Chapter Nineteen #3
“Uh huh.” Caleb chants raw and encouraging praise.
“Good girl. That’s it. That’s what I want from you.
I love watching you come.” He doesn’t ease his tortuous attention to my flesh as the orgasm rolls through me.
When the sensation subsides, he withdraws his hands and sucks my arousal from his fingers.
“Mmm . . . Is this what your pain tastes like?”
I pant audibly, gasping for breath. Not only did my enemy steal my orgasm but also my ability to speak.
He squats in front of me with devilish intent. “I want more.”
I’m hanging on his every word. If he told me to fold, I would. His voice is mesmerizing and intoxicatingly sexy. Like a starved animal, he wants to ravish me.
He lifts my leg so my thigh is angled outward. Once I’m open for him, I whimper at the temperature mixture of a cool breeze, and his heated breath whispering against me.
Silence has never been so loud. And until now, I had forgotten all about it, but he sees it. I’m so embarrassed and disgusted at myself.
“What the fuck?” Caleb mutters.
At his repulsion, a lump hardens in my throat. And the tears pool in my eyes.
A gentle pull and twist tells me Caleb is inspecting the scars on my body, even the one I’ve feared to look at myself. Out of sight, out of mind. The one across my opening.
I fail to swallow the lump in my throat, and the tears fall. I kick my leg out of his grasp.
Caleb lets me. He looks almost scared. Not of me but of what could have happened to me. If he only knew . . .
I could’ve been fully clothed, drowning in multiple layers, but no amount of clothing could make me feel any less naked.
Caleb’s voice is deep but wavering on control.
“The scars . . .”
I hang my head. “I know . . . I’m a monster.”
“No, you’re not . . . Tell me who did this to you, and I will show you a monster,” Caleb growls.
I bite my bottom lip and shake my head. The truth is so much worse than that. It’s easier to grasp the idea that someone else would do this to me. Because who would voluntarily and repeatedly destroy themselves? Only a masochist, like me.
“I did.”
Caleb’s brows furrow with confusion. He’s trying to make sense of why someone would do this to themselves. How broken I must be to have caused my own pain in a world of suffering.
I gaze into his eyes, searching for a sign he understands. Pleading, I want him to see me differently. I want to be seen for more than just a monster. A veteran with wounds, perhaps. The physical battle may be over, but the mental war never ends.
I plead with my eyes, Please see me. I’m more than what you see.
But hope crashes down on me with the truth that although I have scars, the ones to worry about aren’t visible to the naked eye. And if he couldn’t handle my physical imperfections, how could he—or anyone—ever face the mental ones?
I avert my eyes. I’m too damaged.
He crooks a finger under my chin, gently forcing my gaze back to his.
Sternly, he says, “You are my prisoner. Your body belongs to me. From now on, any mark on your body is mine to make. Every bit of your pleasure and pain are mine and mine alone, to give. Because this one”—he tilts my thigh to reveal the deepest of my scars, the one on my femoral vein—“could have cost you your life. Something that is also up to me.”
He must be done.
But instead, he walks over and grabs the arrow sticking out of the ground.
Its sharp, golden edge shines with a glare in the moonlight.
Inspecting it, he runs his hand over its length.
It’s not coming from a place of logic, but I melt into the feeling.
He’s not scared of me. He doesn’t find me monstrous.
“You never used your safe word,” he says.
I can’t believe it. He wants to continue?
“You don’t find me . . . repulsive?”
Slowly, he saunters over to me. Gently, he cups my chin, lifting my face to his.
“I don’t like tattoos or scars on my body.
It’s too easy to pick someone out in a line up.
I don’t like being trackable for my enemies.
But on you . . .” A pointed edge drags over my scar, the pressure from the blade delicious. “. . .I prefer them.”
The endorphins kick in, and I moan, “Why?”
“Because, baby girl. Now, not only are you unable to run from me, you can’t hide from me either. You’ve just made yourself that much easier for me to find. So, thank you”—he drags the arrow from the spot he pricked and cuts shallowly along the scar—“for servicing your alpha . . . Your master . . .”
If the rope wasn’t holding me up, my knees would have buckled. His words could make anyone melt. And as he taught me in the last bet, I’m not above anyone.
Caleb steps away and strolls to a tree. It’s a tulip poplar, a natural disinfectant found in the wild.
When he returns, he rubs its leaves between his fingers, extracting a gel-like substance, then runs it over the tip and arrow’s shaft.
He turns and points it straight at me. “You’ll use your safe word to tell me if I hurt you, or it gets to be too much, yes? ”
“I will.”
He makes long strides to close the distance between us and gives my body a once-over. He hums, “Good. Because I’m about to disrespect your body in ways that will make you scream.” He drags the pointed edge across preexisting scars, and I silently thank him for not making new ones.
I hiss, but the endorphins don’t fail to give me the rush I crave.
Caleb checks in with me. “How does that feel? Harder or softer?”
Ashamed at myself, I respond quietly. “Harder.”
“If you want anything from me, you’re going to have to speak up. I want you to tell me exactly how you like to be touched.”
“Harder,” I say louder.
There’s a twinkle in his eye at the permission I give him.
I’ve never had this much control as a prisoner before.
This time, he cuts deeper, and it feels so good to bleed at the hands of someone else yet still on my terms. With every cut, I ooze the emotions I’ve been scared to let myself feel.
He’s destroying my walls, and I’m safe and unashamed.
The realization is so scary, tears sting my eyes and stream down my cheeks.
“You bleed so well for me.”
He reaches between my thighs and tugs and pinches my swollen flesh.
There’s an internal exchange in my senses where the pain shoots up and pleasure surges down. My pussy throbs at the sensation.
His pinch turns into a massage. He’s kneading me, and I become soft dough in his hands.
I bite back my moan.
“Louder, baby. Come on, don’t hold back those moans.” As punishment for doing so, does one quick slash against my skin and grits through his teeth, “Let me hear you.”
He dips his head and pops my bud into his mouth.
He sucks it so hard I swear it’ll leave a bruise, then lets it go with a pop.
His tongue darts out to join in on my torture and alternates between flicking and biting my nipple.
It’s when he slowly inserts the shaft of the arrow into my sex that I do exactly what he told me to do.
I throw my head back and cry, “I can’t.”
“You will.” Caleb pumps the arrow inside me, increasing his thrusts as he pays close attention to my body’s cues.
The minute I roll my hips, he slows. When I stop, he increases his speed and pressure, pumping into me hard until I’m chasing an orgasm. He’s got me riding a roller coaster just, so I can scream for him on the way down. I come and writhe through my climax, clenching around the shaft.
The arrow is retracted. While maintaining eye contact, he drags his tongue up the shaft and laps the blood dripping down my thigh as well. “Your pleasure and pain together are a lethal combination.” He shoves the arrow in my face. “I want you to taste what I’ve done to you.”
I lick up the side he left for me, and he moans.
“That’s so damn hot. I like watching you taste yourself for me.”
A sense of power rolls through me. It’s his smoke-like voice. It does something to me. I love the way he can praise and degrade me at the same time. His sadistic, condescending sweetness pushes me further over the edge.
“Give me one more.”
“One more wha—oh!”
My question is answered when Caleb falls to his knees and sucks my clit between his lips. He spreads me open, parting my folds and flicks his tongue. My body jolts when he nips at the sensitive bud, then swirls the tip around my pulsing entrance.
“Yes. Just like that. Oh, that feels so good.” With one hand, he intermittently treats me to a quick slice up my inner thigh. With each, I climb even higher. “There! Keep it right there!”
Caleb moans at my cries, and his audible pleasure is just what I need to tip over the edge.
The orgasm that’s been brewing erupts and just like he promised, I’m screaming.
When the pleasure subsides, Caleb undoes my restraints and lets me off the ride.
I collapse, and Caleb leaves me on my hands and knees to dress himself.
His demeanor changes completely, and that glimpse of sensitivity I saw in him is gone.
But that momentary peek behind the curtains will keep convincing me to stay.
He’s done irreversible damage to me, and I don’t think I could recover.
Or leave.
I can convince myself I used him for pleasure, but I’d be lying to myself.
At least I didn’t full-on sleep with the enemy.
“As much as I’d like to, the king wouldn’t approve of you being put back in the cage. Which means you’ll be sleeping with me tonight until we can find you a suitable arrangement.”