Chapter Twenty-Three
Before she could protest, Verity found herself unceremoniously hauled across the pool. As they reached the steps, she threw her weight back, trying to break his hold on her wrist but Cross merely grabbed her round the waist and tossed her over his shoulder. Ignoring her frantic hammering on his back, he looped one arm over her thighs, holding her firmly in place and carried her through the open door, back into the flat.
Once inside, he dumped her on her feet and disappeared into the bedroom without a word. Confused and disoriented, Verity swayed, vaguely aware that she ought to be taking the opportunity to make a run for it, but unable to come to a decision on which direction to choose. Before she could settle on a single plan, Cross returned, wearing a pair of dark grey sweatpants and a dangerous expression.
Pulling a dry t-shirt over his head he stalked towards her and Verity raised a shaking hand in apology for... something? Her thoughts were a chaotic jumble of images and she was struggling to find the correct sequence of events. He was angry, that much was clear. Had she been angry too? She remembered lashing out but couldn’t remember why? She was soaked. The unfamiliar shirt clinging to her torso. Her fingers reached for the fabric. Why was she wearing this? Where had it come from? Was it his?
Still lost in her scrambled thoughts, she was taken by surprise when he suddenly dropped into a chair and pulled her with him. Before she knew what was happening, she found herself upended over his knee, feet kicking in space as he pushed the tail of the shirt out of the way, exposing the naked flesh beneath.
She heard rather than felt the first slap land, the sound shattering the unnatural silence of the apartment like a gunshot and ripping open unhealed memories. A rapid volley of blows followed and although Verity was aware of the percussive effect of each, ricocheting through her body, she could not distinguish the individual points of impact.
The remembered smell of blood and gunpowder filled her head and she retched. Then the next stroke landed and that memory was obliterated.
That one hurt!
The imprint of his palm burned into her chilled skin and she let out a yell, fighting to free herself from his grip. Cross merely tightened his hold on her arm, twisting it further up her back and pinning her place.
“Did you feel that one?” he said with satisfaction. “Is this what you wanted?”
As the cloying blanket of numbness that she’d been trying so hard to push away was suddenly torn from her grasp, Verity howled in shock as every sensation intensified. His palm connected with the back of her thigh and her whole body went rigid.
“Had enough yet?” he asked
“Fuck You!” Verity screamed, thrashing her legs in a fruitless attempt to squirm out of his lap.
“I’ll take that as a no.”
The onslaught continued and Verity cursed him at the top of her lungs as each blow landed, setting fire to the delicate flesh.
Then Cross paused, one finger lightly tracing the vivid imprint of his hand, and Verity gasped as entirely different sparks flew beneath her skin.
As he continued to draw delicate patterns across her burning bottom, he asked, “Are you ready now?”
Thoughts reeling from the sudden shift in attack, Verity shook her head. “Ready for what?”
“To talk about what happened last night?”
Not trusting herself to answer, Verity clenched her teeth and stared at the carpet.
Cross hummed and stroked a hand down her spine. “I didn’t realise you already knew Valentina.”
Verity stiffened. “I-I don’t. I’ve never met her before.”
His fingers trailed up her inner thigh, Verity screwed her eyes closed, trying to ignore the lick of heat that followed them.
“We both know that’s a lie,” he murmured. “A reaction like the one you had last night is driven from memory. A very specific, highly personal memory. And I need to know what.. it… was...” He punctuated the final words with three slaps landing in rapid succession, switching between one cheek and the other.
The bruising pain seemed to flare out from each specific point of impact in waves. It sparked off other nerves, vibrated down her limbs and echoed off deeply buried memories. All the suppressed emotions Verity had been trying so hard to avoid, tore through her and she screamed in fury and outrage.
Now alternating between sharp slaps, and slow soothing strokes Cross was making it impossible for her to form a defence. Gradually her shrieks broke down into excuses and then apologies and finally silence as the fight drained out of her and she surrendered to the sensation.
In response, tempo changed again and the blows now landing were softer, bringing with them a sense of warmth rather than pain, but each forced a jerky gasp from her lungs. The steady pulse between her thighs grew louder, distracting her thoughts and shredding her attempts at control. Unable to help herself, Verity rolled her hips, unconsciously grinding against his lap.
Cross paused, his large hand resting lightly against the quivering skin of her bottom. “Perhaps, it’s a different sensation you need?” Not waiting for a response, he ran his fingers up the damp seam of her sex and Verity clutched at his leg as her head spun. The intimacy of that touch was harder to bear than the spanking which has preceded it, scraping over raw nerve endings and opening old wounds that she’s spent decades trying to bury.
Then his fingers sank deep inside her and she clenched around his hand as the sensation intensified. To her horror, the piteous whimpering sound she was making choked off and a broken sob tried to force its way from her throat. Squeezing her eyes closed, she felt the first tears sting beneath her lids.
No, no, no!! She would not cry! Must not cry!
It wasn’t that she was afraid of showing weakness, but she was terrified on some visceral level that if she once gave into that urge and started crying she might not be able to stop.
Ever.
But the fingers were relentless, stroking in and out of her swollen channel and the bright spiral of excitement began to uncoil in the pit of her stomach.
“Are you present now?”
Her response was immediate, her thighs parting beneath his touch as she whispered, “Yes!”
Gathering the moisture flooding from her, Cross circled her clit and Verity couldn’t suppress the groan that followed.
The circling finger stilled, resting lightly on the throbbing bundle of nerve ending. “Is this what you need?” he asked, underlining the question with a light tap.
Eye closed, she clenched her teeth and focused on her breathing, desperately trying to keep it steady and even. But as he delivered one sharp smack to that overstimulated bundle of nerves her resistance cracked and the first ragged sob escaped her closed lips. Choking back the one that threatened to follow she held her breath, braced and waiting for the next attack.
But his wicked fingers returned to their gentle torment, circling and stroking, bringing her back to the edge before once again denying her release with another brisk slap to her tortured flesh.
The first tear trickled from her eyes and dripped from the end of her nose. Time was suspended as she watched it fall to the carpet and vanish. A second followed the same path.
Still she held her breath.
Dizzy with the need for oxygen she was unprepared for his final assault as he spanked her clit three times, each smack harder than the last. No longer able to distinguish between pleasure and pain her body shattered beneath the force of her orgasm.
Overwhelmed by the torrent of sensation, the dam broke and the tears followed.
***
Once he was certain she’d begun to sob in earnest, Cross stopped and ran a soothing hand over the raw and inflamed skin of her backside, feeling a disconcerting mix of relief and guilt. This wasn’t how he’d planned to have this conversation, but the punch to his jaw had taken him by surprise and the pain, as he’d nearly bitten straight through his tongue, temporarily overwhelmed his usual self control.
Bringing her upright he settled her into his lap, careful not to add additional pressure to her rapidly bruising flesh and pulled her tight against his chest.
He held her for the next hour as she cried, her tears soaking into the front of his t-shirt as her hands bunched into fists around the fabric, dragging him closer. Moving only to rub slow, soothing circles on her back he waited.
Gradually the storm passed, the tears giving way to nauseated, heaving gasps and then silence.
Now it was time.
Suppressing the uncharacteristic wave of guilt he took advantage of that one crystalline moment of calm after all the emotion had been burned out. That point where she hovered between past and present, awake and asleep - when it would be impossible for her to mount a defence.
“What did she do?” he asked, his voice quiet but insistent, demanding a response.
Verity shuddered, the words were coming from a place she could not control.
“She had my mother shot,” she replied, her voice oddly calm as she stared blankly into space. “While I watched.”
Cross frowned. That sounded unlikely. Not that Valentina wasn’t capable of such a thing - she had plenty of blood on her hands, but it wasn’t from random individuals. He didn’t see how she would have crossed paths with Verity’s mother.
“Are you sure?” he asked gently.
Verity shrugged, “Mum made me hide in the cupboard under the stairs, but I could see her through the crack… hear her footsteps on the tiles.” She twitched and then swallowed hard, clearly fighting down a wave of nausea. “I will never forget her voice as she gave the order to shoot, or the smell of her fucking perfume.”
“But why?” he asked. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe her, but the story made no sense to him. The account in Verity’s file said that her mother had been the victim of domestic violence and there was still an active warrant for her father’s arrest.
She sighed and closed her eyes. “Because of some stupid insurance scam my dad was running at the time.”
“Insurance?” It didn’t sound like something Valentina would have bothered to be involved with.
“He was faking traffic accidents with a mate, spotting expensive cars and manufacturing a collision. Then one of them played victim, claiming to have been injured and the other pretended to be a witness. It was always late at night and his targets had normally been drinking so they were keen to pay him off rather than risk the police getting involved.”
Cross froze, suddenly finding it difficult to force air into his lungs. “But Valentina didn’t pay?”
She gave a harsh laugh. “Valentina didn’t stop. Just drove into him when he tried to flag her down and carried on.”
A sick feeling tightened in his gut and Cross had to wet his lips before he was able to ask, “And he was killed? Your father?”
“No - more's the pity,” she spat, “badly hurt, but not killed. He didn’t even wait until he was out of the hospital before he tracked down her licence plate and started leaving threatening messages. He claimed he’d seen what she’d done and that he’d go to the police if she didn’t pay up.”
She shifted in his lap, starting to emerge from the fugue state. “By the time he realised that she really wasn’t someone you wanted to mess with, it was too late. So he did what he always did when things went wrong. He ran away and it was mum who was left to deal with the consequences, like usual.” Her face twisted in pain. “He wasn’t even there when she–” Unable to continue she clapped a hand over her mouth as her shoulders gave a convulsive shudder.
Cross pulled her tight against his chest, tucking her head under his chin as he stared into space.
This was not the confession he’d been expecting, nor one for which he was prepared. While it answered most of his immediate questions, it also tore a gaping hole through much of the belief on which he’d built his entire life.
For he knew one element of that story from twenty years ago which apparently Verity did not.
It might have been Valentina’s car on the winding country lane that night – but she hadn’t been the one driving.