Freedom, Colorado 1

  Freedom to Submit

  Smart, curvy, surveillance expert Danisa Milan captures a killer’s crime on video. When he threatens her life, her high school dream man, Sheriff Brady Braxson, insists she move in with him and his Dom rancher roommate, Lucas Holt. Maybe it’s the danger she’s in, but her desire explodes being around them, and she loses her heart to both. But are they only acting like they want her because she’s in their care, or do they want her to be their submissive for life?

  Brady and Lucas find Dani perfect in every way, but they don’t want to overwhelm the ménage virgin. What can they do to convince her to be theirs forever?

  When the killer is found dead, everyone thinks the danger is over. Then Danisa finds evidence someone else is behind the murder, and their lives tailspin. Can the men reach her in time before she’s killed, too?

  Genre: BDSM, Contemporary, Ménage a Trois/Quatre

  Length: 53,916 words

  FREEDOM TO SUBMIT

  Freedom, Colorado 1

  Melody Snow Monroe

  MENAGE EVERLASTING

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  ABOUT THE E-BOOK YOU HAVE PURCHASED: Your non-refundable purchase of this e-book allows you to only ONE LEGAL copy for your own personal reading on your own personal computer or device. You do not have resell or distribution rights without the prior written permission of both the publisher and the copyright owner of this book. This book cannot be copied in any format, sold, or otherwise transferred from your computer to another through upload to a file sharing peer to peer program, for free or for a fee, or as a prize in any contest. Such action is illegal and in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law. Distribution of this e-book, in whole or in part, online, offline, in print or in any way or any other method currently known or yet to be invented, is forbidden. If you do not want this book anymore, you must delete it from your computer.

  WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  If you find a Siren-BookStrand e-book being sold or shared illegally, please let us know at

  legal@sirenbookstrand.com

  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  IMPRINT: Ménage Everlasting

  FREEDOM TO SUBMIT

  Copyright © 2013 by Melody Snow Monroe

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-62242-987-5

  First E-book Publication: June 2013

  Cover design by Harris Channing

  All art and logo copyright © 2013 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PUBLISHER

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  Letter to Readers

  Dear Readers,

  If you have purchased this copy of Freedom to Submit by Melody Snow Monroe from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.

  Regarding E-book Piracy

  This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.

  The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.

  This is Melody Snow Monroe’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Ms. Monroe’s right to earn a living from her work.

  Amanda Hilton, Publisher

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  www.BookStrand.com

  DEDICATION

  To Peyton Elizabeth and Lara Valentine.

  FREEDOM TO SUBMIT

  Freedom, Colorado 1

  MELODY SNOW MONROE

  Copyright © 2013

  Chapter One

  “He’s coming out. Get ready.”

  “Roger that.” Danisa Milan sat up straighter and rolled down the driver’s side window. Crisp high-altitude air rushed in, forcing her to tug down her ski cap over her short hair. With care, she placed the rented Canon 400mm, F2.8L lens on the half-lowered glass to balance it and pre-focused on the hotel room door. It was after 9:00 p.m. and dark as hell, but at least the tacky, overhead corridor lights cast a strong, yellow glow on the cracked cement walkway and faded hotel doors. Given the lens’s low aperture, she had a chance at an excellent capture.

  Danisa loved this part of the surveillance—locating the subject and getting a good shot. Despite the chill, her hands were sweating like they always did. She constantly worried that in the heat of the moment she’d forget to change a setting. Too high an ASA and the picture would be grainy. Too low, and the highlights would be lost, making facial recognition near to impossible. Before she went through her camera check for the tenth time, the motel room door opened. Her pulse jumped.

  She looked through the viewfinder once more and rotated the lens for a vertical shot to capture the man’s full body.

  She tapped her ear bud. “Subject is outside, but I can only see his back. He’s leaning in and facing the woman. She’s too far inside to see anything other a hand on the doorjamb and an arm encased in a red, silky robe.”

  “Do you have any shot of his face? Even a profile?” Nikki whispered, not wanting to interfere with her audio setup from the next room.

  “Not yet. Come on, Charles Lane. Turn this way for me please, darlin’.”

  She’d been tailing him for six weeks. For the last four Thursdays, he’d come to High Peak Motel in Freedom, Colorado. She guessed he’d picked this location because Freedom was a small town—all of five blocks by four blocks—located about forty-five minutes west of Denver, where he worked and lived. He always met a woman in room 104. Lane was smart though. He wore a big brimmed cowboy hat to hide his identity even though it looked kind of dumb with his perfectly fitted suit. The collar of his jacket was always turned up when he came or went, and the man walked with his head down and his hand covering the side of his face closest to the parking lot. Clearly, he was a man who didn’t want to be recognized.

  But last week, he’d gotten careless. The thin, pretty woman had stepped outside with him after their rendezvous, and when he turned to kiss her one more time, Danisa had caught them in the act. Unfortunately, her client, Michael Sussman, said he needed one more set of photos to prove this wasn’t a one-time event. She didn’t complain. A job was a job. Besides, that meant she got to hold, fondle, and enjoy this rented ten-thousand-dollar lens for one more week.

  Sussman decided to add audio to the mix this time, so he hired her talented coworker, Nikki Wilder, to do her thing.

  The man stepped back and Danisa’s heart raced. She’d set the camera on multiple exposure. As the man turned, she held down the shutter and let it rip. He looked up for a brief moment as if to figure out the source of the sound. In that moment, he exposed his face briefly then assumed his clandestine pose. As soon as he walked back to his Lexus, she released the button. His hurried footsteps implied he didn’t like this seedy neighborhood any more than she did.

  She couldn’t wrap her mind around why the CEO of Denver Mining didn’t pay to have his woman in a classier place. Men.

  Time to go. “It’s a wrap, Nik.”

  “Roger. Breaking down now.”

  Her coworker would need ten minutes max. Nikki and their other sorority sister, Holly Morganton, had approached her four months ago about starting a security service agency together. Since then, the three of them had worked side by side.

  Danisa yawned, slipped the camera back inside the car, and rolled up the window. As she leaned over to pick up her case off the torn seat and grab a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup, shouts drew her attention. She sat up and looked in the direction of the noise.

  “Holy shit.”

  “What?” That got Nikki’s attention.

  She tried to put the pieces together. “Out of nowhere, this guy appears. He’s yelling at Lane’s prostitute.” The man’s posture was off. He shifted from one foot to another, causing Danisa’s sixth sense to go into overdrive.

  “Her pimp maybe?”

  “Could be.” He was dressed in black slacks and a long leather jacket that hung past his knees. The woman was still in her skimpy robe. Poor thing must be freezing.

  On instinct, Danisa lifted the camera to her eye, turned it on, and began shooting. The man suddenly stopped yelling, stepped back, and fired three shots.

  Danisa froze. “Fuck. He shot her.”

  “For real?” Nikki’s voice trembled. “Is she dead?”

  “I don’t know. Call 911.” Danisa’s heart slammed against her ribcage and her hands shook. “Jesus.”

  She hadn’t signed up to see this kind of violence. She switched the camera to video mode and pointed the lens at the scene. Nikki had been a cop and had complained that witnesses never gave an accurate description. Dani

sa would let her equipment do the remembering.

  Her gut swirled with horror at the prone woman’s body. A pool of blood seeped onto the gray cement. “Terrible, terrible.”

  Reality struck. Danisa had witnessed a murder. Holy shit. As the man ran down the corridor in her direction, she rotated the camera and followed the fleeing figure. He’d parked in front of room 110. As he opened the door to his Cadillac Seville, he looked around, as if to check to see if anyone had seen him.

  Danisa froze, panic ripping through her veins. She wanted to take a still of the man’s face, but as soon as he looked straight at her, her heart stopped. She ducked. Fear drenched her.

  Get out here.

  No. She couldn’t leave Nikki.

  “What’s happening, Dani?”

  Her mouth wouldn’t form the words. She inhaled to gain some control. “I think he saw me,” she whispered.

  “No way.” Clicks and snaps tumbled through the ear buds. “Stay where you are.”

  Static sounded and then silence. What was Nikki doing? “Nik?”

  Nothing. Damn. Danisa wanted to look to see if the killer was heading her way, but she didn’t dare peek. A car engine cranked to life and wheels squeaked on the pavement. A second later someone knocked on her back door.

  Danisa jerked in her seat, her heart at her throat clogging her ability to breathe.

  “Dani, hurry up for Christ’s sake.”

  She let out a breath and fumbled for the lock. The door flew open. Nikki tossed her gear in back, slammed it closed, and ran around to the front seat. She climbed in. Danisa sat up and cut her eyes toward the vacant space in front of room 110. “He’s gone.”

  While her jacket would mask the odor, her pits were wet and her high blood pressure was about to damage her heart.

  “I know.” Nikki picked up the remnants of three other candy wrappers, wadded them, then stuffed them in Danisa’s camera bag. “You’re a slob.”

  Who cared? Her messy car wasn’t important. Their safety was. She grabbed Nikki’s wrist. “Did he see you?”

  She grinned. “Yeah. That was the point. To take the focus off you.”

  “You acted as a decoy?” She and Nikki might only be sorority sisters, but after that daring move, her friend had just been promoted to sister level.

  “Hell, yeah. I figure if he saw me come out of the room he’d wonder what I knew. I didn’t even look up but headed across the parking lot.”

  “He could have shot you.”

  She leaned back and grinned. “But he didn’t.”

  Nikki might have acted nonchalant, but Danisa bet blood was pounding in Nikki’s ears as much as it was in hers.

  Danisa held out her hands. They shook. “I’m still in shock.” Sirens sounded. That was fast. “Oh, my God.” It finally hit her that a woman was lying on the ground, bleeding to death. “Oh, crap. She might still be alive.”

  Danisa pushed open her door and raced across the lot. When she approached, the vacant eyes and still body told her it was too late. Only then did she see the frail kid shivering in the open doorway.

  Nikki rushed up behind her. “What—” She halted, her gaze turned toward the kid. “Go to him. I’ll take care of the woman and speak with the paramedics.”

  Ever the cop, Nikki took over. The ambulance arrived and pulled up behind them.

  “Excuse us. Coming through.”

  Danisa entered the room, and the kid backed up. She held up her hands. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m here to help.” She placed her body between the kid and the doorway. “Look at me.” He didn’t need to see the paramedics check the dead woman, who she figured might be his mom.

  He glanced up and his eyes hardened.

  “What’s your name?” The poor kid had to be in shock, too.

  Pain sliced through her, remembering the moment she watched her mother die. She’d lived long enough to get to the hospital after the hit and run, but she died later that night.

  “Mark Richie.”

  So he was Carmen Richie’s son. “Mark’s a nice name. How old are you?” He was a tall kid, so it was hard to tell. Danisa was way out of her element here. Nikki should be the one conducting this interview, but she was busy.

  “Eleven.”

  She swallowed her gasp. Jesus. What was he doing here? His T-shirt was thin and stained. With the door open, he must be cold. “Do you have a jacket?”

  He nodded. He went into the bathroom and came out wearing a denim shirt. Oh, my. The woman outside was dead and this was a crime scene. She stepped over to the door, caught Nikki’s attention, nodded, and closed it.

  The hotel room had one queen-size bed. The sheets were wadded in the middle with the bedspread crumpled on the floor. A worn dresser with a twelve-inch television with rabbit ears sat on top. A scratched table huddled in the corner contained a sink, microwave, and small fridge. She wasn’t sure if this was supposed to be an efficiency or what, but it smelled of cigarette smoke and sex.

  She didn’t want to sit on anything, so she remained standing. “What are you doing here, Mark?” All of the options seemed bad.

  “I live here.”

  Acid dug into her belly. She wanted to gather this poor child in her arms and give him some loving. She knew what it was like to lose a mother, but not at his young age. “Is your father somewhere or another relative?”

  He shook his head. Why wasn’t he screaming and running to his mom? He acted like a robot, but maybe that was his way of coping. More questions bombarded her, but before she could ask, someone knocked on the door. Mark stiffened as if the intrusion meant another john.

  “Wait right here.”

  Danisa pulled open the door and halted. The vision before her took her back seventeen years to a time in her life when she was happy. The man in uniform ran his gaze from her face to her scuffed boots and back again.

  “Dani? That you?”

  Great. She’d only been back in her hometown of Freedom, Colorado, for two months and hadn’t run into many people from high school. Now, she was dressed in a bulky jacket, a mismatched hat, baggy sweats, wearing no makeup, and she was meeting her former dream man. Thoughts of him had kept her awake at night about what life would be if she was dating him.

  “Brady Braxson? That really you?” His shoulders were broader, thicker, and had a lot more muscle attached to them than she remembered. His cheeks had lost their youthful fat, and his face was thick with manly stubble. Even though the harsh outside light cast a shadow over his perfectly chiseled face, he was arresting. His sheriff’s hat only added to the mystery.

  “The one and only. What are you doing here?”

  She looked behind her. “It’s a long story.”

  “I got all night.”

  Instantly, her romantic dreams surfaced—she, the artistic geek, walking alongside the football hero jock. Brady was a year older, and as such, didn’t know she existed in school, but hey, a sixteen-year-old could pretend.

  “Her eleven-year-old son is inside.” She nodded to the victim and pressed her lips together. She didn’t want to discuss what she knew about the woman with the son so close.

  “Christ.” He turned to another man in uniform. “Hey, Derek?”

  The other officer trotted up to them. Good Lord. He was just as gorgeous as Brady. If she’d known these two lived here, she might have moved back sooner.

  The new arrival focused his gaze on her but spoke to Brady. “Crime Scene Unit is on the way.”

  “Good. There’s a boy inside. Mind taking him to the car? I need to speak with Dani.”

  “There’s a kid in there?” His brows pinched.

  “We think it’s her son.”

  Derek shook his head. A moment later, he led Mark out of the room. The kid glanced at her once then kept his gaze straight ahead. He didn’t struggle and he didn’t cry, nor did he attempt to run to his mom one last time. The officer had the sense to use his body as a shield so the kid wouldn’t see his mother at the end of her life. A blast of cold air raced down the walkway, and Danisa pulled her jacket tighter around her shoulder.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18