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  Logan Callahan fleeced people for a living. He’d been part of an organization of grifters, led by Nell Dubrowski, who stripped marks of everything they owned, leaving them bare and bleeding. But Logan broke free of his past and his addictions. Now, in the profession of forensic accounting, he helps people ferret out exactly the type of con on which Nell Dubrowski fed, yet not colliding with his old demons. Until a call from an investigator dredges up his dark, secret past.

  Kate Malone is everything Nell is not. Young, sensual, and...honest. Kate’s father is the latest mark for Nell, and Logan wants nothing more than to help bring down the woman who represents everything he loathes. Forty-eight hours in a hotel room’s king-size bed with nothing between him and the sensual, adventurous Kate but hot flesh and searing kisses has him vowing to protect her from Nell and her kind. But Logan has never looked good in silver, and he isn’t exactly cut out to play white knight. And revealing his past to Kate might destroy the deepening connection he feels with the woman he hopes will be his future.

  Too many secrets can destroy any relationship, but when Logan finds himself stripped bare and on the wrong end of a loaded gun, he knows that death would be far preferable than to live a life without Kate Malone...

  This story is a work of original fiction. All names, characters, locations, and incidents are products of the author's imagination, or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author.

  This book remains the copyrighted property of the author.

  Copyright 2018 by Adrianna Dane

  Cover Art Designs by T. A. Gallup

  This story was originally released in November 2008 by Amber Quill Press/Amber Heat

  CAUTION: This story contains explicit sexual situations and strong language. You must be over the age of 18 years of age to read this story.

  Strip

  By Adrianna Dane

  Dream Romantic Unlimited, LLC

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Author Bio

  Networking Links

  Chapter One

  Logan walked into the courtroom and took a seat at the back of the room. He knew he shouldn’t be here. If the investigator hadn’t called he might have been able to ignore her presence in town. In this state. Maybe it was curiosity, like stopping at the scene of a car accident, that had him wanting to see her.

  Ten years since he’d last had contact with her. His heart thundered in his chest like a steam engine set to full ahead. Visions blurred and melded together racing to catch up with him. Or to latch onto him and yank him back into the nightmare. As he watched she turned to the dark-haired man sitting next to her, who Logan surmised was her attorney, and studied her profile. Damn, it didn’t seem like she’d aged even a day. But he had. Thirty-seven somehow wasn’t what he’d expected and he felt every bit of those years. Still rudderless, without real purpose. And with no family ties to speak of. The sense of burned-out and used up is what crossed his mind. Probably because he’d tried to pack most of that life into his first twenty-five years. Of course, at seventeen he hadn’t known what he wanted to do with his life. And it hadn’t seemed like anyone really cared what he did. Until he’d met Nell Dubrowski.

  At seventeen Logan had thought he’d wanted the older woman who looked so fantastic in the little red-hot bikini. And that he’d do anything to have her. To be what she wanted. At seventeen it hadn’t matter to him how many lovers she’d had. It only made her more appealing to him. He just wanted to belong somewhere, to someone. It hadn’t mattered that she was probably twenty years older than he was. It had made her all the more desirable to him. It hadn’t even mattered that his own father was one of her lovers. He and his father had been more strangers than anything else since Logan’s mother’s death when Logan was ten.

  My God, what kind of man had Logan been? And why hadn’t his father cared when the woman had finally seduced Logan into her bed, to do her bidding. She was the one who’d shown him the tricks of the trade, taught him how to play a con smooth as you please, drawing him even deeper into her web right after Logan’s father had gone to prison for twenty-five years…for following her orders.

  But darling, delicate Nell had managed to slip through the law’s net once again. Letting one of her men take the fall for her. The orgies, the drugs, the way she bound them all to her, making them do anything she demanded. No step taken without the queen bee’s say so.

  And she loved her games. Even now, he watched her bat her long eyelashes at the man she’d hired to extricate her from another battle where good would never triumph. He saw her lay a pale, jeweled hand on his arm, and give him that vulnerable look that shoved Logan right back into the past.

  Visions of the night of initiation leaked into his mind. They were in the mansion on the hill. As it happened, out of all the properties she’d bilked from her many lovers, it was the only house that remained in her name. It was in the blue and peach decorated front room of Widow’s Lure. How aptly named. There were four men in the room that night. He was surprised he even remembered their names. Lars was her current right-hand man. Then there was Dan, Luke, and Calvin. All of the men were sitting around in their black silk boxers and nothing else. Nell’s current inner circle of felons. Logan scanned the courtroom—none of those men were here. Not a surprise. She changed men more often than she changed her designer dresses.

  Logan had been young and nervous as hell that night. When he walked in, he saw the mirrors and fine white powder strewn across the table. The bottles of champagne, the cut glass bowl filled with condom packets. Tubes of lube and bottles of pills. Lars had risen from the couch and staggered toward where Nell sat on her red velvet throne, carrying a small tray. Nell was draped across the chair, presiding over the room, dressed in a lemon silk negligee and robe that left little to the imagination. Lars knelt and offered the tray to Nell. She’d delicately inhaled a slender white line of powder and then waved him away. Her attention strayed toward the doorway. Logan remembered the smile that slowly spread across her sensuous, full lips. The light in her eyes that drew them all in so easily. It was as though he was the only one in the room. And she made them all feel that way—as though each one of them had that special place in her life. He guessed that’s why they all tolerated each other.

  “Well, come on in birthday boy,” she’d drawled in her sexiest voice. “It’s your party after all.” She’d slid to her feet, and Logan had thought he was going to lose it right then and there because the soft yellow glow of the table lamps behind her turned the outfit she wore totally transparent as she seemed to float across the room toward him.

  He had earned his rite of passage. His father was gone, and as far as Logan was concerned he no longer needed to feel guilty about desiring Nell Dubrowski. His father had told him in no uncertain terms not to contact him in prison. Once again abandoned, making it so easy to turn to Nell and her crew. He knew he was just one of the pack, but that wouldn’t be for long either. One more year of college and he’d show her what he was worth to her organization. Just one more year before he finished his accounting degree and he’d have it all.

  What a fool he’d been. Still with stars in his eyes that night. He had worshiped everything about her. Watching her like a puppy dog as she sauntered toward h
im, snagging up a bottle of champagne along the way. He heard the four men chuckle, making lewd remarks as she made her way toward Logan. Logan slid a glance to the two on the right. Calvin and Luke. Watched as they shucked their shorts and then fell back onto the couch kissing and fondling each other.

  In this house, Nell was the only woman they were permitted to fuck, unless she gave an order otherwise. But, she loved watching her men make love to each other. Logan realized the level of control it gave her to orchestrate even that most intimate part of their lives.

  It was a part of the scene Logan wasn’t really into. But like the others, he wanted the queen herself, and if there were hoops to be jumped through, he knew he’d do it, just like they did. Young and cocky, he’d figured he was smarter than his father was and he could be the man to give this powerful woman exactly what she wanted. God, how stupid could he have been?

  He remembered her hands on him, shoving his shorts down.

  “Step out of them, sugar. You know the rules.” God, yes, he knew them and eagerly complied with them. Her hand slid down his body to wind her long fingers around his cock. “Such a big boy. Come with me now. Twenty-one. You’re a man now. And we’re gonna see if you can take a man’s punishment. And then you get the prize.” She had leaned toward him—the silk of her gown whispered against his naked body, making him harder. Her thumb stroked over the broad tip of his penis. Then she turned and drew him forward into the room.

  “Okay, boys, he’s all yours.”

  As he watched, they cleaned off the sturdy coffee table. Larson looked at him, bowed and swept out an arm. “Your table awaits, young lord. The queen has spoken.”

  Logan had known what was expected. He’d hated that part, but there was no way into the inner sanctum of the organization, nor into Nell’s bed, unless he did it. He could almost taste the money, the sex, and the power. He would accomplish what his father had failed to do. Satisfy the queen bee.

  Nell led him over to the table and then released him with a small pat on his dick. He’d crawled onto the mirrored surface of the table, balancing on his hands and knees. One of the other men separated Logan’s thighs until his knees were practically touching the edges of the table.

  Logan had looked down and seen his reflection. It seemed surreal, as though it was someone else who looked back. The rigid prick swinging between his outstretched legs. The reflection of the sparkling chandelier above his head. The bits of white powder that still clung to the mirrored surface.

  He had looked up as Nell walked around to the front of the table and held out a long flat wooden paddle. She held it in front of his face. His name had been burned into the wood.

  “See, sugar. Just for you. When this is over, it’ll hang right next to the other boys’. That’s what you want isn’t it, sugar? To be part of the family?”

  He’d nodded, already feeling the pain that was going to slice through his body. He could still feel it after all these years. Nell liked to administer pain—and to receive pleasure. Or rather she liked to watch it inflicted. Nell was all about pleasure. She never would get her hands dirty. But she liked her men softened before she played. She liked them at her feet.

  “Talk to me, Logan.” Her voice had turned a notch harder, reminding him of the cutting facets of the five-carat diamond on her left hand—a gift from a man long gone. “Tell me that you want this. Your rite of passage.”

  He’d looked at her. “Yes, Nell, I want it. I want to be part of the family.”

  She held the paddle closer. “Kiss it, Logan. Show me that you mean it.”

  He’d done as she asked and tried to liken it to a fraternity initiation. That was the only way he could have gotten through it. Joining a brotherhood. The rite of initiation into the powerful Nell Dubrowski’s multi-million-dollar family of grifters. He leaned forward and touched his lips to the hard wood.

  Lars held up the tray with cocaine and Logan inhaled a line. It was the first, but it wouldn’t be the last. It had been surprisingly potent. Dan pushed his shoulders down to the table, and his ass stayed high in the air. Calvin fastened a black silk scarf over his eyes.

  He had tried to prepare for the first strike, but it had been more than he’d anticipated. Different than he expected. Which of them was first he didn’t know. But all four of them would get their shot. Each one offering twenty-one strokes with the paddle, with a small intermission between. More coke for Logan, a glass of champagne, and then it would begin again. The pain drove through him again and again and again. Because of the coke and the champagne, there was a lot he didn’t remember about that night. Except for the flood of sensations that ran rampant through him, colors mingling and twining through him. There was also a lot he never wanted to remember. But somehow he’d passed the test and become an integral part of Nell’s crew—his family.

  It wasn’t until nine years later that he finally walked out the door, turning his back on everything she represented. Again it was a mirror that did it for him. One moment of terrified lucidity. It had taken another five years for him to kick the addictions she’d instilled in him. He still fought them, every day. And so far he’d won. But he was empty—of drugs, of emotion, of anything that represented human warmth and connection. Thanks to Nell Dubrowski.

  He looked to the other side of the room and saw the top of another blond head. But it was like looking at night and day with the contrast between the two women. She must be Kate Malone. Investigator Alarna had mentioned that Marcus Malone had a daughter and she was the one fighting Nell.

  He didn’t know what he expected, but it hadn’t been the quiet beauty he saw sitting there, an intense expression on her face as she spoke with her lawyer. Logan was intrigued as he saw her worry her full lower lip. A hand rose to push at her long, blond hair. Her shoulders straightened as she glared past the lawyer toward the other table. Nell seemed oblivious. She had turned around to talk to two men who sat behind her.

  No one was a match for Nell Dubrowski. He could have told the pretty blond that she was wasting her time. It was odd how something nagged at him when he saw the young woman. Emotion that hadn’t been a part of him for a lot of years. Actually, what he was feeling right now had never been something he felt before. An odd protectiveness he didn’t understand. What the fuck was he doing?

  He didn’t want to be in this courtroom. Seeing Nell brought it all back too vividly. There was nothing left of the pleasure, nothing of the sexual frenzy, the power high. All he saw now was a monster who used and then destroyed everyone who came in contact with her. And Kate Malone scared the hell out of him.

  Suddenly, he rose from the seat and silently left the courtroom, heading for the nearest men’s room. His stomach roiled like a sea surging in the aftermath of a storm. He headed for the sink and wet a paper towel and then looked straight at the man in the mirror. He remembered the last time he’d looked this close. A moment of clarity that saw the vacant-eyed addict he’d once been. One moment of lucidity that had probably saved his life.

  He didn’t want to remember the sexy, vulnerable Kate Malone. One thing he wasn’t was somebody’s knight in shining armor come to save the day. Logan had turned to the field of forensic accounting by an odd quirk of fate. Dominick Alarna had contacted him because he wanted him to go over some paperwork that was found among Marcus Malone’s papers. When Alarna had mentioned Nell’s name, it had felt like the carefully built house of cards that Logan now lived in was finally going to topple.

  But Alarna hadn’t contacted him because he’d figured out his association with Nell. He’d called to ask him to help bring her down. What a joke. He should have turned him down immediately, but something dragged at Logan and instead he’d put him off, winding up here to get a look at her. Curiosity was going to get him killed.

  “You’re a damn fool, Callahan,” he said to the image in the mirror.

  He tossed the paper towel and then combed his hair. Nell Dubrowski was a long time ago and it wouldn’t pay to get caught back up in her web. He
’d changed since then. And he didn’t plan on going back. He’d simply tell Alarna to find someone else.

  His mind was settled as he walked out of the restroom. Until a tiny, blond beauty barreled into him full tilt. Logan again found his world spinning when he looked down into the young woman’s ravaged face.

  As he caught her in his arms, Logan knew he was fucked.

  Chapter Two

  “I’m so sorry.” God, why hadn’t she been looking where she was going? Kate had run right into the poor man. All because of what had happened in the courtroom. The judge had not seen it her way. He’d taken the side of Nell Dubrowski, her father’s widow, and thrown the case out.

  A pair of strong hands steadied her. She smelled an intriguing scent. Quite male, and she couldn’t help looking up at him, for once distracted from thoughts of the barracuda she’d turned her back on in the courtroom. She caught her breath at the vision of masculinity who now held her in his arms. For a moment, anger and panic receded and words failed her.

  “Are you all right?” he asked, without releasing her.

  It was odd how she really didn’t want him to let her go. How she really just wanted to throw herself into his arms. Visions of being lifted into his arms and carried out of this place ran through Kate’s mind. What the hell was the matter with her? A shuddering breath escaped her as she tried to steady herself, to remember where she was. And then Kate attempted to extricate herself from the attractive stranger’s arms.

  “Really, I’m fine and I’m so sorry.” Memories of the scene in the courtroom and Nell’s triumphant expression again flooded her. The image of the men she’d embraced and the way the judge had looked at the woman and frustration and anger swept through Kate. Sorrow threaded through the emotions, knowing the woman had caused her father’s death. It wasn’t fair. The attempt at self-control wasn’t working and Kate felt the embarrassing tears drip down her face. Oh, God, not now. “R-really.”