Page 7

Tara tensed, waiting. It was like that moment after a glass or plate falls off the counter, and, assuming you can’t catch it, the only thing you can do is wait and see if it breaks on impact.

Most of the time it shatters, but there are instances where it falls just right. Where the fragile thing survives.

That’s how Tara felt now, as if Nathan’s words had accidentally pushed this fragile new thing between them off the counter and now, she could only wait and watch it shatter on impact.

Nathan tugged the strap on her other ass cheek, pulling it higher, which in turn pulled the entire thing tighter against her pussy. Then he spanked the cheek that hadn’t yet been slapped.

In her mind, the glass hit the floor…and didn’t break.

“I could add a little catholic schoolgirl play to my plan,” he murmured. “T for teacher.”

“I thought you were going to be the headmaster.”

“Hmm, you’re right. Then again, nothing about the game says we can only do what’s on our list.”

“What is on our list?” she asked, lips twitching up into a smile of relief that their friendly moment hadn’t derailed what was to come.

“What’s on our list isn’t the same as what’s on the checklist for our letter.”

“Because you’re adding things like schoolgirl spankings.”

“I like the alliteration.”

“Thank you, I try.”

Nathan’s laugh rumbled through her. He had a wonderful laugh, and she’d once wondered what it would feel like to lean against him as his body vibrated with mirth. She’d never imagined she’d get to feel it like this, her nearly naked body flush against his chest.

“I love your laugh,” she said without thinking.

Nathan’s chuckle faded into a quizzical smile. “You do? I know I laugh too loud.”

“No. Not too loud.”

“I love making you laugh,” he countered. “Hard to do, so it makes it worth it when I finally manage.”

Somehow those words made her feel both special and anxious. She tried to cover it with an arched brow. “Are you saying that I’m humorless?”

“No, I’m saying that you don’t suffer fools, and don’t fake laugh at stupid programming jokes.”

“I have actually laughed a few times when you told that joke,” she said, then paused meaningfully. “But it’s usually because I’m laughing at how excited you look to tell your stupid joke.”

He spanked her ass cheek with two hard swats. “For someone who’s not a brat, you sure have a sassy mouth.” His head cocked to the side as if he were considering something. “No, not brat. Troublemaker.”

Tara couldn’t stop the small chuckle that escaped.

Nathan’s eyes narrowed. “Are you laughing at my joke, or laughing at me for telling the joke?”

“Not laughing at you . Laughing at your expression . You look very pleased with yourself for having thought of a T word that you can use in place of brat.”

“We can’t all be fancy with the alliteration. Some of us keep it simple.”

“Because alliteration is the height of sophistication.”

When Nathan abruptly sat down on the couch, his hands sliding off her, Tara wobbled on her feet, the loss of contact and body heat almost shocking. Regret inched up her throat and she opened her mouth to take back her comments.

They had, once again, started friendly teasing. They’d pushed past it the first time, but if they froze or retreated—even temporarily—every time one of them slipped into well-worn conversational patterns, they’d never make it through the scene.

It might have been fine to banter with him like this as friends, but they weren’t here as friends. She was supposed to be submitting to him.

The odd thing was, it didn’t feel like they slipped out of the scene, out of the moment. Low-level arousal thrummed through her like a persistent drum beat.

This time, she’d pushed the plate off the counter, and it looked like this time, it broke.

She swallowed against the feeling of loss, trying to figure out the most graceful way to walk away.

Nathan grabbed her by the thighs and tugged her onto the couch so she straddled him, her knees tucked by his hips, her ass resting on his legs.

Nathan’s gaze drifted down her body and the mood shifted. It was a seamless, easy transition between familiar, comfortable dynamic to something new that was thick with sexual tension.

He kneaded her thighs, strong fingers digging in. She moaned, startled by the pleasure-pain of the deep tissue massage. His hand worked up toward her hips and she tensed, realizing that in this position her lower abdominal fat partially rested on her thighs.

She leaned back, trying to stretch out her torso so her lower belly pooch wasn’t so obvious. Nathan reached up over her shoulder, grabbing a handful of her hair and pulling it forward to covered one breast. Then he carefully wound the mass of her hair around his palm and tugged.

“Going somewhere?” His gaze, which had been roving over her body, slid up to her face. “Or are you uncomfortable?”

“No, I was just…” She couldn’t bring herself to tell him what she was doing. Admitting it would in turn reveal that she was occasionally self-conscious of her body. Tara didn’t want Nathan to see her that way—as a woman who bowed to societal pressure to look a certain way. She was embarrassed that she was embarrassed, and scared he might react badly to her body, which in turn would kill their friendship.

“Just what?”

Tara leaned forward, internally wincing when the movement caused her belly to rest lightly on his fingers, which were splayed high on her thigh, the tips just touching the sensitive skin of her torso.

“Just what, Tara?”

“I was just stretching.”

“One thing that will genuinely piss me off is lying to me.” He looped her hair once more around his palm, bringing his hand hard against the base of her skull. “I told you I expect you to communicate with me.”

Tara stared at the place where the wall met the ceiling on the far side of the library, the noise of the people around them fading to a buzzing background noise. She had no idea how they’d gotten here and how everything had suddenly gone so wrong. She barely moved, and yet he picked up on the fact that the reason she’d leaned away was something important. Maybe this was the real danger. Not that this could damage the relationship but that he knew her so well that she wouldn’t be able to hide anything.

“Communication is a nonnegotiable. And if you can’t even tell me when something makes you uncomfortable, or when you need some space?—”

“It’s not that,” she assured him. Tara opened and closed her mouth several times unsure what to say, or maybe how to say it. She gave him a helpless look, and Nathan’s expression shifted, his grip on her hair softening.

“If I put you over my knee and spank you until your ass is burning and you’ve hit that nice emotional release, would you be able to talk to me then?”

Tara nodded her head jerkily, saying nothing.

“Okay, baby.” His voice was tender even as he scooted her off his lap so she was standing before him.

Tara felt oddly close to tears as she watched him prep. Nathan spoke briefly to the Dom in the armchair, then shoved the coffee table back and grabbed a thick blanket out of the basket beside the couch. He sat on the edge of the couch and turned slightly to the left, his thighs spread wide.

Tara stared at him, taking in this man who was both familiar and in this moment, a stranger. Just as she’d never realized how well muscled his arms were until she saw him sleeveless in his leather vest, she hadn’t ever contemplated the thickness of his thighs.

“Over my knee.” He patted his thigh once.

Taking shallow breaths, her pussy throbbing in time with her heartbeat, Tara stepped between his spread legs and lowered herself. His thigh was thick but also hard, she soon discovered.

Nathan had placed the folded blanket on the couch beside his thigh so that once she bent over his leg, her belly and chest rested on the blanket. She braced her toes against the floor, her own knees bent. With his other leg hooked over hers, he had total control of her lower body.

“Scoot up. I want your ass higher.”

Tara pushed forward with her toes, her skin squeaking against his leather-clad thigh. Instead of her belly resting on his thigh, the crease of her hip was centered on his thigh, her ass tipped up.

“This isn’t punishment,” Nathan’s voice rumbled, voice lower than his normal speaking tone, and implacable. “This is because you need it. You’re holding back, but I know you want to be a good girl and answer my questions. Tell me all the things going on in that big, beautiful brain.”

He tugged the stiff straps of her fetwear until they were tucked along the inner curve of her ass cheeks. Given how tight the garment was, this spread her ass open, though the center string would cover her at least a little bit. She wasn’t sure if that was good or bad, just as she wasn’t sure if she was excited or mildly embarrassed that Nathan could probably see her asshole.

“I’m going to spank you hard, which means spanking you past the point where it’s pleasure and into the realm of true pain. That means we’re going to use the stoplight method. Don’t get me wrong, I won’t only stop if you say red. Say stop. Say you don’t want to do this anymore. Anything like that and I’ll stop and check in with you. But when I ask you where you are, you say red, yellow, or green. Does that work for you?”

Tara nodded mutely, then took a breath and make herself answer out loud. “Yes, Sir.”

She froze. That “sir” had slipped out due to either instinct or habit. Nathan rubbed her ass, hand moving in large circles over first one cheek, then the other.

“Don’t hold back, or hold anything in. I won’t let you hide from this, so if you try and close in, it will just make it take longer.”

Tara took a moment to wonder exactly what he meant by “this.” Did he mean this spanking, this confession that he wanted, or this thing between them?

“And I don’t expect you to be quiet or still. Like I told you, I’m not a formal Dom. In fact, I quite like watching someone squirm and bounce on my lap as I spank their pretty ass.” He palmed one cheek, squeezing.

“Yes, Sir.” This time she didn’t second-guess it.

His hand lifted away from her butt, and she expected him to give the other cheek a matching squeeze. Instead, his palm came down on her upturned ass in a hard, decisive spank. This wasn’t just a surface sting; he’d slapped her hard enough to make her flesh jiggle, and then he held his hand in place as if he were trying to imprint the spank on her butt.

Tara exhaled as she pressed her forehead against the blanket. Nathan’s hand lifted and again his next move was unexpected. Rather than switching to the other cheek to place a matching blow, he rained four more hard swats down on the same cheek, the last one almost exactly on top of the first. Pain and heat radiated through her, but their trajectory was inverse because as the pain faded, the heat built.

He rubbed her leg from mid-thigh, up over her ass, to her waist. Then he raised his hand and finally balanced her out, with a matching five swats to her other cheek.

The spanking hurt, as it should, but the pain was a temporary and small price to pay for the wonderful heat and throb it left behind. A throb that was matched by the way she could almost feel her heartbeat in her pussy. The latex gusset felt almost unbearably tight. Part of that was due to the way he’d adjusted the straps, but part of it she was sure was due to her labia swelling with arousal.

“Now we’ve got a layer of primer down,” he said.

Tara hid her smile against the blanket. Primer. Sometimes he was such a dork?—

Nathan’s big hand came down on her right ass cheek with a force that shocked her. The crack of sound hadn’t even fully faded before her startled cry of pain echoed against the walls of the library. The conversation in the room lulled in reaction to her shriek.

That hurt .

Then he did it again.

Nathan’s hand came down in a brutal spank, this time hitting her sit spot—the sensitive place where ass met thigh. She shrieked, feet kicking up off the ground, and her right hand, which wasn’t trapped between her body, his body, and the back of the couch the way her left was, reaching back and trying to splay over her ass to protect herself.

Nathan shoved her hand away. “No,” he scolded.

Dammit, why did she find that so hot? Her pussy throbbed in response to his words even as her ass continued to burn with heat from his delicious abuse.

“Where are you?”

Tara, still dealing with the shock of exactly how hard her best friend could spank, didn’t understand his question.

“Where are you? Red, yellow, or green?”

“Oh.” She had to stop and think. She knew she wasn’t in the red stop zone, but that really did hurt so maybe she should say yellow.

Except, if she said yellow, asked him to slow down, she wouldn’t get where he wanted her to be. Where she needed to be.

“Green,” she breathed.

He stroked her back from the nape of her neck down to her waist with his left hand. His palm felt wide and hot against her naked skin. “Good girl for taking time to think about it,” he murmured.

She didn’t even try to hide the needy little noise she made in response to the praise.

His left hand curled around her waist, holding her in place. Tara took a breath, tensing.

“No, no, baby,” he murmured. “Relax and just take it.”

She tried; she really did. But when his hand came down in a brutal spank on her left cheek, she pushed up onto her toes, legs straightening as she yelped. All that did was make it easier for him to spank her, and he took advantage.

Hard blows fell one after another, the crack of palm meeting ass almost one continuous sound.

Tara couldn’t hold still. She rocked her hips side to side, her feel scrambling on the floor.

He’d covered all her flesh at this point from the top of her ass down to the tops of her thighs. Now, every spank was landing on already hot, sensitive skin. It was starting to feel like she had a slight sunburn.

He hit one particularly sensitive spot and she lurched sideways, trying to slide off his lap. He must’ve anticipated the move because his fingers curled under the waist strap of her fetwear. His legs hooked over hers meant her lower body didn’t go anywhere. She managed to twist her upper body and get one hand onto the ground, but with him controlling her body from the hips down, all she was doing was bending awkwardly to the side.

“Where are you, Tara?”

Hearing her name was like a jolt to the system. She panted, still bent oddly. “I don’t know how to answer,” she said honestly.

“Okay. Tell me what you’re feeling.”

“It hurts.”

“This spanking is meant to hurt.”

“It’s natural to try and get away from physical pain,” she panted.

Nathan released her belt, instead gripping the back of the breasts band. Using it like a handle, he hauled her upper body back into place. He was manhandling her. Oh. Oh.

She swallowed against arousal so intense it almost made her lightheaded. He gathered her messy hair into a tail, twisting it once into a rope then wrapping it around his hand in a now-familiar move.

“It’s cute that you still get academic about things, even when your ass is on fire from a spanking.”

Tara could hear the amusement in his voice, but it didn’t make her feel embarrassed or ashamed. There was affection in amusement.

“Now answer my question.” His voice had deepened once more, and the command was unmistakable. “Do you need me to slow down or go softer? Are you at your physical tolerance limit?”

“Chartreuse.”

There was pregnant silence. “Uh…What?”

“Chartreuse. That’s the color you get when you mix green and yellow.”

Nathan’s hand slid from her right thigh up over her hot, aching flesh, crossed to her left butt cheek, and then slid it down that thigh. “First of all,” he mused, “assuming there really is a color called chartreuse, it’s got to be some kind of pink. The word sounds pink.”

“It’s not.”

“Seriously?”

“Yep.”

“Huh.” Nathan spanked her ass in an almost-offhanded way. This was more of a love tap than the true spanks she’d been getting, but she was already so sore and sensitive that she yelped, feet rising off the floor.

“So you’re somewhere between yellow and green,” he murmured.

“Yes, Sir.”

“Are you just saying that because you’re afraid I’ll be disappointed if I need to stop?”

“No,” she said firmly. “I’ve learned to be assertive about my needs, and my limits.”

“Okay, if you say it, I believe it, because I trust you.”

Something deep in her gut relaxed at his words.

Then she couldn’t think anymore because he went back to spanking her. Based on the sounds, he was no longer spanking her as hard. Probably because he didn’t need to. Nathan had done a very thorough job abusing her ass and upper thighs, and so now, even the lightest touch sent pain and heat zinging through her. Each spank caused heat to radiate, like ripples spreading through water.

“Ouch ouch ouch,” she whimpered, reaching back with both hands to cover her abused bottom. He slapped each palm then grab her wrists, forcing them to the small of her back and holding them there with his spanking hand. His other hand still held her hair.

“You’re such a good girl,” he murmured softly, the tender words entirely at odds with the brutal way his heavy hand came down on her ass.

Tara cried out with each blow now, her hips constantly twisting in effort to protect herself.

“I bet your bottom hurts, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, Sir,” Tara whimpered.

“You’re going to take it for me, aren’t you, baby?”

She couldn’t answer because she was crying out, her skin now feeling properly sunburned. She couldn’t help herself but to shift her feet, almost dancing in place while still bent over his lap. As she moved, she felt the slick wetness between her pussy lips leaking out the sides of the latex.

“I think you’re almost there.” Nathan adjusted his legs, trapping hers tightly between his thighs. Then he tucked his right foot back, his calf pressing her knees together and vicing them between his leg and the front edge of the couch.

The restriction actually made it easier for her to calm down, though her breath was choppy.

“I want you to let go, just accept the spanking. Can you do that for me?”

Tara nodded frantically, each movement making her scalp prickling, thanks to his firm hold on her hair.

He released her wrists and spanked her hard twice more, once on each cheek. She needed to move to alleviate the pain, but with her legs trapped between his, her only option was her arms. Though she knew she shouldn’t, she reached back, splaying her hands over her butt and whimpering.

“Move your hands, baby.” His voice was thick with warning.

Her fingers were trembling and she slowly bent her elbows, pulling her hands to the very top of her ass. The instant he spanked her again, her palms were back in place, covering her abused backside.

“Let’s give those hands something else to do.” Nathan pulled on her hair forcing her head up and back, her body bowed in cobra pose. Except cobra pose required using your arms to brace yourself.

A distant part of her marveled at the genius, as she had no choice but to plant her hands on the couch cushion and support her upper body as he forced her into the backbend. This left her ass unprotected.

“This is gonna hurt, baby.” His tone sounded almost regretful.

Heavy hard swats of his hand made her ass jiggle, the heat sinking deep even as her skin stung and burned.

Tara tried to count—she wasn’t even sure why—but she only got to three before the pain and arousal distracted her. He was merciless. Brutal.

Punishing her.

Hurting her.

Giving her exactly what she needed.

Using pain to offer her permission to submit.

Tears filled her eyes, and when she blinked, they slipped down her cheeks. The instant the first sob broke free, Nathan stopped spanking her.

But the spanking had done its job. Not just opened the floodgates but blown the entire dam, releasing everything she’d kept behind those walls.

Tara sobbed with great shuddering breaths. Nathan released her hair, pulling her upright. She expected him to cuddle her, but instead, he gently guided her down to her knees between his spread legs. She looked up at him through teary eyes.

Nathan cupped her chin and stroked her cheek with his thumb, spreading the wetness of her tears across her face.

“You took that so well, baby. Ready to be my good girl?”

“Yes, Sir,” she stuttered, still looking up at him, her muscles trembling slightly in reaction to the spanking.

“Then get up on my lap and spread those legs.”