Unraveled by Her (15 page)

“Feeling the effects of last night, sweetheart?” Robert says, and raises an eyebrow.

At that same moment, the plane hits a small air pocket and the resultant jolt makes me yell out in agony, but when I’ve recovered, I nod.

“Really hurts?” he says.

I nod again.

“Good,” is his only reaction, and it makes me almost as hot as my bruised and blistered ass is at the moment.

“A movie to take your mind off your discomfort, darling?” he says.

“Anything, Robert, anything.”

He presses a button, and the cabin wall in front of us morphs into a movie screen.

And together, we watch
Secretary.

During the scene when the heroine, Lee, bends over the desk and takes a spanking from her boss, I flinch in sympathy.

Until Robert whispers to me, “The punishment I gave you last night was three times harder . . .” and I feel a flash of pride and pleasure.

Once the movie is over, he pulls me into the bedroom and onto the heart-shaped bed with the mirrors on the ceiling.

He tears his shirt off, rips my dress off, and looms over me, his eyes glowing.

“Undress me,” he orders.

I hadn’t noticed till now that he’s wearing the belt I bought for him during our department store spree, and when I undo it, my fingers tremble.

Is he going to use it on my bruised, blistered ass?

Part of me hopes that he will.

Part of me hopes that he won’t.

Either way, it’s his call.

I revel in his power over me.

Besides, I have no choice.

This is the first time he’s ever allowed me to undress him, and I love how hard the muscles of his chest are, and how his taut biceps are so brown in contrast to his white shirt. And that when I take off his trousers, and he is stark naked, and his cock is iron hard, I have stripped him of his civilized veneer and only the magnificent animal male is on display.

He grips me by the forearms so hard that I know I’ll have bruises there tomorrow.

But I don’t care.

The bruises on my ass, though, are another matter.

My ass feels ablaze with welts and bruises, and I don’t know if it can take any more punishment. But I’m not about to admit that to Robert.

In one way, I’m longing for him to put me on my knees and fuck me from behind, my favorite position. But I know that if he does, he is bound to slap my ass as well. Hard. And that I’ll find it extremely difficult to bear.

I can feel my pupils dilating at the prospect.

Without a word, he lifts me up effortlessly and places me on the bed, on my back.

And fucks me that way, in the missionary position, like any conventional lover might fuck his wife or girlfriend.

But with one difference.

As he fucks me so hard and so fast that I grow hoarse from screaming with pleasure, he grinds my sore ass into the bed, and with each thrust makes it sorer and sorer.

The combination of pleasure and pain intoxicates me.

Afterward, when we’re showered and back in our armchairs again, he catches me squirming in my seat.

“Normally a punishable offense, Miranda,” he says.

“I’m sorry, Master.”

“You should be. Apart from anything else, you are making a big deal about absolutely nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“I could make it hurt much, much worse,” he says, and I get wet again.

“More punishment, Robert?”

He shakes his head.

“Not the kind you are thinking of,” he says.

I stare at him with bated breath.

“Imagine spending the next ten hours of the flight forced to wear rubber panties under your dress, the inside of which I’ve spread with a liberal amount of Tiger Balm. After a short while, the pressure inside the panties would build and build, and it would feel as if you were sitting in a vat of boiling water. Not just for a moment, but for hours and hours,” he says, and I go white with fear and sexual arousal.

He gives me a sidelong glance, kisses me passionately, and presses a buzzer, and one of the butlers serves us supper.

Before I expect it, we land at JFK.

I’m happy to be coming home to Hartwell Castle and to start my life there with Robert, but the moment we set foot on New York ground, my first thought is of her, and I feel nauseous.

My nausea increases when I remember that I’ll soon be confronted by the sight of Hartwell Lake and the ruins of Hartwell Island, so at first I don’t notice that instead of leaving the airport, Robert is guiding me toward the heliport.

So that rather than traveling to Hartwell Castle in a limo, and driving up the driveway, from where Hartwell Lake and Hartwell Island will both be in full view, he flies us there himself by helicopter, approaches the castle from the side opposite the lake, and lands the helicopter in the castle forecourt with the expertise of a professional pilot.

Consequently, just as he intended, I am not immediately faced with the view of Hartwell Lake, the island, and the ruins of the mausoleum.

But kind and thoughtful though his gesture is, there is no way he can erase the horrific memories from my mind. And not the guilt. Definitely not the guilt.

Chapter Thirteen

Back at the castle, we have drinks by the roaring fire in the library. I’m feeling drowsy from the long flight (and afterward, when I replay the conversation in my mind, I wonder whether that’s why Robert picked this moment to have it) when he leans close to my face as if he were committing it to memory.

Then he takes my hands in his and holds them tight.

“I didn’t want to ask you this till more time had passed since your ordeal, my darling, but I’m tormented by not knowing what really happened to you during those terrible three days in the mausoleum . . .”

I’m cornered, captured, on the rack with no hope of a reprieve.

I look down at my engagement ring—I’ve chosen the pink diamond for tonight—as if I’ll find inspiration or salvation in it.

But there isn’t any.

So do I tell him the truth at last?

But how can I, after keeping my silence for so long?

And if I do tell him, how will he ever forgive me for my deception?

I take a deep breath. “What exactly do you want to know?” I say.

He gets up, pours himself a brandy, offers me one, and because my heart is thumping as if it will burst, because I need something, anything to calm me down before the sky falls down on me, I take it.

“But if it’s still too painful for you to remember, sweetheart, let’s just forget it. Only, when you were in hospital and delirious . . .”

Delirious! I was delirious! Did I give it away? Does he know already?

“I don’t remember,” I say truthfully.

“Then let’s not talk about it anymore,” he says.

Better to regret discovering the worst about something than not discovering it at all

“Please, Robert, tell me what I said. A lot of what happened to me is still a blur, so maybe you telling me will help me remember.”

“Would you like me to hypnotize you? That might bring everything back,” he offers, and my stomach turns over.

I shake my head.

“If you tell me, I might remember,” I say.

“Nothing definitive, darling, just ravings about Tammy, Mrs. Hatch, her poodle, and then Georgiana, always Georgiana. Clearly she dominated your thoughts because you were imprisoned in the mausoleum alongside her casket,” he says.

I nod, transfixed by horror.

“But you never have to think about her or the mausoleum again, as the mausoleum is now burned to the ground, and not even a trace of her DNA exists anywhere.”

He is silent for a terrible moment.

“Given her past, and her true and evil nature, did Tamara . . .” He hesitates, “Did she do anything to you?” he says.

“She was hardly ever there,” is all I can think of saying.

“Probably spent most of her time at Le Château, instead. A real cash cow, even after Murray left it to her,” he says thoughtfully.

I take a big gulp of brandy.

“We need to put all this behind us, my darling,” he says. “Tamara was obsessed with Georgiana, became riddled with jealousy of you and me, and was obviously planning to kill you. But she’s dead and you are completely safe now. Soon the kidnapping will just be a distant memory, like an old nightmare you’ve long forgotten. I promise.” He gives me a smile so warm and loving that my heart almost splinters with guilt.

We sleep the night in each other’s arms, but although he kisses me, he makes no attempt to have sex with me, and throughout the night and into the morning treats me as if I were a piece of priceless Ming china.

I understand exactly why he is being so kind, but if he carries on being a vanilla gentleman for longer, I think I’ll go crazy. As far as I’m concerned, the only thing that will erase the specter of Georgiana from my mind is to escape into another world, to our secret world where dominance and submission, eroticism and sexual pleasure are paramount and next to that everything else is rendered meaningless.