Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 86167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86167 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
“I don’t!” She tried to twist away from the stinging blows. “Not at all.”
He paused with a growl of derision. “So you continued coming to piano lessons with me to learn music, and not to be spanked?”
“Yes. I mean, no.”
He could point out how wet she was, but that would be uncouth. Instead he began to belabor her bottom again, while she tossed about and made more noises that had him going hard. Smack. Smack. Smack. Her arse was so round and supple, so fun to punish.
“Oh, August, please, my bottom’s on fire,” she begged. “You’re hurting me. You’re humiliating me.”
You do not know humiliation yet. He left off spanking her to squeeze her bottom, then spread her arse cheeks open with his finger and thumb. She went still, hiding her face against his leg. He imagined his innocent minx was in full blush.
“Next time you are impertinent,” he said, “I shall have a footman bring a width of ginger to push into your bottom hole, to sting you and really make you kick as you’re spanked.”
“No.” Her voice was muffled, her face still hidden. “You wouldn’t.”
“You’ll soon realize I would.” He released her spread cheeks, musing. “I must remind the gardener to double next season’s greenhouse crop.”
She wailed as he began again, spanking her in a way to keep her just at the edge between pain and true torment. He wanted her to like it—she did like it—but also not like it. He wished her to be hot and aching in more ways than one when he fucked her mere moments from now.
“Oww. Please. I can’t bear much more.” She tried to free her hands, to cover her heated arse cheeks, but he wouldn’t let her. “Fortenbury would not have been like this,” she cried. “Spankings at bedtime instead of love play…and horrid threats of ginger. He would have been more of a gentleman.”
It seemed to him she asked for more punishment, with yet more impertinence. Throwing Fortenbury in his face? What was that if not a challenge? He set her on her feet and strode to the door, to summon a footman in the hall. By the time he returned, she looked very pale, rooted to the spot where he’d left her.
“I told you, earlier today, that I would show you,” he said, working to govern his temper. “That I would show you what is between us.”
“August—”
“The two of us.” He stepped closer, gesturing between them. “You and me. No one else. Not Felicity or Fortenbury or any other interloper whose goddamned name begins with the letter F.”
Her eyes went wide at his profanity, her breath coming fast. She reached back to rub her bottom through her white gown. Her expression communicated shame and reckless outrage in one. “I did not mean what I said about Fortenbury.”
“That he would be kinder than me? More of a gentleman?”
“I know. They were silly words.”
“Ridiculous words, honestly. A gentleman does not leave a lady at the altar.”
He saw her flinch and regretted saying it. Reminding her. He did not utter the opposite truth, that a gentleman would rescue a lady left at the altar. He did not have to. She was here, now. His wife. His.
He pitched his voice to stern reproof. “We both know you would have been miserable with Fortenbury.”
“Yes. I’m sorry I said it. I was angry about the spanking.”
“Go stand in the corner for a bit, to collect yourself,” he said, pointing a finger. “That’s right, with your gown held up at your waist.” Once she turned from him, he gave up all pretense of discipline and just stared at her gorgeous, exposed arse.
Good God. He was so hard for her, so fucking hard. His cock throbbed from the submissive way she held her hands together, staring at the wall. He forced his voice to steadiness.
“While you stand there, darling, perhaps think about the future consequences of silly, impulsive words.”
He perversely hoped she would be silly and impulsive forever, so he could spank her forever. She shifted on her bare feet as silent minutes passed. Now and again, he heard a sniffle.
He was going to lose it. He had to master his darker urges. Tonight was meant to be a lesson—that she must not disrespect him, yes. That was part of the lesson. But the other part was that he wanted her and only her. Not Felicity.
He wanted her like he wanted air. He wanted to spoil her, please her. Torment her. Make her cry. As if on cue, the footman knocked at the door. August went to fetch the platter containing a knife and a healthy ginger root, shaved into a thick, flanged plug at his direction. He took up the knife and quickly worked it further, feathering the plug’s surface to release the maximum flood of juices to irritate his impertinent wife’s arsehole.