I look beyond him at the others, not their faces. I can’t see that high. But I bring my focus back to my husband.
He wants me to say the words. To tell him he is my lord and my god.
He can go fuck himself.
So instead of saying any words, I smile up to him, all hate in that curving of the lips, and I spit on his shoe.
Well, at the ground beside his shoe because I miss.
We both look at it. It’s not the quantity I hoped for, but the message is clear.
A moment goes by. Another. My heart thuds against my chest. Then he straightens all false calm.
“Gentlemen, if you’ll clear the room. I need a few moments with my bride.”
I shift from knee to knee, try to free myself even though I know I can’t. And as grateful as I am that they’re leaving, when that door closes and Jericho moves behind me, my heart thuds and I stare straight down at the ground, at the little bit of white silk I can see beneath me.
“That’s no way to start a marriage,” he says from behind me.
He takes hold of my hips and draws them up so my ass is in the air putting pressure on my wrists and neck locked in this damned, medieval pillory. With one flip of his hand, he tugs the dress up to my lower back, exposing my thighs and ass.
“What are you doing?” I ask, waiting. Waiting. It’s all I can do.
“I could have you taken out to the courtyard for your disrespect. Have you bound to the post. Stripped naked. Whipped.”
“Wh… What?”
His fingers slide into the waistband of my white silk panties, and he pushes them roughly down to pool at my knees.
“It would be within my rights.”
I try to turn my head to look at him but can’t move. “Jericho?”
He doesn’t speak but I hear another sound. The clank of the unbuckling of a belt. The whoosh of it being pulled through the hoops.
“No!” I try to wriggle free, to sit on my heels but he grips one hip, fingers digging in hard.
“Stay,” he commands.
“I…”
“You prefer a public whipping? Because it will be public. And I won’t be the one wielding the whip.”
“No. No, please.”
“Then stay up. Knees spread.”
I stay as he instructs and a moment later, I hear the sound of it, the belt against flesh, the unforgiving, burning sound. I squeeze my eyes shut and scream in anticipation.
Except there’s no pain.
I turn my head a little when he moves, and he does it again. The belt doubled over slapping against his own thigh.
I scream anyway. I can’t help it.
It’s silent for a moment after that and I wait. I wait for him to whip me with that belt. Tears and sweat drop from me onto the ground.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter in those moments of silence.