Page 36 of Hurts So Good

“Excuse me?” she’d said even as a dark thrill pulsed through her.

Lyles had made a slight gesture with his chin towards the screen on which her slide presentation was projected. “I can’t see that. The lights. Lower them.”

Helen had walked to the light switch on the wall, feeling intensely aware of her body; the pivoting of her hips under her slim skirt, the whisper of her stockings as her thighs crisscrossed, the rise and fall of her breasts as she breathed.

She’d lowered the lights and then looked over at Lyles, who had inclined his head in approval. But his handsome features were otherwise aloof. For the next half hour, as she had gone over her presentation, he had sat unmoving, his long fingers steepled before his dimpled chin, his sea-green eyes gleaming in the low lights of the room.

When she had finished, he’d asked no questions, voiced no concerns, raised no issues. He had only thanked her for the presentation and had taken her business card when she offered it to him. Then, today, had come the news that he had chosen another firm to design his house.

Now there was this. A blatant invitation to come to his luxury apartment and allow him to indulge her most secret fantasy. Helen looked at the photo, and her cunt moistened as she imagined some proper, straitlaced Victorian vigorously spanking her ass for some minor transgression on her part.

Then she imagined Everett Lyles doing the punishing.

She shook her head to clear her thoughts and focused back on the clothes. How did he know she would even wear such things? Somehow she suspected there were other things about her that he knew. Just from looking at her. Watching her. Listening to her.

She picked up the note and read it again.

7:45 p.m. This Friday.

She put the note down and picked up the blouse. She looked at the label, not surprised to see the shirt was exactly her size.

Helen stood in front of the door to Lyles’ apartment. She was nervous, but she had come this far. There was no sense in backing out now.

She took a deep breath and knocked.

Lyles opened the door and gestured for her to enter. She did so, her heels clicking on the hardwood floor of the foyer.

“Come,” he said. “I have something to show you.”

Helen followed him to the wall nearest to the large windows. Outside was a spectacular view of the city’s skyline. He stopped in front of a built-in cabinet and pulled open a huge drawer. Inside, carefully stored, was a collection of assorted spanking paraphernalia: paddles, whips, belts, rods, canes. A miscellany of instruments to be used for both pain and pleasure.

Lyles picked up a strap of leather, the end of which was split into two tails. “This is called a tawse. It’s from Scotland and was originally used to discipline students in school.” He turned it over in his hands. “This is a Lochgelly Taswe.”

“Lochgelly?”

“Yes. This one’s a medium weight one. I have others in London. I’ll have them sent over when my home is completed.”

Helen frowned. “Why didn’t you choose our firm? Was it something I said or did? Or didn’t do?”

“What do you think?”

She shrugged.

Lyles ran the straps of the tawse through his long, elegant fingers. “You blame yourself?”

Helen thought about it. The firm’s president had not been subtle in letting her know that he considered it some flaw on her part that had kept her from nailing what would have been a very big client.

“Well?” Lyles prompted. There was a tinge of impatience in his voice.

“Yes, I failed.”

“And were you punished?”

She gave him a sharp look. “Punished?”

His green eyes gazed deeply into hers. “Chastised for your failure. Disciplined for your malfeasance.”

“My boss was not happy.”

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