Fire After Dark (30 page)

‘Go to the bench,’ Dominic commands, standing up again. ‘Kneel in front and stretch out along it.’

I obey his orders, wondering what is going to happen now as I crawl to the bench and along the smooth wood, my knees on the floor, my bottom exposed.

‘Hug it.’

I wrap my arms around the bench, my sensitive nipples hurting as I press down on the surface.

Dominic begins to pace around behind me. I can’t see what he’s doing but I can hear a rhythmic slap as he hits something against his palm.

‘You disobeyed me,’ he says in a voice of utter sternness. ‘You were late. Do you think a submissive should keep her master waiting, even for one second?’

‘No, sir,’ I whisper. The anticipation of whatever he’s going to do to me is terrible.

‘It was your duty to be here before two thirty so that you could be in the boudoir as I ordered on the
stroke
of the half hour.’ At the word
stroke,
he slaps his hand again.

What’s he holding, for Pete’s sake?

His voice drops to a whisper. ‘What should I do to you?’

‘Punish me, sir.’ My voice is small and humble.

‘What?’

‘Punish me, sir,’ I repeat, more loudly.

‘Yes. I need to teach you some manners. Are you a naughty girl?’

‘Yes, sir.’ The words are arousing me, making me hotter. I wonder if he’s forgotten about the egg, which is still throbbing away inside me.

‘What are you?’

‘A naughty girl.’

‘Yes. A very naughty, disobedient girl. You need six of the best to teach you a lesson.’

He stops pacing and thwacks whatever he’s holding through the air. It makes a whistling sound and I guess it is the riding crop. I feel a rush of fear. I don’t want this, it hurts.
Stay strong,
I urge myself.
Don’t show him you’re afraid.

There is a long silence and I feel my buttocks tingling with the anticipation. I can hardly bear it. And then, thwack!

The whip lands across my buttocks. It stings but doesn’t deliver the sickening blow I’ve been fearing. I stay still and try not to move.

Thwack!

It lands again across the plumpest part of my buttocks, a little harder this time. I gasp. Before I can regain myself, it lands again, harder still and then again. I cry out. My whole bottom feels aflame, the skin red hot and sensitive. The crop cuts into me again with a biting, stinging slice that sends sizzling agony across my skin. I don’t like this feeling of burning pain at all. The little egg is still whirring inside me but I’m hardly aware of it. All I can feel is the agonising cut of the whip as it lands on me for a fifth time. The pain makes me sob out and tears rush into my eyes. I steel myself for the last blow and it comes, harder than all the rest, cutting into my tender skin with the burn of a red-hot poker.

I feel a shuddering sob rising up in chest but I summon all my strength and suppress it. I don’t want him to see me cry.

It’s over. Over.

But I’m going to tell him that I don’t want that feeling again. I can’t bear the feeling of the crop, not just the pain it inflicts but the sense of debasement I feel from having my bottom whipped like that.

He bends down and tugs on the black cord between my legs. The little throbbing egg comes out with a tiny pop. He switches it off.

‘Well done, Beth,’ he says softly and rubs his hand gently over my bottom. ‘I was hard on you. I couldn’t resist the sight of your gorgeous skin turning so hot and red for me. I wanted to tear into it with all my strength.’ He draws in a breath and sighs. ‘You’ve made me very hot. Get up.’

I lift myself off the bench, my bottom throbbing with pain. I can barely stand.

‘Come to me on your knees.’

I obey, and as I reach him, he lets his robe fall open, displaying his nakedness underneath. His penis is standing, huge and hard, evidently fired up by the excitement of what he’s just done. His eyes are dark with lust as he watches me moving towards him, my breasts pushed upwards by the harness. I’m holding the lead that’s clipped to my collar so I don’t trip over it.

‘Give me the lead.’

I pass it up to him, keeping my eyes lowered so that I don’t offend him with a direct gaze. He takes it and tugs on it gently, pulling tight until I’m forced to press against him, his erection hard against my face. My breasts are against his legs, my collar pressed against his thighs.

Desire moves inside me, counteracting the painful stinging of my bottom. The smell of him is gorgeous, familiar and comforting. At last he’s going to let me love him the way I want to. I can touch him, caress him, show him how I feel about him.

‘Take me in your mouth,’ he commands. ‘But do not touch me with your hands.’

Disappointment floods through me.
But at least I get to kiss him, lick him, and taste him . . .

I run my tongue along the shaft: it’s hard and radiating inner heat. When I reach the top, I take it all between my lips, twirling my tongue over the smooth surface, sucking and licking. His fingers curl into my hair, holding on firmly as I let his penis fill my mouth, taking in as much as I can. It’s difficult at the angle I’m at, and my jaw already feels stiff as I open wide to take in his girth, but the joy of being able to love him like this makes me determined to ignore the discomfort. Oh, I adore licking him, smelling him and tasting his musky, salty flavour.

As I suck him, the fingers in my hair tighten. He moans. Then he pulls himself free of my mouth and walks over to the white leather chair, tugging on my lead so that I follow. He sits back on the chair, his legs open, and pulls me up onto the footrest, so that I can lean forward as he did to me yesterday and return to my task.

I hold on to the side of the chair and take him in my mouth again, sucking and licking. He moans more loudly. I want to hold his shaft and move the skin, to bring him even more pleasure but I remember that it is forbidden, so I concentrate on working hard with my mouth, titillating him with my tongue, sometimes smoothing him long soft laps and sometimes using the tip to play around its top.

‘Yes, that’s beautiful,’ he murmurs. He’s watching me as I service his penis, his eyes half closed. I imagine how I must look to him in my collar and harness, paying homage to his huge erection with my mouth. I can feel my own arousal now, the wetness between my legs, the growing hunger to be filled by this great thing of his.

He growls again, and draws in a broken breath. I can feel him swelling even further in my mouth. His hips are moving now, pushing his length into me, fucking my mouth. I want to touch him, I need to – I’m half worried that he’ll push too far down my throat and choke me and that I’ll need my hands to stop him. He thrusts harder in, and I fear that I might gag, but his pleasure is about to erupt now. He gives several sharp, hard pushes and a hot gush erupts in my mouth, full of salty liquid whirling around my tongue. I feel it swim in my mouth, then I swallow it down. It leaves a strange burning trail. Without thinking, I put my hand to Dominic’s penis as he pulls it from my mouth.

‘That was lovely, Beth,’ he says in a voice that is velvety yet menacing. ‘But you touched me. And I believe that I strictly forbade such a thing.’

I stare up at him, nervous. Of course I am still his submissive. I must obey. Does this mean more punishment? I’d been hoping that he was going to do something about the heat between my legs and my growing desire.

‘I . . . I apologise, sir—’

He ignores me, cutting me off. ‘Get up and go to the hall. Put on your coat when you get there and wait.’

I do as I’m told, wondering what on earth we’re going to do now. A few minutes later Dominic emerges from the boudoir. He is dressed in his black T-shirt and jeans.

‘Follow me.’ He leads the way out of the flat and I follow him along the corridor to the lift. My lead is hanging down inside my coat. We take the lift down to the lobby. I look at Dominic who ignores me, tapping messages into his phone instead. At the ground floor, he strides across the lobby and I hurry after him, my shoes tapping on the floor, to where a long black Mercedes is waiting outside. He opens the door and climbs in, leaving me to follow in behind. The driver is invisible behind a darkened screen. I sit next to Dominic on the smooth leather seat and the car pulls smoothly away.

I want to ask where we are going but I do not dare. Dominic continues to say nothing but is busy with his phone.

This day is proving to be very strange, and Dominic himself even stranger. I look over at him discreetly and he seems so very distant.

This isn’t what I want.

The voice comes into my mind. I try not to listen. It is what I want. I asked for it.

I try to gather my strength for whatever is lying in wait for me at the end of this ride.

I am not surprised when the car pulls up in the small Soho street outside The Asylum. I have suspected that somehow or other I am going to end up here, and now I know that the moment has come.

A rush of fear goes through me.

‘Get out,’ Dominic says.

I obey and he follows. Then he leads the way down the metal staircase to the front door. Taking a key from his pocket, he quickly unlocks the door and goes through it. When I have followed him into the small inner hall, he shuts it behind us. I can tell that the place is deserted. Now he pushes my coat from my shoulders and takes my lead. Without a word, he strides off though the empty bar and I am forced into a half run to keep up as he pulls me after him. I know where we are going.

I’ve always known.

Sure enough, he takes me to that metal-studded door, and pushes it open. He turns to look at me for the first time since we left Randolph Gardens.

‘Now you will learn the true meaning of punishment,’ he says.

I’m terrified. This is real, choking fear I can feel rushing up inside me. I step into the darkness, and Dominic flicks a switch that brings to life what look like real candles in metal sconces on the wall, but they must be electric.

Now I can see those implements again: the crosses, the bars, the row of evil-looking floggers. My stomach crashes downwards with a nasty sick feeling.

But I must do it. I have to go through with it.

I remember the decision I made to trust Dominic. He won’t go too far with me, he said that.

He takes me over to the bars stretching horizontally across the far wall, then he unbuckles my harness, and slips it over my arms. He lets it drop to the floor unheeded, and makes me stand with my front against the bars, my back to him. He lifts one of my arms and puts my wrist in a manacle level with my shoulder and positioned so that I can move and flex my arm. He does the same with the other. Then he opens my legs and puts one ankle in a restraint and then the other. I can hear his heavy breathing. This is exciting him.

‘Now,’ he says softly, when I’m completely restrained, ‘we will begin.’

I close my eyes tight and clench my stomach tight. I will bear this. I will do it. And later I’ll explain that the dungeon is not my scene no matter what.

Why did he bring you here?
asks my inner voice,
when he knows that this place frightened you?

I don’t want to listen. I don’t want to hear it. I’ve got to concentrate right now on enduring whatever is coming my way.

The first touch is light and sensuous, the tickle of long coarse horsehair over my shoulder blades. Dominic seems almost to be drawing something over my back, as though marking out his territory, learning the contours for when he begins to strike.

‘This is your punishment for disobedience,’ declares Dominic. I can feel him behind me, drinking in the scene: the manacled girl, the flickering light, the whip ready to strike.

The first blow is soft and gentle and so are the next few. He is warming me up. The blood rushes to my skin, making the blows feel like dozen of sharp little cuts. The horsehair is scratchy and scrapes across my already tender skin. I keep my eyes tightly shut and try to control my breathing, but my heart is racing and fear churns in my stomach.

The heat is spreading as he begins to deliver harder, more regular blows.

So this is a flogging. I’m being beaten with a whip in a dungeon.

I fear, then, what is going to happen. I’m outside myself, considering my predicament. And that means my inner fantasy life is flickering and dying.

But it’s too late.

The blows stop and I hear Dominic’s footsteps move to the rail of instruments, and then he returns. He’s holding something else, I can sense it. He turns it through the air a couple of times in swinging practice strokes and then it comes down, flying over my back, dozens of tails with cruel knots at the end biting into my skin.

I throw my head back and scream with surprise and pain. But before I can think, the tails hit me again hard from the other direction. He’s sweeping his instrument back and forth, hitting me on each swing.

Oh my God, this is unbelievable!

On it goes, the heavy strokes landing with metronome regularity. The pain is intense and with each blow I cry out loud, unable to keep the control I’d fought for under the onslaught. And with each strike, Dominic hits a little harder, as though my screams are inciting him to put more strength behind the blows. His breathing is heavy and laboured.

The tails spray pain across my back, biting cruelly into my poor, tender skin. It’s vicious. It’s more than I can stand, I’m shaking and, between my screams of agony, I’m crying.

The safe word. I have to use the safe word.

I’ve lost all faith that Dominic can see what a state I’m in. He’s flogging me hard, and through the haze of pain and confusion in my mind, I think that he may be losing control.

Now I really am terrified – I’m desperately scared, my crying is getting stronger and more intense as the evil instrument rips into my back again and again, left, then right, left then right. Sometimes the biting tails flick round and nip at my breasts and stomach.

What is the safe word?