“You shall, indeed, apologize for your impertinence, Miss Blanchet. And you shall apologize for your indiscretions. And you shall be instructed firmly in the ways of submission and obedience.”
Lina’s heart went cold. While the words stirred something almost pleasurable inside of her, in her naughtiest places, they also struck her chest with a knife of fear.
Her eyes scanned the shadowy figure before her, looking for the source of the sound, her mind almost grasping it, not quite prepared to believe that it was what she thought it was...
As the realization that the crack had been that of a whip spread through her mind and then, like molten lava, through her body, she stepped backward, looking from side to side, as though for help. The furniture of the room began to take on a kind of recognition in her mind, though it was far too vague to materialize as a complete thought. The visceral reaction inside of her, however, was very clear: she felt a terrifying thrill.
“Because of your most inappropriate behavior, Miss Blanchet, I have dissolved the previous conditions of your contract.”
Lina was walking backward, though Blackstone was not approaching.
So... she was not to be married to him?
She had retreated so far that she ran into the heavy door, and she began to fumble around for the handle without turning her back. “Sir, Mr. Blackstone, if that... is... the case... then I...”
Then she what? Then she was free, yes, but the Harlowes were sure to turn her out of the house.
The whip—for it was a whip, indeed, she knew that now—cracked again, silencing her completely. “I have, however, spent a good deal of money on you, Miss Blanchet. And I,” he snarled with an evil undertone, “always recuperate my money. Fortunately enough, I have a wealthy... associate, who finds your... lack of discretion and wantonness to be quite appealing. He is, however, quite insistent that you be trained properly before you are transferred to his harem. He has... many requirements and it is imperative that you conform to all of them.”
Lina let out a breath in a huff. She did not know what most of this meant, not really, though like the instruments and furnishings in the room, she possessed a shadowy frame of reference for it all and it was one she did not much care for. “I shall not be... I shall not. If the contract is dissolved, then I shall return home. Call me a carriage at once, I shall depart immediately.”
She spun on her heel, with every thought of opening the door and strolling imperiously down the corridor to the corner, where she would run. She had taken note of the twists and turns, and she believed that she could find the stairway.
But her thoughts, running ahead of her feet, were suddenly spinning around as wildly as her own body, for Mr. Blackstone had crossed the room with lightning speed and the silence of a panther, to catch her wrist. He then encircled her waist, and suddenly, she was spinning, moving, and then being pulled toward a hard and rubbery object like a large rocking horse, and then bent at the waist over the object.
The details of her predicament from there came to her in waves: the sensation of leather around one wrist, then the other. Her voice, loud and protesting, leaving her mouth at an absurd volume. She kicked back with her feet but found only air, and then her arms began to pull ahead of her, pulling her down and over the furnished piece she had seen, and was now realizing, simply, was some kind of monstrous device for... for...
For what?
She could no longer lift her head, and her hair had come tumbling from the loose arrangement she had hastily created, so she could not see from behind her brown curls, nor push the hair from her face. What was more, she could feel a hand—a man’s hand, warm and slightly rough, closing around her ankle.
She was so shocked by the impropriety of his touch that she fell silent, and went stiff. Her ankle was enclosed by leather as well, and then the process was repeated on the other side.
When Mr. Blackstone pulled her legs apart, spreading them, shame washed over her, cold and hot at the same time. “What are you—Mr. Blackstone! I insist that you... youstop!Immediately!”
But this humiliating and utterly inappropriate position was nothing compared to what happened next, as darkness fell over her head. For a moment she did not know why, until, incredibly, she felt the cool air of the room against her bare skin.
The bare skin of her legs, her thighs, and ... her backside.
“The very first lesson that I must impart upon you, Miss Blanchet, is about obedience.”
“This is most improper!” Lina screeched. “I... I... I demand that you... release me... at once.”
Instead of being released, however, she felt a further humiliation being added to her predicament: Mr. Blackstone was pulling on the strings of her silk drawers and pulling then open, so that the silky fabric slipped down her thighs and caught about her knees, leaving her bottom entirely exposed.
She did not have long to consider this impropriety, however, because her skin suddenly felt as though it had been set on fire, and the accompanying sound of a slap reached her ears shortly thereafter. Just as she was processing that she was beingspanked,like a child by a father, her skin was again set afire.
Initially, she had been too shocked to say anything, and the second slap took the wind from her lungs. But as the third spank cracked against her skin, a sharp bite in a spreading sea of uncomfortable warmth and numbness, she shrieked and began to attempt to kick her restrained feet.
“Now. Miss. Blanchet,” her tormentor said calmly, punctuating each word with a painful spank. “You will be made to understand. That. You shall obey orders. Not give them.”
“Stop! Stop! I insist that you stop this at—ah!”
A rain of slaps, each one more sharp than the last, fell upon her already burning bottom, and she was suddenly without words. Evidently, so was her captor, for he did not lecture her or speak. She kicked and gasped and cried and flailed, and demanded, then begged, for him to stop.
But he continued on, and tears poured from her eyes and her legs and arms ached from the struggle against the restraints.
At last, for there seemed nothing else to do, she went limp, and closed her eyes, sobbing.
