Page 20 of The Princess Tied

Ruth dusted off her hands then slapped them together. “Done. You can go first.”

As if he needed to approve her, Ruff sniffed at her boots then circled her heels.

He raised himself up on fluffy paws, propping himself on her leg and stretching to sniff higher up Ruth’s pants. She picked him up and deposited him on her shoulder. There was a long second of startled Ruff, eyes staring at the horizon, as if he were thinking, how dare she do this?

Then he pricked to life. Whereupon he settled down, perching there beneath the little roof.

John shook his head. If this was magic, he wasn’t arguing.

He mounted up, seating himself comfortably behind his captive princess, tossed his cloak over her far-too-enticing form, and geed the horse into motion.

True love is like a cake. It does, of course, require constructing.

Rarely is it achieved with one simple ingredient.

John had begun his recipe with bondage and lust, and a little care.

More ingredients were likely coming, or so one might think.

If one believed that Ruth, the dwarf-giant, could predict the future.

She couldn’t, but she was really good at guessing.

After a few yards, John gave in and edged his palm beneath the cloak, where Po’s rear made a minor hill. He ran his thumb over the crease of ass and thigh. Her stillness, then her near imperceptible ass-wriggle made him smile internally. A few strides of Rocky later, a real smile sneaked onto his mouth.

“You okay?”

“Mmpff!”

“Good.” Truth be told, he needed a translator for that.

This was promising.

For the rescue, obviously. His love life was a distant secondary matter.

He held the cloak higher, studying the shadowed contours of her nakedness—hills, yes, also dips, gullies, and dark lustful alleyways. He swallowed.

Not that distant.

CHAPTER SIX

was possibly her weirdest day ever, and she’d had some really unusual ones lately.

Po hung over the horse’s withers, staring at the ground going by a few feet from her eyes, trying not to throw up when the horse strode jerkily and squashed her stomach.

The rope around and under her breasts was chafing, her nipples were digging into saddlecloth, and the rope between her teeth was making her dribble. Drooling was generally considered bad manners. The road had many holes and ups and downs. She made a note of that, for the purpose of distracting herself.

Spend more on road maintenance in the mountains. When she was princess again.

Right now, this day, this second, she certainly was not being very princessy.

What she’d vaguely agreed to with John, while he was manhandling her, was abhorrent.

Those hands of his. She shut her eyes, and not because of vertigo. He somehow bothered her so much with his sexy ways, when he was touching her, feeling her, biting her, that her thought processes became mud.

Then, she felt his hand on her ass again, caressing her there.

Intolerable. Inconceivable even.