by Maren Smith
Her bottom was on fire. She was so mindless to the searing heat that she didn’t even realize the spanking was over until, suddenly, her hands were free and so were her legs. The whole world spun wildly when he picked her up, thunking her back on her feet long enough to erupt out of his chair.
“She’s all yours.” Reeve thrust her at Eric and stormed from the room, all but slamming the door behind him.
Clutching her bottom, Sandy was too busy rubbing to care what had set him off. The weight of her skirts was an agony all its own and she didn’t have enough hands to rub, grab, lift and hold while she ran back into the little nook by the bathroom to see the damage done her in the warped mirror. She had to arch up on tiptoes just to catch sight of her bottom’s reflection.
“Oh my God,” she whispered, more awed than appalled at the flush of bright pink that stained the entire surface of her skin. She argued with her dress, wrestling the volumes of skirt, shift and petticoats all the way up onto her shoulders. She stared, entranced by the subtle finger and thumbprints standing out along the rosy edges of her own punished flesh.
She ought to be furious, but she wasn’t. Something was wrong with her, because as she stood twisting back to see the damage over her shoulders, she realized… she liked this view. No, she loved it. She didn’t think her ass had ever looked as good as it did right now. And the feel of it, not just the heat that seared her fingertips when she gingerly caressed the tender surface, but the hurt laving through her in waves that pulsed in time with her own ragged heartbeat—she liked that feeling, too. It was a steady drumbeat, an intoxicating throb that very quickly turned to arousal as it deepened, taking up residence between her legs. Each steady thump was a slow-suckling mouth, pulling at her clit.
Oh yeah, she liked this feeling. She’d hated every minute of what Reeve had done to get her here, but where she was now was a heady sensation she didn’t want to stop.
“Are you done?”
Startled, Sandy saw Eric’s reflection beside hers in the mirror and quickly dropped her dress. She hadn’t realized he’d followed her and now, his shoulder propped against the wall, he was smiling.
“Was it everything you hoped for?” he asked.
“What do you mean?” She fought the urge to tuck her hands back behind her again, not to feel this time, but to protect. He’d said he was going to spank her too, after Reeve was done. But surely not. That had just been a threat, right? The kind of thing that he had said because she was supposed to be his submissive and he had a script to follow. But Reeve had thoroughly, thoroughly paddled her bottom. She ached back there, in the most delicious way imaginable, but she couldn’t imagine even trying to sit down right now. Surely he wasn’t really going to make it worse.
Pushing off the wall, Eric moved closer. “Was this your first adult spanking?”
Sandy heard herself swallow before admitting, “Yes.”
“Was it everything you imagined it would be?”
She hesitated, then shook her head. “N-no. I don’t like the spanking part, but…” She hesitated before reluctantly adding, “I do kind of like this though.” Shyly, knowing he was watching every movement, she touched her bottom through her skirts. With both hands, she soothed her burning flesh. “I didn’t know it would feel like this.”
It might have been a trick of her imagination, but she thought she saw just a flicker of interest light in his eyes as he watched her.
“It gets better, you know.”
She blinked. “How?”
Moving slowly, giving her plenty of time to evade if she’d only been smart enough to figure out what he intended before, he took firm hold of her ear and led her back to the waiting chairs. And it wasn’t so they both could sit and talk about it, although she did briefly entertain that hope. No, she knew instinctively what he meant to do from the moment he positioned her in that familiar spot to his right and then sat down, presenting her with the unmistakable view of his ready lap. Her stomach dropped, but her toes curled. It was an odd juxtaposition of reactions that only grew odder still when she felt that crawling dread sweep up the back of her legs while her sex tightened and shivered, a miniature orgasm of anticipation that made that invisible suckling mouth pull harder.
She trembled, the fine hairs across the nape of her neck and down the length of her arms lifting one by one.
“Over you go,” Eric coaxed. “Don’t think for a second you’re going to get off as easy as you did with Master Reeve. I’m made of sterner stuff than that.”
Sandy shivered, the heat under the back of her skirts growing hotter. She had no idea that was going to happen either. Shouldn’t the hurt and fire be diminishing now that the spanking was done? What else didn’t she know, and why wasn’t she crying out the Castle safeword as loud as she possibly could right now instead of harboring this needling little impulse to bend back over his knee so she could find out first hand exactly what more she might be ignorant of?
Journalists were a curious breed. That was the excuse she told herself as she crawled into position across his lap. She shivered when he bared her bottom once more. She shuddered when he scissored her legs between his own, just as Reeve had done, and calmly demanded that she give him both her hands. It felt oddly comforting to be so pinned down, restrained in a manner that left her nothing to do but just endure.
Right from the very start, it was so much worse the second time. Not because Eric spanked harder or faster. But, rather, her run to the mirror had been just pause enough for this new onslaught to reawaken the pain centers of every already tender nerve. She hadn’t known they’d been dulled until he began to spank. Again, using only just his hand; again, taking her straight to hell.
She gritted her teeth, the fingers of both her captured hands clawing the air behind her. She just could not stop her body from twisting and writhing, kicking and fussing. It wanted this to stop; but deep inside her mind, in places she could scarcely believe would harbor such ideas, she couldn’t help but think maybe hell was exactly where she needed to go. Especially if, for a little while afterward, it let her wallow in that delicious, throbbing heat.
Chapter 4
Slamming the door behind him, Reeve walked straight up to the opposite wall, laid his hands flat upon the stone and braced himself against it. It took everything he had not to vent his frustration by banging his head. It had been a long, long time since he’d last felt so angry, but this woman, this journalist, had accomplished it, and he couldn’t even say exactly what it was that she had done to spark such internal rage.
Maybe it was the innocence, the novice submissive role she was pretending so well. She was a snake in his garden, but she’d felt good from the moment she laid herself across his lap. Her bottom had held just the right measure of clench and shiver when he’d bared it. Her thighs had tightened the way a true submissive’s would have, knowing the sight she must have presented. She’d submitted and then sassed and then submitted again, and when she’d lashed back with her open hand in that delightfully ineffective expression of pain, the one meant to stop him from spanking any more, God, how he loved that move. It was like she had tapped into his most primal passions, the ones that loved administering a good spanking to a woman with fight, a woman who had to be pinned to take it, who fought and struggled and ultimately lost, but who made him work for that aggressive victory.
And she’d been wet. Her body had responded exactly the way a woman who loved what he was doing should.
Reeve breathed in, willing the anger to cool. His cock was hard. Son. Of. A. Bitch.
“Going that well, I see.”
Marshall. Of course.
Closing his eyes, Reeve drew another deep, calming breath before he turned to face the Master of the Masters. “What are you doing here?”
If Marshall was offended by Reeve’s tone, he didn’t show it. He only held up the thin birch bundle he was carrying. Seven lethal-looking switches wrapped together with a wide blue ribbon that tied the handle into a pretty bow. “On my
way to take care of business,” he said. “I caught Kaylee in a minor fib, but much as I would like to deal with this in the privacy of our home, unfortunately I can’t just leave in the middle of the day. So, we’ll deal with this in her office and if she is not bare-bottomed and nose to the corner when I arrive, she’ll be dancing this nasty little jig again come bedtime. Why, do you think I’m stalking you in hopes of catching an early update?”
“Since this hall isn’t remotely on the way to her office, yes,” Reeve answered. He wasn’t fooled. Marshall had canes a-plenty in his office and he could just as easily have thrashed his wife there. Hearing the swishing impacts and Kaylee’s resulting cries would only have enhanced his already fearsome reputation for those waiting their turn on the benches just outside his door. No, Marshall was indeed stalking this hall, and he was doing it because he was curious.
Swinging the birch rod in a relaxed arch, Marshall gave in. “Fine, you got me. How is it going?”
As if on cue, the sounds of spanking resumed in the room behind them. Almost immediately, Sandy’s squeaks and squeals rose to punctuate each brisk smack.
“Ow! God, please please please!”
That was his handiwork Eric was building upon. Reeve almost smiled, deeply and perversely satisfied by the desperation of those cries. “It’s progressing,” he said dryly.
“Then why are you out here?” Marshall replied. “You should be in there.”
“I’ve already taken my turn.”
“All the more reason to get back in there. Discipline is only half the job,” Marshall reminded. “Those who cause the tears have—”
“A responsibility to the aftercare,” Reeve finished with him. Fuck. He shook his head. “I’m not sticking my dick in that.”
For the first time, a flash of temper touched the ice in Marshall’s pale blue eyes. “Every room comes fully stocked with all the pseudo cocks anybody could ever need, and for a reason. I’ve never made it a requirement that you put your dick anywhere you don’t want. And since when does fucking have anything to do with aftercare?” Stepping in closer, Marshall lowered his voice. “You’ve worked here long enough and if you weren’t a better dom than that, I wouldn’t have you here. I could have stopped that bus at the gates and handed her off to the police, but I didn’t and do you know why?”
“Because you’re a sadist?” Reeve suggested. “You like torturing everyone, even those who work for you.”
The corners of his mouth twitching, Marshall swung the birch in another lazy arch. “Close, but no. I did it because Bill Morris happens to be a friend of mine. He also happens to be her boss. He’s under the impression that she’s a good person, headstrong and stubborn, and for whatever reason she’s got a bee in her bonnet about this place.”
“And you want me to squash that bee.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Marshall said wryly. “I don’t know if it’s possible. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what to do with her, but my instincts at this point are saying ‘What the hell, show her around.’ What are your instincts saying?”
Reeve hated it when Marshall looked at him like that, as if he already knew the answer to the question he’d just posed. He ought to just agree now and get it over with, but Reeve didn’t have all the answers. In this case, he didn’t have even one answer. What were his instincts saying? “They’re saying rent out the asylum wing, slap her in a strait jacket and let her live out the rest of her stay in solitary confinement in a padded room. Strap her every time she starts screaming and tell her its therapy role-play.”
Marshall arched both eyebrows. “That doesn’t sound like much fun.”
“She’s a reporter, pretending to be a submissive,” Reeve said darkly. “She won’t know the difference.”
“Just because she’s a reporter, that doesn’t make her malicious or cruel. It makes her driven by curiosity at best and, at worst, lost.” He tipped his head, giving Reeve that deeply piercing look that always made him think the man could read straight through to his soul. “Remind you of anyone?”
“Not remotely,” Reeve said, knowing full well the answer Marshall was angling for.
“Funny,” Marshall said, without smiling. “I kind of thought it reminded me of you.”
Giving the birch one last swing, the Master of the Masters side-stepped Reeve and continued down the hall toward the offices and his waiting wife. Poor Kaylee. No doubt she was already regretting whatever lie she’d told, though Reeve knew it wasn’t anywhere near as deeply as Marshall was about to give her reason to.
Behind him, the spanking had stopped. He didn’t want to go back in there, but there was only so long he could just stand here, wishing she hadn’t felt as good as she had while he’d been holding her. Two days. That was all she was slated to be here for, and that was all the length of time he had to put up with her. He could do anything for two days.
Reeve held on to that thought as he tapped his keycard to the door and shoved it open again. Eric was sitting in the same chair as when he’d left them, but something had changed. The spanking was over and Sandy was sobbing, sitting upright on his knee now. Her head was pillowed on Eric’s shoulder, her face buried in the side of his neck, and the look on his best friend’s face was damn near paternal as he rocked her. Rocked! Cradling her shaking body while she gasped and moaned as if she were a submissive of value. As if she deserved such tenderness.
She sniffled, and if he felt an answer tug in his chest, Reeve told himself it was only because the dom in him was triggered to respond. To the tears, which he usually found stunningly arousing. To the sniffles and breathy gasps, which could not have hardened his cock more than it already was without her first being on her knees before him, with mascara tracks streaking from damp lashes all the way down to her red, pouty lips. Cock-sucker red, the hottest selling shade Maybelline never came up with.
Reeve startled, suddenly noticing Eric was waving at him. Judging by the are you kidding me look on his best friend’s face, he’d probably been waving for a while.
Reeve shrugged, but Eric stopped him from saying anything with a gesture. He glanced at Sandy’s bowed head as she curled into his chest, snuffling and hiccupping. Her sobs were dwindling, but she was still fragile. Her acting abilities were astounding. How anyone could be so heartless as to beg comfort from someone she was planning to out in her paper in the most socially degrading way imaginable was beyond him. And they were the ones without morals? He almost scoffed, but he bit it back when Eric motioned for silence, then pointed. Following the direction, Reeve noticed her luggage—a large black roll-around suitcase and a smaller leather-bound briefcase. The porters had brought both in from the bus and left them sitting by the wall near the headboard of the bed. Trying not to alert Sandy, Eric was motioning with ever increasing exaggeration—go get it, idiot!
He didn’t mouth the idiot part, but his disbelieving stare sure tacked it on for good measure.
He was an idiot. He also couldn’t believe he was doing this. Reeve approached her bags.
“Now, this is the way things are going to go,” Eric said, covering any inadvertent noises Reeve might make as he lifted the flap to peek inside the briefcase. “I want you to listen carefully, because these non-negotiable points are all based on the answers you gave us when you filled out your application.”
Laptop, Reeve mouthed, letting his fellow Dom know what he’d found.
Get it, Eric mouthed back.
He shook his head. He wasn’t a thief or a snoop, and he wasn’t about to touch her things. Especially when all she had to do was look up and—
Eric made a fist.
Reeve flipped him off.
Pick up the god-damn bag was all over Eric’s face. If it weren’t for Sandy, they’d be having this confrontation nose to nose, and that was what made Reeve capitulate. It had been years since their last real dust-up, and their continued employment at the Castle was based on a three-strikes and you’re out policy. Their first two strikes had happened wi
thin days of hiring on.
“O-o-okay,” Sandy hiccupped.
Reeve silently picked up her briefcase. As he crept with it into the bathroom, he heard Eric listing out the rules in a slow, leisurely way meant to give Reeve plenty of snooping time.
“We’re going to pick your clothes each morning. We’re going to pick your activities and your meals. Do you have any food allergies not listed in your application?”
“No.” She wiped her eyes, but Eric pushed her head back onto his shoulder when she tried to sit up. She snuggled back down again. “Fish makes me gag, though.”
Reeve quietly closed the door on Eric’s soothing, “We’ll try not to make you eat too much fish then. Anything else?”
Once the door was closed, Reeve moved fast. Setting the briefcase on the flat side of the tiled tub, he checked the contents. The laptop itself was likely password protected, so he didn’t bother with that, but what he found beside it was almost as good—a legal pad with a list of notes and self-posed questions that read more like mental reminders of things to look for. Each topic was bulleted.
Illicit drug usage?
Sex trafficking?
Who are the sex workers?
“What the fuck, lady,” he grumbled under his breath, painfully aware that sound carried in this echo chamber of a bathroom.
What exactly are Littles? ‘Exactly’ had been underlined twice.
Underage?
The list went on for almost two pages. He didn’t have his phone on him, it was against too many regulations to be caught on the floor with any kind of modern technology, so Reeve did his best to commit as much as he could to memory before he put the pad back where he’d found it.
“No, he’s not mad at you,” Eric was saying as he let himself back out of the bathroom. “Sometimes our passions run away with us when we’re in a role and we need time to get grounded again. That’s all.”