Page 2 of King of Temptation

She still had a box in her apartment full of the hand-bound picture books she’d created as a child, as well as a variety of short stories and novellas that had won her awards in school. And she could still remember, in vivid detail, how proud her teachers had been, how they’d all talked about the heights she’d soar to as an author.

More than once she’d wondered what they’d think about the fact that she spent her days writing filthy smut about dangerous mafia men willing to burn the world to the ground for the women they loved.

Imagining their reactions always made her laugh.

But it wasn’t her teachers on her mind as she settled in front of her desk. It wasn’t even her standard latte and pastry from Rev and Roll, the bakery a block from her apartment where she went every morning before she sat down to write. No, the man consuming her thoughts as she broke off a piece of her favored maple-bacon donut was a certain red-haired member of the local Irish mafia who’d recently pinned her to a wall and threatened her life.

Okay, maybe that was being a little dramatic. He’d threatened to “show her how the O’Rourkes really deal with naughty little girls” which sounded more like a threat to her ass than her life. But that kind of thing only happened in books.

Right?

As it always did when she thought of Brody O’Rourke, her pussy clenched painfully, reminding her that it had been far too long since that particular area had received any male attention whatsoever. Which was the only reason she was having this reaction to him, and not because she found his cocky, bossy, snarling ways the least bit attractive.

One heroine in the throes of denial, at your service.

Ugh.

Annoyed with herself for letting her mind wander to him yet again, she opened her manuscript and stared at what she’d written so far. Her heroine for this book was a sassy, smart-mouthed brat who was constantly pushing her bodyguard’s buttons. As the daughter of a powerful mafia boss, she was very confident in her ability to push those buttons as much as she wanted without retribution.

But what if she was wrong?

Marigold stepped aside and Goldie Quinn took her place. The words flowed from her fingertips, faster than she could ever remember writing before.

* * *

[“All right, Maria. Enough.”

There’s something in Leo’s voice that stops me in my tracks. An edge I’ve never heard, sharp enough to slice me open if I’m not careful.

But I am a Luciano. Heiress to one of the largest criminal empires in the world and I will not be cowed by a glorified babysitter.

“What if I don’t think it’s enough, Leonardo?” I snarl, jerking my chin up to glare at him, refusing to be intimidated by the fact he has several inches and at least seventy-five pounds of muscle on me.

Before I can blink, he pulls one of the dining room chairs from the table, sits, and yanks me down over his knee. Panic and need crash into each other, a screeching collision of conflicting reactions that sends me into a tailspin.

“Let go of me! My father will⁠—”

My threat cuts off with a loud wail as Leo’s hand slams into my ass, shocking me with how much it hurts.

And how much I am very much enjoying being hurt by him.

“I’ve had enough of your attitude, Maria,” Leo growls, spanking me again and again, covering my entire backside with stinging swats. “From now on, you are going to be polite and respectful to me and my men, or I will put you over my knee like the child you insist on acting like.”

“Fuck you, Leonardo!”

“If you’re still feeling up to it when we finish here, I may give you what you want. If you’re a good girl and beg for it.”

The smarmy response should piss me off. And it does, though that anger is buried under so many other emotions and sensations I can barely reach it.

Over and over he spanks me, until at last the pain is more than I can take and I slump over his muscular thighs, fighting for every breath. “Please… I’m sorry.”

To my immense relief, the spanking ends there and Leo cups my aching ass, giving it a hard squeeze. “You are going to be polite to the people in your employ?”

“Yes, yes, I promise.”

“And you understand that if you aren’t, you will end up right back here? Only next time with your panties around your ankles while I spank your bare bottom?”

Oh. My. God. I have never been so humiliated in my entire life.