Page 80 of Princess Broken

“Touch my clit, please.”

Another torrent of smacks falls over my ass cheeks.

Trepidation rises up my throat and squeezes the backs of my eyes as memories flood in. If vampires could cry, I would. Deeply buried memories fill my mind, and my body freezes in fear.

Someone has spanked my bare bottom like this before. Many times. But then, I wasn’t bent over a pommel horse, it was a lap. A man’s lap. And I was a little girl.

Every muscle in my body is rigid now, making Flame’s blows even more brutal. “No! Please! No! I’m sorry,” I cry out. “I won’t misbehave again. Please. Stop!”

The smacks slow, but the sting intensifies. My bottom is throbbing, screaming with hot pain that’s even worse without new blows. But my sex is throbbing too. Crying out to be taken. And I remember where I am. I am not in our nursery. I am not a child. And the hardness beneath my body is not the man we called Our Friend. The man others called Rasputin.

Then the smacks start up again. Hard and fast. The burning’s intensifying, but I don’t want any more.

“No, please. No. I’ll be a good girl.”

Screaming, I return to the present.

“Sky!” I say on a hard exhale.

My body slumps. Even if I weren’t tied down, I couldn’t move.

And then I realize I’m not tied down.

My eyes are closed, and I keep drifting back into the memories of the nursery. I can see the row of intricately carved, rocking horses, mine with a silver mane. I see my favorite doll, Victoria, with her golden curls and blue eyes and named for my English auntie, a Queen.

I should open my own eyes. That might help bring me back to the present, but I can’t. I’m stuck in our nursery, I’m in Our Friend’s lap and he’s fondling me, soothing my burning bottom but also touching me places he shouldn’t.

He moves me, sets me down on my belly on something soft, with my dress still bunched up over my chest. Hands gently soothe my stinging ass and fingers slide near my sex.

“No,” I say, and the word hurts coming out. “Please. No more. I’ll be a good girl. I won’t cause any mischief. Please. Please don’t punish me again.” I squeeze my legs together tightly hoping our friend won’t put the ivory handle of the hairbrush inside me. The same hairbrush she sometimes uses to spank me. He sometimes pushes the handle in, or his fingers, during my punishments, but only when my sisters and brother aren’t around. Are they here now? “Please Master. Please.” He likes when I call him that.

“Master?” Flame’s voice creeps into my consciousness. And I realize again where I am.

I sob silently, as my body and mind recover. But only my mind requires recuperation.

Once my mind’s back in the present, I realize my body is fine. More than fine—other than the frustration of not climaxing. Now that the memories have faded, Flame can even spank me again, as long as he eventually give me my release.

Sitting, I glance around the gymnasium.

Flame is gone.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Flame

I relish the pain as I watch the burns on my palms heal. And then, the instant the blisters recede, I thrust my hands into the fire again. A calm numbness washes over me as my skin burns.

“Stop it!” Ana tugs on my shoulder, and I fall back from my crouch in front of the fire to land on my ass on the floor.

Pain invades, overtaking the numbness as my hands heal, and I welcome the pain, let it flood through me as I bow my head. I can’t look at her. I don’t deserve to look at her. I don’t deserve to be in the same room as her, on the same planet.

“Flame.” Her hand tenderly touches my shoulder. I shrug it off.

“Talk to me. Please.” Her voice breaks.

Lifting my head, I turn to her, and the agony in her eyes burns new holes inside me.

“I’m so sorry,” I say in a hoarse whisper.

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