The Angel (The Original Sinners) (9 page)

“Hey, bad girl,” came the deep, sexy voice of The Griffin
himself. “Can’t believe the Pope let you out of the Vatican.”

“Call it an indulgence. Now are you going to let me in,
Griff?”

“Say please and call me sir.”

“Did you forget who you’re dealing with?” Nora raised her
eyebrow and directed a stern stare at the security camera.

“Never, babe. Come on in. Let’s get this orgy started.”

The iron gate screeched open and Nora pulled up to the
house—even more impressive up close than from a distance—and turned off the car.
The door yawned open as she neared it. Stepping into the cathedral-like foyer,
she gazed around her with unabashed awe at the interior; it might be a farm in
name but it was a castle in spirit. And coming down the main spiral staircase
taking two steps at a time and wearing nothing but a black kilt and Doc Marten
boots was the lunatic laird of the manor himself.

Griffin Fiske… He was one of Kingsley’s finds seven years ago.
Griffin had been only twenty-two then but he was damaged, dangerous and dead
sexy—Kingsley’s favorite combination. Apparently one night Griffin had been
partying at the Möbius, Kingsley’s infamous strip club, and Kingsley watched
Griffin beat the hell out of a guy who’d crossed the line with one of the
strippers. Six feet tall, bronzed skin and with the broad chest and shoulders of
a heavyweight boxer, there wasn’t much in the world more fun to stare at than
Griffin Fiske. He had elaborate armband tattoos around both biceps, dark hair
that spiked up just too perfectly, and the dirtiest smile she’d ever seen on
anyone besides her. The house might be Greek Revival but the master was Greek
warrior.

“Fiske isn’t a Scottish name, Griff,” Nora reminded him as he
skipped the last four steps to land right in front of her.

“But the house is from Mom’s side. And she was a Raeburn.
Anyway, I heard you had a weakness.” He grinned at her before pulling her into a
bear hug.

“Two words—easy access,” she said, giving him a sharp swat on
the kilt.

“Topping me already? Can’t have that.”

Nora squealed as Griffin picked her up, slung her over his
shoulder and started up the stairs.

“Sir?” came a low, well-modulated English accent from the
bottom of the stairs. At the landing Griffin turned around before Nora could
glimpse the source of the voice.

“Alfred, are you looking up my skirt?” Griffin demanded as Nora
squirmed on his shoulder.

“Master Griffin, I would marry my own mother for the excuse to
stab my eyes out with her brooches rather than see anything under your kilt,”
the man’s voice said with elegant aplomb. “Where would you like your guest’s
things, sir?”

“That’s an
Oedipus Rex
reference,”
Nora, the eternal English major, supplied. The voice clearly came from Griffin’s
butler, who sounded utterly unperturbed by the sight of his employer strolling
around in nothing but a kilt and boots with a woman over his shoulder. Nora
guessed this was not an uncommon occurrence.

“Stick them in the Blue Room. And no interruptions for the next
couple of hours, please. My guest and I will be fucking. Two hours, Nora?”

“At least,” she agreed.

“Better make it three, Alfred.” Griffin shifted Nora higher on
his shoulder and continued up the stairs.

“This is going to be a long summer, isn’t it?” she asked.

“Eight and a half inches long, if you’ll recall.”

Griffin kicked open the door to the master bedroom. He threw
her unceremoniously across the monstrous bed draped in mountains of black
pillows and luxurious white-and-black-striped sheets. Nora’s heart raced as
Griffin climbed on top of her. She playfully put up a struggle but only for the
pleasure of having Griffin capture her wrists and push them over her head. If
she had to choose only one man to be with the rest of her life, it would be
Søren, hands down and for all eternity. But as Griffin held her down with one
hand while digging under her skirt with the other, she couldn’t deny Griffin had
his own charms.

“Left boot or right?” he asked, teasing her clitoral piercing
through her lace panties.

“Right.”

He dug around her right boot and pulled out a condom.

“Griffin, before you fuck me, I have to tell you
something.”

Griffin paused after ripping the condom wrapper open with his
teeth. He leaned close and put his mouth at her ear.

“Tell me anything....” He kissed her from her ear to her
neck.

“It’s just,” she panted as he started to slip a finger into her
underwear, “I need to pee.”

Griffin groaned and rolled off her. “There,” he said and
pointed at a door.

“Thank you, darling. That was one helluva drive, you know? You
get sick of the city?” Nora stood up and walked into the bathroom.

“Parents are in the city. Parents who want grandchildren. I am
here so I won’t be forced to give them any.”

“Understandable,” Nora called out. “My mom stopped asking about
grandchildren ten years ago. Just start fucking a priest and they’ll back
off.”

“Your priest doesn’t put out for me.”

“True. But he’ll beat the hell out of you if you ask nicely
though. Jesus, Griffin, your bathroom is bigger than my basement. Spoiled
much?”

“Not nearly enough. You done yet?”

“Yes and no.”

“I don’t want to know what that means, do I?”

Nora washed and dried her hands. Pausing in the bathroom
doorway, Nora looked at Griffin, who sat on the bed with his legs open wide
enough she could see he wore his kilt in true Scottish fashion. She approved of
this.

“You know, I should probably take a shower before we fuck.
Søren gave me a very intense goodbye last night, and I haven’t washed it off
yet.”

“You know I don’t mind sloppy seconds. And knowing Pope
Whatadick, he probably blesses his cum before he blows it.”

“I promise you he does not,” Nora said as she strolled slowly
back to the bed. “Why do you and Søren loathe each other so much?”

“Ask him,” Griffin said, reaching out to unbutton her
shirt.

“I did. He won’t tell me.”

“Let’s just say we have an ongoing difference of opinion. My
opinion is that he’s a pretentious arrogant prick, and he disagrees with
that.”

Nora stared Griffin down. He couldn’t quite meet her eyes.

“I know that’s not true. I tell him he’s a pretentious arrogant
prick all the time and he’s in full agreement. I could beat it out of you.”

“Not a chance. You don’t get to top me anymore. This summer
you’re my bitch, switch.”

“You used to let me top you all the time.” Nora recalled the
dozens of time she’d tied Griffin down and used and abused his poor willing
self.

“Only because it was the only way you’d let me fuck you. And
even then you never got to beat me.”

“Too bad. I think a good hard beating would be good for your
soul. Fine, you can top me. But no beating me, either. Only dominance and
bondage, alas. Søren’s rules.”

“I know. He called and read me the riot act yesterday,” Griffin
said as he unbuttoned her top button with a deft flick of his fingers.

“He’s very protective of his property.”

“I can’t say I blame him.” Griffin leaned back on the bed and
stared her up and down. “Strip for me, beautiful.”

At thirty-four, Nora would take all the erotic appreciation she
could get from younger men. She let her shirt drop to the floor and peeled
slowly out of her camisole.

“Jesus,” Griffin said and took her by the arm; gently he pulled
her to him. The grin vanished as he stared at her stomach and chest. “He did
give you one helluva goodbye, didn’t he?”

“Oops. Sorry. Should have warned you.”

“You two did blood-play?” Griffin asked in horrified awe.

Nora shrugged.

“A little. Just seven cuts. Speaking of, we should probably
stick to anal for the next couple of days. The last cut was in a pretty
sensitive area.”

She expected Griffin to laugh—if they weren’t fucking, they
were laughing. But Griffin only stared at her a moment while he studied her
skin. He gently ran a finger around her wounds—the cut on her collarbone, on her
rib cage, under her breast.

“We don’t have to play if you aren’t up for it,” he said.

“Griff, I’ve had papercuts worse than this. And also on my
crotch. This is what happens when you fall asleep while working on your edits
naked. I’m up for it. Seriously.”

“Okay. We’ll fuck if you make me,” he said, smiling at her
again. “We’ll just go vanilla until you’re healed.”

Vehemently Nora shook her head. “Not a chance. No vanilla. The
one time I even attempted vanilla sex I nearly passed out.”

“Nora Sutherlin tried vanilla sex? This I have to hear
about.”

Griffin stretched out on his side and playfully patted the bed
next to him. Rolling her eyes Nora crawled onto his sheets.

“It’s not a big deal. Tried it. Didn’t like it. Stopped.”

“Why’d you stop? Vanilla sex is boring but it’s not hard.
You’re the chick. You just lie there and pretend to like it.”

Pretend to like it…that was the problem. She didn’t have to
pretend.... Nora closed her eyes. For a second she wasn’t in Griffin’s bed
anymore…she was on her bed back home with Wesley on top of her. They were
kissing, their bare chests pressed to each other’s. Wesley’s hands stroked her
hair and caressed her arms. She kissed his neck and muscular shoulders. He was
so young, only nineteen then, and still a virgin. And there he was, as brave as
he was beautiful, ready and willing to give her his virginity. And she wanted
it, wanted him…and not for his body and not for the pleasure and not for the
sex. For something else so much deeper and scarier that instead of letting him
make love to her, she let him go.

“It’s hard to explain,” she said, opening her eyes. “Vanilla
just doesn’t work for me.”

“Not that hard to explain—vanilla blows,” Griffin said. “So
what? Celibacy?”

“Don’t even joke about that. Just tie me down, fuck me up the
ass, call me a slut and just watch the cuts.”

Griffin grinned at her. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Ha,” she said. “I’m still the top.”

Griffin raised his eyebrow at her and she knew she was in
trouble—the good kind.

In a second she found herself flat on her stomach with Griffin
peeling her clothes off. From behind the corner of his bed, Griffin pulled out a
leather strap. He grabbed two sets of bondage cuffs from the bedside table. With
practiced expertise, Griffin buckled the cuffs around her wrists and ankles,
bound her hands to the bedpost and strapped her legs wide-open to a spreader
bar.

Nora groaned with pleasure as Griffin prepared her body for
him—she was going to have to ask him what kind of lube he was using because it
felt amazing—and then pushed carefully inside her. She felt the brush of wool as
his kilt rubbed against her naked skin. Nora decided there and then to take her
next vacation in Scotland.

This is who she was, she reminded herself. She was a switch.
All summer long Griffin would top her. All summer long, she would top Michael.
She’d have the best of both worlds and no vanilla sex at all. No staring into
big brown eyes with flecks of gold in them and saying “Wesley” instead of “sir.”
No holding each other while they made love with only sweat wet between them and
not blood. Sex was sex. Pain was pain. And Wesley and that part of her was in
the past.

Griffin continued to move inside her. Nora buried her head
against her arm and whispered Wesley’s name into the sheets.

6

Michael sat on the porch outside his house waiting for
the ride Nora promised. He still couldn’t quite believe that in a few minutes,
he’d be whisked away to a farm in upstate New York to hang out with Nora
Sutherlin and her kinky friend Griffin all summer. The Griffin part of the
equation worried him. Nora he’d known for over a year now, even known her in the
biblical sense. They hadn’t talked much since the night they spent together, but
he still felt comfortable around her. Well, as comfortable as he felt around
anyone. This Griffin guy might hate him. After all, Nora was supposed to train
him this summer. Griffin might not like sharing her with somebody else,
especially not a teenage boy with no money, from nowhere. Michael still couldn’t
believe Father S would share Nora with any guy. But then again, Father S was an
unusual man. He had a very literal concept of ownership where Nora was
concerned. Since he owned her, he could lend her out and she’d still be his.
Michael wondered how Nora felt about being treated like a library book. Michael
kind of liked the idea himself. The thought of being owned by someone he was in
love with got him so turned on he could barely breathe. He felt disowned these
days. His mom didn’t really want him anymore. And God, his dad…his dad?

“Michael? What are you doing?”

Michael froze. Slowly he turned his head to the side and saw
his father in his usual blue business suit stalking toward him. So engrossed in
thoughts of Nora, Michael hadn’t even noticed his father had parked across the
street.

“Nothing,” Michael said, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Waiting on a ride.”

His dad stopped and looked down at him. Even if Michael hadn’t
been sitting and his rather tall, stocky father standing, his dad would still be
looking down at him.

“A ride to where?” his father demanded.

Michael decided to try a little deflection again.

“It’s Thursday morning.”

“I took the morning off. Your mother said you were going to be
gone the whole summer. I thought I should see what was going on with my
son.”

“I’m your son again?”

“Michael, I thought we put that behind us,” his father said in
his most ingratiating voice. Michael liked the yelling better than the sucking
up. At least the anger seemed genuine. His father’s friendly voice only meant he
wanted something. Answers obviously. And Michael wasn’t about to give him
any.

Yeah, I’m totally over that whole you
wailing on me and Mom thing. We’re best buds again, Dad,
Michael
thought but didn’t say out loud. His father could turn anything against him, so
Michael wore his silence as a shield.

His father’s eyes turned cold and menacing.

“Young man, tell me what you’re doing this summer, or I’ll make
very sure whatever it is doesn’t happen.”

“I’m staying with some friends this summer. That’s all.”

Michael’s father stared at him without speaking. Bad sign. His
dad talked. Constantly talked. He spouted off about sports teams, about the
assholes at work, about the president, the job market, the world’s problems that
would go away if everyone were just more like him.

“Didn’t know you had any friends, Michael,” his father said
with cold suspicion.

Michael clenched his jaw and didn’t answer.

“What friends are these?” his father asked in a neutral tone
Michael didn’t trust for one second.

Pulling his knees even tighter to his chest, Michael
concentrated on the cold concrete underneath him. He always played this game
when his father was angry. Michael would disappear, pull into himself, let his
body become a hard outer shell that protected that part of him only Nora and
Father S understood.

“Answer me, Michael.”

At times like these Michael wished he could talk like Nora did,
wished he could say everything he thought. What he wanted to say right now was,
You asshole.

“You as—” Michael began, but stopped when a shiny silver car, a
Rolls Royce maybe, turned the corner of his street.

“What the hell?” his father asked, his angry dark eyes
narrowing at the car.

Michael stood up, grabbed his duffel bag and head toward the
car.

“Michael, get back here,” his father yelled after him. Whoever
was driving the Rolls Royce slowed in front of Michael’s house, and the door
opened for him. Michael threw himself and his duffel bag into the backseat and
the car started off again. Glancing out the window, Michael saw his father
glaring at him with unstrained fury. There’d be hell to pay when he came back at
the end of the summer. But at least now he was free.

Suddenly Michael realized he wasn’t alone in the back of the
lavish car. First he saw riding boots, black riding boots, and dark gray
trousers. The trousers belonged to a rather old-fashioned but dashing-looking
suit worn by a crazy-good-looking dark-haired man who studied him with a little
smile on his sculpted lips. Michael had no idea who the man was, but he had no
doubt in his mind that he sat in the presence of a dominant friend of Nora’s,
and probably a very important one.

Michael hazarded a timid, “Hello, sir.”

“Bonjour, Michael,” the man said with a French accent,
pronouncing his name like
Michelle
. French? So this
was Kingsley, Father S’s necessary evil. The man looked Michael up and down once
more before reclining back and throwing his riding boots on the seat opposite
him and crossing them at the ankles. “
Mon Dieu,
chérie
does have good taste in her pets, doesn’t she?”

“Pets?” Michael repeated, in some distress.

The man leaned forward and Michael nervously studied his
handsome face—the dark umber eyes, strong European nose, the sensual tilt to his
mouth.

“Tell me, Michael, have you ever had sex in the back of a Rolls
Royce?”

* * *

Nora arched her back and tilted her hips high. Finally
she found the right angle of penetration. Admittedly, it had been her idea for
she and Griffin to fuck on top of her Aston Martin, but once he tunneled inside
her, she realized that car hoods and sex didn’t always mix. Not that Griffin
seemed to mind. While she lay on her stomach across the car hood, her hands tied
behind her neck, Griffin thrust blithely into her. Once she raised her hips, he
slipped his hand under her and found her clitoris. Now equally blithe, Nora
turned her head to the side and smiled.

“When did you get a Ducati?” Nora asked, noticing for the first
time the motorcycle sitting in the corner of Griffin’s garage stocked with
Ferraris, Porsches and one hardcore Shelby Mustang.

“I’m fucking you and you’re asking me about my motorcycle?”
Griffin gasped through gritted teeth.

“Sorry, sir,” she said without any actual contrition. “A Ducati
is the reason Søren and I are together.”

“Dammit, I hate that he has one too.”

“I don’t…”

Nora closed her eyes as a memory floated up out of the mists of
the past.

“Eleanor Louise Schreiber! Get out of bed this instant,” her
mother shouted at her. Nora remembered throwing the covers over her head in her
determination that this would be the day she broke her mother’s spirit. This
would be the day she would defeat the tyranny of organized religion. She’d skip
Mass today and never, ever, go back.

“I’m a Buddhist,” she shouted back from under the sheets.

“Eleanor, get out of bed this instant and get ready for
Mass.”

Nora remembered hearing real anger in her mother’s tone. Good.
Anger made her erratic. She’d either kill her or storm out. Either way, it meant
no church today. If Eleanor could just fight her way out of Mass, she’d be
free…unchained, unfettered, unbound by the Catholic Church forever.

“I’m an atheist.” She flipped over onto her stomach. “I’ll
incinerate the second I walk into church. It’s for everyone’s good that I stay
away from that place.”

Her mother had growled under her breath. So that’s where Nora
got that habit from?

“Eleanor,” her mother said, sighing. Damn. Sighing wasn’t good.
Sighing meant her mother was going to try to either reason with her or bribe
her.

“What?”

“Father Greg is retiring soon. Today is the day the new priest
is starting at Sacred Heart. If the new priest hires someone else to do the
church’s books, you don’t get free tuition to St. Xavier anymore.”

“Don’t care. Send me to public school. No more uniforms.”

Nora remembered the sharp breath her mother took. That her
mother hadn’t just beat the shit out of her yet was one of life’s great
mysteries.

“Eleanor,” her mother began, her voice dripping with
saccharine. “Mary Rose told me the new priest is supposed to be very
handsome.”

Rolling her eyes, Nora had flipped back over and glared at her
mother.

“Mom, he’s a priest. That’s gross.”

But her mother continued.

“And he rides a motorcycle.”

That got her attention.

“What kind? Not some no-thrust piece of crap from Japan, is
it?” Her father hadn’t taught her much but he had taught her cars and
motorcycles.

Shaking her head, her mother tapped her chin. “I can’t remember
what it was called. Something Italian sounding. Du-something.”

“A Ducati?”

“That was it.”

Nora remembered her heart racing a little right then. A
handsome Catholic priest who rode the finest, fastest, most wicked motorcycle
money could buy? She’d have to see it to believe it.

“Fine,” she’d said, throwing off the covers. “I’m coming.”

Nora came hard and relaxed against the hood of her Aston Martin
as Griffin made a few more spiraling thrusts inside her before pulling out of
her and untying her hands.

“Good idea,” he said, dragging her back to him. With her hands
now free, Nora tugged down her skirt and leaned back against Griffin. “Never
fucked on an Aston Martin before. Something for the scrapbook,” he said.

“Neither have I. Or in it. Came close with Zach though. He had
a major hard-on for this car.”

“Zach?” Griffin asked, peeling off the condom and zipping his
pants up.

“Blue Eyes, remember? My insanely hot Jewish editor who left me
for his wife?”

“Right. That guy. I think he had a hard-on for you. The car was
just a bonus.”

“She is a very nice car,” Nora said, running her hands over the
hood. The Aston Martin had been a gift from a lover three years ago—a member of
a Middle Eastern dynasty who came to the States every few months to indulge his
very top-secret obsession with female dominants. Gorgeous man. He loved painting
Arabic poetry on her naked body after sex. After their first week together she’d
found the Aston Martin in her garage as a thank-you. “She’s my baby.”

“Why did you have me drive her up here and put her on blocks
then?” Griffin asked, making a circuit around the car.

Nora kissed her fingers and touched the hood in a little
benediction. Noticing the smears on the paint, she grabbed a chamois. With care
and elbow grease she buffed the Nora/Griffin smudges off the inferno-red
finish.

“I was going to give it to Wes, my old roommate.”

“You had a roommate?”

“Live-in intern. Never told you. Gorgeous kid. You would have
tried to fuck him.”

“That’s probably true. What happened to this gorgeous
intern?”

Nora sighed heavily. “He fell in love with me. Bad situation.
Had to let him go.” She tried to sound cold but she could tell Griffin wasn’t
buying it.

“Sounds like he wasn’t the only one in love.” Griffin eyed her
meaningfully.

“Griff, you’re too pretty to also be smart.”

Nora deserved the glower he leveled at her.

“Do you still talk to him?”

“He calls, but I don’t answer. All I know is that he withdrew
from Yorke and went back to Kentucky.”

“You ever Google-stalk him? See what he’s up to on Facebook or
Twitter?”

Nora shook her head. “I’ve been tempted, but I don’t know. What
if he was still sad and lonely? It would break my heart.”

Griffin came around the car and stood in front of her. He
cupped her chin and forced her to meet his eyes.

“What if he was happy? Dating somebody even?”

Nora exhaled heavily.

“It would break my heart.”

“Nora,” Griffin sighed. “You really need to—”

“Master Griffin? Mistress?” came an English-accented voice from
the door to the garage.

“God, it turns me on when he calls me Master Griffin,” Griffin
groaned as Nora laughed and straightened his clothes. He’d actually put on pants
today—khakis with a white T-shirt that stretched across his powerful tattooed
biceps. Pants and a shirt but no shoes or socks. Still, they were making
progress.

“Your other guest has arrived,” Griffin’s stately white-haired
butler said.

A grin spread across Nora’s face. “Junior kinkster’s here.
Let’s go.”

Nora grabbed Griffin’s hand and raced past his butler.

“So tell me about this kid,” Griffin said. “You said he’s a
seventeen-year-old submissive from your church. Anything else I need to know
about him?”

“Like what? Food allergies?”

“Let’s just say I barely remember being seventeen. I think I
spent half the year drunk and the other half of the year high.”

“You don’t have to worry about Michael. He’s very straight
edge. Søren said he doesn’t even drink. But there’s three things you probably
should know about him.”

“I’m ready,” Griffin said, opening the front door just as
Kingsley’s silver Rolls Royce pulled up in front of the house. “Hit me.”

Nora slapped his arm.

“First, Michael doesn’t talk.”

“Is he a mute?” Griffin asked, sounding slightly horrified.
Griffin only shut up when you put something in his mouth—preferably a body
part.

“No, just really quiet. Nervous type. Quiet.”

“Submissive?”

“That,” Nora said as the door to the Rolls opened and Michael
stepped out. He pushed his sunglasses onto his head and smiled up at her.
Raising his hand, he gave her a nervous wave.