Chapter 5
Caleb
I've got Scarletta Mae Desmond exactly where I want her.
Trembling. Soaked. Desperate enough to promise anything if I'll just let her come.
But I won't.
Not here. Not at Station One.
She needs to understand what this hunt actually is. She doesn't get relief just because she begs prettily. Her body belongs to me completely—including her orgasms.
I withdraw my fingers slowly. Deliberately. Dragging them through her folds one last time before pulling out entirely.
Her reaction is immediate. A broken whimper, that turns into a moan, that turns into frantic writhing against the beam. Her restrained wrist pulls at the cuff. Her secured ankle strains against the leather.
"No—wait—please don't—"
I wipe my hand on her ass. Marking her with her own wetness.
"Are you leaving?" Her voice cracks. "Please don't leave me like this—"
I stand, step back, and watch her try to twist around to see me despite the restraints keeping her bent and exposed.
"Master, please—"
The panic in her voice makes my cock throb.
She genuinely thinks I might just walk away. Leave her edged, and desperate, and tied to this beam sixty feet off the ground.
I'm not that cruel.
Well. Not yet.
"I need—you can't just—" She's gasping now. "Please, I'm sorry, whatever I did wrong I'm sorry—"
"You didn't do anything wrong."
I crouch beside her. Run my hand down her spine.
She arches into the touch like she's starving for it.
"Then why—"
"Because you don't come until I decide you've earned it." I lean closer. "And you haven't earned it yet."
Her breath hitches.
"But I did everything—I climbed up here, I put the cuffs on, I took the spanking, I didn't come even though—"
"I know."
My fingers trace idle, wandering patterns on her lower back—slow circles, figure eights, random swirls that make her muscles flutter and twitch beneath my touch.
Light enough to tease every nerve ending still screaming for release.
Not nearly enough pressure to satisfy the desperate ache I've built inside her.
Each stroke deliberate. Calculated to keep her simmering right at the edge of madness.
"You've been very good," I murmur, letting genuine approval color my tone. "Better than I expected, honestly."
I let my hand hover there above the reddened skin of her ass for a long, suspended moment. Let her feel the radiant heat of my palm lingering just millimeters away from contact. The anticipation alone makes her tremble beneath me.
Then slowly—so slowly she could stop me if she wanted—I slide my hand lower. Down between her legs where she's been silently begging for attention since the first strike landed.
Her hips buck up immediately, instinctive and desperate. Chasing any friction I might offer. Looking for more contact, more pressure, anything to ease the unbearable ache I've built inside her.
I don't give it to her.
Instead I spread her open with both hands.
Gently pull her cheeks apart so I can see everything.
Her pussy gleaming wet in the late afternoon light filtering through the trees.
Her tight little asshole clenching reflexively under my scrutiny.
Both holes on display, vulnerable, and exposed, and mine.
My cock throbs so hard against my zipper it borders on actual pain.
Christ. She's soaked. Absolutely dripping. The evidence of her arousal has literally run down her inner thighs, leaving glistening trails on her skin.
All from my hand. From being spanked, and denied, and put exactly where I want her.
She makes this desperate, broken sound as I lean down and put my mouth on her. Half sob, half moan. The kind of noise that goes straight to my dick and makes my balls tighten.
My tongue slides between her folds and into a sweet, slick pool of her arousal. It flows onto my tongue, floods my mouth with her taste—salt and musk and something uniquely, addictively her.
Fuck.
She tastes even better than I imagined.
"Master," she gasps.
I force myself to pull back. I want to tell her that this is far more demanding of me than it is her—because I want to fuck every hole she has right now. Right here. Sixty feet up in the air.
But I'm never going to tell her that. Not during a game. I need her to be afraid. I need her to think I'm indifferent. And I need her to do everything I tell her anyway. So I simply say, "No."
I stand and begin unfastening her ankle cuff.
"Wait—what are you—are you letting me go?"
The hope and terror mixing in her voice is perfect.
I release her wrist next.
She stays bent over the beam for a moment, like she doesn't trust that she's actually free to move. Then she slowly turns her body to face me. Her eyes are huge. Wet. Pupils blown wide with arousal and confusion. "I don't understand."
"Station One is complete. It's time to move to Station Two."
I pull her upright, steadying her when she wobbles.
She's making these soft, desperate sounds in the back of her throat. Little whimpers that tell me exactly how badly she needs relief. How close to breaking she is.
An addict looking for her fix.
Perfect.
I turn her body toward the plank she crossed earlier. The narrow strip of ironwood extending six feet across empty air to the adjacent tree.
"Walk."
Her eyes drop immediately. Down through the gaps in the platform. Down past sixty feet of nothing to the jungle floor far below.
Her breathing changes. Shallow. Rapid.
"I can't—"
"You already did." I grip her shoulders. Firm enough to anchor her. Not gentle. "You crossed it to get the cuffs. You'll do it again to leave."
"That was different, I was crawling!"
I pet her hair, smoothing it back. Her face is glistening with sweat, her skin flushed pink with desire. If she only knew how much I wanted to fuck her right now.
"I'm asking you to walk six feet, my pretty little slut. You don't need to crawl."
She swallows hard. Looks down. Looks back up at me with pleading eyes. "Can't we just climb down the way I came up?"
"No."
My fingers dig into her skin. She's trembling under my hands now. The arousal-driven tremors mixing with genuine fear.
This part is real risk. I'm not going to let her fall. My hands are right here. I can catch her before she goes over the edge.
But if she does fall somehow—if she panics and jerks away from me, if her foot slips on a patch of moisture, if the wood gives under her weight—there's a net strung fifteen feet below. Heavy-duty cargo netting anchored to the surrounding trees.
It will catch her.
But the canopy is thick between here and there. Branches, vines, dense foliage she'll slam through on the way down. The net will stop her from dying. It won't stop her from getting hurt.
Bruises. Scrapes. Possibly worse.
She doesn't know about the net. She thinks it's sixty feet of empty air to the ground.
"Master, please—"
"Look at me."
She drags her eyes up from the drop, looking over her shoulder until her eyes lock onto mine. Her pupils are still wide, but now tears are gathering at the corners. Her beautiful plump lips are parted and trembling.
Christ, she's beautiful when she's terrified.
"You're going to walk across that plank," I tell her. Flat. Matter of fact. "You're going to do it now. And you're not going to fall."
"How do you know I won't—"
"Because I'm right here." I shift my grip. One hand on each shoulder. "And I'm not going to let you."
Her breath hitches.
She wants to believe me. I can see it in her eyes. The desperate need to trust that I'll keep her safe even while I'm deliberately scaring her.
"What if I can't—what if I freeze—"
"Then I'll carry you."
The words come out harsher than I intended. Edged with the frustration of wanting to just throw her over my shoulder and be done with it.
But that's not the point of this station.
She needs to walk it herself. Needs to feel the fear and do it anyway because I told her to.
That's the surrender I'm after.
"You need to trust me, Scarletta. You need to give in to me. It's my job to protect you. If you don't believe that, why are you here?"
I don't push her.
I just stand here with my hands on her shoulders and wait for her brain to catch up to what her body already knows.
She's going to do it. She's going to walk across that plank because I told her to. Because somewhere underneath all the fear and resistance, she wants to prove she can.
Wants to earn what I refused to give her five minutes ago.
Her eyes search mine. Looking for something. Permission, maybe. Or reassurance that I'm not lying about keeping her safe.
I give her nothing except steady eye contact and silence.
The waiting is its own kind of torture. For both of us.
My cock is still hard enough to pound nails. Still throbbing against my zipper from tasting her pussy and watching her come apart under my hands.
From seeing her bent over that beam with her ass red from my palm—dripping wet and desperate.
From knowing she's standing here completely naked sixty feet in the air with absolutely nowhere to hide.
The afternoon sun cuts through the canopy at an angle that hits her body perfectly. Lights up her skin in gold. Makes her look like something out of a Renaissance painting—all soft curves, and pale flesh, and classical proportions.
Except Renaissance women weren't shaved bare and trembling with denied orgasms.
Her breasts are perfect. Small enough to fit in my hands, large enough to bounce when she walks. The kind of tits that don't need a bra but look incredible in one anyway. High and firm with just enough softness that I know they'd feel like heaven pressed against my chest.
Her nipples are standing straight out. Hard little peaks that jut forward from her profile like they're begging to be touched, and pinched, and sucked.
I want to put my mouth on them. Roll them between my teeth until she gasps. Bite down just hard enough to make her cry out and clench around nothing.
I don't move.