Grabbed by Vicious (33 page)

“How?” Her question was breathless and soft.

“I’m going to show you pain. You’ll suffer your

penance under my hand.” He tipped her face and lowered

his until their noses were only inches apart. “Are you

afraid?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” He let his thumb outline her mouth. “If it’s too

much, if you can’t handle it, you say ‘white’ and we’re all

done for the night. Understood?” She nodded dutifully.

Vicious lowered his mouth and kissed her deeply. She

lifted up to meet his searching tongue. When she trembled,

he pulled back and rubbed her cheek. “Let’s get started.”

Hallie shivered under his intense gaze. Fear rattled her

belly. The slight quiver of panic made her chest hurt.

Pain? Punishment? Could she really go through with this?

Vicious would never really harm her. That she believed

more than anything. Whatever they were going to do was

going to hurt, yes, but it wouldn’t inflict lasting harm or

damage. As she gazed into his blue eyes, she realized he

understood what she needed. The guilt of having taken a

life, even a rotten one, was too much for her to move past

without some kind of punishment. To receive that under

his loving hand was exactly what she needed.

“Come here.” Vicious patted his lap. “Hands on the

floor. Head down.”

She followed his instructions and draped herself across

his lap. He was so tall and she so short that it was a

stretch to put her hands on the floor. He shifted her a little

on his lap, tilting her forward enough that she felt off

balance. His big arm clamped down across her shoulders

and held her in place. She flinched when his hand

caressed her bottom. He’d smacked her backside before,

that evening he’d brought home the cat getup, but that was

playful. This wouldn’t be.

“Ow!” She cried out and twisted as his massive palm

cracked her right butt cheek. His hand quickly descended

on the other side and then returned to the right. “Ow! Oh!

No!”

“Hush.” Vicious spoke sternly as he delivered the

unending smacks. “You deserve this. You need to be

punished.”

He was right. She’d done a bad thing. A burning sting

blossomed across her bottom. The uncomfortable heat

spread as his hand whacked her again and again. She’d

never been spanked like this. Ten whacks was the usual

around her house for bad behavior. This? This was

ceaseless and sharp and so much worse because she was

naked across Vicious’ lap.

“Please,” she begged and tried to wiggle off him.

“Please, Vicious.”

“No.” His hand fisted in her hair. He didn’t pull or yank

or cause her pain but the knowledge that he could kept her

still. “Take it, Hallie. Accept your punishment.”

She lowered her gaze to the floor as he beat her ass. As

the humiliation and embarrassment of having her husband

spank her started to fade, something new took hold. It felt

almost…right.

All the guilt she’d carried the last few days welled up

inside her. She choked on the ugliness of it. The memory

of what she’d done, the way she’d stabbed that man in the

neck and then helped Terror get rid of the body, to dispose

of it like so much garbage, made her ill. She sobbed

against Vicious’ thigh. Each painful pull of air stretched

her lungs and made her stomach burn. She’d done a

terrible thing. She needed to suffer for it.

Her bottom was on fire now but Vicious showed no

signs of letting up. She cried and pleaded but he didn’t

show mercy. His big hand found a rhythm that tormented

her. Still, the pain and guilt of what she’d done raged

inside her.

His hand stilled on her backside. He caressed her lower

back and the space between her shoulders. “Are we done?

Have you forgiven yourself yet?”

“No.” The answer tore from her throat on a nasty sob.

“Punish me, Vicious. Make me hurt.”

He went rigid beneath her. In the next instant, he stood

and tossed her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

Her bottom hurt but it wasn’t enough. The guilt clogged

her throat, made it difficult to breathe.

Vicious set her on her feet and made quick work of

securing her arms overhead in some kind of device.

Leather cuffs like the ones she’d worn the first night

squeezed her wrists. They were hooked to a large ring

dangling from a chain mounted to the ceiling. He adjusted

the slack on the chain and forced her onto her very tiptoes.

Still, he wasn’t done. Vicious put cuffs around her

ankles and spread her thighs wide. He fixed chains to the

cuffs and hooked those into small rings protruding from the

floor. She balanced precariously now. Panic momentarily

overrode the guilt.

He stepped away and returned with a towel. Even in

this frightening moment, he showed such tenderness as he

wiped away the saliva and tears and snot from her sobbing

session. The towel was discarded as he walked to a tall,

thin metal chest on wheels. It reminded her of a toolbox.

He opened a drawer and removed two shiny silver clips

attached to a chain.

She gulped at the sight of them. That night at the

general’s party, she’d seen women wearing those.

“No!” She tried to pull back but there was no escape.

“Vicious, please, not that.”

He silenced her with a punishing kiss. “You asked for

this. I’m giving you what you need.”

He bent low and swiped her left nipple with his tongue.

He sucked it gently, forcing it into a stiff peak, and then

clamped one of the clips onto it. She hissed and tried to

jerk away but his mouth had already descended to her right

breast. He performed the same procedure there.

Breasts aching and nipples pinched, she inhaled a

shuddery breath. He picked up the chain dangling between

the two clamps and lifted it to her neck. There was still

enough slack that the clamps didn’t pull. Vicious quickly

remedied that when he opened the ring on the front of her

collar and hooked the chain there. Instantly, her nipples

were tugged and buzzing.

“Oh! Oh no!”

“Sh.” He kissed her cheek. “Learn to accept the pain,

Hallie. Feel it.”

She gulped as his words penetrated her confused mind.

He moved around behind her now. She wanted to turn to

watch him but the slightest movement of her neck pulled

on the clamps. The sharp bite was too much so she stayed

stock still.

Another drawer opened behind her. He retrieved

something. Whatever it was, it made a strange whirring

sound as he moved his arm. The first thud of the
thing

landed on her backside and she gasped. “Ah!”

“It’s a flogger, Hallie.”

Knowing what it was didn’t make it any easier to

accept. The first few whacks were soft but heavy. The

weight of the material impacted her bottom with enough

force to make her cringe. It wasn’t bad so much as

different.

Until Vicious increased the power behind each smack

of the leathery tendrils, that is.

Her gasps turned into cries as the flogger hit her bottom

again and again. Her tissues, already sore from that

spanking, now protested the sharp, heavy thud of the

flogger tongues. She rose even higher on tiptoes, her

calves burning and arms tensing, and tried to escape. It

was no use. She was caught and forced to endure her

punishment.

Her mind turned to another time she’d been forced to

receive a punishment. Then it had been about humiliation.

Having her head shaved in front of her village had marked

her as a law breaker and a criminal. Even worse, it was

the same punishment reserved for the prostitutes

discovered by the village police. Anyone who saw her

after that immediately believed her to be a whore. She’d

learned then to ignore the disdainful looks or the pitying

gazes. She’d learned to move beyond what people thought

and be content in what she knew to be the truth.

In some way, this experience was the same. The pain

Vicious produced with his hand and that flogger began to

surpass the pain of her guilt. She still felt so twisted up

inside. The flashbacks of that night tortured her. The hot

blood spilling over her hand, the gurgling death rattle as

the man finally expired. She could feel the cloth in her

hand as it wiped away the congealed blood on that hotel

room floor. She closed her eyes as hot tears poured down

her cheeks.

She sobbed loud and rough. It was an ugly cry that

racked her body with spasms. Behind her, Vicious tossed

the flogger to the floor. It hit with a noisy thump. He

wasn’t finished with her. She knew because she wasn’t

finished with herself. The catharsis he’d promised still

hadn’t arrived.

His hand tangled in her hair. He tugged her head back,

forcing her chin up and the collar around her neck to pull

taut the chain attached to those awful clamps. She gasped

in pain but Vicious soothed her with his mouth. His lips

followed the curve of her neck and touched her jaw. His

mouth against her ear, he whispered, “I love you, Hallie.”

Before she could answer him, he stepped back and

popped her bottom with something hard and unforgiving.

A cane, she realized a second later.

“
AHH!
”Hallie screamed as the sharp, angry pain striped

her backside. “No! No! Oh.”

He gave her a short reprieve before popping her again.

This time, the pain of the cane blistering across her bottom

surpassed the ugly guilt clawing at her chest. It burst

through and obliterated that torment. Another smack of the

cane and Hallie sagged in her bonds. She cried pitifully

now but felt the strangest sense of relief.

Something warm and bright surged through her. The

pain no longer gripped her. She’d moved beyond it to

something new and different. The knowledge that she’d

taken a life would never leave. The guilt at having made

the choice to save a friend at the cost of another man faded

and vanished.

However awful the choice, she’d done the right thing.

Vicious popped her again, the unyielding snap of the

cane searing her bottom. She cried out but finally found

her voice. “Wh-white.
White
!”

The cane clattered as it hit the ground. She still sobbed

but the tears came from a different place now. Vicious

unhooked her arms and ankles. She fell forward onto him.

He swept her into his strong arms and carried her out of

there. She closed her eyes and reveled in his heat.

When he placed her in their bed, she gazed up at him.

Surprise punched her in the gut. His blue eyes glistened

with tears. Obviously, she wasn’t the only one who had

been moved by the strangely intimate and beautifully

brutal experience they’d just shared.

She slid her arms around his neck and pulled him down

for a kiss. “Make love to me, Vicious.”

Chapter Eighteen

Taking a cane to Hallie’s perfect little ass had been the

hardest thing he’d ever done, but he’d pushed through and

done it for her. He’d known the second she’d forgiven

herself. Guilt had a nasty way of twisting a soul. If it took

a few pops of a cane to bring Hallie to a place of agony

that allowed her to come to terms with what she’d done

and accept forgiveness, then so be it.

Vicious kissed her gently, his mouth moving across hers

with such love. He stroked her arms and ribs before using

a corner of the bed sheet to wipe her face. His lips glided

down her chin to her chest. He hated to cause her even

more discomfort but the clamps had to come off now. He

quickly unclipped the clamp pinching her left nipple.

She hissed and thrashed under him. “It hurts. Oh! Ow!”

“I’m sorry, Kitten.” He licked the nipple and kissed it

tenderly. His fingertips moved to the other clamp but she

smacked his hand away.

“No. Leave it, Vicious.”

“I can’t. It has to come off or you risk injury.” He didn’t

let her argue any further. He squeezed the ends and

removed the clamp. She cried out and twisted her hips. He

hurriedly tongued the throbbing peak and suckled it lightly.