Everything Gained (5 page)

"You had me very worried, you know."

Nina's eyes skipped away from his, and she worried her lip, fussing with the collar of his golf shirt. "I know."

"And you also heard that I wanted you home by ten, and you know the rule about letting me know where you are, and answering your cell phone - "

"I know, I know," Nina answered, sounding whinier than she probably wanted to, considering her precarious position.

Gain took a deep breath. "You do know that you have a good sized punishment coming."

Nina just nodded, apparently finding his top button fascinating.

He tipped her face up, making her meet his eyes. "And you do know that I love you to distraction, don't you?"

Her face clouded. "Even though I lead Dunn on so that I could keep my writing career on track?"

The glare she got made her wish she hadn't said what she did, but there was no retracting it. "That's not what I thought, and you know it. I just thought that maybe you weren't looking at the signs of his... interest," he spat the word out as if it was acid in his mouth, "in you because you were so wrapped up in being happy with your success in writing for him."

"You can backpedal all you like, but I know what you meant."

Gain gave her a sobering glare. "No, you don't, but we're not going to argue that point right now, because we have other business that needs to be attended to."

With that proclamation, he swung her up in to his arms and took the stairs two at a time, despite the added weight. When they'd reached the master bedroom that she'd decorated in soft pink and green florals, he stood her at the end of the bed, then bent her over it, tugging her loose fitting jersey capris and her lacy boy shorts down to her ankles without so much as a by your leave.

"Gain, no, please!"

"Nina, you know exactly what happens to you when you disobey my rules, don't you?"

She was already sobbing, knowing she was in for it.

Bad.

"Y-yes."

"What happens to you?"

She hated it when he made her say it. She didn't quite know why, but the humiliation of it stung her almost more than his swats. "I - I get spanked."

And with that, as if she'd asked for it herself, the spanking commenced.

Chapter Five

Damn that man was strong! Why couldn't she have married a ninety-eight pound weakling computer nerd of some sort, with a dearth of upper body strength, instead of someone who more closely resembling Ahhhnold than Bill Gates?

Nina knew she wasn't supposed to reach back. She knew that if she did, she was going to get it even worse than she was getting it now. But that didn't keep her right hand from sneaking back there, fingers spread, palm up, trying desperately to stop the awful dull, thudding smacks he was applying in rapid concession.

Gain stopped spanking immediately for fear of accidentally hitting her hand. "Nina," he warned in a tone that clearly conveyed disappointment, "you know better than that. Move your hand. I don't care where you put it, as long as it's not in my line of fire."

He waited, knowing how hard this was for her. Once she got her hand back there and succeeded in stopping him, if only for safety reasons, it was just that much harder to voluntarily give up the protection she'd just won. "I'm not going to wait forever, Nina. If I have to move your hand for you, you're going to find your wrists bound. Do you want that?"

Nina sighed, her lower lip protruding. "No, please!" She absolutely despised being tied in any way, so her hand began to move back towards the bed, of course as slowly and reluctantly as she thought she could get away with.

"For that, you're going to get fifteen strokes of the cane - when we're finished with the rest of your punishment."

Giving an outraged shriek, Nina craned her head around, trying to get a look at him. "No, please, Gain! I'll be good! I won't put my hand back again!"

"The operative word being 'again'. Apparently you're forgetting a lot of basic rules we have around here for your behavior - that's why you ended up here in the first place. I think that a reminder is in order that leaves a bit more of an impression than this warm up spanking and strapping you're going to get."

Nina had fairly wailed at his pronouncement of her fate, pounding the bed with her fists in frustration. But the hard, unforgiving flat of his hand against her the taut flesh of her buttocks quickly convinced her to abandon her tantrum in favor of sobbing and screaming from the pain he was inflicting.

Not only was she going to have to endure this terrible spanking, which was at least as bad as the rest of what he was promising, but he was going to take that thick leather belt of his from around his waist, double it over, and use it to make her fairly sing with the sting it evoked with every agonizing kiss of her bottom.

The spanking ended before she expected to, not that she was complaining in the least, but it just meant that he was getting to one of the worst parts more quickly. Although she couldn't see him, because he was standing directly behind her, but she could hear the metallic clink of his belt buckle as he undid it, then the zip of leather grating against fabric as he tugged it out of his belt loops.

Eventually, though, he positioned himself to her left, his fingers touching the small of her back, as if they were going to be enough to keep her in position once he started in with that awful thing. That wasn't very likely.

She began to dance and sing even before the strap found her behind - as if moaning and whining would postpone the inevitable sizzling sting the strap created as it lanced her behind cruelly, leaving bright red swaths in its path that began to crisscross much too quickly.

Gain had become pretty good with the belt through necessity when they were first married and she was a lot more likely to break rules than follow them. He kept it relatively short, and made very sure that it never wrapped around to score the tender front of her; he was as careful with the belt as he was with the cane. The only places that ever felt her need for discipline were those areas made to receive it - her well rounded bottom, and the backs of her thighs.

Gain rather liked the idea that she was reminded of her misdeeds every time she sat down - or laid down - for the next few days. And he loved to grab them while they were making love, fingering them and forcing her to arch even more into him to get away from the slight pain he evoked and towards the pleasure he promised.

And she deserved a little payback for the worry she'd put him through. He did his best not to be a control freak, but considering how they'd parted, he was pretty frantic by the time she finally deigned to call him, and he never wanted to feel that way again.

She was already screaming so hard he knew that she was going to be hoarse the next day, even though he really wasn't putting his shoulder into it, as he might if she hadn't had any warm up. But her bottom was so sensitized from the vigorous spanking he'd given her that even the lighter swats he'd been giving her seemed like too much to bear.

And she still had the cane coming.

He set the belt down next to her on the bed, which only made her wail louder, because she knew what that meant: he was going to get the cane, which was permanently propped in the corner he some times sent her to before punishing her, panties down just below her butt cheeks, so that she could think about what she'd done.

Nina could hear it whooshing through the air as he approached her, while she tried to get her breathing under control. Just when she became conscious of herself enough to wish for a piece of paper towel, one appeared in her left hand. He knew her almost too well.

Gain was listening closely to her breathing. Occasionally, she got very choked up during a punishment, expelling all her breath at once and hyperventilating a bit, and he did his best to avoid that as much as possible. Of course, it hurt. And he expected her to react to that. But if he ever, at any time, thought that spanking her was more detrimental than helpful, they'd stop it cold.

He only did this - he could only do it - because he thought it was what was best for her. That it helped her to feel loved and looked after. If he had, for the slightest second, thought that she wasn't getting anything out of it, then he would have stopped every bit of it immediately. Their relationship was more than strong enough to survive shifting gears a little.

She was his wife. She was his life. And he knew that, when it came down to it, he was the one who would had to keep his eyes open, had to make sure that this wasn't something that was doing more damage than good.

He almost wanted to stop there. She had been through the wringer in the past twenty four hours, in more ways than one. But he knew that stating that she was going to get a punishment and then not going through with it wasn't the right thing to do, either.

And he couldn't let her down. He just couldn't.

Gain was always very careful to take his time with the cane - it was probably the most vicious implement they owned, although Nina would probably say that all of them were pretty awful. He had spent a lot of time learning to master it once he'd decided to add it to their collection, using a pillow on the bed, then only giving her very small - but sharp - lessons at first, until he got the feel for it. He'd only let a stroke wrap three times since they'd gotten it - and he remembered each of her agonized shrieks when he'd made that mistake.

Of course, he'd stopped punishing her immediately, and used a cooling, soothing lotion to help the angry red mark heal; something he would never do to the swollen stripes he applied to her rear.

But that hadn't happened in a long while, and he didn't intend for it to happen this time.

"No, Gain, please don't - I'm sorry!" she sobbed, clutching the paper towel to her chest.

"I'm sorry, too, Nina," he answered grimly. "But you reached back, and if I'd been using the paddle and was in mid swing, I might have broken your hand. That rule isn't in place to make things harder on you - although I know it doesn't make it any easier. It's there to protect you, just like all of the rest of the rules I have for you. If you hadn't reached back, this punishment would be over, and we'd be cuddling by now. But, having promised you fifteen with the cane, I'm not going to just discharge it."

The only thing Nina could hope for was that he'd be lenient on her, and maybe give her a few less than the full fifteen.

But she wasn't that lucky.

He laid every one of those fifteen strokes down onto her bottom, only easing up on them slightly, in consideration of the sorry state her bottom was already in.

But that didn't seem to matter very much to her. Even though they were well out into the country, and the police weren't at all likely to show up at their door, Gain still gave her a pillow to scream into.

Nina could feel him tap against her bottom just before each stroke, as if he was marking out where he was going to strike before he whistled it down and it exploded against her bottom. She would have sworn that she could feel the welt rise even before he lifted the heinous rod, and as he added strokes, the atrocious throbbing in her bottom became a hundred times worse for those pinpointed stripes of agony he laid on.

At ten, she was again thinking of reaching back, despite the fact that that was exactly why she was bent over right now, feeling the fiery lick of the cane every minute or so while she unsuccessfully tried to dance away from it. Gain must've read what was left of her mind at that point, because he was merciful and reached down to gather her wrists at the small of her back. He didn't neglect to give her any of what was coming to her, but he did help to keep her from earning any more.

The last five were the worst of them all. Gain was a firm believer in making a lasting impression. They were all diagonal across the wheals that were already there, the very last one almost vertical down her the entirety of her backside.

The moment it was done, he dropped the cane from his hand, not caring if she or he stepped on it and broke it into pieces. He gave her another piece of paper towel, on which she blew her nose quiet noisily, then lifted her gently up to the head of the bed, where he joined her immediately, using his a soft tissue to dry her tears.

When Nina cried, it wasn't a particularly pretty sight. But then, he didn't want to evoke crocodile tears; his punishments were the real thing and they caused her very real pain. He looked down into very swollen red eyes that, except for the moisture, echoed the condition of her bottom. Her nose was red and runny, and her face was puffy and red in general.

And he loved her even more right then than he had on their wedding day.

He hugged her tightly, rubbing her back reassuringly, but she didn't seem to be calming down much.
"Sweetie, sweetie! You've got to relax. It's all over and done with. I love you, honey. Everything's okay."

She cried even louder, and clung to him, which was very unlike Nina, who was not naturally a clingy woman.

He thought that perhaps she just needed to cry it out a little, and gave her some time before interrupting her wailing sobs again. "What is it, honey? You can tell me. I love you!"

Eventually, her cries did die down, and she accepted another tissue from him, sitting up on his chest a little and looking down at him hesitantly, with her lower lip between her teeth. "I really didn't see him doing anything wrong before he came onto me today, Gain. I didn't try to lead him on or put up with anything I shouldn't have just to keep my job."

So that's what it was. Gain pulled her to him, holding her tight against him and rocking just a little. "Oh, Nina, I'm sorry I said that. I was just crazy jealous at the thought that that man had had his hands on you."

"I'm s-so s-sorry that you had to see that. I-I promise you I di-didn't see it coming - "

Gain framed her face with his big hands, pressing his lips to the end of her nose, then, fleetingly, to her lips. "Honey, let it go. It's done. It's done."

He held her, locked tight in his arms, until she'd calmed down, and the tears ended.

Then he made love to her, pouring his heart into every movement, letting down every wall he showed to the public, every false face he was forced to wear while dealing with customers and even friends. With Nina, he was truly himself, and he loved her endlessly, and was determined to convey that to her, although he knew she was still suffering with the aftereffects off the spanking he'd just given her.

In consideration of that fact, and her ravaged bottom, he rolled her onto her tummy and began to massage her, starting with her shoulders that were always so tense he didn't know how she stood it. He had gotten pretty good at this over the years, and was always very careful to temper his strength as he did it, digging his fingers gently but firmly into those taut muscles.

He'd never gotten over the smooth ivory line of her back, though. Her skin was as soft as a baby's bottom, and fairly white since she burned instead of tanning, and he had never and would never let her use a tanning booth. When she sat on the end of their bed as she began dressing for the day, it was like watching a classical nude painting come to life. She was perfection in his eyes, and his were the only ones that mattered.

He spent a little more time outside than she did, so there was a distinct contrast between his brown hands as they rubbed against her skin that only played up the physical differences between them. She was so small beneath his touch that he often felt like somewhat of an ogre in comparison, especially when he had to punish her. It didn't seem right, somehow, that someone who was as big as he was could inflict such pain on someone who was so much smaller than he was.

But it worked for them.

That was one reason he was able to continue to do for her what he did. If he ended up just mindlessly having to wale on her night and day - if the discipline didn't work for one reason or another and she was constantly having to be spanked for the same thing over and over - then they would have found a different way of handling things.

But even this early in their relationship, it was simply the natural order of things between them, as was this. He would never get his fill of her. He couldn't imagine a time - even when he was ninety five and feeble - that he wouldn't come to life with wanting her whenever she walked into a room.