Page 35 of Wolf Tamer

“I can see why you wanted to keep her for yourself, Reid,” Bullet adds, inciting a round of laughter from the rest of the men in the pack. “She’s good enough to eat, isn’t she?”

“All that gorgeous skin,” Reid says. “Hair thick enough to fist my hand in.” He grabs me by the back of the head and yanks me back, forcing me to look at him. His hand cups my breast, and the laughter grows.

I grit my teeth against his groping, smothering a growl of my own when his fingers find my nipple and pinch.

“Good enough to ride,” Julius replies with a snicker.

“And ride her, I have. This one likes it rough, though. Sometimes it’s hard even for me to keep up with her.”

As if to prove his point, Reid forces me over so that my bare ass faces the rest of the room and brings his free hand down with a loud crack. This time there’s no pleasure in his slap. Only pain and disgust radiates through me.

But his hand is only the start of it, and a signal for the others to crowd in closer.

The only way out of this is through it, and I’m the one who agreed to it in the first place. Facing away from the crowd gives me the opportunity to speak the incantation without anyone the wiser. No one will be able to see what I’m doing and suspect him of subterfuge. I release a pinch of the dried lavender and salt and mutter the words under my breath, praying for a miracle as his hand comes down a second time.

A tingle of magic spreads through my system, along with a warm numbing sensation so that I barely feel it when he grabs a branch from beside the fireplace and begins to paddle me with it.

“I better be careful,” Reid warns the others. “This one actually likes it. She’s always pushing the limits.”

He continues to smack me as hard as he’s able. Soon even thefemalewolves are whooping out their agreement with the punishment.

Fucking sick.

I don’t need to look to sense them crowding closer. I practically feel their breath on me.

All part of the show. At least until the spell begins to fade, almost as soon as it’s begun. I’ve got no choice. Do I?

Not anymore.

Even agreeing to this charade doesn’t make me feel any better, because it hurts. His words hurt, and I’m not sure why.

“Shall we teach our sacrifice what it means to try and fight against us?” Reid asks, waiting for a moment while his people howl out their answer. “Shall we teach her not to run again?”

It’s gotta be the words, because the physical pain, I can handle. I’ve been through enough shit in my life that this is really nothing. If I can handle gutting a vampire with a broken arm, then I can handle this, no problem.

The pain isn’t fully numbed, of course. No doubt I’ve fucked up the spell to the point that it didn’t work to full effect, and so, the pain is real. But so is the agony no one else can see, the wounds slowly splintering my heart into pieces because it seems that Reid is truly taking his aggression out on me.

And means everything he says.

ChapterTwelve

Tasha

The words are the worst part of this whole charade.

I drop my head. My lower lip trembles, and to stop it, I bite down on it until I taste blood.

“You like this, don’t you?” Reid asks with another smack of the branch.

He wants me to answer him, and I struggle to say, “Yes.” The word sounds forced, dragged out of me by duty alone.

At another time, when we were alone, this scenario could’ve had a very different outcome, but there’s nothing sexy about what’s happening here. I feel vile. Gross. And not in a good way.

“Say it louder. Let them hear you.”

“Yes!”

It’s the best I can do, and hearing it spurs Reid into action. He slams the branch down on my skin until every piece of me from the waist down is numb, and not the way it needs to be. Our sixty seconds came and went in the blink of an eye, and even with the spell, it wasn’t enough.

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