Page 6 of Captured

The idea of getting anywhere near this man in an intimate way had every one of her instincts screaming “danger.” She’d learned the hard way not to disobey her instincts. She chose her partners with excruciating precision—they had to be discreet,easy to hide, and easy to manage. With those provisions in place, she had plenty of play toys to choose from.

Dimitri Korba was definitely not a play toy.

His breath seemed to catch as another flurry of words poured out from the screen, and Lauren refocused. Itwasthe advisor, Cyril, speaking to Dimitri in such harsh tones. Then again, he’d always sounded harsh to her, despite the fact that Oûrois was arguably one of the more beautiful languages in the world.

Dimitri’s breath hitched again and she realized that she’d unconsciously moved her hands up his leg as she’d been lying there, trapped in her own thoughts. Now her questing fingers had slipped up dangerously close to the good captain’s groin, and she could tell by the strain on the fabric that Dimitri was not unaffected by what she was doing. Power curled inside her, and she smiled with a triumph that reached all the way to her toes.

Then she reached up farther yet, stretching to the extent that her tethered foot would allow.

Dimitri’s shaft was full and ready, and she brushed the top of his trousers, reveling in the sensory explosion. Her foot was now taut enough against the zip tie that her toes had fallen asleep, and her heart rate had definitely picked up. The tactile pleasure of the rough cotton twill of Dimitri’s khakis stretched tight across his groin and his backside, both of which she was kneading, squeezing, pressing beneath her fingers. Being bound and yet in control at the same time was unlike anything she’d ever experienced before, and she reveled in it, her breath coming harshly between her parted lips before she clamped her mouth shut.

For a second, she imagined Dimitri naked, and white-hot need seared through her.

Back it down, she admonished herself. This could only be a tease. If she kept things in check, no one would know. Because no one could know.

She needed to stay away from Dimitri.

Still, the man had tiedherdown. And he was right here, so hard, so hot, so different from anyone she’d allowed herself to touch…

She skated her fingers up the hard curve of his shaft, fascinated by the way he didn’t move, didn’t twitch, other than the unmistakable throb beneath the touch of her fingers. Dimitri’s voice remained solid and sure, untroubled, as he answered Cyril’s questions. He leaned forward, and she felt the powerful flex of his hamstrings beneath her other palm. Once again, her mind returned inexorably to the image of those legs, naked and strong beneath her, on top of her, straddling her, and she almost whimpered.

She wasn’t an innocent, and there were plenty of guys out there hotter than this giant. Well, prettier guys, anyway. Dimitri Korba was arguably one of the hotter men she’d encountered in recent memory, at least when he didn’t look at her with a snarl marring his lips or disdain in his eyes. She knew better now, though. She knew he found her attractive. Her or at least the idea of her, which was enough for what she needed. From attraction, it was always a very short distance to control, and the idea of controlling Dimitri Korba in secret, for merely a moment or two…

She could totally pull this off. And no one would know. Because, again, no onecouldknow.

As she pressed her fingers into him, teasing him with smooth, hard strokes, Lauren thought about all the ways she could tantalize the man in the few short days—maybe a week, maybe two, but no more—that she’d be stuck in Oûros. She’d make sure they were barely in the same room with each other, but she’d give him a glimpse, a taste. She knew from experience that was the way to make a man insane—denying him what he thought he wanted. She’d have fun playing the game until shecould get out of Oûros and on with her life. Maybe she’d see him again at the wedding, if the wedding between Kristos and Emmaline actually happened.

She hoped it did. For their sakes, she really did. No one should go through life expecting relationships never to work out. She did enough of that for everyone.

The sudden silence in the room didn’t fully penetrate her awareness until it was a hair’s breadth too late. Then Dimitri’s hand snaked down and wrenched hers away from his body, and he pressed her down into the couch.

“Something you want, princess?”

Four

Dimitri had never been so close to losing control since he’d been a hotheaded teenager roaming Oûros’s Royal Beach for the first time. But now, holding Lauren’s hand against his chest, his body levered over hers, it was about all he could do not to drown himself in the woman right there. Which probably wouldn’t look too good on his next report.

Keeping her hand clasped in his, he used his other to unsheathe the knife at his belt. With a quick flick, her ankle was cut free of its zip tie, the handmade noose falling limp.

He stood in one clean movement as Lauren quickly massaged her foot then scrambled up as well. He didn’t miss the way she swayed, then caught herself, ratcheting her body down with every bit of ruthlessness that he was using, though for an entirely different reason.

“How muchtsipourodo you have in you?” he asked, pitching his voice deliberately rude. A blush marred her cheeks, the bane of her pale coloring. “You gonna vomit before I get you back to the castle, or can you hold it together?”

“I don’t need your help,” she retorted, though as her gaze raked him, he was glad the evidence of his arousal was all but erased. God love Oûros National Security Force training. As wellas parents, who were as keen-eyed as they were not stupid. The number of women he’d nearly been caught with would make the American’s toes curl.

Not that she wouldn’t be a pleasure to be caught with. He surveyed her as she took another second to get her mad on. Lauren Grant was the most perfect woman he’d ever seen—flawless in the cold sterile way of a classical painting or piece of sculpture, and spellbinding in the way her haughty eyes had grown hazy with need and her lips had parted, her breath coming fitfully as she’d stroked him. She’d had no way of knowing he could see her every movement in the overhead convex mirror above the screen. She’d also had no way of knowing he’d been looking at anything other than Cyril pontificating on the screen.

But when he wasn’t making eye contact with Cyril like the exceptional soldier that he was, he’d been watchingher. And damn if thinking about her face now as she’d touched him wasn’t getting him hard again.

“You ready?” he said, the words a slap. “I can carry you if you’re sloppy drunk.”

“I said, I don’t need your help. You tied me to acouch. You’re lucky I didn’t wake up screaming during your little one-on-one with Cyril.”

“Couldn’t be helped.” He shrugged, savoring the emotions playing across her face. She was affected by him, there was no two ways about it. “If I’d gagged you, you could have woken up vomiting and died before I could cut you loose.”

That stiffened her spine. “I do not vomit from alcohol.”

“You might have withtsipouro.” He pointed. “Your purse and shoes are next to the water bottle. Probably good to drink something nonalcoholic if you can. Bathroom through that door.”

---