Slap.
A sharp blow hits my ass, so violent it jars the breath right out of my lungs. My mind staggers behind the sensation, failing to process the spanking until the pain blooms—a searing, white-hot heat that scorches the surface of my skin before sinking heavy and cruel into the flesh, the shock of it vibrating down to the bone.
“Do you love me yet?” The question hangs in the air, mocking and sharp, before his hand descends again.
The sound is as jarring as the sting, a whip-like report that echoes off the ceiling. I grit my teeth, burying my face into the crook of my arm to stifle the cry clawing at my throat, but he offers me no reprieve. He strikes again, harder, the blow landing perfectly over the ghost of the last.
“How is divorce sounding now?” he growls, his voice a low rumble in the room. “Still denied?”
I whimper against the hairs that rise along my arm. “You asshole!”
His next strike is quieter. Not due to lack of precision, lighting a fire across my skin that burns its way between my legs, but because he chuckles.
“Is this the love you spoke of, Elara? Hmm?” His next slap is duller somehow, mutating into a throbbing heat that spreads low in my belly, letting a current of energy tingle around my clit. “Can you feel it yet?”
My mind spins, fading the cruelty of his strikes. The dominance of his heavy hand holding me down no longer feels caging. It feels…steadying.
A shameful, liquid warmth unfurls between my thighs. My muscles ease, no longer bracing against the next impact. When his hand lands again, my hips don’t jerk away in recoil; they buck backward, a subtle, involuntary seek for the friction.
That’s when the rhythm breaks.
Vale stops.
He hovers there behind me, breathing hard, the violence in the room suddenly suspended in a thick, confusing silence.
Why did he stop?
Slowly, his hand slides from the burning curve of my ass, down, down, until his fingers curl beneath me. He brushes against my folds, seeking the entrance, and slips effortlessly into a slick, drenched heat.
I shudder, my forehead resting against the desk, unable to hide the evidence of my body’s strange reaction. He drags two fingers through the heavy cream, coating them, noisily testing the viscosity of my desire with a smack of his tongue.
“Interesting…” His voice is thin, breathless. “I cannot tell if I struck too hard…or not hard enough.”
With a rough growl, he slides his fingers inside me again, letting a beckoning motion scrape against my inside. My kneesbuckle, knocking against the wood, but his other hand presses down harder, keeping me bent, keeping me steady.
“You are impossible, Elara,” he snarls as he drives his fingers in a rhythm that is urgent, angry. “Frustrating, maddening woman. You’re so damn stubborn that you refuse to indulge me even with your pain.”
The pleasure is immediate and blinding, fueled by the adrenaline of his violence. I gasp, my head tilting to its side, chasing the friction. I’m close, so shamefully close, my body winding tight, a sob gathering in my throat?—
His fingers vanish.
Crack.
His palm strikes my raw skin. Not hard enough to injure, but sharp enough to shock the pleasure right out of my body. The climax dissolves into a frustrated ache.
Hetsks. “Don’t you dare.”
Vale immediately resumes the assault, harder this time, his thumb grinding down on my clit while his fingers plunder the wet heat inside. He’s relentless, stealing my breath, forcing the sensation back up the mountain at a breakneck pace.
“You cling to the things that should repel you,” he mutters, his breaths coming faster. “You should be running away, Elara.Why aren’t you running?”
I can’t answer. I can only keen as the pressure builds again, higher, hotter, a wave crashing over my head until?—
The next blow lands on the other cheek, stinging and rude. The orgasm shatters again, leaving me trembling and whining, frustrated tears pricking my eyes.
“Please,” I beg.
“Please, what?” His tone is a taunt. “Please stop? Please hurt you more?” Before I can answer, he growls, “Be still.”
