He leaned forward, nuzzled her backside with his face, rubbing his jaw against the left cheek. His heated breath whispered over her sex and she contracted without thought, just imagining his tongue sliding in there, the way he’d done it before. God, the coil in her stomach was so tight, she was shaking all over, from something even more powerful than pain.

“More,” she whispered. “Please, sir.”

He paused; then she felt the brief prick of fangs before he pulled back. “All together. I want to hear you scream.”

She wasn’t entirely sure what he meant until the belt landed. He didn’t pause to let her speak, though she tried to get the syllables out. They got lost when she did in fact cry out, not once but on each of the final five strikes. The sixteenth he threw in unexpectedly singed her nerve endings and sent her body jerking hard against her bonds. Tears had wet her face, but she said it now, six times in succession, breathlessly, an oath that suddenly meant far more.

“I will never disobey you, sir. I will never disobey you, sir . . .”

The tongue of the belt teased over her throbbing flesh, then down, playing with her soaking cunt. It had been a crude word at first, one he used, but now she embraced the primal sound of it, at least in her mind. It made her hotter, needier. Leaning in, he pressed against the back of her thigh. He was in fact hard as an iron bar for her.

“Of course you’ll disobey me again. Because of who you are, and how that mind of yours works. And because you’ll realize if you’re very bad, I’ll do this to you again. Lift your ass to me, Elisa. Lift it as high as you can, and hold it there until I tell you that you can move.”

It was an awkward position, but she managed it, perhaps because she was so overwhelmed with emotional reaction she thought she could touch her arse to the back of her head if he commanded it. She didn’t think about his words, about how shameless the truth made her. Instead, she waited, soft whimpers coming from her, whimpers that became a different kind of cry as his mouth closed fully over her wet cunt, sucking on those juices, licking them away and creating more as his tongue dipped into her, swirled and came back out, only to thrust in again.

It doesn’t make you shameless, Elisa. It means you want to serve your Master, give him pleasure, make him crazy with lust for you until he’ll fuck you a hundred different ways, wear you out and then want to take you all over again, to remind you that you’re his.

She wanted him to take her while she was tied in this chair, helpless to him, his cock buried deep inside of her. She wanted him to thrust and take her over, reach under her arms and grip her breasts through the thin dress, rip the fabric away and leave it in tatters. She wanted him to do what he wanted, take her soaring to that incredible place that at times had left her perplexed and wanting, but there was no confusion now. Her fully woken body had a singular purpose, to serve his pleasure.

“As part of your punishment, I had no intention of being inside you tonight, even if you begged,” he observed, that growl in his voice. “Though you’re making it damnably difficult to remember why the hell I decided that.”

“It wouldn’t bother me . . . if you changed your mind.”

“No, I’m sure it wouldn’t.” Stepping to the side of the chair, he lifted her chin, keeping her arched in all ways to him. With the other hand, he slipped back over the globe of her backside and found her wet pussy again, began to stroke that dense area of nerve endings with devilish skill. “You’ll look at me as you climax, Elisa. Give me everything. Don’t take your eyes off me, or I’ll give you fifteen more stripes, and I promise they will hurt like the very devil over top of those.”

She didn’t need the reminder. Now that he was done, there was a throbbing heat over her buttocks that told her she was going to have trouble sitting down for the next day or so, unless the second-mark healing ability jumped in and helped her somewhat. But to look at him while this was happening was so difficult. Those dark, fathomless eyes following the widening of her gaze, the stretching of her mouth as air became too precious and small, the quiver of her body, the rock of it against her bonds as she began to jerk against his hand. When two of his fingers slid inside of her, emulating the act of his cock while his thumb stroked and massaged her clit, she could hardly bear to hold his gaze, though it was such a pleasure to look on his face, get lost in it instead of what she must look like.

“You look like the most fuckable thing in the history of the world,” he said, his gaze ablaze with heat. “Obey me now, Elisa. You come for me. Spurt your honey over my fingers; clamp down on them.”

She couldn’t stop herself. The climax swept over like a tidal wave and though she kept her eyes on his face as he commanded, it was a struggle, because her cries became a scream. The arched position of her body made her completely helpless to him as he kept teasing, pumping, massaging, stroking, holding her chin up so he could see how it all affected her, every tear and quiver, the terror and pleasure of it at once rocketing through her.

She wanted to eat him alive. If she were free, she’d leap upon him, lick and bite until he rolled her under him, pinning her down and taking charge once again, overwhelming her with his strength and will.

It took forever to come down, and when she did, she wondered if anyone else was in the house.

Mal put his mouth to the corner of hers. “I hope the whole damn staff was in here, so they could hear how well you served me. How you belong to me.”

Served him? But he’d given her all the pleasure, hadn’t he? And taken none for himself.

Elisa, there are many things that give a vampire pleasure. Nothing pleases us so much as surrender. He was freeing her bonds, but her legs were shaking so badly, she was afraid she might topple over. She needn’t have worried. He released her hands but then rebound her wrists together and lifted her in his arms.

Carrying her out of the study, he took her through the house and down the steps, down that long hallway with the cat mural. Into his bedroom and then onto his bed. When he laid her there, he began to undress her. One item at a time until she was completely naked and he was still fully clothed. He unbound her wrists to get everything off, but then retied them to the headboard. He used longer ties for her legs and bound her ankles to the gnarled wooden branches at the base, her legs parted wide so that the remains of her climax were trickling out, teasing the lips of her cunt. When he stretched out next to her on one elbow, he made it clear he would take all the time he desired to look his fill. Remarkably, it made her body start to feel restless again, as if it could reach a climax again in no time. She should be exhausted.

“What . . . what are you doing?”

“I’m turning in early tonight. For the next few hours, you’ll do nothing but lie next to me. Until dawn, I will touch you, arouse you, make you greedy for another climax, but you’re not going to have another. Not for a while. This is the second part of your punishment. The next time I tell you to say, ‘I will never disobey you, sir,’ you will mean it to the depths of your soul.”

His look gave her those butterflies in the stomach. “I don’t think I could do that again for a while anyhow. The climax part.”

“Hmm. You may be right. But I’ll please myself.” Leaning forward, he began to drop kisses along the curve of her right breast, then the left, working his way around the nipples without touching them. Elisa watched the peaks drawing into intense, tight points, felt her lower belly begin to coil again. Yet when her body began to involuntarily move toward him, trying to beg for his mouth where she wanted it, he gave her a light slap in a most unexpected place, that tender place between her legs. She jumped and he gave her a reproving look. “You don’t move unless I tell you to do it, atsilusgi.”

She obeyed, and obeyed, and obeyed, until she was crying again, her body quivering with the most painful need she’d ever experienced. When he finally put his mouth on her nipples, the surge of vicious reaction took her so close to climax, but he would allow nothing but air to touch that part of her body. If it started clenching on its own, trying to create the feeling of touch or friction, he eased off, took the feeling out of reach until she’d calmed. Then he started again. He drank from her as well. Tiny sips from her throat, the inside of her thigh, his hair brushing her sex, his nose briefly nuzzling into that wet, dark place. He told her she smelled like hot need, the most irresistible smell to a man.

He suckled her breasts again. Once, he laid his body full upon hers, stroking along her flanks with his capable hands, the hard evidence of his desire pushed up between her legs, her bare, wet cunt dampening the denim. She’d never imagined anything like this, a man teasing a woman to such a mindless frenzy. He was right. She’d say anything he wanted, just to get him inside of her. But nothing would sway him, because he was teaching her a lesson, making a point. The word he’d said earlier kept sticking in her head. Master. He was teaching her how to properly serve a Master. How to serve him.

But to be her Master, he would have to mark her once more. Make her his fully marked servant, bound to him for all eternity. She’d be his forever, the way Dev was to Danny, serving whatever needs she had, public or private, with other vampires or without. It was a life far beyond her simple desires and dreams, and yet he was making her body override her heart, making them both believe they could want anything he desired, a dark magic she couldn’t resist.

He rose up above her now, stroking her breasts, feeding her his fingers, so she could taste herself from where he’d had them inside of her. Tell me now, Elisa. What’s the lesson you’ve learned?

I will never disobey you, Master. Please . . .

“Please what, Elisa?”

“Please . . . come inside of me.”

“What if I take my own pleasure and don’t allow you to release? Make you continue to suffer?”

“I don’t care. I want to give you pleasure. That’s all I want. Make me suffer, but let me be the one to please you.” She couldn’t bear the idea of that hard cock inside of Chumani’s body. Or anyone else.