Chapter 8
“Jeans and panties down, then over you go.” Garrett patted the tops of his thighs in invitation as he sat on the side of a king-sized bed covered in a black silk duvet.
Billie stared incredulously at the realization Garrett was obviously waiting for her to drape herself over his legs so he could spank her. “In your dreams!” She snorted.
Garrett quirked one eyebrow. “Did you mean to say that out loud?”
Her hands clenched into fists at her sides. “Go fuck yourself!”
“Yes, I believe you did,” Garrett mildly answered his own question as he rose fluidly to his feet. “We’ve already had this conversation once about your manners and what comes out of your mouth,” he continued in that same even tone, “but I’m happy to reiterate. But only the once,” he added darkly. “Then you’ll take your spanking and we’ll return downstairs to rejoin my brothers, at which time you will tell us everything that led up to this moment.”
“No.”
His silver gaze pinned her to the spot. “Who did I say was in charge in our mating?”
She raised her gaze to the ceiling. “You.”
“Did you just roll your eyes at me?”
“Maybe,” she answered warily.
His mouth thinned. “Who did I say would face the consequences if you disobeyed me?”
“Me.”
“Who did I say—”
“I don’t give a damn what you said, Garrett,” Billie interrupted furiously. “I’ve assured Grigor I mean Gayle no harm. I certainly don’t need a lecture from you or your permission to go back to London and get on with my fucked-up life!”
“—would have a very red bottom if she attempted to defy me?” Garrett continued as if she hadn’t spoken.
The warning glitter in his eyes said otherwise. “You did,” she acknowledged. “But—”
“Are you going to tell us how you got yourself embroiled in this mess and why?”
Her chin rose. “No.”
“Willingly take your punishment I said would be yours if you defied me?”
“You have no right—”
“Are you?” he repeated in that steely voice.
“You’re a sham, do you know that?” She glared at him. “Your whole family thinks you’re the charming rogue of the family, and underneath all that, you’re this whole other asshole of a person who likes to dominate and control women.”
“Woman,” he corrected softly. “You’re the only woman who exists for me now,” he explained at her questioning frown.
“Well, isn’t that just wonderful for me!” Billie scorned. “I have a life, Garrett,” she reasoned. “Places I need to be. People I need to see.” Her father might already be dead, for all she knew. Her heart pounded and her stomach sank at the thought of it.
Garrett shook his head. “Your life is with me now. Your place is at my side. Until we’re mated, and after, there’s no one else you need to see or be with but me.”
“That is so shortsighted,” Billie snapped in frustration. “I’m twenty-five years old. I have a life, responsibilities.”
“Such as?”
“Such as mind your own fucking business!”
“My patience is at an end.” He stepped forward into Billie’s space, his aroma of spices and male sexual musk suddenly overwhelming. “I’m going to spank you now, and continue spanking you until you agree to tell us what we want to know.”
“Which is?”
“The reason for your actions the last two months.”
She gave a stubborn shake of her head even as she fought against the desire coursing through her body. “I can’t do that.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Does it matter?”
“Probably not, when the outcome is the same.” Garrett’s expression was grim as he easily picked her up in his arms and carried her over to the bed, keeping Billie in his arms as he sat and began to unfasten her jeans.
“I’ll hate you if you do this,” Billie warned.
“But you’ll come for me too,” Garrett said with satisfaction.
He had felt and breathed in her reaction a few minutes ago when he’d smacked her bottom as he walked up the stairs.
The hardening of her nipples against his back.
The telling squirm of her hips on his shoulder.
The gush of cream he knew slicked her pussy lips.
Billie’s mouth might deny wanting to be spanked, but the rest of her body told a different story.
“I won’t do any such thing,” she blustered as Garrett easily lifted her enough to be able to pull her jeans and panties down to just above her knees. “Garrett, please stop this,” she pleaded as he turned her facedown over his thighs, her bare bottom raised as one of Garrett’s arms across her back and one across the backs of her legs held her firmly in place.
She had the most delicious bottom Garrett had ever seen. Plump and juicy, but toned. He could also breathe in her increasing arousal now, and see those juices glistening between her thighs.
He lifted his arm from across the backs of her thighs. “Part your legs for me,” he instructed gruffly.
She tensed. “Why?”
“Do you have to argue about everything?” he mused.
“Usually, yes, but especially when someone is threatening to spank me!”
“That someone is your husband,” he grated.
She bucked against the restraining arm across her back. “Like hell you are.”
“A dragon mating is an even deeper bond than a human marriage, which makes me—”
“We aren’t mated!”
No, and Garrett was seriously regretting that fact. If Billie had already been his mate, then she wouldn’t be constantly fighting him on everything. “Maybe I should rectify that right now.”
“No!” Billie fought in earnest against being restrained. “I can’t mate with you— What are doing…?” she groaned as she felt the caress of Garrett’s fingers along the seam of her pussy.
“Showing you how much you want me.” His hand appeared in front of her face.
Billie felt the heat of humiliation bloom in her cheeks as she saw the slickness of her pussy juices coating his fingers. “That bloody aphrodisiac is the cause of that, not you,” she lied. She’d been attracted to and wanted Garrett before any aphrodisiac entered her body.
“Let’s put that to the test, shall we?”
“By spanking me?”
“I’ve changed my mind about how to punish you,” he dismissed.
“You have?” Billie wasn’t sure if it was relief or disappointment she felt.
Garrett didn’t answer, but the arm across her back was removed, and seconds later, she felt his hand take a firm grasp of one of the cheeks of her bottom before the fingers began to squeeze and caress. Her breath caught in her throat as Garrett’s other hand returned between her thighs, fingers dipping into her wetness before stroking from her perineum to her clit, lingering there to swirl and stroke that sensitive organ until it stood erect and aching.
She groaned again as heat coursed through her body. “This isn’t a punishment.”
“It can be.” Those caresses and squeezes continued unabated. “Tell me when you’ve had enough.”
“What…?”
“Come for me,” he ordered.
“I don’t—”
“Come for me,” he repeated in a hard voice.
Billie screamed out the pleasure of her release as her clit was squeezed almost to the point of pain between two of Garrett’s fingers while his thumb thrust in and out of her pussy. The fingers of his other hand dug into the flesh of her bottom, prolonging and deepening her climax.
It was the first of many long and heated climaxes, until one of them continued for so long, Billie felt as if her body might actually shatter completely.
“Garrett, you have to stop!” she sobbed as he continued that merciless stroking and caressing of her oversensitive clit throughout the climax.
“Yo
u’re the only one who has the power to stop this,” he spoke gruffly.
Power? What power? Garrett was playing her body like a finely tuned instrument that responded only to his touch.
He had taken her to heights of pleasure, giving her body so much stimulation over and over again, until her release had become pain mixed with that pleasure. That edge of pain added to the torment of her oversensitive body.
Garrett had never known anyone as stubborn as his mate. Billie refused to concede, even though she must now be in extreme discomfort from overstimulation.
He wasn’t sure how much longer he could continue to do this. He knew Billie wouldn’t agree with him, but her increasing distress was as painful for Garrett as it was for her. His cock was also rock hard, not only from his touching and caressing Billie but also from the insidious perfume of her arousal having invaded all his senses until he almost felt drugged by it.
Perhaps he should have just spanked her, after all, and gotten this situation settled as quickly as possible. It would certainly have been less—
“Okay, I give in,” Billie cried out in anguish. “I’ll talk to you. I’ll talk to your brothers. Tell you whatever you want to know. Just please stop, Garrett. I can’t—can’t take any more!” She began to sob in earnest.
Garrett breathed an inward sigh of relief even as he turned Billie gently and lifted her into his arms to hold her close against his chest, the flow of her tears soaking into and quickly dampening his polo shirt.
His arms tightened about her as he buried his face in her hair. “I’m sorry,” he groaned. “I’m so sorry.”
She sniffled. “What…?”
Garrett exhaled shakily. “My frustration gets the better of me sometimes. But I shouldn’t have done that. You’re my mate, for me to protect and care for.”
She kept her face buried in his chest. “Oh, I think you more than took care of me.” A trace of humor entered her voice. “My clit will probably never be the same again.”
Garrett gave a wry chuckle. “I’ll kiss it better later.”
She raised her head to glare at him, the evidence of her tears still on her reddened cheeks. “Like hell you will—” She frowned as he grinned at her. “That wasn’t funny, Garrett.” She landed a punch against his shoulder. “You aren’t coming near my clit again today— What are you laughing at now?” She frowned her irritation with his levity.
Garrett continued to chuckle for a while longer before answering her. “I’m ‘not coming anywhere near your clit again today’?” he repeated. “Where would like me to come instead? Because at the moment, I have a serious case of blue balls.” He grimaced.
“Sick bastard!” She landed another, less playful punch to his shoulder before standing, turning away to adjust and refasten her clothing and then facing him again, eyes glittering with determination. “Let’s go downstairs and get this over with. Then you can decide whether you want any part of your anatomy near me ever again,” she added heavily.
Garrett was frowning as he stepped forward to take Billie in his arms. “Nothing you have to tell me will ever stop me from wanting you as my mate. From being proud to have you as my mate.”
Her gaze didn’t quite meet his. “Let’s just wait and see about that, shall we?”
His arms tightened. “It will change nothing,” he promised firmly.
Billie looked up at him searchingly. Garrett’s gaze met hers calmly and without judgment. His expression was one of resolve.
Leaving her in no doubt that he meant what he said.
“Okay.” Billie breathed out her relief as she pulled free of his arms and stepped away. “Let’s go downstairs and do this.” She held out her hand to him.
There wasn’t a single moment of hesitation as Garrett placed his hand in hers and followed her from the room.
Chapter 9
Garrett was aware of Billie’s nervousness as she sat on the couch beside him once they were downstairs in the sitting room, where his brothers still waited. He could feel her tension in the dampness of the palm of her hand as he held it in one of his own, and in the quick way she talked and never met anyone’s gaze.
She started by telling them about her childhood. Of growing up with just her father after her mother walked out on them when she was very young. Then her father’s incarceration in prison four years ago after he began working for Cezar Fescaru. Followed by the Romanian’s request that she work for him against Gregori Markovic or her father would suffer the consequences of her refusal.
Garrett bristled slightly when Billie admitted that part of the Romanian’s plan had been to wreck the Russian’s marriage, using her as “the other woman.”
His tension eased again when Billie admitted, after kissing Gregori only once, that she couldn’t go through with it even if Gregori had been willing. Which he wasn’t, and he had shown that displeasure by dismissing her and passing her over to Nikolai Volkov for her last month of employment.
That had been when Fescaru stepped up his game and demanded that before Billie left, she was to transfer funds from Markovic’s offshore account into a second account owned by Fescaru.
Which was when Billie had brought Gayle, a hacker by profession, in to help her. Because she had no idea how to go about transferring those funds without Gregori instantly knowing what she’d done.
“You involved my mate in your criminal activities,” Grigor cut in furiously.
Garrett was the one to answer his brother. “And Gayle would be the first to admit that she knew she was being paid fifty thousand pounds to commit a crime.”
Grigor’s dragon simmered just beneath the surface. “That is not the point—”
“Of course, it is,” Garrett snapped. “You know I like Gayle, but I’m not blind to the fact that she was something of a wild child before you tamed her.”
A touch of humor tilted the sternness of his brother’s lips. “She is still a wild child. And never let her hear you say I tamed her,” he advised dryly. “Not if you wish to retain your balls.”
“Which he says are blue at the moment—” Billie broke off with a self-conscious grimace as all the brothers turned to look at her before their speculative gazes then moved on to Garrett.
He looked decidedly uncomfortable, and Billie doubted it had anything to do with the tightness of his jeans squeezing those blue balls and more to do with his brothers realizing not only had their mating still not been completed, but Garrett was sexually frustrated from not having come even once. Whereas she…
“Moving on,” she said briskly, deliberately meeting Grigor’s gaze. “Yes, I did involve Gayle, but as Garrett said—and much as you might not like it, Grigor—Gayle was initially a more than willing accomplice. And while her having the strength of character to reverse that transfer of funds is laudable, it resulted in Fescaru demanding I kill Gayle once he realize she was responsible, as a measure of my loyalty to him. A demand I had no intention of carrying out,” she added firmly as Grigor looked prepared to explode.
His eyes narrowed to dark slits. “Then why are you here?”
Billie sighed. “I followed Gayle to Wales with the intention of warning her Fescaru wants her dead, but once she was incarcerated in the castle, it became impossible for me to talk to her. So I watched and I waited. Then Nikolai arrived with several of his men, and the situation became even more complicated.” She gave a pained frown. “Why was Nikolai here?”
“We have recently made…something of an alliance with Gregori Markovic,” Nathaniel answered. “Dylan is mated to Gayle’s sister, Holly, and Dylan was helping to…extract Gayle from her part in your illegal activities— The facts can’t be changed, no matter how much you growl, Grigor,” he admonished his brother.
“Shall we move on again?” Billie suggested brightly.
“Nikolai came here to tell us you had escaped and to help recapture you,” Nathaniel economized in acknowledgment of the low growl still emanating from Grigor.
She nodded. “And once he arrived, it mad
e my task of warning Gayle about the danger Fescaru represents that much more difficult. If I don’t do what he asks, he’ll send someone else here who will kill Gayle.” And her father, something Billie had been trying to avoid at all costs but now had no idea whether or not she’d succeeded.
“Then he must be eliminated,” Grigor stated without hesitation.
Billie winced. Admittedly, all these men had been born during a time when an argument was more often than not settled with a sword, and there was no doubting it would make her life much easier if Cezar Fescaru was no longer around to blackmail her. But this was the twenty-first century, a time when people didn’t just go around eliminating each other whenever they felt like it.
Well, not the people Billie usually knew, anyway. All that had changed since she began working for Gregori Markovic and was then blackmailed by Fescaru. Since her life went to hell in a handbasket, in fact.
“Could we just back up a few steps?” Garrett said slowly. “Is Fescaru still threatening to kill your father if you don’t kill Gayle? For God’s sake, get control, Grigor,” he rasped as his eldest brother gave another low growl.
Tears glistened in Billie’s eyes. “Yes.”
“But you came here to warn Gayle anyway?”
“Yes.” The sob could be heard in her voice.
“Knowing your father might die?”
“As I haven’t contacted Fescaru for several days, Dad might already be dead.” Tears fell unchecked down the pallor of her cheeks.
“We only have her word for any of this—” Grigor didn’t get to finish that accusation because Garrett had crossed the room with his preternatural speed and now had one taloned claw about his brother’s throat.
“That is my mate, Grigor.” He thrust his face almost into his brother’s. “If Billie says she came here to warn Gayle, then that’s why she’s here. Do you understand?”
“You—”
“Edward Rider is in the infirmary after he was attacked by another inmate yesterday, the second time in a matter of weeks. His injuries aren’t serious, and he’s expected to be released back into the main prison later today.” Aeran looked up from his laptop as silence fell over the room and everyone turned to look at him. “I hacked into the prison database.” He shrugged without apology. “I’m guessing we need to do something about this?”
Garrett (Dragon Hearts 6) Page 7