Beauty's Beast

by Carolyn Faulkner

  And if it took blistering her little behind every time she had a derogatory thought about how she looked to get her to stop running herself down – and he wouldn't hesitate to punish her, either, if she all of a sudden decided to find something else wrong with herself – then that's what he'd do.

  At the moment, however, even though he knew he was going to be drastically changing the color of the landscape that was laid before him, he couldn't get over just how gorgeous she was. Wonderfully generous in some places, such as the bottom that was perched precariously over the unmistakable evidence of his desire, and completely in proportion in others, with long, shapely legs and very cute feet.

  "Dear God, you're beautiful, woman," he said reverently.

  Taren snorted loudly and got a very hard smack on her bottom for her efforts that made her shriek her displeasure and try to reach back to lay a defensive hand over that most vulnerable spot. But she found, instead, that not only had she failed to protect herself, but she'd lost the only hand she still had free, since her other hand was blocked from reaching back – or, in truth, doing anything that even remotely smacked of helpfulness – by the chair as well as the mountain of a man who was sitting in it.

  Now he had her wrist held at the bottom of her back, just above the beginning gentle swells of her buttocks, and she was well and truly defenseless against anything he decided to do to her.

  "I'll not have you contradicting me in this, Taren. You're going to end up here every single time I here you saying anything derogatory about your looks as surely as you would if I caught you with a cigarette in your mouth."

  His hand ran up and down her skin again, his mouth watering. "Every little bit of you is stunning – your body, your face, your mind."

  She snorted again at a very bad time, just when his hand was at the bottom of her bum, right where it became thigh, and that's where the next swat landed, so hard it knocked a startled yelp out of her.

  And then they just kept coming, at least as hard, if not harder, as that last one.

  "I've seen you with your brother, and with Lynette, and with Nila, who I can tell you don't like. You're a bit prickly, as if you think you need to ward anyone off saying anything to you that might make you remember who you really are, that might call attention to the marks you wear."

  She was forced to listen to him, but his hand was where every beat of her heart was focused now because of what it was doing to her, creating a sting the likes of which she hadn't felt in a very long time, one that compounded exponentially with each crisp swat. One that thrummed to life with each additional crashing together of flesh, the unyielding against the indefensible, subjected to both terrible rhythms that fed off each other as he decorated that roses and cream complexion of hers until every inch of it blushed a fierce, hot red.

  "But those are marks of honor, my Taren. Every single ridge and bump. I can't imagine the amount of pain you had to endure to get them – and then to recover from them."

  She had long since started crying, and if the way he had blistered her rear hadn't achieved it, his words – and the fact that she could hear that he was holding back tears himself – would have more than done it.

  "I don't know what anyone else sees when they look at you, but I see you as absolutely perfect. I see you smiling, your eyes sparkling, looking mischievous because you're teasing your brother or making some kind of smart remark. I see all of that hair that I want to wind around my wrist and hold in my hand as I…"

  He was already rock hard beneath her – she could feel him pressing proudly up against her.

  Bruce cleared his throat. "Well, I'm allowing myself to become distracted, but then you do that to me, too, in case you hadn't realized it. When I look at you, I see all of you – not just the wonderful proof of just how much you love your brother and how brave you are – but every bit of you."

  No one had ever called her scars wonderful before. Few people acknowledged that she even had them, except the ones who out-and-out stared at her. No one close to her even saw them anymore, she knew.

  But she did.

  And he did, apparently, although he…

  He was making her fall in love with him with every word he said, as if she wasn't already halfway there. He was almost too good to be true, which made her even more wary of him than she might have been. Far from being the embodiment of what she had expected him to be – a vapid, self absorbed actor – she had found that he was smart and generous and unfailingly kind to everyone, as well as very industrious and hard working, even at a job that technically wasn't even his!

  He had stopped spanking her, and she expected that he'd just help her up and that would be that, but instead he lifted her into his arms, planting his lips on hers and walking with her into his bedroom. The only thing he had asked for from them was a king sized bed, so his small room was all bed.

  Bruce couldn't quite believe that feisty Taren wasn't registering an indignant protest at his high-handedness, but she wasn't, and he wasn't about to say anything that might break the spell she was under.

  He lay her down on the bed as gently as he could, but her bottom was still bare, and she moaned when it came into contact with the comforter, her breath hissing in through her teeth.

  "Hurts, yeah?" he asked, stretching out on the bed beside her.

  Taren nodded vigorously, thinking that he was going to commiserate with her, perhaps even apologize for having spanked her.

  No such luck.

  "Good. Next time you'll think twice about saying something so horrible about yourself, won't you, lass?"

  That got him nothing but a deep growl in response.

  He surprised her by sitting up suddenly and pulling his shirt over his head while she lay there and watched, biting her lip as she saw his lightly hair covered, impressively broad, exceedingly well-muscled chest. Her fingers itched to touch it, and her hand even came up, but she was hesitant, and became more so when he reached down to try to unbutton her shirt.

  Her hand came out to stop him without her even thinking about it, and, to his credit, his hands halted immediately. For some reason, the heavy weight of them on her stomach made her shiver.

  "What is it, baby?" he asked, his voice softer than she'd ever heard it before, caressing over her skin like gossamer.

  "No, Bruce, please. I-I'll make love with you – I want to," she confessed, surprising herself as well as him with her admission, especially considering the current condition of her behind, not looking at him but at where her hand rested on his, appearing quite wee, she realized, in comparison. It would have been enough to make her smile any other time. But not now. Things had gotten very serious between them very quickly – although she knew he didn't necessarily see it that way; she did. "But I'd really like to…" She had tried, but there was no holding the tears back, especially since she'd already been sobbing over his lap. "to keep m-my c-clothes…"

  There was no way he could take a second more of her trying to tell him that she wanted to be with him but only if she could remain clothed. There must be more scars than just what met the eye, he realized, and nearly kicked himself for it. Of course there were. She'd been in a fire.

  Taren found herself immediately scooped up onto him where he was half lying against the headboard, half lying down. But he had every bit of her gathered into those big strong arms of his, and it felt like Heaven on Earth to her, making her heart ache, wishing she felt comfortable enough to just lay her head on his chest and let him take care of her. But even more than that, deep down inside her, she wanted to feel free enough with him to be fully naked with him.

  She was close to that, but couldn't quite get herself the rest of the way towards trusting him completely with all of her secrets.

  "Oh, honey, stop, please. You're going to break my heart," he whispered against the top of her head. He tilted her beloved face up to his and kissed her reverently, then pressed his lips over all of her face, busily kissing away tears. "Why don't you just let me love you? I won't do anyth
ing you don't want me to. The light in here is fading fast, and I won't insist that we turn any on, although I promise you I will in the future," he warned softly. "But not now. Right now, I just want to fill my hands and my mouth and my heart with you, to hear you start out sighing and end up screaming my name."

  He didn't really wait for her to answer him one way or the other. Bruce wasn't at all sure he was going to want to hear it, so he decided he was just going to love on her for as long and as far as she would allow. He hoped he could convince her that she had nothing to fear from him in any way – least of all that he might think any less of her just for the few imperfections on her skin.

  He began by encouraging her to stretch out on top of him, even though he knew it was going to be agony for him. There was nothing he would have liked more than to drive himself into her, right here, right now.

  But he would have made himself a eunuch – well, maybe not quite that far, but pretty close – before he'd do anything that might risk turning her off or scaring her.

  She lay atop him, and she might have straddled him, but her jeans and panties were still bunched at her knees. Blushing brightly, Taren dismounted and pushed her pants off, but kept her tiny little panties, as if they would be any kind of defense against him, but, ridiculous as it was, it helped her feel not quite that horribly vulnerable to him.

  Not that she worried much about that need. He had proven himself to be, not just a very pleasant man, but, despite the fact that her bottom was still burning, also quite the gentleman in most ways.

  When she reclaimed her position, she kept a leg on either side of his hips, her heat landing directly over the growing bulge in his pants. She stretched herself out over the rest of him, though, laying her cheek on his bare chest, liking the way his chest hairs tickled her face and the feel of his warmth and strength beneath her.

  It was like lying down on top of a surprisingly docile bull.

  "Comfy?" he asked, tugging her head back a bit so he could look down at her, with his hand buried in her hair.

  "Very. You're so warm!"

  "I'm glad."

  His mouth found hers, and he did his best to content himself with merely kissing her, not that it was a trial – just the opposite. It had him raring to go much more so than he would have preferred, frankly. Her lips fit perfectly with his, and she sank into the kisses, not throwing up any roadblocks whatsoever, letting him arch her neck back, cup her jaw and take her mouth.

  The only sounds he heard from her were sighs of pleasure and the occasional whimper when he changed things up, began to nibble on her neck, rewarded by her soft sighs.

  "I remembered that you liked that."

  He saw a blush creep over her face, and she tried to duck away from his kiss, but he wouldn't let her, tipping her mouth to his, his hand stroking slowly up her back to just between her shoulder blades, holding her in place, holding her still for his kiss.

  When he finally pulled back, they were both breathing heavily. "Jesus, Taren," he breathed, and that earned him a big smile of pure accomplishment that he hadn't expected.

  "I thought you said I would be sighing your name, not the other way 'round!"

  He grinned, but she recognized that it was somewhat strained. "You make it difficult, lass." Then he corrected himself, his eyes on hers as he caught her hand and brought it to where he was the most male. "You make it hard. You make me hard. I haven't wanted a woman this badly since I was an untried boy. You make me feel sixteen again, lass."

  Bruce had meant her to feel complimented, but he could see she was troubled by what he'd said, although she hadn't withdrawn her hand, and instead was exploring him tentatively, in a teasing manner that he didn't even think she really knew she was doing. "But you could have any woman – quite literally any woman – and probably any man, too if that was your bent."

  "It's not, by the way," he said, clearing his throat. "There's nothing wrong with that, of course, but I'm uh – as you might have guessed, considering what's beneath your hand – distinctly heterosexual."

  That earned him a timid smile.

  "But you've dated." She seemed determined to compare herself to faceless masses of impossibly, improbably perfect women she imagined he had been – or could be – with.

  His long finger tilted her chin up so that she had to look at him. "No buts, Taren. I'm here with you, and no other woman can change that. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else, with anyone else, but you."

  Her eyes skittered away from him, and he knew that he hadn't convinced her, but he knew that wasn't going to happen in one night, either.

  Finally, he could take her light teasing no longer and yanked her hand from him, long fingers manacled around her wrist.

  "Woman! You're going to kill me dead with those fingers! Either stop touching me entirely…" the words had slipped out of his lips without thought, and he fervently prayed she wouldn't choose that option "or touch me like you mean it. I canna take any more teasing, or I'm going to cum in my pants."

  She looked up at him, a smile of pure triumph playing about her lips. "Really?"

  He gave her a considering look, trying to decide whether she was as innocent as he'd painted her in his mind, and deciding instantly that she was. Her face was too open to afford much in the way of posing, and besides, she wasn't that kind of woman, anyway.

  "Do you mind if I…" Both delicate, feminine hands were at the waistband to his jeans.

  "Hell no!" His vehemence had her grinning.

  He reached down to help her, and she swatted his hands away. "Let me do it. I always did like the idea of undressing a man."

  Bruce squelched the entirely jealous noise that threatened to leak out of his throat. He was no virgin. He could hardly expect her to be, but the idea of her being like this with anyone else – it made a massive shudder run through him that she could hardly have missed.

  For her part, Taren was having a hard time not being truly agog at his size. Of course, he was a big man all over, but she knew– not necessarily from experience but having read a tremendous amount – that wasn't necessarily a good indicator, but he seemed to be the exception to that rule. She unbuttoned and unzipped then peeled away his jeans, expecting that a lot of what she was seeing was material, but she was dead wrong, and as she freed him from the confines of his pants, he grew even bigger right before her eyes.

  By the time she had his pants down his legs, the broad tip of him was more than peeping out from beneath the waistband of his underwear.

  She put her hand atop him, cupping him almost as he had her, but he groaned.

  "No more, please."

  Taren found she liked it when he begged.

  "Please, touch me."

  A lot.

  To have a man like him, who was so much a man, who was larger than life in many ways, and obviously quite experienced in such things – much more than she – begging her to touch him had her dampening her panties even more than they already were.

  Hooking her fingers into his waistband, she drew them down, slowly, delighting when he sprang forth out of this last bit of confinement, and she did her best not to stare, but she wasn't very successful as she relieved him entirely of his underwear. She'd never seen a man so well endowed in her life – not that she slept around at all – and not that she'd watched much in the way of porn, either.

  But still. It was impressive, just like the rest of him, and not a little intimidating.

  Her hand itched to touch it, so she did, finding it warm and hard and surprisingly velvety.

  Watching her explore him, so full of undisguised wonder, a thought occurred to him.

  His fingers tangled themselves in her hair. "Are you a virgin, my love?" He didn't think so, but he had to ask. She was staring at him as if he was an alien and touching him as if it was something she'd never before encountered.

  But she shook her head solemnly, saying in a tight, sharp voice, "I've only done it once, and it was…hurried, and he didn't want me to undress much, and he
didn't, either, and it was…not very satisfactory."

  It sounded horrible, and he felt his heart rending inside him for the young woman she must've been, whose first time was with a callus dick who obviously just wanted to get off.

  Forgetting what he'd promised her, and ignoring the demands of a cock that desperately wanted to continue to feel her hands around it, he leaned down and wrapped his arms around her, guiding her to lie on her back next to him and leaning a bit over her to brush her hair away from her face.

  He took heart that she hadn't winced away from him touching her left cheek. "Taren, my love, your first time should have been full of roses and magic and champagne, and your lover should have made sure you came so hard you thought you were going to expire from it."

  She frowned up at him. "I thought it was supposed to hurt the first time?"

  Bruce's eyes went wide, and his jaw clenched. He could barely get the question out through his teeth, "He hurt you?"

  Taren shrugged, and Bruce was appalled by just how blithe she was about it. "It hurt. I thought it was supposed to. He didn't really want to do it, anyway, and I wasn't really ready for him."

  His fingers covered her mouth gently. "Stop. Please." He thought if she said one more word about her atrocious experience, he was going to have to kill someone, starting with the jackass who hurt her unnecessarily. "And in answer to your question, no. If a man cares enough to take his time, to make sure you want him enough that you can't think of anything else, that your body has prepared the way for him naturally, and not to stab at you like a mindless, rutting bull, then there doesn't have to be anything but unbelievable joy. It shouldn't hurt." He was getting worked up again, and he took a deep breath, continuing much more calmly, "Taren, I can't tell you how much I wish this was your first this time, right now, here, with me, because the asshole you were with back then…"