by Cerys du Lys
Maybe because I was already aroused and trying so hard to resist my own impulses, the idea of punishment didn’t sound as awful as it had earlier in the day. I flashed back to the way it had felt when he had whipped me with his leather belt. Once I had grown accustomed to it, the sting had died down and a kind of sexy warmth had remained.
“Fine. Go ahead. I’m going to keep telling you what I really think of you even if I get whipped for it. Master.”
“Kneel here, with your chest on the bed.”
I did it. I knelt on the floor with my belly and chest pressed down on the berth that I considered his bed, since he had slept there last night while I had lain on the floor, naked and clutching my blanket.
I closed my eyes when I heard him step behind me, waiting for him to strike me with the belt. But that wasn’t what happened. Instead I felt his hand on my ass, caressing me gently. I was about to object that I wasn’t doing any more damn sexual stuff with him when he lifted his hand and then brought it down on my butt with a loud crack.
“Ow!”
“Don’t make a sound,” he warned in that harsh drill sergeant voice. Then he spanked me again. And again. And again.
I had never been spanked as a child. As an adult, I’d fantasized about it during vanilla sex with a couple of boyfriends. But I’d never fantasized that it would hurt so much. He hadn’t really hurt me with the belt. It had seemed scary because it was, like, a freaking belt. I guess he hadn’t swung it hard.
This was different. Now he was hurting me. He kept changing the spot where he struck me, adding new areas of pain to the mix. I’d never realized there were so many different spots available for punishment on my buttocks, but he kept finding new ones. Weren’t people supposed to have a safeword for stuff like this? I guess there were no safewords when you got yourself kidnapped.
Each blow left a stinging sensation on the skin and, deeper down, a sort of ache. He had told me not to cry out, and I tried not to. Less because of the order than out of pride. Wasn’t he getting tired? When was it going to end?
In my effort not to scream or whimper or cry, I responded to each slap by arching away from his hand, a movement that drove the inside of my thighs against the frame of the bunk. When he found a spot down on the underside of my bottom, near the place where it met the tops of my thighs, his spanks drove me up in such a way that my pussy, which seemed unaccountably damp, and my clit were being pressed into the mattress and my own movements added to the pressure there. My ass felt warm and warmer still, and my clit began throbbing with the need for more pressure, more stimulation.
As my arousal intensified, the pain from the spanking faded. I wasn’t even sure if he was still hurting me, or if his hands were caressing me instead. My heart was rocketing in my chest and my breathing had turned quick and light. Images of him fucking me—maybe even in the ass, where I was still a virgin—filled my consciousness. I wanted his cock in my pussy, soothing the fire he’d started. In my ass, hurting me. In my mouth, driving into me while I knelt naked before him and endured whatever punishment he felt like dealing out. I didn’t even mind the rope collar around my neck, which wasn’t tight enough to restrict my breathing. It marked me as his. I was his slave and he my master, and, in my spiraling excitement, that was okay with me.
The hand that was spanking me slipped between my legs and found my wetness. Yes, yes, I thought, touch me. Release me, free me, make me come.
“No,” I moaned, as his thumb flicked the engorged bud that was my clit. At the same moment, one of his fingers was slipping into me, sliding in easily because of the slickness there. “I don’t want...please, no, please stop.”
“I don’t believe you,” he said. His voice had lost its usual cool inflection. I realized he was kneeling on the floor behind me. He was still dressed, but I could feel his erect cock pressing against my ass, just as I had imagined it.
“I. Don’t. Want. This.” Each word was a monumental effort to force out. Because I did want it. Oh so very much.
He stopped. His hand disappeared from between my legs, and the other hand, the one that had been spanking me, ceased that activity, too.
Oh god, oh god. I groaned in frustration. My hands were clutching the sheets on the bed, all but tearing them off the mattress. I had been so close to coming that stopping made my sex ache and vibrate with tension, practically screaming with a voice of its own, “why, why, why?”
My captor pushed away from me and stood up. A moment later, I heard him leave the cabin and lock the door behind him.
I dragged myself up on the bed and lay there, legs pressed together and twisting in frustration and misery.
I was weak. But I’d said no in the end, hadn’t I? Was I weak or was I strong?
I didn’t know.
He had stopped. Was that cruel or kind?
I didn’t know that either.
I didn’t know anything anymore.
Chapter 11
Nick
Fuck.
Up on deck, I stared at the gray sea and tried to regulate my head, which was churning with violent thoughts. I’d already given up attempting to master my cock. I considered diving into the sea for a swim, but the water wouldn’t be cold enough to dampen my fires.
Ellie Heath. If there was a highway to hell, I was cruising down the fast lane. Maybe Nigel was right about me, after all.
I hadn’t thought myself capable of doing some of the things I’d done to her. Worse, I’d been reveling in it. The more I handled and dominated her, the more I wanted to master her, break her, hurt her. Make her my slave in truth.
The dark energy just kept rising from somewhere deep inside me. It fizzed through my brain like champagne. It made me feel absurdly powerful to see her crawling at my feet. Naked. It made my dick painfully hard and left me amazed at my restraint. Why I hadn’t fucked her yet was a mystery to my horny body. My mind knew why—I’d been stupid enough to make that promise.
Not until you beg, captive mine. Which you will very soon do.
But my mind was slowly losing this battle. And that scared the shit out of me because it almost never happened. Mind over body—that had always defined me. I’m good at controlling myself. Locking down any stray antisocial feelings. Being the good boy my fucking bastard cousin Nigel so blatantly was not.
Ever since finding Ellie Heath, of the glorious red-gold hair and the purple hyacinth eyes, I’d been aflame. I didn’t have a clue why this should be so. Nothing about it made sense.
Meet sexual sadist Nick Gabriel. Was there a monster in every man?
I’d always had extreme fantasies. I’d played around with kink with many of my former lovers, but that had been consensual. Ordering someone to bare her ass so I could spank it would be done with a safeword in place. It would be followed by mutual orgasms and laughter.
This was different. This was something I’d never intended. Ellie’s sudden appearance was likely to wreck all the plans I’d been working so long to achieve. She was a wild card thrown by the laughing gods in the final stages of the game. You think you’ve got everything figured out? Deal with this, sucker.
So I’d had to improvise. And, fuck, before I could even think it through, it had gotten out of control. I was supposed to be calm, cold, and in tactical mode. Instead, I was finding perverted pleasure in humiliating some innocent bystander who’d had the bad luck to stumble into my melodrama with my fucked up family.
And everything I’d done—the rope around her neck, the beatings, the commands I’d insisted she obey, the sexual groping—had sent sick waves of exaltation through me. Maybe I’d never known how it felt to have all boundaries lifted. No pesky social restraints. Total freedom. Man. Woman. See. Want. Take.
The thing was, I liked Ellie. She wasn’t my usual type, but she was brave. Intelligent. Hilarious, at times. Some other woman might have cracked by now, but she’d kept it together. I admired her for that. It didn’t prevent me from wanting to break her down, but I had to give her credit—she wasn�
�t making it easy.
In normal circumstances, I might even have hung out with her. Tried for a hook up, maybe more. If things had been different, I don’t think she’d have refused. There was chemistry. Hell, she was close to being willing, even now. I could have taken her a few minutes ago. The lips of her sex had been puffy and wet. She’d forced out that “no” from sheer gritty determination. Although it had just about killed me to stop.
Today had been rough on her. But I’d gotten her close to where I needed her to be. Which was good, because we were running out of time.
I had to cool down. Thinking about dominating and fucking Ellie was not what I needed to be doing right now. If I got careless and screwed up, people would die.
I needed to focus on Nigel.
If I had to use Ellie to bring him down, then use her I would.
Metin came somewhat hesitantly to my side. “How’s it going?”
“Fine.” I looked into his curious, slightly envious eyes until Metin’s gaze dropped.
“Your girl—she is okay?” he asked.
“She will be.” I hoped.
“She is afraid. Foolish woman.” He seemed less callous than he was trying to sound.
Fuck. Metin had never been too good at disguising his basic decency. He probably had a lot more of that quality than I did.
Metin hesitated. “You aren’t—” He paused, probably deciding which question he was brave enough to ask “—hurting her?”
I am fucking hurting her. “Have you ever heard a woman complain after she’d been with me?”
Metin considered. “You haven’t been with a woman since I’ve known you.”
Whoa. Was that true? I’d known Metin for six months. Surely... I thought back. Fuck. The kid was right. No wonder I was walking around with a dick too swollen for my jeans.
This whole mess was turning out to be a lot harder than I’d anticipated.
Chapter 12
Ellie
I awoke with the sun in my face and a low male voice whispering in my ear. “Wake up.”
I blinked into Nick’s vivid green eyes. He was clean-shaven and his breath smelled faintly of toothpaste. In the full light of day, he was even hotter than he’d looked yesterday. He was dressed in blue-jean cutoffs and a black T-shirt. Tall and tan, he seemed to explode with sexy goodness. His gilt hair shone; his eyes reflected all the mysteries of the sea.
My sex clenched in that unpredictable but delicious way it tended to do when he was around. I glared down at my body as if it were my enemy. My pussy didn’t care that he was a smuggler and a thief. My hormones had no shame, no self-respect.
He had left me alone all night. He’d never returned to the cabin after that abortive attempt at sex. Metin had brought me supper and, later, taken away my tray. I’d seen nothing more of either of them after that. I’d finally gone to sleep, leaving the light in the head on and its door fully open.
“I’m leaving it unlocked,” Nick said. “You can come out when you’re dressed.” He nodded at a bundle on the floor. “You’ll find your things here.”
“My pack?”
“Your camera’s there, too. Undamaged, I think, except for a few dents.”
I pulled out the camera and examined it as tenderly as I might an injured puppy. “Thank you.”
He ignored me and left the cabin. As he closed the door behind him, I took my camera and went to the porthole to look out into the bright iridescence of the new day. I saw no sign of land. We were well out in the Aegean Sea, whose name conjured up visions of the ancient world.
The water sparkled liquid gold under the radiance of the rising sun, and the morning had a hazy, timeless quality to it. For an instant, I felt transported to another century. I seemed to know these waters intimately, as if I had sailed them myself in the Golden Age with the heroes and warriors.
But no. There was nothing heroic about this voyage.
Ten minutes later, dressed in the fresh jeans and dark blue top I’d taken from my pack, I grabbed my camera and left the cabin where I’d been imprisoned. I walked down the narrow companionway to the yacht’s main salon. I could hear men’s voices out on deck. Passing through the far end of the salon and up several steps, I saw Metin at the helm and Nick in the bow, doing something to one of the sheets that controlled the jib. One blond head and one dark against the bright-blue sky. My captor must have sensed my presence. He beckoned, and I went out, grateful that I wasn’t to be locked up below all day.
The fresh air assaulted me, rushing to fill my lungs and wreak havoc with my hair. Spreading my arms out wide, I inhaled deeply. There were worse fates, I decided, than being snatched away on a yacht.
I shaded my eyes to stare across the deck. The sails were puffed full of wind; the sea creamed beneath the prow as the yacht skimmed over the sea with all the grace of a great white bird. I noted the boat’s name stenciled on a life preserver. Voyager, she was called. As the sun rose higher in the eastern sky, its radiance bathed the entire vessel, tipping the slender top of the mast with amber. My imagination let loose again. I was on a mythical ship, sailing Homer’s wine-dark sea; my fate was in the hands of Poseidon, the fierce god of water, wind and waves.
“Is it okay if I take a few pictures?”
Nick nodded.
I got several fast shots of the wind-filled sails and the glowing mast before the light changed. Then I moved about the boat, shooting from several different angles, losing track of the time, concentrating all my energy on my task.
I whirled to the touch of Nick’s hand on my shoulder. “Getting any good shots?”
“A few. The light is excellent. Look.” I pointed at the foamy spray that rose before us each time the bowsprit rode the curl of a wave. “Can you see the color refraction as the sun pours through the spray?”
“Yeah. Like hundreds of rainbows. Can you capture that?”
“I can try.” I leaned over the rail, focusing on the swirling colors. The rocking of the waves made it difficult for me to hold my camera still. My arms were beginning to ache with the effort. Still I shot, leaning over some more as I shifted the camera to get a new angle.
“Watch it,” Nick said sharply as a gust took us and the yacht rocked, nearly sending me off balance. I felt his hands grip my waist. “I don’t want you falling over the side.”
I turned, feeling his hands tighten on me as I rotated. My stomach muscles flexed and the desire lurking under the surface fluttered. “Thanks.” Jeez. Stop thanking him. He didn’t deserve any thanks from me.
For several seconds he continued to hold me, not exploring, not caressing, just letting me feel his heat. At last, he allowed his hands to fall back to his side. “You seemed totally absorbed, as if you could see nothing but the images in your lens.”
“I get that way. I love taking pictures.” I was speaking fast, nervously. “Seeing an image the way no one else sees it. Capturing it.”
“I’d like to see your work.”
“Sorry, but your associate back on the Turkish coast deleted all the pictures I’d already shot.”
“True.” He was looking speculative now. “Have you ever shot for your mother? Photos of the artifacts recovered on digs?”
“Now and then. I’ve never specialized in that kind of work, although I suppose it’s what inspired me to take pictures in the first place. As a child, I used to pore over those beautiful color photographs of King Tut’s golden mask and the frescoes on the gates of Babylon.” I paused. “Why? You want pictures for your smuggler’s scrapbook?”
I expected him to take offense at my non-submissive tone, but he just shrugged it off. It wasn’t easy to needle him.
My first sight of Golden Dolphin Island came several hours later. It was little more than an arid hunk of rock. Stark and gray, it rose in masses of volcanic rock against the blue sky. Here and there, I saw some olive green or yellowish scrub and a few scrawny trees and bushes, but for the most part, the island was bleak and uninviting. “It looks forbidding,” I said.
>
“It is forbidding,” Nick returned with a distinct edge to his voice.
“Have there ever been any significant settlements here?”
“Not recently. Fresh water is sparse, so not much grows.”
“Is the island recorded on any ancient charts? How do you know it’s been here long enough to have anything to do with the Trojan War? Maybe it was thrown up by volcanic activity in later years.”
“No, it’s been here for eons. The Greeks of the fifth centuryB.C. had a name for the island—Worthless Rock.”
“But the Turks called it Golden Dolphin Island? Why?”
He shrugged. “I’ve no idea.”
He seemed edgy as we approached the island. He hid his feelings well, but I had little to do to pass the time except observe him. His face became more drawn, his conversation more terse with each passing minute. It did not help my own peace of mind to know that he was ill at ease.
The sails were down as we entered a narrow bay. Metin was at the helm. Nick touched me on the shoulder. “Come with me,” he said, waiting for me to stand and follow.
We descended to the stateroom. He closed the door and turned, close to me—too close, as he so often seemed to be. Why did his big body generate such warmth? And why did my own respond with such hunger every time he looked at me?
“Listen.” His hands came down on my shoulders. He adjusted the rope collar around my throat. “Your life is in danger here. If you decide to do anything stupid—like try to escape—I’ll be hard put to save you.”
I didn’t say anything. If I saw a chance to escape....
His fingers tightened. “You do want to keep on living?”
“Of course I want to keep on living.”
