He didn’t let her voice break off his lecture. “—then you’d be dead right now. You’re lucky no one else saw you up on the wing, in any case, Eleanor. You have no idea what could have happened to you if you were captured. Rape, murder, or both come to mind. Not to mention being captured and enslaved, which you should be more frightened of because you had a taste of it. But let me tell you, you had it easy compared to what’s out there. Females of other races are sometimes chained to the walls and—”
Just as he was psyching himself into a right horror, she spun around. “I’m sorry, okay?” she groaned, already wilting from his lecture.
“You’re going to be a lot sorrier in the morning. But it can wait until we’re in our apartment on the mothership.”
Her face went through a tide of different emotions. She seemed confused for a while, and then worried, and then embarrassed, and finally indignant. “Graham, you can’t just spank me every time I—”
“Deserve to be spanked? I guarantee you it won’t be a problem for me. Now, are you awake? Because if you want to keep arguing, I’m going to assume that you’re not interested in sleeping.” There was promise in his voice, and after eyeing his face with a wary glance, she shook her head. He was satisfied with this and led her toward their room, where on the other side of the hall they could hear Fie throwing up, loudly, while Jio and Peyton talked to him comfortingly and Thorton griped at Mary for attempting to bandage him.
As they entered the room where he and Eleanor had been sleeping, Graham distantly reminded himself that his life had always been crazy. If anyone could handle life with a mostly human wife, it would be him. Already, even though he could feel distressed emotions fuming from her, he could still see her mind working on all cylinders behind her eyes. Her brain was always turned on to the fullest, thinking things through, problem solving. And he, who easily sailed through for fourteen years of risky combat, decided he could be her match. He could keep his head calm in a storm, and a girl like Eleanor was going to be kicking up a whole hurricane, this he knew.
* * *
“What did you call him to lead to this?” Mary asked, wrapping Thorton’s knee now that it was reset.
“Do you know what a zoopafoob is?” Thorton asked, gritting his teeth together.
“No.”
Thorton dropped his head back to his pillow. “Yeah, I don’t think there is a human equivalent. Let’s just say it’s pretty bad. Still, he cheated. And Ellie’s gonna kill me when she realizes that I gambled away the hovercycle. I know she wanted me to at least take her on a ride before the boss made her get rid of it…”
Peyton came in finally from visiting Fie, his expression reflexively dark. He knew. And what was strange was that she was glad that he knew. She hadn’t been able to really look at him since he returned; she felt too guilty.
Mary glanced at him, blushed, and then gave Thorton a sort of desperate expression. “Alright, so, before you do anything rash to my Mary,” Thorton said, understanding Peyton’s firm look toward Mary, “understand that she’s a good girl, led astray by the small one.”
“I can’t believe that you’re the one who drugged him,” Peyton sighed, obviously disappointed. “What could Ellie have possibly said to talk you into doing that? Please say blackmail.”
Mary blushed; she was wrapping Thorton’s knee as slowly as possible. “She explained what she was doing, and I got lost somewhere when she was explaining something about magnetic repulsion and radio waves. I didn’t even think she had brains, you know? Not real ones. I just thought I’d throw her a bone… I thought she knew how to keep out of trouble…” She shrugged when she saw Peyton’s incredulous gaze. “She was pretty damn good at it when she worked for Jazeel.”
Peyton looked somewhat amazed that Mary could be that naive. “Mary, baby… We worked as a team. I was in charge of making sure she didn’t do anything stupid, and not because Jazeel wanted me to. All she could do was listen in on Jazeel’s inner monologue—she doesn’t have enough sense to rub two thoughts together. Never has. I’ve never seen someone so tunnel-visioned in my life.”
“I didn’t know,” Mary admitted, shaking her head innocently.
“You knew better.”
“Peyton, let her be, eh? She’s patched me up pretty well!” Thorton piped in, patting Mary’s hand reassuringly. “We should all be lucky enough to have a Mary in our lives!”
Mary shook her head, her face blushing. “No, no. Poor Fie—I don’t know what I was thinking! Even Ellie almost died tonight. It was the biggest clusterscrew in history.” Her lips were curled with disgust for herself. She had been at Fie’s side all night, discovering how much an eight-foot man could throw up. She had found out that it was a lot. She was lucky he hadn’t had heart failure. She could have never lived with herself.
Thorton looked surprised to see a tear drop down Mary’s cheek. She was deep in picturing how bad things could have gotten that night. “It’s okay, Mary. Everything worked out okay,” Thorton reminded.
“You’re done,” Mary told him, sticking out a strong chin. “Just get some sleep, Thorton, and for God’s sake—take it easy.”
Peyton’s eyes softened when he saw her tears. He led her out of the room with his hand gently on the small of her back. He heard her sniffle.
“Thorton’s right. Everything did end up working for the best,” he heard himself saying soothingly. “Don’t cry, darlin’…”
“I was stupid.”
“Ellie was stupid.” If she didn’t know any better, she would say he was arguing against his earlier self. But she knew that Peyton didn’t like seeing her upset.
“No, Ellie was being Ellie. I was being stupid.” She shook her head stubbornly, more tears escaping her eyes. “If I hadn’t done it, Ellie wouldn’t have been in any trouble. She wouldn’t have gotten the chance to get into it! Poor Fie!” She wiped her face clean with her hand, but tears soon replaced the ones that she wiped off.
“Let’s just go to sleep for now, honey. You’ll feel better in the mornin’,” he cooed sympathetically, putting his muscular arms tightly around her.
He got her to believe that sleep would make her feel better. But when they did go to sleep, she just dreamt of it. Dreamt of Ellie being stuck up thirty feet, the bottoms of her bare feet stuck to the spaceship as she froze to death in a heavily polluted space station. Peyton had way better circulation than either of the girls, and he still had to wear several layers—even double socks. And he still came in half-frozen!
After the same nightmare woke her up twice, she sighed loudly and crawled out of bed and began rummaging around in the dark for Peyton’s belt, which was still on the pants he was wearing that day.
It was probably about six o’clock in the morning, which meant the Swarii were probably up and at ‘em already, and Mary and Peyton had been asleep for a measly four hours. But when she found the belt, she got up on the bed and knelt by Peyton’s head. “Honey?”
Peyton slowly woke up by opening his eyes and closing them. When the sight of her leaning over his head in the darkness actually sank in, his eyes opened again, this time much more awake and much wider. “What’s wrong?” he asked, wiping the sleep off of his face as he sat up. He turned on the light next to him.
“I think you should spank me,” she said quietly, her cheeks flushing, wringing the belt in her hands.
Peyton’s eyebrows raised with surprise. “Just a couple weeks ago, you said I didn’t have the right to spank you. Now you request it?” He didn’t sound incredulous as much as amused.
“I can’t sleep, Peyton. I feel like… like I owe someone something, you know? It’s weighing on my conscience. I don’t want to get away with anything. You know Ellie won’t, and I don’t want her to get punished but I get off scot-free.”
Peyton sighed. He was obviously tired. He was probably dreaming about going to the Super Bowl again… It had been awhile since he saw one of those. Still, he looked Mary up and down, concern etched across his face.
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br /> “Alright,” he said, rolling out of bed and heading over toward his pants, which he quickly pulled on, as if being naked while punishing her was an inappropriate act. “I was going to punish you, but then you were doing such a great job of punishing yourself. But you’re right—punishment should come from me.” He opened his palm so she could lay the belt into it. “The great thing about having me around is that you don’t have to punish yourself.”
She already looked like she was second-guessing this whole thing, and very slowly put the belt into his hand.
He put his other hand on her cheek and gently stroked her with his thumb. “I’m really proud of you—for coming to me for this,” he told her, smiling softly.
“Good you think so,” she replied, sounding like she was in pain already. “I think I must be nuts.”
“You’ll feel better about it, I promise.”
* * *
Peyton helped her off of the bed and wheeled her naked body around the other side of him. He sat on the bed and pulled her over his lap. The cut still healing above his ankle tingled at the remembrance of the last time—the last spanking that was already so different. She was letting him arrange her body over his knee so her wrists were pinned to the small of her back by one of his hands, and his leg held down the backs of her knees. There wasn’t very far she could go.
“Now, what are you about to be spanked for?” he asked somberly.
“Doing something devious, let alone far against the Hippocratic Oath…” she groaned, crossing her feet nervously.
“Yes, ma’am. That’s correct.” She was adorable, Peyton thought. He just loved her. It nearly killed him when he raised the belt up and brought the leather down upon her bare bottom, and he found himself cringing when he did it. Smack! There was hardly a sound from her—merely a guttural moan. He brought it down again, and again.
About the tenth smack, she cried, “Please stop! That’s enough!” but he kept on.
“It’s not enough,” he replied firmly. “We’re just gettin’ goin’.” And he was just getting going—her bottom was barely spanked enough to make any part of it pink. And although she had asked for this lesson, he was still going to teach it properly. What she had done, he reminded himself, was dangerous, and irresponsible, particularly for a girl in her late twenties. With Ellie it was predictable—if she was the type who’d go to college, she’d be one of the first of them to get drunk and not show up to midterms. Mary wasn’t. She had more self-control than that. But obviously, she could be talked into stupid.
“Peyton!” she yelped. “I’m sorry! Just stop!”
She began to try to violently squirm from his grip. But he knew she wouldn’t bite him again. He didn’t want to have to punish her for that infraction again. This time, it would have been much worse.
The belt, be it convenient, was not one of his favorite tools to spank with. When he had time, he liked to use a wooden paddle at the palace—that was easier to wield. Belts and straps were long enough to give him less control of the territory he was spanking. He wanted her bottom a nice shade of red, but he didn’t want her bruised.
She squealed and screamed loud enough for probably the whole ship to hear, and that, he decided, was for the better. Everybody needed to hear that serious mistakes were dealt with, even by the humans. But eventually her yelps and demands shrank down into sobs. Finally, she fully submitted to her punishment. She was letting him do this—she didn’t even fight him any longer.
Her bottom was a very pretty red—it was a dark color, really. The zone he had covered was from the top of her bottom to nearly above her knees, mostly because he knew that spanking the thighs hurt more. She should feel properly punished from this—she would feel better. Her penance was fully paid.
Finally, he felt he could put the belt down and rub her bottom as she sobbed over his knee. He released her hands. “Shh, baby,” he cooed at her. “It’s over.” He helped her into standing, watching her continue crying, and then took her onto his lap. He held her and rocked her for a long time until she eventually fell asleep.
He smiled and laid her down and pulled the sheets over her. He pulled off his pants and crawled into the bed next to her. “You are so sexy,” he whispered, knowing she couldn’t hear him. “And you’re such a good wife.” He put his thick arm around her and nuzzled his nose into her long, blonde curls, his groin pushed against her tender, warm bottom. It was easy for him to fall asleep.
* * *
“And y’all are losin’ the war?” Peyton asked flatly, his expression failing to hide how much he was impressed with the immense spacecraft they were ascending to in their small shuttle.
Jack didn’t seem to hear Peyton and crossed his boots in front of him, then passed Ellie a warm, yet short, smile. She would have returned it, but she was too exhausted. She hadn’t slept a wink last night. With every passing moment, she was wishing the shuttle would open itself in space and she would just float away from all of this.
She didn’t regret what she did much, although Fie gave her a scowl when she walked by him that morning to get onto the tiny vessel that would carry them to the mothership.
Now, his peevishness was making her feel… guilt. Which she didn’t like. She hadn’t felt that emotion hardly at all since she’d been abducted, but now she felt sullied and sticky with it.
She knew that this probably wouldn’t last long, since as soon as Graham got her alone again, guilt was going to be last thing she felt, but she still leaned over toward Fie. “It was nothing personal,” she told him, although when she was making her plans she had been glad that it was Fie staying behind, and not somebody else. Fie had, after all, been very unsympathetic about treating her like a science project. She had been probed enough that, when Fie drank the potion Mary had cooked up, Ellie had smiled widely, knowing that she had pulled one over on him for once.
“Wasn’t it?” he asked, the question spitting out with a sullen grunt.
Ellie frowned and avoided Graham’s eyes, although she could feel them at the back of her neck. “Well… it was a little personal,” she admitted, pinching her thumb and forefinger close together. “But I thought it was just going to make you pass out, not make you sick as a dog. Well, maybe a little hungover,” she added as an afterthought. “But not enough that you’d look like you were just in a scuffle with King Kong.”
“I didn’t get half of that,” Fie grunted miserably.
“I’m sorry,” she told him simply. “And I’m not saying that because Graham’s making me say it, or anything like that. I’m sorry that I did that to you. Or had Mary do that to you, rather. It got out of hand.”
“I should have seen it coming,” Fie finally said after a long silence. He peered at her out of the side of his eyes, his face still leaning against the window. “You’re very easy to underestimate. I guess I expected you to act more like a child and less like…well, like I would if I felt I was being imprisoned.” He shook his head. “We didn’t mean to make you feel that way,” he assured her. “We were trying to keep you safe.”
“And trust me, I appreciate that now more than I did yesterday,” she replied, crossing her legs. The memory of nearly freezing to death the day before began to push its way into her mind, and she tried to brush it away before a chill set itself into her bones.
He grinned faintly at this. “You are a lucky one, at least. Maybe that will help you survive.”
“Aw, I think she’ll survive because she’s so cute,” Thorton cut in, and reached down to playfully pinch her cheek. He was seated next to Ellie but just across from Fie, his eye swollen shut and his knee wrapped tight with ice. “Reminds me of this…” he looked like he was searching for a word, “this little pet I had when I was a kid. Defecated in my shoes every day, but I still loved the little jerk because, you know, he was very cuddly.”
Fie and Ellie both simultaneously snorted at this. “You think I’m a jerk?” she asked Thorton teasingly, still trying to alleviate some of the tension in the room.
“A cute jerk,” Thorton said with another cheek pinch.
She brushed him away before her cheek went numb, and then looked over at Peyton. He and Mary were cuddled up closer than ever as they stared out the windows. She was surprised they didn’t look as tired as she was. From the sounds that were coming from across the hall, it was obvious that the pair of them didn’t sleep much either the night before.
Mary and she made eye contact, but Mary didn’t look angry, exasperated, or depressed, not like she had the night before when her body had been practically vibrating with guilt and nerves.
If Mary had been allowed to sleep through the night, then she had seemed to opt out of it. But despite the cries Ellie heard coming down the hall, Mary didn’t seem any worse for wear now. In fact, she seemed positively serene.
Ellie wiggled her nose thoughtfully at this, but she was still avoiding Graham’s eyes, where she knew that a single expression was going to remind her exactly how much trouble she was in, and exactly how little she should be looking forward to her quickly approaching punishment. Despite how calm Mary seemed right now, Ellie highly doubted that she would be feeling the same way after her own punishment.
In fact, she didn’t know how she’d feel at all. It was hard for her to think of consequences until they were right upon her, and she couldn’t think of the future hardly at all. The future was too crazy, and her life now was exotic and foreign. Even her own brain, hormones, and emotions weren’t what they used to be. She felt like she had been upgraded with a whole new physical system but wasn’t issued a user manual.
Graham’s hand fell onto her shoulder and he pointed through the window and said, “There’s where the married apartments are. That’s where we’ll be living while off-planet.”
She risked looking at him then, mostly because his tone sounded much lighter, as if he wasn’t upset with her anymore. And if he wanted to pretend she wasn’t in hot water, she was game to pretend right along with him for as long as he wanted. “What’s the difference between the married houses and the…?”
His Untamed Mate (Swarii Mates Book 1) Page 26