DevilsBoudoirSeriesSecretDesire

Devil’s Boudoir Series

Secret Desire

By Robin McKnight

Published by Horny Devil Publishing

Copyright 2013 Robin McKnight

ISBN 978-1-62518-053-7

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Devil
’
s Boudoir Series: Secret Desire Copyright © 2013 Robin McKnight

Edited by Frank Lee and Colette Stone

Cover art by Dee Allen

Electronic book publication

With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Horny Devil Publishing LLC, P.O. Box 2508, Palm City, FL 34991.

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This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters
are productions of the author’s imagination and
used fictitiously.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to
anyone who’s ever been afraid to be honest with themselves, and to everyone who’s ever taken a chance on love, even when it
means facing your own deepest secrets.

Chapter One

Shrill ringing pierced the decadent quiet of the early morning in
Evan’s private room at the Devil’s Boudoir
. Despite her deliciously sore
body’s protest,
Rissa leaned over the edge of the bed, rummaging through the discarded, and after last night, shredded clothes for her cell phone. Sleep-blurred vision made it difficult for her to read the caller ID, so she d
idn’t even try.

“Hello?” A groggy, sleep-drenched voice purred out of her, but the
sedate tone only lasted a moment.

“Hello, Ms
. Trent? This is Maria Malone with the police department. We have a young man here who gave us your name as his emergency contact. We picked up Mr. Deacon Cain around two this morning for drunk and disorderly conduct.
He’s over at St
.
Andrew’s hospital being treated for
alcohol poisoning.
He’s still under arrest, but we need someone to sign the
hospital paperwork,
then we can take it from there.” The woman on the
other end of the line seemed calm and rational; Rissa was anything but. A litany of emotions jumbled in her head,
but she’d decide how to feel after the
shock of it all wore off.

“Ok
.
I’ll be there as soon as I can
.
Deacon doesn’t have any real family, so I guess I’ll have to do for now.” Extracting herself from the warm cocoon of Evan’s body, sh
e padded to the bathroom. Evan had done as he always did and
washed her after they’d scened, but she needed a shower to
wake her up more than anything else. A jarring jolt of cold water streaming from the massaging shower head was enough to wake her up, clearing the fog of sleep and shock from her mind.

Her long, chocolate tresses pulled back in a ponytail, she grabbed a set of yoga pants and a tank from the stash of spares she kept at the club then pulled on her tennis shoes.
She didn’t bother with a bra or panties, because
hopefully, she could sign the papers and
be right back here in Evan’s arms
before the sun finished coming up. Her last exchange with her ex, Deacon,
hadn’t gone so well
; she had no desire to see him for any reason. The
loneliness he’d left
in his wake had been replaced by the love she had for Evan along with the overwhelming love he had for her. The last thing she needed in her life was someone who thought the things about her that Evan nurtured and loved so much made her a
n undesirable freak, but she couldn’t
just leave him in the hospital.
If he’d given her name,
it meant he was really bad off. The
conscience in her wouldn’t let her turn her back on him, no matter what he’d done to her
.

Crawling back up into the bed, she kissed a sleeping Evan, letting him know where she was going and
that she’d be back as soon as possible
.

“Don’t let the bed get cold, please
.
I’ll be back before you even have a chance to miss me.” She grabbed her track jacket from the closet as well
as her car keys then
jogged up the underground club’s staircase to the
lingerie shop upstairs. Keying in the alarm code, she let herself out onto the street, more than a little taken aback by the sting of an icy wind. She hugged her jacket close quickly climbing into her little black BMW, thankful for the heated seats, and even more thankful that there were no cops on the street between the club and the hospital. She wanted to get in, get out; get back to
Evan’s bed
and capable hands as quickly as possible. Speed limits were more like recommendations for people who
didn’t
know how to handle the horses under their hoods anyway.

*****

Deacon jerked his arm against the restraints cuffing him to the hospital bed railing. His usually perfectly coiffed, deep blonde hair was a mussed and
tangled mess that looked like it hadn’t been washed or combed
in days. A thin, glassy sheen coated his dark brown eyes; every vein in his body seemed to stand out from his pale skin. He barely looked like himself, but his attitude was ever present. Cocky self-importance and intolerance for being manhandled by male nurses created the impetus for the myriad of profanities that spilled from his room out into the hallway. Despite his pounding head, he roared at everyone who came near him, spitting vile insults at the officers standing just outside the door. His stomach had already been pumped, so his lips were tinted a deep purple by the charcoal. The IVs in his arms helping to treat his alcohol poisoning were stretched tight as he thrashed and tried to break free of the restraints. The alcohol still working its way out of his system made him more ornery than usual; the crash that was coming was going to be a killer.

“Under arrest? What do you mean, under arrest?! It’s not illegal for
a grown ass man to drown his sorrows in a bottle of bourbon, you dick heads!
I wasn’t hurting anybody! Under arrest?! Arrest this!” His hips
thrust up, and he humped the air as he slung his last statement at the officers. Their rolling eyes did nothing to stem his ire. He continued to be a royal pain in the ass to everyone around him.

He couldn’t remember much, thanks to his drunken stupor,
and he preferred it that way.
He’d proposed to the money, er, girl
, he thought he wanted to spend the rest of his life with and
she’d not only turned him down, she’d done it at his birthday party in front of all of their friends
. Then to add a giant kick in the balls to that little insult, she ran off with his best friend of twenty years.
A simple “no thank you” would have suffice
d.
He’d given the officer Rissa’s name to call, but he wouldn’t be surprised if she left him
there to rot. Honestly, h
e wouldn’t blame her if she did
.
He’d been a dick to her
; he knew it, and now look where he was. Utterly alone, homeless, and quickly gaining a reputation as a shiftless, drunken hobo with a police record to match. Since Mystie had run off with his best friend, he was living out of his car, showering in the sink at work. For such an independently wealthy
woman, she’d had no shame about emptying his bank account
, draining him dry. Finally quieting down as the last vestiges of his drunken rage began to subside, he resigned
himself to the fact that Rissa wasn’t going to come fo
r him. I
n her shoes, he wouldn’t either
. When he heard her voice from just outside the door tangled amongst
the gruffer voices of the officers who’d
brought him in, he just rolled over, his back to the door. How could he face her now after everything he
’d done to her?

*****

“You must be Ms
. Trent.
I’m
Officer Dalton, and this is Officer Marino. We found Mr. Cain in an alleyway off First surrounded by empty liquor bottles. He was groping everything in a skirt that passed by.
They’ve
pumped his
stomach, but it doesn’t look like he’s eaten in a while
. Pretty sure he was trying to drink himself into oblivion, because his blood alcohol content was high enough that we brought him in to be treated for alcohol poisoning.
You can see him, you’ll need
to sign the hospital paperwork, but
when he’s released, we’ll have to take him down to the station
.
He’ll be
bo
oked in, but it’s a misdemeanor
, so he can post bond and you can take him home;
he’ll just have to come back to court on the scheduled date.” The
officer was nice enough, although he sounded more like he pitied the pathetic drunk than anything else.

“Thank you, sir
.
I’ll talk to him
,
find out what’s going on, then I’ll
sign the papers and you can take him.
I’m not taking him home
, though.
I’
ll
give you his girlfriend’s number
. Y
ou can call her to take him home.”
Stepping past the officers and into the room behind them, she stopped dead in her tracks a moment before slowly approaching the side of the bed. He was chained like some animal;
she almost didn’t recognize him
. He was usually so well put together with perfectly-styled golden hair and perfectly-pressed designer clothing, but this trembling, filthy, pitiful excuse for a man was someone completely different.

“Deacon? What the hell did you get yourself into? Why did you call
me? I left the warmth of a very good man to come down here, and I gotta
say I’m not all that impressed
.
Where’s your Barbie at anyway? She should
be here, not me.
” Her tone was more accusatory than she’d in
tended, but what the hell was she supposed to do?
He wasn’t her responsibility
anymore, and
she wasn’
t his. That had been his choice.

“I’m sorry, Riss
.
I didn’t think you’d actually come
. And
she’s gone.” At first his voice had been pathetic, almost begging, but then when
she mentioned his girlfriend, his eye brows snapped together as he turned over to face Rissa. His teeth clenched together, his voice was barely more civilized than that of a rabid wolf.
Clearly, she’d stepped on a nerve,
yet she
was tempted to stomp all over it, because let’s face it, he had it coming
. However,
she couldn’t do that
.
Revenge wasn’t really in her
repertoire;
hurting him more wouldn’t help anybody
.

“What do you mean, she’s gone? Like gone to get a cup of coffee,
shagging the doc on his break, what kind of gone? Last I heard you were
picking out engagement rings with pink diamonds, how can she be gone?”
Rissa stood back from the bed, her arms crossed over her chest, putting a good distance between them
—
not only because he smelled like an ash tray that someone pissed in and then dunked in bourbon, but also because if she got too
close to him, she’d actually feel sorry for him
.