Taming the Beast.

A Fairy Tales of New York Romance.

Lucy King.

Dedication.

To my fellow Fairy Tale of New Yorkers: Kelly Hunter, Heidi Rice and Amy Andrews brilliant writers and awesome brainstormers. Youre the best.

And to the team at Tule thank you for all your help with this book.

Dear Reader, When the opportunity to write a story based on Beauty and the Beast came up, I jumped at it. Not only is it one of my favorite fairy tales, it was also to be part of a quartet to which the other contributors were the fabulous Kelly Hunter, Heidi Rice and Amy Andrews. Well, how could I say no? I couldnt, and Im very glad I didnt because creating our lovely heroines, their world and the hot men who rock it has been an absolute ball from start to finish.

Meet the Ugly Ducking in Kellys Pursued by the Rogue, Rapunzel in Heidis Tempting the Knight and Cinderella in Amys Seduced by the Baron, but for now, heres my Taming the Beast, and I really hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

x Lucy.

Prologue.

St. John the Apostle Academy, Upstate New York, ten years ago.

Flanked by her stony-faced, scarily silent parents, Mercedes Hernandez sat outside the Mother Superiors office on what had to be the worlds most uncomfortable chair, stared at the floor and prayed that she wasnt about to a) pa.s.s out b) spontaneously combust or c) and this was the absolute worst throw up.

All three were a very distinct possibility. Her stomach was churning like a washing machine on a spin cycle. Her heart was racing so fast it could have won the Kentucky Derby. Her mouth was as dry as the Patagonian Desert, and frankly if she got any hotter shed set alight the wood of the seat beneath her b.u.t.t.

Shifting awkwardly, Mercy swallowed hard, took in a slow, deep breath and surrept.i.tiously plucked at her shirt, but just like everything else shed tried in the last quarter of an hour it didnt make the slightest bit of difference.

"Est quieta," ordered her mother in a low tight voice, and she instantly went still.

On the outside, anyway.

On the inside, though...

Well, there clearly wasnt a lot she could do about that, and really, it wasnt all that much of a surprise, was it?

Firstly, she was in a whole heap of trouble. Only last night Sister Ignatius had caught her and her three best friends rolling around their dormitory, hopelessly drunk on some stolen and frankly rather sub-standard communion wine. The tall stern nun had taken one horrified look at them, crossed herself frantically and then frogmarched them to the school clinic where theyd stayed overnight while the effects of the alcohol wore off.

And they had.

Sort of.

Mercys giggling had definitely gone. As had her at-the-time-hilarious malcoordination. But so too had the thrilling exhilaration of breaking the rules, because in the bright light of mid-morning what had seemed wicked and daring and exciting the night before now just seemed deeply ill-advised.

Especially when she, Faith, Dawn and Zelda were all now sitting outside the Mother Superiors office, waiting to learn their fates. And even more so when, judging by the disapproval and disappointment she could feel radiating off her ultra-conservative and deeply traditional parents whod had to interrupt a rare holiday in Florida to come and deal with this hers wasnt going to be good.

Then, as if that wasnt enough for her nervous system to have to handle, there was him.

Seb Madison.

The guy sitting opposite her a few feet away on the other side of the foyer, long legs stretched out in front of him, muscled arms folded over his broad chest. Zeldas older brother and guardian, and, ever since shed seen a photo of him on Zels phone a year ago, even though shed only actually met him once, the subject of the biggest, longest, deepest crush she Mercy had ever had.

While the nausea turning her stomach was undoubtedly down to apprehension and a hangover, the weakness in her limbs and the general melting of her insides was all down to him because he was absolutely gorgeous.

Deciding to risk it, Mercy glanced up to get a quick fix because it had been at least five minutes since her last, and as her gaze landed on him tingles shot the length of her spine.

Oh, he was so handsome, she thought, stifling a sigh of longing as he tilted his head at something Zel said and scowled. His dark hair was cut so short it was probably shaved but she found she didnt care about the loss of it because it simply drew her attention to the rest of his harshly beautiful face. To the thick black brows and the dark, bottomless, haunted eyes beneath. To the sharp cheekbones, the straight nose and the strong line of his jaw. And then to his mouth, as unsmiling as ever, and the s.e.xy as h.e.l.l scar that scored a one-inch vertical line at the right-hand corner of it.

Wherever Seb was stationed at the moment it had to be somewhere hot and sunny because he had the deepest tan that made his dark eyes look even blacker and the whiteness of the scar even more p.r.o.nounced. And hed obviously left in a hurry because his clothes were crumpled and he looked shattered, as if hed traveled for a year and a day to be here instead of presumably merely overnight.

And, Lord, how she longed to make him feel better. She wanted to smooth away the tiredness and the desolation that seemed so ingrained in him. She wanted to run her hands along his jaw, press herself close and then smother him in kisses until the scowl went away and he looked at her with heat and desire and need. Which so wasnt going to happen but still, she could dream.

And dream she did. All the time. Whether in the middle of some yawnsville todays New Word of the Day, thank you very much lesson, or snuggled beneath her duvet, shed inevitably drift off to a hot, dusty foreign land where she was a damsel in distress in flowing robes, perhaps locked in a tower or perhaps chained helplessly to a wall and Seb, her bronzed knight in shining armor, would battle the odds to come and save her. Having escaped the villains hed then whisk her off to his tent/palace/fortress where, to her throbbing antic.i.p.ation and heady delight, hed ravish her. At length. And expertly.

She had to guess at the actual intricacies of the ravishment, of course, because she was sixteen and stuck in this boy-less convent boarding school and therefore only had a theoretical knowledge of how these things worked mostly gleaned from Zel, whose knowledge seemed to be anything but theoretical but she supposed she guessed pretty well because shed lost count of the times shed woken up all hot and shaky and panting.

If shed had any sense of shame shed have confessed, but try as she might, she couldnt bring herself to be ashamed, and besides, she didnt think all the Hail Marys in the world would atone for her l.u.s.tful thoughts.

Or her guilt, come to think of it, which was just as big a burden to bear because that she felt this way about Seb, and had done helplessly for months now, was not something she was particularly proud of.

For one thing, from what shed heard, hed treated his sister abominably. Mere weeks after their parents had died in a car accident hed packed Zel off to the first of two boarding schools in England, leaving her to fend for herself with barely a backward glance. Understandably, back then she could have done with the support of the brother she worshipped. He, however, had apparently chosen to vanish off the face of the earth, calling her four months after dumping her and her trunks in a brand new dorm to tell her that hed been at a French Foreign Legion training camp, had just signed a five-year contract and would be largely out of contact for the foreseeable future.

From the sounds of things Zel had buried her hurt, bewilderment and pain deep and had then channeled all her energies into being as wild and reckless as possible, which, as shed already been expelled from two schools for her behavior, she clearly did exceptionally well.

Mercy could only listen to the stories, ache for her friend and mentally d.a.m.n Seb Madison to h.e.l.l, while nevertheless fancying him rotten and remaining convinced she could be the one to change him. Yes, he was obviously aloof, distant and about as unfeeling as it was possible to be. And yes, he was by all accounts a terrible brother and a c.r.a.ppy human being and she could totally see why Zel called him The Beast. But even though she and Seb had only met once she thought she understood why he was like that and she knew she could help him because he just needed to be adored and looked after and she was more than up for the job.

If only hed give her the chance...

This time Mercy forgot to stifle the sigh that rose up inside her and when she let it out it seemed oddly loud in the tense silence that was swirling around the foyer.

Mortified, she froze. She held her breath, cast a quick glance round, and then relaxed and let that breath out because, gracias a Dios, no one seemed to have heard it. Dawn, who was sitting all alone lucky thing looking pale, drawn and desperately worried, was staring straight ahead. Faith was muttering something to her big hunky brother, Ty, who for some reason was shooting daggers at Zel. And Zel herself was glaring at the floor, her expression mutinous and determined, even though shed admitted shed woken with the mother of all hangovers and must be feeling dreadful.

Which left Seb. Who maybe, horrors of horrors, had heard because why else would he be looking straight at her when so far he hadnt glanced in her direction once?

Her gaze locked with his and her heart lurched crazily and Mercy realized, a blush storming into her cheeks and her pulse beginning to pound, that there was no maybe about it. He had heard, and he would know, because how she felt about him must be written all over her face. It had been at Christmas, which, after much begging of her parents shed spent at the Madisons huge and gloomy townhouse largely trying and failing to get Seb to notice her, and it had to be now.

So look away, she told herself frantically. Look away. All that she was achieving by continuing to stare at him was her own humiliation. But she couldnt. It was like she was trapped. Like she was drowning. Like she was suffocating...

And then suddenly he snapped his gaze from hers and she could breathe again. Fast and shallow, sure, but at least her lungs were working again.

Until somewhere in the periphery of her awareness she heard the sound of the door to the Mother Superiors office opening, saw Iggy gliding over, and then they seized up all over again, because, oh Lord, the pint-sized Mother Superior might look dainty and fragile but actually she was far from it. When raining down fire and brimstone on whomever had erred she was terrifying, and this morning thered be fire and brimstone like never before because they had definitely erred.

But there was no escape now, thought Mercy, dread pooling in her stomach and wiping out all thoughts of Seb and her unrequited love for him. She, Zel, Dawn and Faith had made their beds the minute theyd started pouring that pilfered communion wine down their throats and now they had to lie in them.

She wasnt coming back. She wasnt coming back.

Beneath the unflinching gaze of the Mother Superior, Mercy looked at first her father and then her mother, shock reeling through her. Shed known it was going to bad so far Dawn had been suspended, Zel expelled but she hadnt known it was going to be this bad.

Her parents were removing her? For ever?

No.

They couldnt.

What would she do without her friends? They were everything to her. Theyd been there for her from the moment shed arrived to begin with, brilliantly clever scholarship student, Dawn, an only child like her, and Faith, whod arrived devastated by the death of her mother and who was only just beginning to get over it. And then, last year when shed turned up in a whirl of color and glamor, wild and rebellious Zelda.

Together, theyd taken her under their wing, standing up to the girls whod bullied her over her almost incomprehensible Argentinian accent, and then spending hours helping her with her English until it was flawless. They were the sisters she didnt have. Her best friends. And now shed never see them again. Shed never see Seb again. Her life was over. Oh, this was the worst thing ever.

"You cant do this to me," she said, her voice shaking horribly.

"Yes, we can," said her father in a tone that brooked no argument.

"But why?"

"You grew up on a vineyard," said her mother. "You took your first sip of wine at the age of two. You know to treat it with respect. Not only that, you begged to be sent away and after a lot of consideration, despite our reservations, we thought it would be good for you. We trusted you. And how do you repay us? By stealing some wine communion wine at that and abusing both it and our trust in you."

Her mother raised her eyebrows as if in expectation, but if she thought Mercy was going to reveal whod stolen the wine she could think again. All four girls were responsible it wasnt as if any one of them had protested when the idea had been mooted and theyd made a pact never to tell. And anyway, it wasnt like it had been consecrated communion wine. So the Mother Superior could stare all she liked and her parents could raise as many eyebrows as they liked; Mercy wouldnt breathe a word.

"What will happen to me now?" she said instead, hating that she sounded so weak, so pathetic.

"Youll finish your studies back home in Mendoza and then start working on the vineyard," said her father. "Youll learn your heritage. Learn to value it. Until you do."

In the taut crackling silence Mercy felt herself begin to tremble inside as the enormity of what was happening hit her. She wasnt just being ripped from her friends, with whom she was very much going to try and keep in touch; she was effectively being sent to prison. Once they got her home her parents would never let her out again. Theyd barely take their eyes off her. It would be awful.

She cast a quick beseeching, desperate glance at the Mother Superior but there was no sympathy in that quarter, and it was then that she realized with a sinking heart that she couldnt fight this. She was sixteen. A minor. She didnt have the option of telling them all to get lost. She had to obey. She had to leave. It was done.

Chapter One.

New York City, Upper East Side, ten years later.

Right. Enough was enough.

Standing at the door to the apartment that occupied much of the top floor of the Madisons townhouse, Mercy pulled her shoulders back and blew out a long, steady breath.

She could do this.

She had to do this.

Or she had to at least try.

By all accounts Seb Madison hadnt changed one bit in the last five years, let alone the last thirteen, but the anger and frustration and hurt she was simmering with on Zeldas behalf meant that she couldnt not. She really couldnt. Not when it sounded as if hed plumbed new depths of contemptibility earlier.

Ten minutes ago she and her friends, Dawn and Faith, had arrived at what Zel called the Madison Mausoleum where shed been living in a self-contained apartment on the second floor for a few months now. Theyd come to offer Zel their support, because since the crack of dawn this morning the paparazzi had been beseiging her over a story that wasnt even true.

Mercy, Dawn and Faith had come laden with chocolate, sympathy and a flask filled with virgin mojito. However, theyd been there barely five minutes before details of the horrible confrontation Zel had had with her brother had spilled out.

Apparently, fed up with his emotional neglect of her, shed challenged him on his lousy behavior towards her over the years and had then followed up with a few home truths, to which hed responded with typical frostiness and stick-your-head-in-the-sand denial.

Zel was in pieces, clearly devastated that her brother still didnt want to have anything to do with her, and that had been that as far as Mercy was concerned. Her friend had overcome so many demons to get where she was, but her shattered relationship with her brother was still one of them, and it killed Mercy to see her like this. Especially when it wasnt Zels fault.

So if there was anything she Mercy could do to fix things, shed do it, which was why she was here, at Sebs door on a mild September Friday evening, burning with a sort of righteous anger and the need to put things right.

One last shot, she told herself, feeling adrenalin begin to flow through her veins as she knocked twice and bellowed, "Seb? Are you in there? Open up." One last shot.

For Zelda.

Not for herself.

For Zelda.

As long as she remembered that shed be fine. And she would remember that because this time, unlike the last time shed tried to make Seb see what was happening to his sister, she was not going to let him distract her. This evening, shed stay strong, say her long overdue piece, and if she was convincing enough, firm enough, she might even achieve the impossible and actually get through to him. She might make him realize what a s.h.i.t he was to humanity in general, what a cold, callous cabrn hed been and was still being to Zelda in particular, and persuade him to make amends before it was too late.

And, yes, pigs might fly, but they hadnt taken off yet, so, as the thud of approaching footsteps reached her ears, Mercy pulled herself together and rallied her thoughts.

Focus, she instructed herself, her pulse picking up and her head buzzing with a sudden flurry of unbidden and unwelcome memories. Do not think about the last time you saw him, the last time you were here. Do not remember the scalding heat of his touch, the dark intensity of his eyes, the feel of his body beneath your hands. Or the spectacular all-night-long s.e.x.

That is not what this is about.

If you have to, remember instead that he took advantage of your pathetic teenage crush on him and used that spectacular all-night-long s.e.x as a weapon to avoid a discussion he did not want to have.

Remember that the following morning you woke up alone, riddled with guilt and self-disgust, and then, burning with mortification and remorse, had to creep out of the house making sure you werent seen.

Most of all, though, focus on the misery hes inflicted on your best friend, because thats why youre here.

The steps stopped and Mercy set her jaw. The handle turned and she straightened her spine. So when the door swung open she was more than braced for the sight of him, standing there and filling the s.p.a.ce, tall, lean and still so darkly, staggeringly handsome hed rob her of her wits again if she let him.