Page 32 of The King's Maiden
“What does it matter?” I growled.“Clearly,I don’t want you to stop right now.”
He slapped my ass, making me yelp. The sting of his palm throbbed on my barely covered cheek and pulsed between my legs. Before I could react, he slapped the other.
“Oh, fuck!” I cried out. “Okay, okay. You’re right!”
“What do you say if you want me to stop?”
Pain heightened my panic and sharpened my mind.
“I yield,” I rushed out. “Landon, I yield.”
“Good girl,” he whispered.
His weight disappeared.
Free to turn my head, I glared at him where he sat at the end of the bed. Resting back on his heels, he watched me carefully as a dizzying storm of confusion, anger, and lust raged inside me.
“What the hell was that?”
“Thatwas only the beginning, Maiden.” His head tilted as he assessed my reaction, palms sliding down his thighs as he leaned forward and got closer. “You need to give me your safe word every time we enter this room. Do you understand? Next time, I won’t coax it out of you. I’ll leave.”
“Coax it out of me?” I shot back. “Is that what you call that?”
He sat back, affronted.
“It felt more like you spanked it out, if you ask me.”
His eyes narrowed. “Andthatis exactly why you have a safe word, and whyIneed to hear you say it at the start.” He shook his head. “I didn’t force you to sign up for The Quest, Quinn. No one did. You applied to be a Maiden knowing what it meant, right?”
Fuming, I nodded.
“And you have my word and the King’s that nothing will happen in here that you don’t want. I will push you. I will test what you think you can handle. But I won’t force you to do a thing.” He broke our stare, glowering at the door. “The only one here without a choice is me.”
“What do you mean?”
He snapped his gaze to mine, eyes wide as he realized what had slipped out of him.
For someone who seemed like a grade-A control freak, I imagined that didn’t happen often.
“Nothing.” Climbing off the bed, his fingers moved to the buttons on his shirt. “Now, do you want to continue, or do you want to call it quits?”
I stared up at him, trying to read behind the lines in his expression. My silence only deepened his frown.
He did up the buttons on his shirt quickly, dropping his hands to his belt and walking to the door. His hand landed on the doorknob and jarred me out of my silence.
“No, wait!”
Scrambling into a seated position, I knelt on the bed the way he had. I sat back on my heels, running my fingers through my hair as I tried to find the words I wanted to say. I threw my hands in the air when the words wouldn’t come and dropped my open palms to my thighs.
“Just wait. Please.”
Landon turned back, his eyes lingering over my posture. His nostrils flared, and he stepped toward me. “Tell me.”
I hesitated, holding back the truth and wondering if I could really go through with this. My teeth sank into my lower lip, gnawing at the tender flesh as indecision ate me up inside.
His eyes fixed on my mouth, and they darkened as he came close enough to reach out and touch me. “Tell me.”
“I need to do this.”
