TWENTY-TWO #3
‘When you make a decision for me, you take something that isn’t yours.’
The flogger snapped once through the air – a clean, sharp promise. She jolted.
‘So now I get to take from you.’
And I would give back pain, because it was the only thing I trusted myself to give right.
I hesitated, fingering the leather in my hands.
‘Safe word.’ The demand came quiet but firm, a reminder that this was still her choice, even when everything else belonged to me.
I wouldn’t hurt her – not in the way that broke people. Pain was memory, boundary, release.
‘Red to stop, green to go,’ she whispered.
We breathed.
‘What will it be, little angel?’
She inhaled deeply, and I waited. Patiently. Praying she would trust the monster enough.
‘Green.’
My exhale nearly carried off her name with it like an offering to the devil himself.
This little vixen… she wanted the darkness.
The first strike landed low, painting a beautiful sting across the soft swell of her arse. Not hard – a warning, a greeting. She let out a quick breath, not a moan – but her thighs quivered all the same, the reflexive clench of a body caught between fear and desire.
I waited. Let the silence hold us until anticipation hummed loud enough.
The second landed harder. Still, she didn’t cry out. The welt bloomed slow and red beneath my gaze, and with it came the realisation that this – this surrender – was her gift to me.
My dick was hard, aching, because she was giving me everything, and asking for nothing.
The third strike crossed the first, an X of possession drawn into her skin. A breath trembled through her, then held.
She whimpered, but didn’t move, didn’t say a word. Didn’t tap.
‘Count them.’
‘Three,’ she gasped.
‘Louder.’
‘Three!’
The flogger came down again, snapping against the curve of her hip like a wicked kiss that made her body lurch slightly forward, and wrenched a hiss from between her teeth.
‘Four!’ she cried.
‘You don’t chain me, little angel.’ Another lash, dangerously close to the trembling seam of her thighs in a promise of what I could take and what I would withhold.
‘Five!’ she choked out, voice cracking.
I waited. Listened. Her breath was ragged but steady. No sobs. No panic. Only desire and the smallest tremor of pain laced into it. That was what I wanted. That was what we both needed.
I dropped the flogger, drunk on her already.
My palm ran up the red swells, over her spine that curved beneath it in invitation, and slid around her throat – tightening just enough to remind her what she’d offered – herself.
I crowded her, body pressed flush against her back, lips brushing the shell of her ear.
‘You’re going to beg before I let you come,’ I breathed, and even I could hear the hunger in my voice.
And hatred.
But not for her, yet for the part of me that needed this.
‘You’re going to plead. And like that night – you’ll be on your knees, full of me.’
Her body trembled beneath me, breathless from the exquisite edge of being seen and claimed.
And she was fucking soaked – the heat of her sex clung to my skin as I slid a hand between her thighs, fingers ghosting over her folds like the purest form of damnation.
‘Oh, that’s it,’ I muttered.
But my breath shook because I was as desperate for her.
When my fingertip passed over her clit, the pillow absorbed her moan.
I didn’t relent. I pushed two fingers inside her – just a slow, claiming thrust curling deep as my palm ground against her.
After a while of this beautiful torment, she finally bucked, mouth open in a silent cry that broke something loose inside me.
And then I pulled out.
‘No.’ The word came out rough, a growl dragged from the part of me that wanted to give her everything.
I gripped her neck gently, yanking her head back until her face hovered inches from my mask. ‘Not yet, little angel.’
She moaned, chest heaving, her body trembling as she held her arse raised. I relished the flush of her skin, the eagerness of her thighs wanting to open wider.
‘Let me punish you, little angel.’ I loathed how pleading it sounded – but also how much I meant it.
‘Yes,’ she whispered.
‘Louder.’
‘Punish me, Ghost.’
I left the bed, and she held her breath, body still bowed. She twisted slightly to see what I was doing.
From the duffel, I pulled a box. The slow reveal of the black vibrator was a performance, as I wiped it with a cloth like it were a blade I had forged for her alone.
When I held it up, her eyes widened – fearless. Her thighs spread – wet.
And I burned.
‘Green?’ I asked. Barely.
Her gaze rose from the toy to my face. I saw the hesitation as I dropped the wipe to the floor, waiting.
I would’ve waited forever. Because wanting her wasn’t the point. Her wanting what I gave her – that was everything.
‘Green,’ she whispered. A single word. A surrender.
I smiled behind the mask.
Clicking the toy on, I watched her flinch, then her entire body tightening like silk pulled taut, spine stiffening with the tension of a prey sensing the predator’s final approach.
I was going to ruin this woman.