Sophie Oak - Siren Enslaved

“Yes, sir. She said she has an inside source.” Candice’s voice softened. “Mr. Lodge, I don’t think it’s anything you should worry about. She’s just asking questions. It’s not the first time this has happened. There are always rumors. I just wanted you to know.”

He took a deep breath. The light changed back to red. He was lucky there was no one on the road. “Are you sure? I should come home.” Maybe it was for the best.

“No, no, you promised me you would take a vacation.”

Now she was stern and unmoving. Julian felt his lips tug up into a small smile. When she talked to him like that, he could almost see her the way she was thirty years before. Candice Holloway had been the tenth nanny his uncle had hired. He’d run through nine in the years after his parents died in a car accident. He’d intended to run her off as well. She’d flatly refused to be dismissed. She’d told him she wasn’t going anywhere, no matter how hard he tried to push her away. Candice Holloway promised that she would never leave him, and she never had. When he no longer needed a nanny, he’d convinced her he needed an assistant. Along the way he’d managed to convince her to let him pay for her children’s college education and set up a retirement plan for her. He believed in gratitude. “It isn’t much of a vacation spot, Candice.”

“That will be good for you, sir.” She sounded more relaxed now. “A little peace and quiet is just what the doctor ordered.”

Something caught Julian’s attention. On the hill behind him it looked like a wedding party was breaking up. He would need to move soon. He just didn’t like to talk and drive. He believed in concentration. “The doctor didn’t order anything. You did. I’m almost to the ranch if my GPS is to be believed. Is there anything else I should know?”

Julian watched as a ball of white appeared on the sidewalk several blocks down from him.

“Lucas Cameron was in the dungeon last night.”

Nothing odd there. Jackson Barnes’s younger brother had become a regular at The Club ever since he finished law school and began working at a prestigious firm in Dallas. It hadn’t hurt the young man’s chances that he came with a small, but lucrative client list made up of Barnes-Fleetwood and Julian, himself. Julian sighed as he realized why Candice would mention it. “He brought Lexi with him?”

“Yes, sir. I thought you would like to know. They performed a scene and left. Ms. Moore was reportedly very upset.”

Julian’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. Lexi Moore was rapidly becoming a problem. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do about those two. He’d thought about calling her mother, but Lexi was twenty-four. Though she didn’t have a membership at The Club, Lucas did, and he acted as her Dom. Unless he was willing to seriously argue with Lucas, he had to allow it to continue. He’d offered to talk to Lucas. Lucas had declined. That boy was wading into dangerous waters. Lexi Moore was on an emotional ledge, and she and Lucas seemed to think they could solve her problems with public spankings. Julian sighed and felt tired at the very thought of trying to deal with it. If he revoked Lucas’s membership, he and Lexi would more than likely find another club. Julian didn’t like the thought of that. At least this way, he and Leo could keep an eye on the situation.

“Thank you for telling me, Candice. Please call me if the situations, either of them, worsen. I’ll see you in a week. Until then, I will enjoy my vacation. You needn’t worry. It appears absolutely nothing interesting ever happens in this town.”

He hung up the phone just as he looked in the rearview mirror. He felt his eyes widen. It appeared as though a large marshmallow was barreling down Main Street. The frothy confection had a blonde head sticking out of it. Julian stared in the rearview, unable to look away. A man raced after the white puff ball. He was wearing a tuxedo and screaming something that sounded like “Annie.” A large crowd was pouring out of the church. Very interesting. He wondered if the marshmallow intended to run all the way to Mexico to get out of her wedding. Julian didn’t blame her. He probably would do the very same thing if he had been foolish enough to agree to something like a wedding.

The puff ball had stamina. Though he couldn’t see her legs through the sea of taffeta surrounding them, he knew they had to be pumping overtime. As she came into sharp view, Julian could see that her mascara was running in dark rivers down her face. Her ridiculously long train trailed behind her. The man, who seemed to be the groom, tried to chase down his frothy prize. He would probably make it. All he had to do was get within twenty feet of the fleeing bride, and he could put a foot down on the satin trail behind her. If he had any sense at all, he had a length of rope on him. Julian always had a length of rope. The groom could tie up the fleeing bride and drag her back to the church. If he was really serious about this whole marriage thing, he would spank her first to start the marriage on the right foot.

Julian sighed. It wasn’t his concern. Still, he enjoyed a train wreck as much as the next person.

The marshmallow steamrolled down the sidewalk. Her arms pumped, her legs strained. Her eyes widened and locked on…him. Before Julian could think to gun the engine, he was assaulted by a sea of satin and lace.

“Drive!” The woman practically screamed the words as she threw herself into the front seat.

Julian struggled to find his way through the cloud he found himself caught in. “Excuse me?”

“I said drive.”

“Yes, I speak English. I wasn’t asking what you said. I was rather shocked that you had said it. Were you raised in a barn?” He shoved down the mountain of fabric that covered his face. He looked at the woman now in the seat beside him. He really should have kept the top up.

“Please drive,” she beseeched him. Her tearstained face went straight to his gut. “I am begging you to please drive.” She hiccupped through her tears and managed one last word. “Sir.”

Julian practically growled. She’d said the one thing that he couldn’t ignore. She’d called him Sir in that oh so sweet way that let him know she would be soft and submissive if he played her properly. She would submit and lie beneath him with no demands of her own except to please him. Perversely, it made him damned determined to meet her needs. She’d done the one thing guaranteed to manipulate him each and every time.

He thought about it. He thought briefly about simply waiting. The tuxedoed groom was so close. Another few steps and he would haul this sugary piece of trouble right out of his convertible. He would drive on to Jack’s ranch and spend the next week catching up with friends. He wouldn’t get involved. He wouldn’t get in trouble.

“Please, Sir. I am begging you.” Her breath hitched, and blue eyes pleaded with him.

The groom closed in just as Julian gunned the engine. Trouble, it seemed, just followed him.

The man beside her finally gunned the engine and took off down Main Street. Dani took a deep breath and tried to get her hands to stop shaking. What the hell had she just done? She’d panicked and fled, leaving 122 wedding guests sitting in the pews at the Willow Fork Methodist Church. Only they hadn’t been in pews at the end. She’d looked back long enough to see the wave of people coming out of the large doors to gawk at the idiot running out of her own wedding.

She tried to shove down the ridiculous amount of satin and lace currently assaulting her. God, she couldn’t breathe. She glanced out the rearview mirror of her handy getaway vehicle. Finn had stopped running. He stood at the stoplight, his face contorted in concern. She turned to look back at him.