The Black Fox (The Dirty Heroes Collection Book 1)

by Brianna Hale

  The waltz ends, and I wrench myself out of Zacarias’ arms. I stare up at him, breathing hard, willing my feet to carry me far, far away from him. He’s gazing down at me with a hollow expression, almost like he’s in pain. I could bear his cruelty because it made me hate him, but seeing that the ache in my chest is mirrored in his eyes makes panic flood through me.

  “Mi niñita.” His voice is roughened and low with emotion, and he reaches for my hand. He’s forgotten everyone around us. He’s forgotten he’s my stepfather. That my mother could be watching us at this very moment. He’s a man reaching for the woman he craves, and nothing else matters. For one long, terrible heartbeat, I want to go to him, too.

  So I run.

  I lift my skirts in both hands and force my way through the crush of bodies. Behind me, Zacarias shouts my name. I duck under a man’s arm and swerve around a woman’s frothy skirt, plunging deeper and deeper into the crowd.

  There’s a potted palm on the edge of the dancefloor, and I force myself into the alcove with it, my chest heaving and my heart thundering. A moment of privacy, that’s all I need. As soon as I’ve calmed down, I’m going straight upstairs to my room and locking the door. To hell with the ball. Mama can yell at me in the morning if she wants, but I’m not risking that man coming near me again.

  Finally, my breathing slows and I can stand up and look around. There’s no sign of Zacarias among the whirling bodies. Chin up, I step out from between the palm fronds and make my way around the edge of the dancefloor, carefully not meeting anyone’s eyes.

  “Señorita. Señorita!”

  I walk faster. If they’re talking to me, they can go away and leave me alone. A waiter steps in front of me, a glass of champagne on a tray. There’s a napkin lying next to it.

  The man smiles and gives me a little bow. “From a gentleman who didn’t give me his name, with his compliments.”

  I glance at it warily. There’s something on the paper napkin, and when I looks closer I see that it’s a sketch of a fox in black ink. My heart races, and I snatch up the napkin and open it, certain that there will be a message within.

  Meet me on the mezzanine in ten minutes.

  I sob with relief and hurry toward the stairs, leaving the bewildered waiter behind me, the paper napkin crumpled in my fist. There’s a mezzanine above the ballroom, and the music and laughter fades away behind me. It’s cool and quiet up here. There’s a large, dim room full of sofas, tables and bookshelves, and a corridor at the far end. I pick up my skirts and run, determined to search everywhere, hoping that I didn’t conceal myself so long behind the potted palm that he gave up and left.

  As I pass an alcove, a hand reaches out and grasps mine. I see the flick of a black cape. A broad brimmed hat. Two dark eyes sparkling behind a mask.

  The Black Fox scoops me against his hard body. Then his mouth is on mine and he’s kissing me like he’s as desperate for me as I am for him. I open my lips to him and his tongue caresses mine with the passion of a long lost lover. I moan against his mouth and wrap my arms around his neck. He’s here. He’s here.

  He pulls away, panting against my lips, and I cling to the folds of his cape. I need him to obliterate what just happened. As I search his blazing eyes behind his mask, I feel love for him fill me from head to toe. He’s the one I crave.

  I press my mouth against his once more. “Thank all the stars in the sky. You’re here.”

  The Black Fox braces his hand against the wall behind my head and gazes down at me, his thumb rubbing over my lower lip. What I can see of his face is filled with so much tenderness. “You don’t even know who I am.”

  I trace the bristles of his short, black beard with my fingertips. “Yes, I do. All I want is you. I’ve never begged a man for anything in my life, but I need you, Black Fox.”

  “My sweet Lolita.” He groans and kisses me again. His hat is knocked to the ground and my fingers tangle in his thick, dark hair. Everyone feels very far away as our mouths crash against each other’s in the dim light.

  “Why are you here?” I whisper, sliding my hands up his broad chest. “Are there criminals at the ball?

  “No. I’m here protecting someone.”

  “Who?”

  He brushes his lips over mine. “You.”

  He kisses me again, a bold, searing kiss, one that takes my breath away. His hands slide possessively around me and I want to cry out for everyone to hear that I’m his. His, and no one else’s. It’s the Black Fox who my body craves.

  “I have to taste you,” he says roughly. He lifts me up onto a table and draws handfuls of my skirt up. I lean back on my palms, watching him caress my legs as if I’m made of the softest silk. His fingers slip beneath the delicate elastic of my underwear and draw them down my thighs.

  I bite my lip, knowing that my mother and Zacarias would think it’s wrong, even disgusting, to let a stranger touch me like this. I’m tired of other people dictating my life. I’m making my own choices, and tonight I choose the Black Fox.

  I lift my knees for him and open before him, baring my naked sex to his eyes and touch. He stands between my thighs, and his thick, tanned fingers trail over my belly and then down over my pussy, my heart-rate accelerating as my nerve endings fire. He grazes my soft, slick folds, and then strokes my hard, sensitized nub.

  “Yes,” I whisper, my head falling back. “Yes, please, more.”

  I wish my stepfather could see me now, spread wide for another man as he coats his fingers in my wetness and slides them into my pussy.

  No. What am I thinking? I shove all thoughts of Zacarias away as the Black Fox gives a groan of approval, his fingers pumping in and out of me.

  “Buena niñita.”

  I clasp the back of one thigh and pull it up toward my chest, offering him more. He dips his head and tastes me, and as the heavenly sensations overtake me I know I’ll let this man do anything he wants to me. His two fingers push deeper.

  “Are you a virgin, my sweet girl?”

  “Yes,” I confess, hoping that it won’t mean he stops. The Black Fox goes on licking me. I thread my hands through his hair. I can tell he’s older even though I can’t see all of his face. Late thirties, or perhaps forty. His jaw is strong and his eyes sparkle darkly, and his naked body must be a sight to behold.

  “Can I have your sweet little cherry, Lolita? Can I take it now?”

  The slow swipes of his tongue have me lying back on the table, my arms flung above my head, lost in pleasure. “Yes, daddy.”

  I feel his mouth curve into a smile. “You want me to be your daddy, niñita?”

  I bite my lip and nod. I want him to put strong hands on me and take his pleasure in my body while telling me I’m such a good girl for him. When I look up, the desire sparking in the depths of his eyes is intoxicating.

  He gives my pussy a spank with his fingers, and my whole body jumps as I gasp in shock. “Ow!”

  He smiles at me. “No tears. No whimpering. You’ll be a brave girl, won’t you?”

  He unzips his fly, and to show him just how brave I can be, I reach in past the waistband of his briefs to curl my fingers around his member. My eyes widen as I feel his girth, as hard as iron and so hot in my hand. I explore his length, the tracings of veins and the ridge at the tip. The Black Fox pushes down his underwear and his cock springs free.

  My mouth falls open as I take in the sight of him. He’s shaved down to black bristles, and I don’t know whether that’s why he looks enormous, or if he just is enormous. Both, I think.

  “Scared?”

  I realize I’m staring at him, and close my mouth and shake my head. “No, daddy.”

  He rubs the thick, slippery head of his cock against my clit. “I love it when you call me that. Good girl.”

  I sit up on my elbows, transfixed by the sight of him. He grasps my thigh with one hand and pushes my legs wider. With delicious slowness, he invades my tight heat. His girth stretches me with fierce pleasure-pain, and I pant hard watching him push d
eeper and deeper. With short, demanding thrusts he makes me open before him, and soon the sting is replaced by a friction so sweet that my whole body feels filled with champagne.

  I gaze up at him through heavy lidded eyes as he pounds me. The Black Fox. My Black Fox.

  “Can you choke me a little?” I whisper softly, ashamed for asking for it.

  I’ve got all night. You’ve got about a minute till you pass out.

  The Black Fox meets my eyes behind his mask. I can’t tell what he’s thinking, and for a moment I’m worried he’s going to tell me I’m disgusting. Then he tugs his belt free and wraps it around my neck. I whimper and flick needful eyes up him, enjoying the sensation of my life in this dangerous man’s hands. It’s like he knows I was craving the feel of leather around my neck.

  He smiles and clenches the belt tighter. “Are you going to be a good girl for me?”

  It’s hard to speak around the tight leather. “Yes, daddy.”

  His eyes are glittering as he stares into mine, his cock pounding my pussy. “Sweet Lo, fucked in an alcove by a strange man while Mama is dancing downstairs.”

  I swallow with some difficulty and gasp, “Not a stranger. You’re my Black Fox.”

  “Oh, yes, niñita. Your Black Fox. Just—” he thrusts hard “—yours.” He thrusts again, choking off my cries with a vicious clench on the belt. I can’t breathe, and the pleasure rushing through me suddenly effervesces and explodes, cascading in warm waves through my body.

  He goes on pounding me hard, letting go of the belt in favor of holding both my hips steady in his grip. “Just your Black Fox. Just yours, Little Lo.”

  His strokes are selfish and deep now, slaking his desperate need with my body. I feel another orgasm building on the tail of the last, and it bursts through me as he groans deep and low and his rhythm stutters.

  7

  Zacarias

  I lean over her, breathing hard, my hands braced against the table either side of her head. How beautifully disheveled she looks, her hair laid out in messy curls across the dark wood.

  I’ve taken what doesn’t belong to me, and even in this guise I can’t summon a scrap of regret. The choking was a little rougher than I would like to treat my beautiful girl, but I can’t refuse her when she begs me so sweetly. I withdraw carefully and thread my belt back through my pants as she sits up. Her dress pools around her thighs, and I take her once again in my arms and kiss her.

  “Is it true?” she whispers, reaching up to wrap her arms around my neck, so innocent, so trusting.

  “Is what true, mi ángel?”

  “Am I in danger from someone?”

  I take her face between my hands, squeezing my eyes closed. Lolita mistakes my shame for worry. She reaches up and draws my chin up so my eyes meet hers. “It’s all right. I already know who it is. My stepfather, Zacarias.”

  I seize her arms. “He means you harm and he’ll stop at nothing to get what he wants. You must stay away from him.”

  “I will try, but when we live in the same—”

  “Promise me you will stay out of his sight. It’s more important than you can know. Promise me.”

  Lolita licks her lips, and whispers, “Yes, daddy.”

  Immediately, her cheeks color up, like she isn’t sure whether she should call me that. It sends angel song thrumming though my blood. My sweet little girl trusts me. Needs me. Only me.

  “Yes. Good. Do as you’re told and stay out of his way. Let me handle the rest, mi niñita.”

  “I like it when you call me that,” she says, wrapping her arms around my neck.

  The emphasis is on you. When you call me that. Not him. I kiss her one last time, a hard, bruising kiss. I mean her to feel me after I’m gone from her side. “Be safe, mi niñita,” I whisper, and then I’m slipping away into the shadows.

  She calls after me, “When will I see you again?”

  But I’m already out of sight.

  I change in mine and Valeria’s room after making sure the coast is clear, and then slips back downstairs to the ball. I don’t pass Lolita in the corridors. I wonder if she’s come back down to watch the dancing or gone to her own room. I have to grip the bannister hard for a second to prevent myself from going to look for her. She’ll be covered with my scent. Filled with my seed. My mouth curls in a triumphant smile. He might have Lolita’s heart, but I have tasted her body.

  And I’ll taste it again.

  Valeria hasn’t even noticed that I’ve been gone when I return to her side. She’s flirting like crazy with the French ambassador, the man she was supposedly hoping would become her son-in-law. I wait silently a few feet away, pretending to watch the dancers but reliving the last half hour with my Little Lo. Her cries as I lapped at her clit. Her virgin pussy clamped tight around my cock. I’ve never known anything like it.

  I have to have her again. As Zacarias, as the Black Fox, I don’t care. But soon. I lose myself in schemes, ways to trick my pretty little stepdaughter into taking my cock and coming hard on it again. I feel myself smiling a nasty smile as I imagine it.

  Beware the wicked stepfather. That’s something the fairytales leave out.

  Finally, after Valeria has danced twice with the ambassador and once with a lesser Spanish aristocrat, the ball ends and we make our way upstairs. Valeria’s drank too much champagne and wobbles on her high heels, but I’m thankful as it means she doesn’t notice my silence and admonish me for boring her. She takes off her dress and falls into bed in her makeup and jewelry. A few minutes later she’s snoring.

  I go out onto the moonlit balcony and look at the clear, starry sky. So, this is my life now. The deepest unhappiness and the cruelest bliss. I should walk away, but I feel the it keenly as the silver light washes over me: I’m trapped by my need for her. Unto death.

  Lolita and I are both silent over breakfast and the drive home. Lolita and I. Lolita and I. How I love the way that sounds. Valeria is quiet at first as well, nursing her hangover. Then the coffee kicks in and she rouses herself, and chatters ceaselessly about the ball. My sweet Lo has put on a pair of large, dark sunglasses and gazes out the passenger side window, sunk in thought. Every now and then she runs her thumbnail over her plump lower lip. Her swollen, thoroughly kissed lips that I can still feel moving against my own.

  Is she remembering how it felt to kiss me? Is her tender pussy sore this morning from the pounding I gave her? Every time her eyes meet mine, she looks hastily away. I want to laugh. She’s being a good girl for her daddy and trying to avoid me. When she shifts in her seat she winces slightly, and I smile broadly at the road ahead. What I wouldn’t give to get her home and coax her legs open for me again.

  Daddy knows you’re sore, he’ll be gentle sweetheart. Look how wet you are for me already. That’s it, take daddy’s cock…

  I almost drive off the road thinking about it.

  When we reach the castillo, Valeria gets out of the car and saunters up the steps, her hips swaying and her chin held high, as if an evening of male attention has recharged her batteries. I pull our bags out of the trunk while Lo stretches and rakes her fingers through her long hair.

  By the front door, Valeria pauses and turns around, a puzzled expression in her dark eyes. “Lolita, I didn’t see you much in the ballroom last night. Where were you?”

  Lolita freezes, her fingers stilling in her silken strands. Behind her, I stay where I am, my hands clenched on the luggage.

  She licks her lips. “I was dancing, and then I talked to a friend. After that I got the most splitting headache and I…I thought I should go straight to bed. I was going to say goodnight to you, but you seemed to be having such a good time that I didn’t want to interrupt.”

  Valeria’s eyes narrow with irritation. I can see that she dearly wants to scold her daughter for not meeting enough men, but as she coopted the most eligible bachelors all night, she seems to think better of it.

  My wife disappears to the castillo, and I follow Lolita up the stairs. Just inside the d
oor, I drop our bags, catch my stepdaughter by the wrist and pull her around to face me. “Lie to your Mama if you want to, but not to me.”

  She glares at my hand on her wrist and then up at me. “Go to hell.”

  Anger smolders deep in my chest. How dare she talk to me this way? “One of these days, a man is going to take his belt to that tender ass of yours, and you’re going to be better off for it.”

  Her pretty mouth parts in shock. “One of these days I’m going to tell Mama that you’re touching me like no stepfather should, and she’s going to kick you out so fast your head will spin.”

  “Just try it, and you’ll see where your lies get you.”

  “Did you enjoy getting your hands all over me last night?” she hisses. “Your mouth in places it shouldn’t be?”

  She’s talking about the kiss I pressed against her throat, but I can’t help but remember the luscious taste of her pussy and how she squirmed against my tongue. I draw her closer, murmuring softly, “If I sucked on your plump little clit and made you burst on my tongue, would you still run to your mother and tell on me? Or would you start running to daddy, instead?”

  Lolita’s face suffuses with outrage and shock. I turn away and pick up the bags, laughing.

  Her whisper follows me down the hall and pierces me like a dart. “I hate you.”

  Pain explodes in my chest. I manage to turn a corner before I double over, gasping for breath. I can feel it like a physical thing, her hatred, and it makes me jubilant but the Black Fox despair.

  There are old vines on the east of the castillo, and I need a hobby. Something to keep my hands busy. I’ll learn to make wine.

  Can one just do that, learn how to make wine? I have no idea, but with vines to hand and all the time in the world, there’s no reason not to try. It keeps me away from Lolita. Even as Zacarias, I’m wary of being too close to her. When I lay eyes on her the urge to be cruel, to take hold of her, to slide my hand beneath her skirt as she begs me to stop threatens to overwhelm me. I must be clever around Valeria. I must be deceptive.