Bound and Determined (15 page)

that Owen had doubts as well.

Owen wound the silk attached to Sterling's wrist around his hand and

used it to lead Sterling over to the bed. “I could do this several ways, but

there's a reason why over the knee has never gone out of fashion, and it's

certainly one of my favorite positions to give a spanking.” He held up his hand.

“And there's a lot to be said for using this, not a hairbrush or a paddle, though

for a longer session it's not practical. I'm going to spank you twenty times;

enough to leave a burn, but really just a taste. Twenty is nothing. A warm-up

lap. You're to count in your head, and if I stop and ask you the number we've

reached, I expect you to know, or I'll add another two. Any questions?”

Sterling's heart was beating overtime, and he wondered idly how many

months of his life were being burned away via sheer adrenaline. Not that he

cared.

Questions? The only question he had was, why was he still standing up

when he could be draped over Owen's lap.

“I don't—no. No questions.” Being spanked twenty times didn't sound like

enough, really, but he trusted Owen, who had sat down on the bed and was

waiting. Owen shouldn't have to wait.

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It was awkward, figuring out how to lie down as an adult across another

man's lap. The only spanking Sterling had ever participated in was the playful

kind, whacking another guy's clothed ass a couple of times. Now, with his torso

lying across Owen's thighs, he felt less sure of himself again.

The first touch of Owen's hand, smoothing over his ass, made him forget

everything but what was about to happen. His usual tension at being touched

there didn't exist; he
wanted
to be touched when it was Owen doing it, and this

wasn't being fucked, this was being spanked.

Owen put a hand palm down in the small of Sterling's back, anchoring

him, and made some small adjustments to their positions, spreading his knees

a little wider so that Sterling's dick was kissing air, unable to find anything to

rub up against. His toes dug into the thick softness of the rug by Owen's bed,

and his fingertips could touch the floor if he ever relaxed enough to spread his

fingers, currently clenched into fists.

“Ready?” Owen said and waited for Sterling to croak out a yes before

hitting him.

It was expected, and it still shocked him into a grunt of surprise, an

openmouthed gasp. Owen hadn't made that first slap light at all; his hand had

slammed down, fierce and hot, forcing pain and heat into Sterling's ass. Pain

given without anger, without disappointment…pain that melted Sterling's

defenses like ice in sunlight and left him open to Owen in a way that scared

him even as he reveled in it.

He held 'one' in his head, the number grounding him with the promise of

nineteen more just like that, and found himself arching up his hips, his legs

spreading wider, begging silently for another.

The next blow was harder, as if the first one had been a test, and Sterling

gave a little cry as the initial sting of it became a deeper burn. He had time to

think 'two' before the third slap came, about the same as the second in force

but, because his nerve endings were already flaring, more painful. He cried out

again, remembered to count 'three,' then found his mind shutting down as the

next few blows came, everything becoming about the pain and the moments in

between. His ass was on fire, his throat roughened by the sounds that were

escaping him, and his head was spinning.

“What number is that?” Owen asked gently while Sterling was still poised

for the next sharp crack of pain, waiting for it.

It took him a few seconds to get his head back together enough to answer,

and then he discovered he'd lost count. There'd been three, and then maybe

another eight after that. “Um, eleven?” he guessed.

Owen gave a dry chuckle. “I'm glad I never had to teach you math. No.

Twelve. Which means how many remaining?”

It was amazing how difficult it was to gather his thoughts together enough

to do a sum a five-year-old could have managed easily. The spanking had

shattered him, body and mind, splintered him into jagged pieces, not with each

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61

smarting, biting slap, but the struggle not to give in to the insistent clamor of

his dick, demanding to come. If he'd been aroused before he'd gone over Owen's

knee, he was beyond that now. He didn't have a reference point for how turned

on he was; he'd never, ever felt this close to climaxing for so long. Never

realized just what denial would do to him.

“Ten,” he said and wished, with a small, rebellious part of his brain, that

he'd gotten that wrong too, so Owen would add more to the tally. He wanted

more. It was torture, and he wasn't sure how long he could keep from coming,

but the pain, sweet, hot, welcome, was worth it.

And, yeah, he was curious about what a punishment from Owen would

be, and
that
edged his arousal up well into the danger zone just thinking about

it.

“Ten,” Owen repeated, his voice stern now, sending a shiver down

Sterling's spine. “Don't lose count again, Sterling. Focus, please.”

The next three landed on the same few square inches of skin and brought

tears to his eyes because that went beyond what he could handle. He

squirmed, sobbed, wetness blurring his vision, tears falling when he squeezed

his eyes shut. Two more on that same spot and then Owen mercifully moved

away, leaving that place throbbing.

That was five, which left five more. Sterling inhaled sharply with the next

slap, and when he exhaled, he was crying, really crying. He fought it, trying to

hold in the string of sobs, but he'd lost all control, and there was no way to

wall off a tide that had been gathering for years. Through the struggle, he kept

track of the blows with the one part of his brain that still seemed capable of

counting, so that when Owen paused again to ask, “What number is that,

Sterling?” he was able to say, accurately if in a broken voice, “Ni-nineteen.”

He was still crying, the salt of his tears stinging his eyes, and his cock

hurt
. Not as bad as when he'd hurt his shoulder—that had been spectacularly

painful, leaving his vision washed out with bright white and his tooth chipped

from clenching his jaw so hard. He wanted to come, he wanted to come
now
.

He'd been waiting so long, and his ass had to be bright red now.

He wasn't going to come. He wouldn't. No matter how much it hurt not to,

or how good it would feel to just let go, Sterling was stubborn, and he was not

going to let himself come.

The last three blows weren't any less painful for the fact that they were

reaching the end; Sterling breathed heavily through his open mouth, still

crying, his lips dry and his dick wet-tipped. As the sharp pain of the last strike

came, his cock gave a warning throb, and he couldn't wait to see what would

happen as a result—he scrambled off Owen's lap without permission and

clamped his hand down around the base of his dick, squeezing so hard to

prevent himself from coming that he moaned. “Sorry,” he gasped. “I'm sorry, I

had to—”

Owen didn't say anything, which was like a dash of cold water over

Sterling, killing at least some of his arousal and reducing the
now-now-now
to

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Jane Davitt & Alexa Snow

a more plaintive hope of
soon
. No praise, no blame, just Owen staring at him, a

slight frown creasing his forehead, his gray eyes narrowed. The silence

stretched, and then Owen crooked his finger and beckoned Sterling closer

again.

“Back over my knee,” he said, and there was no mistaking the fact that

Owen wasn't all that happy with him, but when Sterling, after a frantic swipe

at his wet face, obeyed, his body a scream of sensation, muscles protesting the

return to a position they'd held for so long, Owen put a cool hand, his left

hand, on what had to be scarlet skin, taking back some of the heat, and let his

right hand, the palm feeling rough and hot, caress the back of Sterling's thigh.

“I know why you did that, and I appreciate your efforts to obey me and not

come when you didn't have permission, but never break position like that

again.” Owen smiled; Sterling could hear it shape his voice. “Apart from that

lapse, and your inability to count, you were a pleasure to spank. Thank you.”

Sterling felt a smile break out across his own face even as he lifted a hand

to wipe away tears again. Part of him had been worried that there were things

he was doing wrong without realizing it—it was a relief to be told that he hadn't

screwed up
too
badly. He was trembling, his ass a constant pain and his cock a

more bearable one now that the adrenaline had died down a bit.

“Thank
you
,” he said, meaning it more than any other thanks he'd ever

given. His throat hurt, felt raw from a combination of cries and sobs, and his

nose was stuffed up, and God, he was tired. He wanted to slide off Owen's lap,

curl up on the floor, and go to sleep right there.

After a final pat to Sterling's ass, Owen took his hands away. “Lie

facedown on the bed now. You need to get yourself together and just come

down from the high.”

Moving from Owen's lap to the bed was more of a scramble than a graceful

shift of position, but Sterling was past caring. He sprawled out on a cotton

comforter washed to softness and felt the bed rock under him as Owen stood

up. “I'll be back in a moment. I'm going to get you a Coke. You need the sugar.”

Before he left, he untied the silk from Sterling's wrist and folded it into a

compact square, tucking it into Sterling's hand. Sterling clutched at it as if it'd

been Owen's hand and felt the delicate fabric catch at the work-roughened skin

on his fingers.

He felt so
good
. He didn't even care that he was still hard and had no idea

when Owen might let him come—sure, his dick ached, and it probably would

for hours, but every other part of him, even his sore ass, felt good. Relaxed, like

all the tension he carried around with him all the time, to the point where he

mostly didn't even realize it was there, had melted away, leaving his muscles

heavy and lazy, slow.

Apparently his brain was willing to melt right along with the rest of him,

because he was actually dozing when Owen came back. He wasn't sure if Owen

had said something or if his return had just changed the room somehow—

because it made sense that Owen's presence would change a room that much.

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63

“What? Sorry.” He pushed himself up onto his elbows, wincing as the tender

skin of his ass protested.

“Lie still,” Owen said chidingly. He set down a tray on the night table.

Sterling squinted at it without making much effort to see what was on it. “You

can sit up and drink some Coke in a moment. I want to take the temperature of

your backside down a few degrees.”

Even with that warning, the cold, rough washcloth that Owen draped

across his ass felt icy. Sterling whimpered in shock, goose bumps breaking out

over him. “Cold!”

“I know.” Owen blessedly didn't scrub away with the cloth, just let it leach

the heat from Sterling's well-spanked skin and then repeated the process a few

times before patting Sterling's ass dry with a towel that might have been as

fluffy as a marshmallow but right then would have made a good substitute for

sandpaper as far as Sterling was concerned.

“Some cream now,” Owen said, sounding distracted. For the first time

Sterling found himself wondering if Owen was as turned on as he was. He

hoped so; maybe fellow feeling would let Owen give him permission to jerk off.

The cream really helped, Owen's fingers spreading it quickly and carefully.

When the aftercare was over, Sterling figured that he might just be able to bear

wearing pants again—assuming he didn't have to zip them up.

“Stay on your stomach while the cream soaks in,” Owen said, “but prop

yourself up on your elbows and have a drink. Then tell me how you're feeling

and what that was like. I'm not looking for 'awesome' or 'cool'; I want to know

what worked and what didn't.”

Taking the bottle Owen handed him, Sterling drank half a dozen swallows

almost greedily, then made himself lower it because drinking too much all at

once when you were really thirsty was never a good idea. The icy liquid soothed

his throat and settled in his stomach, cold.