by Litte, Jane
Crack! Again, it came down against her flesh. Oh, God, yes. She moaned at the sharp sensations that rocketed over her skin—a mixture of pain and pleasure. Crack! Down it came again, slightly higher, slightly stronger. Each lash felt like it was leaving a long, throbbing trail on her skin.
It felt amazing.
Her sex clenched with each hit, and she began to shift against the mattress, back and forth. Her nipples had grown hard and they ached, the delicate chafe of the blankets against them increasing the pleasurable agony.
After several more slaps of the whip across her stinging buttocks, he began to rub the whip against her flesh before swatting her with it. It was a tease of anticipation, the smooth feeling of the flexible crop against her flesh, brushing against the curve of her buttock.
“Do you like that?”
“Yes,” she whimpered against the covers.
“Ask me to spank you again. Tell me how naughty you’ve been.”
“Very!” she blurted.
“Very . . . what?” He teased the loop of the crop against her throbbing skin.
She writhed on the bed, grazing her aching nipples on the bedding. Her sex clenched hard in anticipation of the next hit. “So naughty,” she breathed, telling him what he wanted to hear to get the next crack of the whip against her skin. “Thinking dirty thoughts about being spanked hard . . .”
“And then what . . . ?”
She bit her lip for a moment, and then added, “And then fucked. Harder.”
Ash was rewarded with the whip. It cracked hard against her ass, and she gave a squeal of delight at the hit. He was careful to aim it on the padding of her ass, and she began to anticipate that he would strike her . . . on her sex. Her knees moved apart a fraction with each successive crack of the whip until she was practically straddling the bed, her sex wide open and slick with need.
Would he hit her there? Would it hurt?
He rubbed the crop against the inside of her thighs thoughtfully. She moaned as the loop of the crop tickled the lips of her sex. He then skimmed the rod between her buttocks, rolling it slightly in the valley there. Ash whimpered.
“What do you need? Tell me,” he asked her again. His other hand lightly grazed her buttock and gave it a light tap.
“More, please.” She rolled her hips. “I ache . . .”
He shifted next to her on the bed, and she could almost feel the heat of him next to her. The whip tapped lightly against her hip, and his fingers skimmed along the lips of her sex. “Is it a good ache?” he asked, and she felt his breath against the small of her back, his knees brushing against her right one.
His fingers grazed over her flesh, then dipped in and brushed against her clit. At the same time, he gave her a light slap of the crop against her ass.
Her entire body shuddered and she gave a small cry. The sensations rocketing through her were overwhelming, but she wasn’t quite at orgasm—not yet. It built inside of her, and she writhed on the bed, trying to maneuver his fingertips back to her clit again.
He listened to her silent request, his fingers dipping in and brushing against her clit, slick with need. Again, he raised the whip and it whistled through the air before cracking sharply, low across her ass, grazing the sensitive flesh of her sex.
She came. A cry broke forth from her lips and her entire body tensed with the force of her release as he brought the whip down lightly again, prolonging the sharp kiss of pain. Her body clenched hard and she rocked against his fingers.
But he removed them, and what could have been a long, languid orgasm was cut short. She gave a small cry of distress at that. It had been everything she’d ever wanted . . . just cut sadly short. Still, the languid feeling was moving through her body, and she sighed. It was almost perfect. Almost.
The man next to her shifted, and the bed adjusted as his weight came off it. She lay there boneless until he began pulling her to the edge of the bed. His hands pushed her hips down slightly, then grasped her thighs. His hands were rough as he tugged her backward, and his palms rested on her throbbing ass once more, palming the flesh and soothing it.
Then, he spread her legs wide and she felt the nudge of his cock butt against her sex, a split second before it slammed into her. “Like that?” he gritted. “Is that how you want to be fucked?”
The breath gasped out of her lungs. It hadn’t hurt—she was too warm and wet for that—but it had been surprising, and the stretch of him seated deep inside her felt good. She rocked her hips back against him, encouraging another thrust.
Instead, he gave her a hard slap on the ass and ground against her, rolling her hips with the force of his own movement. “Tell me,” he demanded. “Do you like that?” Again, he slapped her ass roughly.
“Yes!” she cried out. “Just like that!”
“How do you want it?”
“Hard,” she moaned, her internal muscles clenched around him at having to describe it. “Hard and rough. Please. Please.”
He thrust again, and she was thrilled by the equally hard slap of his hand on her ass that reverberated through her body. The pattern continued—thrust, slap, thrust, slap—and she was helpless to do anything but raise her hips and encourage him with her cries of pleasure. Her buttocks stung from the onslaught, and every new crack of his hand just added to her heightened senses. One particularly crisp slap brought her close, and she writhed beneath him, rolling her hips and grinding them against his. “More,” she breathed. “Harder.”
“Sounds like sweet little Ashley likes it rough,” he gritted out, and gave her another deep, digging thrust of his cock. “Like this?”
She felt him leaning over her, and then the whisk of the riding crop against her ass. Light at first, then hard. Then another hard thrust of his cock, his free hand digging into her hip.
“Harder,” she demanded again, the orgasm close. Her toes curled in anticipation.
The crop slapped against her skin again, the sharp kiss of it sending her over the edge for a second time. Ash cried out her release, her body clenching wildly against his.
He was behind her, jerking against her hips and shouting his release a few seconds later. His hips rocked against hers for a moment more before he fell on top of her and rolled them both to the side on the bed.
Ashley panted, feeling boneless and wonderful. That had been the most spectacular pair of orgasms that she’d ever had. Ever. She could cheerfully lay there for the rest of her life.
He curled up behind her, his body pressed against her own, sharing warmth. One strong arm was locked around her waist in a possessive gesture that she liked quite a bit, and he smelled good. Sandalwood and bergamot. The scent of it made her utterly content. She could just melt into a puddle and sink away at this moment.
Well, except her arms hurt. The handcuffs were definitely starting to cut off her circulation. She twisted her arms once, and then sighed. “Josh, can you take these off me now?”
He stiffened against her, and then she felt the bed move and coolness rushed against her back. He’d been so warm against her. He returned a moment later, and she heard the click of the handcuffs before they fell to the bed. With a happy sigh, she sat up and took off the blindfold, and then rubbed her wrists.
Josh sat across from her, his short brown hair wildly rumpled. He rubbed his head and then grinned. “So how’d you know it was me?”
“I knew it was you as soon as I walked in the door,” Ashley confessed. “I think the blindfold made me use my other senses a bit more. I was able to pick up the scent of your cologne.” She smiled at him and cocked her head. “And you can’t disguise your voice, even if you try to do that growling thing low in your throat.”
“Huh,” said her fiancé, and then rolled back into bed and wrapped his arms around her again. “I suppose it’s good that you knew it was me the whole time.”
Ashley rolled her eyes at the miffed sound in his voice. “Do you think I would have let just anyone spank me like that?”
“I don’t know,” h
e said, grinning. “Is it on your list?”
“Ha-ha. Very funny.”
Josh leaned over and gave her a kiss, and she leaned into his embrace. “Next time you want to try something kinky in the bedroom, why not just tell me?”
A hot blush covered her face, and Ash looked away. “It’s not exactly something that comes up in conversation.”
“Why not?”
She squirmed a little. “It’s just something I feel weird asking about. It’s not exactly a normal thing you can say to your fiancé. I feel weird about it. I never would have asked if Haven hadn’t gotten that crazy idea in her head.”
Josh leaned in and kissed her nose. “Haven is a genius.”
Still a little put out at her friend’s meddling, she gave a mock frown. “As soon as she turns her back, I’m going to find her two strapping hot men and a pair of handcuffs for her so she can finish her list.”
“She’d probably like that,” Josh said. “But I can’t thank her enough for coming up with this crazy idea.” He rubbed her deliciously sore bottom and grinned. “If you’d have never made that list, we would have lost out on hundreds of crazy nights of sex.”
Lifting an eyebrow, Ashley regarded her fiancé. “Hundreds?”
He gave a solemn nod. “Through sickness and health, for richer, for poorer, and for lots and lots of future naughty spankings.”
She laughed.
Jessica Clare is the pen name of the artist formerly known as Jill Myles. She feels totally like Prince when she mentions that, too. Jessica Clare’s first steamy contemporary for Berkley Heat, The Girl’s Guide to (Man)Hunting, will be out in May 2012. You can visit her website at www.jessica-clare.com.
WICKED WEDDING NIGHT
MARGARET ROWE
One
HALLAM ABBEY, KENT
NOVEMBER 1815
“Why?”
His new wife gazed up at him with barely contained terror. That would make the next hour so much easier, he supposed. A modicum of suffering on her part would prolong his pleasure. He wasn’t proud of the fact, but there it was. Since his time in a French prison as a guest of Emperor Napoleon, Viscount Lucien Ransford had had a problem pretending to be a bland, bloodless aristocrat. He’d had the decency beaten right out of him. Repeatedly.
His limits to vice? He had none now that he could recall.
“Why not?” Someone should have warned her before she so foolishly trapped him into marriage. “Did you not just hours ago promise to obey me?”
“But this is . . . You are . . .” She paused, her sea-blue eyes awash in virginal tears. At least he assumed she was a virgin—her trap had been too clumsily set to hope she had any skill in the bedroom. She tried to shake a plump ankle, but his skill held her quite fast. “I don’t believe this is normal.”
Lucien gave a hollow laugh. “There is nothing about us that is normal, Maida.” He tightened the silken cord at her throat, draping the ends between her breasts. The thought of leading her around on all fours made his cock stir. “We’ve known each other three days, the last two of which have been spent preparing for the benighted wedding. It took you precisely one day to wander into my bedroom uninvited and crawl into my bed. Sleepwalking, you said. When you woke up, your screams were quite affecting. And effective. The entire house party was witness to your so-called mistake.”
“It was a mistake!” she cried, struggling again at the bonds that tied her to the bedstead. “I’ve walked in my sleep since I was a child.”
“Then someone should have tied you to your bed long before this.” He stepped back to admire his handiwork. His bride was sheet-white where she was untouched by dark curls and shadow, an entrancing chiaroscuro. She might be a stranger, but she was an attractive one. Once he broke her to him, she would do.
For a time.
Lucien couldn’t think too far ahead. His captors had robbed him of that, too.
“P-Please don’t do whatever it is you’re thinking.”
He leaned over her. “And what do you think that is, my dear?”
“I don’t know, but you’re scaring me. I shall do my duty to you without these—these restraints.”
Duty. An empty word. Duty to King, duty to country. He’d had enough of that.
“It is your duty to submit to me in any way I choose. Surely your mother told you that between her bouts of gloating.” Maida Clement’s mother, a viciously ambitious harpy, was more than pleased to see her daughter rise above her station, no matter how the feat had been accomplished.
It would serve her right not to consummate this farce of a marriage. It wasn’t as if he had any interest in continuing the Ransford line. He could not imagine himself as a father. What could he teach a son? How to tie an untieable knot? How to wield a whip to greatest effect? How to bear endless beatings without breaking an oath? A wave of despair threatened to plunge him further into darkness, but he picked up his glass instead and drained it.
The day had been interminable. The grim ceremony was held in the abbey’s empty chapel—Lucien had refused entry to anyone but his hosts and his bride’s smug parents. A falsely cheerful wedding breakfast, with toast after toast to the health he would never have, had gone on for hours as the food in front of him curled and curdled. A torrential downpour, even now spattering against the black bedroom windows, had prevented him from leaving his cousin’s estate after the festivities. He was doomed to spend his wedding night with the house party revelers and his own threadbare conscience.
The guests had not expected a scandal and resultant wedding and had not ceased giving him advice, ribald or otherwise. The ride to Town and Doctors Commons to obtain the special license had not been far enough to escape their meddling, thought it had given him a respite from the smirks and whispers for a few hours.
His cousin Harry had thought it the greatest joke that Lucien had been caught in such a compromising position—Lucien, who had led Harry far afield before his wife reformed him.
“Your wings have been clipped for good, Luc. My wife says there’s nothing more satisfying than restoring a rake’s virtue, although little Maida has her work cut out for her, I expect.”
At present, little Maida looked incapable of doing anything more than blubbering into the bedsheets. And she was not so little. In stature, yes—the top of her dark head barely came up to the middle of his chest, but her breasts were luscious, ruby-tipped globes. All of her was a fleshy paradise, really—gentle rolls of marble skin gleaming in the candlelight. Lucien had stripped her of her plain white night rail a while back, pleased to see her skin blush with embarrassment as her nipples puckered. She had been still as death until he pulled the cords from his dressing gown pockets, and then she’d come to rather surprising life attempting to alter her fate.
Served her right. Sleepwalking. The oldest trick in the book, worthy of the plot of some gothic romance written by a singularly idea-challenged author. A pity she had not fainted at his feet in the conservatory instead—he would have stepped over her and moved on through the pots of forced amaryllis.
But now she was his wife. A woman he knew precious little about, save her mother was a grasping harridan, her father a cipher, and she herself had spectacularly lovely tits.
Lucien knew how the story would end. But until then, he’d make best use of this night and all the ones to follow.
Two
Maida Clement would have risen from the bed and throttled her mother if she were not so neatly bound in place. The viscount—she refused to think of the fiend as her husband—was perfectly correct to think he’d been tricked into marriage. She had been desperate enough to agree to her mama’s scheme three days ago, never dreaming how this night would turn into a nightmare.
Lucien Ransford was every young girl’s dream—golden, gray-eyed, gorgeous. A war hero to boot. But she was no young girl, which was one of the reasons she had taken a deep breath, loosened her night rail ribbons, and walked into his room.
Maida knew he’d be sleeping, virtually uncons
cious. According to Vivienne, her husband’s cousin took a draught nightly to ward off unpleasant reminders of the war. He kept a lamp burning, too, which had been helpful in their discovery once she’d started shrieking.
Maida was thoroughly ashamed of herself, and now she was about to pay for her folly. How foolish to think she could finally escape from her miserable home life into a marriage based on deceit. But she was six and twenty. Her one relatively dedicated suitor had the misfortune to be killed at Salamanca four years ago. None of her mama’s conventional schemes to replace him had worked, and Maida was exhausted from trying them.
If she’d had different parents, she would have been content to climb on the shelf with her books and gather society’s dust, but Mama made that impossible. There was no escape from her mother’s vituperative tongue and endless machinations except for death or marriage, and surely marriage was preferable. How hard could it be to find oneself married to the beautiful Viscount Ransford?
Hard, apparently. Maida closed her eyes, blocking out the sight of Lucien Ransford’s tented dressing gown. Unquestionably he desired her in this shocking state—splayed before him, split open, tethered tight, every inch of her exposed.
Her mama constantly snatched the tea cakes from her hand, and had once locked her in her room for a month with tea and gruel only in an attempt to turn her into a sought-after sylph. Well, Maida wasn’t willowy or fashionable. She was short, plump, her dull brown hair frizzed in damp weather, and she read books. Maida wasn’t the romantic sort. She had known from the time she was small there was no romance in her future. Major Everett’s death had proven that—though he was not the romantic sort either, just a widower looking for a stepmother to his son. The little boy had been sweet, and, apart from a few chaste kisses, Maida had been hazy as to what would transpire on her wedding night.
Somehow she’d imagined the major would lift the hem of her nightgown and breach her useless maidenhead in a dignified way, not truss her like one of Cook’s Christmas geese. It seemed her desperation would only become more profound every minute she spent with Viscount Lucien Ransford.
