She used her free hand to push the waistband of her trousers downwards, bringing her bottom, cooled now but still tender, out into the frigid air of the punishment chamber.
“Use the whip, Sir,” she suggested feverishly. “I need it. I need to feel your dominance over me, or I’ll never learn, will I, Sir? Teach me the lesson. Make it a hard one, one I’ll never forget.” She rubbed her hand over the receding welts, pinching her flesh, moving in to press against the imprisoned erection.
Paul’s hand smacked down hard on the rudely-exposed backside, and Suka’s cry was only partly of pain. Jubilation fizzed through her. He could not resist this opportunity. She had bought time, time to convince him this was no momentary aberration but a shared emotional experience on which they could build a happy partnership.
“You’ll get it,” snarled Paul. “Believe me. You won’t forget this for a long time.” He pulled her roughly forward, taking her on a tour of the well-equipped suite. “The only question is, where shall I start?”
Suka’s beady eyes worked hard at taking it all in. There were hooks and chains hanging from the ceiling with adjustable pulleys. There was a large wooden cross on a platform. There were medical gurneys with arrangements of straps. As they advanced through the room, Suka began to have misgivings. Some of these items were proper, fully-fledged torture devices. She screwed up her eyes and clamped her legs instinctively, praying she had not let herself in for anything too physically gruelling.
Paul stopped in front of a horrifying-looking bed of nails.
“What do you deserve, Suka?”
She squeaked, trembling, wanting at once to hide in his arms, and run away. Which was the best option?
He took pity, patting her shoulder.
“I’m not a true sadist,” he told her, and she let the balloon of air that had been constricting her chest out again. “I don’t like hurting people who aren’t enjoying it. But this is my quandary, Suka. I want to punish you. But I don’t want you to enjoy every moment. I want to test you, stretch
you, take you to a limit. What’s your limit?”
“I don’t know,” admitted Suka, her voice uneven. “Never been there.”
“We’ll find it,” promised Paul. “And it will be painful. Don’t think it won’t. You need to feel it. But when you’re sure you can’t take any more, you must tell me. Say the word ‘surrender’ and I’ll stop. And you can go back to the ship, alone.”
Suka pouted. He was still talking about making her return.
“What if I never surrender?”
Paul sighed pleasurably. “If you never surrender…I’ll have to rethink, won’t I? I have my limits too. I couldn’t damage you, couldn’t draw blood. I wonder whose boundary will be reached first?”
Suka felt there was nothing in the whole wide universe she wanted to find out more.
Chapter Four
“Strip,” said Commander Paul suddenly, and Suka froze for a moment, gathering her wits and her nerve, before leaning down to remove her left boot. She was going to view this as a test. A test of obedience, a test of endurance, a test of courage. And if she passed it, she told herself her prize would be Commander Paul as her master, in her personal life as well as the professional sphere.
Standing barefoot on the cold smooth floor, she finished the job of lowering and removing her trousers until only her top half was clothed. She wondered, with a hot flash of embarrassment, if Paul could see the dried crust of his own semen clinging to her inner thighs, but she banished the thought by lifting her crew jersey over her head, pulling stray blonde curls from the severe plait.
Now naked, Suka could not help hugging herself under her ribcage, shivering in the frigid air. Luckily, the wall lights seemed also to generate heat. A bearable temperature would take a little while to establish itself, but it was on the way.
For now, though, Suka’s nipples stood out like hard pink pearls, painfully tight and still slightly raw from Paul’s earlier treatment. She was not sure what to do with her eyes—if she looked at him, was that too bold? But she didn’t want him to think she was scared of him, even though she was, a little. She settled for tilting her head down and regarding him from beneath lowered lashes. He seemed to approve, feet planted wide, arms folded across his chest, letting his eyes travel from her toes to the crown of her tousled head.
“What shall we do with Suka?” he asked the shadowed walls, looking around him. “What does she deserve?”
He found a large storage chest and opened it up, exclaiming delightedly at its contents. Suka watched him retrieve a glossy black thing and hold it up.
“She needs to be dressed and prepared for punishment,” said Paul. “Lift your arms.”
Suka obediently raised her arms above her head and allowed him to wrap the item around her middle torso. It was a cupless corset-type affair, strictly boned, cinching in her waist and supporting her breasts, which stood pertly above the shiny fabric. Paul drew the back-lacing as tight as he could without making her squeal, restricting her so she had to breathe with care. He put his hands on her hips and traced their outline, apparently pleased with the way the garment made her bottom swell underneath its rigid busk.
“You should wear one of these all the time,” he said conversationally. “It would keep you in check, I think. Now, next…”
He returned to the chest, and this time he bore a wide collar of a dark, leather-like material, which he buckled around her neck, forcing Suka to keep her chin up. The final item made Paul laugh as he rummaged in the box of tormenting treasure.
“Good old-fashioned high heels,” he said, drawing out a pair of dangerous-looking pumps. “You know, all sorts of women used to wear these all the time, even on Earth.”
“I know,” said Suka, having to exercise her chin muscles to get the words out over the top of the collar.