Lauren Hawkeye - My Royal Sin / Playing Dirty

I swallow the threat of my own conscience trying to weigh in. What do I care about a stupid painting or what she wants with it? I have the chance to save my brother, Jasper. That’s all that matters.

So I repeat her words over and over again to center myself in the moment—to remind myself of what I must do.

I nearly break an ankle climbing the chapel stairs in these boots, four-inch stilettos that cuff just below my short skirt. After almost two months of my apprenticeship, I’m used to the shoes and clothes, but my attire was not built for more than seduction.

There’s also the small fact that I’m on the Edenvale Palace grounds—making my way to an apartment in the lonely-looking, ivy-covered tower next to the chapel. My phone rings, and instead of silencing it as I pull it from my pocket, I accidentally answer it.

“Hello? Are you there?”

“Shit,” I whisper-shout as I scramble back down the steps. “Camille, I’m here. Just...give me a second...” I race outside and around the corner, through the first door I see, not wanting my client to catch me conducting any sort of personal business when I am supposed to be...working. Complaints equal a reduction in my take, and some, I’ve heard, suffer worse.

I freeze, though, when I realize where I am—in the Royal Edenvale Church itself.

“Is everything okay?” I whisper into the phone, and I hear my brother’s wife sniffle before she speaks.

“You’re...you’re working. Aren’t you?” Her voice breaks on that word, working , and I can hear her anguish, her guilt.

“Yes,” I answer, trying to soothe her with the one word. “It’s okay. Don’t worry about me. But something is wrong with you. Tell me what it is.”

She sniffles again. “I took Lola to visit her father today. It was the first time I brought her with me, the first time she would see Jasper in two months, and when the guards told him we were there, he refused to see us.”

I suck in a breath, both at Camille’s pain but also for my brother, Jasper. Because I’m at the Edenvale Palace, completely out of my depth, about to seduce a man I’ve never met—a prince, no less. I understand his shame.

“He loves Lola. You know that. And he loves you. But prison is no place for a child. And you can understand him not wanting her to see him like that. Can’t you?”

I hear the clang of heavy shoes on metal in the tower entryway next door, which can mean only one thing. My client is approaching.

“He wouldn’t refuse to see his child,” Camille weeps. “Something is wrong. I can feel it in my bones.”

“I’m sorry,” I say frantically, trying not to let my own worry about Jasper sink in but also not wanting the prince to find me hiding out in the chapel on my phone. “I have to go, but if tonight plays out as it should, I will have enough to pay this month’s lease on the cottage. You and Lola are safe for now. That is all that matters.”

“But—”

The door from the stairwell starts to slide open, and because I have no choice, I end the call and sneak past the pews and into a confessional. I’m still trying to calm my breathing when the shadow of a man appears on the other side of the lattice.

“Have you come to make confession?” a deep, gravelly voice asks.

I stopped believing in any higher power long ago. But I know why I’m here and what part I need to play. “Forgive me, Father. For I have sinned.”

I open the screen on my phone that has my script for our introduction. I must believe in my brother’s innocence, and that giving up my own will set him free. If I can earn the money the Madam is talking about, then I can buy the best legal representation and set my brother free. Jasper Vernazza is a world-famous art historian. He’d never dream of stealing anything from the museum to sell on the black market. Someone set him up, but for the life of me I cannot imagine why.

“You may proceed, child,” he says. “The Lord is ready to forgive your sins.”

I stroke a finger along the lattice grate and hum, reminding myself to play the part for which I’m being paid.

“What if I want to keep sinning?” My voice is breathy and soft as I infuse it with the need a client would ache to hear. It’s practiced need on my part, of course. But if my training was a success, he won’t know the difference. I glance at the screen in my palm. “What if all I want is to relieve you of that desire pulsing between your legs?”

“Who sent you?” he says, and I can tell he speaks between gritted teeth.

“Let me taste your thick, aching cock, Father,” I say, my voice sweet as an angel as I try to sound less like I’m reading and more like this is what I truly want. “Let me take you so deep. I want to feel you throbbing, salty sweet against my tongue—”

I jump at the sound of what must be his fist thumping the wall between us.

“Who. Sent. You?” he interrupts, but I will not be deterred, not when my only choice is to succeed.

I scroll through the preplanned dialogue on the screen. “Think of all those times you’ve come alone,” I tell him. “Every fantasy you’ve ever had, every sinful act you’ve dared to let yourself imagine—I can be that for you.”

His breaths are ragged, but he does not speak.

I glance at the screen again as a text notification pops up, catching me off guard.

“‘Why did you hang up on me?’” I read, but then realize I’ve read it aloud. And then I add, “Shit!”

He breathes in, and I can tell he’s about to speak, so I fast-forward to the next step to regain control of the seduction, even if it is a lie.

I let go of the lattice and slip my free hand under my skirt, closing out the text and returning to my lines.

“Highness.” I moan as I slip a finger beneath my thong, working myself until I’m wet. “Do you hear that?” I ask, plunging two fingers into my now slick heat. “That’s my pussy, so ready for you. Don’t you want a taste? Just a little lick?”

You need the money. Your brother’s life—the lives of his family—depend on it.

This silent reminder plays on a loop in my head as I try to lose myself in self-pleasure before I get swallowed by regret.

This is for your family.

I swirl a slippery finger around my clit and gasp, the phone clattering to the floor. “Don’t. You want. To make. Me. Come?” I ask between pants, the words all me now. I am lost in the moment just as if I were in the tiny bedroom of my old flat, taking myself to a place that is not here, in this church, but somewhere I am safe. Somewhere I am wanted rather than paid. “Is your hand on that cock, Highness? Is it daring you to bury yourself inside me? Because all you have to do is step into my side of the confessional and sheath yourself to the hilt.”

I try to bring myself to climax, but even I can’t forget entirely where I am or why I ended up here. So I embellish, crying out in feigned ecstasy.

“Oh... Your Highness. Oh God! Your Highness, I can’t—” I add a few more gasps before yelling, “Benedict!”

“Enough!” he growls, and I collapse onto my knees with a satisfied grin.

Yes. That was quite enough.

He waited until he thought I was done, which means he didn’t want me to stop. If that’s all that comes of tonight, I have succeeded in the first step for which I have been hired.

You must earn his trust and break him.

Because this is not just any client on the other side of the wall. He is a prince, second in line to the throne and brother of our future king. I’ve just attempted to get myself off in the presence of a man I’ve only ever seen on a television screen or staring at me from the pages of a newspaper.

I let down my guard for mere seconds and scramble for my phone on the floor, which is why I startle to see him standing in the opening of my booth.