her onyx robe, her nipples beaded.
When she raked her gaze down him this time, it remained at his feet.
Daimon looked down at the thick metal ring just a few inches in front of his boots.
Metal of the gods.
He cursed that infernal ring, recounting all the times he had been bound to it, how it never moved even when he thrashed and tried to break free of it.
He swallowed and dropped to his knees before it.
Sucked down a fortifying breath as he held his hands out to it.
“Let’s not rush.” Nemesis drifted into the beam of light and it reflected off the gold filigree that formed a corset over her stomach, cinching the black layers of her dress in to reveal her curves.
Cold skated over his flesh as she ran her hand over his shoulders and he closed his eyes as she crouched behind him, her fingers easing down his spine.
“We would not want to bloody this.” She stroked the hem of his top and he dutifully lifted his arms above his head as she pulled it up. “There’s a good boy.”
He scowled at her over his shoulder when she finished removing his top.
She leaned towards him, her crimson hair brushing his bare skin, her breath cold against his ear as she whispered, “Now, now. Best keep that temper in check lest I decide a different sort of punishment for you.”
She skimmed her palms across his shoulders and her hands shook as she sucked in a trembling breath.
He didn’t want to imagine the vile things she was contemplating, tried to shut them and the sudden spike of fear that lanced him out of his mind. She wouldn’t violate him like that. The terms of his punishment were hers to set, but it would overstep a line and his father would have her head.
She brushed her lips across his left shoulder.
Daimon clenched his fists. She wouldn’t.
She chuckled into his ear. “So tense. I would have thought you would be more relaxed these days.”
He wanted to look at her and demand what she meant by that, but he knew the answer in his heart.
She knew about him and Cassandra.
Which was strange.
She had never taken an interest in any of their lives before now. He had never realised she could see such things from her domain in the Underworld.
Rich brown leather snapped around his wrists and jerked him forwards as the straps attached themselves to the heavy metal ring.
Nemesis stroked two fingers down his spine and murmured, “How many lashes are adequate punishment for breaking an exile, entering the Underworld without permission, and murdering hundreds of people here in your father’s domain?”
Daimon really didn’t want to know the answer to that.
“I would have given Esher twenty-thousand at the very least.”
Daimon closed his eyes and bowed his head, fighting the urge to ask her to give him less than that, to use the attraction she felt towards him to bargain with her.
Her lips feathered across his ear. “Perhaps… ten thousand?”
Gods, that was still too many. A few thousand with her barbed metal whip was bad enough, always had him close to blacking out. Part of the terms of penitence was that he had to remain awake for it all to utter an apology, one for each lash of her whip. She would be forced to wait for him to heal and wake again, and would no doubt increase the number of lashes.
Keeping him here in her realm for longer and longer.
She loosed a soft moan as she caressed his shoulders, as she lowered her hands down his back and then under his arms. Her breasts pressed against his back and he bit his tongue as she raked nails over his bare chest.
“It has been so long since I have been with a man,” she whispered into the shell of his ear.
“No.” Daimon jerked backwards as much as he could with his hands bound to the ring, attempting to dislodge her.
She chuckled and nipped at his earlobe. “Would you really get a say if I decided your punishment would be to service me?”
He wouldn’t, but someone else would. “Father would have your head.”
She sighed. “Unfortunately… that is true. Fifteen thousand lashes it is.”
“Fifteen?” He twisted his head towards her, his cheek colliding with her lips. “You said ten.”
“You were insolent.” She pressed a kiss to his cheek and edged backwards, rose onto her feet and rounded him, standing so close that he had to tilt his head back and look up at her to keep his