Page 48 of Vengeance of Childhood Proportions (Till Death Do Us Part #7)

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Mal

My little owl was up against the wall. There was a small stage, barely a foot off the ground, with red curtains outlining it.

I wondered if it was for the littles to do fashion shows or something on.

Regardless of what they used it for, I was going to use it to make my little owl soar.

She might have confirmed her name was Phoebe, but I wasn’t prepared to use it.

Even in my head. Especially not after hearing how much she loved me calling her my little owl.

She was just barely able to grab the curtain rod above her head. She’d even joked about being too little to be a little when we’d tested it out to see if it would work as her handhold.

I’d put my crop away after her reaction earlier. I was aware that it hadn’t been from the crop, but it still didn’t feel right using it. I grabbed my flogger instead.

“Ready, pet?”

She tested her grip on the curtain rod and then nodded. “Yes, Sir.”

“Tell me your safe words.”

“‘Crow’ to stop, ‘raven’ to slow down, Sir.”

“Good girl.”

I struck, using an overhand motion to bring the leather down across her back.

She barely even moved as the red lines formed on her pale skin. “One. Thank you, Sir.”

Something nudged me in the back of my mind, and my eyes narrowed. I repeated, “Tell me your safe words, pet.”

“‘Crow’ to stop, ‘raven’ to slow down, Sir.”

Her voice was steady and was showing no signs of distress. “Do you wish to use either one?”

“No, Sir.”

I twirled the flogger a moment, making it snap in the air without touching her. She did not flinch, nor did she show any signs of fear at the leather cracking. “And you wish to continue?”

“Yes, Sir.”

I nodded. I wasn’t one to ignore my instincts, but I couldn’t find cause in them. She was giving me the green light, and I trusted that she knew what she wanted.

I struck again, slightly lighter to ensure that I was not making a mistake.

This time her back arched and she took a deep breath as she accepted the blow. “Two. Thank you, Sir.”

Her reaction seemed more normal this time. That was good. “Harder or softer, pet?”

“Harder, please, Sir.”

I eyed her grip on the bar above her head and noted that it was steady. I was careful not to strike her over the same lines I’d previously made.

She gasped. “Three. Thank you, Sir.”

“I’m going to pick up the pace, Little Owl. Keep up your counting, but you do not need to thank me after each one.”

“Yes, Sir.”

I started off with quick, snapping motions, covering from her upper back down to her upper thighs. Her skin pinkened and reddened beautifully, and I had half a mind to call the photographer again to capture this moment.

She was around the count of thirty-three when I realized what it was that felt off, and had felt off since the start.

My little owl was not aroused . She was saying the right things, moving the way one would expect, but it was like a parent watching their child do a cartwheel for the hundredth time.

There were no gasps of pleasure, no moans of delight, no squeezing of her thighs to try to quell the ache… Her hands weren’t even gripping the bar tightly.

I stopped immediately. Her skin was a bright shade of red, dozens upon dozens of lines crisscrossing over her flesh like a work of art. It had to be painful. I’d been flogged numerous times under Mistress Charleen’s tutelage. Even a soft touch held some bite.

Yet my little owl stood there like it was nothing.

She wasn’t a masochist. I knew that from our safety talk, but there was a difference between craving pain and appreciating pain.

I liked a little pain with my passion. It heightened my awareness, as it did with many submissives.

But, despite common misconception, BDSM was not about beating someone to a pulp before fucking them.

You didn’t have to be in pain to get off.

Noticing that I’d stopped, she glanced over her shoulder. “Sir?”

Even her voice was steady, like she’d just asked what color the sky was.

“Turn around.”

She did as ordered, keeping her hands on the bar as she spun. She was so… relaxed . There was nothing. No pain, no arousal. If I touched her pussy right now, I’d bet everything I owned that she would be bone dry. What the fuck was going on?

We hadn’t introduced pain management into our sessions before. I knew from our safety talk what she was okay with, which was pretty much everything when it came to pain. Bondage was her hardcore limit, and we had been concentrating on that for so long that I had wanted to change things up tonight.

Wanted to give her something special, especially after how she’d taken care of me last night.

Our eyes met. Hers were brown today, like her hair.

And I saw it then, her arousal. Me flogging her back had done nothing for her, but her looking at me?

That turned her on. But I couldn’t allow my ego to get the better of me.

We needed to have a serious talk, because I’d disregarded my instincts and chose to trust her instead.

And if I was right, then that was the absolute wrong decision, especially with a flogger involved.

“You don’t like pain, do you, Little Owl?”

She blinked, and her expression… The only word I could think of to describe it was ‘innocent’. “I can take it?—”

Anger rose up inside me. “I didn’t ask you if you could take it ,” I snapped, throwing the flogger onto the plush floor next to the stage. I stormed forward and took her chin in my hand. “I asked you if you liked it.”

Her eyes widened, but I saw no trace of fear on her. She swallowed hard before answering. “No.”

Motherfucker. I’d just flogged the woman I was fairly certain I was falling in love with and she hadn’t wanted it.

I stepped back, releasing her. My foot slipped from the stage, and I stumbled backwards but didn’t fall. I felt the thick carpet beneath my bare feet but not much else. Horror gripped me, and for a moment, I wondered if I was going to lose my dinner.

I sank to my knees before her, my legs not able to hold my weight up anymore. What had I just done? I said the only thing I could to make it all stop: “Crow.”