I glance between them, more than aware that they’re speaking in riddles right now, and I’m too emotionally exhausted to figure out what it means.
Every time I blink, I see it.
The man, the sharp, percussive crack. The way he folded, like a marionette with its strings cut. The perfect, horrifyingly small hole in his temple.
I shiver, pulling the cashmere blanket tighter around my shoulders. It smells of him, of sandalwood and power. It doesn’t help.
Across the aisle, Antonio’s brother types furiously on his phone. His brow is furrowed, his jaw set. The air hostess moves with a practiced, silent grace in the galley, the clink of ice in a glass a delicate, normal sound.
I am the only one who seems to remember a man just died. I am the only one whose hands won’t stop trembling.
Antonio is beside me, his presence a physical force even as he stares out the window at the clouds below. He hasn’t spoken since we boarded. The silence is a weight, pressing down on me, and I know it’s deliberate.
He is letting me stew, letting the image fester.
Finally, he turns his head. His eyes, dark and impossibly deep, land on me. There is no anger in them. There is nothing at all, and that is so much worse.
“You disobeyed me, Pup.”
His voice is quiet, almost conversational, but it slices through the hum of the engines and freezes the blood in my veins. The memory of the gunshot evaporates, replaced by a more immediate, personal terror.
My heart jackhammers against my ribs. “I-I’m so sorry, Master” I stammer, the words tumbling out in a rushed, panicked whisper. “It was so loud, and I was scared. It won’t happen again., I promise. I’m sorry.”
He listens, his expression unchanging until I run out of breath and apologies. He doesn’t blink, he simply leans back in his plush leather chair, the movement fluid and controlled. He crosses one leg over the other, and his gaze drifts over me, from my tear-filled eyes down to my shaking hands.
“Strip.”
The word is soft. Absolute. It hangs in the air between us, sucking all the sound from the cabin.
My breath hitches, and my eyes dart instinctively to Mateus. He doesn’t look up from his phone. His thumbs keep flying across the screen. I look toward the galley, where the air hostess is stirring a drink with her back to us.
Antonio’s voice comes again, lower now, a velvet-wrapped threat. “If I have to repeat myself you’ll be in far more trouble, Pup.”
I swallow convulsively, a loud, painful gulp that seems to echo in the silent cabin.
This is my punishment, this is the price of my disobedience. I think right now I’d take the finality of a bullet.
With fingers that feel thick and clumsy, I reach for the thin straps of my blue silk dress. I push them off my shoulders, and the air in the cabin is cool against my suddenly exposed skin. I shift, letting the fabric whisper down my body, pooling in a dark puddle at my feet on the deep pile carpet. I stand there, naked, my arms crossing over my chest in a futile attempt at modesty. The heat in my face is unbearable. I stare at the floor, at the intricate pattern of the rug, wishing I could sink into it.
“Look at me.”
I force my gaze up. He is watching me, his eyes now gleaming with a dark, possessive light. He enjoys this. He enjoys the flush on my skin, the tremble in my limbs, the absolute vulnerability.
“Lay yourself across my lap. Face down.” he says, his voice a low thrum that vibrates deep within me.
There is no hesitation left in me. The fight, the shame, the fear, it all coalesces into a single, driving need to obey. I step out of the puddle of silk and move to him. I can feel the phantom stares of the other two people witnessing this, though I know neither is openly looking.
I lower myself awkwardly across his hard thighs, the cool leather of his seat and the rough texture of his trousers against my now feverish skin. I’m not exactly small in stature and being put in this position makes me only too aware of how big my thighs are, how round my body is, especially compared to the likes of Felice.
Well, that bitch is dead now. I killed her. No, I can’t think like that. I can’t.
My cheek rests against the seat, my face turned toward the window, toward the endless blue. My bare bottom is exposed to the cabin, to him.
His hand rests on the small of my back as a heavy, warm weight. “You will count each one,” he instructs, his voice calm, didactic. “And you will thank me for it. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Master,” I whisper into the leather.
The first spank lands without ceremony. It’s not a love tap. It’s a sharp, stinging crack of his palm against my flesh meant to hurt, to chastise. The pain is bright and shocking.
