I Thee Take (To Have And To Hold Duet #2) - Natasha Knight Page 0,59
strapped Mara’s hands in the SUV. “She needs to be bathed. Badly.”
“Asshole,” I can’t help but mutter.
The woman raises her eyebrows and gives me a look.
Felix glances at me. “One more word and I’ll cut out your tongue.”
I keep my mouth shut.
“Shall I take care of it, sir?” the woman we drove with asks.
“Do. Without leaving marks.”
She nods.
He turns to me. “She’s got a talent for not leaving marks. Isn’t that right, Lizzie?”
Lizzie—Mara—doesn’t answer.
He shifts his attention back to the woman who let us in. I wonder to myself how women work with men like this, knowing what they’re doing. Selling other women and girls.
“And this one, well, I don’t need to tell you what will happen if this one isn’t delivered in pristine condition. No one lays a finger on her. Helga will remain with her at all times.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Is he here?” I hear Felix ask as we’re ushered upstairs by Helga.
“Not yet but we’ve had word his envoy is on its way.”
I momentarily hear a harp as a server pushes a door open carrying an empty tray into the large kitchen. He doesn’t spare us a glance as we’re led up two flights of stairs to a luxurious hallway with gold and pink wallpaper and plush carpet. The patterns are dizzying. There are a dozen doors on this floor. As we walk past them, I hear some sound, but not a lot. What I can hear reminds me of the boat with those women. This must be the auction. This must be where they were brought.
Mara and I are taken to the room at the far end of the corridor. It’s a bedroom more luxurious than any I’ve seen. The huge bed is the centerpiece, the fabric draping it like something out of a princess movie. Pink all around, as far as the eye can see. I wonder if a five-year-old decorated this place.
Three men accompany us inside and Helga starts right away.
“You, sit.” She points to a chair in the far corner as if Mara is a dog.
Mara spares me a glance before walking to the chair and taking a seat.
Helga turns to me, looks me over, eyes scornful. I can’t tell how old she is. She could be thirty or sixty with her gray-streaked hair drawn back into a tight bun, face pudgy, the lipstick she has on strangely out of place, too pink, too smudged. She’s sturdy, built big.
She unhooks the same strap she’d used to strike Mara from her belt.
“Strip her. Get her on the bed on her back.”
The men obey without a word, my struggles not hindering their efforts in the least, my curses doing nothing but earning a clucking of the tongue from Helga.
Once I’m naked, I’m lifted and hauled to the bed, my arms still behind my back, wrists still bound. The metal of the handcuffs digs into my lower back.
“Open her legs and keep her down.”
“No!” Again, it’s useless to fight. I know it. There are too many of them and I’m bound. One of the men takes hold of my shoulders to pin me to the bed. The others move to either side of me each taking a leg, spreading me wide.
Helga’s gaze shifts to my exposed sex then to my eyes. “Wider.” She runs the strap through the palm of her left hand, and I realize what she means to do. She’ll strap me there. It’ll leave a mark, won’t it?
“Good,” she says once my legs are at the point they’d break if they were spread any wider. “Hold her still.”
She shifts her position slightly, I guess to get at me at a better angle, raises her arm and brings the strap down over my sex.
For a split second, all I hear is the sound of the strap, then nothing. Just nothing. And then the white-hot pain.
“You’re a fucking sadist!” I shout when I can speak again.
She straps me again, not bothering to comment as she lashes me six more times. My crotch is on fire and I’m wriggling to get out of the way but can’t. She’s precise. She’s done this before.
“It’s enough,” Mara says from a few feet away.
I see she’s gotten off her chair, but she stops the instant Helga turns her attention to her. I see the girl’s throat work as she swallows in fear of the woman.
“Did I tell you to get up?”
“He’ll get less if she has marks. She’s swollen,” Mara tries.
Helga walks toward her. “Did I tell you to get up?”