by Roxy Harte
I call her Sophia, the name she has not been called by any other except me since her mother died. I borrowed her for a time, but she was never really mine, and returning from Africa, I had no right to seek her out. But not seeking her out was impossible. I love her…but I cannot even blame the emotion flooding my chest on her. Though I left her at the penthouse pissed as hell. Tonight was supposed to be our night together, alone time…playtime with just me and her. Because only alone can we play as roughly as we like. We take risks, controlled risks yes, but we definitely push the limit. She likes to call it waltzing the edge. I smiled when Garrett asked her, “Waltzing the edge of what?”
She replied, “You know, silly. Why do you tease me so?”
But he didn’t know or he would have been terrified. Death. We waltz the edge of death. She trusts me with her life every single time we play in private, and Garrett, as much as I love and respect him, just can’t stomach the danger. He doesn’t have a clue as to how far we go, because although we played, and I played rough with him, we didn’t play for keeps. It’s a thrill ride with Sophia because she does trust me so and I don’t know what I’d do without her, now that I’ve found her.
I disappointed her tonight by canceling a weekend together she’d really been looking forward to, as had I, because Glorianna called me, and my responsibility is to my country first and foremost. Though I am not a citizen, or even a documented agent, the United States has my loyalty and in return, they grant me safe haven. I could not deny Glorianna. Sophia will get over it.
“Talk to me, Thomas,” Glorianna whispers, her voice honestly tinged with concern.
I don’t answer, instead I take her face into my hands. This is what I do best, taking the attention off me and deflecting onto them. Kissing each eyelid closed, I reflect on just how easy people are to maneuver. Retrieving the blindfold I’d tossed onto the nightstand hours earlier, I place it again over her eyes before caressing her supple shoulders, amazed again at their incredible softness. She is twice my age, or almost at any rate, but once the lights go out it is easy to whisper assurances against her mouth. She melts beneath my touch, accepting the lied promises as truth. It is her weakness that will lead to her heartbreak, not broken vows. At least, that is what I tell myself.
I should feel bad.
I don’t. Lies are my life.
Lying is my sacred duty, and some nights I feel duty is the hardest bitch I ever have to sleep with.
“She is a ghost, mon amour, someone from long ago who is dead to me now. It was just a stupid, stupid dream.”
“Good,” she replies tersely, then with a sly smile adds, “Perhaps we should discuss the real reason I summoned you to my bed tonight. Although I think that you in my bed should occur more often…but we can discuss that…later.”
I blink, shielding fast and hard, as she lifts the blindfold from her eyes. Making eye contact, she waits for a response. I remain silent, waiting for the shoe to drop, my brain pacing, wondering who I will be asked to kill this night and whether the scales are weighted to my side or hers.
“So quiet, Thomas. You must remember I am well used to men trying to manipulate me with their kisses, but then, isn’t that why you are in my bed in the first place? Because I will not fall in love with you?”
She squints and purses her lips. I’m certain she considers how much she should say, how much she can safely reveal. No, I hadn’t really forgotten her rise to power was due to her keen intelligence and shrewd cunning.
“You do realize that you are my favorite agent?”
My lips twitch but I don’t smile. “I didn’t realize tonight I was here as an agent. Your pleasure was my only agenda this night.”
She laughs a short hoot that would seem cold and cynical if not warmed by the smile sparkling in her eyes. “You do amuse me so, Thomas. I love that you lie so well. You make me feel safe, cherished…well used…and sometimes even loved, but there is always duty between us. You protect me, meet my darker needs…and I protect you.”
I watch her turn to open the top drawer of the nightstand, retrieving a sealed file. I assume the file contains the identity of who she will ask me to kill.
“There is a man in Europe, making sport of killing our operatives. Worse, he airs the killings over the internet under the perversion of snuff films.” She pauses, only to hand the folder over to me. I don’t break the seal, waiting for her to say more, because I know she will.
“We have no idea who the man is, only that the man whose identity is contained in the folder is associated with him. Of course, first instinct was to have him brought in, to convince him to disclose to us the identity of the leader.” Her lips tighten. “But then I saw the photos. Perhaps you can explain, Thomas.”
My heartbeat pauses mid-beat, her voice implying I know something, perhaps as much as the man caught in the photos. I am on trial, and whatever is contained in the envelope doesn’t bode well for me leaving this room safely if I don’t provide the answers she wants to hear. I crack the seal to the folder and spill out the contents, but before I even respond, she clasps my hand and begs, “Please tell me that man isn’t you, Thomas!”
The face looking back at me from the photo is my own, but it isn’t me. It is my twin, Nikos. My fingers brush the photo lightly, touching his face, bringing fresh newness to a pain I have kept buried in my heart. I whisper, “It isn’t me.”
“Good,” she replies, pulling a second photo out from under the first, revealing two young, identical-looking boys, arms wrapped around each other’s faces, wide smiles reflecting a happy day, their school soccer uniforms covered with mud. “Then I can assume it is your brother?”
“Yes,” I answer, my heart racing, already wondering who I will have to trade favors with to keep him alive if Glorianna asks me to kill him now.
“I want you to bring him to me.”
Ordinarily, I do what I am told, no questions. Today, I cannot remain silent. “May I ask why?”
Her eyebrow lifts and I know that look, that how-dare-you-question-my-authority look, but then her lips twitch in amusement. “How much do you know about your brother’s activities in Paris?”
“I know he is working undercover. I know it will be extremely difficult to find him or extricate him from his current mission.”
“Yes, well, as long as you understand your personal risk. All you need to know is by bringing him to me, you will save his life.” She lifts the blindfold to her eyes. “Now, where were we?”
* * * * *
December 23
Transatlantic flight, Air France 83
Caught in a brilliant ray of sunlight, winking silver draws my gaze outward to a brilliant blue sky as the plane I’m riding in joins the others waiting for landing clearance as Paris becomes clearly visible below. The lump in my throat returns and I find myself floored by the raw emotion cutting through my heart. I should be surprised, it’s been so long since I felt anything at all, but after crying into my pillow last night under the soft caresses of Glorianna, nothing surprises me.
I left Paris meaning never to return, and yet I’ve dreamed of returning every day since. I left Nikos here, not wanting to, begging him to come with me, even though at the time I had no idea where I was going. He refused.
Eva too, I left in Paris. My greatest regret has been Eva.
I can’t keep my mind off her, although we shared only a few months together. I doubt she would even remember my name if I were to seek her out. She most certainly hasn’t dreamt of me as I’ve dreamt of her. She haunts me. I see her around every turn, just a glimmer, never her. I cannot close my eyes without thinking of her Nordic blue ones, which dramatically change to the warm blue-green of the ocean surrounding Greece, my native birthplace, in the heat of passion. Does she think of my dark brown ones with such obsession?
I waste my time with such thoughts when it is my twin brother I go to find.
I have known for a while something was wrong, that Nikos was in peril. A unique bond binds us and wh
ether the pain is mental or physical we sense it in each other. It has always been. Normally, because of his work as an undercover operative, I feel a vibration from him, it simmers beneath my skin, letting me know he is on edge, but what I am feeling now is greater than ever. If I didn’t know better, I would say it is fear, but as far as I know, nothing has ever scared him. However, until last night, I was stuck waiting for him to make contact. Contacting him was an impossibility.
Glorianna has made the impossible plausible, although I will not go so far as to even entertain the idea I will be able to extricate him—that will take cooperation.
“Sir? Sir?”
The voice is a gnat buzzing my ear, and I fight to hold on to the feel of Eva, the taste of her, the scent of her, so all-consuming it must be real. I smell her, but then, with a touch on my arm, she flees, her memory recoiling back into the shadowy safe house inside my mind, gone until the next chance dreaming. I growl at the concerned flight attendant, jerking my arm from beneath her innocent touch, my nose seeking the source of the scent responsible for the latest dream.
The sensual, floral scent of Tuscany Per Donna is powerful, and I am swept again into the memory of our shared past life. Memory tied inexplicably to Eva’s signature scent…
It was during our last hours together.
I’d taken the bottle from her after watching her with it had driven me to distraction. My mind’s eye forms the vision of her nude. Now, as then, so wrapped up in her ritual, dabbing scent behind her ears, along her jugular, inside the crease of her elbow and on her wrists…drawing a line of teasing scent beneath her breasts and down her stomach to her pubis. It was when her hand passed between her legs I lost control and, in a growling, very uncharacteristic moment, stole the bottle away from her, replacing her hand with my tongue between her thighs.
“Monsieur?”
I glance up in time to see the flight attendant’s tight frown. I assume she has addressed me more than once. Perhaps several times.
I know I dreamt again. Between Sir and Monsieur, my reality shifted and I was again with Eva.
Where? Not here. Here being twenty thousand feet above sea level.
I’m losing it. The it in question being my grip on reality. Worse, I’ve lost my edge.
San Francisco made me soft, affected the way I think.
“Oui?” I blink innocently, taking the flight attendant’s hand and pressing my lips to her fingertips, inhaling deeply of her own scent mingled with the perfume. The irony of the moment doesn’t escape me.
“Lovely, Mademoiselle. Tuscany Per Donna, oui?”
“Oui,” she answers, tugging back her hand. Gripping her fingers a bit tighter, I establish my presence, forcing her gaze to mine. I have begun culling out her deepest desires. Without her even knowing it, I am topping her.
Indicating the blinking overhead—Fasten seat belt—she commands in French. My brain translates without effort. “Please return your seat to the upright position. The captain makes our final approach. Yes?”
“Oui.” Feigning awaking, I release her hand and stretch lazily before pretending to wipe sleep from my eyes.
Just that easily, I make her relax. Her smile is a wonderful thing. In mere seconds, chemistry develops.
Disarming. My expertise on body language makes me a formidable foe, and an even stronger ally. I have a knack for it, making people feel comfortable, gaining their trust without question. A skill that made me the best at what I did, for a while anyway. Depending on the country I worked for, I was the highest-paid assassin, guardian or investigator. Who better skilled than the one who could move from inner circle to inner circle like a chameleon?
Knowing all women enjoy the tousled look of men upon awakening, I court this small advantage.
“Pardonnez moi, your perfume reminded me of a special woman.”
“Ah, a past love, your first? Yes?” She laughs and strokes my arm, flirting. “A Frenchman always remembers his first love best.”
“Oui.” I smile and, that easily, her curiosity is sated. She walks away, leaving me to bask in the subtle remnants of her perfume, wondering how I was ever fool enough to believe I will be able to keep from seeking out Eva.
“Parting is all we know of heaven, and all we need of hell.”
Emily Dickinson
Chapter Two
Kitten
Going limp in my bonds, whether defeat or exhaustion, the sharp ache comes and then retreats, leaving in its place the soft whoosh, whoosh, whoosh of my heartbeat. Thomas is gone. Again. I’m angry. He promised he would not disappear without at least some word. I can only assume it has something to do with the other, the one he does not discuss but which keeps all of us slightly on edge, especially now that the travel seems more frequent. God, please let him be all right. He is scarred. The wounds of a dangerous past I pray are not part of his secret present but fear are.
When Thomas is gone, Garrett keeps me bound. I think he feels he needs to protect me from myself but also because he knows the solitude and isolation of being kept so for long periods is a comfort to me.
I dream of Thomas, my Lord Fyre, and of course Garrett, my Master—not asleep, not awake either, trapped in my mind, remembering…
I walked into the living room when I heard their voices. It always makes me so happy when I hear them together. They love each other. They love me. My heart sings with the joy just knowing so brings.
Thomas held a small box, one I recognized from the fetish store Wild Things downtown.
“Master. Lord Fyre,” I addressed them.
With my entrance their conversation ended, though the easy atmosphere remained, their mood seeming light. Master’s night, my brain clicked out in thought. If it were Lord Fyre’s night with me, Master would be tense, hating not that it is Lord Fyre’s night, but worrying because we sometimes play a little too rough, and that makes him nervous someday we will take it too far and something disastrous will result.
I never worry about such things. Whatever happens would happen, life is too short to worry about what-ifs.
“Kitten,” Master answered me. His gaze trailed over my nakedness, warming me, and it was as it always was with him…like it was the very first time he saw me naked. It made me feel shy in his presence.
“Come,” he called to me, “I have a surprise for you.”
Smiling, I went to him. Went to both of them, since they were standing side by side. “Master?”
Reaching into the box, he pulled out a sturdy leather collar, fitted with several silver rings and, lifting my hair, he placed it around my neck, above my golden locket and kitty collar that marks me as his and above the frayed rope collar that marks me as Lord Fyre’s. He tightened it down snug and it seemed an uncomfortable weight around my neck but I didn’t say so. I remained silent and watching, wondering what an additional collar might mean, and being more than a little apprehensive about what it could mean.
I relaxed a little more when he pulled out a second collar, identical to the one he placed around my neck, and handed it to me. “Put it on Lord Fyre.”
My lips parted, being not as well trained as the rest of me, dying to ask questions, but by force of will, I closed my mouth and, looking at Lord Fyre, caught his barely there lift of eyebrow before his face went smooth and inexpressive once more. Oh God, is this okay? Did the raised eyebrow mean it’s okay to collar you or was it a challenge to try it…or was it saying “don’t even think about it”?
Trembling, I did as I was told.
Lord Fyre’s skin was very warm beneath my fingertips as I closed the buckle and tightened it before locking it in place. Master doesn’t Master Lord Fyre, so I couldn’t imagine what was going on. Or what was about to happen.
“Kiss him.”
I didn’t take my gaze from Lord Fyre’s, not the entire time I was placing and locking the collar in place or as I leaned in to obey Master’s next command. Kissing Lord Fyre was easy, so unlike our first-ever kiss. It seemed our mouths melted together, bin
ding us as one being. I never wanted our kisses to end, not even when I knew Master was watching us this time, but the kiss did end, eventually, leaving me warm and feeling drugged.
“Undress him.”
My breath caught and I paused, not reacting, my gaze still locked on Lord Fyre’s face. My heart slamming through my chest, hands trembling, I obeyed Master.
Using me as his tool, he was topping Lord Fyre and I had no idea how to react, not knowing how Lord Fyre felt about it, not knowing how I felt about it, but I didn’t think about it, I merely obeyed. I slowly unbuttoned four buttons on his knit jersey before pulling it over his head and dropping the fabric to the floor, knowing Master would have taken the time to shake out the shirt and fold it neatly before proceeding and feeling a bit guilty I hadn’t, then reasoning that Lord Fyre never takes the time to fold.
His thickly furred chest bared, I could barely resist rubbing my hands over him but I did, even though I wanted to do so, so badly. It was a conscious effort to restrain myself as I dropped to my knees and unbuckled the leather belt at his waist. I unbuttoned his jeans because they only buttoned, didn’t zip, and my fingers shook so badly a zipper would have been a kindness. Then the task was done and I was left pulling the stiff denim over his hips, taking down his sporty, gray boxer briefs with the denim, realizing only after I had the fabric around his ankles I had to unlace his boots and remove them and his socks first. Red-faced, I barely managed it, but once I had him standing before me naked, I rose, pushing aside the pile of clothes with my toes.
“We’ll have to work on your technique, Kitten, but that’s later,” Master promised. I turned to see his lips twist in a snicker then dropped my gaze to watch him pull out a third collar. “Collar me, Kitten.”