Once Upon a Time

by Luna Doerr

  “I think we’ve already established that.”

  She strides toward me and straddles my lap. Her nipples are dark and puckered, tight little buds my lips are burning to kiss.

  “What are you doing here with me?” I ask.

  “I’m horny, Alaric.” She rocks her pussy against my hard cock. “You took me to Maine and spent two weeks fucking me like no one else ever has. I need another taste of that.”

  I am desperate for her to kiss me, to soften the bite of her words. But she doesn’t. Instead, she lifts her hips and slowly lowers herself onto my throbbing cock.

  “Where did you get that filthy mouth?” I grind out, biting my lip.

  Her laughter is like bells or wind chimes or expensive crystal … or something. I’m not capable of rational thought at the moment.

  “I love you,” I blurt out. Yeah, that’s probably the least rational thing I’ve ever said.

  She moves her hips on me, back and forth, up and down. I’m nearly delirious with pleasure and need.

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Yes—“

  She covers my mouth with hers, silencing me, and then rides me hard until we both come, gasping and grabbing at each other’s bodies. As I float down from the mind-blowing high of my orgasm, I am sure of only one thing.

  Rational or not, I love her.

  47

  Caterine

  It’s still dark when I awake, clutching the hotel’s thin spare blanket to my chest. I had overridden Alaric’s insistence on taking the sofa. If I had taken the bed, he would have gotten up at some point in the middle of the night and joined me. On the couch, there is only room for one.

  I sit up and stare at the window. We’d left the drapes open and now the still falling snow is backlit by the ambient light of the suburbs. Headlights, streetlights, office buildings that remain lit all night long. Some nights, I long for the perfect darkness of the Pennsylvania countryside where I grew up … or of Maine.

  But Maine had been dark in other ways, too.

  I crawl from beneath the thin cotton blanket and find Alaric’s cashmere sweater on the floor where I tossed it hours before. I pull it on over my head, then wrap myself back up in the blanket. The cashmere warms me instantly, the fabric soft and cozy against my skin. And of course, it smells like Alaric too—musky and male. I bury my nose in the sleeve and inhale.

  I love you.

  I had never imagined a man saying those words to me. Men hadn’t really been a part of my life, growing up. My mother had dated here and there, but mostly it had been her and me. Just the two of us against the world.

  No, you don’t.

  I don’t believe for one moment that Alaric White really loves me. For starters, we barely know each other. Oh sure, we know each other’s bodies but our minds, our hearts, our souls?

  Oh hell no.

  And I already know Alaric White to be a man who would say anything to get what he wants. He wants me, no question about that. But loves me?

  I sincerely doubt that.

  I can’t afford to even entertain the fantasy that he might love me—or even be capable of loving me. It would be all too easy to fall head over heels for a man like him. I’d started to fall for him in Maine, before learning the truth about him, his family and what he had been prepared to do to me. Use me to further his career, then move on.

  I shouldn’t even be here right now. If I had a lick of sense, I would have tossed his hotel room key in the trash and stayed home. If I’d done that, I’d be warm and safe in my apartment instead of curled up in a hotel blanket and the man’s own sweater.

  Not that wearing his sweater is all that awful.

  You are so fucking weak.

  I am weak. I want Alaric White to be a sort of man he isn’t. I wish he could be truthful and honorable, a man with a normal job that didn’t involve him fucking “research assistants.”

  But this is it for me. I had one final taste of the drink that is Alaric White and as soon as the sun comes up on this day, I am going back on the wagon. Maybe I’ll sign up for one of the online dating services, meet some nice local guys to go out with. There has to be someone in the DC area who can distract me from my fantasies of Alaric.

  I close my eyes and try to drift back to sleep. But no such luck. I open my eyes again, spotting Alaric’s laptop on the end table. I reach for it and flip it open.

  Will Charles ever see the light and give Erica what she needs? Alaric certainly doesn’t seem to be taking him in that direction, but it’s a romance so it needs to end happily ever after. I open up the manuscript file and begin to type.

  So Charles thinks he needs a new woman at the brothel? I will give him one.

  When Erica arrived at the brothel in her red silk dress and feathered mask, there were so many people milling about that no one questioned her presence. Several men looked her over and smiled. She hurried to the second floor and found an empty room at the end of the hall. The ordinariness of the room surprised her. What was she expecting though? There was a bed covered in ivory and yellow linens. Golden drapes were drawn against the street outside. Innocuous paintings hung on the wall, landscapes and still lifes of fruit. It looked as though it could be any bedroom in any wealthy family’s home. She supposed that was the point. A man like Charles would never feel comfortable going to a common whore but here he could fool himself into thinking he was doing something respectable.

  She sat stiffly on the edge of the bed, realizing she had no idea what she was supposed to do now. What was the protocol for all of this? Did she sit here and merely wait? Should she lie down on the bed or sit in a chair? Undress or remain clothed? She hadn’t thought this through well enough, she could see that now.

  She had overheard Charles speaking to his footman so she knew he planned to come here today. But what if someone else came into the room first? What if Charles recognized her? What if the mask weren’t enough to disguise her identity? She needed to take additional measures, that was clear.

  She dimmed the bedside lamp, then undressed to bare skin and climbed beneath the covers. A few moments later, a knock sounded on the door and she froze, her heart pounding viciously in her chest. The door opened and a man who was not Charles peered in. He looked her over, squinting in the dim light.

  “My apologies,” he said. “I was looking for someone else.”

  She breathed a sigh of relief as the door closed upon his figure. But her relief lasted only a minute as voices quickly materialized on the other side.

  A woman’s voice. “There is a new girl in here, my lord. You might like her today.”

  Then came Charles’ voice. “I hope so.” The door opened and he spoke again. “Extinguish the light, please.” She heard the door snick closed behind him. “Don’t speak to me. Do as I say.”

  She reached her arm over and turned the gas down until the tiny flame flickered out.

  “You’re new.”

  It was not a question and his tone of voice said that he required no answer. She nodded, not looking directly at him, the long feathers of her mask fluttering around her head. She felt him studying her, and she began to worry that he recognized her.

  “I like the mask,” he said at long last. “Please keep that on and try not to look at me. If you’re new, best that you not see me too clearly yet.” He pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it onto the floor. “I will be honest. I am a hideous man and eventually you may decide you wish not to have me as a client. I will not complain to the madam about that, if you do. But for tonight, I need someone new.”

  A rush of heat flooded her body as he unbuttoned his trousers and shoved them to the floor. Even soft, his cock was long and thick and she was instantly wet for it. How could he think he was hideous? On the contrary, she found his body beautiful. There was not an ounce of portliness on him. His arms and chest looked as though they were carved from stone.

  Even his halting, limping stride as he crossed the room toward the bed aroused her, the sense that this mi
ght be a dangerous man. Charles had his fantasies, clearly, but she had her own—and they all involved her husband.

  He leaned over the bed and grasped her shoulders. He pulled her up until she was sitting on the edge of the bed. “Open. I want those lovely lips wrapped around me.” He lifted his cock to her mouth.

  Charles had never spoken to her like this at home. When he came to her room at night, he said very little, in fact. But she wasn’t offended by his words. Far from it. His forthrightness and his commands—his expectation that she would do exactly as he ordered—set her body aflame with lust.

  She wanted her lips wrapped around him, too.

  She took him gently into her mouth, stroking him with her tongue until his length grew hard. She reached around his hips and grabbed his buttocks, enjoying the way his muscles flexed beneath her palms as he thrust into her mouth. At first, his thrusts were short and quick and Erica commanded herself to relax and open her throat to him. He felt so much bigger this way than when he was between her legs, and he felt pretty damn big then. As she became accustomed to his size, which increased the more he thrust, the movement of his hips slowed and he pushed deeper and longer into her mouth.

  She dared a glance up at his face. His head was thrown back, his eyes closed, his lips parted as he thrust in and out of her mouth. She slipped her soft hand beneath his balls and that was all it took. He grabbed her head and held it tight as he shot hot streams of lust into her throat.

  Suddenly Erica understood what her sister had said about having power over a man. Erica had never felt she’d had any power over Charles … until now.

  She laid back on the bed and spread her legs wide for him. In an instant, his softening cock was hard again. She ran her finger through her wet folds and he groaned in agony before burying his face between her legs. The firm softness of his tongue against her most sensitive flesh felt so good she had to bite down on her lip to keep from crying out. He had never used his mouth on her at home—why? Surely he knew how wonderful it felt. Why would he deny her this pleasure, but not some common whore?

  He spread her open and licked her with the flat of his tongue. A deep rumble rolled up from his chest when he discovered how wet she was. How wet she was for him. He licked and nipped at her with a fervor she hadn’t seen him display for anything since he’d come home from the war. She was drifting off to a state of bliss, so close to tears, as his soft warm tongue alternately tickled her bud of pleasure and plunged deep into the very center of her desire.

  “Ahhh,” she whispered. “My lord.”

  The words were soft and escaped her lips before she could stop them, but they were loud enough for Charles to hear. His mouth left her pussy and he pushed her legs roughly toward her chest. What was going on—?

  A sharp slap sounded on her bottom.

  “I told you not to speak.” He moved to the edge of the bed. “Come here.”

  She hesitated, not sure what was happening.

  “Now.” His voice was deep and stern. It was a tone she’d never heard him employ before, at least not with her. “Over my knee.”

  48

  Alaric

  When I stumble out of the hotel bedroom after a night of only fitful sleep, I find Caterine sound asleep on the sofa. She’s wearing my sweater, and my laptop lies closed on the floor next to her.

  I pick it up, certain I didn’t leave it on the floor last night. My heart soars at the thought that she read the draft for part two.

  I set the computer on the coffee table, then wonder … has she added to the draft? Caterine is a wonderful writer and had improved part one immensely when she was in Maine. Maybe she had a few ideas in the middle of the night?

  I sink into the upholstered chair and flip open the computer. Sure enough, there is a new scene at the end of the document. I take a deep breath and begin to read, occasionally looking over at the sleeping woman on the sofa. By the time I finish reading the scene, I am rock hard and want nothing more than to scoop her up from the couch and carry her into the bedroom. Then fuck her until neither of us can stand.

  Instead, I begin to type.

  Everything had been going perfectly with the new whore until she moaned in pleasure. She was exactly what he wanted that night. A new girl. New to him, new to the madam’s—not so jaded and overused as the other women. She was tighter, her skin not yet marked with the bites and kisses of other men. She was perfect, until she made that breathy little sound that his Frederica made when she was about to come on his fingers. It tore him from the moment, reminded him of what he was doing—and reminded him of whom he’d rather be doing it with.

  “Over my knee,” he commanded the new girl and she obeyed. Her ass was smooth and alabaster white. He stroked it several times before administering the first sharp slap. At first, she made no sound and in the dark he couldn’t tell whether she was biting back her cries or not. Not that he cared. He was punishing her.

  He spanked her until her skin was hot beneath his hand, his aching cock pressing into her soft belly. To his dismay, her hips had begun to buck and roll beneath his stinging hand, and damned if that wasn’t the most arousing thing he’d ever seen. Each slap of his hand against her bottom pushed her closer to orgasm. He had not intended to give her pleasure but suddenly he was powerless to stop.

  When at last she cried out, he administered an even sharper slap, one that sent her writhing into mindless pleasure and it took all his self control not to follow her there. As she bucked over his knees, he knew her orgasm was genuine and not merely a pretense of pleasure. He didn’t wait for her body to still before bending her over the mattress and thrusting his hard cock into her. She was slick and hot, and the skin of her ass was warm as he held her hips steady.

  As he pounded into her, he imagined that it was Erica’s ass he held in his hands, Erica’s pussy he was engulfed in. He so wanted to turn his wife over his knee and punish her for tempting him every night, for luring his hideous face and ruined body to her bed. He wanted to spank her over and over for not helping him resist her seductive temptations, for making him a weak man.

  The thought of Erica’s bright red bottom beneath him quickly had his orgasm barreling down his spine. She was wicked, his Erica was, making him want things he shouldn’t want. He slapped the whore’s ass one last time and then emptied his rage and frustration, his confusion, into her. He collapsed onto her sweating back, moaning in utter anguish.

  “Erica,” he mouthed into the whore’s shoulders. “Erica.”

  49

  Caterine

  The sharp rap on the door wakes me, and I open my eyes to see Alaric wheeling a room service cart next to the suite’s small dining table. The aroma of coffee and bacon wafts over. I stretch my legs and swing them over the edge of the sofa, groggy but glad to be awake.

  I had been in the middle of a strange and terrible dream. I’d gone to the cemetery in my hometown to put flowers at my mother’s grave. But once I parked the car and set out on the gravel walking path that winds through the cemetery, I got lost, unable either to find my mother’s grave or find the way back out. By the time I awake, it’s nightfall in my dream and still I am lost.

  I look across the room at Alaric, lifting the silver lids off plates of eggs, bacon and toast. He pours two cups of coffee, then looks over at me.

  “Morning, sleepyhead.” He smiles. “Hungry?”

  Right on cue, my stomach growls. I am hungry. I’m also not sure what I’m doing here. Or what my mother would have thought of it, sleeping with the son of a man who tried to kill her—a woman who, by any standards, had been a good and decent person.

  Alaric walks over to the couch and holds out his hand to help me up. I push off the sofa myself without his help, ignoring the quietly raised eyebrow. Nor do I allow him to pull out a chair for me. I seat myself before he has time. He takes the chair opposite me.

  “Did you sleep okay?” he asks, taking a sip of black coffee.

  I nod and poke my fork into the scrambled eggs. Alaric
has showered already, his hair still damp, and dressed in jeans and a dark green button-down shirt. He didn’t bother shaving. The stubble adorning his jawline is ridiculously attractive.

  I look down at my plate. I do not want to be ridiculously attracted to him. Coming here yesterday was a mistake. Huge mistake.

  “Is it still snowing?” I glance toward the window.

  “No. It stopped a couple hours ago. But it looks like about three feet out there.”

  I sigh. Three fucking feet of snow?

  “I’ve already called Sim. I can drive you home in your car, then he’ll drive me back here in his.”

  “I take it he’s with Zoe?”

  Alaric nods and offers a wry grin. I withhold a response. Normally, I don’t care who Zoe dallies with—men are never a long-term thing with Zoe anyway—but Sim is a connection to Alaric. I need to break this off cleanly, no matter how hard it might be.

  “Thank you then,” I say.

  We finish breakfast in silence. Alaric refills my coffee cup once and offers me his last slice of toast. He has a rich boy’s manners. Not that I’m at all familiar with rich boys.

  “I read the scene you wrote,” he says, as he begins clearing the table. I stand to help, moving plates and napkins back onto the room service cart.

  “Sorry about that,” I apologize. “I couldn’t sleep. You don’t have to use it.”

  He grabs me and pulls me close. His thumbs caress my cheek and a wave of panic begins to rise in my chest. It’s dangerous to be this physically close to him. Last night made that abundantly clear.

  I am like an alcoholic; I have to stay away from the stuff entirely. You can’t take just a sip and still consider yourself sober.

  And I took way more than just a sip of Alaric last night.

  He senses my discomfort, though, and lets go. “You don’t need to apologize for it, Caterine. I told you in Maine that I think you’re a terrific writer.” He sits down on the couch and pats the cushion next to him. “Sit. I have a proposal for you.”