14. Syn
14
SYN
My first night here was a disaster. I barely slept, and I yawn as I peek out of my bedroom in the early morning. I’m desperate for coffee. Or something stronger. I have a feeling I might need it to battle it out with Tarquin’s icy front and Declan’s psychopathy. Seeing no one in sight, I take the risk. I haven’t eaten since Mrs Winters brought up the sandwiches, and I haven’t had anything to drink except water since the tea ran out. Surely, they don’t mean to starve me, so venturing downstairs to find the kitchen isn’t going to cause issues.
I hope.
I also hope I don’t run into Declan. Tarquin I can handle to some extent. Declan is a whole other bag of damage that I’m not sure I want to touch too deeply on.
Creeping down the hallway in my bare feet, my stretchy white dress clinging to my curves, I pass by a door near the top of the stairs and come to a halt.
A light slapping sound catches my attention behind the solid white wood of the door to my left, and I frown.
There it is again. Slap. Pause. Slap.
Chewing my lip, I know I should move on. Nothing to see or hear here. None of my fucking business. But before I can take two steps, the door swings open, and Declan looms in the doorway, one hand on the frame, the other pressed against the back of the door as he holds it in place with his thumb. “Synthia,” he murmurs.
I smile and try not to stare. He is shirtless, wearing only a pair of black joggers. His hair is tousled, but the wicked gleam in his eyes is what I try to avoid.
“Declan,” I say. “Good morning.”
“Who told you to call me Declan?”
“It’s your name, isn’t it?”
“I didn’t give you permission to use my name,” he says, eyes narrowed.
Quick as lightning, he reaches out and grasps my wrist, pulling me inside his room. He closes the door and presses me up against it.
“So, what would you like me to call you?” I ask as he looms over me.
He leans down, placing both hands on the door to the sides of my head. “Master.”
I grit my teeth. “Okay, Master . Good morning to you.”
He chuckles, but it sends a concerned shiver down my spine. “That’s better,” he says. “You are just in time.”
“What for?”
He straightens up, dropping his hands to his sides, and I breathe out as he gives me space.
He holds something up, and I blink at it before shooting my gaze back to his.
“Do you know what this is?” he asks.
“A whip of some kind,” I reply, my gaze darting back to the leather tendrils sticking out of a shortish black handle that he grips tightly.
“Very good,” he whispers. “Nothing like a bit of self-flagellation in the morning to get the blood pumping.”
So that’s what that sound was? He was whipping himself?
Eyes wide, I stare at him and lick my lips. “Uhm… do you want me to watch?” I ask, confused why he would say I was just in time. “Or do you want to…?” I trail off, hoping it’s not the latter.
His eyes darken. “No, Synthia.” He grabs my hand and presses the whip’s handle against my palm. “I want you to take over.”
My blood runs cooler. “What?”
“I want you to whip me. Punish me. Give me absolution,” he says, gripping my chin so I’m forced to look at him.
“I can’t?—”
“Obey,” he growls. It’s low, controlled, and expressly given to make an omega submit to his demands.
Involuntarily, I lower my gaze, hating this about my biology. Hating this about his .
My hand curls around the handle of the whip, the leather warm from Declan’s grip. This implement of pain now in my possession feels foreign, wrong somehow.
“I don’t know how,” I whisper.
Declan’s eyes flash with something unreadable. He turns away from me, and I stifle my gasp. His back is a canvas of defined muscle, already marked with thin red lines.
He crosses over to the windows and kneels down. “Don’t keep me waiting, Synthia.” His voice is hard, cold and terrifying.
Forcing myself to move, staring at his back, I stop within whipping distance and plant my bare feet. I glance at the armchair where we fucked last night, and I can’t help but check the chair in the opposite corner to see if Tarquin is here watching.
To my relief, he isn’t.
With a trembling hand, I bring the whip up and lash Declan lightly on his back, wincing as it hits the marks he has already made.
“Harder,” he growls.
I do as instructed, putting a bit more effort into it.
The loud slap makes my stomach clench.
I do it again.
“Harder.”
I grip the handle tighter, my palm sweating against the wood. Bringing my arm back further, I deliver a stronger lash across his shoulder blades. The crack of leather against skin echoes in the room, followed by my sharp intake of breath.
Declan is motionless and silent.
“Again.”
My hand shakes as I deliver another strike, watching a fresh red line appear across his pale muscled back. I don’t understand this—why he wants this pain, why he’s making me do this. Each lash makes me flinch, and bile rises in my throat.
I bring the whip down again, harder this time, my confusion turning into something else—a strange power that flows through me with each strike. He makes no sound as I increase the strength of my strike. The power that flows through me is unnatural. Omegas don’t get this kind of power over an alpha. Ever. Even during sex, it’s not about us. It’s about them. What they want. What they can do to ease our heat.
I lash at him again, my arm aching from the effort.
“Harder,” he says. “Make me feel it.”
“I’m trying,” I pant.
“Try harder. You aren’t absolving me from anything.”
I want to ask a thousand questions, but I can’t. I grit my teeth and bring the whip down as hard as I can.
His breath catches, and I think I’ve gone too far.
I waver, but he whispers. “Now, you’re getting it.”
His back is a crisscross of angry red welts, and while on one side it makes me feel sick, on the other, I want to create more lines.
I bring the whip down again, putting all my strength behind it.
“Faster between strikes,” he grits out.
“I can’t?—”
“Obey your Master,” he cuts me off.
Glaring at his back, there is only one way I can do that. Forehand and backhand.
I move my position and backhand the whip before instantly turning it and lashing out forehand, like some macabre tennis game.
He groans, the first sound I’ve heard him make, but it isn’t from pain. It’s sexual in nature. It arouses me, and I do it again. He groans louder this time and slips his hand into the waistband of his joggers. He pulls his cock out and tugs it roughly. I gasp at the sight and strike him again in quick succession.
His groan deepens as he works his cock, the muscles in his back tensing with each stroke of his hand. I continue the rhythm of the lashes, forehand and backhand, watching his skin bloom with fresh welts. There’s something primal happening between us—his submission to the pain and my administration of it creating a dark, twisted connection.
His back arches as I deliver another set of rapid strikes, his hand tugging his cock faster. I’m horrified at how my body responds to this twisted scene—the power rush, the heat building between my thighs as I watch him pleasure himself while I inflict pain. Slick wets the inside of my thighs, seeing as I stupidly chose not to put any underwear on. He inhales deeply as I thrash him, drawing in my scent, which makes his growl a low rumble.
Strike after strike, I watch his muscles tense and flex beneath his increasingly marked skin. His hand moves furiously over his cock. I bring the whip down hard across his shoulders, and he throws his head back with a groan.
He climaxes with a shuddering grunt, coming in his hand as he drops his head, panting raggedly.
Instinctively knowing this is the end, my arm drops heavily to my side, aching and throbbing. Now that the moment has ended, my breath hitches, and I move closer. “You’re bleeding.”
“Don’t touch me,” he grits out as my hand hovers over his back. “Go.”
I drop the whip, and it thuds to the floor at my feet as I back away.
Before he can tell me again, I turn and flee from the room, shutting the door behind me before leaning against it, my heart hammering in my chest. My palm still burns from gripping the whip, and I can feel the ghost of each strike reverberating through my arm. The worst part is the slick still coating my thighs, my body’s betrayal of the twisted power dynamic we just engaged in.
How could I be so turned on by hurting him like that?
Taking a shaky breath, I push away from the door and hastily make my way downstairs, coffee forgotten, knowing I definitely need something stronger to take the edge off this morning.