Page 12 of Cherry Auction

“Punish me?” I squeak.

“Yes,” is all he says.

His hands slide down my thighs to my knees, then sensuously to my calves, and finally to my ankles, where he begins to untie my shoes. I shiver, at the same time I’m calmed by his gentle touch. Even though he just talked about punishing me.

But I wasn’t lying earlier when I said something in me seemed to recognize him. He says he doesn’t know me, so is this what people mean when they talk about trusting theirgut? My gut says he’s a safe person. It’s why I got in the car. But maybe it was this kind of thinking that got me in an alley with a pipe or whatever to the head in the first place.

“You never answered me,” I whisper. “About whether you’re going to hurt me or not.”

His hands massage my foot and back up to my calf. “Did Moira explain about a safe word?”

“Yes,” I hurry to say. “Red. My safe word is red. I saw a woman use it at the club when we visited.”

“Good,” he murmurs, low and reassuring. “If anything gets to be too much for you, all you have to say is your safe word and I’ll stop touching you.”

I breathe out in relief, then double check, “No matter what?”

“No matter what.”

My breath finishes expelling from my lungs. Safe word.Safe. Okay. See, my gut was right.

“In the meantime, I want to play with you. Do you want to play? That’s what you came here for, isn’t it?”

Well, that’s an odd way to word it. I came here to get paid, but I supposeplayis a nice way to put the act of what it takes to get paid. Quinn used that term upstairs, too, didn’t she? Play. That’s all this is. Adult play.

And his massaging touch on my calves certainly does feel nice. Really nice, actually. I bend instinctually toward his touch.

It doesn’t hurt that he was the handsomest man in the room upstairs. My whole body reacted to him when he came up to me on stage. His first touch on my wrist was unlike anything I’ve felt in the two months since I first woke up. A zinging chemical awareness of him rushed through my body. I thought it was just a spike of adrenaline from the auction ending.

But after the nerves of the car ride, when I was worriedabout his eyes getting a little dark and scary, it’s back in full force now that he’s touching me again.

And really, it only makes sense that rich guys might be a little intense. He did just pay fiftymillion dollarsfor a night with me. Holy shit. What’s fifty million dollars minus fifteen percent for the club’s broker’s fee?

I blink beneath the mask. Still too many millions of dollars for me to count, and it’ll be all mine after tonight. I’ve done it. Surely that will be enough money to find out who I am. I frown, thinking back to the moment when it seemed like the stranger might have recognized me. He said he didn’t. Was that why he paid so much for me, though? Because I remind him of someone?

He massages back up my legs towards my thighs and I start to have trouble trying to think about why I’m doing all this. All I know is, now that this handsome man is touching me, for once I’m not afraid of the dark.

I inhale sharply as his hands slide up my legs. My insides clench in surprised pleasure. Whatever I imagined whenever I tried to think about what the actual sex might be like… I didn’t think— I didn’t really think aboutenjoyingit.

But the more his strong, expert hands work my legs, thumbs massaging up my inner thighs towards the apex of my?—

A stunned, high-pitched little gasp comes out of my throat.

And then his deep voice is hot beside my ear. “Do youlike my hands on you?” He smells so good—some manly scent I can’t describe except for how it makes me clench again.

I nod. When I do, my cheek rasps against the stubble on his face. He immediately pulls away.

“Climb on your knees to be fucked doggy style,” he says, his voice suddenly harsh.

I blink underneath the mask, startled. Is that it? Are we going to do it now? I’m not sure I know what… doggy style is, but I can guess from the “climb on your knees” part.

Feeling out the mattress with my hands, I turn over and get on my hands and knees.

“Good girl.” He spanks my ass, and I let out a startled, “Oof!”

“Did you like that?”

I blink beneath the mask and answer honestly. “I don’t know.”

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