“Alexander.” She smiled regally, a large Birkin bag hooked in the crook of her elbow.
“Alena. May I?” He gestured to her bag.
“I’ve got the bag, but I’ll take your arm.” Alexander cocked his arm, and she slid her left hand around his right elbow.
They walked down the hall and paused at the door to the dungeon. She’d suggested they get a drink, which meant going into the ballroom, as that was where the bar for this event was.
They both hesitated, and Alena glanced at him, brows raised, lips twisted in distaste.
He didn’t want to go back in there either.
“It’s nearly five a.m. Perhaps we should have breakfast instead.” The words were out before he could think about them. It wasn’t exactly forbidden for members to socialize outside of the club, but it was discouraged.
Alena smiled, clearly relieved. “Breakfast is perfect. I forgot you’re a local, well, at least you’re from this country. Do you know the city well enough to choose a place? I can do a quick search if not.”
“I know the city. I live in Wien.”
“Where’s that?”
“My apologies. Wien is Vienna. It’s the German name.”
Alena clicked her tongue. “Of course, I knew that. I’ll admit my brain is tired after everything you put me through.”
She narrowed her eyes in mock anger, and Alexander laughed.
Had he ever laughed with a sub before? No, usually they were either blissed out or semi-horrified once the arousal wore off.
Together they walked to the elevator, passing a few couples and triads still in their club attire headed for aftercare rooms.
Alexander pushed the button for the elevator, then turned to look at Alena. “Are you staying in this hotel?” The hotel was technically closed, which was why they were able to use it, but the host had made rooms available to members.
“I was. I had my bags picked up last night before coming up to the club. I’m headed to Iceland this morning for business, and didn’t want to have to worry about my suitcase.”
“You’re flying to Iceland today?”
“My flight is at ten.” She checked her slim watch. “Given that it’s now just after five a.m., I have plenty of time for breakfast. And at least two cups of strong tea.”
The elevator doors opened and they stepped in. Alexander set his kit down and tugged his phone out of his pocket, looking for the article he’d seen.
“Are any restaurants going to be open this early?” Alena mused.
He tapped the screen, opening the article. “I don’t think you’re going to Iceland today.”
“Sugar, I know I said I wanted another night, and if I didn’t have to go I’d be—”
“One of their volcanos is spewing ash,” he interrupted. Later he’d think about what she’d been saying and parse out what it made him feel. “Flights are grounded.” Alexander turned the phone screen so she could see it.
Alena took his phone, quickly scanning the article. “No flights in or out. Well damn.” She passed back the phone and started to reach into her bag when the doors opened.
Alexander cupped her elbow, guiding her out. Most of the lobby was draped in plastic that sealed off the areas being remodeled. Tall, slim windows above the main doors allowed in light. Alena paused in a streak of pale pearly white luminescence that painted silver highlights on her cheekbones and hair. Dawn was approaching, and quickly.
She dug her phone out of her purse and checked it, making a frustrated noise. “My flight was most definitely canceled. My assistant, who I hope is now asleep, poor thing, canceled my meeting, but didn’t make me another reservation.” Alena tapped her nail on the phone screen. “I don’t like to make unnecessary trips, or waste trips.” Alena was speaking fast, her fingers sliding over her phone screen. “Just paying for carbon offset won’t do as much good as not flying when I don’t need to.”
“You are an environmentalist?” Alexander asked. His company moved goods by plane, train, and cargo ship, all of which produced pollutants.
“No, just want to make sure the earth survives.” Alena sighed. “Anyway, apparently I don’t have a flight to catch. Would you be so kind as to recommend a hotel?”
“You’re planning to stay in Vienna?”
“I’m already in Europe, so hopefully I can bring forward some meetings I have scheduled in France for next month, and avoid flying to Europe again.”
“The planet thanks you,” Alexander said while internally wincing.
She tucked her phone into her bag. “My clever plan to have my luggage held at the airport doesn’t seem so clever now. Once I check in somewhere, hopefully I can get a messenger service to deliver my bags.”
She looked up at the windows above the door. The roof of the building across the street was visible, and a little patch of pale gray-blue sky.
“I’m glad we’d already made plans for breakfast, otherwise I’d be standing here lost.” Alena’s wry smile and the way her eyes sparkled made him want to kiss her.
He looked at her lips, and remembered how pretty they’d looked wrapped around his dick.
“I doubt you’d be lost,” he said.
“At five a.m. with nowhere to go, and no plans? That seems like lost to me.”
“The captured queen is never lost, only waylaid.”
Her eyes widened.
Damn it, remembering her sucking his dick had made him speak out of turn. He shouldn’t have mentioned, even obliquely, her submission.
“Maybe you’d care to escort me to the hotel you’re planning to recommend?” Her gaze darted to his bag. “You have your kit with you…”
Alexander nearly choked on his surprise.
Alena’s cheeks heated and she looked away. “I’m so sorry. I forgot that club members aren’t supposed to do things like that.” She adjusted the bag on her arm, then reached for her phone once more. “I’ll find a hotel and—
“We didn’t get our third night,” he said softly. He probably should have taken longer than a few seconds to think about what he was doing.
Alena turned slowly, one brow arched. “Oh?”
“You said you wanted another night.”
“I did. I do. You’re not offended I suggested it.” She gestured to his kit once more.
He shook his head. “No. I would never have proposed it, as we’re too close to the last scene.”
“You’re worried if you suggested it, I’d only agree because I was still feeling submissive?”
“Worry? No. You are perfectly composed. But it wouldn’t be proper.”
“Your faith in me is complimentary, but I assure you I love to make bad decisions.”
That startled a laugh out of him. “I do know a place that will serve us breakfast. Where you can have your bags delivered. But—” He stopped to clear his throat. “But it is not a hotel.”
This is a bad idea. You’re going to scare her.
Alena’s mouth rounded in an “O” and he wanted to lean in and bite her bottom lip.
“You’re talking about your house.”
“I am.”
“Is that allowed?”
Alexander shrugged.
“Right, I forgot you said rules are for other people.”
“If you don’t feel comfortable, which is of course understandable—”
He spoke at the same time she did, saying “That would be lovely but I don’t want to impose.”
They stared at one another.
Her lips twitched. “I must admit I find the idea of a third night with you slightly appealing.”
“You are the one who first suggested it,” he said dryly, while enjoying the way her eyes sparkled as she teased him.
“As long as you promise there will be a chaperone, and that my bedroom door will have a lock…”
Alexander couldn’t remember the last time he’d enjoyed a conversation so much. Still, he had to make sure he wasn’t manipulating her. “I don’t want you to feel obligated.”
“I don’t. I trust you, Alexander.”
“You shouldn’t.”
“And maybe you shouldn’t trust me.” She winked.
Alexander took out his phone and called his driver, speaking to him quickly in German. He hung up and looked at her. “If you’d feel safer taking your own vehicle, I can give you the address.”
Alena slid her arm around his. “Alexander Wagner, correct? With a W? I’ll send myself an email saying that if I disappear, you’re the primary suspect.”
“I’m not entirely sure you’re joking.”
“Oh, I am. I’m going to email my assistant and say that if I disappear she should send the police after Vienna resident Alexander Wagner.” She grinned.
“Is that a yes or no to wanting your own car?”
“I want to ride with you.” She looked at him through her lashes. “I plan to make you feel very guilty as I wince while sitting on my abused ass.”
“Guilty, or aroused?”
“Will the fact that it hurts to sit, and that the hurt makes me remember what it felt like to have you spanking me, arouse you?”
His slacks wouldn’t hide a hard-on the way his leathers did. “Keep teasing me, and I will feel far less guilty than I should.”
Arm in arm they walked to the front doors. A club staff member waited silently, and when a black car pulled up out front, he unlocked the doors to let them out.
Alexander opened the rear car door for Alena, chuckling softly at her exaggerated wince when she sat.
He slid in on the other side, greeted his driver, and then turned to her.
Alena was no longer smiling, but frowning while looking down at her hands, curled loosely in her lap.
She’d changed her mind. He leaned away from her, giving her space. “I’ll drop you off at a hotel, and wait to make sure you get a room.”
“No, it’s not that, but… I need sleep, and some time to work. I hate to make demands when you’re already going out of your way to help me.”
He relaxed. “It is not an imposition.”
The frown melted to a smile and she reached up and touched his cheek. “Have I mentioned how much I like it when you talk? Not that I don’t like it when you’re all forbidding and silent.” She twisted her features into a ferocious frown.
“I do not look like that.”
“Of course you don’t.” She patted his cheek again, but then her hands dropped, her expression turning grave. “What worries me is… Am I going to your house as a guest, or as a sub?”
Ah, he understood her concern. “As a guest, of course. I will give you privacy for as long as you need.” He touched her chin so she looked at him. “This evening doesn’t have to be a scene if you’d prefer—”
“Tonight I’d most definitely prefer to be—” She leaned in, whispering against his cheek. “—naked, on my knees, begging you to touch me.”
Alexander’s cock hardened in his pants.
Alena’s lips brushed his cheek as she pulled back, a knowing smile curving her lips. “But until then, I’m just a waylaid traveler, accepting your kind hospitality.”
“After dinner,” he all but growled. Damn it, he sounded like a fucking animal.
Fitting, when the things he wanted to do to her were savage. He’d tried to warn her away both nights, and she’d been the one to make sure he didn’t walk away.
Every time he was with a sub, he worried he’d lose control of himself, give in and take it too far. Alena had tempted him far more than any woman in recent memory, but he’d maintained control.
“After dinner?” She arched a brow
“After dinner, you’re mine.”
Alena leaned back, apparently relaxed. “I do love having something to look forward to.”
Alexander spent the rest of the ride imagining all the things he wanted to do to her. Some of them were dark, cruel things he would never actually do. The things he’d threatened her with at the apex of their most recent scene.
If the woman beside him knew every lurid detail of his fantasies, she’d jump out of the moving car.
Or maybe she’d face him, regally demand he abide by her limits, then drop to her knees.
By the time they pulled up outside his home, his fantasies had mellowed and become plans.
He’d taken her mouth last night, but this evening, if she begged just right, he was going to fuck her sweet pussy.
* * *
Alexander waited by the stairs. The guest chamber Alena was using was halfway down the hall on the fourth floor of his home in Josefstadt. The property, which took up half a city block and was five stories high, with a Mansard-style roof, white stone walls, and evenly spaced windows, had been in his family for generations. In the past, when business was bad, sections had been split off and turned into apartments or offices. At one point no Wagner had lived here, the whole thing rented out to various businesses.
Alexander’s father had waited out the last tenants, then renovated the building, turning it back into a fifteen-bedroom mansion, an almost obscene luxury to have so much real estate used as a private residence in Vienna’s eighth district.
The ground floor was leased retail space, a concession to the district director who’d personally asked Alexander’s father to allow businesses to operate there, especially given the building’s location across the street from Hamerlingpark.
A satellite Wagner Global office suite on the first floor had a large, stately conference room which he used whenever he had to meet with the board. Meeting in his home both emphasized his status and meant everyone was comfortable enough to have a drink or two. Alcohol made board members far more insouciant.
Besides the meeting room, the business suite had several private offices, including his home office, paper file storage, and even a small server farm, the off-site backup for the company’s information network.
One of his two assistants worked exclusively out of the office here, coordinating with the other assistant who was based at Wagner Global headquarters, located only a few minutes away in District One.
The remainder of the first floor was also dedicated to offices, but not for employees of Wagner Global. The half-dozen offices on the opposite side of an impressive landing were for the people who managed the Wagner family affairs. Alexander’s house manager, valet, chef, and the curator who supervised and maintained the Wagner’s art collection, all had offices. There was also a set of offices RTW Security used when needed. The Wagner Global board of directors insisted he have personal security with him for some travel, and in those instances the offices served as a home base for the personal, event, or physical security teams Zakaria Schroeder sent over. RTW’s CEO would have preferred that Alexander allow a full security office, with variable speed guard rounds, ingress and egress checkpoints, as well as the most advanced—invasive—security system possible. Alexander valued his privacy too much to allow that.
The second and third floors had beautiful drawing rooms, parlors, libraries, and even a small ballroom. There were also bedroom suites on those floors, ornate rooms filled with antiques, most often used by visiting dignitaries or business people who needed to be impressed, flattered, or both.
The fourth floor had been stripped of any of its original architectural details when it was rented to a garment company and used as a factory. Given that there was no remnant of the original architectural details, this floor had been renovated into seven bedroom suites, a dining room, and a commercial kitchen capable of preparing food for several hundred if he hosted a party.
Tonight they wouldn’t be eating in the fourth floor dining room—though that’s where they’d had breakfast this morning, a quiet affair punctuated by yawns as they began to feel the effects of a night without sleep.
The door down the hall opened, and Alena stepped out.
Alexander straightened, awed anew by not just how lovely she was, but her innate magnetism.
She wore black. A simple black dress that might have been unremarkable if it was o
n anyone but her. Her hair was loose around her shoulders in soft, dark waves, though it was pulled back on one side in a style reminiscent of old Hollywood.
A blood-red pashmina was hooked over her arms, and matched the red heels she wore.
She glanced at him, and her lips curled up. Her smile was full of secrets, but warm rather than cutting and cold.
He wanted to strip the dress off of her, bare every inch of her flesh so he could torment her, tease her. He wanted to bring her to her knees, even as he wanted to kneel before her.
The captured queen.
She exuded august confidence as she walked down the hall, each footstep making her hips sway.
The queen. She wasn’t captured.
Not yet.
“Alexander.”
“Alena.” He held out his arm. “Will you join me?”
“Of course.”
When he turned her towards the stairs instead of leading her to the dining room, she glanced at him in surprise.
“Skipping dinner, and going right for dessert?”
“No. But I wanted us to dine in private.”
Together they mounted the steps, Alena walking rather gingerly.
“You mentioned that you prefer not to wear high heels.” Alexander said when they paused on the landing.
“Sugar, I know you aren’t suggesting I would wear flats with this dress.”
“But if the shoes hurt you…”
“Beauty is pain.”
Alexander chuckled, as much at her exaggerated tone as the words themselves.
When they reached the top of the stairs, he keyed in a code on the discreetly hidden panel, then opened one side of the grand double doors that protected his home.
He gestured for her to proceed him, watching her butt, which was nicely cupped by the fabric, but not so tight as to be lewd or cheap.
“Oh,” Alena said in surprise. “This is your home.”
“The whole building is my home.” He stepped in and closed the door.
“You might own the whole building, but I got a tour of the first, second, and third floors after I woke up from my mid-day nap, and the rest of the building is a showplace. A museum. This, this is you.”
She gestured around the open plan central living area.
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