He struck her again. Breath exploded from her lungs. Then again and again the flogger landed, sometimes in the same spot over and over again until tears filled her eyes. She could never guess where the next blow would fall. After fifty she stopped trying to guess. After a hundred she didn't even care. It stung brutally, and her skin burned like fire. More, she wanted. More. Let him burn her to the ground. Let her rise again from the ashes.

The flogging ceased and S0ren pressed his chest into her bare back. She cried out as his heat scalded her raw skin.

"Too much?" He slid his hands up her sides and cupped her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. He teased her nipples and now she groaned in pleasure. He'd become the master of her body already. Tied up like this she could give herself neither pleasure nor pain, nor any sort of release or relief. All sensation came from him and him alone.

"No, sir."

"You want more pain?"

"I want all the pain you want to give me, sir."

With her arms tied to the bedpost she could only see in front of her. S0ren pulled something else from his trunk. She couldn't see it, but she could guess from the sound of the air being sliced in two. When the cane contacted with the back of her thighs, she screamed. She didn't mean to, but the pain pushed the sound out of her. S0ren paused as if waiting for her to object, to ask him to stop. If he waited for her to ask him to stop he'd be waiting all night.

He struck her again.

A third time.

A fourth.

She'd never known pain like this pain. She'd never known strength like the strength she summoned to endure it. And soon she no longer endured it, she enjoyed it. The pain became a game to her. How much could she take? How much could S0ren give? He enslaved her with the pain. No one would suffer this willingly, so if she suffered it, it must be because he owned her and could hurt her like this. And yet she'd come here of her own volition. And a single word could stop him. He owned her for the same reason. It made no sense, none at all, and yet her body understood. She knew her body understood because S0ren dropped the cane onto the floor and wrapped a hand around her hips. He pressed two fingers into her and sank deep into her wetness. She'd never been this intensely aroused in her life.

With one hand still inside her, S0ren reached up and unknotted the ropes. He turned her and pressed her back to the bedpost. With an arm under her left knee, he lifted her leg, opening her up so he could explore inside her more easily. She felt nothing but pleasure as he probed her with two fingers, moving in and out of her slowly. Her wetness eased his pa.s.sage as he pushed deep into all her hidden places. When he pushed a third finger into her, she winced.

"I know it hurts, Little One," S0ren whispered as he kissed her and pushed into the band of tissue at the entrance of her v.a.g.i.n.a. "Let me do this. It'll be better this way."

"Not with your fingers, please," she begged.

"It will hurt less this way. I'll have more control."

She shook her head.

"Please ..." she begged and S0ren pressed his forehead to hers. "It's how I dreamed of it. Please ..."

"You do beg beautifully."

"I'll beg more if you want me to." She wanted him to break her hymen not with his fingers but when he penetrated her the first time. It had to be that way. She needed it that way.

"You'll beg for mercy when I'm inside you the first time."

"I don't want mercy. I want you."

He kissed her mouth as he lowered her leg to the floor. The entire back of her body from her knees to her shoulders throbbed from the beating. Why did people flee from pain and avoid it like the plague? Yes, it hurt, but so did everything that mattered. Love hurt, life hurt, birth hurt, changing hurt, growing hurt. The dead didn't hurt, only the living. She had never felt so alive.

S0ren kissed her again, but only long enough to wet her lips. When S0ren gripped the back of her neck, she had an idea of what might be coming next. It didn't surprise her when he forced her onto her knees. She opened his pants and remembered that she'd fantasized about doing this to him since she was fifteen years old. But she wasn't fifteen. She was twenty now. A grown woman. No reason to be nervous. He'd grown hard while beating her and she licked her lips in antic.i.p.ation. Wrapping her mouth around him, she sucked deep, relishing the taste of him. S0ren dug his hand into the back of her neck with bruising strength. From his lips escaped the slightest of groans. The sound of his pleasure emboldened Eleanor. She sucked harder, deeper, licked him from the base to the tip over and over again.

This was what she'd wanted since the day they met. She'd wanted to serve him, to kneel before him, to offer herself to be used by him. Every day he sacrificed himself on the altar of the Catholic Church-gave up his time, his wealth, his freedom. That she could give this one thing to him, the pleasure of using her, and she would give it with all her heart, body and soul.

She winced as S0ren dug his fingers even deeper into her skin. She knew she'd have a black bruise from his fingers tomorrow.

"Stop," he ordered and Eleanor sat back on her knees.

S0ren cupped her chin and ran his thumb over her lips.

"I think you enjoyed that."

She smiled up at him.

"I live to serve."

"You do now."

With his hand on her chin, he guided her off the floor and back onto her feet.

"Wait by the bed."

S0ren left her standing at the bedpost while he pulled the top sheet of the bed down. He took more rope and another set of cuffs and laid them on the bed.

As he prepared the bed, Eleanor stared at the winegla.s.s on the table. She walked to it and drank the last few drops of wine. She took a step back and then another.

When S0ren turned back to her she held the gla.s.s out in front of her.

"Eleanor?"

She dropped the gla.s.s and it shattered on the floor at her feet ... her bare feet.

"Eleanor-"

Before he could order her to do otherwise, she took a step forward onto the broken gla.s.s.

"You said nothing pleases you more than someone who will bleed for you." She took another step. The gla.s.s cut into her heel, into her toes. S0ren inhaled sharply as she walked to him-bare feet on shattered gla.s.s. She hardly felt a thing. The only sign that gla.s.s had cut her were the b.l.o.o.d.y footprints she left behind her. She looked into S0ren's eyes. His pupils had widened hugely and his bare chest moved in shallow pants. She crossed the four feet to the bed.

"If it had been fire, I would have walked through fire," she whispered.

"If it had been fire, I would have carried you through it." He lifted her and laid her in the center of the bed.

She wound her arms around his neck and he dug his fingers deep into her hair, bending her body back, baring her neck. He kissed the hollow of her throat, bit her collarbone and shoulder. With his knees he forced her thighs apart. He grasped her c.l.i.toris between his thumb and forefinger and she flinched from the marriage of pain with pleasure. He pried the lips of her v.a.g.i.n.a wide open and hooked his fingers over her pubic bone, pushing the tips into that soft hollow an inch inside her. Low moans escaped her lips as he took possession of her body. The pain in her feet was long forgotten as her inner muscles pulsed around his fingers. Before she could come, however, he released her from his grasp and pushed her hard and fast onto her back. In seconds he had her wrists and ankles cuffed to the bedposts, and left her lying there as she breathed and waited and wanted. She closed her eyes as he returned to her, a wet cloth in his hand. He wiped blood and gla.s.s off her feet, a move so careful and tender she could scarcely believe that he was the same man who moments earlier had nearly ripped her open with his fingers.

You have only seen him by day. She remembered Kingsley's words. All light and shadow. But the night will come and you will see the darkness.

So this was the darkness? Then may she live the rest of her life by night.

After binding her to the bed with leather cuffs and black rope, S0ren stared down at her helpless body.

"Mine," he said and met her eyes.

"Yours, sir."

When he'd finished binding her, she lay on her back unable to move her legs or her arms. This was how it would be. This was how it would happen. This was the beginning. This was the end.

S0ren stripped out of his clothes. She had dreamed of his naked body and now she saw it bathed in moonlight and candlelight and his own light that came from within him. Even naked he still seemed clothed with dignity and strength, and he wore his strength like a shield. With his body, he covered hers. His thighs felt like marble against her thighs. His skin shone like polished gold. His lips tasted as sweet as the wine and she drank deep of him.

"Why did the king tie Esther to the bed?" he asked.

"Because he loved her."

32.

Eleanor SREN LINGERED AT HER MOUTH. HE KISSED HER AND she returned the kiss with equal and even greater fervency. Their tongues mingled and she drank of the wine on his lips, swallowed the heat of his mouth. Eleanor winced as S0ren nipped her bottom lip.

S0ren dusted kisses across the sensitive skin of her chest. Under his mouth her heart pounded, her blood throbbed. She ached to touch him but every time she tried to move her hands the bonds held her. Kingsley had warned her about the bondage. S0ren needed to stay in control as much as possible. The more helpless she was, the more he would feel compelled to protect her.

She inhaled as S0ren licked the tip of her right nipple. He brought his mouth down on her breast and sucked gently as he teased her left nipple with his fingers. Tied down as she was, she couldn't do much but arch her back to offer more of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s to him. He moved his mouth to her left nipple. Heat gathered in her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and melted through her stomach, settling into her hips. She wanted him inside her. No, not wanted, needed.

"Please, sir ..." she begged.

"Please what?" He raised his head and c.o.c.ked his eyebrow at her as if amused she would even dare beg for anything.

"I want you."

"You have me."

"I want you inside me."

"I'm always inside you, Little One."

Eleanor entertained a brief fantasy of stabbing him in the neck. But then he moved his lips to her mouth again.

"Patience," he whispered against her skin. "I have waited years for this night. I won't rush it."

"Did you really want me from the day we met?"

"So much it scared me."

He ran his fingertips down the center of her body until he rested his palm against her c.l.i.toris. It pulsed against his hand.

"I want you to come for me. I need you as wet as possible before I enter you. Understand?"

"Yes, sir." She started to breathe heavier as S0ren pressed the heel of his hand in deeper. He dipped two fingers into her v.a.g.i.n.a before pressing his now wet fingertips against her c.l.i.toris. Desire engulfed her as he made tight circles on the swollen knot of flesh.

Her hips rose off the bed and she went still underneath him. Her entire body locked up before exploding with pleasure. Her v.a.g.i.n.a clenched and released rapidly, fluttering inside her and pressing against nothing. She couldn't wait to come around him, to let him feel her own pleasure on his body.

"Good girl," he said, brushing a lock of hair off her forehead.

He kissed her nipples again as she recovered from her o.r.g.a.s.m. He sucked leisurely, lazily, at them as if he intended to spend all night lying between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. She had a vague memory of Wyatt kissing her nipples like this. When he had done it she'd watched him and felt tenderness toward him like a mother to a child. They might have been the same age but she felt so much older than him. But with S0ren she felt like the property of a king, like Esther in a harem, captured and conquered. And like Esther, she knew she had conquered the conqueror with the greatest of all powers-love.

S0ren kissed the valley between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and his lips traveled down her stomach and over her hips. He nipped her hip bone with his teeth and the moment the pain registered, S0ren moved between her thighs. Eleanor stiffened as he licked her, kissed her, made love to her with his mouth.

"f.u.c.k ..." she groaned, unable to contain herself. She hadn't expected him to go down on her. He'd said he would pleasure her but this act seemed almost submissive to her as he knelt between her legs. But then he increased the pressure on her c.l.i.toris with his tongue and he pushed in two fingers and rubbed that soft hollow on the front wall inside her. He mastered her with his mouth. With his fingers he spread her folds so wide, exposing the entrance to her body. She couldn't hide from him. He saw all of her, all her most secret places. He licked her c.l.i.toris again and again, and when she came, she clenched at his lips and fingers.

He rose up and kissed her. She tasted herself on his mouth and couldn't get enough of it. Had she imagined anything so erotic before? His hand traced a line down her body from her collared neck to her thighs. He slid his thumb into her and she winced at the strange sensation. The wince turned into a gasp of pure pain as he pressed down hard against her hymen, not hard enough to tear it but hard enough that tears sprang to her eyes. He inhaled sharply as if he registered her pain inside his own body. He experienced her pain as his pleasure. Let him hurt her, then, so he could feel the pleasure of it. Let him destroy her so she could be reborn.

The pain pa.s.sed and S0ren settled in between her thighs, the tip of his length pressing against her c.l.i.toris. She pushed her hips hard into his, opening herself to him, offering herself to him.

She looked up and saw S0ren's eyes were closed. His long, unnaturally dark eyelashes lay against his cheeks. The veins in his strong arms and shoulders quivered as he held himself over her. He started to speak but not in English. It was Danish, his first language. She knew some Danish, enough for her and S0ren to tell each other "I need you, I want you" without anyone understanding them. But in her fevered state she could recognize nothing he said, not at first. He murmured the words like a prayer. She raised her head and pressed a kiss against his throat, her most favorite part of his body, the part hidden by his collar. The final words of his prayer she understood.

Jeg elsker dig.

I love you.

"I love you," he said, in his first language, and the words rose like a banner over the bed.

With her eyes half-closed, she felt the world falling asleep around her. She heard music somewhere in the distance, a haunting solo voice almost inhuman in its beauty. Did she hear this? See this? Or did it all come from within herself like a dream half remembered only hours after waking? She buried her head in the hollow between S0ren's chin and shoulder. She breathed in and inhaled the scent of snow, new snow, clean and cold. And then she knew the truth.

S0ren didn't smell like winter. Winter smelled like S0ren.

Jeg elsker dig.

She heard S0ren's voice through the mist.

With one thrust, he pushed inside her.

Pain like she'd never imagined rent her in half. Rent her in half, split her in two, burned her like fire, tore her like paper.

Beneath S0ren she struggled and cried, her face buried against his chest. He cradled the back of her head as she wept tears of agony and surrender. He didn't pull out of her, didn't apologize. He held himself still, but inside her he pulsed as her v.a.g.i.n.a stretched and strained to take all of him into her. This was the price she had to pay for the kiss that couldn't be unkissed, for the apple that couldn't be unbitten, for the road she had taken. They had gone too far now. They could no longer go back.

She never wanted to go back.

The pain suffused her entire body. It burned like the hottest fire and if she had the use of her arms she would have tried to push him off her. One word could stop her suffering. She said nothing.

Slowly she emerged from the haze of pain and heard S0ren's ragged breathing in her ear, the slightest catch of his breath, the subtlest moan in the back of his throat. Had there ever been a more beautiful sound than this-the sound of the pleasure he took inside her?

Instinct told her to shrink from him, to pull away. But she fought that urge and instead raised her hips again into his. He penetrated her until it seemed as if his entire body filled hers to the breaking point. Each slow, controlled thrust stretched her open wide, tearing the gate that would keep him out of her. She wanted it gone, wanted everything between them gone forever. His hand found her hand and he locked their fingers together as he rose up and pushed in again. She braced for pain but instead felt a deep stab of pleasure. Her eyes flew open at the shock of it, so carnal, so animal. With a cry she pushed her hips into his again and again. A rush of fluid between her thighs eased his pa.s.sage even more. Blood, perhaps? Her own wetness? It didn't matter. All that mattered was that he impaled her, invaded her, took ownership of her with every controlled yet merciless thrust.

She focused on his face, on the long dark eyelashes resting on his cheeks, on his partly open lips, on his blond hair that she ached to run her fingers through, on the sheen of sweat that covered his forehead, his shoulders and the vein that pulsed visibly in his neck. It must have taken all his strength to hold back and not lose himself inside her. Sixteen years since he'd last done this. His self-control could shatter at any moment. She wanted it to shatter.

Raising her head off the sheets, she kissed his shoulder. She whispered, "You own me."

S0ren opened his eyes and gazed down at her.

He thrust so hard into her she stopped breathing. He thrust again just as hard and she exhaled once more. It had to be like this, it had to be brutal. It wasn't enough to take her virginity-he had to obliterate it.