Leith (Mountain Men 1)

“Have you ever been kissed by another before me, Cairstina?”

I shake my head, holding his gaze.

“Have you ever been touched by a man?”

I hesitate.

Touched, yes. Touched like this? No.

He quickly amends his question, a fire lighting his eyes I haven’t seen before, his voice deepening, husky.

“Have you ever been with a man?”

I shake my head.

No.

He blinks, a long, pause before he opens his eyes, then swallows. I watch his Adam’s apple bob, as he wraps his arms around me and draws me closer to him.

“C’mere,” he murmurs, drawing me onto his knee. He bends his mouth to mine and brushes my lips with his. It’s the most tender I’ve ever seen him, the gentlest. His mouth at my ear, he whispers, “And what is it that I told you to do? Did I tell you to try on your new things?”

I nod.

He trails a finger down the side of my face, holding my gaze with his.

He shakes his head from side to side. “And you didn’t obey me. Didn’t I tell you you’d be punished if you disobeyed me?”

I nod, my breath hitching.

His eyes darken. “I could do anything I wanted to you.” He bends his mouth to my chin, fluttering kisses going down the length of my neck to the top of my breast. “Couldn’t I?”

I nod again, my hands flying to hold onto him for purchase when I find myself lifted bodily up in the air and planted, belly down, over his lap. He rests his hand on my backside, and gives me a little squeeze.

“How should I teach a naughty lass to obey?” he asks, patting my arse with his big, calloused palm. I’m grateful for once in my life that I can’t speak, for if I did, I wouldn’t even know what to say.

He tips me up and reaches for his waist. I could scramble away from him now, when his hands aren’t on me, but two things I know for sure.

One, he’ll catch me.

Two, I’ll always wonder what would’ve happened next.

I hear him fumbling at his waist, then there’s a clink of metal and the sound of fabric sliding. I look over my shoulder to see him wrapping his belt around his hand, leaving a wicked-looking leather tail.

“Lie still,” he raps out, a sharp command that makes me quickly obey. He taps my backside with the leather.

“I could spank you with my hand, mark you with my palm, until you felt my marks any time you sat for the next week.”

I gulp.

“I could get the tawse and tie you to my bed, then whip you until you felt every lash for days and remembered to obey at every command.”

I shiver. That sounds wicked, and yet…

“But for now, I’ll give you a warning. Something so you know that I mean what I say. That when I tell you to do something, you do as you’re told. So every time you see my belt around my waist you’ll remember. Obey.”

There’s a hiss through the air then a sting of his belt, but it’s unlike anything I’ve ever felt before. Unaccompanied by the wicked taunts and cruel words of my past, this is wildly erotic. I’m intrigued.

He’s so close to me, there isn’t much room for him to swing, so the leather thwaps against my arse with a stinging burn, but no more. Every lash, one upon the other, builds with an intensity unlike anything I’ve felt before. There’s a burning on my skin but an ache between my legs, a throbbing so intense I feel I’ll die if I don’t find relief of some kind.

If I could speak I’d plead with him, but I don’t know what I’d ask for. To stop the punishment, to put his belt down?

No. I crave more of this measured, deliberate, erotic pain.

I’d beg him to touch me. To give me more of this beautiful, wicked pain. To give me a chance to please him. To let me show him I wasn’t a spy or someone he couldn’t trust.

My mind is a jumbled blend of thoughts and hopes and fears and needs but most of all, heated, throbbing desire.

“Will you behave yourself, lass?”

I hesitate, because I don’t want this to stop. The worst he could do right now is stop or reject me, so I don’t want to tell him I’ll behave.

He growls and taps my upper thigh with the leather.

“Will you?”

I shake my head no, and he responds with a wicked lash, much harder than the first ones. I open my mouth in a silent scream when he lashes me again, two more times in rapid succession, the cuts of his leather so painful I’m nodding my head like a madwoman. Yes, yes, yes, I’ll fucking obey.

“Will you, then?”

I nod, bringing blessed relief as he lays down his belt beside him and rubs his palm on me to ease the sting.