Page 41 of Taming Scarlet

Cuffs?

Leather cuffs?

I didn’t have any time to wonder about that, though, before I heard Julian clip something to one of the wrist cuffs, making a sound like Hugh’s leash did when I clicked it on his collar.

My belly wobbled as there was another click.

Then, my body was being pulled backward, my shoulders pinching toward each other, my back arching backward and down.

Another click.

Then a fourth one.

Did he just… did he just… hogtie me?

Did I justlet himhogtie me?

“If you can’t be trusted to stay where you know you are supposed to be…” he said when he was finished, and took a step back to admire his work. I could practically feel his gaze on my back and ass. “You will be restrained,” he said.

Then, with nothing else, he walked away.

I was too stunned to say anything, just listening as he took Hugh out onto the balcony to do his business.

When the dog came back in, he made a beeline for the bedroom, likely exhausted from playing with his friends all day. Too tired to worry about why his mom was naked and restrained in the living room.

“When are—“ I finally found my voice to start to speak to him after listening to him make himself coffee in the kitchen.

“You don’t have permission to speak,” he cut me off. Tone calm and cool.

And I didn’t… I didn’t try to say anything again.

Not even as he moved back toward me, stepping over me to sit down on the couch with his coffee, scrolling through something on his phone.

Completely ignoring me.

But… wasn’t the point of all this… BDSM stuff about, you know, sex?

Why was he acting like I wasn’t even there?

“What is this—“

“I will gag you if you don’t behave,” he cut me off once again, just scrolling away at his phone.

“You aren’t even looking at me,” I said, hearing a whine in my own voice, and really hating the sound of it.

“You haven’t earned attention,” he told me. “When you learn to submit, you will have as much attention as you want. Right now, you are being punished. You deserve this,” he added, gaze finally cutting over toward me. “Don’t you?” he asked.

“Yes,” I whispered.

Because, in a way, I had expected consequences of my actions. I just hadn’t anticipated that I would submit to them. I thought we were going to yell and fight and that I would eventually run him off.

Julian, it seemed, was not a man who riled that way. He had too much control over himself.

And, it seemed, me.

So I sat there on my knees, the lush carpet starting to bite into my skin at the continued pressure, my shoulders aching from the pulled-back position.

As Julian finished his coffee.

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