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“Because I want to begin as I mean for us to go on.” As he said this, he ran a hand up her back and lightly squeezed her nape. Perhaps he tried to soothe her, but her body was shaking with quiet tremors that would not subside.
“But…”
“But?” he asked patiently. “You asked me if I would spank you in our marriage, and I said I would. You agreed it would be appropriate, remember?”
“But—” Harmony tried to untangle the muddle of her feelings. “I thought you would only spank me when I’ve done something wrong.”
He considered that. “Sometimes I will spank you for disciplinary purposes. Other times, like tonight, I’ll spank you to foster a sense of closeness between us. If I only ever spanked you when I was cross, you would come to hate it, and perhaps even hate me. And that would sadden me greatly.”
Somehow Harmony couldn’t fault the logic in that. “But— But—” He waited for her to collect her thoughts. “But how can it make us feel closer?”
He kissed her again, just a light brush across her lips. “It is easier to show you than explain.”
With those words, he guided her body forward until she was draped across his legs. Harmony did not resist, although she felt exposed and awfully endangered. He smoothed the skirt of her nightgown over her bottom and pulled her flush against his body, so she felt more secure. A little more secure.
“But—”
He paused in arranging her. She looked back at him, wishing this made more sense.
“I am afraid you will hurt me.” She still remembered the spanking in Newcastle. The pain of it had been quite surprising. She wasn’t sure this wedding night activity would result in the closeness he sought.
“This will not hurt much, this spanking,” he assured her. “You are not being punished. You’ll come to know the difference between the two.”
“So you are not at all angry with me?”
“No.” He stroked his palm across her bottom. “Merely enamored. You are my duchess. My wife. Now, put your hands on the floor and keep them there.”
She very nearly said no. She would have said no if he hadn’t asked with such politeness, and if his palm upon her bottom hadn’t felt so pleasantly warm. He began to push up her nightgown, and then she really felt she must stop him. But she didn’t.
He bared her right up to her waist and she let him, keeping her hands on the floor as she’d been told, even though her face burned and her mind was spinning from this new state of affairs. It was her wedding night, but rather than kissing or having marital relations with her, he was arranging her over his knee. He was spanking her simply because he wished to spank her, because he was her husband now and had the right to do it.
This wasn’t what she’d expected at all!
She told herself she would stop him as soon as he began, explain to him that she did not agree with being spanked at his whim, whenever he wished it. The very idea! She let him give her a few light smacks, only because she was trying to think of exactly what to say—but it became increasingly difficult to think. The spanks were not too hard, but hard enough that an excited, hot feeling bloomed in her pelvis where she bent over. Her body began to anticipate the rhythmic blows, to enjoy them, even.
She tensed her buttocks, distracted and confused. Part of her wanted to rebel against this patently unfair treatment, but a larger part of her wanted to continue to submit because the pain felt pleasurable in the strangest way. After a time, he spanked her harder. Not painfully hard, but harder, and still she didn’t resist. She understood the difference, just as he’d told her. He was not smacking her as sharply as he’d done in Newcastle, when she’d felt punished indeed. This was different. The pain was not bitter, but sweet.
She wasn’t sure if she was supposed to feel such pleasure from what he was doing, but she did. She stopped thinking about halting him and protesting this treatment, and gave herself up to experiencing it instead. The sounds of each spank, accompanied by the soft intake of his breath, the size and pressure of his hand against her bare skin… It ought to feel scandalous to her, being naked to his gaze, his hand smacking away at her bottom, but he did not make it seem that way. I want to begin as I mean for us to go on.
She shifted her hips, but didn’t attempt to get away from him. His large hands heated not only her cheeks but the side of her flanks and the tops of her thighs. Her entire bottom grew throbby and tingly, and she began to feel a restless need for more. Either harder spanking or something else. She moaned, confused, wanting to touch him, wanting him to hold her close and explain these feelings to her.
“What is it?” he asked, pausing.
It is that I cannot tell if you are hurting or pleasing me just now. This was nothing at all like the spanking he’d given her in Newcastle. Then, she had cried and wished for it to end. Now she only wanted more.
He gave her more. Sharper slaps that heightened the tingling to an aching pain. She threw a glimpse over her shoulder to find him watching her with a dark, assessing gaze. She was aware of his hard thighs beneath her belly and his other hand braced at her waist. She was aware of his brocade dressing gown against the underside of one arm, and her flimsy silk nightgown whispering across her nipples as she shifted. His blows didn’t hurt much in isolation; it was the continued assault that made her feel curiously close to some edge. She wanted to cry, not from pain, but the sheer intensity of their interaction. He had been correct. Spanking could bring them closer. This realization resulted in a small, shocked sob. Upon hearing it, he ceased spanking and caressed her burning bottom.
“Good girl.” His voice was a caress in itself. She was lifted, righted. She felt loose and floppy, like a doll he manipulated with his great hands. He stood her before him, letting her nightgown fall back down to her ankles. His face looked severe, but not in a cruel way.
She gazed back in a kind of stupor, beyond explaining the way he’d made her feel. The way he still made her feel, just by looking at her that way. “I understand now,” she finally said. “I understand what you meant. About…about the closeness.”
His fingertips strayed over the curves of her heated bottom. “I’m glad.”
She shifted, his desultory caress increasing the taunting ache in her
center. “Will you do that to me every night?”
“Spank you? Not likely. The other, perhaps.” His lips widened in a slow smile. “Every night would suit me very well.”
Harmony thought she knew what he meant, but she wasn’t taking anything for granted on this night of such surprises. “What other?”
His smile disappeared as his expression turned intent again. “Lie down and I’ll show you, my love.”
Chapter Eleven: The Best Part
He will not hurt me. He is kind and caring. Harmony repeated that to herself as he guided her back on the bed and slid under the covers beside her. He shrugged out of his dressing gown, carelessly, impatiently, and Harmony thought he would fall on her and strip her next. She feared roughness and abruptness, but he was gentle. He touched the neckline of her nightgown, traced the delicate ivory ribbon that drew it closed. Only then did he slowly untie it. She stared transfixed at his broad naked chest, his shoulders so different in form and breadth from hers, and his taut stomach below, a compelling ladder of muscles. She wanted to touch them so badly her fingertips ached.
“I— I never thought I would marry,” she whispered as he parted the collar of her gown. “I never really thought much about…what we are to do.”
He leaned close and kissed her just beneath her ear. “Very little thinking is required.”
“Oh.” She sighed as his lips brushed across her neck, followed by more lingering kisses. He plundered her mouth, then licked beneath her chin as his hands came to rest at the base of her throat. With a smooth, easing movement, he brushed his palms down over her breasts. She leaned forward into his hands, needing his touch, his contact. He pressed her back instead and kissed her again. As he did, his hands opened over her nipples. His fingers sought and traced them, and Harmony’s whole body reacted with flaring, racing…desire.
That had to be what this was. Desire, arousal. Wicked cravings. “Oh…” she whispered.
“Oh,” he echoed softly, stroking her again. He was so calm, his touch so deft and practiced. She stared at him in a kind of shock. His manner of touching was like no other touch she’d experienced before. It was gentle and yet so powerful. She didn’t only feel the contact in her nipples, but in the ache of her bottom and the heated throb between her legs. She grasped at his hand, halting him.
