She’s delightfully, deliciously naked. The light from the bathroom limns her smooth curves. Damp tendrils of her hair frame her face. She hesitates in the door, her hands fluttering around her hips as if she wants to cover herself. She doesn’t know her own perfection. But then after a moment, her stance firms, her hands fisting at her sides. My good, brave girl.
“Come to me.” I wait by the bed as she slowly crosses the room. As my shadow stretches over her, her pulse jumps in her throat. She has said she trusts me, but some part of her, the primal instinct, recognizes me as a threat. A predator. A Beast.
And I am. I tower over her, big enough to break her in two.
That’s why I’ve waited so long and prepared so much. In my earlier rages, I’ve risked breaking her which is why I haven’t let myself touch her until I was absolutely in control of myself. I need to be gentle as I master her completely. She can never crave any touch but mine.
Her lashes lift, her incredible eyes meeting mine. “What are you going to do to me?”
“I’m going to teach you, sweetness. How to submit to my commands. How to give yourself fully to me.”
Her chest rises and falls rapidly. But her gaze doesn’t leave mine. I’ve never had a creature look at me with such trust even as she says, “I don’t know if I can do that.”
Oh sweetness, you can. “You don’t have to do a thing.” I can’t stop myself from reaching out and touching her hair. My hand is huge next to her face. I grip one of her damp locks, swallowing it in my fist. “Just let go and be mine.”
Seventeen
Daphne
The Beast looms over me, half in shadow. In the dark, the scarred skin around his mask disappears. When he turns his head I get a sense of deja vu, like I know him from somewhere—
“Go to the bed and lie down, face up.”
I swallow. My hands come up automatically to cover my breasts.
“Ah ah,” he catches my wrists and moves them apart, baring my chest to his gaze. My heart is pounding, overwhelmed. I’m so vulnerable right now.
Still holding my wrists, he backs me to the bed. When he lets go, I scramble up and lay back. Maybe if I obey him, I won’t have to worry. I won’t have to think. Let go and be mine.
He bends to grab something at the base of the bed. When he rises and I see what he holds, I scuttle to the headboard and plant myself there, my knees drawn up to my chest.
“You want to tie me up?” I squeak. “Again?”
He tosses the chain onto the bed. The silver length has a leather cuff on the end. I clutch my wrist.
His gaze never leaving mine, he heads to the foot of the bed, leans down, and reveals a second restraint. There’s one at each corner of the bed. He ends up beside me again, unbuckling the leather cuff for my left wrist.
“Submit, Daphne.”
After a deep breath, I do. I could tell myself I have no choice, but it’s not true. I could’ve protested when he announced it was time for my punishment, and he would’ve backed down, tucked me into bed and coddled me like an invalid. It was my curiosity as much as his depravity spurring us forward. I don’t want to stop. I’m in too deep.
I scoot down and lie back. After a pause, I slowly spread my arms and legs. The ultimate submission. That fact that the position makes my pussy throb has nothing to do with it.
“Good girl,” he murmurs, taking my left arm and securing the cuff around my wrist. “Flex your fingers for me?” I do and he strokes the tips. His dark eyes bore into mine and my core clenches. He only has to touch my fingertips to turn me on.
“Too tight?” he asks. I shake my head. His cheek curls—another smile!—and he heads down to cuff my feet.
“You’re being so good, Daphne. You know what that means?”
“What?” My voice is husky. The sound of it surprises me—I’ve turned into a sexpot. I’ve never felt like this before, but this moment is one of many firsts. He’s still dressed like always, but this time, I’m unafraid as he strips me bare. Lying down and letting him restrain me with an excited willingness.
I’ve never been more turned on. My nipples are crinkled peaks, begging for attention.
“It means you get a reward.” He turns and walks away, leaving me helpless and bound. My arms are stretched over my head, my legs able to bend a little but not move much more than that. What is he going to do to me?
When he returns, I’m almost panting, my heart fluttering in the cage of my chest like a captured bird. But my nipples are harder than ever. And my pussy aches…
“Shhhh.” He lays a large hand on my chest, splayed over my breastbone. “Calm, Daphne. I won’t hurt you.” A quirk of his lips, a crooked smile. “At least, not more than you like. Because you like some pain, don’t you?”
“I…don’t know.”
He reaches behind his back and I cringe, expecting an implement of torture. When he shows me what he’s holding, I almost laugh.
“A rose?” The petals are dark red, just beginning to unfurl.
I crane my neck and he brings the bloom to my face. I inhale the scent. This time memory brings me back to the first time I found the rose—on my pillow in my room at Thornhill. It was a week after my mother died. I was eighteen, almost nineteen. My childhood room felt like it belonged to a stranger, the walls, the bed no longer familiar. Everything had changed. I’d stepped over the threshold from girl to woman, and I would never be the same again.
Deja vu. I’m standing at another threshold now.
The Beast uses the rose to trace the contours of my face. Up one cheek, down the other. Over my lips and down my sternum. He trails the rose between my breasts. The petals tease my already peaked nipples.
“I thought this was punishment?” I manage breathily.
“It is. I’m going to teach you not to be so reckless with what belongs to me.” The rose brushes lower, teasing the taut plane below my belly button. When did my skin get so sensitive?
I hold my breath as the rose dips lower.
“One day, Daphne, I will call and you will run to me.” It’s a promise, a threat, a vow.
I shiver and get that sense of deja vu again. Or maybe a premonition.
He grabs a pillow and slides it under my bottom, propping up my hips. Gods, I’m fully on display now, my labia slick and plump.
“You poor thing. So very needy.” He tickles my folds with a forefinger. “Shall your Master make you feel better? Here?”
I whimper.
“Or maybe you want me here.” He probes my entrance gently. I clench my thighs, drawing them together as far as they can go. Which isn’t very far. The Beast smirks at me, teasing my slick hole as my knees tremble, trying to close to keep him out.
A petal breaks from the rosebud. He rubs the bloom over my folds, tickling my labia. Another petal breaks off, and another. The Beast crouches low and blows over my skin, and I clench my core. The petals scatter.
He spends time with his head angled this way and that, his mouth hovering over me, his lips pursed so each breath sends petals dancing over the bare canvas of my flesh. He sends the petals this way and that until goosebumps rise on my bare midriff and my pussy aches.
Then he straightens, rising over me to observe me like a work of art. My flesh prickles further.
“Beautiful,” he finally pronounces, and turns away.
“No,” I whimper, tugging at my bonds. I’m aching, dying for him to touch me.
“No?” He shoots a smirk over his shoulder. “Are you trying to tell me something, Daphne? Have I given you any indication that you’re in charge?”
I shake my head. Maybe, if I’m a good girl, he’ll come back and ease this crazy ache.
He sets a small wooden box on the bed and lays down beside me, his head by my hip. The bed creaks with his weight.
He turns the rose, shows me the stem. The thorns.
“You told me pain makes you feel alive,” he reminds me. I raise my chin, refusing to cringe away. He circles my nipple with the sharp point. One
wrong move and he’d prick me. My blood would well, the color the same shade as the rose…
“I bought you something.”
He sets the rose aside and opens the box, angling it so I don’t have to crane my neck too much to see the contents: strangely shaped jewelry adorned with glittering green stones.
“Do you know what these are?” He lifts one to show me the clamp mechanism.
“No,” I swallow. “But I can guess.”
“I’d tell you,” he holds the clamp open over my nipple. “But I’d rather show you.” When the clamp closes, the bite sends a shot of sensation straight to my pussy. I breathe out, letting the low-level pain linger and fade away.
The Beast studies my face carefully. He must see the exact moment when I’ve adjusted to one clamp, because he nods. “And the other.”
This time he holds the clamp open over my nipple for an interminable moment. I have to close my eyes. My focus makes the bite worse, or maybe it’s just the compound pricking sensation from two clamped nipples.
“Beautiful,” he says again. “Open your eyes, Daphne.”
I obey and he teases the undersides of my breasts with the rose. My breasts feel fuller, aching not with pain but with need.
“These are far from the most intense clamps I could use. You look so lovely, I might find a pair you can wear all day. With emeralds to match your eyes.”
“You’re nuts,” I say without heat.
“Careful. I have a third clamp I could use.”
Third clamp? “Where…” My voice trails off as I realize what he’s threatening. “Oh.” My eyes widen. “You’d clamp me…there?”
“I would. I will. Not today. We’ll work up to it.”
I should be mad, raging at the thought of him adorning my breasts and clit with jewels and parading me around his castle naked, but I’m panting, incomparably turned on.
“I wonder,” he murmurs, with a studied glance at my pussy. “You can take the pain. But do you like it?”
He rises from the bed, repositioning himself between my legs. With my hips elevated, I can only see the dark top of his head as he bows over me. I stifle a moan as he nuzzles me.
“Oh, Daphne, you like it. You like it very much.” He raises his head enough for me to see his evil expression. “You know what this means?”
“No,” I gasp, my chest heaving.
“There’s so much for us to explore. So many combinations of pain and pleasure. So many ways to make you feel alive…” He lowers himself down and I let my head fall back. I can’t fight anymore. When his tongue finally touches me, I give in.
Eighteen
Beast
She tastes sweet. I’ve scented her before but this is my first taste and oh fuck. I’m supposed to be the one in control here. I fist my fingers into the sheets, chasing her honey with my tongue. I need more. I need every drop. Her lithe body jerks, the emeralds winking at me.
My erection hardens to stone at the sight. She’s submitted so beautifully. Without qualm or question. Only trust. Trust in me.
No one’s ever given themselves to me so freely, before or certainly not after I was scarred. No one’s trusted me like this in my whole life. And for it to be her, Daphne, my Daphne—
The time of punishment is over. Now I’ll reward her so well. I’ll play her body and make it sing.
I undo the nipple clamp even as I suckle harder on her clit. Her head flies back, her body shaking in the grip of orgasm. Her cries ring out.
That’s right. That’s right, beautiful.
And just when her cries reach their crescendo, I undo the second clamp and the second rush of pain hits her, prolonging her orgasm or launching her into a second, I’m not quite sure. But I’m there, just the tip of my tongue flipping ruthlessly back and forth over her clit until she’s screaming at the top of her lungs and thrashing on the bed.
Pain plus pleasure just delivered her the most incredible, raw climax of her life. Unbelievable.
She stretches out her hand as far as the restraints allow, moaning, “Please. Please let me touch you now.”
I lift my head from between her legs, my own erection pulsing so hard it’s painful between my legs. Sweat dots her brow and her hair is damp against her forehead. Her pupils are blown from pleasure.
She’s the most beautiful fucking thing I’ve ever seen in my whole fucking life. I can’t stand it. I have to have my own relief.
I want to thrust inside her beautiful, dripping sex. Even imagining her tight heat enveloping me is almost enough to have me spilling in my pants.
Daphne, my Daphne, finally, I could finally—
Instead, I whip away from her and yank my cock out of my pants, grab the base of it and then pump furiously.
* * *
Daphne
He turns from me. His head bowed, his shoulders hunched and shuddering. He’s jerking himself off and no matter how I crane my head, I can’t see anything beyond his dark profile, gilt in dying firelight.
He’s still completely dressed while I’m stretched out bare and naked. Even now, while he pleasures himself. I can somewhat understand about his face, but why does he hide the rest of his body from me?
And he won’t let me touch him. Why? Does he hate me that much? Or is he ashamed of how he looks? The thought strikes me and I sag back. I don’t understand, there’s so much I don’t understand.
The Beast groans. His back judders as if he’s cumming. For a moment there’s no sound but his ragged breaths.
Then he heads to the bathroom—I still can’t see anything. When he returns, the side of his face I can see is unreadable, but he has a warm cloth in his hand and a jar.
He sits on the bed beside me, silent at first as he rubs the warm cloth between my legs. When he finally speaks, a wave of relief runs through my body. “You were beautiful tonight. I’m so proud of you.”
Why do his words make me want to cry? After all I’ve achieved in my life…but as he dips his fingers into the jar of what turns out to be salve and rubs them oh so gently over my poor, abused nipples, I realize that all the praise I got throughout my life was never about me. I was always praised for what I achieved. Not for who I was—at least, not after my mother died. Tears spring to my eyes and I blink them back, hoping he doesn’t notice them.
Next he undoes the restraints, rubbing the marks on my wrists. So gentle now, the opposite of the demanding Master earlier. Or maybe not the opposite, maybe it’s just the other side of the coin. This is the whole man. He’ll never inflict more than I can handle, and he’ll always be here after to soothe and care for me.
I curl into him as he gathers me into his arms and carries me to the armchair. I’m drowsy. Where I was strung tight as a guitar string earlier, now I’m limp and loose.
He builds up the fire and returns to the chair, lifting me and taking a seat. I’m in his lap, surrounded by his warmth, his strength. He’s still dressed and I’m still naked, but it’s still so good, so wonderful to be so close to him. I’ve never felt more connected to a human being and I never want him to let me go. He’s touching me everywhere, and in my way, I’m touching him. Well, the most he’ll let me.
I don’t know how long we sit like that, cozy as a couple. I try to stay awake. I don’t want to miss a moment…
But it’s…so warm…so…cozy…
My eyelids droop.
I fall fast asleep.
* * *
When I wake up, I’m curled up in the same chair, but I’m alone, a blanket settled over me and while the fire is still going, it’s dying down. And the Beast is nowhere to be found.
I sit up and look around in confusion, scrubbing at my eyes.
I tug on a long sweater and slippers and go in search of him.
As soon as I start heading down the main staircase, I smell something amazing.
I still don’t know my way around the castle, but I follow my nose.
Gods, what is that? It smells so freaking good and just now do I realize how freakin
g hungry I am. It’s only today that I’ve really gotten my appetite all the way back after being sick and I feel like I could eat a large pack animal.
The main floor of the castle is beautifully decorated. I only glimpsed it during my mad dash through the place when I ran out into the labyrinth. But now as I go, I take in the antique furniture, some of which looks almost a hundred years old.
I can’t imagine the Beast hunting antique stores to find all this stuff or hiring an interior designer to fill the castle.
But right, he said he inherited the castle from his ‘predecessor’, whatever that means. That word makes is sound like whoever it was wasn’t family, but why else would someone give away a castle in their will to just one man?
It’s one mystery after another with the Beast.
I press my hands to my face and pause by the windowed double-doors to the back garden. My whole life has been upended by a man I know literally nothing about. It’s insane. Completely and utterly nuts.
So why does it feel like at the same time I feel closer to him than anyone else in my life? That he knows me better than anyone ever has before?
The sun is setting, the castle casting long shadows over the huge labyrinth garden in the back, purple and electric pinks spilling across the sky.
I press my hand to the cold glass. You never get views like this in the city. And when was the last time I paused to watch the sunset? To notice anything beautiful?
“There you are.”
I startle, but only a little, as I turn and see the Beast standing at the other side of the expansive sitting room.
“I was just coming to get you. Dinner’s ready.”
His eyes move from me to my hand on the glass of the double doors. The same ones I fled through. Does he wonder if I was thinking about running again?
I step back. “I wasn’t going to—”
“I know. Come. The food will get cold.”
Just hearing his calm, confident voice sends a thrilled little shiver down my spine. Gods, he’s electrifying.
Billionaire’s Captive: A Beauty and the Rose Box Set Page 10