stage followed by two uniformed staff members rolling a spanking bench into place.

  Everything she’d come to this club to see, to feel, to learn about, he was offering to her. And in the end, she could have complete freedom. From him, from her mother. She’d figure out the hows later.

  “Okay. I agree.” She pulled free of his grip and thrust her hand out to him. A business agreement began with a handshake. She knew that much.

  He looked at her offering and chuckled, taking it between both of his.

  “Let’s get home, then.” He turned her and escorted her toward the exit.

  “What’s on the upper floors of this building?” she asked once they were in the back hall headed toward the garage. Staircases went upward into darkness, and she’d seen an elevator.

  “The girls who get work privileges here are also able to rent the rooms on three of the floors to do business. We provide security for them, so it’s safer for them to stay here than to go to a motel down the street or out to some asshole’s car.” Peter grabbed her coat from one of his men and helped her into it.

  “The three floors above those are going to be mine once construction is complete. I didn’t want to hold off on the club while my private rooms were being finished,” he continued to explain as he took her to the garage where he’d parked his car.

  Azalea thanked the man holding her door open as she climbed into the passenger seat.

  She had more questions for him, but when he took his spot behind the wheel and turned the music on, she figured he didn’t want to play twenty questions.

  And she didn’t want to jeopardize the gift he was giving her. Hope. In a few weeks, she would be free.

  Chapter 10

  Peter escorted Azalea up the steps to the house with his hand on her back, wishing her coat wasn’t barring him from feeling her skin. He hadn’t taken much time to pick a dress for her; he’d simply grabbed a black dress from Ellie’s closet, positive she’d forgive him the intrusion.

  But to see it on Azalea, the way it flowed over her gentle curves, highlighted her generous breasts, and showcased the muscles in her back when she moved—Ellie would have to buy herself a new dress when she got home.

  The front door opened as they approached. Daniel stood with his hand out, gripping a cell phone, and a quick glance at Azalea on Peter’s arm.

  “What’s wrong?” Peter asked, stepping through the door and helping Azalea with her coat. She remained silent, taking in the foyer, and he realized she hadn’t been given a proper tour of the house. The way her eyes widened at the artwork and architecture of the narrow area made him want to show her Ellie’s art gallery. His cousin’s wife had a gift with the paintbrush.

  “Aubree,” Daniel said, shoving his phone into his back pocket. “I was just heading out. She went to Sampson’s tonight, looking for a shift. When Sarah reminded her she was off duty for the time being, she threw a fucking fit.”

  Peter sighed. He’d forgotten all about Aubree. When was the last time he’d forgotten about delivering a punishment to one of the girls? Had it ever happened?

  “I should have dealt with her by now.” Peter glanced at Azalea. She seemed focused on a painting, but he knew her better. She was listening to every word.

  “I told Sarah to keep her there, give her something to do, and I’d pick her up,” Daniel explained.

  “Okay. I’ll talk with her first thing tomorrow. Tell her to meet me at eight.”

  “Got it.” He glanced at Azalea. “You sure you don’t want me to take care of it?”

  Peter would like nothing more than to hand off his responsibilities, but until Ash made it back home, he was keeping things as they were.

  “No. I got it. Get her back here and remind her that if she would prefer to leave our employment, she’s more than free to do so.”

  Daniel started to speak, but shook his head and clammed up. With a curt nod, he stalked through the door, pulling it shut behind him.

  Azalea folded her arms over her stomach, taking another step toward the stairs.

  Peter pulled one hand free and linked it with his, walking her up to his room. She’d agreed to give him everything, and he wouldn’t wait any longer to claim what was his.

  “What did you mean when you said you should have dealt with her?” Azalea asked once inside his bedroom. She walked to the far corner of the room, away from the door leading to his private playroom, and away from him.

  “Exactly what you think it means,” he answered, shaking his suit jacket off and tossing it on an armchair.

  “How you dealt with me this morning?” she asked. Her fingers were twirling her long hair, but he didn’t see any actual fear in her eyes. She might be nervous—and she should be—but she wasn’t afraid of him.

  “Well, not as severe. She won’t be as stubborn as you.” He smiled.

  “She’ll just—I mean you’ll—” The deep blush that took over her face couldn’t have been more beautiful.

  Peter held back his laugh, not wanting her to misunderstand and think he was laughing at her. That didn’t mean he didn’t intend on using her embarrassment to push her a little further.

  “I’ll make her bend over the spanking bench we have in one of the offices in the Annex and bare her ass for me. Then we’ll discuss what she did wrong, and as long as she doesn’t give me any attitude, I’ll give her ten lashes with a belt.”

  She hadn’t blinked while he spoke. She didn’t make a sound or protest
when he made his way over to her.

  “What did she do wrong?” Azalea asked, finally breaking her silence.

  Peter tilted his head. “Well, I wouldn’t tell her how you’ve been naughty, so I can’t tell you how she was naughty, either.”

  She nodded, and just like that she seemed to snap out of her trance.

  “She’s agreed to this? I mean, she’s your employee, right? Isn’t that like—assault?”

  Peter chuckled. “No, it’s not assault, and she’s fully consented to the consequences for breaking the house rules.”

  He placed his hands on her slender shoulders. Sliding his hands behind her, he unzipped the dress. “But we aren’t talking about her anymore. Right now, I want you to take this dress off and let me see you.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “You did agree, remember? At the club?” He let her go and backed off. He wouldn’t force her, and he wouldn’t disrobe her. She would do this, and she would do it on her own.

  “Well, yes, but I didn’t think—”

  “You thought we’d come home and snuggle up in front of the TV?” He couldn’t remember the last time he’d watched television.

  “Take off the dress, Azalea,” he ordered when she didn’t respond or start moving. “I’ve already seen you naked.” Except this time, he’d be paying a hell of a lot more attention to what was standing before him.

  He didn’t take his gaze off her. It would make it easier for her if he wasn’t looking, but that wasn’t the point.

  She brushed the thin straps from her shoulders and let the dress slide down her body and pool at her feet. He kept his eyes focused on hers, enjoying the blush creeping down her neck and across her chest.

  “Your hair. Put it behind you.” He wiggled his fingers at her.

  She started to roll her eyes, but stopped. He’d let it go this time; she did catch herself after all. And he wasn’t a complete asshole.

  Well, not at the moment, anyway.

  She swiped her hair behind her shoulders, leaving her breasts completely exposed. Her nipples beaded up nicely with the slight chill in the room. Perfectly round, pert pink nipples.