A Perfect Storm (3 page)

“That’s generous of you,” Sophie replied.

Upon reaching a door at the end of the hall, Emma came to a stop. With one twist of the handle, Emma swung the door open wide. “Here is your room. If you do not mind eating with Mr. Cabot later, then that will save me from making a special tray for you.”

As she stepped into the opulent room, Sophie murmured, “That’s not a problem.” She tried not to drool on the expensive rug covering what was surely a freezing stone floor, or to fling herself onto the four-poster bed. After hearing Lucien’s story, though, the richness in these restored rooms now had true meaning for her, and she wondered if the duke had ever shared this very room with his soul mate.
I can’t believe I didn’t ask Lucien their names.

Sophie spun and grinned at Emma. “I have a million questions for your boss and am looking forward to dinner.”

“I wish you luck.” A shadow crossed Emma’s emerald eyes before she turned to leave.

“Wait.” Sophie rushed to the door. “Why luck?”

Emma sucked in her lower lip but then blurted, “A little advice, Miss—I mean, Sophie?”

“Absolutely.” Possibilities of cracking the elusive Lucien Cabot’s code pulled Sophie closer to Emma. “I’ll take anything I can get.”

Emma glanced down the cold, empty hall and then said, “Be mindful of Mr. Cabot turning your questions back around on you. He has…secrets, as anyone does. But I have yet to see him share them with a single person in this world. It’s unlikely he will spill them for a TV news story.” Her gaze then softened along with her voice. “Or for the woman behind the camera.”

Emma’s comment pricked Sophie’s pride and drew a bit of metaphorical blood. “How long have you known Mr. Cabot?”

“I’ve worked for Mr. Cabot in one way or another for over ten years.”

Sophie’s mouth gaped. “Really?”

“I’m older than I look. Listen”—Emma’s peachy skin lost its healthy color—“I’ve probably said too much, but I don’t like to see good people bang their heads against a wall.”

Sophie thought about the imposing man who’d given her a tour of his home—hard in more ways than the physical—and arched a brow. “Mr. Cabot being the wall.”

“He has been called intractable by more than one of his previous employees.” Emma grinned just then, and it instantly brought life back to her features. “A certain one still calls him ‘stubborn bastard’ as much as he calls him Lucien.”

Another big man filled Sophie’s mind. “I’d bet money Magnus calls Mr. Cabot something in that vein every day.” At Emma’s widening stare, Sophie added, “It’s impossible to miss a certain glint in Mr. Larsen’s eyes when he speaks of his employer. I get the feeling Magnus sees himself as Mr. Cabot’s equal and has no fear of losing his job.”

“They have a mutual respect. Magnus is not afraid of Mr. Cabot. Nor am I or Jade or Cale or even Owen, for that matter.” Sophie could only assume Emma rattled off the names of other Ravenstoke employees. “Mr. Cabot does not see us or treat us as inferior, but rather…” She expelled what looked like a held breath and smiled sheepishly. “He keeps himself separate, even when in the same room, if that makes sense.”

“It does.” Sophie breathed a heck of a lot easier. She knew how to handle quietly intense men who sometimes seemed to live behind an impenetrable wall. Her brother had been such for as long as she could remember. “I hear what you’re saying, and I will keep it all in mind when dealing with Mr. Cabot. Thank you.”

Red suddenly filled Emma’s cheeks. “I didn’t mean to scare you.” She rolled her eyes and laughed, clearly at herself. “I have a tendency to ramble, and you’re a new face in the castle, and we don’t get many visitors, and you seem so genuine, and…well…anyway… I’m sure you know very well how to take care of yourself. If you want to rest”—Emma backed into the hallway—“I’ll collect you in time for dinner. Bye.” She took off down the hall at something just shy of a run.

“Bye.” Sophie waved halfheartedly, uncertain about what had just happened.

Had Emma just warned her off Lucien? Not in a “he’s mine, don’t touch him” way but rather just a sympathetic heads-up that Sophie wouldn’t get anywhere with the man, even if she tried.

Sophie might look naive—those same people who thought her physically weak tended to view her as an empty-headed lightweight—but in point of fact, she could see shades of a set-up in Lucien Cabot’s insisting on meeting with her today and today only. As she’d told him, he was not responsible for Mother Nature, but she also knew it was easy enough these days to track an oncoming storm 24-7 on the Internet. He easily could have planned for her to have to spend the night, or even a few days, at Ravenstoke. The question then became, why?

Her personal life didn’t open any avenues to an answer. No boyfriend; hadn’t had a real one since college. And her friends didn’t have much more in the way of money, prestige, or power than she did. Her brother had some money, but not enough for anyone to start some grift game through her, or even to make it worth kidnapping her.

She did have a job in news, though, even if she wasn’t in charge. Lucien must have thought her gullible and wanted her to be a mouthpiece for some story he wanted told—beyond the one of the duke and his male companion.
I can work with that little bit of information, as a start.

Sophie jumped off the bed with renewed energy and bolted for the wardrobe on the other side of the room. If she had any hope of figuring out Lucien Cabot’s plan for her, she actually had to be in his presence. Walking around a drafty castle in damp jeans would not put her at the top of her game. She swung open the double doors and made a face. Two dresses with spaghetti straps hung on the bar—one black and one white.
Not gonna work for me.

Sophie pulled open the first of two drawers. A gray hoodie sweatshirt lay folded neatly there, and two pairs of panties lay directly next to it. A yank on the second drawer revealed nothing but an empty, cavernous space. Sophie almost slammed it shut but at the last second narrowed her stare. “Wait a minute.” She stuck her hand in the deep drawer and measured its depth almost halfway up her forearm.

After closing the second drawer, she pulled the first one open again. When she stuck her hand in this one, the depth barely went past her wrist. A quick check of the fronts showed them to be the same size.
Hmm
. Sophie fingered the perimeter and knocked her knuckles against the base. It held, but something in the hollowness of sound when she tapped had her dropping the hoodie and underwear onto the floor. Sophie smiled, and a nice hum of adrenaline made her sit up on her knees a little bit straighter. At the front of the false base, a small black ribbon stuck out. Sophie hooked her finger into the loop and lifted the board of wood right out of the drawer.

Oh my
. Covering her mouth, Sophie took in the neatly soldiered items, each in its own velvety cubby. Right in her drawer sat a whip, ropes, and over a dozen sex toys.

Chapter Two

Sophie eyed the drawer full of enough sexual paraphernalia to have a small orgy, and she whistled softly.

“Well, well, well, Mr. Cabot,” she murmured as she fingered an enormous black dildo. “This was definitely not part of your official tour.”

After flitting her fingers over a few of the other items, amazed and sometimes confused by the purpose of some of them, Sophie spun and shot to her feet. She ran to the bed and, upon closer examination, found metal O-rings drilled into the back sides of the headboard poles. One hop onto the bed later, she stood at a height where she could see a similar type of ring near the tops of each poster of the bed.

What the heck?

Lucien had specifically mentioned to Magnus that Emma should prepare “the blue room” for Sophie. He could not have merely forgotten this room had all the alterations needed to create a bondage setting.

A shiver went through Sophie, and it had nothing to do with the damp denim still clinging to her legs. Miranda’s immediate concerns of something sinister lurking behind this invitation to Raven Island had Sophie running to the window to check on the storm. Yanking the heavy curtains open showed a powerful downpour battering the glass.
No getting out of here tonight
. A faint orb of yellow wavered through the sheets of water. Sophie could make out what looked like a narrow courtyard below and what had to be another room across the way. The orb had to be a light in that room, glowing through the darkness outside.

Spinning again, this time Sophie ran across the large room and swung open the door.
Steady, girl
. Rather than sprint down the hallway to the next door—the way everything in her being itched to do—she moved with careful steps to the next room and slipped inside. A quick inspection of the wardrobe showed a similar false-bottom drawer with variations of the sex toys and restraints she had found in her assigned room. The bed in this room had slats across the canopy top with hooks and rings clearly able to hold something or someone in place.

In Sophie’s search of this wing of the castle—six large rooms in total—two other bedrooms held versions of what existed in the first two. Closer inspection of the two sitting rooms found more of the same. So Lucien had not given her the one sex-laden room in this castle with the intention of either titillating or possibly intimidating her. She breathed easier—for about a second.

Right then Sophie’s radar sounded. Footsteps coming from the sitting room at the center of the second level reached her ears, and she slinked back into her room. She closed her door on the murmur of a male voice she didn’t recognize calling for Emma.
Whew
. Sophie slumped against the wood.

What had she stumbled upon at Raven Island? Sex parties became the most immediate and obvious answer. No one man with a preference for BDSM-type fun with his mate—or mates, perhaps—needed that many sex toys, restraints, and disciplinary items. There had to be others involved. Maybe extremely wealthy people, or maybe well-known. With a man as rich as she suspected Lucien was, who happened to own a castle on a private island, Sophie figured he probably knew plenty of people who could afford to play in a safe, hidden environment—one free of prying eyes.

The question then became, if he was having sex parties, so what? As long as everyone was of age and consenting, then Sophie never found herself attracted to so-called news stories that dragged people through the mud or tried to out people or reveal secret fetishes. They tended to make her feel a bit dirty and like she needed a shower after watching them.

Still… Just because Sophie had no interest in doing an exposé story on Raven Island—if there even was some juicy little story to tell—didn’t mean she didn’t have a thousand questions and all kinds of curiosity. Not only about Raven Island but the owner as well.
Lucien Cabot
. The man even had a mysterious, sexy name. When Sophie closed her eyes, she could still see his intense amber gaze finding and holding hers repeatedly during their tour. Just as had happened in real time, her skin tingled now, as if he had put his hands on her with just a bit more familiarity than was customary for a man she’d just met.

A very fast Google search earlier had revealed nothing about Lucien. Not entirely shocking. Some people actively protected their privacy. It was difficult to achieve in this day and age but not impossible. Occasionally people owned property or businesses through holding companies to maintain anonymity. Sophie had the feeling if Lucien didn’t want something to happen, it wouldn’t. Conversely, if he did, such as getting Sophie here on a day when she wouldn’t be able to leave, he could make that happen too. So to Sophie’s mind, if she had to spend a night or two at Ravenstoke anyway, she wasn’t averse to doing a little snooping. Not for a story but merely to appease her interest.

After all, Lucien had invited her here.

He would have to live with whatever she discovered.

* * * *

Sophie had sat still in the blue room, waiting for as long as she possibly could. She really had. But her curiosity got the better of her, and waiting till dinner, no matter that it might be less than an hour away, suddenly felt like shackles holding her to the desk chair. She laughed, the sound a little high, betraying her jitters. With memories of the bondage gear tucked in the wardrobe still so vivid in her mind, she understood why her thoughts had jumped so quickly to being restrained.

Taking a breath for calm and now dressed in one of the skimpy dresses from the closet, but with the oversize hoodie sweater covering most of it, Sophie wandered out of her room.

Truthfully, she knew she should have waited for Emma to come get her for dinner, but every time Sophie had closed her eyes to rest, Lucien’s enigmatic, or maybe even arrogant, stare filled her thoughts, calling her to search him out, to discover more about him. She heeded the need, if only to see if her paranoia had gone into overdrive, or if seeing him again would settle her suspicions as well as her interest. As much as she might want to, she would not lie to herself; Lucien Cabot intrigued her. And not just professionally.

Reasoning that since she’d come straight to his study, she wasn’t really violating any etiquette rules, Sophie lifted her hand to knock, but held back from hitting the wood; the door wasn’t firmly closed. She eased it open a few inches, took in the deep shadows filling the space, as well as the man leaning back in his desk chair with his eyes closed.

Such severity ruled the lines of Lucien’s face, even in sleep, that Sophie couldn’t ignore the pull to step closer. His piercing citrine eyes loomed clear in Sophie’s mind as one of the most commanding and intimidating aspects of his persona. But as Sophie got within touching distance, she realized his overall appearance exuded a “don’t get too close” vibration. Sophie automatically rubbed her arms to ward off the chill, yet, rather than back away, she took another step closer. Hard brackets lined his mouth, and his eyes moved under the closed lids as if in the middle of a distressing dream. He had his hands clenched in tight fists against the arms of the chair, and a fine sheen of perspiration covered his skin. His pulse jumped visibly against his neck, and he mumbled something inaudible under his breath.