Tethered (The Stables Trilogy #2) (6 page)

His hand tugged her head back further, her neck craned. The other hand released her breast and crept slowly, tantalizing and terrifyingly slow, up to her throat. It cupped her there. She knew he’d feel the rapid-fire pounding of her heart through her delicate skin.

“Why can’t you just obey?” The question hissed in her ear, making her quiver. “Why do you challenge me?” The fingers on her throat tightened. Her breaths became thin wheezes. Maple’s eyes rolled, and her hips ground against J.B.

“Damn you,” he cursed, the pressure growing on her neck until she couldn’t inhale. Burning air immediately built in her lungs. Between her legs she was aching, her clit so swollen just a touch would set her off. “Damn what you do to me!”

J.B. released her throat, and she drew a deep, bruising inhale. He let go of her hair, too. Both of his hands reached around her, quickly unbuttoning her shirt. Working quickly, he unbuttoned it all of the way, yanking it off and down.

“Pull your pants down,” he commanded.

There was a voice that J.B. used when training the pony girls. It was firm, controlled. Loud and clear. It demanded obedience and rewarded when obedience was given. The voice J.B. was using now wasn’t that voice. This one was lower. He growled his demands.

The only control in it was the thin rope he was clinging to.

Rushing, she fumbled as she undid the fly on her jeans, yanking them down.

“Lay your top flat on the desk. Ass out.”

Maple lowered her bared chest to the glass desk. The cool, smooth surface sent ice through her veins, and she shivered. It contrasted with the intense heat she felt between her legs.

“This is a punishment, Maple. You deserve it. You’re a naughty girl, a rule breaker, and a tease.”

She should be ashamed. But Maple wasn’t ashamed. Lust was her master, tugging at her puppet strings, and she surrendered fully to it.

“You’ve heard of the rule of thumb?” J.B. growled as he asked her.

With her cheek pressed to the glass, she saw him go to the wall of bamboo switches. The first time she’d been in the office, she’d assumed it was just another art installation. As he grabbed a long, thin switch off the wall, it dawned on her that it served dual purposes.

She spread her legs a bit.

The first swing was a warm up. A prelude. The switch licked across her ass. It was a quick caress that left stinging in its absence. A few more soft slaps of the switch warmed her skin. The thin cotton of her panties barely shielded her from the hits. Maple moaned and rolled her hips. 

This angered J.B. She knew it because the next hit whistled through the air before striking. It felt as if the bamboo cut into her, and she screamed, her fingernails scratching at the desk. Instinct made her want to jump away. Training kept her in place. “Tell me what you did wrong, Maple.”

“I groomed Bane!” The switch hit again once. Twice. Her ass and thighs were on fire now, screaming. There shouldn’t be pleasure in this, but just having him here, behind her, was enough to make the need in her core crippling.

“Tell me what you did wrong, Maple.”

The endorphins were already flooding her system. When combined with the wild neediness she felt for him and the menacing flares of pain, it provided a fog that made thinking straight impossible. She’d told him what she’d done wrong!

“...I groomed Bane?”

He unleashed on her, whacking her over and over on her ass. This was discipline. He wasn’t trying to coax a response out of her. He was invested in her punishment. The rapid-fire whistles of the switch made the air hum. Fear bloomed in her chest. This felt different than what she wanted. She’d wanted the desperate, torrid passion he’d shown in the stable.

This was black punishment.

She screamed as he whipped her, her throat wracked by sobs and pain. Her hips writhed, trying to avoid the slicing slap of the switch. This only made it worse, the whole of her lower body catching hits.

“What. Did. You. Do?”

Her mind raced, trying to pick through the onslaught of emotions and physical responses for the answer he was seeking. “I-I disobeyed.”

He was still. She shuddered and sobbed, her face sliding in the slick mess left by her tears.

“Don’t do it again,” he seethed. “You should be gone. My business, Maple, relies on trust. I have to be able to trust my employees. Yet time and time again, you break that trust. You break the rules.”

She heard his switch drop to the floor. When he touched the inflamed skin on her backside, she whelped. “Why can’t I let you go?” J.B. whispered as he traced soft design in the heat of her skin. It ached, prickling spikes following the trail of his design. “Why are you trying to ruin me?”

“I’m not,” she croaked out. “I’m sorry,” she added. And she was.

“Get up,” he ordered, but softer. She did. “Sit on the desk.”

She wanted to shake her head. Surely he wasn’t going to make her sit after that! Yet this was all because she couldn’t obey him. It startled her that she’d spent so much time falling over backwards for Tony, yet remained defiant toward J.B. She wanted J.B., more than anything else, yet it seemed like she was determined to piss him off.

Because you’re tainted. You do want to ruin him. You want to pull him down to your despicable level.

She sat on the desk, gulping back the pained gasps. The coolness of the glass was a small comfort. He stood in front of her now. His hair was damp with sweat, his chest heaving from exertion. The tether he kept on his control was back in place. This was J.B. the rancher, the trainer.

“In a few days I leave for the show.”

Maple nodded, trying hard not to shift her weight. Each movement, no matter how small, sent pulses of pain up and down her backside.

“You’re coming with me.”

“Okay.”

“You’re the only person I’ve made numerous promises to and broken them, Maple. I promised to fire you if you went in the stable. If you touched Bane. You’ve done those things and more.” He stepped closer and she saw the muscles in his jaw twitch. Okay, so not as in control as she’d thought. “I don’t like giving second chances.”

“Spread your legs.” Swallowing hard, she did. It was excruciating. He’d given Tony a run for his money on dealing out pain. Possibly even superceded him.

That shouldn’t be as appealing as it was.

Cool air met with her sodden panties. His green and blue eyes speared her. Without breaking eye contact, without even blinking, he reached forward and pushed aside the soaked cotton.

His fingers stroked her sensitive, swollen lips. Maple mewled, spreading her legs wider, but she never stopped looking him in the eyes.

J.B. didn’t play with her. He pinched her clit then, hard, twisting the nub roughly.

Maple came, hard. Her body jerked and her toes curled. Her backside was beginning to bruise, and it screamed due to her writhing. J.B. kept his hold, rubbing her, rubbing her, making the orgasm continue until coming wasn’t a release anymore, it was its own punishment. Her clit slipped quickly from desperate-for-release to way over sensitive, but he wouldn’t let go.

His eyes never stopped looking at her.

The waves of pleasure became shocks, too intense to be enjoyed. “Oh, God, J.B., please!” She started to scoot away from him, but his over hand caught her at the curve of her hip. His thumb drove into her hip bone, gripping tight, forcing her to endure the twisting of her clit.

A second orgasm began to build, white hot. He stroked her harder, his touch almost bruising. He was still punishing her, even now, for not obeying. Taking his frustration with her out on her body.

“Come
now
, Maple,” he ordered.

For once, she obeyed. The second orgasm was quicker, a flash, but it ripped her apart. Howling, Maple threw her hands behind her to keep from crashing through the desk.

He released her.

“Get the fuck out.”

Just like that, he gave her an order like he’d stopped her in the middle of a job instead of bent her over a desk and whipped her.

Shaky and unsure, Maple slid of the desk, yelping at the pains in caused. Her fingers shook as she buttoned her shirt and pulled up her pants. When J.B. didn’t say anything else, just waited, cold and aloof, she knew she’d been dismissed.

Maple had just come harder than she’d ever come in her life, yet she walked away feeling nauseous.

What the hell was that
?

Maple limped back to her room. Every step was agony. Her ass, hips, and thighs throbbed with each step. Her movements were slow, but Maple’s mind was racing.

The world she thought she knew had just been turned upside down. The rules had been made clear. J.B. wasn’t going to be with her. He was barely tolerating her presence. Any attraction they felt wasn’t supposed to mean anything.

But he was right-- he kept giving her chances when he should have fired her. It wasn’t that Maple wanted to be fired. It was just, well, some impulses were too hard to resist. It didn’t help that her impulse to groom Bane stemmed from a moral dilemma: it came, in this bizarre, fucked up ranch, from a place of love.

Maple didn’t love Bane, but she loved horses. These ones in her care even more than most. J.B. had a past with Bane, and she got it, she really did. But she couldn’t just stand aside and watch such a magnificent stallion be locked away like a prisoner. So she’d acted, and, even with each wincing step, she couldn’t find it in her to feel regret.

Then there was J.B.’s form of punishment. He
knew
her. Knew what made her tick, and obviously, he knew what made her come. If he’d wanted her to feel remorse, then why had he turned her on? Given in to the dark pleasures she wanted? That he obviously wanted too?

He’d made her orgasm, hard, and then he’d kicked her out.

Confused and feeling jittery, Maple finally made it to her room. Stripping her clothes, she turned to look in the mirror.

The pattern was beautiful. J.B. was an artist, and he’d made her skin a masterpiece. The lattice of red welts was meticulous, each stripe painful and exacting. It looked to Maple like an act of worship, not punishment.

So what did that mean? Her heart beat too fast, fluttering in her throat.

Ice cold water burst from the showerhead. Maple’s nipples tightened painfully, as if trying to hide from the bitter chill of the shower. On her backside, though, it was a blessing, soothing the inflamed skin.

It also offered a stark focus, cutting through the fog of her confusing emotions.

Maple didn’t know what it meant, that J.B. kept her here.

That he had broken one of his rules, too. He’d touched her.