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dissuade him, they would only make him more determined.
    Kirk sat very still on the couch. He had not yet moved from the position he'd spanked her in. His legs were spread shoulder width apart and the arm that had delivered the stinging blows to her backside now  rested by his side. He was looking at her with a cool, clear gaze, a slight smile glimmering on his lips as he waited for her to react.
    She had a choice. She could throw the tantrum that was rising steadily in her breast, fueled by a sense of outrage and unfairness. She could apologize for her behavior. Or she could pretend that what had happened had in fact not happened. That was the path she chose. Oh he was strong and virile and he could thrash her if he chose, but she did not have to acknowledge it. Her hand moved away from her stinging bottom as she composed herself and moved to sit gingerly in the soft arm chair furtherest away from him. She did not speak, she did not trust her voice to be as steady as she wished it to be.
    A rumbling sound started from the couch. He was laughing. He was laughing at her. “Oh Evelyn, you are a prize,” he said.
    “You are a filthy criminal,” she bit out in harsh response. His laughter died on his lips. So the truth hurt him, did it? Kirk obviously liked to think of himself as one of the good guys, but the good guys did not come down into dark basements and threaten helpless old men and take their daughters as deposits on bad debts. She made no effort to hide the derision on her normally sweet face, but when he stood up swiftly she was forced to choke down a cry of fear.
    “Yes Evelyn, yes I am,” he purred, stooping next to her. “So be careful what you say, pretty one.” Menace rolled off him and she could no longer hide her fear as she recoiled into the depths of the chair.  The look in his eyes was entirely cold. Gone was the amusement at her reaction to being spanked, and gone too was the anger that had proceeded the spanking. There was nothing there now, nothing at all. A  mercury cold shiver trickled down her spine as she realized that Kirk, if that was his name, was one of those men capable of anything, anything at all. She was not the only one who had been playing a fine game of pretend. His smiles and his friendly glances had been but a facade. She was now seeing his true nature, and his true nature was a void of terrible possibility.
    Just when she thought she might scream from fear, he winked and his expression was transformed. He looked just like a normal man again, an everyday man. The chill did not leave her bones as he stood up and walked into the kitchen.
    “Are you hungry yet, little one?” His deep timbre rolled from the other room. A perfectly ordinary question from a singular man unlike any she'd ever known before.
    She was hungry. She was starving in fact. “A little,” she admitted in a voice that trembled. “Sir,” she added as an afterthought. She wanted to appease him desperately, she had the certain sense that being on his bad side would not be pleasant and she'd felt herself slipping to that dark place when he'd looked at her with those cold eyes. She did not want to go back there. The Russians with their harsh words and harsher hands had not put that primal fear in her nearly as effectively as he had done with one look.
    Eve heard him moving about in the kitchen making comforting domestic sounds. She kicked her shoes off and drew her knees up to her chin, wrapping her arms around them as she took refuge in the fetal position. It had been a long day, a long day of bad decisions and worse consequences. If only she'd ignored the call this morning. If only she'd resisted the lure of easy money. She should have known her father would never help her.
    She was vulnerable and exposed. Kirk was offering her protection until the end of the week, but what then? Would he simply hand her over to the Russians then? He had certainly agreed to if her father didn't pay. Lost in worry, she began to