by Riley Pine
I increase my pressure, kneading the ball of her foot. Her lids flutter in a sort of ecstasy. I love that my touch brings her joy on so many levels, from carnally depraved acts to these gentle moments of tenderness. In fact, this is what surprises me most. I never doubted that physical pleasure with another would be anything less than addictive and amazing. But it’s these quiet interludes where we aren’t sucking and mouth-fucking, grinding and groping, that make me happiest.
I could watch Evangeline sit naked and cross-legged on the bed all day—doing nothing but sipping Earl Grey and sketching me—and consider myself contented.
She has filled almost an entire notebook with my nude form.
I’m not sure what she’ll do with it when she eventually leaves. I stiffen, my jaw tight as always when I think of such impossibilities as our eventual separation. I am arrogant enough to assume that she will take my images with her and on some lonely night in the future look at them with a smile playing on her lips of the sweet time we shared, these magic hours when the world seemed to stop for us.
We haven’t taken things all the way. Christ, I smirk at myself. I sound like an earnest virgin.
But if the shoe fits...
I’m a virgin who has fucked a woman with his whole hand, allowed her to trace her tongue over every acre of my cock, kissed her from her aroused clit to her rosebud ass.
But I have not truly entered her.
Nor will I.
For as real as this feels, we still are playing a game of pretend. And for all intents and purposes, I am her client. No matter what emotions I think are tugging at my heart, I hired her from that Rosegate madam to be mine for a month.
If I enter her now, one thing is for certain...I won’t ever be able to fulfill my destiny. If we join together, we will never be put asunder.
So I hold back, and though it seems to disappoint her, I have made sure to make it up to her in other ways that cause her immeasurable pleasure—and multiple orgasms. My current record is five in one session.
And it’s one that I’m determined to break.
“What shall we do this afternoon, Your Highness?” she asks idly.
“I was thinking of trying that trick with my tongue that made you claw at my shoulders like a she-cat,” I answer with a studied nonchalance.
She tosses a pillow at me, laughing. “A she-cat.”
I point at the claw marks on my shoulders. “Do you have a better description?”
“I plead innocent,” she says, opening her eyes extra-wide for emphasis. “I was driven out of my mind by lust.”
“I’ll drive you out of your mind,” I cry and lunge at her, hooking her around the waist and tickling beneath her ribs.
There’s a knock at the door.
“Did you order room service?” I ask, willing to let her go if she is famished. We’ve kept up quite the athletic horizontal routine.
“No, you?”
I frown. “No.”
The knock sounds again with increased urgency, and I get the sinking feeling that our happy time here sequestered from the world has come to an abrupt end.
Evangeline lets out a huff of annoyance and wiggles into a pink silk nightshirt crumpled beside her. I get up and wrap a towel around my waist, sauntering to the door. It’s a disappointment but not a surprise to see X there, hands clasped, face serious.
“I apologize for disrupting you, but this couldn’t wait.”
X has been hard at work deciphering the language of the map. What he thought would take him a mere day or two has lasted the week.
“Of course.” I beckon him forward. “One moment so that I can get decent.”
I duck into the bathroom, where I tug on a pair of sweatpants. My chest is covered in love bites. It turns out Evangeline likes to mark her territory, and for the time being, she considers my body hers.
I love seeing them there, a reminder of some of the happiest times in my life thus far.
When I come out, X is still standing, and Evangeline kneels on the edge of the bed covered in my robe.
“I couldn’t get him to crack,” she says. “He refuses to tell me a single word.”
“That’s because I didn’t want to share this information without Benedict close by to provide support.” X’s voice is calm, cool, but also kind.
“What does that mean?” Evangeline rises up off her knees, her cheeks blanching with alarm. “Oh my God, Jasper. He’s not... He isn’t... Oh no, no, no—”
“No, not Jasper. Your sister-in-law, Camille, has been arrested, and your niece, Lola, has been removed to a government-run orphanage.”
Evangeline
I crumple into a ball on the bed, convulsing with sobs. Here I’ve been basking in pleasure for the better part of almost two weeks, as if in denial of the danger my family still faced. Whoever started this has already taken from me my father and my brother. Now a mother and her child? Who could be so hateful? So merciless?
“Shh, angel. It will be okay,” Benedict whispers as he rubs my spine.
I can barely speak through the tears. “This is my fault,” I tell him. “I came here to do a job—to earn enough money to take care of them. To save my brother. Maybe I have been doing this for them, but I’ve also been indulging my every fantasy.” I nearly choke on a hiccupping breath. “Because of my selfish whims, my niece—” I can’t bear to think of it. “Oh, Lola,” I cry. “Why didn’t Camille call me? Prisoners are allowed a phone call, aren’t they?”
X shakes his head. “This place is...different.”
Benedict continues to try to soothe me, but I push him away, scrambling off the bed to where X stands.
“I have to help Camille—and get Lola out of that place!” I tell him. “You can help, X. I know you can.”
He swallows but just stands there. Then I feel Benedict’s hands on my shoulders.
“Evangeline,” he says. “Of course X can help. We both can. But this is beyond our jurisdiction. The mother...she is imprisoned in Rosegate, yes?”
My whole body trembles as I nod.
“Your Highness,” X says. “Despite our years of diplomacy with our territory, we have no direct oversight of their courts or laws. This is part of the Rosegate Compact of 1702.”
I learned about this in primary school as a child. Our small kingdom was a simple city, smaller than Monaco and more akin to Vatican City, a country once walled off from the rest of Europe, with a focus on pleasure-making and the arts. At last, feeling the looming threat of war from the aggressive Nightgardin, Rosegate gave up much of our independence to be protected by Edenvale—but not all. And we never lost pride in who we were, a cultured people with a storied history.
“And, of course, the fact that last year your brother spurned the Baron of Rosegate’s sister and blew up their planned engagement means we can’t go through any direct route,” X adds.
Through puffy eyes, I watch a silent conversation transpire between my prince and his guard. Benedict narrows his eyes at X, his jaw set in quiet obstinance.
“Your Highness,” X says again, but nothing comes after.
For a long, drawn-out beat, neither man says a word. Benedict simply stares the other man down until X finally grumbles something.
“What was that, X?” Benedict asks with the authority of a true royal.
X crosses his suit-clad arms. “It was Sanskrit. I’m afraid the true meaning of my sentiment will get lost in translation. But if you are determined to try your dealings with Rosegate in this matter, then I must assist you.”
I throw my arms around X’s neck and kiss the man’s cheek. “Thank you!” I cry. “Thank you! Thank you!”
Then I turn to Benedict, and he looks at me with a measured gaze.
“I have not forgotten our arrangement,” he says, his voice calm. “I have sent two weeks’ worth of payment to The Jewel Box a
lready—and I’ve put some extra in a private account for you to access once you leave this place.”
The muscle in his jaw ticks, and I want to reach for him, to assure him that as much as I need the money, he has become so much more than an assignment. But I can’t lose focus again. So when my fingers twitch, and my hand begins to move, I stop myself before I can feel his stubble against my palm.
“Thank you” is all I say. “I’m going to clean myself up. Then have to leave for Rosegate at once.”
* * *
Benedict is quiet for much of the three-hour ride to Edenvale’s neighboring territory—to the place I truly call home. Though in the back of the Rolls-Royce that X drives, the prince sits with my hand in his, every now and then giving me a gentle squeeze to let me know he is still there.
I’ve gotten so used to seeing him in plain clothes—or nothing at all—that to see him in the habit of a priest once again is so jarring that I wonder if the man sitting next to me is the same one who has tasted every inch of my body.
“This is who I am,” he says softly when he notices me staring.
I nod, and my throat tightens. “But is it who you want to be?”
“Evangeline,” he says, but nothing comes after the utterance of my name.
And I get it. He has a duty to fulfill, whether he wants to or not. It is the way of his family, and despite his carnal needs, Benedict Lorentz is a man of honor. We are so much alike, the two of us. Bound to family in a way that choices seem to be made for us rather than of our own free will.
“This sure as hell isn’t who I wanted to be,” I say, forcing a laugh. But he doesn’t respond. “I’m not proud, you know. Of what I have to do to take care of the ones I love.” I swipe at a tear under my eye. “But there aren’t many options for me in the art community at the moment, not with our family name being dragged through the mud like it is. It’s funny, though. If the other girls knew I was a prince’s whore—”
“Stop!” he growls. He drops my hand and grabs me by the shoulders. I see the pain in Benedict’s dark green eyes, and I know that I’ve hurt him somehow.
“Never, Evangeline. Never do I want you to call yourself such a name again. Do you understand me?”
I open my mouth to answer, but he doesn’t wait for me to do so.
“That account I set up for you—it’s not just for the month you’ll be with me. It is to take care of you and your family after we go our separate ways. I will not send you back to that place. I will not let another man—”
This time I interrupt him.
“I am not yours to save,” I say, though I know I’m a hypocrite. Here we are, entering the city of my birth, where I’m fully willing to let him leverage his power as a priest to get what I need. Because the truth is, if anyone could rescue me from the life I never wanted, it would be this man.
I would choose him. But he can’t choose me.
“Highness, we are here,” X says over the intercom, and I look out the window to see a sign that reads Rosegate Institution for Female Confinement.
Benedict and X both convinced me that trying to see Jasper is too risky. With me being the only one to solve this puzzle and save my family, whoever is after us—and I know the Madam fits in here somewhere—cannot know that I’ve found the map.
But a recently imprisoned woman who has called upon her personal priest for confession...
Benedict is our ticket to Camille.
“Do you remember the plan?” X asks, and Benedict nods.
“How can you be sure they will not recognize me?” the prince asks.
X lowers the partition and turns to us, grinning. “Because your brother is the face of Edenvale right now, and while I know living in his shadow might be unpleasant at times, you will now use it to your advantage. It would be wholly unexpected for Edenvale royalty to walk into this institution unannounced—and that is precisely why it will work.”
I raise my brows, my gaze volleying between the two men.
“X,” I say, “you speak as if you do this kind of thing all the time.”
He winks. “I assure you I do nothing of the sort, Miss Evangeline.” Then he turns to Benedict again. “They have a chapel on the premises. That is where they will bring her to meet you. It’s imperative that you take her to the confessionals on the second floor. Should anything go wrong and you have to abort the mission early, there is a zip line that runs from the second-story window straight over the outer stone wall. We’ll pick you up there if necessary.”
Benedict squints at something in the far-off distance. “Do you mean that wall out there with the barbed wire at the top?”
X nods. “That’s the one.”
“And I’d have to jump out of a second-story window to attempt traveling over that wall?”
X nods again. “Yes, exactly.”
“And if I ask how there came to be a zip line from the chapel to the property beyond the prison?” Benedict asks.
X gives him a crooked grin. “I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to divulge that information.”
Benedict clears his throat. “Well, then. Nothing will go wrong,” he says.
He kisses me quickly and exits the vehicle.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Benedict
“FATHER JOHN?” A weasel-faced guard frowns at the roster. “I don’t seem to have you here on my list of approved visitors.”
“I arrived at the Rosegate Monastery last week.” My tone is mild but firm, velvet stretched over steel.
“From Edenvale?” The guard cocks a brow and scratches the side of his pointy nose.
My accent gives me away as expected. I keep my face a gentle mask, the model of a simple priest come to hear prisoner confessions. “Yes, I’m here in your lovely city on a sabbatical.”
The guard grumbles under his breath but seems reluctant to grill a man of the cloth.
“On your way,” he mutters, hitting a buzzer that allows me entrance, and picks up a pornographic magazine.
Charming.
I pass through the thick stone walls topped with barbed wire. No woman has ever broken out of a Rosegate prison and lived to tell the tale. X must have been joking with his talk of zip lines. Despite Rosegate’s reputation as a city of beauty, art and learning, it has a dark underbelly, not unlike many old European cities. In this case, it’s home to an old, but notorious, penitentiary.
A grim-faced female warden greets me with a downturned mouth. “Morning, Father. This is an unexpected visit.”
I give her the sign of the cross. My hand does not betray me with a tremble. My features remain as calm as with the guard out front.
“There is no right or wrong time to find succor in the mercy of the Holy Spirit,” I say mildly.
She snorts and flexes her large fists. She looks like the sort of person who drowns puppies for fun. A steely-eyed woman for a coldhearted place. The air is sour with hopelessness, as if those behind the bars have been abandoned by God Himself. Through one of the barred windows high above comes the unsettling sound of sobbing.
“No one has signed up to hear confession in weeks,” she growls. “Besides, what good will it do ’em?”
From somewhere deep inside the prison bowels comes a terrified scream. “No, please! No!” It’s cut off with an abruptness that makes my throat tighten.
“For those who are of the faith, the sacrament is an opportunity for atonement, to cleanse the soul from the stain of sin.” It’s all I can do to steady myself in the face of so much casual cruelty.
“Ha! Hope you’ve come armed with bleach and industrial cleaner to deal with this filth.” She whirls and sees a female prisoner scurrying past clutching a stack of books. “You there, where are you going?”
The woman flinches as if expecting to be struck with the billy club hooked to the guard’s utility belt. “I’m Prisoner 35495,
assigned library duty.”
“Well, I don’t like the look of you, 35495,” the matron snarls. “What was your crime against the city?”
The woman bobs in an awkward curtsy. Her cheeks are gaunt. It looks as if she hasn’t eaten a proper meal in months. I feel sick to my soul. This is what passes for justice in these parts? I’m part of the royal family and therefore culpable in this mistreatment. Rosegate might be a special city with special rules, but prisoner mistreatment is a violation of international law.
“Begging your pardon, miss,” the woman stutters, her Rosegate accent making me wince. She sounds so much like Evangeline, who is now outside, waiting for me to send word of her sister-in-law’s fate. “I’m a pirate.”
“But there’s no ocean near Rosegate. If you take me as a fool, I’ll show you who laughs last around here.” The warden’s eyes are slits as her hand, the one that reads hate, slinks to the club.
“Begging your pardon again, I mean no disrespect,” the prisoner says hastily. “See, I was convicted of piracy, not with regards to the ocean or ships, but for stealing.” She hangs her head, her grimy face stained with shame. “I pirated a great deal of intellectual property. Books, to be specific. Hundreds if not thousands of them. That is why I work in the library now. I only have another month on my sentence, and I am trying to atone for the error of my ways.”
The warden looks flabbergasted anyone would steal an item such as books. “Be gone from my sight, worm,” she commands. “Now, where was I? Oh, you...” She looks at me as if I’m dog excrement stuck to her combat boots. “Like I said, no one signed up for confession. Sorry you hiked your holy butt out from the monastery, but we can’t help you none.”
I think fast. “But surely you have new prisoners. My monastery informed me that your new intake occurred this week.” The lie flows so smoothly off my tongue that I almost convince myself.
She eyes me warily. “What’s it to you?”
I’m setting off her internal alarms. “New prisoners might not have time to have requested confession.”
She shrugs. “We only got one this week. Treason.”
I don’t blink an eye. “Then it sounds like she must have much to unburden. If you would be so good as to show me the way to the chapel, I’ll wait for her there.”