Chapter 26. Kit
The light comes in before I’m ready for it, gray-gold through the gap in the curtains. My eyes open, and then I remember.
The promise. Redline. Soren’s voice: Kit will be getting another one in the morning.
I become very still under the covers. The stillness lasts approximately four seconds before something makes me turn my head toward the doorway.
Soren is already there. Fully dressed. Jeans, a dark henley, boots already on. His posture is the same as it always is: unhurried, completely at ease. He has a paddle in his right hand.
He’s smiling.
My first instinct is to scramble backward. My heels push against the mattress, my back finds the headboard, and I sit there with the covers bunched at my waist, my hair a disaster, and my eyes considerably wider than they were thirty seconds ago.
“Morning,” Soren says calmly, enjoying the panic in my eyes.
Sadistic bastard.
“Morning.” The word comes out rough.
“I promised you’d get another one after you woke up.” He doesn’t move from the doorway. “I always follow through on what I say.”
I know this. This is not new information.
I have, in fact, been aware of this quality of Soren’s since the first evening in the shop, and nothing about the months since has revised the assessment.
The problem is that knowing something intellectually and having it arrive in your bedroom at seven in the morning holding a paddle are two substantially different experiences, and my nervous system is currently working very hard to distinguish between them.
“Can I…” My voice is still thick with sleep. I clear my throat. “Can I at least go to the bathroom first?”
Soren considers me for a second, apparently determines this is a genuine and reasonable request rather than the opening argument in a forty-five-minute delay campaign, and nods.
“Go.”
I climb out of bed, cross the hall to the bathroom, and close the door behind me. Then I stand at the sink with both hands against the porcelain and stare at myself in the mirror.
I turn on the cold tap and splash water over my face. My dark hair is going in every direction, my eyes are still heavy with sleep, and my body has already decided that remembering what’s waiting for me in the bedroom is sexually relevant information.
Of course it has.
I turn around enough to inspect yesterday’s damage in the mirror. The faint marks from the belt are still there, and my backside is definitely sore, but nothing looks alarming.
Oh, damn.
The thing about knowing what’s coming is that it doesn’t help.
This is a fact I’ve verified multiple times now.
I can name every step, narrate it to myself in advance with perfect accuracy, and my body will still produce exactly the same sequence of responses as if the whole thing arrived without warning.
Foreknowledge only means I carry the anticipation longer, which is its own punishment.
Soren knows that too.
I use the toilet, wash my hands, dry my face and go back.
He has moved from the doorway to the edge of the bed. The paddle rests across his knee, pale wood catching the morning light.
He looks me over as I approach.
“Come here first.”
I stop in front of him. Soren’s hands settle briefly at my hips, and he turns me enough to check the marks from last night. His touch is careful, clinical for all of ten seconds, which somehow makes the entire situation worse.
“Sore?”
“Yes.”
“Too sore?”
I check honestly.
“No.”
He looks up at me. “And you’re still comfortable with the second part of the consequence?”
My stomach flips.
“Yes, Daddy.”
He lifts the paddle slightly.
“This okay?”
I stare at it.
Fuck.
When he makes me say it, I get so hard it’s hard to breathe.
“Yes, Daddy.”
“Good boy.”
Then he pats his thigh.
Fuck.
I push my sweatpants down and step out of them. The morning air is cool against my skin as I lower myself over his lap, and his hand comes to rest at the small of my back the way it always does.
He holds me there for a moment, letting me breathe.
Then the paddle lands.
My entire body jumps. My exhale punches out of me on impact. My fingers drive into the bedding as the soreness left from last night ignites all over again.
“Oh, fuck.”
The second stroke follows after just enough time for me to understand exactly how much I hated the first one.
Soren doesn’t rush. My toes curl. My knees press together. Somewhere around the fourth, the involuntary noises begin—short, bitten-off sounds I can’t quite suppress no matter how determined I am to suffer with dignity.
“Daddy, please, I’m already so sore.”
His hand remains warm against my back.
“I know, baby.”
The paddle lands again.
“Ouchie!”
Fucking sadistic bastard. Fuck!
My hips shift. I’m trying to stay still and take it quietly, which is an absolutely ridiculous goal and becomes more ridiculous with every strike. Soon I’m panting, crying, squirming across his lap while Soren keeps me steady.
Then he stops.
His palm moves slowly over my back, grounding me.
“Kit.”
I drag in a breath.
“Yellow?”
I check myself properly. The pain is intense. I’m crying. My body is shaking. But my head is clear. I want to take this.
“No.”
“Good.”
His hand rubs once over my back.
Then the paddle comes down again, and I howl.
“Daddy, please!”
Another.
“Fuck!”
He pauses just long enough for me to settle.
“Five more. Count them for me.”
I nearly sob harder on principle.
“I can’t take five more.”
Soren’s hand stills against my spine.
“If you need this to end, you say Red.”
Fuck.
“No Red,” I whisper.
“Then give me five, baby.”
Sadistic bastard.
The paddle lands against my right cheek.
I sob. “One.”
The next lands across the left.
“Two!”
I squirm hard enough that Soren waits until I’m back in position before continuing.
The third comes down.
“Three!”
I breathe through the heat, trying to remember how lungs work. The fourth lands and I cry out.
“Four!”
Soren’s hand caresses my back.
“One more.” I’m openly crying now, face wet against the bedding. “You still with me?”
“Yes.”
“You can give Daddy one more?”
I check again. Then nod.
“Yes, Daddy.”
The final stroke lands across both cheeks and I jump, yelping hard enough to embarrass myself.
“Five!”
The paddle disappears immediately.
“Done.”
I collapse.
Soren’s palm replaces the wood, warm and gentle against me. “Good boy. You were so brave for Daddy.”
My breathing comes in rough little bursts. My face is wet, my backside throbs, and the strange floating pleasure that always seems to arrive after the pain starts spreading through me.
“The consequence is over,” he says.
My whole body loosens.
“No more hanging over you. No more worrying about it.”
“Okay, Daddy.”
“Good boy.”
He lets me stay across his lap until I’m ready to move. Eventually his arm comes around my chest and draws me upright. My legs are unsteady when I stand in front of him, eyes wet, face hot, and I feel mildly embarrassed and so, so turned on.
Soren looks at me. He smiles. Then his hand slides around the back of my neck and pulls me closer.
“Come here.”
I go. He kisses me slowly. When he draws back, his forehead rests against mine.
“Do you want more?”
My breath catches.
“Yes, please, Daddy.”
“More what?”
Oh, fuck him.
“You.”
His mouth curves.
“Sex?”
“Yes, Daddy, please.”
“Good.”
He kisses me again, and this time there’s heat behind it. We’ve already had the practical conversations. Testing. Barriers. What we’re comfortable with. What I want from him. I know what I’m saying yes to.
And I can’t fucking wait.
Soren eases me down onto the bed and takes his time with me. His hands move over my lower back, my hips, avoiding the most tender places as he traces the aftermath of the morning.
“Still okay?”
“Yes. Please, Daddy.”
His hand moves lower, and the first direct contact makes my whole body jerk. I’m so sensitive already that it feels almost unfair. One slow stroke becomes two, and I’m arching into his touch before I’ve recovered enough dignity to pretend otherwise.
“Easy,” he says, voice low and steady. “Easy, baby.”
I can’t.
I’m already close. The heat in my belly builds with humiliating speed, my hips pushing into his grip, breath coming in short bursts.
Then Soren stops.
I whimper. Actually whimper. The sound is so pathetic I would laugh if I could access any part of my brain not currently occupied by the screaming absence of his hand.
“Not yet.”
I make a wounded noise. He kisses my shoulder.
“Still want me?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me.”
“I want you to fuck me, Daddy.”
His breathing changes. Good. At least I’m not suffering alone. He reaches into the nightstand, and a moment later his hand returns to me. He guides me onto my stomach, and I go willingly, face pressing into the pillow, body already anticipating what comes next.
He takes his time preparing me, checking me as he goes, and when the pressure becomes more intense I breathe through it and push back toward him.
“Daddy.”
“I’m here.”
“Please.”
When he finally settles behind me, his hand spreads broad and warm over my hip.
He pushes in slowly.
The sound that leaves me is not dignified. It’s a long, shaking exhale that empties my lungs completely and leaves me trembling against the mattress. He fills me gradually, pausing until my body gives instead of demanding that it does, and for several seconds neither of us moves.
His hand stays at my hip. His breath is warm against the back of my neck. Then he starts moving.
The first stroke is slow and deep. I feel every bit of it. My fingers lock into the sheets, my mouth opens against the pillow, and I make another noise I’m going to deny later.
Soren establishes a rhythm, steady and controlled, and my body responds with humiliating enthusiasm. I was already close before he started. Now, with him inside me and his hand anchoring me to the mattress, there is no chance whatsoever that this lasts long.
I stop thinking. That might be the nicest part. Everything condenses into sensation: the warmth in my backside, the fullness of him, the scrape of sheets beneath my fingers, his breath against my neck, his voice when he tells me I’m doing well.