Deviant Knights (2 page)

But then he suddenly realized…she was kissing
the captain back.
 
She began to writhe
against the obese man,
undulating
her hips against
what he hoped was not the man’s erection.
 
Bile rose in his throat.
 
The
captain separated from her and beamed down at him, insolence in his smile
before he turned back to the woman.

“
Paloma
, you have
pleased me.
 
You promised you could lead
him here and you succeeded.”
 
The captain
stepped back and reached into his jacket, pulling out a coin purse, which he
handed to
Paloma
.

She grinned at the Captain and then looked down
to the purse, opening it and eyeing the contents before tucking it into her
waistband.
 
Turning away from the captain,
she glanced down at him and glared.

“You disgust me, aberration.
 
I despised touching your body.
 
But it was worth the gold to see you in their
clutches.
 
Heretic!”

He steeled himself when he saw her foot fly in
his direction, catching him swiftly in the bollocks.
 
Pain radiated through his body, but it was
nothing to match the ache in his soul.
 
The captain jumped atop his white steed with great effort and whisked
the woman onto his lap.
 
She grated her
hips on top of his, punctuating her perfidy.

They led him back to
Barcelona
, dragging him behind the woman he
thought he adored and her lover.
 
He
began to wonder how they would end his life.
 
Would it be the hangman’s noose, the guillotine? Or would he be burned
at the stake?

Chapter One

Present Day

Kadence
ran through the front door, tossing her pack and keys to the
counter without looking to see where they landed.
 
Her feet crossed the worn linoleum of her
eighth-floor walk-up’s kitchen, crossing onto the worn parquet of the tiny
living room.
 
Eyes solely on her
computer, she dropped into her oversized office chair, her one luxury in the
tiny abode, and clicked her mouse. The large blank screen hummed to life, color
bursting before her eyes, and she clicked on the Internet portal.
 
Breath hitched in her lungs from her
impatience.
 
Another few clicks and she
saw the email she’d been waiting on in her inbox.

Hovering
the mouse over the email, she paused.
 
Nervousness swelled in her gut.
 
What if he hadn’t liked it?
 
What if he thought it was horrible?
 
What if, what if, what if?

Straightening in her seat, she shook her head to
get the errant thoughts out of her mind.
 
He’d loved every piece she’d shown him thus far, had eagerly purchased
every single one.
 
Why would this one be
any different?
 
She clicked the email
link and settled back into her seat, imagining the sound of his voice as she
spoke the words in her head.
 
Of course,
she assumed his voice would be deep and
sensual,
the
kind a woman could listen to for hours and never get sick of.
 
The kind that practically
peeled the clothes right off their backs.

In her mind, he was also tall and handsome.
 
It was already apparent that he had no issues
with money, as he’d spent well over five grand to buy her artwork.
 
That still boggled her mind.
 
Never in a million years had she thought
anyone would be willing to purchase her hobby, and she was glad every, single
day that she’d posted some of it on
DeviantART
.
 
Six months after activating her account, a
message had come with an offer to buy one of the first pictures she’d added.

At first, she’d thought it was a joke.
 
But the mysterious Michel de Saint-Omer had
been quite serious.
 
A few days after
that message, she’d met a bike courier at a Starbucks twenty blocks from
home.
 
The delivery guy had handed her an
envelope with five hundred dollars in cash inside and a note of thanks, signed
in a strong hand with a simple “M” at the end.
 
Kadence
had handed over a cardboard shipping
tube with her sketch inside and shook her head the entire way home, zipping and
zagging
in hopes she was not being followed.
 
Freaks were everywhere in NYC, no reason to
open herself up to chance.

The whole experience had been surreal.
 
But that five hundred had bought more art
materials, as well as a nice night out for her and her best friend, Jane.
 
They’d toasted “M” and danced the night away,
sipping frilly, girly drinks as they moved their asses on the dance floor.

Two weeks later, he placed another order for a
painting she’d done.
 
She had a lot of
different art pieces, but Michel had requested to purchase a painting of the
same subject as the first buy.
 
It was
then that she began to question Michel’s sexuality.
 

All the pieces he requested were of her dream
man, a male she’d dreamed of for over two years.
 
She could see his face in her mind’s eye—as
if she had a permanent photograph tacked to her pre-frontal cortex.
 
Mr. Dreamy spent nearly every night with her,
sensually touching her body, whispering sweet nothings into her ear.
 
She woke up alert and frustrated every,
single morning.
 
Nothing was ever
consummated, though she really wished for some satisfaction after so many
months.
 

Soon after his dream appearances began, she’d
started to sketch him.

It was a little obsessive.
 
Okay, it was a lot obsessive.
 
The only person who knew anything about it
was Jane, who still thought it a bit odd, but let it go because she loved her
like a sister.
 
And the fact that
Kadence
was absolutely clear that the man didn’t
exist.
 
At least
outwardly.
 
Inwardly, she wasn’t
so confident.
 
Was it just her overactive
imagination mixed with a little dry spell in her love life?
 
Well, a big dry spell.
 
She hadn’t been laid in over two years, since
moving into the city.
 
Since the dreams
had begun.

Not for lack of trying, but all of the guys she
seemed to run into seemed to be at polar ends of the dating spectrum.
 
Either they were ready to settle down, as in
immediately, or they only wanted a piece of ass.
 
Kadence
wasn’t any
man’s booty call or one-night stand, nor was she ready to slip a diamond on her
finger.
 
It just wasn’t her style.

Where, oh where, was Mr. In Between?
 
But at least she had Mr. Dreamy.
 
He’d been in her head for so long that she
was starting to blur the lines between reality and the surreal.
 
She knew he didn’t really exist, but he was
just there.
 
Always
there.
 
When she
was lonely.
 
When
she was sad.
 
He was there for her
every single night.
 
Holding her and
making everything feel better.
 

Of course, they never talked in her nightly
strolls through dreamland.
 
He held her
in his arms, kissed her neck and shoulders.
 
Perhaps caressed the swell of her breast as he lay
close beside her in her bed that wasn’t her real bed.
 
It all took place in some surreal baroque
bedroom with swirls of red smoke surrounding them.
 
Like a bad acid trip, not that she’d know
what one of them looked like, but she could imagine it was awfully close.

Kadence
wasn’t sure if making him the star of her artwork was good or bad
at this point.
 
It had started as a way
to potentially stop the dreams, a way to excise whatever demons she had in her
psyche.
 
Not that the dreams felt in any
way malignant, but the constant state of sexual frustration she woke up to had
gotten old a long time ago.
 
Yet the
artwork hadn’t seemed to rid her of her curse, only strengthened it.
 
And now, she was so used to drawing the sculpted
lines of his handsome face, that no matter what she began to draw, it always
seemed to become about him.

Expressively blue eyes were framed by a strong
brow and a straight nose.
 
His cheekbones
were high, but the firm, chiseled edge of his chin didn’t allow his face to
look feminine in any way.
 
Light, brown
hair was longer than what she usually liked in a man, but it looked right for
him. The soft curls ended just below the nape and would cover a collar, if he’d
ever been dressed in any of her dreams.
 
A very tall, thick, muscled body was something hard to rage against her
softness.

 
The small
smattering of chest hair sprinkled between his flat, hard nipples and then
started again around his navel, trailing down to his substantial, erect
cock.
 
Not that she’d ever been able to
enjoy the organ. At times she even wondered if it would fit had she the
chance.
 
He was perhaps around
thirty-five, with tiny fine lines around his eyes and mouth, perfect for her at
thirty.
 
He was utterly and completely
exquisite, the perfection of masculine beauty.

Michel apparently felt the same, because over
the last couple of months, he’d bought a grand total of six pieces, spending a
good deal of money to acquire them.
 
The
last one had been a work he’d requested, her first commissioned painting.
 
If she could focus on the email at hand,
she’d know if he liked the second custom-made piece.
 
She dug down deep to find the baritone voice
she’d attached to Michel in her head.
 
Too bad he was gay, because the image of him in her head was
exhilarating and sexy.
 

She read and re-read the missive, a pang of fear
spiking through her.

The work
is exquisite.
 
You really are quite
talented.
 
I think it’s time for us to
meet in real life, and we can make the exchange over dinner.
 
Interested? -M

The idea of going to dinner intrigued her, to
see if the face and voice she’d imagined was anywhere close to what Michel
looked like in real life.
 
But he was a
virtual stranger, heavy on the virtual.
 
Yes, he’d been in contact with her on and off for over five months, and
was a client, but he could be anyone.
 
Thoughts of a serial rapist or axe murderer wafted through her head and
all the urban myths and legends she’d heard over the years came crashing down
on her.

But their many emailed conversations had been
full of charm and hadn’t brought on any thoughts of weirdness or oddity.
 
There’d been no vibe of danger, and the man
had spent a lot of money on her.
 
He was
helping her to live out a life’s dream.
 
Didn’t that deserve a go-see and a handshake?
 
Some gratitude for making her feel for once
that there was a future for her that consisted of something other than slaving
away in a job she hated?
 

Clicking on the reply button, she thanked him
for his kind words and agreed to dinner.
 
She hovered again on the send button, considering everything once more
before clicking the button firmly.
 
Butterflies swarmed in her stomach, her nerves getting the best of
her.
 

Surprise filled her when she got an almost
immediate response.

Great.
 
Nine o’clock, tonight.
 
Per Se in the
Time
Warner
Building
.
 
See you there.

Kadence
looked at the screen, dumbfounded.
 
Ignoring the high-handed, near-demand for her presence without asking if
the day and time would work, she focused rather on the fact she’d be going to
one of the hardest restaurants to get a table at in the city.
 
Per Se was extravagantly expensive as well,
but she’d heard the food was to die for.
 
She wondered how many people keeled over from the bill alone.