My begging is weak, feeble. I know it, and he knows it. The smooth leather brushes my clit. I flinch.
“No flinching,” he says.
“Sorry, Sir.” My voice tremors with fear and anticipation. He slides the leather over my clit, down my left inner thigh and back up again. He repeats the movement on the other side, this time peppering my flesh with tiny little taps that sting, but don’t actually do any real damage. I still flinch with every one.
“I told you no flinching, Pet. You get two more.”
“No! I’m sorry, Sir.”
“Three more. Keep telling me no, and I’ll make it five,” Ares snaps.
He’s like some cruel and vengeful god. I tremble before him. The crop lands hard on my pussy. The pain is excruciating, a searing, burning heat like I’ve never felt. My insides contract. The Satan’s Fork hums. I scream because it’s all too much. I can’t take it anymore. With rapid speed I didn’t know he possessed, Sir strikes twice more in quick succession, and then it’s all over. The beating, anyway. The vibrations on the fork only intensify when he picks up the vibrator and holds it against the metal prongs. Without warning, my orgasm slams into me. The rope seems to tighten, digging into my flesh as my body jerks and writhes. I ride out my pleasure with his crop rubbing my sensitive clit, and the vibrations forcing my pussy to clench and cream all over his crop.
“What do you say, Pet?”
“Th-thank you, Sir.” I can barely form the words.
I tremble. From head to toe I quiver as he removes the implement from my body and slowly begins untying me.
Ares pulls me into his lap and unravels the silken cord from around my legs. One at a time he frees them, his hands massaging my flesh to help the blood to flow. I’m vaguely aware of the pain this causes, but I’m so high on endorphins right now I don’t have the ability to process anything other than his soothing words in my ear. “Such a good little Pet. I know that must have hurt a great deal, but you’re so strong and brave. So fucking perfect.”
He gently pushes me forward and unfastens the rope at my back. My arms hurt more than my legs did, and I actually cry out when the pins and needles set into my heavy limbs.
Ares’ deft hands rub and knead my abused muscles. He lets me lean against his chest, his hard cock pressing into the small of my back. He doesn’t rock his hips or force me to touch him. It’s such a small thing, but it makes me smile because this is just one of the rare moments in which I truly feel treasured by him. I love the closeness that comes with his aftercare, and I have to wonder if it’s not a big part of why I’ve fallen hard and fast for him, because he can be a tyrant—that much has been clear from day one—but he’s also capable of such tenderness.
He slides his hands over my body, caressing every inch. Not in a sexual way, it’s more intimate than that, sensual, and full to bursting with adoration, just like my heart. I’m going to have to cut it free from my chest, leave it skewered and bleeding in my cell for him to find. I’ll have to learn to live without it when I run, because I can no longer live with it if it means living like this.
***
Sir dresses me likethe other slaves, in a strappy harness that covers more of my body than a swimsuit might—if that swimsuit had cutouts that exposed my breasts, ass, and pussy to the world. All the important bits are not covered, not by a long shot, but I suppose that’s the point. He wants me accessible to him at all times, in all ways.
He makes me wear the mask again when we do finally emerge from the room and head downstairs. I feel uneasy. Will I be recognized without it? Do I want to be? I don’t even know who I am. Can you really miss a life that you don’t remember? All I’ve known since waking up in my cell is my Sir. I remember flashes but never faces, never anyone whom I loved or who may have loved me. None of my memories are clear. They’re skewed by the fog of forgetfulness, by this amnesia. I remember the pain when I woke up in that cell, the fear, the bruises on my body, but how I was taken, where I was taken from has never returned to me.I need to know. Surely, I deserve this one thing from him?
I tear my gaze from the finely dressed Dominants and their naked slaves as we descend the stairs and turn to Ares. He seems lighter today, freer, if that is possible. I wonder what it feels like to truly be free. I have half a mind to ask him, but I don’t because I’m not sure I truly want to know the answer when freedom is something I will never possess again. “Where did you take me?”
“What?”
“Where did you kidnap me?”
He yanks my collar and ushers me to the side of the staircase, pushing me up against the wall. Angry eyes bore down into mine. “You are never to ask me that, and you’re not to ask me somewhere so fucking public. Do you understand me?”
“Isn’t that what all of these men do? Kidnap their slaves? I doubt anyone enters into this life willingly.”
“You don’t know anything, Pet. Yes, most of the slaves here have been acquired through abduction. I’ve trained at least six of the slaves in this room, and countless more for these men.”
My eyes widen. “Where are they?”
“Who?”
“Where are the rest of the slaves you’ve trained?”
“Enough questions,” he says and steps back. “I doubt your ass is ready for another beating.”
I clench my cheeks together involuntarily. “You always say enough, but you never give me any answers.”
“It’s not my job to give you answers, Pet,” he says through his teeth. “It’s my job to make you the best submissive you can be.”
“Your job? Will you . . . will you sell me too? Like the others?” The words tumble out of my mouth before I can stop them. His gaze darts from mine to the wall above my head and he releases an impatient breath. “Is that why you took me? Is that why you brought me here, displayed me in front of those men yesterday?”