Free Comfort Food by Kitty Thomas Page B

get. She was unsure which would be worse, an instrument of pain, or pleasure.
    When he returned, his hand was gentle on her chin, raising her face toward him, and she opened her eyes. She could see something soft and almost human in his gaze, and she wanted to latch onto it. He turned her face so she could see the riding crop dangling loosely from his hand.
    Her eyes flew back to his as the same cold fear she’d had in the other cell came rushing back. His eyes held question. He’d only hit her if she agreed. The mockery of her free will made her angry, but her anger was dwarfed almost completely by the feel of his hand on her face.
    He’d been gentle in the other cell. He’d taken something profoundly scary and been kind and reassuring. She was still reeling from the careful way he’d held and rocked her afterward and then watched her with something like concern as he’d put his pants back on.
    Her eyes drifted to the riding crop again, and she nodded. Then he was behind her. She tensed as she heard the crop slice through the stillness of the room. It was deafening. And then the sharp, loud pain. She gasped, tears in her eyes.
    “Please . . . ”
    He stopped.
    “No, don’t stop.” She wished she could take the words back, but any further begging died in her throat as she relaxed and let the crop fall on her.
    How had she allowed him to turn her into something so ugly? Someone who craved any sensation at all, even if it was pain. A few moments passed, and she let the rhythm of the strikes wash over her. When she’d reached the threshold of complete surrender, the pain morphed into something tolerable and almost . . . pleasant?
    Her body betrayed her, taking this new sensation and responding with arousal.
    He stopped then, and she had a moment to catch her breath before he returned with a single-tailed whip. She’d thought it was ending, but he’d only been warming her up for more. She’d read enough to know this wouldn’t be pleasant.
    The whip cracked a few feet from her, and she jumped, finding her knees no longer wanting to support her weight. He allowed her to lie on her stomach and ran his hand over her back and the roundness of her ass. Then the strip of leather whipped across her skin, leaving a sting so sharp it brought tears to her eyes.
    As he whipped her, she cried out but didn’t beg him again. She let it happen, whatever he wanted, as long as he didn’t take her back to the bad cell.
    He continued, and she found herself floating while the endorphins flooded her system, and he pushed her higher still. Tears streamed uncontrollably down her face, but it wasn’t the pain that made her cry.
    It was release, absolution. The surrender, finally, of everything to him. The acceptance that she was now his creature, not her own, and the inexplicable peace that brought her.
    Finally, it stopped and she could feel a warm wetness on her back. He’d made her bleed. She felt his tongue trailing over the opened flesh. He stepped away from her, and she worried he wasn’t finished yet. Maybe he would take her beyond her ability to tolerate the pain to make her prove her new loyalty to him.
    When he returned, he had a small basin of water, cloths, bandages, and ointment. He patched up her wounds, then turned her in his arms and kissed her softly on the mouth.
    He retrieved the blindfold again and she scooted back.
    Her voice cracked, “Are you taking me back to the cell?” If he took her back there and left her to rot after this . . .
    He shook his head. She crawled back to him so he could tie the piece of fabric over her eyes . . .

    When the blindfold came off, I was in the nice room again.
    “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
    I couldn’t stop saying it. It was a mindless litany now. I turned in his arms and my mouth found the hollow of his throat, and I kissed him.
    He left me then. When he returned, I was stretched out on the bed, the pillows propped underneath me, watching for the door to open again.