Cat and Mouse (16 page)

Katrina pushed away from the door and climbed atop her bed. Every negative scenario that her mind invented seemed completely logical. He was human, after all. She leaned against the stack of pillows at her back and folded her arms across her chest. It would serve her right—she’d been too happy lately, too spoilt. She wasn’t worthy of continuous bliss like this. No one was.

A soft knock startled her. “Yes?”

The door opened and Maxwell’s face appeared. “You in bed already?”

“Not at all. I was…waiting for you, actually.” She couldn’t fight the grin that insisted upon turning the corners of her mouth up.

His face simply lit up. “I’m…very glad you did.”

“So am I.” Her reply was embarrassingly breathless, but she ignored it.

“I—I have a fire going in my room…”

“Oh, yes. Of course.” She hopped from the bed, blew out her candle and, after making sure no one was about in the hallway, followed Maxwell to his room.

He shut the door and turned to her.

“I thought tonight went very well. Your sister seemed—”

Katrina didn’t get to finish her sentence. He had closed the empty space between them and enveloped her in his arms. She’d barely had time to take a breath when he pressed his mouth to hers. Katrina gave in most willingly.

He kissed her until she was dizzy with it, until the ache between her legs demanded she mention it. “Mmm… Ma… Maxwell?”

He lifted his lips away from hers. “You shouldn’t be trying to converse right now, not while I’m trying to kiss you senseless.”

Katrina giggled. “Perhaps that’s why I’m speaking—I
am
senseless. So, to my knowledge, you’ve obtained your objective.”

“Then talk, and be quick. For I’m not sure how much longer I can refrain from making love to you.” His embrace loosened, but just a bit.

“I seem to remember something about you showing me where that led.” She indicated the secret doorway in the wall.

“You mean to say that you haven’t even taken a peek, while I was out?”

Feeling suddenly very shy, she tucked her lower lip between her teeth and shook her head.

“Hm. That must have been very difficult for you.”

“Not at all. I waited because I wanted
you
to show me.”

Maxwell stood there for a few endless moments staring into her eyes. Emotions she hadn’t seen in him before passed over his features—as if he couldn’t believe what she was asking, as if he doubted his ability to acquiesce her request, as if an invisible uncertainty had taken hold of him. Sensing his hesitation, she placed her hand upon his cheek.

“I trust you.”

His warm gaze conveyed to her how pleased he was at her admission. She stood there beneath his arousing scrutiny, and mere heartbeats before she was about to throw herself back into his embrace, he led her to the panel in the wall. With his free hand, he took hold of the chair rail moulding and pressed a hidden button on the underside. The door popped open.

It seemed as if she was passing
Through The Looking Glass
. With not a spark of perceivable light, it engulfed her in an inky darkness. She stopped a few steps in and Maxwell released her hand. In moments he lit an oil lamp and shut them in. The red glass shade cast an otherworldly glow over the room. Unidentifiable shapes as big as furniture stuck out from the walls. Padded and covered in different hues of leather, a tall slim bench, a short square foot rest, and one furnishing the size of a couch had above them several silk cords that hung from the ceiling. She stepped forward and took hold of one, then noticed the chains that dangled side by side with the slender ropes.

She surveyed the circumference of the small room, and observed a beautiful ostrich feather fan and at its flanks, a few single plumes tacked to the wall. On another side of the room, next to a waist-high bench, which was too high for anyone to sit upon comfortably, hung an assortment of buggy whips and bridles from pegs. She took a few steps towards the odd collection.

“It seems your groom has mistaken this room for the stables.”

“What?” He walked over to where she stood. “Ah.” He chuckled. “No one knows this room exists, save myself and now you.”

“No one? But—” She raised her hand to one of the whips and found that it possessed a wide tab of soft kid leather at its end. She swallowed hard. “Oh, I see.” That breathless quality had returned to her voice. She dismissed it as her curiosity overtook the moment. Her heart began to pound out a voluble tattoo. “Then, is this for—?”

Maxwell slid his arms around her waist from behind. “Yes.”

She detected that the same breathlessness had assailed him as well. Her gaze darted to each whip. One had fluffy down-like feathers for its end. One possessed a long, soft leather fringe. One had what resembled rough, braided horse hair that seemed more spiky than pliant. There were more, but she could no longer dwell upon them as her simmering blood was now at a boil beneath her skin. She turned in his arms and looked into his eyes, but just as quickly, her aplomb slipped away like a mist. She studied his shoulder as the words echoing in her mind struggled to be set free.

“Maxwell, I—” Katrina drew a shuttering breath. “Would it be possible—?” She cleared her throat. “That is to say, could you—?”

“Yes?” She could hear the slight grin in his voice.

“You aren’t going to make this easy, are you?”

“Make what easy?”

No, he wasn’t
. And she knew that if she didn’t exhume the courage from deep within her to ask him this very moment, then she’d never be able to. “Oh, for heaven’s sake. Look, I want it.” Her gaze darted to his. “I want you to use those horrid little torture devices on my bottom.”

“I’m sorry. Wha—?”

“And don’t you dare make me ask you again. If you didn’t hear the first time, then turn about and we shall leave this room this instant.”

She’d never seen such a wicked grin. Her breath became trapped in her lungs. He placed his hand behind her neck and drew her cheek to his. “Whisper your request into my ear.”

Pondering his appeal for a moment, she realised that it certainly was easier asking him when he wasn’t looking directly at her. Perhaps she’d pass him a bloody note next time.

Katrina turned her face so that his lips brushed the outer shell of his ear. One breath, then two. How in the world could she ask for what she longed for? At once it came to her. Without waiting for a single second more to pass, she whispered, “Spank me.”

She nearly lost her breath he hugged her so tightly, but she had to admit, it felt wonderful to be enfolded and safe within his strong arms.

Maxwell began nibbling her neck, placing little kisses up and down the skin there, tonguing her sensitive throat. She clung to him while he stoked her fire. He was oh, so good at fostering within her a great anticipation of what was to come.

Finally he turned her around and placed her in front of the waist-high bench that protruded from the wall. He lifted her arms and wrapped a silken cord around each wrist. He then moved to a small ship’s wheel mounted next to the bench that she hadn’t noticed before. Turning the wheel to the right made the bench extend farther out from the wall. It pressed against her hips, causing her rump to stick out behind her. She held onto the restraints for balance. At her back, Maxwell nudged her feet apart. Painfully slow, he inched her short drawers over her derrière a little at a time—first a tug on the right side, then he’d tug down on the left, grunting and murmuring naughtily the entire time. “The skin of your arse is so soft.” He stroked a tickling finger beneath the fabric. “Oh, the things I want to do to this bottom.” She could feel his warm breath caress her skin with each tortuous reveal.

If he didn’t lay his hands on her soon she just
knew
she would die.

Finally he removed her drawers completely. He pulled yet another extension of the odd bench she leaned against from underneath, forcing her knees apart. This made it impossible to close her thighs.

He stepped over to the wall to choose his weapon. She watched as he stroked his long fingers down each of his whips, lingering on the different tips. Katrina’s breath came forth in short pants.

In her opinion, he’d dallied before his collection entirely too long. “Hurry,” she murmured.

“Patience, my impish girl.”

Her body began to shake, which puzzled her because the room’s temperature was comfortable. She returned her attention to Maxwell and observed him take the first whip she’d noticed off the wall—the one with the wide, soft leather end.

He stood behind her for a few moments then she heard the rustling of fabric. Turning her head, she saw that he was in the process of removing his waistcoat, neck cloth and dress shirt.

Good God
. What had she got herself into?

Finally he stood at her backside, pressing against her so that she could feel the hard length of his erection bearing down on her naked bum cheeks and the heat of his bare chest as he leaned over her. She watched as he brought the whip around to the front of her. Taking an end in each hand, he pressed it gently just beneath her breasts. He then drew it up over her nipples and back down again, over and over.

“I’ve got you in my trap and now I’ll never let you go,” Maxwell whispered.

Katrina closed her eyes, letting the sensation wash over her, allowing the gooseflesh to titillate her senses. A tiny moan escaped her as she tilted her head back.

“Your body is so reactive, my little mouse.”

She should protest the use of that silly nickname he’d given her. But then decided that he could call her whatever he wished as long as he pleasured her in this wanton manner.

She felt something softly draw tiny circles down her spine. “That first time you left me on Lovat Lane I wanted to find you and have at your sweet cheeks with such a heated vengeance…”

He’d spoken so quietly she had to strain to listen.

“I wanted to strip you naked and tie you to a rack in some dungeon.”

Katrina’s breath caught. He painted the naughtiest pictures in her mind.

“Perhaps I’d let the other guards watch me whip your silky arse then take you from behind.”

Before she could react, Maxwell took the whip and nudged a curtain aside upon the wall before her, a bit higher than eye level. An angled mirror hung there. He stepped away from her and moments later, the mirror revealed another reflection as a second set of curtains was pushed aside on the opposite wall. She gazed into it and realised it was Maxwell’s naked back she saw, and her bottom, bared to him—entirely at his mercy.

He caressed her skin just before the first blow landed.

She went rigid, but, surprisingly, it didn’t hurt as much as she’d thought it would. Another landed, more intense than the first. Then a third hit—the hardest of the three. She hissed an intake of breath.

“Mm. It seems we’ve found the beginning of your pain threshold. Let’s see how far we can push you.”

Five fierce blows in a row smacked against her bum. Her skin throbbed severely, but it felt oh, so good. Would he go further? He couldn’t possibly be finished, could he? It wasn’t enough. No, not by a long run.

Maxwell dragged the soft tip of the whip over the welts on her bottom. “More?”

Refusing to beg aloud, she didn’t reply, but hoped to heaven he’d continue.

Seven, harsher blows cracked against her tingling cheeks, leaving Katrina shaken and needy.
Yes, oh, yes
.

“Now remain very still. I’m going to give you twenty strokes this time. If you don’t cry out or move, I shall reward you most pleasurably.”

Katrina fisted the restraints in her hands, ready to take her punishment and earn his promised heaven. A trickle of sweat formed at her temple and threatened to slide down her cheek. She wanted desperately to scratch at it, but she sensed that within their titillating game, the penalty for her disobedience would be too great.

His twenty blows hit every inch of her exposed bottom that hadn’t been touched before by the whip. She thought she’d never sit again, so intense was the sting.

Maxwell walked over to the wall of whips and Katrina, trying to catch her breath, rubbed her sweat-dampened face on her arm, quickly so as not to alert him.

“You did so very well, mouse,” he said as he replaced his naughty device back upon the peg. He walked to the opposite wall. She watched him take down the feather fan and come once again to stand at her side. “Now be a good girl and come for me.” Then his hand slipped around the front of her, and he slid his fingers between her thighs, working her clitoris in tiny circles.

Katrina moaned a luxurious, sensual sound.

With the feathers he fanned the burning flesh of her bottom, stroking it lightly over her skin, easing the sting. “My God, how creamy you are,” he whispered. He eased two fingers inside her and out just as quickly, only to toy with her nubbin again. He stroked her in the same fashion that he’d slid those wicked beads of his in. Up and down, his digits strummed her instead of the jade. Katrina’s arms ached, but she needed to orgasm so badly she ignored the pain.

“You want to come?”

“Yes,” she breathed.

“You want to feel that sweet release, don’t you? The building up, holding your breath until rapture overtakes you, until your control snaps.” The fan fell to the floor and he stroked her faster.

“Yes,” Katrina panted.

With his free hand he pushed his finger into her vagina from behind. Still diddling her clitoris from the front, he stroked the opening of her anus with his other thumb.

“I am so going to fuck you after you come,” he whispered into her ear.

Nudged over the edge, she screamed as her orgasm hit. He sank his fingers deep inside her, lifting her up, her toes hardly touching the ground. “Yes, fuck my hands, that’s it.”

She pumped her hips with short, jerking motions while she rode the blissful waves of electricity that pulsed all the way to her soul.

Maxwell finally released her. He unwrapped her wrists and she leaned upon the bench, shaking as echoes of delight thrummed through her body. She barely noticed when he slid the underside of the bench back into place and was vaguely aware that he’d removed the rest of his clothes.