Training Lady Townsend(28)

“Oh, it hurts terribly! You must take it out.”

“I seem to remember you saying something to that effect on our wedding night. But it’s not coming out until your spanking is over. In fact, its potency increases over time, which is why a long and arduous spanking is called for when a ginger fig is in place.”

“Ohhh,” she said, letting her head fall down. It was useless to try to fight him. All the boring, respectable husbands in the world, and she ended up with this one. Precisely her luck.

He did embark upon a long and arduous spanking. At the first crisp smack, she clenched her cheeks and let out a wail of fresh agony. Squeezing upon the ginger increased its potency tenfold. As smacks continued to rain down, she found it impossible to control the clenching of her buttocks, and thus she suffered quite a bit, as each time the ginger delivered more sting.

“I surmise you are discovering why ginger is used in conjunction with corporal punishment,” he said. She could hear amusement in his voice, and wanted to slap him for it. “If you do not clench, it will not feel so bad.”

But it felt bad even when she didn’t clench, and how was she to lay limp and let him punish her hindquarters without squeezing them tight against the blows?

“Please, oh please,” she cried. “This is too cruel.”

He stopped, allowing her to catch her breath, but of course, the punishing burn in her bottom continued even when his hand was at rest. She believed it was a half hour or more that he stopped and started in a very long and arduous spanking indeed. Somewhere around the middle there were tears. She wiped them away feeling a very pitiable and abused wife, but they were tears of frustration more than anything else.

Nothing about this was unbearable. That was the worst thing. The pain was constant and consistent but eminently bearable, and then...there was so much more. There was the scent of him, and the faint sounds of his exertion, the leather smell of the library and the occasional hiss from the fire. There was the rosy throbbing in her bottom mimicking too well the hot throbbing between her thighs. Oh, why did he do these things to her? And how was she to survive with any dignity? By the end, she wanted him to force her and possess her, and she couldn’t imagine why except that she was truly lost to the world of iniquitous sin.

“Please,” she said again, and this time it sounded like a completely different sort of plea. His spanking hand paused. The other hand tightened on her arm, then released her.

She was borne up and placed on her feet, and before she could even get her bearings, bent roughly over her husband’s desk. She braced herself upon her forearms, staring a bit wonderingly over at the pile of correspondence, and the letter to her papa and mama just atop it. She squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head away. Behind her, Townsend grasped her thighs and plunged his cock all the way inside her, so her hips bumped hard against the edge of the desk.

The ginger was still in her bottom, burning and torturing her, but his thrusting cock brought an entirely new type of torture, because she wanted it. She craved it and wished to bend before it just as she was. She arched her hips back to receive him, which brought an appreciative growl to his lips. That a man might ever growl so at her... Her hands made fists as she rested her forehead against the desk.

She felt his fingers curl into her hair. A small tug and he urged her up so her back bumped against the hard muscles of his stomach and chest. She wished that he was naked, and she was naked, so she could feel the warmth of his skin. He nuzzled his face against her neck, kissing, licking, nibbling. Biting. Her body drew up, preparing to explode. She clutched at him wherever she could, at his thighs, his fingers, the lace at his wrists.

“Come for me now. Do it,” he said. “Naughty girl.”

“I can’t. I can’t,” she cried. She felt so hot and wild, so ashamed of her uncontrolled behavior. Her lust.

“Yes, you can. You will,” he rumbled against her ear.

And she did, crying out as her bottom contracted repeatedly about the ginger, and her spasming channel milked the solid intrusion of his cock. He pushed her forward and pressed hard inside her, hurting her hips on the edge of the desk again, but she was beyond caring. One, two, three crashing thrusts and he went still behind her, whispering oaths and endearments under his breath.

He leaned down over her, his warmth enveloping her. His hands played at either side of her hair, making her feel sleepy and replete. “I will have to think of some better words than beautiful and compelling,” he said after some time. He pressed his cheek against hers, then turned to give her a kiss. “I find they are inadequate to express how truly transcendent you are.”

And she thought, If I am transcendent, you have made me that way.

Even the ginger couldn’t take away the feeling that this marriage, and her burning lust for her husband, was very, very right.





Chapter Twelve: Wilderness Walk




Hunter lounged back on the blanket on the lower south lawn, one leg bent, the other sprawled alongside his discarded coat and hat. He breathed deeply of the fresh scents of autumn leaves and grass. There would not be many more opportunities for picnics before winter was upon them, trapping them inside the house.

Not that being trapped in the house with Aurelia would be a bad thing.

There was a time he might have imagined it so. No longer. Over the past few weeks he’d come to the gradual and lowering realization that he was quite hopelessly in love with his wife.

She sat across from him, the sun playing off her glossy curls, and her ripe, seductive body displayed to stimulating effect by her low-cut gown. The dear thing just had yet another plump finger of ginger fixed into her bottom, which was probably why she squirmed so prettily over tea.

“Some men only fig their women to increase the intensity of a spanking,” he said, smiling over at her. “But they are unimaginative, aren’t they?”

She looked up at him from beneath her lashes with a harried exasperation that never failed to fire his blood.

“Poor little muffin,” he said, handing her a cream-filled cake. “It cannot be easy being married to me.”

“A great deal of the time it is not.”

He laughed at the barely veiled reproach in her tone. Lady Dormouse was not often in evidence these days, having been replaced by a much more confident—and sometimes downright impertinent—companion and lover. It was considered very gauche among the aristocracy to pant after one’s own wife, but with each passing day he wanted her more, admired her more, particularly her courage in fulfilling his unconventional demands.

Many wives would not have put up with him. They would have gone to a father, or brother, and rid themselves of his company if not his name. They would have found a way to live apart from him, and perhaps he would have been content enough easing back into his former life of casual, debauched sex. Instead, Aurelia had decided to submit to him, and slowly unwound from an uptight ice queen to a sensual, alluring bedmate. She had left behind all the virtue and restraint of her youth...for him.

It made him love her with an uncomfortable intensity. Sometimes it seemed his love for her burned through his very veins.

But did she love him? He wasn’t sure. Sometimes he thought she did, when she smiled and laughed with him. Sometimes she was still withdrawn, spending lonely hours curled in her window seat.

“Are you happy?” he asked as she licked a bit of cream from her lips.

She looked around the sunny field, and down at the confection in her hand. “Yes. Why shouldn’t I be? These cakes are my favorite, and it’s a lovely day.”

“I don’t mean happy just now. I mean, are you happy in general? Are you happy...with me?”

She gave him a long, frank look. “You are very brave to ask that when you’ve just put ginger in my arse.”

“Such language, my dear. You’ll have to be punished, won’t you?”

She came very near to rolling her eyes. He smothered his own smile and reached for her. “Come and sit with me.”

They were finished with tea. He pushed the cakes and cups aside and pulled her against him so they reclined together in the sun. “You smell like sugar,” he murmured. “And other delicious things.” He tugged down her plunging bodice to expose her nipples and the tops of her breasts, and bent his head to tease the pink tips. They pulled taut into stiff, pointing buttons he tormented with his teeth.

“Oh,” she sighed. “Please, Hunter.”

It still gave him a thrill to hear his name on her lips. She’d finally relaxed into calling him by his given name, in private at least. She squirmed against him, emitting little gasps no doubt elicited by the ginger. Still, her hips pressed to his, her head thrown back to give him access to her breasts. “You like that, do you?” He took one nipple between his teeth and bit it until she squeaked. Then he held her tight as he licked away the sting.

“I do like it,” she said. “Please...come inside me.” Her hands gripped his shoulders.

“I will, my love. But today we shall try it a new way.” His thoughts wandered to the vial of lubricating oil he’d brought along in his pocket to accomplish the task. She tensed a bit in his arms but he soothed her with a kiss. “You shall survive it, I promise.” He drew away and stroked her cheek. “But first things first. It’s time to take you to our favorite tree.”