Chain of Kisses

Chain of Kisses
Angela Knight

All rights reserved.
Copyright ©2011 Angela Knight

ISBN: 978-1-60521-657-7
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Publisher:
Changeling Press LLC
PO Box 1046
Martinsburg, WV 25402-1046
www.ChangelingPress.com
Editor: Margaret Riley
Cover Artist: Angela Knight

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Chain of Kisses

Angela Knight

For years, Prince Admiral Arles of Tor has been obsessed with Gisel Vanda, who jilted him at the altar. When Arles discovers the lovely runaway is now a mercenary space captain, he captures her, determined to get Gisel out of his system. He soon discovers she’s even more intelligent and beautiful than he remembered, but she’s also a political liability he can’t afford.

Gisel bitterly regrets jilting Arles, and her love for him still burns bright. Even as he tests her with acts of erotic dominance, she sees the opportunity to redeem herself. But with a murderous enemy closing in, can love survive the demands of royalty?

Chapter One

I gave the manacle on my right arm a restless tug, and it responded with a musical rattle. I couldn’t see a damn thing. A blindfold bit into my temples, wrapping me in sensual, intimate darkness.

The lack of vision only made me more aware of
him
-- his scent, that faint tang of spice and masculinity, the heat of his big body standing just to the left of the bunk he’d chained me to, the slight rasp of his breathing. I have always been acutely aware of Prince Arles of Tor, once my intended, now my captor.

The bed dipped under his weight as he sat down beside me. I quivered like an animal, imagining his nudity. The way he’d looked that night ten years before was branded on my memory.

Arles’s broad back had flexed as he’d used the light whip, the perfect, tanned hemispheres of his bare ass working in concert with the leap of thigh muscles and the snap of brawny arms.

The girl had squirmed and sighed every time he hit her. Even as young as I’d been a decade ago, I’d known she loved it. The smell of sex hung in the air like some kind of musky, exotic spice.

“That’s what he’ll do to you,” my sister had whispered as we watched from the secret chamber. “And he’ll make you want it. Mother will be appalled.”

Our mother might have known Arles dominated other women, but it would never occur to her that one of her daughters would feel the need to submit.

We, after all, had been born to rule.

“Never,” I’d snarled, with all the melodrama of the seventeen-year-old I’d been. I couldn’t drag my eyes away from the prince’s feral strength. “I will not shame my blood.” I could feel myself going wet.

“You will. He’ll weave his alien magic, and you’ll bow that proud little head.”

I feared Isa was right. Even if I hadn’t been in love with him, Arles was too much for me. I’d end up sacrificing everything I was to his dominance and raw male power. My mother would turn from me in disgust and revulsion. I couldn’t bear the thought of her disappointment.

But I also knew my mother would force me to abide by the demands of the treaty. Saying no at the altar was not an option.

Two hours later, I slipped from the palace, abandoning my world, my family, and my life. The Capital Spaceport was only a few blocks away, and I meant to seek passage off world. I was too well known to take a flitter taxi -- any capital cabbie knew my curfew and would refuse to pick me up, for fear of the Royal Guard’s wrath -- so I decided to walk.

A block from my goal, I was attacked by a pack of throat slitters who dragged me into an alley. I survived only because a passing mercenary heard my screams and charged to the rescue. He killed every one of the slitters and flew me to his ship for treatment of some ugly injuries.

Captain Galon Teve had a merc’s hard eyes, but his heart was soft. When I told him my story, the big, gray-haired cyborg took pity on me and hired me on as crew.

My new mentor taught me how to fight, how to kill, and how to pleasure. Yet no matter how I tried, I could never love Galon as he came to love me. My heart was already captive to a boy with a Paladin’s eyes -- and a man with a devil’s smile.

Under Galon’s tutelage, I discovered a talent for tactics and strategy. Eventually I became his second-in-command. When Galon fell in battle against the Fafnar, I succeeded him as captain of the
Valkyrie Quest.

Through it all, Arles haunted my shamed fantasies. I’d lie in my lonely bunk with one hand stroking between my thighs, remembering the shadows rolling across his big body in time to the snap of his whip.

Now it was no dream.

Arles touched my nipple, brushing calloused fingertips over the hard nubbin. Just once, but I still caught my breath at the liquid heat that rushed through me.

“Sensitive little breasts.” His voice rumbled in the intimate darkness of my blindfold. “I wonder how you’ll taste. Shall I find out?”

Saliva flooded my mouth, and I swallowed. I didn’t answer.

“I asked you a question.” His fingers closed over my flesh in a pinch carefully calibrated to give more pleasure than pain. Yet the potential sting floated just beneath the delight like a dark promise. “I want an answer. Shall I taste you?”

“You’ll do as you please. You always do.”

“True.” He twisted, released, flicked the nipple back and forth, sending warm delight lapping along my nerves. “But a show of submission on your part might appease me.”

“I rather doubt it.”

“But can you afford to take the chance?” Another hot pinch, this one with a hint of sting. Perversely, I felt heat flood my belly. “My reputation is not exaggerated.”

“I never thought it was.”

“Perhaps a silk flogger.” He brushed his hand over the sensitive flesh of my left breast, gave me a caressing squeeze. “Right across these pretty tits. I would enjoy watching you dance.”

“I’ve heard that of you.” I tried for a tone of mild contempt, but my voice sounded too high, too breathless. I silently cursed myself. I could usually act more skillfully for my enemies.

Unfortunately, I’d never seen Arles as a foe. Even now, bound and naked, I remembered the thoughtful boy who’d first taught me strategy over endless games of Conquest.

The prince was even more skilled now, a conqueror of two worlds who’d driven the Fafnar from Torrean space with his ruthless, brilliant tactics. When Arles tracked me down three days ago, I’d known I was in trouble.

I wasn’t really surprised, though. I’d known the prince would demand a reckoning one day; my actions had done too much damage to his reputation. Anybody who watched the news vids knew that.

I’d also known winning a fight with him wasn’t likely. Arles commanded a huge, Starbreaker-class warship that was the pride of the Torrean fleet. Bristling with blaze cannons and thermal torpedoes, the
Mjölnir
outgunned the
Valkyrie
three to one. Naming that ship after Thor’s Hammer had been entirely too apt.

But though the
Valkyrie
was small, she was fast and nimble. She proved it as the
Mjölnir
chased us for three days through the thickest asteroid field I could find.

Arles caught us just as we prepared to escape into superlight space. A salvo of thermal torpedoes blew
Valkyrie
’s quantum engines, leaving us dead in space.

The prince demanded my surrender as the price of my crew’s lives. I didn’t want my people to pay for my sins, so I’d agreed. Leaving the
Valkyrie
in the hands of my executive officer, I flew to meet Arles in my personal launch.

When I stepped off the small craft’s ramp onto the
Mjölnir’s
squadron deck, I found him holding a collar and a set of magnetic slave bands equipped with chains. The golden restraints were engraved with erotic images and studded with emeralds for maximum barbaric glitter. He’d chained and collared me as his grinning crew watched. I could only grind my teeth in rage, trying to ignore the heat in my cunt.

Now Arles traced one finger down my torso, dipped suggestively into my navel, and paused at the neatly trimmed edge of my bush. I managed not to squirm. “I have a suspicion you’re wet,” he said, his voice dark and low. “Are you? Do I arouse you, Gisel?” He laughed. “Odin knows you’ve made me hard and hot.”

His fingers dipped between my spread thighs. Both of us groaned at the slick, tight flesh he found.

“Ripe,” Arles murmured. “Ripe as a peachango. Ready for my cock. Is that what you want, Gisel?”

“Do you care what I want?”

“Not really.” I could almost feel his purring laughter, soft as fur draped over cold steel. “I care what
I
want. And what I want is to taste you, beat your sweet little ass, and grind my cock deep in that tight little cunt, which is exactly what I’m going to do.”

His mouth covered my nipple in a breath-stealing rush. Sensation exploded across my nerves -- the gorgeous rake of his teeth over the hard tip, the wet heat of his tongue sweeping circles over jutting flesh, his lips tightening in a hard, drawing suction. I gasped. My chains rattled, gold links ringing as I writhed in helpless lust.

Arles growled back, his voice rough and male, as he settled over me like a mantle of hard muscle and warm skin. His scent flooded my head, dark with alien spice and masculine musk. Instinctively, I tried to curl my arms around his strong back, but my chains pulled tight. I was still helplessly spread-eagled beneath him.

“Mine,” he rumbled, lifting his head from my breast. “At last.”

And he kissed me.

It was a burning kiss, a devouring kiss, all tongue and thrust and bite. I moaned, losing myself in his taste as I arched into his tensile brawn. But even as I savored his ferocious sexuality, some part of me squirmed in shame. My mother had taught us that craving a man’s dominance was weak.

But as the prince kissed me like a conqueror, I realized I did not care. The queen’s teachings had cost me my world, my honor, and the man I loved. I was tired of running from Arles of Tor. There was no point. He had me.

He’d always had me.

By the time he broke the kiss, both of us were panting. I could feel his cock against my belly like a length of pipe, velvet over iron. “I believe I owe you a spanking,” he murmured in my ear, his breath tickling my skin.

“Somehow I don’t remember that particular debt.”

Arles gave my earlobe a retaliatory nip, then levered off my spread-eagled nudity. Something clicked, and my chains fell lax with a musical rattle. Despite my blindfold, I tried to bolt from the bed.

The prince snaked an arm around my waist, spun me around, and pushed me back down. My stomach hit hard thighs, and I felt a cool draft across my bare ass. I twisted, driving my elbow blindly at his face with the vicious skill Galon had taught me.

Arles caught my fist in one hand, captured the other wrist, and dragged them both behind my back, despite my bucking struggles. The manacles’ magnetic fields engaged, locking them in place. The chains draped down over my hip, the links cool against my hot skin -- leaving me helpless across Prince Arles’s knees, just as I’d been in my most searing fantasies.

I tried to rear onto my feet, but he arrested my surges with a hand on my shoulders, pinning me like an errant toddler.

It was said the royalty of Tor had been gene-sculpted for combat, creating warriors who were faster, stronger and smarter than any commoner. As I struggled against his iron hold, I began to believe the rumors. He could crush me if he chose.

“Now,” Arles said, not even winded. The bastard. “Let’s see what shade of pink this pretty ass turns.” He brought his palm down on my butt with a loud
smack
. I swallowed my yelp.

Another smack as his hard hand met my soft backside, then another and another. The flesh heated with each swat. “Arles, you son of a bitch!” I snarled, kicking out as I tried to lever off his lap.

“That’s no way to talk about my mother,” he said mildly, controlling my struggles with no effort at all. The smacks came faster, igniting my ass into a bonfire blaze as I kicked and cursed.

Despite my snarls, heat burned deep in my juicy pussy. Odin’s balls, I wanted him. Each stinging swat only increased the craving.

“Do you have any idea of the scandal you brought down on both our Houses, you spoiled little brat?” Arles growled between blows. I realized rage steamed beneath his taunting dominance. “You spat on all the Torrean warriors who fought and died to protect your wretched little world from the Fafnar.”
Swat! Swat!
“Twelve years my people battled the lizards to drive them from Swanhilde space, and how did you reward us?”
Swat, swat swat!
“You jilted me at the altar and made a mockery of the treaty between our worlds.”
Swat! Swat! Swat!
“My brother had to marry that little whore sister of yours to salvage the treaty, and she’s led him a merry dance since. And all this time, I didn’t know if you were alive or dead!”

That last was followed by a smack so hard, it was all I could do not to scream. My eyes stung, and I blinked furiously, determined that the captain of the
Valkyrie
would not cry.

Worse still, every accusation carried a shameful cargo of truth. I had betrayed him and my own people, and for what? Cowardice. “
I am sorry
!” I blurted, meaning every syllable. “Odin’s eye, I’m sorry!”

“We’ll see, won’t we?” He freed my wrists and dumped me on his bunk, then stripped the blindfold from my eyes. As he straightened over me, I blinked my vision clear -- and gaped up at him in helpless lust.
Gods, he’s grown more beautiful
.

He looked like one of those ancient Earth statues given life as he stood there with his big, bare feet braced wide. Muscle worked over his body in rolling curves, veins snaking along massive biceps as corded tendons flexed. His shoulders looked as wide as a wall compared to his tight waist and long, strong, warrior’s legs.

But it was his face that riveted my gaze.

Arles’s eyes were the burning green of jungle leaves backlit by the sun, made even more striking by the brilliant gold sunburst around his pupils. He stared at me, his nostrils flared like a hunting beast’s, as though he drank my scent from the air. His cheekbones rose in chiseled juts to either side of that Roman nose, sweeping down to the hard angle of his broad jaw. His mouth was drawn tight with temper, but I remembered the lush sensuality of those lips. I’d stared at them for hours as a girl, dreaming of virgin kisses.