Surrender’s Dance - ISBN: 1-59632-126-1
Fired! When hard-driving Asia Drake hears those words, she’s in shock. Her entire adult life has been about proving herself, taking charge, making decisions. She’s often secretly fantasized about being at the mercy of a man who sees her as a sex slave. As a sexual object, she’d no longer have to compete, to battle. Instead, she’d exist for one primitive purpose.
In a heartbeat, everything changes. Her world shifts and she finds herself in a jungle, running from her supremely muscled and all-but-naked pursuer. Despite her desperate attempts to escape, he brings her down, strips her and binds her. She has become his, helpless against his masterful command, unable to do anything but accept unrelenting sexual stimulation.
Zemar, the lion, is a master in the art of preparing his captives for their new lives as slaves valued for their ability to give and receive carnal pleasure. He knows his job and does it well. He sees them as bodies, sexual organs, and nothing else. For him it’s easier that way.
But Asia is more than a captive trainee. Even as her body hums with mind-shattering needs, she remains a woman wounded by her past. And beneath Zemar’s powerful muscles beats a heart too long locked away.
More than their pleasure is mated when they dance Surrender’s Dance.
Excerpt
Dense, heavy vegetation pressed in on Asia . Her breath came in ragged gasps as she half-ran, half-stumbled, down what couldn’t really be called a trail. Panic came at her in waves and rendered rational thought impossible.
She knew only one thing – to flee.
Arms pumping, legs straining, she leaned forward and dodged to the side in a desperate attempt to avoid an overgrown, head-high bush. She managed to keep her footing, but with her next step, her heels sank into damp earth.
Heels? What had happened to her jogging outfit?
Don’t think! Don’t think!
Shaking her feet free of the damn useless shoes, she plowed on. Too soon, she knew she’d made a mistake. The feet of her pantyhose were already shredded. Her soles were being cut by rocks and tree roots. Sobbing, she willed herself to dismiss the pain and disconnected sensation. She had to run, to escape!
Escape what?
It didn’t matter. If whoever was pursuing her caught up with her, she was doomed. If she knew nothing else, she knew that.
Running had always calmed and centered her, but this was different. Instead of a paved path, she was on uneven and treacherous land, and time had buckled in some incomprehensible way. Not only didn’t she have a clue where she was, the contrast between light and shadows made anticipating her next move impossible. Panic again clawed at her throat.
Before she knew it was going to happen, she fell. She managed to turn so she landed on her shoulder instead of her breasts, then struggled to get to her hands and knees. Her straight-line skirt clung to her legs much as ropes would. She started to pull the fabric up over her thighs so she’d have more freedom of movement, but a sudden weight on her back slammed her belly to the ground. She smelled wet earth and struggled to look over her shoulder. The weight shifted until the pressure was between her shoulder blades.
Oh God. Someone’s foot was holding her down.
“Give it up!” a man ordered. He punctuated his command by shifting his weight to the back of her neck.
Her legs and arms remained free, but what good were they if all they could reach was the ground? Even worse, she couldn’t breathe! The burning in her lungs became more intense and still more. She tried to reach behind her, to get free, but couldn’t grasp anything. As her consciousness faded, she wrenched her body to the side. Gasped for breath. Before her attacker could adjust, she struggled out from under him and onto her hands and knees, lacerating her hose even more. Instead of trying to stand, she forced herself to look at the threat to her freedom and maybe her life.
Because she was staring up at the sky, she saw little except a massive, dark, nearly naked shadow.
“Like the feeling of a little freedom?” The shadowy figure taunted her, voice deep, and husky, and knowing. “It’s not going to last.” With that, he leaned down and pressed his large hands against her shoulders.
Although she tried to scramble away, his greater weight forced her to the ground again. This time, instead of putting pressure on her neck, he straddled her and settled his hips over her buttocks. He yanked off her blazer, popping buttons as he did and exposing her sleeveless silk shell. Then he wrenched her arms down against her sides.
Before the threat fully penetrated, he ran a rope around her right elbow and pulled it toward him. He grasped her left arm. Propelled by desperate strength, she managed to briefly free it. Grunting, he pinned the arm to the ground with his knee, then slowly and deliberately looped rope around that elbow. He leaned back, pulling on the ropes to force her arms as far behind her as they would go. He secured the bonds so her elbows nearly touched.
Handcuffs wouldn’t have done a better job of rendering her arms useless, but he obviously wasn’t satisfied because he grabbed the long, thick hair she’d always been so proud of and lifted her head. He ran more rope around and under one shoulder, and then the other. Once he’d tied that off, he released her hair and ran yet another rope from the one over her shoulder blades to her elbow restraints. Even if she’d been able to force her elbows closer together to loosen the tie there, the latest rope effectively prevented her from freeing herself.
Caught!
Her eyes burned, but she wouldn’t cry. No. She could get out of this. She would.
When she’d fought off the surge of panic, the man was no longer sitting on her. He pulled her up by the rope harness, first to her knees and then to her feet. Then he turned her toward him and released her.
The man she’d seen in the park!
Except … instead of shorts, he now wore what appeared to be a loincloth, which ended just shy of his knees. He needed a shave. His dark hair was long and wild-looking; his eyes black and deep set and strangely beautiful. Mesmerizing. His skin tone made her guess he spent much of his life out-of-doors.
“Didn’t expect this, did you?” her captor asked, but he didn’t seem to care if she answered. “You should have been careful what you wished for.”
Wish? She couldn’t think beyond this moment. Her awful helplessness.
Her legs trembled so much that she had to put effort into keeping her knees from buckling. Technically, her hands were free, but it didn’t matter because she couldn’t use them. She who had never felt any kind of restraint in the real world was acutely aware of every strand and knot binding her body. His handiwork forced her to arch her back, which emphasized her breasts. True, she wore a top and bra, but the covering now seemed transparent. How could it be otherwise with the way he was staring at her breasts?
Her nipples had become erect. Certainly she wasn’t turned on!
But this man was like no other she’d ever been in contact with. There was nothing civilized or restrained about him, nothing soft. It was as if he’d stepped out of some private and sensual recess of her mind.
“Fear isn’t far from eroticism. And you’re feeling both.” He flicked a finger over a nub. She jumped back. “Predictable reaction, just as I know what you’re going to do and feel from now on. Turning your back on everything you’ve ever been or believed about yourself won’t be easy. That, in part, is why we took you back in time to your professional life – to make the contrast clear.” He made a show of reaching out. Although she back-pedaled, he easily kept pace and closed his thumb and forefinger over her nipple. Despite the two layers of fabric, he held her in place with his grip. “Lots of lessons ahead of you, Asia Drake.”