Chapter 17

Chapter

Seventeen

ANI

I stand alone with Phoenix. He has a thin scar that runs down his left cheek. It’s subtle but just visible enough to make me wonder what caused it. I’d never seen it before, but then again, I was lost in the daze of butterflies and first kisses.

“I’ve upped security surveillance of the house. So, if you even think there is a chance of escape, I will get that thought out of your head right now. You can run, but I’ll hunt you down, and you won’t like the consequences for that act. I’ll allow every single man who is involved in the hunt to have his chance to punish you. So, the choice is yours.” Phoenix smiles, but it is not warm and inviting. No. A smile of evil. Phoenix removes the knife from my panties.

He raises the blade to my eye level. Glancing at it, I can see it’s coated with my signs of fucked-up lust and twisted sexual need.

It glistens with sin.

Phoenix is right. I am a dirty girl. Yes, filthy. So fucking wrong. I should be screaming. Demanding freedom. I should be fighting to escape, but instead I’m nearly coming on a weapon used to kill.

There is a sparkle in Phoenix’s eye and a smirk on his face as he returns the blade to its holder on his belt. “I advise you to be a good little girl. Do you understand?”

I nod and say softly, “Yes, sir. I’m not going to try to leave. I want to prove to you that I can be trusted.” I don’t want me or my sister to be on the outs with the Godwins—whatever that means. I don’t want to suffer either and be miserable the entire time I’m here. I don’t. I can do this. I can earn my comforts. I already have one. I have a long way to go to furnish this room, but I know the only way to survive this ordeal is by focusing on one comfort at a time. I can do this. I have no choice but to do this. I also want my Phoenix back. I want the man I first met in the attic, and I know he’s there beneath the anger and the fury. “What are you going to do to me now?”

It suddenly dawns on me that I am still standing with my arms at my sides. Like I’m a private in the army standing before a general.

Yes, sir.

No, sir.

Whatever you say, sir.

Only this time, the private is wearing nothing but a pair of white lace panties. I don’t have to look down to know my nipples are hard, nor do I have to press my legs together to feel the leftover wetness from the kiss of the knife.

Phoenix takes hold of my hair again and circles it around his hand. He then guides me out of the room as if my hair is a leash, and I’m his mangy mutt. We head down the hallway, where cameras are placed strategically. Is Phoenix recording so he can watch later? How many cameras are there? I can practically feel eyes burning holes into my exposed flesh.

When we reach the bathroom door, Phoenix turns to me with seriousness washed over his face. “A new camera has been placed in here. This is going to be filmed the minute we walk into the bathroom. I’m going to be rewatching. I don’t want to miss a thing. I want a close-up recording so I can truly examine how grateful you are for your life and my mercy. Are you going to be able to behave and act as I would expect someone who wants to earn items of comfort would behave? I’m serious when I tell you that what you do from this point on is crucial. So, will you be able to do exactly as I say?”

Do I have a choice?

I swallow hard and take a deep breath. In a very tiny voice, I answer, “I think so… sir.” The word still feels foreign but doesn’t necessarily feel more fucked up or wrong than my current situation.

My body trembles with the overwhelming nerves exploding within, but I don’t want Phoenix to see that anyone has the ability to break me. Inner strength is all I have left. This is my new reality, but I need to stay strong. I’ve tried begging, and begging didn’t work. So I have to regroup. Approach this situation differently. I need strength and determination to survive this.

I can survive this.

It’s temporary.

It’s just until Phoenix feels safe enough to know that my sister and I mean no harm.

And there will be a time when he lets down his guard again and allows me in. Then I can somehow wake from this nightmare. But for now, I have no choice but do as commanded. I need time… time to figure out how to fix this situation. I will remain strong no matter what occurs on the other side of the door.

Phoenix’s face lights up, and he strokes the back of my head. The act doesn’t feel loving, but rather condescending. Humiliation is clearly a tactic of his. What’s worse is I’m not sure I totally hate it. I should hate it, but tingles in my core disagree.

“That’s my good girl. You just do as I say, and don’t fight me in the slightest. Swallow that pride raging inside of you. Your pride is only the first of what you’ll lose while here.” He opens the door and guides me inside.

I enter a pristine bathroom, fiddling with my fingers as I try not to view my reflection in the mirror. I don’t want to see my new reality staring back at me. I’m standing in nothing but my panties with a man who is nothing but a monster. I have already been more vulnerable and intimate with Phoenix than most men in my past, but now… I don’t even know what to call this. I look up to see a camera in the corner of the room with a red light on and know there is no turning back. Phoenix will be watching the replay of this later.

“All right. Let’s get you out of those panties.” Phoenix’s command is firm.

Only pausing to appreciate my breasts for a moment, Phoenix takes hold of my panties, squatting as he pulls them down all the way to my ankles and lifts my feet one at a time to step out of them.

Glancing up and staring at my exposed, completely naked body, he scowls and stands up. “Bad, bad girl.”

I flinch at his words and his stern expression. I have no idea what I have done wrong. I’ve done exactly as he’s asked.

“Only very bad girls have hair on their pussies,” he lectures.

I glance down at my little brown curls and then back at him in disbelief.

“This is not acceptable. ”

He takes a step forward, lifts my arm, and runs his fingertips along my armpit, nods, and then runs his hand down the front of my leg and nods again.

“Lucky for you and your ass, you at least take care of the rest of your body hair. But,” he says as he goes and sits on the edge of the tub, “you’ll still be punished for a hairy pussy.” He pats his lap, which I assume means he wants me to lie over it since he used the word punished .

“I… I’m sorry.” The man sitting before me is not the same man I thought I knew before. It’s like I’m presented with a dominant man on steroids. Once a man, now a monster.

I have no idea what to say or do. The humiliation of this entire conversation is almost too much to endure. And the fact that it’s all caught on camera makes it even worse.

“Mistakes happen, but that does not mean that there won’t be consequences.” He pats his lap once more. “Now come here. I haven’t got all day.”

Oh, Jesus.

This is it. I am about to be spanked for the first time in my entire life. Spanked over a man’s knee. Is this really happening? Am I really standing naked in front of a man and a camera? All because of me keeping a secret of murder from a powerful and now clearly ruthless member of a fucked-up family. My choices are either death or… shame and humiliation?

My legs tremble, and when I take my first step, I wonder if my knees will buckle from beneath me. As if I am moving in slow motion, I somehow reach Phoenix and place my body over his lap, feeling the firmness of his thighs beneath my belly.

“Now, before we start,” he says as he runs his palm along my naked behind. “Some punishments will also earn you extra comforts if you submit properly.”

I nod as I stare at the tiled floor beneath me.

“Each comfort will depend on severity and how well you take the discipline.”

I nod again.

“To begin with, we will only do a single comfort punishment,” he says. “So, expect this show of discipline to be far easier than any of the future ones. Now, I’m giving you this spanking today to remind you that good girls keep their cunts nice and smooth.” His hand comes crashing against my flesh, and I flinch more out of surprise than pain. He swats me again and again, before saying, “After every swat, I want you to say ‘good girls keep their cunts smooth.’”

The next swat stings far more than I expect.

“Good girls keep their cunts smooth.” The words sound as if they are spoken by someone else other than me.

The second swat hurts even more than the first.

I gasp when the sting begins to set in. “Good girls keep their cunts smooth.”

The third swat brings on panic. How will I be able to endure this?

I squint. “Good girls keep their cunts smooth.”

The fourth swat makes me squeal.

“Ow!” Fuck, it’s starting to hurt. Far more than I thought it would.

Phoenix spanks me several more times. “What are you supposed to say?” he warns.

“Good girls keep their cunts smooth!” I cry out as my ass heats up with every second that passes. Each swat hurts more and more, and I’m not sure how many of the searing blows I can take.

He brings his large palm squarely down on my punished cheek, and I gasp at how the pain radiates through my core.

“Good girls,” I squeak, “keep their cunts smooth!”

He spanks me again, but this time hitting the tender flesh that meets the tops of my thighs.

“Please!” I beg. “It hurts!”

I’m begging again, even though I’m trying to be strong. I don’t exactly have a choice. My self-preservation overtakes any sense of pride or conviction I had.

My plea is rewarded with a volley of spanks that are far worse than the ones given seconds before. He continues with a ferocious spanking as I kick, wiggle, cling to his calf, and cry out in pain. The sound of his palm connecting with my punished flesh echoes off the walls of the tiled room, the only sound louder is my cries for mercy. Over and over, Phoenix holds my helpless body to his lap and spanks my butt, even taking some time to once again spank my upper thighs and the area where my bottom meets my legs. It’s excruciating, and that he can do all this with just his hand and little effort on his part terrifies me as to what else he is capable of.

Finally, as I lie gasping for air, Phoenix pauses, rubs my skin, which feels as if it has been stung by a million hornets, and asks, “Shall we try this again, dove?”

Swat !

I don’t hesitate in the slightest. “Good girls keep their cunts smooth.”

“Now that is truly my good girl,” he praises, which actually does fill me with a sense of warmth and pride.

Swat!

“Good girls keep their cunts smooth.”

“We will do ten more, and then your spanking will be over. You have earned a comfort item, dove.”