Page 51 of The Queen (Masterpiece Duet 2)
“Damon,” I say.
A man wearing only sparkly leather pants kneels beside Damon’s chair. His visible erection says he’d like to do a lot more than talk, but Damon reclines without any sense of urgency or interest. He has on slacks and a white dress shirt, rumpled but still dashing.
“Excuse me,” I say louder.
A hush comes over the conversation around us. The man with leather pants stops talking. Only then does Damon lift his head, his black eyes meeting mine. A spark of anticipation heats my body from the center spreading out.
“What can I do for you?” he asks, his voice mocking.
God, I knew better than to come here. I did, but here I am anyway. “Can I speak to you in private?”
“Private,” he says, considering. “What’s the fun of doing things in private? Anything you want to do in a room we can do out here. Isn’t that right?”
The question is posed to the crowd, who laugh and tell him yes, please, do.
There won’t be any emotion between us. No relationship. There’s only this, mocking me in public, saving me in private, the hero who won’t let himself be happy.
My throat burns. “Please don’t do this.”
He smirks. “I’m not doing anything yet. Would you like something? You look delicious in that dress. Like a cupcake. Very sweet. Should I lick you and find out if you are?”
There’s a part of me so in love with this man that I want to say yes. So desperate for any part of him that I’ll take this fake showman instead of the real person inside. “No.”
“Or maybe you’d like to trade places. You could be queen of the Den, ruling from on high while I kneel in front of you.” His smile is taunting. “I could kiss your feet. Would you like that?”
The people around me laugh, egging him on. They would watch him crawl for me, watch him debase himself with glee, but more than that, they want him to humiliate me.
“Higher and higher,” he murmurs. “I could kiss your pretty pink…lips.”
Of course he’s not talking about my mouth.
He’s talking about the place between my legs.
What would Damon do if I started undressing in front of everyone? If I accepted his challenge and displayed myself here? I think he would stop me, but that would mean admitting that I matter.
And anyway, that’s not what I want to do. I don’t want to force his hand. To challenge him into it. He doesn’t want me, or maybe he doesn’t want me enough.
I still can’t help myself from asking one more time, from begging—even if that makes me a masochist. My love for this man ran so deep I almost didn’t recognize it myself. It’s like breathing or thinking. Like being. That won’t stop if he makes fun of me, if he sends me away, but I don’t want him to.
My pride is a physical lump in my throat. I have to swallow it, force it down so I can get the words out. “Damon Scott, I want you. I think you want me too. But I need you to say it. I need you to be with me.” My voice cracks. “I can’t stand here alone anymore.”
It’s all the courage I have in the world. All the dignity, which isn’t much. I’m not the honorable Avery James who can watch as the love of her life jets around the world in solitary danger.
I’m the girl from the slums of Tanglewood, the broke-down Cinderella who never got her prince.
The crowd watches me in breathless silence. Whatever happens next, I’m the best piece of entertainment they’ve seen in a while. Nakedness and sex are fine for depravity, but nothing compares to this—to baring my soul, my fears, my hopes to a man who doesn’t want them.
Women look on with blatant jealousy. How much would they want Damon Scott kissing their feet?
His dark eyes are hooded, his mouth set in a hard line.
If his voice had been soft or hard, I could have had a chance. Instead it’s jovial, more the showman than ever before. “If you want me, you can have me, sweet girl. Anything you want. Money. Sex. I’m yours to command.”
My breath hitches. Money. Sex. He left out the things I want most. He wants to worship me in this pretend way, to make a show of it instead of something private.
“Fine,” I tell him. “Then get on your knees.”
It’s like the room sucks in a breath. I can hear them gasp, feel the shift in the air.
Damon’s eyes turn sharp as a blade. He studies me for long seconds, looking at my challenge from every angle, but this is what he wants. This is what he asked for.
In a slow languid motion he moves to the floor in front of him, on his knees in his bespoke slacks, black hair in artful disarray, white dress shirt rumpled. He looks like a man well-sex and thoroughly debauched. The only thing he doesn’t seem is submissive.
