by James, Gemma
Oh hell.
The smile curving my mouth wasn’t good. This was supposed to be about punishment. About driving home the fact that she couldn’t just take off and put herself in danger whenever she fucking felt like it. Her fuck-up had gone way beyond mutilating her skin, or mouthing off, or disobeying some rule. She’d put herself at risk. Again.
Damn straight the punishment would be severe.
I filled a bowl with cold water, grabbed the ginger, and strode toward the hall, exhaling the most dangerous of my anger as I went, but Angel’s voice stopped me in my tracks.
“Don’t h-hurt her.”
The girl looked terrified. I gave Jax a meaningful glance. “You better take her for a long walk. We’re gonna be at least two hours.”
He nodded, understanding what I was getting at. Angel did too, because she cried in protest, begging me not to hurt Alex as he ushered her outside. But what she didn’t understand was that Alex needed the lesson.
She needed the fucking pain.
I’d reneged on doling out appropriate discipline a few weeks ago on her birthday, shortly after we’d set up camp. I hadn’t had the heart to punish her on such a special day, so I’d given her a verbal lashing and a pass on the physical punishment.
After all, her fingernails had barely left a mark on her skin—not deep enough to draw blood.
A few days later, I regretted it, because she’d gone apeshit with the sharp end of a roasting stick on her arm, leaving a nasty gouge. A nightmare had probably triggered the incident, and that had been my second mistake.
Instead of forcing her to talk, I’d waited for her to come to me.
In the end, the wound healed, but apparently my belt hadn’t done its job, and neither had her imprisonment in the bedroom these past few days, ankle shackle keeping her safe; if it had, she wouldn’t have even thought of going to her father without me.
I would not…could not go easy on her again. This time, I’d have to go beyond the physical.
As I headed into the bedroom, the realization cracked me in two, threatening to dent the shell I’d built around my heart all day as I agonized over her safe return.
My first glance at her in the corner, naked and on her knees with her hands together at her back, only armed me with more ammunition. She was so fucking prim in this moment. Demurely submissive. Too damn obedient. Alex knew exactly what she was doing. Everything about her body language spoke of repentance, but underneath the perfected pose, did she really feel remorse? Or was she playing me like only she could—appealing to the softer side of myself?
The man with a fucking conscience, with a healthy sense of socially acceptable versus socially fucked.
Alex was not this submissive doormat in front of me. Fuck no. She was the spitfire that fought me every step of the way. The strong woman who flipped the bird at me and anything else standing between her and what she wanted.
That type of behavior was how she’d ended up in that corner, telling a lie with the language of her body. Deceit stormed through her veins.
I wasn’t falling for it. Letting the door slam behind me, I started across the room with purpose and set the bowl onto the dresser, followed by the ginger root. From her corner of shame, she peeked at me.
“Rafe…no.”
“Was your visit with the old man worth it? Did you find what you were looking for?” Despite the hell she’d put me through, I hoped she’d found the closure she needed, though I highly doubted she had.
“You were right,” she said, and I knew admitting so cost her a huge chunk of her pride. “He’s a cold-hearted bastard.” She peeked at me again before her gaze darted to the ginger. “Don’t do this.”
“Your ass is gonna burn for what you did.” My tone left no room for argument, and the slump of her shoulders told me she heard it. “Bend over the bed.”
“Please!”
“Begging won’t help you, babe. Now get over there before you make things worse for yourself.”
She rose on shaky limbs and trudged to the bed, her head dipped, spirit dragging as if she were facing the firing squad. In her mind, she probably was. Alex could handle a lot of shit—all kinds of pain from whips and canes to the reliable weight of a firm hand.
But stretch her ass and make it burn, and you’d see her fracture.
She cast one final glance my way, imploring me for a stay of punishment. If not for the dampness on her cheeks, she might have persuaded me. But those tears of regret, fear, and even anger drew me in. Hardened my heart and my dick. Those tears were my weapon against her pleading, sorrowful eyes.
She draped the mattress, and I couldn’t have positioned her better myself; hands at the small of her back, legs planted shoulder-width apart on the floor, ass out.
She was the sublime picture of capitulation.
Still not falling for it, but I’d test it.
“I’m wearing your least favorite belt.” I let that dangle out there for a few seconds, giving her time to envision the agony the strap of leather would inflict, because her pain threshold was levels below it. “Can you stay still for this?”
“I’ll try.”
“No, babe. You either stay still, or you don’t. There’s no trying.”
“Don’t do this.”
“Don’t put yourself in danger again.”
Silence.
What could she say to that?
She chose the smart route and said nothing, and I reached for my buckle. “You’re damn lucky Jax has his hands full with Angel, because I’d let him whip you for what you did to his tires.” I slid the belt from the loops of my jeans, and she flinched.
I waited.
Seconds ticked off in my head, each one never quite the right moment to begin.
The first strike to her ass landed in surprise, and I got a high-pitched mewl as a reward for my sneak attack.
“How many?” she cried, voice strained with desperation. Giving her a number would allow her to focus on the end in sight instead of the pain of each burning lick. After what she’d pulled, I wanted her to feel every strike to the follicles of her hair and the bottoms of her feet.
“You’ll know when I know.”
I laid another one on her, the sharpness of thick leather on skin echoing off the walls. Then another.
I didn’t count, and even if I had kept count, I probably would have lost track. Turning her ass red did that to me—sent me to the darkest corners of my mind. The part of myself that terrified me most. With each jerk of her body, the tighter she fisted her hands, the closer together her whimpers came…
The more I fell into the pit of all that was twisted. My cock lengthened and hardened in my jeans, straining against the zipper. Painfully aroused.
Still, further into the black hole I went.
It took her letting loose a howling shriek and a break of the pose to snap me out of it. She got back into position before I could reprimand her. Dropping the belt on the floor, I filled my lungs with a calming breath, counted the rapid beats of my heart, prayed for patience and composure.
“Does it hurt?”
“Yes.” She sniffled.
“Is it a bad kind of hurt?”
She hesitated, no doubt tempted to lie.
“The truth, Alex.”
“It’s a…a g-good kind of hurt.”
Her butt cheeks were beet red, welting in some areas, and despite her low tolerance for that particular belt, I’d known what her answer would be. If her quaking thighs didn’t let me know, the shimmer of arousal between them would. Those sexy tanned legs of hers weren’t weak from pain. Fuck no. They shook with the effort it took to keep them spread. Not that closing them would give her relief. Her deviant cunt would still throb.
I pulled the chair from the opposite corner where I’d found Alex and moved it next to the nightstand, followed by the bowl and ginger. Removing a pocketknife from my jeans, I sat and began peeling and skinning the first finger off the root. “Time for the bad pain, sweetheart.”
> 18. THREE TIMES THE BURN
Alex
I was fucked.
He wouldn’t even spare me a glance. The determined way he skinned and carved that huge piece, so intent on his sadistic artistry, scared the shit out of me.
God, he was furious. For that reason alone, I didn’t dare move or say a word, no matter how I ached to apologize and beg for mercy. The only thing I had the courage to do was watch him carve his ultimate weapon, aside from water, against me.
Please, not the ginger. Anything but the ginger.
As his fingers worked the knife along the piece, and a plug-like shape began to form, I blinked rapidly, hating the threat of tears. Hating my weakness. If I were stronger, braver, somehow capable of tolerating this particular type of pain, he wouldn’t be able to hold it over me.
He finished carving and dropped the ginger plug into the bowl of water, and I thought this is it, but then he broke off another piece and brought his knife to the outer skin.
Dread ignited in my gut. I shouldn’t have gone to my dad—not without Rafe. It had been a stupid and reckless thing to do. In the end, the visit had done nothing to answer my questions. Instead, it left me feeling like an orphan.
Rafe believed he was justified in punishing me, and maybe he was, but I didn’t think I deserved such a harsh form of discipline. That was the downside of giving my free will to a man who wouldn’t hesitate to take advantage of my weaknesses.
And Rafe Mason was my number one weakness.
“You broke my trust,” he said, shattering the silence after a while. He started on a third piece, and the repugnant spiciness of ginger grew stronger in the air.
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m not sure I believe you.”
“I am. I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
“Hurt me? You pissed me off, Alex. And you scared the fucking shit out of me. Do you have any idea what losing you would do to me?”
I couldn’t help but glare at him. “That’s a stupid question.”
He winced, but it was a fleeting show of empathy. “Then you know how fucking terrified I was when you disappeared on me.”
“I do, and that’s why I am sorry.”
“I sense a caveat in there, babe.”
“I had to confront him.”
“I told you no.”
“Maybe it wasn’t your decision to make.”
“I don’t care. I made it, and you ignored it.” He glanced up from his work long enough to pin me under the boldness of his green stare. “You ignored it knowing there would be consequences. Don’t pretend you didn’t know this was coming.”
I couldn’t argue with that. We fell into silence while he finished carving what I hoped would be the last piece. Rising from the chair, he set the knife on the table. Then he bent and kissed the watery regret from my face. I wanted to beg him not to go, but he moved behind me, taking the bowl of torture with him, and I felt the weight of it on the mattress. The dreaded sloshing sound followed as he selected the first piece.
My ass was only seconds away from scorching, and despite laying here, free of restraints, I couldn’t bring myself to fight him. And it would be a fight. In fact, if it came down to it, he’d probably bring Jax in to help hold me down, if he had to.
“Do you think you deserve the ginger?”
“No.”
“I figured you’d say that. But you don’t get a choice in this, do you?” He paused, apparently expecting an answer.
“No.”
“That’s right. Just like I didn’t get a say when you stole the Jeep and slashed Jax’s tires.”
I closed my eyes in shame. What I’d done was underhanded and unfair to him, and totally fucking dangerous.
He positioned himself between my spread thighs. “If you try closing your legs, I’ll carve a fourth piece, and we’ll be here even longer.”
One wrong involuntary movement on my part, like my thighs inching toward his hips, would land me in more trouble. By the time he was finished, I’d have cramped and stiff muscles from spreading my legs for so long.
I was sure that would pale in comparison to the burn.
Rafe brought our bodies flush together, his erection bulging through his jeans, and the blunt tip of the ginger nudged my puckered hole. I held my breath.
One, two, three, four…
Rafe shoved it in my ass.
“Owww!” I screeched, eyes watering from the rough entry. The plug was cool at first, but after a couple of minutes…
Oh God, fucking God almighty…when that thing heated up…unbearable.
“Take it out! Please, Rafe! Please, please, please…”
“Clench and hold until I tell you to stop.”
“No!”
He smacked my ass, and I contracted around the plug then immediately relaxed my muscles to escape the amped intensity.
Oh God. How would I get through this?
“Babe, last warning.”
Outright sobbing, I clenched and didn’t let go this time. A wave of nausea hit me, and for a few seconds I worried about soiling the bedding.
The nausea subsided, but the liquid fire in my ass didn’t.
Rafe’s zipper sounded, followed by the rustle of denim. He palmed my ass, fingers kneading flesh, rubbing my cheeks together around the base of the ginger plug. His rough manhandling intensified the pain, making it intolerable, and I let out an animalistic howl.
He positioned the head of his cock at my pussy. “Unclench.”
Panting through my mouth, I relaxed into him and focused on the metal bars of the headboard, counting each one, but as soon as he thrust inside me, the headboard became a blur—nothing but a pain-filled abstract existence of shadows and shapes.
And a dizzying contradiction of pain and pleasure.
His cock had never felt so good, but the hotter the ginger amped, the less pleasure I derived from the plunder of his shaft.
He hissed in a breath. “Fuck, baby. So damn good. I might have to fuck your mouth for a while to take the edge off.”
My gaze landed on the abandoned knife. He’d carved three pieces, and he wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t intend to use them all.
His thick cock sank between my folds, then he pulled out to the tip before shoving in again, each deep thrust a slow dance of torture. This wasn’t the tempo he used when he wanted to come.
This was him holding off his orgasm.
Because he had two more pieces to get through first.
I was fucked.
19. NO MERCY
Rafe
What an erotic show, watching my cock sink inside her body as I palmed her ass. There was nothing unusual about fucking her, but everything surrounding the act heightened it.
The ginger protruding from her ass as my shaft disappeared beneath the piece. The opposing sensations I unleashed on her—her pussy filled with the privilege of my cock as her backdoor burned. And my hands on her sexy behind, kneading her flesh against the ginger.
With each thrust, I dug my fingertips into her cheeks a little more, bringing about an involuntary ass-clenching.
Our bodies slapped together, thigh to thigh, groin to ass. Unable to control the contraction of muscle, she grunted every time I plundered her wet cunt. She was slowly sinking into the mattress, seeking respite from my brutal assault.
She’d find none. I grabbed her by the hips and slammed into her with more force.
“Ahhhh!”
“Hurts, does it?”
“Yes!”
“The stupid stunt you pulled this morning ripped me apart, Alex.”
“I’m sorry.” She muffled her sobs into the bedding, and I smacked her ass.
“I want to hear you. If you’re gonna cry, don’t hide it.”
“Please, Rafe. No more.”
“We’ve still got two more pieces, sweetheart.”
She sobbed again, her shoulders shaking from the power of her despair.
“Remember this pain the next time you even think of
running off like that again.”
She didn’t reply, but I knew this experience would stay with her. As much as punishing her like this got me off, I didn’t want to have to do it again.
Not like this—as a result of reckless behavior. If I ever used ginger on her again, I wanted her to give me the gift of it, in spite of the pain it caused her.
My balls tightened, and the pressure in my dick almost reached the breaking point. I pulled out before I came, then I crawled onto the mattress and kneeled in front of her, the crown of my dripping cock aimed at her lips.
“Suck me.”
She was such a good girl, opening her mouth and letting me push inside, that I almost went soft on her.
But that’s what got us here to begin with.
“Clench and hold.”
She released a groan of pain as I tangled a hand in her hair. Angling her head back, I slipped between her lips in lazy thrusts—just enough to keep her mouth busy without dragging an orgasm from me.
Because when I finally came, I wanted to do it inside her ass.
Her tortured, tender, tantalizing ass.
Her gorgeous red ass.
I grunted at the thought, and she let out an answering moan around my cock.
“Are you still clenching, babe?”
With another moan, she nodded.
Moaning meant pleasure. Moaning meant the fire in her backdoor had simmered to a tolerable level, and she was getting too excited from sucking me.
“Time for round two?”
Her eyes widened, those jade orbs bright with the threat of fresh tears. As I withdrew from her mouth, the heat in her gaze dimmed.
Acceptance kicked into gear.
I had to give her props; she didn’t protest once as I switched out the ginger plug with a new one. I sank inside her soaked cunt and stilled, gliding a palm down her spine as I waited for the burn to return. She whimpered, and my dick twitched inside her, eager to claim her once more.