The Mistress (The Original Sinners 4)

He took a step back and turned around. As he neared the end of the hall Nora called out to him.

“We can still be friends, right?”

Wesley didn’t turn around to answer but the word was all she needed.

“Forever.”

Nora laid a hand against the wall to steady herself. Wesley...her Wesley... This time she knew he was gone for good. It was okay. It was all right. As much as she loved him she knew she never intended to marry him. She knew he wanted things she would never give him—children, monogamy, an undivided heart. He deserved all that and she prayed he would get it someday. Sooner rather than later, she hoped for his sake. For all their sakes.

After a minute Nora felt strong enough to go open the door to her bedroom. Grace was there. She would talk to Grace about it all. That would be nice, wouldn’t it? Talk about man troubles to a woman? What a novel concept...a female friend who wasn’t in the Underground. She could get used to that, maybe. More women in her life, less men. More stability, fewer adventures. Maybe she could get used to a quieter life, less kink, less craziness...

Worth thinking about. Settling down with Søren a little. Might be all right. People did that. They got older, they calmed down, they stopped sowing wild oats and started sowing...what? Domesticated oats? Something like that.

Nora started to back into her room but paused with her hand on the doorknob when she saw someone slipping into the darkening hallway.

Laila...she’d know those long legs anywhere. Instead of her usual jeans and tee, Laila had on a little slip of a white nightgown, girlish and innocent. She must have stolen it from Anya’s closet. Perfect fit. And Laila didn’t even look her way. She seemed a girl on a mission and that mission involved leaving one room and going into another room.

Wesley’s room.

Nora couldn’t help but smile, proud of Søren’s niece for doing something so foolhardy as to attempt to seduce the almost unseduceable Wes Railey. She must get that from Tante Elle.

“Good girl,” she said to no one. Nora walked to the end of the hall and listened a moment at the door. She heard nothing, no voices. Hopefully Wes would let her down easy and not hurt her feelings. Hopefully Laila would take the rejection well and get back into her room before her overprotective uncle discovered what she’d been doing...or attempting to do. The only man who’d sleep with Søren’s virginal eighteen-year-old niece was a man with a death wish. Crazy kids.

Nora heard the front door open and close and she peered around the corner of the stairway. Søren had returned from his run.

“Hello down there,” she called from the top of the stairs. “I snuck out of my room.”

“I see that.” He stood at the bottom of the steps looking sweaty and sexy and absolutely overjoyed to see her standing up and smiling down at him. “I think I ordered you to get your rest, didn’t I?”

“You did.”

“You think I won’t punish you because you’re already bruised?”

“I’m willing to take that risk. Speaking of risks...”

“Eleanor...”

“Catch me.”

She swung her bottom up onto the banister and without any further warning slid down it toward Søren. He caught her with far more grace than her awkward dismount warranted, and she wrapped her arms and legs around him.

“Eleanor, how old are you?” He sounded utterly disgusted by her childish behavior.

“Fifteen.”

Søren shook his head.

“You’re too young for me,” and he moved as if he would drop her.

“I’m thirty-four, I’m thirty-four, I swear.” She clung to him and he pulled her back up.

“Are you going to act like it?”

“Do I have to?”

“No.”

“Then no.”

“Could you at least try to behave yourself for a week or two? My heart could use the rest.”

“I am. I’m going to be a saint from now on. No more wild partying, no more drinking too much, no more running off with younger men, no more wild craziness.”

“A miracle has been wrought today. And I’ll believe it when I see it.”

“Of course if I stop sleeping with other guys...and gals, that means you can’t play with other submissives anymore.”

“Well...” he said as he hoisted her into his arms and started up the stairs with her, “let’s not get carried away here.”

41

THE PAWN

Laila knew she would fail even before she slipped into Wes’s room. She also knew she’d never forgive herself if she didn’t try. Her mother was frantic on the phone, wanted her back home immediately. She’d talked Freyja off the ceiling, reminded her that she and her uncle had discussed a short trip to the States earlier that summer. But her mother was adamant. She had to come home as soon as possible. So tomorrow she flew back to Denmark. Everything that had happened had been hushed up, hidden, swept away. No reason to get the police involved or freak out her mother any more than she already was. The people who’d kidnapped her and her aunt were all dead and gone. Kingsley’s people had “cleaned up” the mess. At least that was all he said about it, and she certainly didn’t want to know any more.

She didn’t want to know anything tonight, didn’t want to think about anything. She only wanted to be with Wesley in every way he would let her before she returned home and probably never saw him again.