Tag: dark romance

This was not how he wanted to be spending his Christmas.

Ever since Astor came into his life he had dreamed about the life they could have. It was a life he didn’t deserve and yet one he craved with every fibre of his being.

It had been nearly twelve months since he bought Astor at that auction.

One year.

How could his life change so much in only one year? How could he change so much in only one year?

He had been so close to having everything he wanted. So close. He’d been able to touch it and yet it had all fallen through his fingers.

It had been two months since that night at the party.

Two months since he had held her in his arms as her blood soaked through his clothes, seeping out of her, taking her life along with it.

Two months since he had begged her not to leave him. “You’re going to survive, Astor. I won’t lose you,” the words still rung in his head, little good they had done.

Two months of loneliness was almost more than he could bear.

Keeping one hand on the wheel, Frost picked up the gun on the passenger seat and looked at it. So many fears and questions ran through his head. Was he a coward to contemplate taking his own life if he couldn’t spend it with her? Was he dishonouring her and everything she had done? Was he taking the easy way out?

After two months he was too depressed, too exhausted to figure out the answer to those questions.

Pulling to a stop outside the cabin he had spent his happiest days in, he debated leaving the gun in the car, he didn’t have to do this. It wasn’t too late. He could still choose another path.

Despite his attempts at positivity, Frost brought the gun with him as he fumbled in his pocket for the cabin’s keys. He wished Christmas was over already. Christmastime had never been his favorite time of the year, but he had never dreaded Christmas Day like he did today. Tomorrow morning while the rest of the world celebrated with family and friends he would be alone.

Alone or dead.

Opening the door he dropped the gun when a figure sprung forward.

“Merry Christmas. Well I guess technically its Merry Christmas Eve since its only ten thirty.”

Frost just stared.

This couldn’t be real.

There was no way.

It had to be a trick.

The cabin had been decorated for Christmas, there was a tree, garlands, even mistletoe. And standing before him was the woman he loved more than life itself.

“Astor, I thought they wanted to keep you away from me,” he stared, still staring at her like she was some sort of apparition who might disappear at any second.

“They can’t keep me away from you, no one can. Nothing can. I quit. I quit my job, its done, I told them a couple of hours ago then came straight here to wait for you. Why do you have a gun?” she asked, seemingly noticing it for the first time.

How did he answer that?

Did he tell her that that day, having her bleeding body ripped away from him as paramedics and cops swarmed the building. They had tracked Astor through an implant she hadn’t even known they’d put in, and he was eternally grateful that they had. She had been rushed to the hospital, he had been given a deal, no prison time for his part in the human trafficking ring in exchange for his testimony, and for staying away from Astor. He wouldn’t have done it but he’d been told that if he didn’t agree to stay away then she would lose her job.

He knew what being a cop meant to her so he had agreed.

And hated every day since.

The cops had at least kept him updated on her condition, and recovery from the gunshot wound that she had inflicted herself to take out the man who killed her sister.

But now she was his and her job was no longer an issue.

“I wasn’t sure I could live without you,” he told her, he owed her honesty.

“Well you don’t have to.” She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him. “I missed you, I missed this, I don’t want to ever be away from you again.”

“You won’t be,” he whispered then kissed her again.

Astor was glad that the men had separated her and Frost, she didn’t want him to see this.

She knew how this was going to end.

She had always known how this was going to end.

And she didn’t want Frost to go down with her.

She didn’t want him to see this.

It was dark down here in the basement, and quiet, the sounds of the party going on upstairs didn’t reach down here.

They weren’t alone in the basement, the man who had her by the arm was dragging her down a long hall, past cages and boxes with helpless young girls, abducted, sold, now suffering again. The cop in her wanted to free them, but the sister in her had to finish what she started.

So she did nothing and allowed herself to be dragged down the corridor and into a room. In the middle of the room was a man sitting in a throne.

A throne.

Astor almost rolled her eyes. Who did this guy think he was? Sitting in a basement on a throne waiting for young women to be delivered to him for him to rape and beat and who knew what else he did to them.

The man was dressed all in black and he looked up slowly as she was dragged over to him and shoved onto her knees.

She knew the second he saw her face because his eyes grew wide.

Good.

He recognised her, or at least he thought he did, and he was probably having a heart attack wondering how she was kneeling before him. She and her sister were identical twins, so he was no doubt freaking out thinking she had somehow come back from the dead.

Astor looked at him and smiled. “Miss me?” she whispered, quietly enough so the men standing guard around the room wouldn’t hear her.

“How are you here?” he demanded, jumping to his feet and roughly grabbing her, dragging her upright.

“I’m here for you.”

“You can’t be,” he growled, shaking her violently.

“And yet I am.”

“No,” he backhanded her and she tasted blood. “Who are you?”

“You know who I am,” she goaded, she just needed to push him a little more.

“Who brought you here? They said you came with a man. A man who said he owned you but that you needed better training. Training is what I do, but you know that. This is some sort of trick, isn’t it? Isn’t it?” He shook her again, then his fist connected with the side of her head. “You think you can trick me? What did you think you were going to try to get your revenge? You stupid, pathetic girl. Lets go get your man, show him what happens to people who think they can mess with me.”

He spun her around, crushing her against his chest with an arm pressed against her neck.

This was the moment she had been waiting for.

Her colleagues thought she had pushed so hard for the undercover gig to bring down the human trafficking ring. Frost knew she was here for revenge, what he didn’t know was that the only way she could kill him was this.

Astor reached into her dress and grabbed the small gun that she had hidden under the fake breasts she had put on for the party.

She only had a split second to do this before the man’s bodyguards were on them.

She pressed the fun to her chest and fired.

The bullet passed through her and into the man behind her.

She didn’t know his name but she knew he was and she knew what he had done to her sister, and she was content knowing that even though she was going to die and she would never have the future with Frost that she wanted at least this man would be dead.

As blood drained from her body the world began to go fuzzy.

She dropped to the floor with a jarring thud.

Gunshots filled the air.

Then she was being grabbed, cradled, hands pressed to her wound, someone stroked her hair.

“No, Astor, don’t you dare die on me.”

Frost’s voice.

Frost was here.

She wasn’t sure how, but that was nice. She couldn’t think of a better place to die than in the arms of the man she loved.

“Astor, stay with me. Come on. You can’t live without me, say it, because its true. I can’t live without you. You just think about that before you leave me. Say it,” he ordered. “Say ‘You can’t live without me’.”

She didn’t have enough energy left for so many words, but she summoned what little she did have and whispered, “Love you.”

Frost knew this wasn’t a good idea and yet there wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for Astor, and she wanted this.

“Remember, keep your head down, don’t speak to anyone, don’t make eye contact, and don’t leave my side,” he whispered to Astor as he led her into the secluded country house of the man who had run the same auction he had bought Astor at. It was going to be a long time before he forgave himself for that. If ever.

“I know,” Astor hissed back.

It was now or never.

Inside the house was full, laughing, talking, food, men-and the occasional woman-and their slaves milled about. He didn’t know how they were going to find who they were looking for. The only lead they had was that Astor’s sister may have been given to a man known to work with unruly slaves, beating them into either death or submission.

“Oh My!” a man said coming up to him. “She’s a pretty one.” The man ogled Astor, who did indeed look stunning in her tight fitting, low cut black dress. But the thought of anyone else looking at her, having fantasies about her, was almost enough for him to throw the whole charade away and drag her back to their cabin.

But he didn’t.

“Actually I’m having a little trouble with her,” he said. “She’s not as obedient as I want. That’s why I’m here. I’m hoping to find someone to help me with that. Do you know anyone?”

The man leaned in conspiratorially, “Rumor has it, that there’s a man here, down in the basement, who does just that.”

He felt Astor stiffen beside him and he prayed that she could hold it together. “Thank you,” he nodded to the man. Then he forced out, “Maybe once I get her under control we could do a little swap. Yours is a pretty one too.” He nodded at the blindfolded, gagged young woman standing behind the man with her wrists tied together a string leading from them to the man’s hand.

Leading Astor along, close behind him, he didn’t trust anyone in this house around the woman he loved. He wanted to discuss what was going to happen once they got to the basement, but it was too risky, he was going to have to trust that the plan they had worked out before they got here would work.

Two of the biggest men he had ever seen in his life stopped them at the bottom of the basement stairs.

“I’m here to get some help with this one,” he said jabbing Astor in the shoulder while silently apologising. “I was hoping to get some tips from the expert on training her to behave appropriately.”

The men exchanged glances, then one of them turned and disappeared into a room. The other stood silently, and so did he, growing more anxious by the second. He wanted out of here. He wanted his gorgeous woman naked in their bed at the cabin, the fire crackling, just the two of them, making love . . .

“He’ll see her.”

The voice startled him out of his fantasy and back into the moment. “Thank you,” he said as he stepped forward, bringing Astor with him.

“No,” the men stopped him. “He’ll see her. Not you. You can go back upstairs to the party. He’ll work with her, see if she’s malleable, if she is you can discuss a long term plan with him at the end of the night.”

That wasn’t happening.

He wasn’t leaving Astor alone with that man.

He wasn’t leaving her alone with anyone.

Apparently what he wanted didn’t matter.

One of the men grabbed Astor and dragged her away from him, the other shoved him up the stairs.

The door was slammed and locked with a terrifying air of finality.

“I don’t like this plan.”

Astor glared at Frost, he’d already told her that several times. “Do you have a better idea?”

“Jumping out of a plane without a parachute would be a better idea, jumping into the lion’s cage at the zoo would be a better idea, going into the very depths of Hell would be a better idea,” he raged, stalking around the small cabin.

“You’re being melodramatic,” Astor rebuked.

“Melodramatic?” He rushed her, yanked her off the chair at the table she’d been sitting in and shoved her up against the wall, crushing his mouth to hers and kissing her senseless. “Its not melodramatic to worry about the woman I love walking into the devil’s lair.”

Call her sappy but all she heard was that she was the woman that Frost loved. Consider how they met and what she had to, not even taking into consideration that they were on the run, and she probably should be taking things a little more seriously, but she loved this man, and it touched her heart in a way nothing else ever had when he said he loved her.

“Why are you smiling all goofy at me?”

“Because I love you,” she said, her hands moving to unbutton his shirt.

“Oh, no, no, no, you don’t get to distract me like that, missy.” Frost snapped a hand around her wrists, pinning both of her hands to his chest.

“Missy?” she arched an eyebrow.

“Don’t do this,” he begged. “There has to be a better way.”

“We haven’t come up with one,” she reminded him. “You used all your contacts to get this name, its the closest thing we have. This could be our only chance. He’s going to be at the party. You take me, I pretend to be your slave,” that word almost stuck in her throat, even though that had been the plan all along, to pretend to be someone’s slave she still didn’t like the idea of belonging to another person.

“You can never pull that off. I can’t either,” frost protested.

“We can. We have to.” Whether Frost liked it or not, or how risky this was or not, they had to do this. She had to get justice for her sister. If she didn’t then she would never be able to get closure and move on.

Frost glared at her, but she saw the love in his eyes. He knew how much this meant to her, and he knew that this could be their only chance, and he knew that to have the future together they both wanted they had to do this first.

Then he shoved her down to her knees. “Good morning, class, we have a lot to learn and only four days to learn it.”

Astor shivered, and hoped she knew just what she was about to get them both into.

Frost was pretty sure this was a mistake.

On so many levels.

Right now he was afraid that when Astor woke back up, and when reality set in, she was going to resent him kidnapping her and bringing her.

He sighed.

It was too late to do anything about it so he may as well plough forward and follow through on what he’d started.

With a last glance at the bed where Astor was still fast asleep, he turned back to his laptop. He had at least managed to make some progress trying to track down who had bought and killed Astor’s sister. He didn’t have a plan yet, and he wasn’t letting Astor just rush blindly into this because she was so focused on getting her revenge, but something would come to him. It had to, he had the best motivation in the world, keeping the woman he loved alive.

“Hey.”

He jumped at the voice, then frowned as he turned to find Astor standing behind him. “You shouldn’t be up.”

“I’m feeling better,” she told him, and her eyes did look clearer than they had earlier. “This cabin is really adorable.”

She looked around, and his did too, even though he knew that the cabin looked like. She was right, it was an adorable cabin. It was one main room with a bathroom, there was a kitchenette in one corner, a square table beside it, a large fireplace took up most of one wall, there was a couch in front of it, a bed in the corner on one side of it, and the desk where he was sitting on the other side.

“It belonged to my grandfather. We used to come up here sometimes, just the two of, go fishing, hike, ski, those were fun times,” he said wistfully.

“Thank you for bringing me here, and sharing this place with me,” she rested a hand on his shoulder.

Her touch did what it always did. It overwhelmed him with such intense love for her that the only thing he could do to deal with it was to sweep her off her feet, deposit her on the sofa, and kiss her senseless. He wanted to do more, but she was recovering from a concussion, and he didn’t want to make things worse.

“Don’t stop,” she murmured when he broke the kiss, her hands curling into his hair and trying to bring his mouth back to hers.

“You’re recovering from a concussion,” he reminded her with a laugh.

“Hold me,” she asked, starting to look a little sleepy.

Now, that he could do. Scooping her into his arms he sat down with her on his lap, reaching for a blanket that was folded over the back of the sofa, he tucked it around them. The flames in the fireplace danced about and he could hear a blizzard swirling outside, this was how regular people spent their days. Sitting curled up in front of a fire while a storm raged outside. Only they weren’t normal people, and these circumstances for them being here were about as far from normal as you could get.

And yet they were here.

And they were sitting together, enjoying one another’s company.

“Have you slept at all since we came here?” Astor asked.

“No, but I have been working on finding the men who killed your sister.”

“And I appreciate that. I want to see them pay for what they did, but not at your expense. Lets go to bed, get some sleep, then in the morning we can work on a plan. Together.”

He wanted to argue, tell her that he needed to figure this out for her, she had fallen in love with him and he needed to try to prove to her that that hadn’t been a mistake. But how could he resist going to bed with Astor, even if it was only to sleep?

“Okay,” he agreed. He carried her to the bed, and once they were both lying down, pulled up the covers. Astor immediately snuggled into him, her breath warm against his neck, and she lay close enough that he could feel her heart beating.

Frost had never known it was possible to love someone like he loved Astor.

He’d thought that kind of love was reserved only for fairytales, and he was far from Prince Charming, so how could he ever hope to find his Cinderella?

Yet life had given her to him.

She might be just as twisted and dark as he was, they were the perfect couple, and he loved her deeply and completely. He would make sure that he helped her get what she wanted, and then who knows, maybe they would get their happily ever after.