"No. I'm going to go upstairs," she said finally, but made no attempt to leave her position.
There was no sound of a chair moving across the stone tiles, because he'd gone intangible again, but suddenly he was right behind her, grabbing her by the arm and spinning her around to face him. Some of her reaction may have been leftover from Elizabeth; some may have been caused by the surprise of being grabbed. But most, she thought later, was probably the fact that she was sulking and he wouldn't let her continue.
He felt very solid and real as he pulled her away from the counter, but that meant he'd left himself open for her to touch him back. Her hand flashed up and slapped him hard across the face. She stood there, appalled at herself, hand stuck in the raised position as she stared. There was no sudden flush of red, no mark to show that she'd just hit him, but that didn't keep him from knowing what she'd done. His grip on her other arm tightened, eyes glittering dangerously as he pulled her up against his chest hard.
"You like to slap people, girl?" he asked, words passing through gritted teeth. "Or maybe you're just looking for someone to knock that attitude out of you."
He crouched, wrapped an arm around her legs and hefted her right over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and, for a second, she slumped there like one. Then she realized how much trouble she was in and began to struggle. Her arms flailing as they beat against his back, legs trying to kick but not getting anywhere since he was holding them tightly.
"John! Let me go! Put me down right now!" she shouted as she tried to heave herself off his shoulder.
He laughed, a harsh caustic sound that sent a shiver down her spine as she worried about how big a hole she'd dug for herself with that impulsive reaction.
"Let you go? I think not! You've been asking for this since you came back in the house. I don't know what's gone wrong, but I can assure you, I will get to the bottom of it!"
His hand cracked down across the seat of her upturned backside to emphasize his words. He carried her out of the kitchen, down the hall, and started up the stairs without any effort. All she could think of, during the whole humiliating journey, was that the professor would be tickled pink by the footage of her struggling in mid-air as she floated up the stairs.
She tried grabbing the large polished knob at the base of the banister as her dangling arms passed it and holding on with all of her strength. She wasn't silly enough to think he'd put her down, but she had to at least make the attempt. Five sharp slaps to the backs of her vulnerable thighs were enough to convince her to let go quickly, and he proceeded up the steps without further trouble from her. When he got to the bedroom suite, he kicked the door open with his boot and set her down just inside.
"I tried being nice. I tried being patient, but you've used up all your chances, Miss April, so now you're going to see what badly behaved girls get from me." He folded his arms across his chest and stared at her, daring her to respond.
Her eyes held his for a brief second, and then she looked down at the floor, letting her heavy hair slide forward to hide the nervous pouting set of her lips. Part of her tingled with a touch of excitement. The way he took command and hauled her up to her room was—there was no other way to describe it; it was hot. The fact that she was very much afraid of what he was going to do next should have killed the rising ardor, but it didn't. Her panties dampened, and she shifted nervously. She didn't want the punishment, she knew she didn't, but still the idea of it had her stomach doing dizzying flips inside of her. She felt like she should say something, apologize, perhaps, but she couldn't make herself do it, so she remained silent while he regarded her sternly.
"Remove your pants and your undergarments, too. You won't be needing them for the rest of the night," he said calmly.
Her head shot up, a look of horror on her face as her eyes swung to the camera in the corner of the room.
"But—but, John. They'll see!" she reminded him with panicked desperation.
Elizabeth had reminded her that they wanted to see action on film, and she'd expected to have to accept that, eventually, if she wanted to keep the deal, but she'd never expected to have to worry about it so soon.
"Yes, they'll see what happens when a woman has well and truly earned her punishment," he said, not budging on the order.
"We could— The bathroom—please?" she begged.
Her hands clutched at the waistband of her pants, holding them in place in case he tried to snatch them down. But he had no intention of letting her get out of doing it herself.
"No. You've told me that you're used to having freedom. That you aren't used to obeying men and that I have to be fair, and I've agreed. But I've seen the television. I've seen all those colorless movies. The woman slaps the man and then he punishes her. It's happened over and over, so it should be no surprise to you when I react the same way."
There wasn't an inch of give in his tone, but he didn't move closer to her. He simply waited while it all played out in front of the camera.
"But, John, those are just movies! Those are entertainment. They aren't—they're not real stories," she insisted as she took a nervous step back into the room.
"This will be entertaining, too; not for you, perhaps, but for myself and others, yes. If you're trying to convince me that in your time women can slap men with no consequences, it just makes me happier that I'm from a more sane time. But regardless of how the men of this age would handle your behavior, I will be dealing with it my way. Now, you will remove your pants or I will remove them for you—and you'll regret that choice," he said with a growl.
There was no playfulness in his expression. No hint that this was going to be one of the fun punishments he'd spoken of. He was obviously pissed that she'd slapped him, and she was afraid she was going to regret it dearly.
She tried one more time, stammering, "B-but—" and he grimly took a step toward her. "I'll do it," she promised hurriedly as she scooted farther back, now in the center of the room.
She twisted, looking back over her shoulder at the camera again. There was only one, positioned on the far side of the room, but it was placed high up in the corner and was angled to capture most of the suite as it slowly cycled from left to right. The best she could manage for privacy was to stand close to the high four-poster bed so that it blocked most of her body as she reluctantly slid her pants down over her hips and stepped out of them. She paused, thumbs tucked into the waistband of the dainty blue-and-white striped bikini panties, and shot him a pleading look.
He just watched, without a sign of mercy, and with a scared, hitching breath, she tugged them down and dropped them. They fell with a quiet whisper against her skin to land on top of the pants, and she stepped out of them because that felt less foolish than letting them lie puddled around her ankles. She had her hands wrapped in the hem of her t-shirt, tugging it as far down over her thighs as it would go. She wasn't sure why it felt so embarrassing to be pants-less in front of him. He'd seen her entirely naked, admired every inch of her tawny skin as his hand stroked over it—but this felt different.
There was some shame for the way she had acted; she hadn't approached things like an adult. Breaking plates and refusing to talk wasn't going to do anything to draw him into the modern age where men and women were equal, but maybe—maybe she didn't want him to relinquish control. She was embarrassed, scared, and a little turned on by what was happening at the moment. She needed time to think about what she wanted from him, from the relationship, but it couldn't be when she was dealing with impending punishment.
She shot another look at the camera, shivering partly from nerves and partly because the room had gotten a little chilly. She didn't want this filmed, any of this, but she didn't have a choice, and if they were going to watch her being punished, she wanted to keep a modicum of self-respect. She was still half-turned to look at the blinking red eye when he moved closer and caught her arm. He spun her around to face the bed and pushed her, belly-down, over it. She let out a gasp of shock, struggling in surprise, a
nd found her arm being twisted up behind her and pinned just above her waist.
"Please, John," she whispered, trying to keep her voice too low to be heard.
It was pointless, and she knew it. They'd bought the most sophisticated audio software for the EVP data they were gathering, and she'd heard for herself how it picked up most of the sound in the room. She'd tried to forget about it, knowing it was another layer of privacy they'd stripped away, but it was always there, in the back of her mind, that they were listening.
"Now you want to talk?" he said, tone scathing. He began to lecture her, voice clipped and filled with annoyance. "Nothing about your behavior in the kitchen was acceptable to me. I agreed to meet you halfway, but if that is what you consider the middle, we're going to have problems, girl. I tried patience, and you threw things at me, so now we'll try this my way. Remember that I did warn you," he said.
Her face flamed, and she was sure it would be clearly visible on film, so she buried her head against her free arm to hide it. She wondered if it would have been less embarrassing if both sides of this dynamic could be caught on camera. Or would it have been worse? There was something uniquely humiliating about being filmed kicking and squealing for no apparent reason, but then, having them hear the blistering lecture he was giving her, that might have been worse.
"I'm sorry. I really am. I was just upset." Short statements, muffled by her face pressed into the covers, but heartfelt. She really was extremely sorry at the moment, mostly for herself.
"I understand upset. I also understand being corrected for bad behavior, which is what is about to happen to you, Miss April," he informed her sternly. Miss he called her, distancing himself from her emotionally so that he could punish her as harshly as he thought she needed. His hand swung down, cracking hard across one quivering cheek, and she jumped forward, a sound of pain and shock bursting from her mouth. He wasn't being gentle, and this wasn't foreplay; it reminded her of the kitchen the night they'd met. And just like that night, he wasn't taking his time to build. She'd barely caught her breath when his broad palm crashed down on the other cheek, and for a while there was nothing but the sound of flesh meeting flesh and muffled yelps.
He seemed to be concentrating on the same area, delivering each hard spank on top of the previous one, and it burned fiercely. As her backside reddened under his palm and began to sting, she started twisting and trying to angle herself. Not to get away; she knew that was impossible; but to guide his aim towards another spot. It didn't work, and he completely ignored her attempts, moving to a new untouched patch of skin only when he was ready. A litany of pleas and sounds of pain punctuated the staccato slaps.
"Ow! Please!"
"Stop!"
"It hurts! John!"
"I'm sorry. I'll talk next time!"
"Damn it, stop!"
She hadn't meant to swear. It had been startled out of her by a wicked swat that had caught the top of her thigh and sent her rocking forward from the force. The last sentence got his attention, all right, and he did stop—for a moment. And then it got her an immediate upgrade in her punishment. Instantly, his hand was flying hard and fast at a speed that snatched her breath away and started the tears flowing like a sudden downpour. She buried her face deep in the bed to muffle the wailing that poured out of her.
"I warned you about the vulgar language, too, April. And while I do agree that you have a right to the occasional profanity that seems so common these days, I do not and will not ever find it acceptable for you to throw such words at me. Especially not while I'm punishing you for poor behavior," he said. His voice was low, gravelly, and almost a snarl as he addressed her unfortunate choice of words.
Her entire world shrank until there was nothing in it but his hand and the searing flames it was raising across her skin. As the tempo picked up and her struggles increased, he released her wrist and instead wrapped his left arm around her waist, snugging her up against his side firmly. There was something so intimate and possessive about the way he did it. The way he held her tight against him as he slapped his hand down across her posterior. It hurt so fiercely that she thought she'd break. She forgot entirely about the camera on them. Forgot about everything but all that heat centered in her hindquarters. It was beginning to throb and that, combined with the vibrations from the swats, somehow began to arouse her again.
The tingling feeling between her legs and the way her stomach had done a slow turn, that had quickly vanished when the spanking began, but now, for some reason, it was rising again. Moisture formed, soaking the short thatch of hair between her legs, and she pressed them together desperately. The tickling of pleasure was a distraction from the pain, and the sharp sting was slowly melding into something else. Every time his hand came down, jiggling her cheeks with force, a dizzying sensation rolled through her belly. It was like she was on a roller coaster.
It still hurt, and she still cried out in pain, but now there was a different tone to it. The tears slowed, too, and her body began to rock with the swats in a steady motion instead of just jerking away from them when they came. This reaction took her by surprise, and it was embarrassing. She wasn't thinking about the team reviewing the footage in the morning, though later she'd remember that and cringe in mortification. No, she was afraid that he'd notice how she was responding to his punishment. He wanted her to enjoy the spanking when it was meant to be enjoyed, but she was unsure of how he'd feel about her enjoying what he was giving her in anger.
The insides of both legs were coated with slick arousal from the drops that beaded and then rolled down her thighs. She clamped them tightly together to hide what she hoped wasn't completely obvious to him. But that, in itself, added something to it; the pressure of the squeezing stimulated the swollen nodule between her lower lips, and she began to rhythmically tense her muscles to bring that surge of pleasure closer. She was so intent on bringing herself off that it actually superceded the pain of the punishment. She stopped trying to hide her reactions in her effort to get there, and he caught on fairly quickly to what was happening.
He stopped spanking her, but she barely noticed. Her ass and thighs rippled as she clenched and squeezed, hips pressing into the bed she was bent over in an effort to get traction. His eyes narrowed as he tried to figure out what was happening, and then it dawned on him. He'd never had a woman react that way to an actual hard punishment. Bed games, yes; everyone knew a little pain improved the pleasure, but this? He'd been spanking brutally hard, and her response was not what he'd expected.
But he did know how to deal with it. While it delighted him that she could take this level of pain and still feel aroused from it, it wasn't the goal he was going for just then. He wanted, needed, her to understand the lesson that he was trying to teach her. As much as he wanted the relationship to work between them, he knew he had only a few weeks to show her what she was truly letting herself in for. Forcing that woman to sign over the house to April, only to have April flee, would do him no good. He needed a willing partner, a mate who would accept his authority, at least in some things. And he would bend to accommodate the way the world, and women, had changed, but only to a certain point.
His hand began to caress and rub the red and swollen skin, following the gentle curve of her hips as he soothed the sting slightly. The tips of his fingers trailed along the divide of her cheeks until they found the small gap at the top of her thighs. She still held them closed, but he began to push his hand between them, opening her to his touch. Her mound, covered in a silky thatch of dark curling hair, was damp, practically dripping with excitement, and he tickled his fingers along the seam, teasing until she spread her legs farther apart without urging.
A soft moaning sound emerged from her mouth, a sound of frantic need, as he parted the slick lips and drew the pad of his finger back through the inner folds firmly. She gasped as pleasure shot through her like lightning, rocking forward and then pressing back against his touch for more. She didn't need much stroking; she was already wet and rea
dy when his finger found her clit, pressing under the hood and beginning to tease and rub the stiff little nub. In under a minute, she was writhing and making sounds that caused his cock to harden, and he eased back just enough to drag things out a little longer.
He captured her clit lightly between two fingers and then began to slide them back and forth in quick, short motions, so they stroked both sides of it, keeping her on edge. It was pleasurable and not enough to heighten, but gradually he lengthened the strokes so that the fingers were slipping down the length of her sex and circling her entrance. He dipped the tip of his longest finger inside, only as far as the second joint, tantalizing her with that feeling of being penetrated, before sliding back up through the slick folds to her engorged bud.
She began to beg. "Please, John. I need you inside of me. Please, please f— take me!" she blurted, nearly making the mistake of swearing again before switching her request to something that would please him better.
Her ass swayed and pushed out as his hand slid back down to plunge one finger inside of her again. It felt so good, so perfect, but it wasn't enough. She needed more. She needed something thicker and longer to fill that aching hunger, but he seemed stubbornly determined to continue what he was doing.
Never in her life, with her limited sexual experience, had she ever wanted so badly to be fucked hard. Her legs spread wider, back arching to present herself to him in a way that would have seemed obscene if she'd been aware she was doing it. She was trying so hard to tempt him with her body, and it worked. She did tempt him, and his body reacted to hers. His erection was hard and long, and it was pressing painfully against the front of his trousers, wanting to be released. There was an ache centered deep in his balls, demanding that he take what she was so willingly offering. But.
This was meant to be punishment. He'd started out angrily determined to teach her a lesson and her arousal had turned that to a new direction. What he was doing now was going to bring things back around, and it would end up being even more punishing for her, and satisfying for him as a result. But not if he gave in to his baser animal instincts and thrust away all his motivation inside the warmth of her body. He was stubbornly determined to put off his own pleasure in favor of a greater understanding; it would be worth it in the end, if he could hold out.
A Haunting Experience Page 14
