I moan, squeezing my eyes shut. His sexual torture is driving me insane and I finally cave. “Please. Sir.”
He presses a kiss to the top of my head and starts moving again. “Good girl.”
Heat flushes through me at those two words. My body climbs back up to breaking point and just as I’m trembling on the very edge River drops his lips to my ear.
“What are you hiding from me, Freya?”
I freeze.
He circles my clit. “Tell me what I want to know, and I’ll give you what you need.”
I cry out and tear my hands from the wall to push him away. I spin around and shove against his solid chest but he doesn’t budge. “You son of a bitch!” I go to hit him again and River grabs my wrists, securing them above my head with one hand. I struggle but his hold is iron-clad.
Eventually, I collapse against the wall, trying to catch my breath and make sense of what just happened. “Experimenting. Fuck you.” A tear runs down my cheek and I hope to God it’s too dark for River to see. “What was the hypothesis,Sir? If I get Freya horny enough maybe she’ll tell me the truth?”
River sighs. “Yes.” His free hand comes up and the pad of his thumb brushes away my tear. So much for it going unnoticed. “I concede that perhaps this was a mistake.”
“Let me go.”
River shakes his head. “You’re all worked up, darling. It would be cruel for me to leave you like this.”
My eyes widen in disbelief. “What you just did was cruel.” I swallow and shrug my shoulders as best I can, trying to appear cavalier. “Besides, I don’t need you. I can just go find Jude or Oz. Maybe both. I’m sure they’d be more than happy to help me out. Hell, even Eli might be up for a quick fuck.”
I yelp as River spins me around to face the wall again and a sharp sting smacks against my ass. My mouth falls open. He just spanked me.
“Careful, Freya. If you act like a brat, I’ll treat you like one.”
“With your bare hands, right?” I snark, over my shoulder.
River’s laugh is low and delicious, and I hate my body for responding to it. He rubs his palm over where he just smacked. “I’m starting to think I might need to get out my crop for you.”
Before I can tell him exactly what I think of that idea someone knocks on the door.
“This better be important,” River snaps.
“Some detective is here. He said Freya asked him to bring over Camilla’s case files,” Jude says from the other side of the door.
River sighs. “I guess your punishment will have to wait.” He loosens his grip and I free myself. Before I can grab it, he picks up my phone and slides it into his pocket. “I think I’ll keep hold of this for now.”
I grit my teeth and walk past him but turn back when I reach the door, my hand resting on the handle. “You act like you’re so calm and controlled but you’re fooling yourself if you think what just happened here was nothing more than anexperiment.”
It takes two to create the fire we just did. I felt him harden against my back, heard his breathing turn ragged. River’s not as unaffected as he likes to pretend and that is the only thing right now stopping me from leaving and going after my dad by myself.
Well, that, and the damn anklet.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
River
I DO NOT make mistakes. I wait and I plan, and I don’t let emotions get in the way. So why the hell am I all twisted up inside because I had Freya trembling beneath my fingers?
It was supposed to be an act, nothing more. A way to get her to talk. Except she’s too strong for that and I’m the weak fool who just gave himself a taste of the forbidden.
I can still smell her on me and it’s taking everything I have not to storm over to where she’s talking with Luke and drag her back inside.
He arrived five minutes ago, Camilla’s file in hand and asked to speak to Freya in private. She knew damn well I couldn’t say no when, to the outside world, Freya is merely consulting on a case.
Jude joins me by the front window at the bottom of the stairs and peers out at Freya and her partner.Ex-partner.
