To her shock, however, he instead knelt before her, his hands forcing her legs apart, and holding them firm as he leaned forward, he pushed past her nether lips with his tongue to find with unerring aim the sensitive jewel of her sex. His tongue began to tease it, but while he was able to arouse it so that her body gave him a libation of love dew, Jasmine herself was repulsed by his actions. Still, Jasmine knew that he would expect some show of emotion from her. “Ohhh!” she cried out at him. “Do not! Do not!”
He laughed, drawing away from her, and looking up at her with wild eyes. “That’s it, bitch,” he whispered.“Beg!But you do not fool me, my sweet! You are born a whore like all women. Like my mother who sold herself to the highest bidder, and like Kipp’s mother, who simply sold herself to her master so she could live like a lady. At least they disliked being mounted. You, I suspect, enjoy a man between your legs.” He rose and walked away from her.
“Aye,” Jasmine answered him boldly, “I do.”
He turned, looking at her surprised. He had never before heard a woman admit to enjoyingit.All the women he had ever known whined, and complained, and made excuses. “You like being fucked?” he said, intrigued.
“Of course,” Jasmine told him. “Most women do if you approach them properly. Let me down now, my lord. You may keep me bound, but I can no longer feel my arms, and I don’tthink that good. It really isn’t necessary to abuse a woman in order to enjoy her favors, you know. Just the sight of me naked aroused you today, did it not?”
It had!For the first time in his life he had swollen with lust just looking at a woman. He hadn’t had to whip her. He had done that afterward in his disappointment, and while he had enjoyed it, he realized he was not now aroused at all by his viciousness. It gave him pause.
“Let me down,” Jasmine repeated once more.
Wordlessly Piers St.Denis lifted her from the hook. Leading her to a wall he reached down and, lifting up a wide leather collar, fastened it about her neck. There was a chain attached to the collar which was also fastened to the wall. Then he unbound her hands. “Sit down,” he commanded her, pulling her skirt and petticoats from the table and tossing them to the dirt floor
Jasmine gingerly lowered herself to the pile of clothing. Her bottom was sore, and, touching it with tentative fingers, she could feel the weals that he had raised with his strap. She began to rub her arms in an effort to regain some sensation in them. “I am cold,” she told him. “Light a fire, if you know how, or are you useless in there also?”
“No fire!” he snapped at her. “This cottage is thought to be deserted, and a fire might bring a search party to my door, seeking you, my sweet. That would be most unfortunate, would it not?”
“Then at least let me put my clothing on, or I shall die of an ague. You know how sensitive I am to the damp and cold.” She sneezed as if to emphasize her point. “You will get little enjoyment out of a sick woman, my lord, will you now?”
He acquiesced, although not particularly gracefully. “Very well,” he said, gathering up her stockings, and tossing them toher. “But no shoes, madame. I cannot have you running away, can I?” He smiled mockingly at her.
Jasmine quickly drew her wool stockings on, fastening them with their ribbon garters. Then she yanked her petticoats and skirt on, thankful that two of her undergarments were flannel. She attempted to draw her chemise and blouse together, but they were badly torn. “Let me have my shawl,” she asked him. “If the ague attacks my chest, I shall expire, and you will suffer an even more horrible death than the Leslies have planned for you for just kidnapping me.”
He flung her the shawl with an ill-concealed grace. “What makes you think your Leslies will ever find you before I have seen to James Leslie’s death and returned with you to England, where the king will then be forced to give you to me to wed?”
“They will find us,” Jasmine said firmly. “And how many times must I explain to you, my lord, that King James willnevergive me in marriage to you. My family would not allow it, and I should kill myself before I would ever allow you dominion of any kind over me!”
“I have already gained control over you, my pet,” he told her. “Did your love juices not sweeten my tongue just moments ago, and did you not cry out with your pleasure?” He laughed. “You are a far grander conquest than I ever anticipated, for I have discovered that I do not need to strap you to become excited by your charms. Still, I will probably continue to do it for my mere amusement. And when we return to England my brother, Kipp, shall also be well entertained between your milky thighs while I billet my cock in one of your other two orifices. Have you ever accommodated two lusty stallions at one time, my pet? It is, I have been told, an unforgettable experience for all three people involved.” He came now and sat himself beside her for a moment. “You are such a strong woman, my pet. I am strong, too, but Kipp is weak. I shall teach you how towield the tawse and the birch on him. You will tease him with your sensuous body and mouth, and then we shall complete the torture by coupling before him until he is weeping with his own desire. If he can restrain himself from release, then perhaps I shall let him have the pleasure of your body, too. As I am your master, my pet, so shall I allow you to be mistress over Kipp. Like me, he has a fine, big cock, and shall give you much pleasure.” He began to stroke her eagerly.
Jasmine looked past him to the window. It had become dark while they had been there. Glancing back at her captor, she could hardly see his handsome and dissolute face. The dark, however, did not seem to disturb him at all. “I am hungry,” she said, “and thirsty.”
“I am hungry, too,” he murmured, pushing her back and beginning to kiss and suck upon her breasts.
Angrily she pushed him away. “Is it your intent to starve me, my lord?” she snapped at him. “Is this how you show me your affection?”
“I will have to go down into the town to get us food and drink,” he said pettishly.
“Then do so!” Jasmine ordered him imperiously. “And afterward, if you have pleased me with a good dinner, who knows what will transpire between us, my lord marquis.” Her tone was now a purr of suggestion.
“Bitch!” he snarled suddenly, drawing away from her and standing. “Do you think to gull me with your suggestive words? If you would have me believe you, you must give me a little pleasure now,” he told her.
“What would you have me do?” she asked him, wondering what wickedness he had in mind for her. Was he going to use that damned tawse on her again? She didn’t think him recovered enough yet to mount her, but she could not be certain.
“On your knees,” he ordered sternly. Then he pulled his limp manhood from his clothing. “Not enough to unman me,” he warned her, “but skillfully enough to give me a frisson of pleasure so that my trip into Leith will be a happy one.” His hand fastened into her hair, and he forced her head forward. “Open your mouth, my pet, and show me just how truthful your words are. Or are they false, and you seek to lull me into a stupor?”
Jasmine blanked her emotions and took him into her mouth. For a moment she was unable to act, but then she began to suckle hard upon him, her tongue teasing at him, her teeth grazing him just enough to arouse him. If this was the worst, she thought, then it would be worth it. She drew fiercely upon him, and he began to moan, his fingers kneading into her scalp, pressing her nearer and nearer to his groin. Jesu, she thought! Would he never let her stop. In a moment he would surely burst in her mouth, and she didn’t believe that she could bear that sort of torture.
“Enough!”he finally ground out, and allowed her to fall back upon her heels. He looked down at his organ, and was amazed. It was larger than he had ever known it to be. “You are a sorceress,” he said low. “I have never known a woman who could please a man so well.”
“I have kept my part of the bargain,” she said. “Now go and fetch us some food and wine, my lord marquis, before I expire both of hunger and of cold.”
“Very well,” he said, and, bending he retied her hands. “I do not want you getting into any kind of mischief while I am gone,” he told her with a chuckle.
“Go,” she said stonily. “I am growing fainter by the minute.”
He left her alone in the darkness, no fire, no candle for light. Her last glimpse of him was of the marquis outlined in the door as he went through it. Then he was gone, the door closing behind him. Immediately Jasmine began to work her wriststogether in an effort to loosen the rope with which he had bound her. Outside she heard the muffled clop of his horse’s hooves as Piers St.Denis rode off down the hill. She had no idea how long he would be gone, how much time she had to escape him. The rope began to ease its grip. Jasmine breathed deeply and slowly, calming her beating heart, clearing her mind so she might act expeditiously and not lose this chance. Finally, she was able to slip one wrist free of its bonds. Quickly she pulled the rope from her other wrist, rubbing them both to ease the chafing they had taken this afternoon between being bound to the pommel of a horse, then hung from a hook. The skin was raw with the abuse she had suffered.
