Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 102375 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 512(@200wpm)___ 410(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102375 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 512(@200wpm)___ 410(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
But I cannot deny that Jino knows what he's doing. That's why I hired him for this game in the first place.
She is in danger. I'm in danger.
Dom and Ricky are in danger too.
And now Jino. And Jino, unlike Dom and Ricky, won't give up his life on my whims. No matter how much blood there is between us.
The chance to force Emmaleen to leave is over now. Jino knows I killed Rico, knows Emmaleen Rourke is the loose end. He knows he's got power over me to dictate her future.
It's a small sacrifice, really. Her days, as he put it. Especially when I get her nights. "Just to be clear, we're in agreement about the punishments?"
"Well… sure. Fine. You can punish her. But just so we're also clear, that doesn't preclude me from doling out consequences as well."
This is a bad idea. Not because I think Jino will hurt her. At least, not the way she's been hurt in the past. He's never going to punch a woman. He might whip her though.
"I think we need to agree on punishments. I mean, if you're gonna strap her down and cane her legs—"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Jino says, pressing both open palms at me. "Caning is a punishment living in some as yet undetermined future, Giovanni. I'm going to withhold orgasm. I'm going to bite her a bit. Slap her nipples with a crop. I'm not going to lash the girl. At least, not yet. That's a very advanced demerit consequence. If—when," he amends, "we do cane her. She will love it."
I snort. Which is highly unlike me. "I doubt that."
"You say that now, but this is the point, Giovanni. When she does feel the cane across her ass, she will climax. She will squirt down her leg, that's how much she’ll love it."
I picture it. Her body bent over the bench. Her legs open just enough for me to gauge how wet her pussy gets. Is it wrong that this turns me on? Because it does. Of course it does. I like the subs as much as Jino does. I just never bothered to actually train one. Not properly. Not to… fruition. To slavery. But Jino's right. If Emmaleen can learn to crave this, to find pleasure in submission, that’s a prize indeed.
"In theory, I'm okay with that," I say to Jino, my voice cool, controlled. "But I want to be clear on one thing. I don't want her broken. I want her willing."
Jino smiles, a slow, dangerous curve of his lips. "Broken and willing are the same thing, Giovanni. She won't be broken if she chooses it. And she will choose it. When she learns what pleasure can be found in surrender."
I consider this, the implications swirling in my mind. Jino's approach is brutal, calculated, and effective. But there's always been a fine line between pleasure and pain with my women. Between consent and coercion. I've always walked that line, but with Emmaleen, it feels different. More precarious.
Still, what choice do we have?
Emmaleen's life is at stake. Not because I'll kill her or Jino will kill her. But because if the LaRiccia clan ever finds out she's the reason Rico is dead, they will kill her.
We're… saving her.
Protecting her.
Her submission is her salvation.
The next time I look at Jino, he's smiling. He sees it. The change in me.
I'm a believer.
"Let's go over the initial presentation," Jino says. He comes towards me, hooking an arm around my shoulder, directing me back to the various dungeon stations.
Then he leans in close and begins to explain…
15
I'm sitting on the edge of a mattress so thin it looks like it came out of a prison fire sale, having what can only be described as an existential meltdown about Giovanni and Master’s lack of commitment to my undying submission. My thoughts are coming in fragments, like someone dropped my brain and it shattered on the cement floor.
What the actual hell am I doing here?
Two men just had a literal fistfight over how to best degrade me, and I'm... what? Still sitting here? In a nightgown that shows more than it covers, contemplating my life choices like this is some kind of weird self-help retreat and not a hostage situation with occasional orgasms?
God, the orgasms. That's part of the problem. I want them. Badly. Badly enough to stay.
The vinyl mattress squeaks as I shift, and I half-expect it to be wired to record that too. Everything monitored. Everything controlled. Everything a manipulation.
Just like with Tyler.
My stomach clenches at the thought of him. Tyler with his designer watch and his carefully cultivated stubble and his hand around my throat.
"You're nothing without me," he'd whisper. "You're lucky I even look at you."
And I'd believed him. For two years, I'd believed every word.
Until the stairs.
I trace my finger over the small scar near my eyebrow—my souvenir from that night. The night that should have killed me but instead woke me up.