‘I could have taken more,’ I said.
He gave my shoulder an affectionate squeeze.
‘You’re as rare a find as anything in my collection,’ he said.
I wondered if he was going to kiss me, or touch me, or do anything to assuage the fire that raged between my legs now that the sting was levelling into a delicious soreness.
He pulled me to my feet and held me against him until I stopped shaking. I squashed my face into his expensive shirt and breathed him in. I could have stayed there for ever, wrapped up and warmed, but event
ually he gave my bottom a little pat and whispered, ‘Run along now.’
It stung far worse than his razor strop. I jerked my neck back, lips parted in dismay.
‘Run along?’
‘Yes. We’ve both got work to do.’
He softened visibly at my appalled expression and stroked my hair.
‘Oh, Sarah,’ he said. ‘Don’t get in too deep, my love.’
‘I’m not!’ Arrogant swine.
‘I hope not. Do you want me to fuck you?’
I shook my head, though I did, of course, but it wasn’t meant to be like this. It wasn’t meant to be this bald, flat question, almost a statement.
‘You don’t? Well, what’s the matter then?’
‘I thought … forget it. I was mistaken.’
I tried to wrench myself from his grasp but he held me fast, his eye on me, sizing me up.
‘Sarah, you’re here for the whole summer. We’ve got plenty of time. We can get to know each other.’
This was better. I stopped struggling.
‘And I want you to want it,’ he whispered. ‘I want you to want it really badly. I want to make you wait until you can’t bear it for another minute. I want to hear you beg me for it.’
He slid his hands under my skirt, which had fallen back down over my bottom, and lifted it again, cupping the sore buttocks, squeezing them.
‘I think you’re wet,’ he said into my ear. ‘I think you’re a real glutton for punishment, aren’t you?’
I tried to remove my ear from the toxic influence of his silken words, but he found it again, and poured more of them in.
‘I think I might have to punish you again,’ he said. ‘Maybe every day. And when you’re good and wet and ready, I’ll tie your wrists to the bed.’ He nipped at my earlobe, so delicately, so devastatingly. ‘Then I’ll make you spread your legs and hold them wide open for me and do you know what I’ll do?’
‘No.’
‘I’ll breathe on your clit. Just one hot breath. And I’ll leave you there, tied up, legs wide, every cell in your body screaming to be fucked. And maybe I’ll come back and fuck you later. And maybe I won’t.’
He rubbed his nose in my hair, then down my neck.
I almost ground myself against his pelvis. Almost. God, it was hard not to.
Kiss me, I pleaded silently. Kiss my mouth.
But he let go of me, then turned me around by my shoulders and propelled me to the door. I was still hobbled around the ankles by my knickers and I nearly stumbled.