“Thank you.”
“And if you last ten minutes,” he said, and she turned her head and saw him glance at the clock on the fireplace mantel, “I’ll give you what you want.”
Ten minutes of pain? For a kiss from him? She would have traded an entire hour of pain for a kiss. Who was she kidding? She would have traded all night.
“Ready,” she said, and before she could prepare herself, the first blow landed on the center of her back. She gasped from the sudden shock of pain.
From behind her she heard Søren laughing.
“I told you so,” he taunted.
“I didn’t say ‘stop.’” Let him tease and taunt. She could do this.
“No. No, you did not.”
Grace braced herself but the second blow hurt even worse than first. The third came fast after that. She flinched with each strike but managed to do no more than gasp or wince. Not once did she cry out. Not once did she scream. After a few more strikes she found herself zoning out. The pain didn’t fade. On the contrary it built as the flogger landed again and again on her raw back. But she stopped caring about the pain, stopped counting the minutes until it would end. The most enigmatic man she’d ever met desired to give her this pain, needed to give her pain, and so she accepted the pain as a gift and offered him her body for his use as a gift in return.
When the flogging finally ceased, Grace sagged against the bedpost and swallowed large gulps of air.
Søren came to her and laid the flogger back on the bed. He reached up and took her by the wrist, turning her to face him.
He cupped her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes.
“Good girl,” he whispered. “I’m proud of you.”
“You are?”
He nodded. “For someone who has never done this before, you take pain beautifully.”
She beamed with pride. Praise from him was worth all the pain.
“Thank you. I want to please you.”
“You do.” He raised her hand to his lips and kissed the center of her palm. Still holding her hand he brought his mouth to hers. At first he kissed her so gently she barely felt it. Then she realized he was waiting, waiting for her to kiss him back, to take what she wanted, what she’d asked for, what she’d earned. And since she had earned it, she pressed her lips to his, opened her mouth and let him have at her. She tasted his tongue, the hint of wine, tasted his hunger or perhaps it was hers. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her naked body into him. An ache unlike any she’d ever felt before coalesced within her like a storm cloud forming. With each passing moment the storm intensified as her desire for him thundered through her.
Finally he pulled back and looked down at her with something akin to surprise in his eyes. Had the ferocity of the kiss shocked him as much as it shocked her?
“Tell me what you want, Grace,” he said again, this time slightly breathless. “And I’ll tell you how to earn it.”
“I want you to touch me...all of me.”
“It will cost you.”
“I’ll pay any price.”
“Stand in your place.”
She turned her back to him, crossed her arms and rested her forehead against her wrists. He didn’t pick up the flogger this time. He’d gone back into the bag for something else. She didn’t see it, but she heard it. When he whipped the air it made a whistling sound.
“You recall how much the flogger hurt?”
“Yes. A lot.”
“Good,” he said. “This is a cane. It will hurt worse.”
“Ten more minutes?”
“Oh, I won’t cane you for ten minutes. You’d end up in the hospital. I’ll cane you for one minute.”
“Thank God...”
“I’ll whip you for the other nine.”
The cane landed in the center of the backs of her thighs. The impact felt like a line of fire erupted on her skin. The next blow moved up higher. The third higher still. But the fourth moved lower so she quit guessing where the next would land. Her bottom, her upper thighs, her lower thighs...they burned with a pain she’d never experienced before. And as quickly as it started, it was over. But only the caning. Something bit at her back with tiny, tearing teeth. She heard a snap, something cutting the air, something stinging her skin. As before she lost herself after a few moments. The pain became a fact of life, as much a part of her as breathing. She didn’t seek to stop it. She didn’t even endure it. She received it, accepted it, even enjoyed it for the fact that the man who gave it to her needed to give it to her. The gods of old had demanded blood sacrifices from their people—a dove slain on an altar, a rook or a sheep. For some gods, even a person. The blood atoned for the sins of the people, bent the ears of god toward the supplicant. But Grace felt nothing like a dove laid out upon an altar. Giving herself to Søren for a night? This was no sacrifice.
When the pain stopped, Grace did nothing but stand and wait. When the pain stopped, Søren was at her back, turning her toward him again. His mouth found hers and she returned the kiss as ardently as he gave it. As they kissed he pushed her onto the bed and held himself over her. She lay underneath him as his hands traversed the full plane of her body, over her br**sts and down her stomach, down her legs and across her hips. He had such graceful hands, such knowing fingers, and when she opened her thighs and he slipped his fingers into her, she accepted them like a gift. She gloried in every touch, every sensation, even the discomfort of her battered back on the sheets.