Page 35 of Bound

My voice shakes. “Not theirs.”

“Not the Morettis.”

The belt leaves my skin. He pulls himself to a stand. He towers over me. I can’t breathe. The silence before the first strike is unbearable.

Then it lands. Not brutal and not soft.

A sharp, bright line of heat across the middle of my ass, hip to hip.

I gasp, grabbing the edge of the velvet pillow. The sting blooms fast, spreading through me in a hot rush.

He crouches down again. His palm follows instantly, rubbing over the mark, soothing what he just lit.

“Color.”

My breath comes too fast. “Green.”

His mouth brushes my shoulder. Tingles travel up my skin. A nip at my neck. “Good girl.”

The praise breaks me a little.

The belt strikes me again. This one is lower. Heat and pain dance along the lower curve of my ass where it meets the tops of my thighs. This time I know what is coming, and somehow that makes it worse. Better. My body braces. My mind scatters.

Still, every ugly thought Carlos planted rises, trying to get its teeth into me.

I came as a weapon. I carried the fob. I lied.

The belt snaps down again.

I cry out freely, grateful for Bachman’s obsession with soundproofing.

Lucian’s hand is there now warm and firm, rubbing the sting into heat.

“What are you?” he demands.

I shake my head.

His palm grips my hip. “Answer me.”

“I don’t know.”

Wrong answer.

The belt lands again. Sharper. I gasp his name, half protest, half plea. “Lucian.”

Lucian steps in behind me, his shirt and chest brushing my back, his voice rough at my ear. “Yes, you do.”

I squeeze my eyes shut.

“I was sent,” I whisper.

His whole body goes still.

“I was sent to you,” I say, my voice breaking. “The Morettis sent me. Carlos opened the door. I walked through it.”

Lucian’s hand slides around my throat, not squeezing, only holding me exactly where I am.

“Yes,” he says.