Sweet Jayne Read online

  I shudder at his tone but nod. “Yeah, it’s in my purse. I can add it to the meal and then put it in the oven as soon as you’re done with my punishment.”

  Crack!

  Fire rips across my skin as the belt cracks against my ass. I scream but don’t dare move. His heavy hand is more preferable than the other implements he has at his disposal.

  “One thing, doll. You had to get one thing. What took you so long? Do I need to remind you what happens when you run late?” he demands with a hiss, his finger flicking the sore flesh where he whipped me.

  Gritting my teeth against the pain, I shake my head emphatically. “I never need a reminder. You know that. It was the stupid train. I was doing great on time until the train held me up. Please,” I beg, “you have to believe me.”

  “Hmmmm... If you aren’t guilty, then why are you begging for punishment?” His question throws me off guard and I stutter trying to find the right answer.

  “I, uh, I—”

  Crack!

  This time his hit lands on the middle of my back and it hurts like hell. I clutch onto the bedding to keep from scrambling away from him. Seeking escape is not an option.

  “Tell me why the fuck I’m whipping you, Nadia, if you’re so fucking innocent,” he seethes, his breath coming out in ragged huffs.

  A sob gets caught in my throat but I swallow it down. “B-B-Because I like it when you hurt me,” I lie and push my ass into the air. “I need the pain.”

  Clearly, I’m a masochist. But I have my reasons.

  “Is that so?” he questions with a chuckle and runs the leather of his belt down along the crack of my ass. “Are you wet?”

  “Yes,” I tell him, “and I crave for you to fuck me.”

  He pops my ass playfully with the belt and I squeak in surprise. I was expecting another lashing. But then his fingers, two of his thick digits, are pushing into my pussy, completely distracting me from any thoughts of punishment. He glides them in and out easily because my being wet for him wasn’t a lie. My body is under my command and I can control it as needed.

  “Lie down on your back in the middle of the bed,” he says suddenly as he wrenches his fingers from inside me.

  Without hesitation, I scramble over to the middle of the bed and wince when I lay down on my newly inflicted welts. His dark eyes peruse over my large breasts, down over my flat tummy and wide hips, to my pussy.

  “So beautiful. How’d you manage to trick me into becoming my fiancée?” he questions as he climbs on to the bed. He gently spreads my knees apart and hooks my legs around his waist. I swallow down my anxiety when he loops the belt around my neck. It isn’t tight…yet.

  “I didn’t trick you. I just want to be with you all the time. I’m glad people will know I belong to you,” I tell him with a practiced smile.

  He yanks on the belt hard enough to pull me into a sitting position by my neck. My fingers naturally claw at the leather to loosen its grip. The air I was so easily breathing seconds before is completely cut off and my tongue hangs out as if in a search of just one tiny breath.

  “Damn straight you belong to me,” he snarls as he uses his other hand to guide me onto his cock. I slide down easily over him and he grunts in pleasure. “It’ll be a nightmare, though, once Donovan gets wind of this. He doesn’t share well.”

  Stars are glittering in my vision as I struggle to breathe. My first reaction is to get rid of the belt, but when I can’t loosen it, I grab on to the back of his hair and attempt to pull him from me. He hisses at me but doesn’t release me. Instead, he slams us down on the bed and he fucks me into the mattress, his grip never waning on the belt. When I go to push at his face to get him to release my throat, he bares his teeth to my forearm and bites down like a wild beast.

  More searing pain jolts through me but I can’t scream. My sobs, my screams, my pleas are all lodged in my throat below where the belt is cutting them off. I can feel the blood trickling down my arm and I start to grow dizzy.

  My body goes limp beneath him. I don’t remember him coming. I fade off into the darkness of my mind. It’s warm and quiet there. Safe. He’s there.

  “That’s not a word.” His eyebrow is arched up in challenge.

  I stare at the Scrabble board and frown. “Where I come from, it is.”

  He smirks and shakes his head. “The things I allow…”

  Smiling triumphantly, I accept all sixty-four points. “Your turn, loser.”

  His eyes are on the board and I take a moment to risk a glance at him. I like when he’s relaxed and playful. “Keep talking, little girl. I’ll still win and then what?”

  “You’re not going to win,” I scoff.

  His lips quirk up into a smile and he tugs at the knot in his tie, loosening it. The action steals my attention for a moment. “And if I do?”

  Heat burns up my neck as a brief, wicked thought flits through my head. One I’d never allow myself to say aloud. I swallow down my embarrassment and meet his stare.

  “You won’t. But I’ll humor you. If you do, what do you want?”

  He reaches across the table to pull some tiles from the bag and accidentally brushes his hand against mine. Just an accident. I think. My cheeks must be blazing crimson at this point but a jolt of excitement courses through me at his touch. Our eyes meet, his searching mine with an unexpected heat behind them. Such an intense, foreign heat. I think. “If I win, you have to...” He looks off, somewhere behind me, as if he were considering this seriously. “Wash my car.”

  I’m already shaking my head and arguing. “It’s ninety degrees out there, easily!”

  He contemplates my words and his lips twitch with amusement. “You can wear your swimsuit if you want. I’m easy. You know I’d never let you suffer.” At this, he winks. Playfully. I think.

  I clench my thighs together and refrain from fanning the heat away from me, which seems to have crept inside on this unusually warm late October evening. “I’m going to win,” I assure him. I think.

  But then, I spend his entire next move wondering how I can let him catch up. Because, I do, in fact want to lose. Anything to see that hungry look in his eyes when he mentioned me wearing my bathing suit. And he was hungry. For me. I think.

  I think I want him to see me like that, barely dressed. And I’m not sure why.

  I think he wants to see me like that, barely dressed. And I’m not sure why.

  “Mine,” he says in a low, gravelly voice, which makes me shiver.

  My eyes fly to his in shock but then I stupidly realize “mine” was his word, not a declaration... of any other sort. Oh. However, there’s no mistaking the glint in his eyes. Primal and shameless. Starved. For me. I think.

  He most definitely wants me.

  I think.

  Does it make me a bad person if I think I want him too?

  “Shhh,” his deep voice coos as I drag my eyelids open, stealing me from my warm memories.

  He’s still inside of me but he’s removed the belt from my neck. His eyes shine with something I’ve never seen before. Adoration maybe? Pride?

  My throat is hoarse and scratchy. I’d kill for some water right now but I’m too weak to move. I tense when he starts peppering kisses all over my face and then down along my sore throat. He makes his way to my collarbone and when he reaches the top of my full breast, he sucks the upper part of it hard into his mouth. I want to cry out but I’m too worn out to do much protesting. He sucks and sucks until I know I’ll have a big-ass bruise for days.

  “I’m ready for dinner, doll. I have some cases to look over but I want to watch you cook in nothing but those cowboy boots you’re wearing,” he says with a playful growl. “So fucking hot.”

  He climbs off of me and saunters off toward the bathroom, his sculpted ass tightening with each step. I attempt to sit up and manage to bring my shaky hand toward me to examine it properly. His teeth marks left a red, angry mark, and in some parts of his bite, he punctured the skin. Blood continues to seep from the woun
ds and I can only stare at it.

  I don’t realize he’s returned until he pulls my hand from my gaze. His brows furrow as he inspects the wound. My belly flops when he brings my wrist to his mouth. I brace myself for him to hurt me again but instead, he runs his tongue along the flesh and licks up the blood. He flashes me a wolfish smile.

  “Clean this up so it doesn’t get infected,” he instructs and climbs off the bed to start dressing. “Wrap it in some gauze and then start dinner. I’m fucking starving.”

  I let out a relieved sigh the moment he leaves the bedroom and dutifully do as he says. It isn’t until I’ve cleaned my arm and am wrapping it in gauze that I allow myself to smile in celebration of my small victory.

  I did it.

  I fucking did it.

  Logan was enraged beyond logical reason, yet I had the ability to bring him back down to earth. To me. This is progress. We may be going public with our relationship, but I won’t let that ruin my carefully laid out plans. It’ll be trickier, especially when Donovan assuredly shows up, but I have do this.

  I need to do this.

  My heart depends on it.

  The fragility of my perfectly sculpted plan is hanging precariously in the balance of others who could ruin everything. People are nosy, especially the good-looking cop who ran me off the road. His eyes were calculating. Perceptive. Aware. Not one who seems to miss a single detail. I just pray to God I can fool him too.

  The lives of the ones I love depend on my ability to play a part.

  I hit the lock on the Camaro and stride into the police department with hot coffee in hand. Last night, I’d lain in bed for hours thinking about Nadia. She’d grown up since I’d last had eyes on her but she was still the stupid bitch from before. What pisses me off, though, is that she’s been off the grid for three goddamn years only to just pop right back up. It doesn’t make sense. I wanted to throttle the answers from her last night but the moment I learned she was with Logan, I knew things would have to play out much differently.

  I would need to be careful.

  This morning, I woke up with a new attitude. It didn’t matter where she’d been. All that matters is where she is now. She’s right under my nose and I can finally start implementing my plan to make her pay.

  I yearn to collect her debt to me.

  I’ve seen Chief’s house. It’s big and the man is loaded—how is the question. People seem to forget he wasn’t always this way. At one time, he wasn’t any better off financially than me and my family are. But he’s rich now and nobody seems to question how or when it happened. Of course Nadia would move from one sugar daddy right into the arms of another. A sly little cunt is all she is. Everything is one big show and she’s their little star. Acting the stupid, emotional damsel in distress back when she could have been revealing clues about Kasey. Then, hiding behind the domineering presence of her prick stepfather, Donovan Jayne—a fucking thorn in my side—when the media storm about my sister’s kidnapping became too much for her fragile fucking self to take. And now, she’s the police chief’s perfect princess despite her breaking the goddamned law.

  “Ghost,” Lena, the department receptionist, greets as I walk into the building. “Head on over to the conference room. Chief is making a statement to the press. He came in with Jayne’s stepdaughter.” Her eyes widen and her dyed red eyebrows fly to her hairline which perfectly matches her brows. “This town is going to have a field day with this one,” she mumbles as she shifts through papers on her desk. “He’s like twenty years older than her. Why are we even having a press conference over this?”

  Who the hell knows anymore in this town? I grunt but storm past her, ignoring her question. “Don’t be a gossip, Lena.”

  Striding past my office, I eat up the distance to the conference room with long and purposeful steps. As I approach, I can see everyone in the department squished inside, including a couple of reporters from the local news stations. But Lena’s right. Since when is the police chief’s engagement newsworthy? The whole thing is fucking weird.

  “The Jayne girl grew up to be a hot piece of ass,” Bart Stokes, mutters to me as I squeeze into the room. “Have you seen the tits on that one?”

  Jerking my head to him, I sear him with a scathing glare. “Maybe Chief would like to hear that comment?”

  His cheeks redden—the devious smile falling off his face—and he drops his gaze to the floor. I’ve followed her life for so long that I almost feel a proprietary sense of ownership over her. She’s mine to ruin and destroy. It’s already bad enough Logan’s marrying her. I don’t need every other asshole in this precinct falling for the duplicitous bitch.

  I want to be the one to make her fall.

  And I know just how I’m going to do it, too.

  Pushing through the crowd, I make my way to the front. Logan is imposing his commanding presence over the audience in his dress uniform. Neatly styled hair. Clean shaven. The complete embodiment of police perfection. When I finally bring her down, Logan too will no doubt suffer for her sins. It will get ugly and there will be consequences for my actions. But I will ride out of this town in a blaze of glory, my vengeance in hand, knowing that justice has been served against this gold-digging whore.

  “Thank you all for coming today,” Logan’s voice thunders. “I know this is a little out of the ordinary for you all, but I have an important announcement and wanted everyone in on the great news. I’m getting married.” He flashes a white smile which earns responding camera flashes. The man is a natural in front of a crowd. “Please meet my fiancée, Nadia Jayne. You may all recognize her as the daughter of my good friend and hotel and resort tycoon, Donovan Jayne. We plan to marry in the spring and I can’t wait to start my life with this incredible woman.”

  Cameras flash and my eyes finally fall to her. No longer does she look to be the little broken bird from last night. No, today she’s got her armor up and rewards the crowd with a winning smile she no doubt learned from Logan. Her hair is no longer messy but hangs in long, silky waves over her full tits, framing the soft features on her face. Her face is painted with a bunch of expensive looking makeup, certainly not the kind my sister used to wear, and she almost looks pretty. To everyone else. I can see how they’d think she was hot. Her eyes scan the people in the room and when they find mine, they stop. I watch with fascination as her pupils dilate and her pouty lips, which are stained red, part open.

  Those lips will be the first step in her fall.

  Her perfect, white teeth bite down on her bottom lip creating a beautiful contrast. Those lips are the color of blood and I feel my cock twitch at the idea of spilling some of hers. How fucking amazing would it be to run my sharp pocketknife along her throat and puncture the skin below her right ear. I could gather up her tainted blood with the pad of my finger and smear it around her mouth to see if it really does match her whorish lipstick. Would she suck herself off of my finger?

  A shameful heat creeps up my neck as I realize I’ve given myself a hard-on fantasizing about her blood. As if realizing I’m turned on by her, she bats her eyelashes in an innocent way and sends me a meek smile. The smile is only meant for me, and it only serves to add fuel to my fire of hate.

  How dare she try and play me at my own game?

  I scowl at her until she breaks our gaze, a frown marring her enticing features. Logan continues rambling but I don’t hear a word of it. I need to get the fuck out of here.

  I need to think.

  Prioritize.

  Set my plan into motion.

  Pushing back through the crowd, I escape the suffocating presence of her and unlock my office. Closing the door behind me, I remove my coat and roll up the sleeves of my dress shirt. I slip my iPhone into the dock and turn on some Led Zeppelin. As “Stairway to Heaven” starts playing, I begin to relax. Surprisingly enough, my love for seventies music was something I’d gotten from Donovan. Back when his brother worshipped the ground he walked on, and as a result, so did I. Funny how things change. That
all seems like a lifetime ago. I’m staring out the window, contemplating my next move with lingering thoughts of my old friend hanging in the air, when a small knock on the door jerks me from my thoughts.

  “Come in,” I bark out but remain turned away from the door.

  The door clicks open and the muscles in my back tense. It’s her. I recognize the way my body flares to life with a hatred that makes me tremble when she is near.

  “Um, Ghost?” she calls from the doorway. “Things were getting a little hectic in there. Logan asked me to come sit in your office until he’s finished.”

  I turn to regard her and have to physically force the look of disdain from my features. My plan won’t work if I start by scaring the shit out of her. With a sigh, I motion for her to sit down at one of the chairs across from my desk. “Close the door behind you.”

  She presses it shut and leans against it, folding her arms over her chest. The white cardigan she wears over a peach colored dress gapes between each button. It’s a pathetic attempt at hiding her generous breasts. When she clears her throat, I snap my gaze to hers, realizing I’ve been blatantly staring at her chest. To disarm her, I flash her a grin that works for every chick. One of those lopsided, smug grins that melts women like butter in my presence.

  And thankfully, Nadia is no exception.

  “Led Zeppelin,” she says with a smile. “I approve.”

  “So glad I have your approval.” My chest tightens and I clench my teeth. I don’t need her goddamned approval but I placate her anyway.

  Her lips part open again and she tears her gaze from mine, focusing on the nameplate on my desk, but when she reads it, her brows furrow as if something just clicked in her pretty little head.

  Did someone finally learn how to pay attention?

  Where were these fucking skills a decade ago?

  I wonder if she’s putting together the fact that I’m Kasey’s brother. If she’s afraid of me for that very reason, she should be. Because of her lack of description of the man who took my sister, she single-handedly ruined my life. Surely, she senses I’ll ruin hers too. The thick curtain of hate hangs between us with no intention of being pulled away. It will always remain in front of me, veiling the beautiful woman before me with the constant reminder of her fortuitous mistake.