Because We Belong (Because You Are Mine #3)(62)
Author: Beth Kery

“Come here,” Ian said, taking her hand. She looked over at him in confusion when he led her to a stretch of blank wall between an antique chest and an elaborate oil painting of a man on a white horse in sixteenth-century garb. “I’ll be right back,” he said.

She watched him go into his closet, just as he had last night to get the belt. The skin on her bottom seemed to prickle in anticipation. Her clit did the same. When he came out of the closet, however, he wasn’t carrying a belt, but instead a wooden paddle. Her eyes widened as he neared her.

“I thought you didn’t have any things like that here,” she said, eyes fixed on the paddle. At first glance, it looked like the paddles he had used on her in the past, but it wasn’t. It was flat on one side and slightly convex on the other, an elevated ridge running down the middle of it. The paddle portion was about a foot long and three or four inches wide, not including the handle with a leather carrying loop attached on the end.

“I was thinking about how to improvise,” Ian said with a small smile. Her breath stuck in her lungs when he removed a silver cuff link from his sleeve, slipped it into his pocket and began to roll back the sleeve on the arm that held the paddle. He flipped the paddle, holding it up for her inspection. “It’s a miniature cricket bat. In fact, it’s the first one Grandfather bought me when I came to Belford as a boy. I uncovered it in a cabinet in the billiards room earlier today. Well, in fact I was searching for it.”

“With no intention of playing cricket whatsoever,” she said, amusement mingling with her arousal.

“I played regularly in school,” Ian told her with a smoky look as he transferred the paddle to his other hand and fleetly removed his other cuff link. She licked her lower lip distractedly at the vision of him rolling back the white shirtsleeve and revealing another strong, hair-sprinkled forearm. She could see the outline of his cock quite well in his trousers. It’d been trapped by his boxer briefs in an upward slanted position pointing toward his left pocket, the fat, tapered head delineated even through the fabric. Her mouth watered with a sudden acute desire to feel him plunging in her mouth. “I’m quite good at it, you know, handling the bat,” he said, stepping toward her, the paddle now firmly in his right hand.

“I’m sure you are,” she said, looking at him with mounting lust spiked with just a hint of wariness. She lowered her gaze to the paddle. He held it up.

“It’s very light. They’re made of willow,” he said huskily. “Touch it.”

She swallowed thickly and ran her fingers over the tool he intended for her punishment. It was lightweight.

“It will sting.” She said her thought out loud, shakily.

“I believe it will, yes. I’ve never used it to this purpose. Be sure and keep me apprised of how it feels,” he said, his small grin a little wicked, walking behind her. She gasped in excitement when he pressed the paddle to her ass and circled it against her buttocks through her gown and underwear. For an erotic moment, she just stood there while he ran the paddle over her prickling flesh softly.

“Drop the gown,” he said thickly after a moment as he slid the paddle over the bottom curve of her cheeks and rubbed, now lasciviously.

She whisked the spaghetti straps of the gown over her shoulders and down over her breasts. The garment pooled around her waist. Ian continued to lewdly rub her ass with the paddle, but helped her, sending his fingers beneath the fabric from the back and pushing the gown over her hips. He lifted the paddle and the silk slipped down her legs, pooling at her ankles. He walked in front of her to the blank stretch of wall.

“Come over here,” he demanded quietly.

She stepped out of the gown and the slippers she’d been wearing and approached him clad only in a pair of sheer lace panties. His gaze was on her breasts, belly, and mons, making her nipples stiffen and her clit swell and ache.

“Put your hands above your head and lean against the wall,” he instructed, stepping aside to give her space, his arm bent, the rim of the paddle resting casually against his shoulder in what looked to be a familiar pose from his cricket days. A whole history of naughty references about Englishmen and spankings flashed through her brain, making her hide a smile. It aroused her, though, the idea of having her bottom smacked by the cricket bat . . . by the idea of having her ass spanked by the sexiest Englishman in existence.

That aroused her very much, she admitted, as she started to take the position, her head turned, gaze glued to Ian. He put his hand on the sensitive side of her ribs and she wondered if he felt the way her heart was pounding.

“No, lovely, don’t bend over yet. Just lean against the wall. Put your feet behind the rest of your body. There. Perfect,” he growled softly next to her ear. When she’d settled, her feet were about two feet away from the baseboard, her hands were above her head, her forearms bracing her weight, her breasts heaving six inches from the wall. She wasn’t bent at the waist, but instead in sort of a vertical slant against the wall.

Ian moved behind her. She couldn’t see him without straining around to look. She knew from experience he wouldn’t like it if she gave in to her curiosity. He always said her eyes undid him. Instead, she stared fixedly at the blank wall and forced air into her lungs.

He slid his fingers beneath the waistband of her underwear and lowered them down over her ass to midthigh. She started to move in order to assist him in removing the garment, but he stopped her.

“No. Spread your thighs wider.”

She did what he said, stopping when Ian said, “There.” When she’d opened her thighs, the lace panties had stretched tight between them. She heard Ian grunt softly in male satisfaction and thought he must have appreciated the image of her lowered panties remaining on her thighs. Lech, she thought, smiling to herself. In fact, the thought of arousing him from such a small thing pleased her inordinately.

She sensed him standing just behind and beside her, her breath hitching when he pressed the cricket paddle to her bare bottom. At the same moment, his other hand caressed the side of her body, skimming her hip, waist, ribs, and breast. She shivered, the power of his stroking hand amplified by the threat of the paddle against her ass. Waiting for the first stroke was always almost unbearably exciting for her.

“We can talk more about your safety in the next several days, but in the meantime,” he said, still caressing her, “promise me you’ll be excessively careful.”