AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I’m preparing a quick lunch in the kitchen when he comes in and puts a comforting hand on my back. But I can’t accept his comfort. It’s become harder with each time I’ve rejected him. So I pull away and keep my eyes firmly trained on the knife in my hand, slicing through vegetables.
“Clara,” he says with a stern warning.
I flinch and halt the motions of the knife.
“Look at me,” he demands.
I shake my head, staring into the red tomatoes on the cutting board. I can’t bear to face him. Not when he’s the reason I’ve shut Markus out—not when he’s the real reason Markus left.
Seeking comfort with Grigory is betraying Markus.
A large hand closes around my wrist. “Let go,” he says.
My muscles constrict, and I tighten my grip on the knife. But Grigory just squeezes my wrist until the strength drains from my hand and he can pry it from my fingers.
Not bothering to find out if I’ll disobey another order, he grabs my arm and steers me into the living room.
My head starts spinning, emotions surfacing like a shark bursting from the deep as I try to figure out what to do. Should I tell him to leave? Fight him? Use my safeword?
I’m nowhere near a decision when Grigory sinks onto the couch and drags me over his lap in one swift motion. Too tense to move, I just lie there, torso flat over the couch and legs hanging toward the floor.
Even knowing what’s coming, I can’t get a protest out. I’m frozen, unable to do anything but try to shut myself off. So I do just that. I draw in on myself, ignoring the submissive urge tugging at me and the gnawing guilt.
Deft hands shove my skirt up, gliding over my hips with a too intimate touch before they drag my pantyhose down to expose my butt.
Usually, even when punishing me, Grigory starts out relatively mild, working his way up to the punishing pain. But there’s no build-up today. His enormous hand crashes down on my ass in a harrowing rain of painful strikes.
Smack! Smack! Smack! Smack!
The sound keeps going, ringing out into the room in rapid succession. My butt is on fire, and it keeps burning and burning without end.
I try to shut myself off from the pain, remain stiff and numb, but each blow tears through my rigid walls, and soon I’m scratching at the sofa and kicking my legs behind me. But Grigory just pins my legs with his free arm, and I’m too numb to move my upper body.
So I turn to screaming instead. Shrill wails mix with the sharp sounds of flesh hitting flesh. The noise drives me to madness, finally shoving me out of the anxious paralysis.
“Stop,” I yelp. “I don’t want this.” I repeat the words over and over as I flail my legs and start writhing. I end up putting in all my strength, but it’s still no match for Grigory. He simply presses a hand to my back while the other keeps raining cruel smacks over my butt.
My words morph into angry sputtering. “I hate you. You fucking bastard. You have no right to do this.”
“Damned right I do,” Grigory growls, slamming his hand onto my ass with even more force. “You’re my responsibility now, and if you won’t let me take care of you, I’ll damn well make you.”
Something starts building inside me. Something heavy and oppressive that I’ve forced down for long. I try to keep it in and hold onto my hatred, but as the assault keeps going, pain bursting through my system in blinding flashes, it gets harder to hold onto anything.
Smack! Smack! Smack! Smack!
The sound has no end; the pain has no end.
Suddenly, I can’t bear it. Hopelessness shudders through my body and breaks me into tears and sobs. I’m no longer scratching or kicking, but holding on, clutching the cushion in my hands and wanting nothing but to stay here with Grigory, no matter what he does to me.
“That’s it,” he says, his voice now full of appraisal. “Good girl. Let it all out.”
Smack! Smack! Smack! Smack!
He keeps raining down his heavy hand, sending deep bolts of pain into my flesh and muscle, spurring on my tears until I’m weeping from the bottom of my heart.
When he finally lifts me up to sit in his lap and gathers me close, I feel hollow and broken. But the suffocating weight in my chest is gone, the aching tension the same.
I keep crying for a long while, clinging to Grigory like my life depended on it. “Please don’t leave me,” I whimper as a surge of the uncertainty I felt last summer suddenly rises.
