Page 32 of Irish Brute
But Braiden spanks like he does everything else, with calm determination and an absolute certainty that he is right. He knows when to plant a hand on the small of my back, giving me a chance to catch my breath. He knows when to return to flesh he’s already made raw. He knows when my trembling legs are begging for more, when my whispered, “no, please, no more,” really means I’m braced for another blow.
And he knows when I’m stretched as far as I can stand, when one more swat will topple me over the cliff from throbbing, burning pleasure into unforgivable pain.
My sides heave like I’ve run a marathon. My calves ache with the effort to stand still. My chest collapses against my desk, and I turn my head to the side, gulping, gasping, begging for air.
Braiden palms my ass, his hand feather-light against my burning flesh. I mew, because I can’t take any more pressure, because I want it, because I need him.
He shifts closer, stroking the lips of my pussy. “You’re so wet,” he breathes.
I groan as he presses one knuckle against my swollen clit. I rock against him, needing more.
“You’re mine,” he says. “This soaking cunt is mine.” He stiffens two fingers and plunges them deep inside me, hard and fast.
I panic.
My throat works, but I don’t remember the word, the single syllable that will save me. My eyes squeeze shut. My mouth stretches open. And I wait for the terrible, horrible explosion that I know will end my world.
13
BRAIDEN
She didn’t use her safeword the entire time I spanked her. I waited for it, knowing I could stop myself mid-stroke. I’m the master of control.
I measured out exactly how much she could handle. I knew, even if she didn’t.
If she chose to stop short, I’d have let her. Maybe I’d lose some respect for her strength, but I would always honor her choice.
But she isn’tchoosingto shut down now. She isn’t here at all. Her body is collapsed against the desk. Her face is turned to the side, tiny panting breaths leaving clouds on the glass. Her eyes are squeezed shut, like she’s praying to be spared, but she can’t manage a word, not a single syllable, not evenred.
The scar near her hair stands out like a brand.
Russo. Fucking Antonio Russo.
Samantha heard her cousin being raped in the worst possible way. How many times in the past week has she replayed that phone call in her head?
Russo just hurt Samantha—took her pleasure, took her release, as surely as if he touched her with his greasy, greedy hand. And for that, he deserves to die.
I ease my fingers out of Samantha’s tight, wet cunt. Heat rises from her arse, from crimson flesh that I know will darken during the night as bruising sets in.
Russo broke her, but I’m the one who crossed the wiring in her brain. I showed her the knife-edge between pleasure and pain, and she loved it—her soaked pussy can’t lie.
But now she’s lost the line between thrill and threat. Every nerve in her body is shouting that she’s about to die.
So I lean close, taking care not to touch her. I whisper in her ear. I tell her that her body is lying. “You’re safe,” I say. “You’re fine.” And then the thing I should have promised from the start, before I made her beg, before I delivered a moment of punishment: “I’m not him.”
I’m grateful when she starts to whimper. She’s back in her head. Back in the real world, not the nightmare Russo made for her.
Now that her muscles are no longer locked with fight-or-flight adrenaline, I can ease her into my arms. There isn’t a sofa in this room, there are no good chairs, so I take her to a corner instead. I brace my back against the walls, and I pull her onto my lap, helping her spoon against me to ease the pain on her bruised arse.
She smells like my soap and my shampoo, and I realize she must have showered after I left this morning, after her long night alone in the safe room. But more than that, she smells like sex, a brine that stiffens my cock no matter how much I send the message that the dodger can just go begging.
I’ve been hard since she dropped to her knees.
It made me drunk, listening to her beg. Knowing she was yielding that control, that she accepted my authority, that I can keep her safe.
I saw the exact moment she broke. One second, she knelt there, weighing all her options, the attorney who faces down tax authorities, who keeps the freeport running night and day. The next second, she offered all that up. She gave it over to me.
She accepted that she doesn’t always have to manage the entire feckin’ world around her.
