The Firm Hand of the Law (12 page)

“I’m sorry…”

“Go inside. Go to my bedroom. Take your clothes off and wait for me.”

He gave the orders calmly, but they made her stomach quiver. She opened her mouth to ask a question, but shut it again and decided just to obey. Whatever he had in store, she probably deserved. Maybe he was right. Maybe she did need to be in trouble. As she stripped out of the dress she had been wearing since their date, she figured she was probably too messed up in the head for anyone to really know what was going on in there.

Gareth entered the room, holding a long silk tie in his hands. He didn’t have to say what it was for. She was going to be cuffed, but this time he was using something a little less institutional to take her freedom away.

“Seems to me you can’t get by without being in trouble,” he said, swirling his finger in a gesture to make her turn around. “Put your hands behind your back.”

She did as she was told, feeling vulnerable and excited at the same time. His bedroom smelled of him, warm and masculine. Gareth looped the silk around her wrists with a practiced touch which made her think he’d probably done it before. Within seconds she was both naked and restrained, completely at his mercy.

Gareth gathered the pillows from the head of the bed and piled them in the center. “Bend over.”

It was an awkward task, crawling onto the bed without hands, but she managed to shuffle over the soft coverlet and put herself in the position he asked for. It wasn’t uncomfortable once she laid over the pillows which supported her hips and raised her cheeks.

“You’ve been bad, Brannigan,” he drawled, slapping her bottom lightly with his palm. “But you know that already. What you don’t know is what’s going to happen when you’re a bad girl.”

He was so perfectly calm and in control that Lily was a little worried. He should have been madder. He should have been lecturing and growling. Instead he was just firm and determined. She could hear it in his tone and see it in his eyes.

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” He was unbuttoning his shirt as he spoke, revealing a muscular expanse of chest covered in a pelt of thick, dark hair. His biceps and forearms rippled with the motion as he prepared for God only knew what.

“I…” Lily didn’t have the words to explain herself. She didn’t understand herself, not really. Anything she could have said wouldn’t have helped. “I’m sorry,” she said, realizing how lame that sounded.

“It’s easy to be sorry when you’re caught,” Gareth said, slapping her bottom with hard, resounding strokes that made her bottom jiggle and burn. A few more slaps like that and she was struggling against her bonds in an effort to protect her bottom. It was to no avail. The soft silk was just as effective as handcuffs as he palmed her bare bottom, then slapped her right cheek hard enough to make her squeal. “You wanted trouble,” he growled, prowling around her in his shirtless state. “Now you’re in real trouble.”

Gareth stood before her, letting her watch as his thick fingers went to his waist and began working at his belt. It made a soft 
thwip
 sound as he pulled it out of its loops and doubled it over in his fist.

“Let’s see how you like the consequences of real trouble.”

“No! Jesus, Gareth.” She heard the panic in her voice. So did he. Before lashing the belt down across her oh so deserving cheeks, he paused and patted her bottom.

“You’re safe,” he said in that low rumble that made her believe him. “You’re safe, but you’re about to have a very sore backside.” She felt the leather drift over her buttocks in slow, almost hypnotic swirls. “Count each stroke,” he instructed. “You count nicely, and you’ll save yourself some trouble.”

Just when she didn’t think it could get any worse, he’d made it worse. Bad enough to be vulnerable to his belt, even worse to be vulnerable to his authority. If she was counting out loud there could be no denying that he was in charge. There could be no struggle if she was complicit in her own discipline. As she was struggling with his instructions, the belt cracked down across her bottom without warning.

“Count it.”

She made a whining sound before nearly whispering the word. “One.”

“Good girl,” he said. “But I want to hear that louder.”

“Gareth!” She whined his name, but he wasn’t having it. He slapped the leather down again, catching the bottom of her cheeks.

“Two,” she gasped as her skin stung.

“Good.” He raised the leather again. Lily was starting to relax and settle down. It wasn’t as painful as she had expected it to be. It wasn’t pleasant, but she could stand it.

The third stroke landed against the crowns of her cheeks. It fizzed and stung and maybe left a little bit of a welt. She couldn’t see of course, but there was something about the way the belt caught her bottom that gave her the impression she was going to be in some serious trouble next time she came to sit.

“Five!”

“Five?” He repeated the word, incredulous. “You think this is funny, girl?”

She looked up into his face, hoping to see a little glimmer of amusement. If there was any, he was keeping it very well hidden. His stern features were perfectly composed.

“Three?”

He shook his head curtly. “We’re starting over.”

“No! Please! I’m sorry.”

“You said you were sorry, then you tried being cute. Let’s see where cute gets you.” He put his hand on her lower back and brought the belt down one, two, three, four, five times in quick, hard succession, leaving her writhing and squealing too loud to count. “You want to be cute some more?”

“No!” Lily felt tears springing to her eyes. She just wanted it to be over. It wasn’t fun anymore, if it had ever been fun at all. This was trouble, real trouble that really hurt. Her bottom was hot and stinging and felt as though a whole hive of bees had been unleashed upon it. “I’m sorry,” she sniffed.

“This time, you count properly,” he said, starting all over from the beginning just as he had promised.

“One,” she gasped tearfully. The searing stroke burned atop all the others just long enough for another one to land. “Two,” she said, trying to stop her voice from cracking. The last thing she wanted to do was cry in front of him.

“You’re my girl now,” he said, his voice firm as he brought the belt down yet again. “And I am not going to tolerate any of your disobedience, your insolence, or your criminal tendencies, you understand? You stay on the straight and narrow from here on out, or you go over my knee.”

She didn’t have anything to say to him, aside from a sniffled. “Three.”

He paused for a moment and walked around her, letting her bottom burn all on its own. Lily kept her head down, unwilling to see that hard look in his eyes. The next slap came almost carelessly, delivered diagonally across both cheeks. The tail end of the belt wrapped around her cheek and landed with extra momentum, stinging her upper thigh in a way that made her jolt and buck.

“Count it.”

“Four,” she whimpered. So far there had been a total of twelve strokes, probably more than he’d intended to give, but no fewer than she’d gone out of her way to deserve. She was fervently wishing she hadn’t joked about the third stroke, and that she hadn’t shoplifted that stuff, and that she hadn’t given the assistant attitude, and really, that she hadn’t gotten up that morning at all. Her regret was complete.

“Last two,” he said.

The words were probably supposed to provide some kind of hope, but the prospect of two more strokes of his belt made her tremble.

“Please…” She just barely whispered the word.

“What was that?”

She couldn’t bring herself to beg for mercy. Judging by his tone, it wasn’t likely to work anyway. Another stroke of the belt was snapped across her bottom before she could make up her mind whether to say something or not, and her pleading words turned to just one: “Five.”

Gareth delivered the sixth stroke dead across the center of her cheeks, as hard as any that had gone before it. It burst across her strapped bottom with the fury of an exploding sun, making her shriek the final word. “Six!”

He dropped the belt and gathered her up into a hug. Lily’s sob of relief surprised her almost as much as the warmth and comfort of his arms did. She wanted to hate him for what he’d done, tying and strapping her until tears came to her eyes, but all she could do was bury her face in his neck and sob apologies.

“Shh,” he said, stroking down her back and then gently down over her bottom. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay,” she mumbled tearfully. How could it be okay when her whole body seemed to be aching with the consequences of her action?

“Hey.” He leaned back, put two fingers under her chin, and lifted her head up “It’s over. You’re forgiven.” He smiled and his gaze softened. She felt his forgiveness, but it wasn’t as easy as that. Her bottom was stinging and aching as it never had before, and the memory of his stern presence stalking around her, delivering ruthless discipline, had not yet faded.

Gareth let her recover quietly, holding her close as he unlaced the silk around her wrists and freed her.

When she could talk without sniffling, she asked the question that had been playing on her mind. “Were you going to give me that many in the beginning?”

“Actually, I was going to give you six of the best,” he said, stroking her bottom tenderly. “But you wanted to play at the wrong time.”

She lowered her eyes again, not wanting to remember what he’d looked like, not wanting to remember how it had felt when she’d displeased him. That had been the worst part of it, not the slapping of the leather, but the heavy sense of disapproval. Lily didn’t know when she’d started caring what Gareth thought. What she did know was that she was in deeper than she’d ever wanted to be. It was one thing to stay with a cop. It was something completely different to be falling for one—and one who spanked her at that.

“I don’t think you’ll do that again, will you?”

Lily shook her head a little. That had been a very bad idea. She would not do that again. Maybe a variant thereof, but certainly not that.

Gareth pressed his lips to her cheeks where a few stray tears had trickled. “I hope you won’t make me do that again.”

“I didn’t make you do a damn thing,” Lily argued reflexively.

“You know what I mean,” he said, his tone getting all lecture-y again. “If you deserve a spanking, you’re going to get one.”

There was no point being angry at him. She had gone out of her way to get into trouble, and for no discernible reason at all. She didn’t need to steal, she’d wanted to steal. And now that her butt was burning and probably bruised, she felt better. Gareth seemed to understand what she needed better than she did; apparently that was a damn good spanking more often than not.

Blushing at the revelation, she buried her face in his chest and let him comfort her with soft rubbing strokes to her very sore, very naughty bottom.

Chapter Nine

After the spanking and the counting and the undeniable enforcement of Gareth’s authority, Lily laid low for a few days. She was being good, but she was also trying to work out her next move. The larger problem was still in play—Jasper and his treachery.

The Brannigan way of dealing with things was as biblical as it was simple: an eye for an eye. He was not going to get away with what he’d done, and Lily was determined to get her revenge regardless of what the police were doing. As a lifelong member of a criminal syndicate, she knew all too well that bad guys didn’t always get punished, especially not ones who could afford lawyers. Jasper was probably never going to see the inside of a cell, but that didn’t mean he was going to get away with arson.

The good thing about going after Jasper Woodcock was that he was not hard to find. He ran several shady businesses, but his favorite among them was an adult studio known as Paramor Pictures. Word on the street was that he spent pretty much all his time there.

Lily made her way to the lot by bus, where she discovered that there was basically no security. Paramor Pictures was a retrofitted warehouse around which pretty girls in various states of undress sashayed about the place. Lily didn’t quite fit in, but only because she was fully clothed. She rectified that by removing her jeans, which made her look the equal of most any woman in the place. The plan was to get in, take revenge, and be gone before anyone knew that she was there. It was bold, but Brannigans were bold, and it would send a message. A message that nobody was untouchable, not even smooth-talking maniacs.

The first thing to do was to get a sense of the lay of the land. Lily made her way through the corridors decorated with X-rated images of some of Paramor’s starlets. The girls were gorgeous. They’d almost certainly find work in other places once Paramor was gone.

A label on a door stopped her in her tracks:
WOODCOCK

The label on the door proclaimed Jasper’s last name boldly. She could hear him inside, his distinctive voice grunting curse words in a fashion which strongly indicated he was in the middle of something distasteful.

She reached into her bra and fingered the pack of matches she’d brought with her. Something was going to burn. Not the whole place. That would be excessive and possibly dangerous. This visit was a test run. This was where she took something important to Jasper and destroyed it. Something he’d miss when it was gone. Something to put him on his toes and let him know that she was coming for him personally.

Lily was staring at the door malevolently when it was wrenched open and Jasper came storming out.

“Jasmine!” he boomed. “Where’s Jasmine? Whoa!” He stopped and stared at Lily. “Brannigan!”

“Yes,” Lily said, drawing herself up to her full height. “Me.”

“Come to kill me?” He laughed. Jasper was a handsome man. In some bizarre act of cosmic malevolence, he had been blessed with near movie star good looks in addition to the soul of a daemon. He was well aware of his appearance and put every effort into maintaining it, down to manicures and brow shaping. But his debonair aspect did not fool Lily in the slightest. She knew exactly what Jasper was; being good looking didn’t change his essential personality. He was a hunter and an apex predator, not of animals, but of men. There were stories which made her stomach churn to think about. She pushed them away in favor of feeding the beast of anger dwelling in her gut.