Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 130317 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 652(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130317 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 652(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
“I’m doing it, baby girl,” he growled. “Get up on my lap right now and take what’s coming to you!”
Mia’s eyes went even wider but she came to him anyway. To Sev’s satisfaction, she lay on the couch, arranging herself face down across his lap with her ass in the air.
“Good,” he said. “Now I’m going to give you a bare-ass spanking for being so stubborn. Understand?”
Mia didn’t look up but he heard a muffled “Yes, Sir,” which he approved of.
Reaching down, he pulled up the hem of her night shirt to bare her full, luscious ass. Then he began to spank her.
He didn’t go too hard—the idea was to teach her a lesson and get her to talk, not hurt her. But he didn’t go too soft either—the spanking was a real punishment for putting herself in danger and it ought to sting.
“Oh! Oh, please, Sir!” Mia gasped and writhed on his lap until he had to hold her down. Wrapping one arm around her, he continued with her punishment. Smack…smack…smack… His big hand rose and fell, turning her ass sunset red before he finally let her up.
By then she was crying, the tears filling her clear gray eyes in a way that twisted Sev’s heart. She had needed the punishment, but he hated to see her upset.
“Come here, baby,” he murmured, turning her over and pulling her against his chest. “It’s okay—everything is going to be all right now.” He stroked her long hair away from her face and waited for her to get control of herself.
Mia swiped at her eyes and pressed close to him. Sev was glad to see that she was willing to take the comfort he was offering. Maybe the spanking had softened her up and they could finally get to the root of what was hurting her.
“All right, baby girl,” he said softly. “Now tell me—why did I spank you?”
“I…because I was putting myself in danger…Sir?” Mia said, looking up at him uncertainly.
“That’s part of it.” Sev nodded. “What else?”
She shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
“Because you’re shutting me out,” Sev explained patiently. “You’re hurting—I can see that. But until you tell me what’s hurting you, I can’t help you, baby girl.” He stroked her flushed cheek gently and looked into her eyes. “Talk to me, Mia. What’s wrong?”
“I…” She bit her lip and looked down at her hands. “It’s so…so embarrassing.”
“Tell me anyway,” Sev said. Guessing, he asked, “Does it have to do with those images they were showing on the screen when I found you in the Inner Sanctum?” That felt right because he remembered how ashamed she’d been—how she’d tried to take the caning because she’d been, as she said, “wrong and dirty.”
“That’s…part of it,” she confessed and her cheeks went even pinker, letting him know he’d guessed correctly. “It’s just…that’s not the first time something like that has…has happened to me. And it…it reminded me of how bad I am and how I don’t…don’t deserve to be happy.”
“What?” Sev frowned. He’d had an idea that the time they spent at the PPP Dome had stirred up bad memories of the past for Mia—the same way they had evoked his own past on his home planet. But he still didn’t know what those memories were. “Why would you think you’re bad and you don’t deserve to be happy, baby?” he asked her gently. “What happened to make you think that?”
“I guess I might as well tell you,” she said dully. “You already saw what I was doing on that screen.”
“What? Touching yourself?” Sev shrugged, uncertain why this was such a problem. “Why is that a big deal? I mean, I know it must have been embarrassing for everyone to see it—those bastards—showing it like that!” Just the thought of how her privacy had been violated made him angry all over again. “But everybody does it—touches themselves, I mean.”
“Not at the PPP Dome, they don’t—at least, women don’t,” Mia pointed out. “And they didn’t in the sect I grew up in, either. Masturbation was considered one of the worst sins you could commit. Like you were going straight to Hell if you did it—that kind of thing.”
“What?” Sev frowned.
He knew a little of the concept of “Hell” she was talking about—some Earth religions believed in a fiery pit where souls burned in agony forever. The Kindred version of Hell was different—it was complete and total separation from the Goddess. A black void where no good thing could ever come because her goodness and light had been forever excluded. Sev didn’t know which idea was worse, but he could understand how the idea of a lake of eternal fire would frighten a vulnerable child.
“You told me this wasn’t the first time it happened to you—what exactly?” he asked, trying to form a more coherent question. “Being called out for, uh, touching yourself?”