it thundered in her ears. She found the energy in the room was dark and menacing, a strange combination when she’d been feeling Savage’s deep concern for Absinthe. Now there was none of that, only this terrible need to strike at her.
She used everything she’d learned that Absinthe loved, pouring attention and care on him, trying not to let the pacing that was coming closer and closer behind her get to her. Savage was like an animal. A terrible predator waiting for her to screw up.
“Fuckin’ get to work. Don’t you know the first thing about suckin’ cock? I can text one of the little club girls, get them to go down on him and do a better job than you’re doin’,” he hissed, contempt in his voice.
Fear beat at her, but anger mixed with that fear. As long as she felt anger toward Savage, as long as she thought about coming to her feet and driving her fist into his mouth to smash his ugly words right back down his throat, she was never going to convince Absinthe she was that frightened little kitten who desperately needed him to come save her. She was too busy formulating plans to save herself.
She understood flashbacks. She did. She’d had a few of her own. What was wrong with her that she was never enough for anyone to stick around? All while a part of her tried not to think of herself or why she couldn’t reach Absinthe, she worked her skills on him, doing her best to ignore the growing threat of the predator prowling behind her. She kept trying to find Absinthe, to connect with him. To reach him. Even with their pathway forged so solidly between them, nothing got through to him. Nothing at all.
Savage crowded behind her aggressively, his fist once more in her hair. “You don’t seem to believe I’m serious, little pet. I think you need a little persuasion.”
Her eyes met his, those cold, dead blue ones, and at once her vision changed and she was in the past again. There were girls, not women, but girls. She couldn’t begin to guess their age, late teens maybe. Several were tied in twisted torture positions to various racks or benches, much like she imagined a modern-day bondage room might have, only this looked as if it might be the real thing. No velvet whips. No soft floggers. A loud whistle cut through the air and a stripe of red lit up one of the girls. She screamed. Immediately, the crack of other whips followed as a dozen men followed suit, whipping other girls.
One man stepped forward and a hush fell over the room. Even the girls went quiet. He was completely naked, his body all raw muscle, scarred, burned, with the words Whip Master branded into his chest. His hair was a mass of blond curls. He walked up to a girl crying and squirming on the rack in the center of the room. On his back, he had the words Master of Pain branded into his skin. He had scars all over him, both front and back, chest, buttocks, thighs. He was covered in scars and burn marks.
He leaned into the sobbing girl and licked at her tears, cupping her face gently and whispering to her. She nodded over and over. He kissed her and then backed off, walking away, muscles rippling as he coiled the whip. Abruptly he turned back to her, lashing out, striking repeatedly, turning her body into a series of red stripes forming patterns over her breasts, belly, sex and thighs. She didn’t scream, but tears continued to run silently down her face.
The whip master turned his head and Scarlet’s heart stuttered. He was no man. He was a teen, already with a man’s body, all muscle, his cock large and powerful, his eyes as ice-cold as the densest glacier. She recognized Savage staring at her before he walked back to the girl and once again licked at her tears, his hands roaming over her body, his cock sliding into her slick pussy as he took her hard and fast, uncaring of the blood running down her body.
Scarlet was staring into those same blank eyes right at that moment. She had no idea how she connected with his past so clearly, that terrible vignette of his life, but those images of his teenage training sent chills down her spine.
“You see me,” he said, his voice completely devoid of emotion. “Now we understand