Page 17 of House of Cards (The Devil’s Den #2)

Zoey

I jerk at my cuffs when the door slams closed like a rifle shot.

What the hell? One second he’s whispering fucked up shit in my ear, breathing on me like he’s going to kiss me and then he slams the door?

No. Smith only slams doors when he’s really, really mad?—

“You’re a pretty little slut,” comes a voice a few feet behind me.

Sweet Jesus. That wasn’t Smith slamming the door, was it? It was whoever the fuck is standing behind me.

This must be Howler.

Every inch of my skin tries to crawl off in a different direction.

Smith’s voice is deep, cultured. Like he has a degree in something intelligent and boring, parents who own several shell companies, and just does this whole sex-trafficking thing as a side hustle because he got bored of all the trophies he won for fencing.

This guy?

He’s an oaf who transports butcher meat around on his shoulder all day before spending his evenings eating TV dinners and drinking beer while he watches reruns of boxing matches from the eighties.

Wow.

My imagination is so much more vivid with this blindfold on.

The air stirs, and I shudder when I realize it’s because Howler is moving closer. He audibly sniffs the air, and I have to force myself not to think about what expression is on his face.

When Smith smells me, it’s fucking hot.

This guy? I think I threw up in my mouth a little.

I yelp in surprise when Howler grabs my ass and squeezes. Goosebumps break out on my skin…and not the good kind.

His hand is big, rough, cold.

The image of a butcher grows so strong, I can’t help wonder if he was handling dead meat before he arrived. If there’s still blood in his nails. Fatty under-skin grease on his palms.

Fuck off with that shit, Brain. A butcher can’t afford a place like this, or a woman like me.

I hope.

I clench my jaw, holding onto the thought with steely determination as Howler feels up my ass cheek like he’s inspecting the tenderness of a cow’s rump.

Satisfied with the left cheek, he moves on to the right. This brings his body closer to mine, and with it, a whiff of cologne.

Yup, there it is.

Rich person ’s cologne. So strong, he must have bathed in it.

Howler grunts as he kneads my right cheek like he’s tenderizing a piece of steak.

“What’s all these marks on this slutty ass of yours? Thought I’m your first?”

Don’t do it, Zoey. Don’t open your big, fat?—

“Oh, you thought you were buying fresh meat? Sucks to be paying premium for leftovers, doesn’t it?”

He stops cold, hand tightening painfully once, twice, against my bruised flesh. I bite back a grunt of pain.

“You’ve got some mouth on you, slut. Best you shut the fuck up.”

“Don’t worry, sweetie,” I croon. “You’ll always be my first…disappointment.”

Howler snatches away his hands like I burned him.

Well, I did burn him. Ha ha.

I like to think Smith’s doubled over with laughter in his pervy little Peeping Tom room next door.

Yeah… no.

I bet Smith’s face is a thundercloud. I’m pretty sure I shouldn’t be speaking to their clients like this.

Yes, Sir. No, Sir.

Spank me with anything you like, Sir .

“Don’t need a mouthy slut like you. Got one of my own already,” Howler says in a tight voice.

“Do you also have to tie her down before you fuck her?”

Howler lets out an indignant huff, so close I can feel the sickening wet heat of his breath.

“That right?” he mutters, his voice moving behind me again. “We’ll see what you’ve got to say when I’m done rearranging your insides, you worthless fucking cunt.”

I’m so shocked, I don’t even beg for mercy.

A heavy crash goes through the room, my body flinching at the loud noise, then a suffocating silence.

Was that the door or the closet?

Oh God, is he fetching something from the Closet of Kink?

I’m so fucked.

My heart is pounding so hard, the buckles on my fetish gear are clinking.

The air changes. It feels thicker now, weightier, like it’s pressing down on me. I feel the anger and frustration coming off in waves from the predator behind me. Hear the rustle of his clothes. Slow, heavy breathing.

God, I’m not going to survive what comes next.

“Smith! Smith!” I yell, yanking on the cuffs, willing them to spring open and release me.

He said he was watching. But he didn’t say he’d intervene. He probably only told me that as some kind of sick mind-fuck.

“Smith, please!” I hate how desperate I sound. How pathetic.

There’s a soft sound behind me.

I don’t know why, but I get the image of something thin and hard being dragged through a clenched hand.

“Hey, listen. Howler, right? I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry!

” I blurt out. I wipe my face against my shoulder, trying to push the blindfold off my eyes.

“I ran my mouth when I should just have shut up and let you, you know, do your thing. This really is my first time. So why don’t you cut me a little slack?—”

The first lash comes out of nowhere, followed almost immediately by a second strike with whatever he took out of the closet. It’s stiff, thin, and sings in the air on its way to my flesh.

I have no fucking idea what it is, but holy crap, it hurts like a motherfucker. A horizontal line of pain erupts over my ass cheeks like a fire-breathing dragon just licked me, followed by a dull ache that seeps right into my flesh.

The third and fourth strike land barely an inch above that already heated, throbbing flesh. I would have yelled if I wasn’t so busy gasping in shock.

Fuck it, that stings!

I’m about to say something, perhaps to plead with Howler to take it easy on me, but a fifth, then sixth blow drives all rational thought from my mind.

“Ow, Jesus, fuck! ” I suck in a gulp of air, tugging desperately at the cuffs. “Hey! Hey! This really is my first time! All I’ve gotten so far were spanks. Please don’t?—”

Jesus, it feels like a fucking air strike lands on my ass.

Eight, ten, twelve lashes. Everyone lands harder than I thought possible, sharp and precise.

There’s a rhythm to them now, a tactical consistency that wasn’t there before.

A cleaver methodically sectioning meat from a bone.

He targets a wide area from the top of my ass to mid-thigh spreading out the blows so there’s no discernible pattern, no idea where he’s going to trike next.

The man behind me isn’t just angry. He’s focused .

I try moving away, shifting my hips, twisting my shoulders, but the X keeps me exactly where he wants me.

I’m howling now, and that’s hilarious in a totally unfunny way. Guess that’s why they call him Howler.

How many stitches will I need after this?

There’s so much agony, it all blends together in a white-hot soup of slivered skin and melted flesh. Something must short-circuit in my brain, because slowly, so fucking insidiously, my brain starts gaslighting me about how good it feels.

It’s just heat, baby. Heat and pressure.

Raw. Brutal. So delicious.

Fuck off , Brain!

“Jesus, stop! Fucking stop!” I blubber through tears that are instantly soaked up by the blindfold.

Somehow, that works. Or maybe the guy’s arm just got tired.

My body racks under a relieved sob as I try to catch a breath in lungs as fiery as my backside.

God, I’m so fucking sore.

It feels like I sat on super-heated metal chair. My entire body is quaking as I struggle to handle the pain. I don’t know if I’m sobbing or panting or both. I’ve never felt pain this intense. It’s worse than when I broke my arm at nine.

“Please!” I fail to choke down a sob of panic. “ Please! ” The last is a shrill, breathless shriek.

But I’ve offended this client past the point of negotiation, it seems. He’s not even speaking to me anymore. My chaotic mind tries to think of something I can bribe him with, but I can’t stand the thought of him touching me again with his coarse, rough hands.

Something cool and firm touches the inside of my thigh. My aching backside is rerouting all the nerves in my body, leaving the rest of me feeling so numb I’m not sure what’s running over my skin.

Is it…is it the handle of whatever he just used on me?

I jolt, trying to close my legs, but with my ankles cuffed, that’s literally impossible.

“No, no, no, no,” I whimper.

There’s a throaty rumble behind me, and every hair on my body stands up.

Despite the low key horror working its way through my mind, I force myself not to move away from his touch. Anything’s better than the all-out beating he was giving me.

The pain is still there. But it’s moved deeper now, from stinging skin to throbbing, aching flesh. I grit my teeth, clench my jaw, and at first with reluctance, then determination, force myself to stop hiccuping like a three year old at the end of a meltdown.

You got this, Zoey. He’s given you his all, and you’re still standing. Soon as you can talk without blubbering, you’re going to cuss him so bad, he’ll?—

He lays a stinging slap to my pussy that stops the world in its tracks.

A single hit with his hand. Just one.

That’s all it takes for my thighs to start quaking.

Not because of the pain this time.

Pain would have been so much better.

The slow, dizzying heat that crawls between my legs and up my spine is more awful than every burning whip lash combined.

Because I fucking like it.

He lets out another deep rumble. And I’m flipped into another moment where I feel like I’ve just fallen through Alice’s rabbit hole. My imagination refines its sketch of Howler, transforming him from a pudgy, broad-faced butcher psycho into…

An image of Smith.

Oh, God, not him.

Why did it have to be him?

Smith stands behind me with a whip in his hand, head tilted and dark eyes gleaming as he considers his next move.

A second slap to my pussy turns my thoughts to mush.

Not because it was harder than the first—although it stings a hell of a lot more because of how wet I am—but because he never took his hand away.

And he doesn’t just squeeze my pussy. He claims it. Steady, unrelenting, like it’s his property and he can do whatever the fuck he wants with it.

I don’t want this.

I swear to God, I don’t want this.

But my pussy does, because it’s dripping wet. And when the hand holding it squeezes, the world cracks, then shatters.

I recognize that touch.

I know exactly who’s gripping my pussy right now.

“Please.” The word rips out of me before I can stop it, followed by a low, guttural moan that might as well be my final act of surrender. Because now I’m not begging him to stop anymore.

I’m begging him to go on.

And somehow Smith knows the difference, because he leans in to reward me with a satisfied, “That’s my good girl.”