Page 15 of Bet On Me, Daddy

“Ah, I see. Well, it is a public punishment, little girl. And Braden has always had a flair for the dramatic.”

On the raised wooden platform in front of them stood a set of stocks. Seated atop a thick column was a piece of split wood with three distinct holes. One for the head, two for the wrists. Just like in the olden days, the offender would be forced to bend at the waist as they were locked into the device.

It was Braden’s favorite piece of equipment to use when he was punishing his own naughty little girl, and if Lottie’s feelings about the stocks were anything like Ruby’s, Beckett could understand why.

Not even bothering to hold back his grin, Beckett nudged Ruby forward. “Up you go, naughty girl.”

She didn’t argue, which was a good thing for her. Maybe she was reconsidering her plan to try and scare him off with her bratty ways.

“Take all of your clothes off, including your shoes and any undergarments. Fold them and place them neatly beside that black duffel back at the edge of the stage.”

Ruby’s eyes narrowed slightly, and he swore he could hear the wheels turning in her mind as she tried to find some way to twist the directions he’d given her. But as he’d learned very early on, the first rule in dealing with brats was to be as specific as possible when giving them an order.

With a quiet huff, she turned her back to him. “Untie me?”

Even though his fingers were actually itching to touch her, he forced himself to wait. “What’s the magic word?”

“Abracadabra.”

Without bothering to answer her, he turned and crossed the platform to his play bag, where he knelt and pulled what he needed from the front pocket where he always kept it. Stopwatch in hand, he returned to her side and held it up for her to see as he hit the button to start the timer. “I will stop the timer once you are locked into those stocks and ready to begin your punishment. For every minute we delay getting you into the stocks, I will add something new to your punishment. Now, Ruby, what is the magic word you use when you are asking someone to do something for you?”

Eyes locked on the rapidly increasing numbers, Ruby nibbled at her bottom lip. “What are you going to add?”

“For starters, I own a very special set of nipple clamps. Minute one, the clamps go on. Minute two, I add a weighted magnet to one of the clamps. There are five magnets in total for each clamp, so you have about ten minutes before I have to getreallymean.”

Ruby

Well,this was a conundrum. She loved nipple clamps, but she’d never played with weighted ones before. And was tonight really the night she wanted to fuck around and find out if she hated them as much as her brain was telling her she would?

Maybe a little.

Cocking an eyebrow, she shifted her gaze from the stopwatch to Beckett’s face. “Look, Bex, you’re the one who wants me naked. So, really, I’m asking you to do yourself a favor here.”

Irritation flickered in his gaze for just a moment before he managed to shut it down. Was it because of the nickname or her snarky comment? Either way, she’d gotten under his skin, and that was a point for her.

“Clock is ticking, little girl,” he said, his voice dropping to a low growl. “But don’t hurry on my account. The longer you delay, the more I get to hurt you. This is a win-win situation as far as I’m concerned.”

Fuck. He had a point. Where some Doms would go right to delivering pain to try and force her submission, he was obviously more than willing to wait her out. And the longer she waited,the worse it got for her. So her choices were between giving him the satisfaction of winning her obedience, or letting her punishments stack up higher and higher while they waited.

Because it wasn’t a matter ofifshe would submit, butwhen. And since she already knew she would eventually give in, dragging it out would only make it worse for her in the end.

His win-win was her lose-lose.

The watch in his hand clicked over to the one-minute mark and her heart, which was already beating harder than usual, slammed against her rib cage.

“We’ve gotten to the clamps. I hope you enjoy pain as much as you enjoy being a brat, Ruby Red.”

She did enjoy pain. What she didn’t enjoy was the unknown. And while she was familiar with clamps, the weights were definitely an unknown to her. “Will you please untie me?”

“Of course. As soon as you address me properly.”

Goddammit. “Will you please untie me, Sir?”

“There we go. I knew there was a good girl hiding in there somewhere.”

Before she could think of something snarky to say, the tips of his fingers brushed over her skin, just above her corset. Electricity shot through her, straight to her already aching clit as he tugged at the laces, slowly exposing her back to him.

“You’re going to break so beautifully for me, Ruby Red,” he murmured, his words wrapping around her like a caress. “You can fight me all you want, but one way or another, you will break. You just get to choose when. And I suggest you choose very, very carefully, little girl.”

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