"Don't do this, Maninder."

Will, was straining up against his bonds, those eyes locked on Maninder, now.

"Don't hurt her."

"I was always there for you," said Maninder, stepping further into the room, towards us. "I have stood by you, protected you. Protected the family."

"You can still do that. There's always a place for you."

"You see?" Maninder said to me. "He will say whatever it is that he thinks I want to hear. It is meaningless. These are not words that can be trusted."

"So you protected them when Sally Fielding came back onto the scene?" I said. "Is that what happened?" As I spoke I shuffled backwards to the edge of the bed and then stood and turned to face Maninder. So much more dignified than if I'd remained kneeling over Will's naked body, presenting my nearly bare a.s.s to our intruder. "Just like you protected them before? Whenever they were threatened?"

He nodded. "That is what I do," he said. "I have been with the family for more than ten years. I come from a poor immigrant family. My uneducated parents had expected streets paved with gold but only found bricks through windows and dog s.h.i.t through the letterbox. The family saw something of merit in me and took me in, and so I have repaid them by protecting them, in whatever way has been necessary."

"You were always a faithful servant," said Will. "A member of the family."

"Those words again," said Maninder. "Those twisting snakes, ever eager to please. Really, they are wasted. Do you not understand? I have not spent ten years of my life, clawing my way out of poverty, just to throw it all away. I have a position of trust and respect. I am sorry. I really am."

And with that, he took another step forward and reached for the leather belt around his chinos.

"Don't do it!"

Will's body arched and he heaved at his restraints, but the cuffs were strong and the bed-frame solid.

I backed away as Maninder came around the bed towards me.

"It is a power thing, I know," he said. "The act will be barely s.e.xual at all."

The tone of Maninder's voice was almost conversational, as he unthreaded that belt from his pants.

"It is about possession, ownership. It is about submission. I will have you, and he will watch, and I will own you both."

He dropped the belt and started to undo his flies.

My back was against the wall now, my only escape the balcony, but that was no escape I could survive.

"You touch her and you will live to regret it," hissed Will, still twisting and heaving. "You hear me? You hear me?"

I took a deep, steadying breath, and somehow found a moment of inner stillness.

Train hard, fight easy.

He was close now.

I'd had to let him come round the bed towards me. He'd dropped his pants, and I could see that he was hard, his d.i.c.k stretching at his briefs.

That moment of stillness, a breath held deep, a calmness in my head.

And then a blur of motion as I raised my right knee in front of me, my foot and shin hanging loose. Then that explosion, my leg straightening, whipping out like a striking snake, all my strength behind it as the flat of my foot made high contact around the shoulder, the neck.

My shoes. My gorgeous Jimmy Choo stilettos, the spike lodging wetly, so that when I tried to retract my leg quickly, before Maninder had a chance to grapple it and pull me off balance, that stiletto heel stuck, and I staggered, stretching painfully.

I stumbled, and my leg came down, leaving the shoe in place.

Catching myself, bent over, my hands on my knees, I peered up.

Maninder had a startled look on his face, one hand raised to his neck, the stiletto still impaled and then, like a tree toppling, the momentum of my kick took him backwards and he staggered, stepped back, caught his foot on the threshold and then he hit the balcony railing and kept going.

His body pivoted at the waist, his feet flying up, and then he was over, arms flailing as he fell.

"It's okay," said Will, his voice confident, strong, even as he lay there naked and shriveled and still locked to his bed. "Sit down. Catch your breath. Okay? Just sit for a minute."

How was it that he was the one in control when he was locked up like that?

I kicked off my one remaining shoe and sat on the edge of the bed, hugging myself, realizing that I was trembling uncontrollably.

"I... I killed him."

"You defended yourself," he said. "You did what you had to do. It's okay, Trudy. It's all okay. That call I made earlier: I have people here who will clear up..."

He didn't need to elaborate. I thought I was going to be sick, and I couldn't get that d.a.m.ned shaking under control.

I turned to him then, finally able to look.

"It's okay," he repeated, and those eyes were no longer those of a predator, but of a protector, a lover, an inspiration. "It really is okay."

The shaking. I wasn't scared. Not any more. I was in shock, perhaps. My veins coursing with adrenalin, my head buzzing.

"You think?" I finally said.

He nodded.

"It will, Trudy. It really will."

Those eyes.

A lover's dark eyes.

He had relaxed, slumping back against his bonds.

I moved around, so that I was looking up the length of his body, finding his eyes, then, slowly, sensuously, working back down again.

Adrenalin rush. The fight or flight response.

He was soft, shriveled, withdrawn, his b.a.l.l.s retraced, pulled up tight in nature's attempt to protect its valuables.

As I watched, he started to fill out once more. His s.c.r.o.t.u.m slowly lost its tightness, his b.a.l.l.s dropping forward in their loosening sac. His c.o.c.k plumped out, started to grow, flopping sideways against one thigh, and then creeping upwards as it grew.

I leaned forward, my hair trailing down, and then, just as his hard shaft reached its full length and came to lie hard against his belly I dropped my head, found the base of that shaft again, sandwiched it between my lips and drew myself up along his length until my tongue found that swollen head.

One hand around his shaft, I raised my head. "You like it like this?" I asked. "You like a bit of excitement?"

And then I plunged my head down, sharp and fast, taking him deep, my mouth tight around him.

It was quick and it was intense, that adrenalin thing, that fight or flight s.e.x.

Bobbing my head up and down, fast and hungry for his climax, he was close almost as soon as I took him in my mouth. The explosion of juices in my throat was sudden, hard and I had to swallow repeatedly, as he pressed up against me, starting to go soft in my mouth so that as I sucked I took more and more of him inside and then his entire length was in my mouth, and his body sagged.

I wasn't done yet. He might be a man who could get whatever he wanted, but now I knew what I wanted, too.

I pulled back and he slipped out between my lips.

I paused until those dark eyes found mine again, and then I moved up against him, lying flat against his body, my b.r.e.a.s.t.s crushed against his hard ribs, my thighs between his, that now-soft bulge pressing against my belly.

He craned his head down and I kissed him, his juices on my lips as his tongue gently probed between my teeth, found my tongue, pressed and slid and danced in my mouth, and then I drew up one leg, pa.s.sed it over his, and then the other until I was straddling him, that bulge now against my own wet mound, separated from me only by the thin satin of my thong.

I started to press, started to arch my back, to roll my hips, to press my mound against that bulge.

Impatient, I reached down and pulled his shaft up against his belly again, so I could grind against its length, each slight movement sending stabs of pleasure coursing through my body.

And a pressure built, deep in my abdomen.

A tightness.

A heat.

A heat that blossomed and expanded and washed over my senses as my entire body heaved in climax.

It was quick and it was intense, that adrenalin s.e.x.

It was urgent and animal.

And I'd never known anything like it.

Later. Much later. I'd kept him locked to that bed all night.

They call it the Stockholm Syndrome. When a kidnap victim becomes so attached to his captors that he adopts their mindset and becomes one of them.

But Willem Bentinck-Stanley was no kidnap victim.

He was here by choice. He was here of his own free will.

He was a successful globe-trotting man, accustomed to the corridors of power. He was strong. Oh, he was strong! He was not the brainwashed victim of some syndrome or other.

And so, he lay there, his body no doubt sore and aching, but he did not protest, he did not fight, as, outside that penthouse bedroom, morning broke over the city.

He was here by choice.

"Do you need to stop? Do you need a break? Just say the word, and I'll unlock you."

"Make love to me," he said, meeting my look with those predator eyes. "Now. I'm not done with you yet."

The Author.

Writing under other names, PJ Adams is a successful novelist, with several novels published by major publishing houses and optioned for movies. As PJ Adams, she writes in the genre closest to her heart, erotic romance love stories with that added heat, including the international bestsellers Winner Takes All and Black Widow. Working as Polly J Adams, she writes best-selling erotica, relationship stories crammed full of explicit s.e.x. Among Polly's most popular stories are the Girls' Club series, and Wings of Desire, the story of a young woman's relationship with the wealthy owner of a New England s.e.x club.

You can find out more about Polly and her writing on her website, on http://www.facebook.com/pollyjadamswriter and on Twitter as @PollyJAdams.

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www.pollyjadams.com/about.php.

Still Waters.

By Joanna Blake.

1.

Janet stared at her shoes while her father droned on and on about responsibility. She did her best to tune him out completely. Until her mother took over the lecture, making sure Janet knew how humiliated she was to have a daughter like her. Then Janet tuned her out too. It was better this way. Just let them have their say and she could get on with her life.

Whatever that was going to turn out to be.

She bit her tongue to keep from talking back. They just didn't get her. They never had, and she doubted they ever would. Her parents were extremely well off and belonged to every club in town. They had the nicest house, the nicest cars, and until recently, the nicest little goody two shoes for a daughter.

She almost laughed but she didn't want to get them going again. She had been a goody two shoes. Until about a year ago. Then BAM. Not so much.