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When I don’t reply, he forces my legs wider and slaps my pussy again. Only this time, he freezes when he pulls his hand back and feels the undeniable evidence of what can only be my arousal. I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense. Logically, I’m aware of that. But I can feel it too. I’m soaked for him. Maybe it’s biology. Maybe it’s derangement. But the evidence of my body’s betrayal is there, and I wish the earth would just open up and swallow me whole.
There’s a long moment when the room falls into complete stillness. The only sound is our collective ragged breaths. His body is warm, trapping me against the bed, and I’m too exhausted to keep fighting. He’s done what he set out to do by leeching every last ounce of my resistance this morning, but at what cost?
“No more,” he grunts finally. “I’m taking you to the stables now, and you’re going to do what I tell you. Understand?”
I’m so relieved he’s not forcing me to acknowledge what he just felt between my thighs that all I can do is nod. But his mercy is not easily won, and he proves it when he removes the knotted fabric around my wrists, followed by the shorts around my ankles. He has me naked. Again.
“Judge—” I squeak when he drags me upright, wrapping one of the sheets around my body. “What are you—?”
He hoists me up over his shoulder, my legs dangling over his front while my head bobs over his back… with a perfect view of his ass. Oh, dear baby Jesus.
“You can’t—”
“Don’t fucking test me,” he snaps. “I’m on a schedule, and already, you have delayed me for the second time this week.”
I heed his warning, not because I’m afraid, but because I know it’s fruitless. I’m only delaying the inevitable. And right now, all I can think about is if he’s taking me outside, perhaps there’s a chance at escape.
He hauls me out of my room and down the hall, winding his way through the house until we reach the front door. As my luck would have it, Miriam is about, smirking as she watches him carry me off like he’s about to sell me at the market.
He doesn’t set me down, even once we’re outside. He hauls me like it’s nothing to him, and I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me, given his obvious strength. If he really wanted to hurt me, he could, very easily. Not that my ass isn’t smarting, but I know it could be worse. So, so much worse.
He enters the stables and sets me down with a grunt, grabbing me by the wrist and yanking me forward. It’s at about this point I realize how truly disgusting it is in here. It smells like horse shit, and the floor beneath my bare feet is undoubtedly filthy too. I thought the soup incident was bad, but I realize now it was nothing compared to this.
Judge stops at a supply closet off to the left, opens it, and retrieves what appears to be a large leather dog collar and two locks. When he turns to me, my instinct is to pull away, but he tightens his grip and halts me with little effort.
“Fight me, and I will make this so much worse for you,” he growls. “I’m done playing, Mercedes.”
I swallow as he yanks the sheet off my body, and it falls to the floor. Then he spins me in his arms and secures the collar around my neck, followed by a padlock that he loops through the ring and one of the spare holes, making it impossible to remove. When he’s finished with that, he leads me to the center of the stables, where a large metal arm hangs from the ceiling with a chain dangling from the end all the way to the floor. On the bottom of the chain, there are four more individual attachments, one of which he secures to my collar with the addition of another lock.
When he’s satisfied that he has me shackled like a dog, he returns to the entrance and retrieves a wheelbarrow, a shovel, and a thick broom.
“Start on that side.” He points at one row of stalls. “I’ll take the horses out of the other, and you can clean those while I ride. I want them all done by the time I return in an hour. Is that clear?”
“You must be delusional.” I snort.
“Test me,” he threatens. “Either you’ll do this or I’ll lock you up naked in the cellar where I kept Ivy, and I won’t come back for you for a week.”
This time, his warning sends a real frisson of terror through me. That place was so fucking creepy. There’s no way in hell I’m going in there with all the skeletal remains of god knows what creatures. I actually felt pity for the woman when she was in there, and that’s saying a lot.
“Do we have an understanding?” he demands.
“Yes.” I glare at him. “I understand perfectly well.” He turns on his heel, and I mutter under my breath. “Fucking asshole.”
Judge didn’t leave me with a lot of instructions, but he did add a few more while he was preparing the horses. I’ll admit, it felt strange watching him in his natural environment. He was at ease, the tension leaving his body as he climbed astride one of the horse’s backs and led the others along beside him out of the stables.
Once I was left alone with my thoughts and nothing else, of course, I tried and failed to release myself from the restraints he’d placed on me. The locks weren’t overly large, but they were strong. I attempted to break them off by force, which was stupid in retrospect because it left me with little to show for it other than a bruise on my neck. When that didn’t work, I considered trying to cut through the leather collar but noted with frustration that Judge had taken care to remove any sharp instruments from my immediate surroundings and locked the closet before he left.
I tested the limits of my chain to see how far I could go, which, in the end, wasn’t that far. It allowed me enough length to reach both ends of the stables but no farther. I was well and truly trapped, and given that I’d already wasted a considerable amount of time trying to find a way out, I had no choice but to accept my fate. It was either clean up horse shit, or have my ass thrown in the cellar with no creature comforts at all.
It was a painful task dragging myself back into the stalls. The smell of urine was overwhelming, and it burned my nostrils as I worked. But worse was the fact that I had zero protection on my body. The straw chafed against my skin as I stepped over it, and replacing it with fresh bedding was no easy feat. My entire body was scratched and raw. On top of that, I had stepped in a pile of manure when I wasn’t paying attention, and I had slipped and fallen into the soiled bedding. So I was quite certain I smelled and looked disgusting.
It was truly awful, and I was really feeling sorry for myself until I remembered why I was here in the first place. That woman I had killed. As much as I didn’t want to admit it, this was probably the best alternative I could have hoped for. If I didn’t have the protection of The Society behind me, and my brother’s swift cleaning of that mess before anyone could find out, I could easily be sitting in The Tribunal’s prison for the rest of my life.
There are moments when I still wonder if it’s what I deserve. Those thoughts war with my justifications. The reminder that she tried to kill my brother. I want to believe she got what she deserved because it makes me feel better about what I’ve done, but it doesn’t bring me any peace. Nothing brings me peace.
I’m exhausted and emotional by the time Judge finally returns. And worse yet, I’m not finished. I’m on the last stall, sniffling quietly, when I hear the clip-clop of the horses’ hooves over the floor. I don’t turn to look. Like a well-trained circus animal, I shovel faster, dreading that he might follow through on his word to toss me in the cellar.
I hear the stall doors closing as he puts the horses away, and my heartbeat quickens when the sound of his boots approaches me from behind. He doesn’t say a word as I race to finish, but I can feel his eyes boring into my back. The undeniable evidence of my scars is on display in the light of morning.
