by Maren Smith
"Liars," he drawled, "get spanked. I do believe I told you that once already. Do I need to demonstrate?"
A tingling wave rolled across the surface of her bottom, much like the ocean water rolling up onto the beach. It was the oddest sensation. She'd never felt anything like it before, and just standing this close to him, staring up into his entirely too-knowing eyes while it was happening, was enough to turn her whole body as hot as a second-degree sunburn.
"I wasn't," she tried again, but her voice wouldn't cooperate. It came out in a breathy squeak.
"Promptly and soundly," he reminded, clearly not buying a word of it. He tilted his head, raising his dark eyebrows in what might have been a playful look if only it didn't seem like such a warning. "With their pants and panties both removed so their naughty little bottoms can be spanked on the bare."
That tingling wave turned prickly.
"Oh well, I guess I'm safe," she said, trying to laugh some of that nervousness away. "Mine is hardly a little bottom."
Apart from his eyebrows arching a little higher, his expression remained unchanged, and yet somehow seemed different from that smiling seduction of just a few seconds ago. "Was that a fat joke?"
The prickling sensation was growing, spreading just under her skin until now she could feel it everywhere. Not just across the surface of her bottom, but up her back and down her thighs, and in the peaks of her nipples as they tightened into pert buds. "I'm sorry?" she stammered.
He was still smiling but it was harder now; his eyes, cooler. A slow blink turned his gaze from her to the beach beyond them. A gentle island breeze tugged at her hair, washing her in the tantalizing hints of his aftershave as he looked first one way, and then the other. Another slow blink brought his gaze back to hers.
"Turn around." He pushed back off the rail, rolling his shoulders in a way that made it feel as if he were squaring off against her. When she only stood there, he twirled a finger at her until, hesitantly, Maddy turned to face the beach.
It was almost like a dream, one in which she knew exactly what was going to happen, and yet her whole body jumped when she felt the flat of his hand slam into her right buttock. The force jolted her hips and the sting… oh, the sting. Pure and simple sensation bloomed out over her assaulted flesh. Big as his hands were, she hadn't known one smack could cover the whole of her entire cheek.
The second swat fell every bit as hard, striking the other cheek and giving her a matching set. The sting shot in deep until it wasn't just in her bottom that she felt it. It was between her legs, filling up the crotch of her jeans and burning in a wholly different kind of blossom. One that she was not at all prepared to feel.
She wasn't about to ask for harder, either.
Nor did she think herself capable of surviving another fifty like it.
Her knees tried to buckle, but Maddy gripped the rail, clinging to it as if it were her only anchor. Her heart was a thundering storm, battering at the interior of her ribs until it hurt.
"Turn around," Dominick commanded, his tone as soft as it was impossible to ignore.
Haltingly, she faced him once more. The urge to reach behind her, to hold her ass between her hands and simply marvel at how two ostensibly minor smacks could sting like this—sting!—became almost more than she could ignore. She gripped the sides of her thighs instead, refusing to rub. At least, not while he was staring her down.
He wasn't smiling anymore. Nor was he frowning. He studied her, waiting for her to come to whatever inevitable conclusion she was going to, but her thoughts were too wildly scattered. She couldn't pull anything together, much less a conclusion. Not even when he inclined his head and oh so politely inquired, "How safe are you now, do you think?"
Maddy's breath caught in the back of her throat. She opened her mouth but nothing came out and, in the end, she was saved from having to answer when Emil poked his head out through the open double doors and called, "Everything okay?"
Define 'okay'.
Maddy's knees tried to buckle again. Clutching her purse to keep from grabbing her ass, she bolted. Somehow she managed to walk without running, tripping, or falling over her own feet. "Fine," she quavered, her voice shaking every bit as badly as her legs. "It's fine. All fine."
Emil held the door while she scampered past. Knowing what she must look like—a chastened child, the little girl Dominick had already called her, fleeing further punishment with a bottom already smarting—she tried to slow down. She tried to grow up a little too, but how impossible that was when the entire surface of both southern cheeks still felt the force of his hand as if he were resting it back there upon her.
Her jeans were holding the sensation in. As soon as she got to her room, she was taking them off until that prickling feeling went away.
She wondered if there would be a mirror low enough for her to catch a reflection of her backside. She wondered if she was pink.
She felt pink.
But after only two swats? Ridiculous!
As soon as she got to her room, though, she was going to check.
Maddy was halfway down the hall before she remembered she was supposed to be looking for her apartment. Face burning, she dug through her purse in search of the key she'd been given at the registration desk.
"Why is it," she heard Dominick say as he and Emil strolled together down the hall behind her, "that it's always the most beautiful women who never seem to know they are?"
Two pairs of eyes itched at the back of her until, unable to stand it, Maddy glanced back over her shoulder. Sure enough, both were staring right at her: one speculative, the other smirking, though his eyes were alive with the kind of hunger that made her own belly quiver in response.
"I don't know," Emil answered slowly. "I suppose it's because the world is full of shallow assholes."
Her cheeks burned hotter, but at last she found her key. What room was she in? 103. The doors were clearly marked. 103… 103… Hell, she'd passed it already. She had to go back.
Double hell! Dominick was standing right in front of her door.
"Out of curiosity," he asked Emil, arms folded across his chest, a thin smile growing across his mouth as she came slinking back down the hall. She ducked her head lower with every step, the soft fall of her blonde hair nowhere near thick or long enough to hide her growing embarrassment. "Say your partner had a low opinion of her own attractiveness and was temporarily stupid enough to say so out loud within your hearing. What would you do?"
"That's easy," Emil said as Maddy shoved her key into her lock. It turned a whole lot easier than her fumbling force required. "Nobody hurts the one I love, not even the one I love. While I might let the first comment go with a warning, on the second, my partner would learn that I wear a belt for a reason. He wouldn't sit comfortably for a month."
Dominick smiled at Emil, but he was looking at her when he did it. "I think I like you, Emil."
Emil looked him up and down, then tsked. "A relationship between two Dominants never works out."
Her apartment door flew open so unexpectedly that Maddy fell into her room. Literally. The contents of her purse went everywhere, but she ignored it. She jumped to her feet, cursing her shoes and, of all things, fixing her hair. Her face blazing, she grabbed the traitorous door and yanked it back into her side.
"This is me," she said, rather unnecessarily. Clearing her throat, she offered a wave as a way of disassociating herself from the whole awkward mess.
"What a coincidence." Thumbing to the door directly across from hers, Dominick said, "This is me, too. Looks like we're neighbors, neighbor. I guess that means I'll be seeing you again."
Oh. Oh, hell.
The tingling, prickling imprint of his hand flared all the more intoxicatingly beneath the coarse denim of her jeans until, from just down the hall, they all heard a familiar voice chime in, "Looks like we're neighbors, too."
Maddy didn't need to stick her head out far to see the owner of that giggling voice. It was Tessa.
Un
like on the plane, this time it definitely was not a trick of her imagination when she saw Dominick's jaw clench. He never quite lost his smile, but there was no hint of pleasure anywhere in his eyes when he said, "Joy."
"Breakfast in fifteen?" Emil asked, trying to keep the conversation light.
"Sounds good to me." Tessa flashed Maddy a triumphant smirk. "That should be plenty of time for us girls to get looking our best."
She laughed, a tinkling sound that said plainly that, for at least one of them, it wouldn't be.
Maddy didn't say anything, she just closed her door. She stood for a long time, her light embarrassment fading into all out humiliation. She didn't feel hungry at all right now. She probably ought to stay in her room. She wasn't here to get laid, anyway; she was here to do a job. She'd be better off if she kept her distance from the others and wrote her article without falling victim to the kind of distraction the dark-eyed Master across the hall most certainly would be. She should let Tessa have him, since she so obviously wanted him.
Except that, that laugh…
Maddy frowned. That laugh grated against every raw nerve in her already heightened body. Tessa was pretty… Okay, she was beautiful. But just like size didn't matter, when it got right down to it, beauty wasn't everything, either. Pushing away from the door, Maddy walked through the barren living room, past the brand new couch set, still wrapped in its store-bought plastic covers, and looked at herself in the bathroom mirror.
She hated mirrors. Mirrors had an awful habit of telling the truth, but even as she looked past the obvious—the reflection of a woman carrying a little too much weight and no longer in her twenties—she knew she wasn't ugly. Far from it; in certain lights… maybe not this one… some people might consider Maddy pretty or at the very least handsome in her own right. Maybe she hadn't licked Dominick yet, but she had seen him first and that should count for something.
He liked her, too. At least, he seemed to. Enough to flirt with her at any rate, and to take exception to her ill-thought-out comment. He'd swatted her for it. Twice. That should count for even more.
Squaring her shoulders, Maddy frowned at her reflection. Fifteen minutes wasn't a lot of time and she harbored no illusions that she could ever compete with someone like Tessa when it came to looks alone. But maybe she didn't have to. Maybe, all she had to do was…
A light, two-knuckled knock tapped at her apartment door, summoning her back out of the bathroom. She went to answer it, her suddenly sweating palms already suspecting who she was going to find standing outside, only it wasn't Dominick. It was a pirate standing at her door. He was half naked. Well, not really. He wore brown pants, clean, neatly crafted to look tattered at the shins, and a bright red sash around his lean waist, decorated with what looked like fairly authentic single-shot guns and a cutlass. He had her bags; a duffel slung over one brawny shoulder and her big blue roll-around sitting up on its wheels at his hip. An entire crew of fellow pirates filled the hallway, trundling past her door with bags slung over shoulders or wheeled behind them on rollers.
"Miss Cameron?" her pirate asked. "I believe these belong to you."
"I believe they do, too." Wondering if she was supposed to tip him for the service, she didn't remember she'd dropped her purse until she nearly tripped on the strap. "Oh, uh…" She dropped to grab her wallet and kicked the rest of the scattered contents—mostly receipts and pens, a package of Tic Tacs, lip balm, some tampons (not due for a couple weeks, but hey, a girl had to travel prepared)—out of the way so he could bring them in.
"Settling in, I see," he joked, flashing her a smile made up of more white teeth than she imagined any true pirate had ever had.
Feeling sheepish, Maddy laughed. "Yeah. Sorry about the mess."
She tried to hand him a couple dollars, but he waved it away.
"Colden Tindall," he introduced himself, tapping a two-fingered salute to the yellow scarf he wore about his head. "If motivation toward tidiness is something you think you need, just ask for me. I'm sure I could find ways to help."
He winked before he left. That wink didn't help dispel any of the lingering tingle still alive and well where Dominick had swatted her. In fact, it made it worse. It also went a long way toward proving he might only be flirting with her because it was his job to do so. On the other hand, it was also Colden's job to bring her her bags, and he'd also stayed to flirt, so perhaps she wasn't so old or big or unattractive that she couldn't still have a good time while she was here.
Shaking her head, Maddy shifted her suitcase far enough into the living room to close her door again. Within a minute, there was another knock.
Expecting another pirate, she opened with a smile. "Ye—" Her smile froze when she saw Tessa.
"Hi," the redhead offered, much too bright and cheerful for it to be genuine.
"Hi," Maddy cautiously replied. Her instinct was to shut the door. Thirty-eight years as her mother's daughter dictated she not be rude.
"He likes to fuck ass, you know." Hooking her thumbs into her back pockets, Tessa propped her shoulder against the threshold. She watched Maddy closely, so as not to miss the slightest hint of whatever shock her words might create.
Having never heard anyone begin a conversation quite like that, Maddy didn't bother to hide her surprise. "I'm sorry?"
"Master Dominick," Tessa specified. "I've had dealings with him before. At the Castle. He likes to fuck in ways that hurt… just a little. He likes to make you sweat. Moan. Groan. Cry." She shrugged her eyebrows, her smile more clever than amused. "His favorite thing is to strip his submissive completely naked in a room full of voyeurs, make her get on her knees, and work her until she can't even beg anymore. I just thought you should know that."
For the first time since it had happened, the tingling across the surface of her bottom died. Maddy couldn't feel anything of Dominick's hand now, although the uncomfortable twisting in her gut became a whole lot worse. "Why?"
Tessa shrugged, with her shoulders now as well as her eyes. "Well, in case you want to go for him. I mean, if you really want that, I won't stand in your way. I'll let you have him, in fact. I just have one small word of advice. If you do decide to go for him, I mean."
She really ought to shut the door. Maddy knew it in every fragile crack and crevice of herself. She should close it right now before she heard something she knew she'd later wish she hadn't.
"What advice?" she asked instead, not really curious but more like with the trepidation one would rip off a band-aid. Fast, so it could be endured and gotten over with.
"If you do decide you want to go through everything he's going to love doing to you–" Tessa's smile turned thin and mean. "—you might want to skip the pancakes at breakfast. Try the carrots instead."
It was startling how she didn't even hear Tessa's voice just then. Rather, she heard Virgil's.
…put the fucking cake down and picked up a damn carrot…
Maddy slammed the door. She didn't mean to. It just happened. One minute she was staring at Tessa's ugly, smiling mouth, hearing Virgil's words as they came pouring out, and in the next, the door banged shut between them and all Maddy could do was stand there, stunned, hurt. Wishing she wasn't either.
She blinked twice as Tessa's high tinkling laugh retreated down the hall and the steady tromp of pirate boots continued delivering luggage before leaving again. She stood there for so long, eventually it got quiet outside.
A cold, hard lump grew in the back of her throat. It took time before Maddy could swallow past it, but once she had, she did the only thing she could think of. She dragged her luggage into the bedroom, threw it on the bed, and then she got ready for breakfast.
CHAPTER FIVE
Packing for a trip was a skill like any other and it was, Maddy realized, a skill she'd never acquired. Admittedly, she hadn't had a lot of time to prepare. She was on a plane three days after she got Rita's phone call. At the time of departure, she thought she'd packed rather appropriately. She had her one-piece black sw
imsuit with the sparkling silver gemstones around the straps and waist, her Hello Kitty beach towel, and a wide array of shorts and tank tops. After all, she was going to the Caribbean. She also had one dress, just in case she attended an event that required something fancier than khaki shorts. But Rita had said costumes would be provided, so she hadn't worried too much about clothes. Now, as she stood facing the doorway to the employee dining hall, she wished she'd packed differently.
She tugged at the short skirt of her dress, adjusted the spaghetti straps, and tried to steady her breathing. She half suspected she might look ridiculous. She'd brought her galaxy dress; a swirl of black, blue and deep purple colors that looked exactly like, well, the galaxy, scattered with stars and the vague shadows of a small planet low on the skirt, and black high heels. It was her favorite dress, but not something anyone would wear to a BDSM dungeon. Not that this was a BDSM dungeon, she reminded herself. It was a get-to-know-one-another over a very late breakfast. It was practically lunch at this point. From the sounds of it, she was one of, if not the last to arrive. She hoped she wasn't overdressed.
Tessa would be in that dining hall. She was probably dressed in something svelte and sexy. Maddy was going to look like a sausage wrapped in the freakin' Milky Way.
She almost lost her nerve. She had so many knots in her stomach, if she tried to eat anything she was going to be sick.
She breathed in deep, trying to squelch her nerves, and failed. Oh God, she was going to make a fool of herself.
She couldn't do this.
She was too old for this. Too old for galaxy dresses and BDSM clubs and gorgeous hunks of man-flesh like Dominick. She was too heavy, too. Not all the mascara and lipstick in the world was going to hide the fact that she couldn't compete with beautiful, mean-spirited women, and what in the world had she been thinking to try!