Chapter 33
thirty-three
“What do you mean?”
Cold stones cut into the soft soles of my feet as I teeter toward the door on shaky legs. The look in Aiden’s eyes grows sadistic. And demented. Shadows settle into the hollows beneath his prominent cheekbones, giving him a demonic appearance.
Aiden’s terrifying. Which stirs me into a frenzy to fight back.
“What was rule number three?” he grits out, lips carved into a strange smile.
My fingers curl around the cold iron bars in the wooden door. “I don’t remember, lord. There are too many to keep track of. And you’re a brute, so maybe I’m not going to follow any of them.”
Despite the force behind my words, I shiver. Not simply from the chill of the air wafting through the cracks in the dungeon walls. Usually, I can anticipate what the man in front of me will do. I like to press his buttons to get a response. But now?
He’s come undone, and I’m not so sure what his reaction will be.
“To not speak unless I command it. I removed your gag. Your straps. You’re free to move around…for now. But if you disobey me, then you won’t enjoy the punishment—”
“I beg to differ, asshole. I think—”
Before the sentence ends, he rips the handle down and flings the door open, shoving me back against the craggy rocks behind it. Deftly, he closes and locks it again as I leap onto his back and grip his neck, tugging with force.
As if I weigh nothing, he flings my body onto the bed, and I bounce back, holding my hands out in front of me. He tugs me forward, dragging me until my knees hit the ground, scraping along the jagged floor beneath the threadbare rug.
“Stop!” I scream, but he’s lifted me into the pillory. Lowering the bar over the back of my neck.
When I kick his shoulder, he bites my leg. I squeal as he grabs my foot and secures it onto the bottom bar, then secures the other.
All I can see is the weeping wall in front of me. Body uncomfortably bent and locked into place.
I shift my thighs as the frigid breeze hits my bare pussy.
To taunt him further, I don’t know why, but I yell, “You better gag me, motherfucker. Because I’m about to scream this whole house down.”
The only noise is a creak as the heavy lid of the chest slams shut. Then a ruffling of clothing.
He leans in close and drops his voice low, though still filled with something like amusement. “Good.”
Searing sharp agony slaps across my ass. I jolt forward with a ragged wail launching from my chest. “What was that?”
I sense his body behind me. Heated and fuming with insanity. If I stick my ass out more, my skin brushes his.
“The crop? Do you not like it?”
“Fuck you— Ouch!” A crack of lightning rips across my still-wounded butt.
“You have three ways to make this pain stop, Ashlyn. You remain silent. You tell me yes, lord. Or you say the safe word. Which will it be?”
My jaw sets as I contemplate the answer. He and I both know I won’t give in with the stupid safe word. I’ll fight to the death before I’d give in and let him know he hurt me.
Remaining silent seems so out of character. But also…it may drive him the craziest.
So that’s what I choose.
“Good girl.” The warmth of his bass sends staggering tingles through the blisters forming on my ass. Somehow, I’m wet. Needy. Body arching back to feel him there.
His palm settles on my lower back, and I gasp at the pleasure replacing the ache.
Only a tiny sigh releases from my lips as he slips his firm cock through my pussy repeatedly but never enters.
The thick crown of his length slots against my hole, throbbing.
Stretching me, but not moving. His hand trails down to hook around one of my hips, the other still holding the crop by his side.
“See? I knew you could be obedient. Now…I want you to say, ‘Please fuck me, my husband.’”
“What? We aren’t marr— Fuck! Aiden!” The burn is so strong, I can only sob, salted tears running over my cheeks. I sniffle, settling into my fate.
“Going to say it, or no?”
His voice sharpens, and my body answers before my brain can stop it—flinch, breath held, waiting for impact. I know this script. My flesh knows it.
My mind takes me back to those moments at Crest. Hands bound to a table by one of the female counselors, swatted with a wooden ruler as another, usually one of the men, would rip my pants down. And then the belt. A paddle. Sometimes one of the kitchen spoons.
I hate that it feels as if this is my home. The place where I should be. That, for some fucked-up wiring in my brain, I crave it. Because it was ingrained in me.
I’m a bad girl and need to be punished.
Years later, everything in me still speaks the language they taught me—pain as permission, obedience as worth.
Worse than the humiliation of knowing he has me right where he wants me is the desire that burns low in my belly as he drags his cock through my wetness again and again, settling himself right where I want him. Pussy begging to be filled. Clit pulsing with demand for attention.
I hate that my back arches for him, even as my mind claws for the exit. Every nerve remembers the reward that follows hurt.
If I speak? I could get that right now. Make the pain go away. And he’ll fuck me.
But he’d win.
He draws back the crop, and I hurriedly make a decision. I scream out, “Please fuck me, my husband!”
The force of him entering takes my breath away, as does the blinding swat of the crop on the side of my thigh. “For not saying it quick enough.” He chuckles.
Every ram is a punishment and a reward. It’s what my body wanted, but my heart longs to return to the back seat. The place where he looked at me like…like he could love me.
Instead, I face the cold wall. Call him mine when I’m still not sure if I’m truly his. Not in the way I want to be.
One of his hands grips the top of the pillory to pull himself closer, thrusting harder, ripping into me with ferocity as he uses me for his pleasure. My own ecstasy is an immaterial consequence to him…
He’s right about being cold. I feel the ice between us despite him delving inside of me. I’m an object. A thing.
That’s the punishment. Aiden’s built a wall, and I’m not sure I can ever break through again.
“How does it feel getting used like this, whore? I’ll make you marry me, get you assigned to be appointed to me…and I’ll fuck you like this on the daily. Unless you’ll truly submit to me, baby.”
One mumbled and stoic word releases from my lips. “No.”
I won’t. I can’t. This isn’t what I wanted to be. Will he ever soften toward me? Ever?
I’m crying. And not because he slaps my ass with the crop once again for speaking out. Now, the pain cuts deeper.
Aiden Isaac Cardell is an asshole.
And he’s really hurt me.
The worst part is how my heart still calls it love—because once, hurt was the only proof I existed.
Like he understands, he pulls out and shoots his load all over my thighs, letting it drip down my legs and onto the ground.
I sniff and wait in torment as he takes his time to get dressed. When he loosens the pillory and releases me, I slump to the floor. Dejected. Wasted.
He throws a towel in my face and snaps his fingers, pointing toward some things on the bed. “Clean up. Next time I approach, you’d better be on your knees, ready to greet me properly.”
His black boots swivel toward the door with a crunch. I raise my eyes and quietly beg him.
“Is this how it’s going to be?” I ask, almost whispering.
The muscle in the back of his jaw throbs. Frost settles over his features as he sneers. “Always. And if you wanted something different, maybe you shouldn’t have cheated on me, slut.”
It’s difficult to know how long it’s been, but I think only two days. Two whole days, perhaps three. My asshole is tender from his last taking. The stripes from the crop are still sore. And he hasn’t let me come. Because I wouldn’t beg for it.
Not while he’s been so very…robotic.
Like a glacial mass that I can feel the weight of, but can’t break through, or it will shatter him and sink me.
He’d left me with his own T-shirts to wear, no underwear. Joke’s on him, though. Maybe I’ll start withdrawal bleeding from the birth control removal.
Sure, he leaves me trays of food. Even gave me one book: a textbook on College Algebra. I used it to try to start fires in the bathroom.
Speaking of which, it’s horrifying in there. Dark. Filled with critters and spiders. The water smells like rust and tastes worse. But at least I have my cleansers. And one towel. A toothbrush. Toilet paper.
And the hidden weapon I’m about to detonate if he pushes me too far.
In front of the mirror, I stare at myself. Less freckly. Paler. How long will he keep me like this? Until I obey and submit? What does that even mean?
No. The truth is, I’m down here until Aiden works out whatever he thinks I deserve. For breaking his heart. Only he doesn’t understand; I destroyed mine, too.
The gold ring itches and comes loose enough that I peel it back. My heart skips a beat. Skin puffy and red. Possibly infected. Black ink dots the area circling my ring finger.
I lift my hand and read the inscription…
Aiden’s Wife
He tattooed me…with a title of ownership.
Placing my hands on either side of the sink, I take a deep inhale of musty air and release it. This prison isn’t for me…
It’s for us. He thinks he can whip me enough to fix the past and create a future where we’re okay.
But I think the only way out of here is to relive it and start over. Tears heat my eyes as the threat of confession looms at the end of my tongue. The words too violent to utter without scarring us both.
Footsteps creep closer down the hall, and I head toward the bed. Not kneeling. Only facing my fate. The one I chose so many years ago.
His face is filled with ire as he opens the door slowly. Creaks cut through the atmosphere between us until he shuts and locks it behind him.
“Why the fuck aren’t you in position again, Ashlyn? I swear to—” He stops. Rubs his face with a palm, and I see how very tired he is.
“I don’t want to play anymore,” I tell him, chest heaving with sadness. “I’m done, Aiden. I can’t do this. I’m not strong enough.”
“Shut the fuck up!” he roars, voice splintering across the low wooden beams. “We had plans. Solid plans. I was going to save you. I wasn’t going to let them take you to Crest again. We were supposed to elope so no one could touch you again. You said you wanted it. Wanted me.”
“I did!”
Two steps, and his hands are around my collared throat, his eyes wild. “Then why the fuck did you cheat on me, huh? Why did you throw it all away?”
“I…”
I can’t look at his face. My body shudders with sobs as he rips off my shirt and tosses me back onto the bed.
His fingers tremble as he loosens his belt, pushes open his jeans, and crawls on top of me.
He’s hard, muscles stiff with fury. I know seeing me like this made him so. Aiden likes to cause pain.
And he’s torn off every bandage I had taped over my heart.
I don’t even protest as he gathers my wrists and forces himself inside me.
“Why, Ashlyn? I never wanted anything in my life but you.”
He thrusts once, twice. Tongue delves out to lick up my tears as he presses tiny kisses to my stained cheeks. His lips hover over my ear. “You’re the only thing I ever cared about. Ever fucking loved. So tell me why.”
Voice strained, I choke out, “The baby was yours.”
Settling on his elbows, his piercing blue eyes lock onto mine. The shock on his face is enough to send my stomach rolling as if in a plummet from space. “What the fuck did you say?”
I meet his eyes through tears, whispering the truth that razes us both:
“He was our son.”