Page 28 of After Dark
Josette sucked in a breath, instinctively adjusting the way she was kneeling to make sure her posture was perfect.
“Eyes down,” Arlo ordered her. “Remain still.”
She heard him walk away, and it was as if every single cell in her body was focused on him, on his every movement. She could hear his shoes against the floor and could track him as he disappeared into the back of the apartment, then returned. Though she couldn’t sneak a glance in the windows that sometimes reflected him, because it wasn’t fully dark yet.
She was facing the wrong way, so she had to wait.
Probably an opportunity to work on her obedience, she thought, though she still had all of those jangly, angry feelings tangled around inside.
“Rise,” he said from behind her.
Josette did as he told her, grateful that she was supple enough to do it gracefully. Because she knew perfectly well that he liked watching her move.
Not that his tone of voice suggested thatgracewould help her now.
“Come to me, please,” he said.
Josette turned to find him standing in the space between the two sofas, and as she walked toward him, she noticed that he’d placed something on the ottoman.
Something she recognized.
Something shehated.
She couldn’t manage to keep her eyes from returning toit again and again, and Arlo made a low noise. “Ah, yes. Your favorite. You can thank me in advance for remembering just how much you always hated it.”
“Thank you, sir,” she managed to grit out, though her jaw felt like it might lock up at any moment, and her eyes were bright with fury and fear and memories of things that she knew were about to occur all over again.
“We may have to revisit your tone after this,” he said. A warning.
Josette bit her own tongue so the sharp pain would remind her to get a hold of herself. She walked until she was standing in front of him, completely naked, while he still wore that suit that made him seem even more lethal and inaccessible than usual.
“We’re not going to go down the list, you and me,” he told her. “There’s no paddle in the world that’s going to make up for the breach of trust between us.”
She didn’t think she made a noise, but she must have. Because he paused, then tilted his head in that dangerous manner that was wired directly into her pussy. “You disagree?”
Josette didn’t know if she did or didn’t, but this wasn’t the time to question him. And she suddenly remembered how peaceful she’d felt in the hall. Sitting there, communing with the terms of her surrender. But then, it was easy to do that when nothing was being asked of her, wasn’t it? It was easy to surrender to theideaof him. Standing here, fury and indignance warring inside of her, words pushing against her tongue, and that horrible fucking paddle waiting for her on the ottoman, well.
This was something else entirely. She fuckinghatedthis.
It made her wonder if she was the selfish girl Frederick had accused her of being after all.
“No,” she made herself say, and much more nicely than she felt. “Sir.”
“Excellent.”
Arlo reached down and picked up the paddle. It was made of a remarkably stiff leather, and it was studded.
It sucked.
“You’ll take twenty strikes from this paddle every night,” he told her. “In case you’re hoping for a reprieve in the form of business trips for me, I’m afraid that I’ve cleared my schedule for the foreseeable future. After all, no point being the boss if you can’t delegate.” His gaze met hers and held. “Twenty strokes, every night.”
He tested the paddle against his hand, and she knew that his eyes caught the way she flinched. He must have been feeling benevolent than he looked tonight, because he didn’t point it out to her. He didn’t use it as an opportunity to make all of this worse, though he could have.
Arlo continued in the same steady, inevitable voice. “Of course, there may be nights that I feel you deserve more. You will thank me on those evenings. You will kiss the paddle before and after each session. And then, far worse for you, will sit here with me and tell me how youfeel. Do you understand me?”
Josette wanted to scream. She wanted to haul off and sock him in his face. She wanted to jump out of the window behind him, then swim her way back to North Carolina.
Instead, she nodded. Then forced herself to speak.
