“Take her Nicholas,” and after pausing thoughtfully, “And Mr. Ruschke, you will deliver the punishment.”
***
Laney was hustled from The Forum through a back door that connected directly to the cellar staircase. The descent took place quickly as the rough Nicholas was a bit like a linebacker in a suit that fit a little too tightly for his muscles. He might as well have carried her. The stairs were old, vibrating a little too much to please her, and with her feet still tucked into the dangerously tall high heels, it would have been impossible to manage if it hadn’t been for the bear of a man who purposefully held her close to his side.
At the base of the stairs, he set her down then took her by the hand and she stumbled behind him into the darkness of a long corridor, until they reached a room where she was unceremoniously shoved into a metal cage that was built into the stone wall. The back of the cage was stone, the three surrounding sides were formed by heavy iron bars.
The cage door closed with an ominous clank, then Nicholas set the lock and without saying a word, he left the room, leaving a shivering Laney alone, afraid and now very cold.
In the silent darkness there was little for Laney to do but think…so much had happened in so short a time… expectations dashed, assumptions shattered, accusations flung at her that seemed hardly justified. Her sanity felt violated. She felt used, demoralized…elated to have been rescued from Kafka …suddenly the Marquis’ fierce judgment…and now Alex sideswiping her with his appearance. He wasn’t supposed to be here, for he was in none of the scenarios, none of her daydreams she conjured when she imagined how her first meeting with the Marquis would play out. Now he was once again firmly entrenched in her thoughts. And he, of all people, would punish her.
The Marquis was really nothing to her now, just an accusing stranger. Any erotic energy she had been feeling from him when he first started to speak had been wiped away by his brutal message, and with Alex in the room, her sexual being was focused solely on the man who knew her more intimately than any man alive.
At least now she understood how he could be so intuitive, how he could know so much about the island and her submissive character, how he could play into her kinky lust so easily and bring her body to such erotic heights. He had told her that he brought his girlfriends to the island for fun and games! How he’d lied and she’d believed him. Her body bristled with arousal, her pussy flooding with life and lust… but the companion to those feelings was a wildly brewing anger. The incidents on the island, the deceit, the careful couching, the way he led her…she couldn’t explain that to the Marquis, he wouldn’t believe her or understand. Of course, Alex had warned her, but he’d also stoked the fires of her need, and incited the mystery of the bracelet. He’d even been the one who first mentioned Paris. All these things conspired together, making it impossible for her not to continue with her mission—which had now landed her in this awful cell.
In the midst of her thoughts, Laney heard the door to the room open. Looking in that direction, she saw Alex standing in the dim light of the hallway. He tugged the chain on the overhead light inside the room—a bare bulb, nothing more—then closed the door behind him.
“I suppose you can imagine my surprise when I was informed that you were here,” he said, directly.
“Oh, really?” she said, as she peered out through the bars.
She felt like a fool inside the miserable cage, without clothes, her feet still wearing the blasted high heels. She angrily took them off and threw them against the bars, then she pulled up and sat with her back to the jagged stone wall—it was hardly comfortable, and maintaining any semblance of dignity in these conditions was impossible.
Alex paced around above her.
“Laney, I warned you about this.”
She humphed… “Oh! Did you really? You didn’t tell me much of anything, but a lot of enticing speculation. It hardly dissuaded me. If you’d have been honest, if you’d informed me that you were ‘in bed’ with the infamous Marquis, I might have actually taken your message seriously.”
“Would you really?”
“Yes, I might have.”
“It’s not for me to be honest with someone who is deliberately lying,” he rattled off curtly.
“You know why I was lying. I was protecting myself while doing my best to find the answers I sought. You could have given me those answers. You could have stopped me on that island. No one would have known but you and me—you could have cut this damned bracelet off!” She hadn’t realized how shrill she’d become until she finished on that high-pitched note. “If you think I’m going to feel better about this because you’re coming here, hat in hand to … to what? Be nice before you beat me bloody, or whatever…”
Although he remained standing above her looking down, Alex figuratively backed off, and Laney could feel his cool like a sudden icy blast of winter wind. “It would seem you’d be more courteous to the man who’s been designated to punish you.”
“And would that make any damn difference?” She spitefully bit off each word, still angry and still not ready to back down herself.
“I wouldn’t bait me, Laney.” She could feel his anger now, not cold but hot.
Noting the look in his eyes, she felt a tremor of justifiable concern pass through her. “Maybe you should just get on with it.”
He nodded. “I will do my job, and you will be hurt for it, Laney.”
She wished she could have contained her emotions a little more, but there was nothing she could do about her outburst now. There was nothing more to say.
After a few difficult moments, Alex turned and doused the light, leaving her to stare out into the pitch black darkness once again.
Chapter Fifteen
Torchlight gleamed across the craggy stonewalls of the cave-like room into which Laney was led. Like something out of a Medieval dungeon, the room brought to mind the worst nightmarish images of convicted slaves, suspended from chains and beaten raw and bloody as they screamed into the night. Imaginings like these had often been fuel for Laney’s sexual lust, but the reality of such a room and such sadists ready to implement depraved fantasies like these had never been her reality.
It was now.
Once Nicholas pulled her from the cage, every nerve in her body, every human sense she was born with was heightened. As she walked in front of the men into this arcane cellar room, she felt almost disembodied: her mind detached, but her body more alive than ever and more scared. Instead of being numb, she felt her fear fully, along her skin and in her beating heart, and pulsing loins. A masochist—at least to some degree—she could hope that the way Alex would ravage her would in some way please her, but there were no assurances at all.
