The Maiden (The Cloister Trilogy 1)

“Listen to her,” the Spinner instructs.

Soon, the Maiden is panting, her head lolling back. I go a little easier, then give her a series of full-force strikes. Her cry isn’t the wail of pain. It’s something deeper and just as raw. Desire.

“You have her.” The Spinner takes the flogger from me. “This is where you want your secretly submissive males to dwell.” She pops her once more, and the girl moans. “Hear that? Ecstasy. There’s a plateau in pain where the most profound pleasure lives. Here, when your subject is pliant, you can get information, plant ideas, and reinforce the love and bounty that flows only from the Prophet. Do you understand?” She reaches around the Maiden, her hand disappearing as the Maiden begins to shake, her breathing growing harder. The Spinner’s arm moves in rhythmic strokes until the Maiden cries out, her pleasure rising and bursting in a crescendo of sparks.

The Spinner removes her hand and wipes her fingers on her skirt. “And that concludes the lesson for today.”

Chapter 13

Adam

“This isn’t what we agreed on.” I stare at the man sitting across from me, a pile of cash in a black garbage bag on the dingy desk between us. We’re in the basement of a decrepit warehouse near the railroad tracks in downtown Birmingham. No man’s land.

“That’s all we got. That’s it.” Ratty G shrugs.

I have no idea what his real name is. I don’t care. All I care about is that he’s short on the money for the heroin we’ve been providing to him and his dealers. It won’t stand. Two of his associates guard the door at his back, their eyes cold, the gunmetal glinting from their hips even colder.

“I have to say I’m disappointed.” I lean back in my creaky metal chair.

His men twitch.

Ratty G twirls one of his dreads and shrugs. “Way I see it, this is the start of a new deal. New terms. Go on back and tell your cult daddy that we want a ten percent cut in prices. We deal everything you send, always. You don’t got no one else who can guarantee movement like that.”

In fact, I have two other dealers who move twice as much product as he does. Ratty G is expendable. I toy with telling him that fact to see if he reconsiders. I opt for choice number two.

I address the beefiest guard by the door. “Currently, Ratty G gets a three and a half percent cut of everything he sells for us. He has a problem with paying what he owes on time. I am willing to pay one of you four percent to do Ratty G’s job, and you can keep that job as long as you pay what is owed on ti—”

Ratty G’s eyes widen. “Whoa, man. That’s not—”

His brains are splattered all over the garbage bag and the desk before he can finish his protest.

“I’ll take that job.” The beefy killer looks at his partner who hasn’t moved. “Be my right hand man?”

He nods.

I pull a handkerchief from my pocket and wipe a splatter of blood from my forehead, then rise to leave. “Pleasure doing business with you, gentlemen.” Hefting the gory money bag over my shoulder, I climb the stairs, get in my car, and head to my next collection stop.

When I enter Delilah’s room, I’m surprised to find her naked and on her knees beside her bed. I’m even more surprised at the disappointment that wells within me. Broken so soon?

I sit on her bed, my body groaning with relief. The ache in my back subsides as I settle before her. It had been a long day of dirt, and I’d been looking forward to the reward of my squeaky clean lamb. She doesn’t disappoint.

“Look at me.”

She lifts her chin, those otherworldly gray eyes meeting mine.

“Why so obedient today?”

Her face stays impassive. “I want to please you.”

“Oh?” I smile. Playing with my food always lifts my spirits. “How best do you think you can please me?”

“By being obedient to the Prophet.”

I narrow my eyes. “You mean to me.”

She drops her gaze for a split second, then meets mine again. “To you, as a representative of the Prophet.”

She’s not broken at all. Just toying with me again. My cock begins to express its interest, coming to life as I stare down at her. Plump lips, rosy cheeks, pert breasts. Fuck, how can a man be expected to concentrate? It has never been a problem before.

“Foolish little lamb.” I stroke her cheek with my thumb. “You are still lost, wandering around in the pasture, ignoring the wolves all around you.”

She pinches her lips together, likely to stifle a sassy comeback. I want her to let it out.

“Stand up.”

She rises, her pale skin almost shimmering. Her neck is still bruised from that idiot Newell.

I pull her hand toward me and move aside a bandage on her wrist. “What’s this?”