Hearing a woman’s voice might just do the trick.
* * *
Marco ran from the house and across the backyard. He had to get away. From what, he couldn’t remember.
He only knew he needed to run. The briars grew thicker and scraped his legs, but he didn’t slow down. Gino would have kept him on the path, but Gino wasn’t here this time.
A few yards ahead, he saw his destination. Safety. He dropped onto his knees and crawled the last few feet, under the canopy of brush and sticks until he’d entered the safety of his lair.
He labored to catch a deep breath. The rustle of leaves drew his attention to the entrance of the lair. No!
Hiss. Whack!
The whistling sound of air being dispersed around an unknown impact implement wasn’t enough to fully jar him from the memory, but the sting of what felt like a cane across his thighs jolted Marc back to the present.
“Tell me where you are, boy.”
Grant? What the fuck was she doing in here? Maybe he was hallucinating again. She scared him as much as Damián did.
Adam had cut Marc down what seemed like a couple of hours ago and had tied him to a chair. He’d also removed the hood. The caged light bulb glared from above, casting the room in shadows with Marc in the spotlight. He’d only closed his eyes for a moment to get some relief. He hadn’t been sleeping, but his head must have lolled to tip her off. Adam allowed him to rest his eyes every now and then, or maybe he just wasn’t keeping watch over him twenty-four/seven.
Not Grant. She appeared to be in charge now.
Where had Adam gone this time? Probably off sleeping in a nice warm bed with Karla curled up beside him. At least he’d come back down here to check on Marc after he’d gotten back from the hospital.
Marc opened his eyes. Grant leaned over him, her face mere inches from his. He smelled her patchouli scent. “Answer me, boy.”
She was dressed in black fatigues, her hands encased in leather gloves. He closed his eyes. “Sono nel bosco.”
“Speak English.”
“Yes, S—” How was he supposed to address her? He’d almost slipped and called her Sir.
“You answer to me as Mistress, boy.”
“Yes, Mistress.” He couldn’t keep his eyes open.
Hiss. Whack!
Fuck!
“You do not fall asleep on my watch and make me look negligent in the eyes of my master sergeant. Do. You. Hear. Me?” To punctuate each of her last words, she slapped him with the cane on the same part of his thigh where she’d already slapped him twice before to wake him up, stinging before his skin began to burn.
“I’m going to enjoy playing with you and making sure we get to the bottom of every fucking thing you need to figure out to get your sorry life back on track.”
Sounded like both Tops would be using SERE resistance tactics.
“Now, tell me where you were just now in that screwed-up head of yours.”
“In the woods.”
“How old are you?”
“Three.”
“Who’s with you?”
“No one. I’m alone. It’s dark.” He shivered, partly because he was naked, but more so because of the memory of the scene he’d just witnessed. “I’m cold.” Perhaps she’d bring him a blanket. Mistress Angelina would have. Hell, he would have if his submissive was cold.
“Why are you outside alone at that age?” But not Mistress Grant.
As the memory of the dream or whatever it was washed over him again, Marc’s breathing became labored.
She grabbed his chin. “Eyes on me, boy.” He looked at her scowling at him. “Take a deep breath. Now.”
Not wanting her to become upset with him for misbehaving, he did so.
“Tell me why you were out in the woods alone at night?”
“It’s not nighttime. Just dark in the lair.”
“The lair?”
Marc nodded. “I was in the old wolf’s lair where Gino and I played.”
“Where’s Gino?”
“Don’t know. Probably at Mrs. Mil—I can’t remember her name, but the lair was the only safe place I could escape to.”
“How were you connected to the lady you can’t remember the name of?”
Marc tried to remember if she was any relation. “A neighbor, I think. Or maybe a friend of Mama’s. She used to watch us a lot after…”
Mistress Grant waited for him to continue before prompting, “After what?”
He shook his head. He didn’t want to remember that time.
Hiss! Whack!
“I asked you a direct question, boy. I expect an answer. Now.”
Marc stared at her, defiantly refusing to answer.
Hiss! Whack!
Shit! He looked down and watched the new stripe appear on his thighs about an inch away from where the first ones landed and already half as red.
“After Mama got sick.”
Grant patted his cheek. “Good boy. Now why did you have to escape to your lair?”
Hiss! Whack!
He refused to look at his thighs but knew she’d hit him in the same place. He screamed, “Because she’s dead!”
“Who’s dead?”
Marc glared at Grant, not wanting to talk about this any further. When she raised the cane to strike again, he ground out between gritted teeth, “None of your fucking business.”
Something flashed in Grant’s eyes before her lips broke into a slow, deliberate smile. “You think not?” She released him from the restraints and pulled him out of the chair and onto his feet in a matter of seconds. His body wavered a few times before becoming steady. “I’ve just been waiting for an excuse to do this. Adam told me you’d be responsive to a good paddling.”
So Adam had briefed her on his earlier revelation. He’d betrayed him. Again.
She dragged him into the dark area outside the circle of light.
“Fuck Adam—and fuck you, too!” Marc struggled to get away, but his hands remained cuffed together behind his back, rendering him helpless.
“On your knees.” When he refused, he heard the whistle of the cane again. The stinging implement hit the backs of his knees and his legs gave way. He fell onto the cushioned kneelers of one of Luke’s spanking benches, similar to one in his playroom at home. Marc renewed his efforts to get away from her.
No way in hell was Grant going to spank him like some naughty boy.
Or some manwhore to be used by another bitch.
Marc put the full force of his weakened body into a charge for her abdomen, targeting her web belt, but she sidestepped and easily deflected him by bringing her clasped hands down in the center of his left shoulder. Merda! Marc went to his knees feeling as if he’d been hit with a sledgehammer.
Grant’s voice remained calm as she walked behind him. “You are so going to regret that move, boy. But I won’t.” She yanked him into place on the kneelers, then slammed his face against the leather bench. She delivered her whispered promise right next to his ear. “You just earned ten more blows on top of the twenty I’d already planned.”
“Bring it, bitch.”
“Flattery will get you nowhere, boy.”
Grant wrapped the waist strap around him and cinched it tightly. She left his wrists cuffed together behind his back. When she tried to apply the first of the thigh straps to restrain his legs, he kicked out.
“We’re up to forty. You like to test the boundaries, don’t you, boy?”
“I’m fucking tired of you calling me boy, lady. I’m a Dominant, just like you.”
Grant laughed. “You sure about that?”
Marc wasn’t sure of anything anymore. Her words left him feeling further betrayed. Had Adam told her about his self-doubts?
His thoughts distracted him long enough for her to cinch his other thigh into the restraints without resistance. Helpless. He detested being helpless, especially with a woman in control.
No, this was no ordinary woman. She was an Amazon in top physical conditio
n. After the Marines, she’d joined Black Ops. Later, she’d trained as a Domme under Gunnar Larson, the man who also taught Damián the ways of sadism and throwing a whip. She’d learned some vicious means of controlling men twice her size.
His junk was at her mercy for the foreseeable future.
Marc struggled to wriggle out of the bonds but stopped when he realized his efforts only succeeded in exhausting him. He needed to conserve his energy to attempt an escape when she finally released these straps. No woman would ever make him feel helpless again. He wouldn’t give Grant that satisfaction either.
“Maybe I can help you develop an appreciation for the paddle. It’s one of my favorite toys.”
Marc stared at her, trying not to let her intimidate him with her calculating smile. Still, he was in no position to continue to defy her. “Mine, too. Mistress.”
Grant laughed. “But I’ll bet you prefer being on my side of the paddle, don’t you?” Out of the corner of his eye, he watched her walk over to the table where Adam had laid out a number of implements. But she ignored the paddle Adam had placed there instead opening her own toy bag. When she turned, he saw she’d retrieved a wooden paddle into which she’d driven rounded-top upholstery tacks, causing the surface to be uneven in order to inflict greater pain. He’d seen her reduce bigger men to tears with that thing. The surface was only about two inches wide, which would heighten the pain. Judging by the muscle tone in her abs and her arms, Marc knew she wouldn’t hit like a girl.
She returned to his side and surprised him by rubbing the paddle over the backs of his thighs. She used the smooth side of the paddle until she flipped it to run the raised tacks over the cane and tawse welts on his ass. She warmed him up with a number of light taps to bring the blood to the surface and prepare him. Marc’s fists clenched in rage and humiliation as his cock began to stir to life.
Grant laughed again. “Does my boy like that?”
“No, Mistress. Anyone touching my ass like that could get a rise out of my cock.”
“How about when I touch it like this?”
Whack!
Marc growled, but the impact ended any chance of arousal. A masochist he was not.
He gritted his teeth and spat out, “Bring it.”
She gave a menacing chuckle before delivering four more swats in rapid succession, alternating between two spots, one on each cheek. She seemed to be using the smooth side of the paddle, but the stinging on his already raw skin grew worse with each swat.
Her scratchy-gloved hand stroked over his burning skin, further irritating the marked areas. She smacked him with her hand, the rivets or whatever digging farther into his skin.
She delivered the next twenty-five swats with the smooth side of the paddle, as well.
Anger boiled up. “Fuck you!”
“Now, boy. I see we haven’t broken you of that nasty defiant habit yet, have we?”
Before the paddle even hit, he knew she’d flipped it over to the tack side.
Gesù. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!
The sting hadn’t begun to dissipate before she landed another blow. Marc fought his bonds. “I’d rip your fucking head off and shit down your neck if I wasn’t restrained!”
The bitch did nothing but smile. “Silly malesub. Think you’re a match for Mistress Grant?”
“I’m not a sub.”
Whack!
Rather than alternate cheeks, she landed this blow on the same spot as the last, and it took Marc longer to regain his senses. He wasn’t sure he could speak without betraying how much pain he was in. How many had that been? Was she even counting? Merda, could he handle any more like that one?
“You’ve had two more added because you can’t fucking police your mouth, sailor boy.”
Raking her gloved fingertips over his sore ass and up his back, she leaned toward his ear and whispered, “Tell me who else paddled you, boy.”
Marc refused to answer.
Whack!
She put her mouth up to his ear. “Tell. Me. Who was the first to paddle you?”
Marc remained silent.
Whack!
“I’ve got all fucking day. You’ve earned ten more.” Again, she rubbed the raw skin on his ass before stroking more gently up his back to his neck. Maybe it just felt gentler because the skin on his back hadn’t been pummeled.
His focus concentrated on the burning in his ass.
Whack!
“I can’t hear you, sailor. Who was it?”
“Fuck off.”
“If you can’t obey and speak to me properly, I might as well remove your ability to talk and give you more time to think about obeying and answering my fucking questions. Open.”
He kept his mouth closed tightly until she pressed the joints of his jaw causing him to lose control of his muscles. His mouth opened and she rammed the ball gag inside with ease, strapping it snugly around his head.
“How does that feel, Marco?”
Why was Grant calling him by his childhood name?
Damn you, Adam, for unleashing this bitch on me and giving her just enough ammo to take me back to that night.
The next two blows on the same spot elicited an uncontrolled scream into the gag. Sweat ran down his forehead to the side of his head, but he’d lost the ability to fight any longer.
“Does it make that cock of yours hard?”
No! Mrs. Giovanni’s voice shattered through his psyche.
His screamed obscenities were lost in the ball gag. She dragged her nails down his back and onto his inflamed ass. He hissed as he drew a breath and tried to hold it as she ventured farther down to his balls and squeezed them. His cock sprang to life under him. He hoped and prayed she couldn’t see it. His face grew as red as his ass must be.
She reached under him and grabbed his erect cock. Her chuckle made him boil with impotent anger.
“My own Italian stallion. If only my husband were hung half as big as you are. You’re going to be God’s gift to women for the rest of your life.”
Marco didn’t want to be any woman’s gift.
Whack! Whack!
Why was his cock so hard, throbbing?
She continued to paddle him with her carved wooden hairbrush. “Come for me, Marco. You will come for me now!”
His cock exploded onto her bedspread. He’d fucking come! Of course, it didn’t take much at his age to get an erection, but he felt mortified nonetheless.
Anger seethed beneath the surface. If he ever got the chance, he would let Mrs. Giovanni feel the bite of that hairbrush. He would show her no mercy. But he fucking wouldn’t make her come. She’d probably like that way too much…
* * *
Hour sixty-six under way. Adam stood next to Grant trying to determine what to try next. Adam hadn’t counted on Marc regressing to a time he didn’t speak English. When Grant removed the ball gag, they’d had difficulty understanding what was going on in Marc’s head.
Grant adjusted some knobs on the surveillance equipment. “My training focused more on Arabic and Farsi, Top. We need Angelina in here. She’ll be able to communicate with him in his native tongue.”
“No way we’re bringing in anyone who didn’t train at SERE School. Let’s move him, then give him some water.”
He and Grant removed Marc from the spanking horse, and Grant helped Marc down his daily eight-ounce allotment of water. Together, they laid him on a mattress in the back of the room. She applied ointment to his welts to help ease the pain. Grant had followed his orders perfectly and had taken him back to the memory with Mrs. Giovanni in record time. Adam knew a woman’s voice would succeed much better than his own.
But what the hell had happened at the end of that triggered memory? Marc had reverted to Italian gibberish in a small boy’s voice. Adam watched on the monitor as Grant reentered the dungeon and helped Marc drink. The past two hours had been under Grant’s control. Marc didn’t take well to women having authority over him.
A litany of Italian shouts spewed from his mouth, a
nd Adam watched Marc thrash around on the mattress.
Had they managed to get Marc to a point where he’d be able to remember some of what had blocked him and wreaked havoc in his relationships with women?
As they returned to the weight room, Grant said, “I can call her. Just say the word. You’re in charge, of course.”
Marc let loose with another string of words Adam couldn’t decipher.
Adam scrubbed his face. He wished he’d never started this fucking scene. Watching Marc go through so much shit, even if he didn’t understand what was happening, and not being able to provide him with anything that would help him resolve the demons from his past made him feel as if they’d only made it to the edge of the abyss.
“No, mamma!”
Those words he understood even with the accent, but Marc added more Italian and lost him again. What the hell had she done—and which mama was he remembering?
“Call her.”
Grant nodded and left the dungeon.
“She’s gone.” The lost tone in Marc’s words led Adam to return to him. He hunkered down next to Marc’s face. “Who’s gone?”
The word barely came out in a whisper. “Mama. I didn’t help her, and she went away forever.”
The flashback crashed through his defenses. Adam saw his father lying in a pool of blood. His mother lay next to the body and told Adam to run. He’d left her lying there paralyzed.
This isn’t your scene. Adam shook off the memory. He needed to regain his focus on Marc.
Adam’s attention returned, but his heart raced until he was able to put a lid on those feelings about his own past. He’d made peace with all that.
“What were you supposed to do to help her?” Had Marc’s mother abused him?
“Get her some water.”
“How would not having a drink of water kill her?”
“It did! Mama needed water because…” Marc’s voice trailed off.
Adam waited and watched Marc’s eyelids flutter rapidly as images of the past bombarded him in his trancelike state. Nothing made sense to Adam yet. He needed to dig further. At least Marc was remembering in English now.
“Tell me what happened.”
Marc’s brows furrowed. “You won’t understand.”
“Try me. What’s going on?”
Somebody's Angel (#5 in a Military Romance / BDSM Romance series) (Rescue Me) Page 43