Lorian sets the paddle aside. His hand replaces it. The first touch is gentle, and I decide that’s worse. He palms my ass where the strikes landed, and I scream. It's a pleasure that hurts now.
"You hate this?" Rafe asks, crouching in front of me now, fingers gripping my jaw. "Say it."
"I hate you," I say, but the way I shake ruins the words.
"You hate how we touch you?" Lorian asks. "You hate how your cunt clenches when we punish you?"
"Yes," I breathe.
"Then, why are you dripping wet for us?"
I don’t answer. I want to say that I hate I’m even here, but that’s not true. Despite all of this, I still want them and to be here with them like this. I want all of this. I have accepted it as my fate. But that doesn’t mean I don’t have any agency in it.
Rafe pins my wrists above my head on the wall as Lorian begins fucking me, then they switch places.
I’m hypersensitized by these men. Every breath burns and every thrust from them feels like a rocket ship of erotic fire into my pussy.
I never want them to stop.
I scream. I come. I curse them. I recite half-remembered prayers the nuns taught me for strength. I bite Rafe’s shoulder. I sob Lorian’s name.
And still they fuck me, and not because I begged for them to do it, butbecause I refused to break for them.
This is what we all need now, reassurance that I am who I have always been, the strong and unbreakable woman they need me to be. They did not imagine it. And most importantly,I,did not imagine it.
When they finally let go of me, I collapse face-first into the sheets, every inch of me bruised and used, pierced and leaking. They left no part untouched.
"I’d do it again," I whisper into the pillow, voice hoarse. "I’d betray you. Even knowing this is the cost."
"We know," Rafe says, pulling me against him as Lorian warms up against my other side.
"That's what terrifies us," Lorian says, his hand possessive on my collar. "And excites us. Our little prisoner, who chose her chains with us.”
"Seven years," I whisper.
"Seven years," they confirm together.
Then we are all silent with our own thoughts as we drift off to sleep.
I begin dreaming of kneeling at their feet, their cocks heavy above me casting shadows, and I lick my lips for what’s to come and what I can command even from the floor.
56
REST, LORIAN
Eve wakesduring the Fifth Chime and tries to disengage herself from us. “I need the toilet.”
We allow her up, but instead of staying in bed, I get up and start the steam cycle in the bathing alcove. When it’s ready with the scent of crushed starbloom petals, designed to relax muscles and quiet nerves, I find her in front of the mirror, surveying all the bruises on her little body.
“We needed physical reassurance,” I say, while gently picking her up and carrying her into the bathing alcove.
“I know,” she says quietly. “Words weren’t enough.”
I set her down in the bath and pick up a warm cloth. I run it gently over her thighs, cleaning away the mess we made. I’m thorough but unhurried; my fingers brushing over swollen flesh with a care that makes her eyes open and find mine. I hold her gaze while I wash her body from top to bottom. And I think she’s surprised by my gentleness, but I don’t say anything. I just let my caresses speak for themselves. They say over and over again, ‘I adore you, Eve. I will doanything for you. I am sorry I am so difficult. That we are so difficult to love.’
When I finish, I dry her with a soft towel and then take outa thin, long-sleeved tunic of deep silver from my wardrobe. I gently guide it over her head and down her arms, my fingers lingering at her wrists, brushing the delicate bones there. She’s so small and fragile. I forget because she’s so strong in herself. I bring my hands back up her body and smooth her brown hair back from her face.
“We couldn’t let you go,” I tell her quietly as not to wake up Rafe. “I don’t think we will ever be able to let you go, even after the seven years.”
