Chapter 23 #2
I grit my teeth, shriek, and snap, holding onto my rage, which fuels the adrenaline in my hot blood. Of course, he would stash a mother fucking paddle on his person. And this one has small metal spikes. Oh, God…
I flinch when he trains it along my back, the cool, textured metal brushing my exposed bottom. Heat coils low in my belly, spreading lower…or higher when it comes to this position.
Circling to my front, Roman hooks the paddle to his belt loop before reaching inside his coat, retrieving a length of red silk rope.
He seizes my arms. I try to struggle, to hit and claw, but it doesn’t take him long to subdue me and bind my hands behind my back, joining them at the base of my spine.
“Ugh, what are you doing?”
“Keeping my wife more comfortable.”
“How about you comfortably kiss my ass?”
It’s the worst choice of words right now. And I know I’ll pay for it soon. But my dark sass is the only thing grounding me right now.
“I will be doing so much more than kissing it, Valentina,” he says, his breath hot between my exposed legs. My thighs clench reflexively.
It takes him all of a minute to secure me, ankles bound, but my knees are bent like a reverse prayer position.
“Are you happy now that I’m strung up like a goddamn turkey at a Thanksgiving market?” I hiss.
Roman chuckles darkly and gives my body a little spin. “No. I won’t be happy until you’re stuffed, basted, and begging for seconds, little bird.” He stops me mid-twirl, his palm lingering on my thigh.
“And now…” He withdraws something from his pocket, and I gasp, shaking my head furiously.
“Don’t even think abo—”
He seizes the moment, shoving the ball gag in my mouth and clasping the leather tie behind my head. My shrieks and cries are muffled as I whip my head back and forth, fighting like a hellcat.
“The more you struggle, the more you will wear yourself out. I suggest you save your strength.”
I burn my eyes against his, wishing I could tell him to fuck off, but he will do that soon anyway. He disappears behind me.
I freeze when he rubs the spiked side of the paddle along my ass. “Relax your muscles. If you tense, it will make the strike hurt with a painful bruise for days. I’d prefer you red and welted, not black and blue.”
“Urrgh!” I screech through the ball gag.
He circles again, jaw clenching, muscles flexing, bracing himself.
Swinging the instrument, he brings it down flat on my left cheek. The spikes bite my skin like little teeth. My chest heaves, my body jutting forward just a little from the momentum. Roman smacks the other side, so the other cheek shares in the stinging sensation.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
He lands three more blows on each side until the heat radiates through my whole bottom.
Nothing compares to the fire Roman is building—no, forging—inside me.
I dangle helplessly, the blood rushing to my head in a pounding rhythm that matches the burn rising in my core.
Roman is behind me again, breathing heat and fury down my spine.
He alternates between soothing strokes of the paddle’s flat leather and the punishing kiss of the spiked side.
He pauses, but I know my punishment isn’t done. Not after what I did. The spiked side touches my thigh, poised there like a breath waiting to escape. I prepare myself for the crack. It doesn’t come.
The shock does.
Electricity rips through the paddle’s spiked edge, discharging through my thighs like molten venom. I scream into the gag, my legs convulsing.
“Oh, did you enjoy my little surprise, Valentina?” Roman purrs, voice sin dipped in brimstone. “I trust you were… adequately shocked.”
All my nerves riot, and I rock my body, fuming and screaming at him through the gag, spitting out muffled curses.
His laugh is low, primal, as if he’s worshiping my resistance just as much as he’s stripping it down. He drags the paddle gently along the inside of my thigh again. My skin is ablaze, senses on fire. And the next flash of electricity explodes like stars behind my eyes.
Each strike makes me see him more clearly. Not just as my husband. Not just as my captor. But as a god. A punishing, ravenous god who would raze the world before letting me go.
“You are not mine until I’ve carved myself into every inch of your body,” Roman breathes, brushing his fingers over my hip, where welts bloom like crimson petals. “Until your mind, your will, your fire—all of it bends for me.”
His fingers graze my inner thigh, so tender, it nearly undoes me. My body betrays me, clenching with need, and the shame only fans the flames.
“I am a master at unraveling the human psyche,” he murmurs. “A specialist in fragility. I know precisely how to break it…and when to cradle it.”
Another jolt. Another scream caught in my throat. My vision blurs as my body quakes from the inside out.
“But you, Valentina… I don’t want to break,” he says, brushing a kiss to the nape of my neck. “I want you to surrender.”
The words pierce deeper than the paddle. Deeper than the shocks.
I squeeze my eyes shut and focus on my breathing—shaky inhales, trembling exhales. The world narrows to his voice and the elements. Ice-laced wind whips over my skin, but his strikes are flame and thunder. Every blow feels like it’s branding me. Claiming me.
He’s moved to my front. The spikes bite at my pebbled nipples. Slighter shocks like a delicate flame.
My legs jerk with each one, tightening more, and I hate that it feels good. I hate that I’m aching and soaked, his cruelty tethering me to him, forcing my pleasure.
Roman pauses to press his lips against the swell of my ass, reverent. “You think you hate me for this,” he whispers. “But what you hate… is how much you want to be mine.”
I want to scream yes. I want to scream no.
But I can only moan, the gag silencing my surrender.
He’s so calm and controlled. Because this isn’t rage. It’s an intentional punishment. Because I defied him. I attacked him. I ran. Straight into death’s waiting mouth. And he dragged me back. He saved me.
Yes, there’s still a black veil between us. Secrets he refuses to share. But here, now? I see facets of him I don’t think anyone else has. Like an uncut black diamond—sharp, indomitable, breathtaking. He cuts me, bleeds me, brands me. And still, I burn for him.
He circles to the front again, and I look up—vision fuzzy, body wrecked—and I see him.
Roman. My storm. My ruin.
His green eyes glow like embers, wild with hunger, hair tousled by the wind. Feral. Glorious. And wholly focused on me like I’m the altar he’ll burn the world for.
A slow, triumphant smile works across his face. He leans in, careless of how his bulge nearly smothers me as he tiptoes his fingers along my folds. I moan.
“You feel that?” he growls, palm covering my drenched center. “That heat? That clench? You don’t hate this, Valentina.”
His fingers slide, tormenting—and I gasp so hard, it sounds like a sob.
“You need this.”
And God help me, he’s right.