Even as I watch Wynter strip for me, I know there’s a reason she turned white as a ghost the first time I mentioned her punishment. Her hands are shaking, her entire body trembling as she pulls the knit sweater dress from her body, followed closely by the knee-high boots and stockings until she’s in nothing but a black lace bra and matching panties that barely cover her pussy.
Her eyes meet mine and the fear behind the ice blue makes my stomach lurch. She’s scared of me.
“Come here.” I motion toward the edge of the bed where I’m perched and she comes to me immediately, not hesitating for even a second. The moment she’s within arm’s length, I tug her until she’s perched on my lap. “You’re afraid.”
Wynter lets out a shaky breath before nodding once, her eyes looking anywhere but me.
“I would never do anything that would really hurt you, dove. I just want to make sure you think twice the next time you think about running away from your security in the middle of a war.” I wrap my arms around her waist and hold her close to me. The way her body shivers under my touch worries me. Is there something she isn’t telling me? “If this is too much for you and you can’t handle it, I want you to tell me straight away, okay? It’s meant to hurt but not so much so you can’t stand it.”
“I know,” she whispers.
“What do you mean, you know?” I gently pull her face around to meet mine.
“This isn’t my first punishment.”
I stare at her for long moments as I try to wrap my head around those words. How can that be the case? I’ve tracked her for every moment of every day for the last eight years, there is no way she had someone punishing her and I didn’t know about it. But the way her lip wobbles under my gaze, tells me she’s telling the truth. “What aren’t you telling me, Wynter?”
“You’ll see.” Her eyes drop from mine as she tries to climb from my lap, but I tighten my hold on her. “Everett, just let me show you,” she whispers, her voice breaking under the weight of the words.
I hold on to her for another moment before finally allowing her to climb off my lap. For some reason the moment feels charged and as she slips her panties down her legs and reaches back to unclip her bra, I can’t help but stare at her perfect body.
It’s not until she bends over the edge of the bed that I see what she was talking about. White and silver lines cover the soft skin of her ass and the top of her thighs, unmistakable marks that must have been made with a belt. The air leaves my lungs as my legs shake beneath me so violently I almost lose them from beneath me.
“Wynter…” I can’t find the words to ask the question I need to ask. I scramble to put the pieces together, to understand how this could have happened if I never had my eyes off her, but I come up short every time.
Her body shakes as a gentle sob racks through it. Her quiet cries mingle with the sound of my racing heart. I reach out to brush my fingers over the scars smattered across her backside but she flinches under my touch, something that’s never happened before.
“You’ve been punished before,” I say. It’s not a question, more so repeating the words she spoke not too long ago.
“Yes.” Wynter chokes on the word and I almost pull her back into my arms. Almost.
“When did this happen?”
“When I was at college.”
“What were you being punished for?” I should be asking who did this, but the chances of her telling me seem so slim that I decide to make it one of the last questions I’m going to ask.
Wynter barely manages to keep her feet beneath her as another violent sob threatens to pull her over. “Does it matter?”
I take a deep breath to push down the thunder raging through my veins and move back to where I was perched on the edge of the bed before, quickly bundling Wynter in my arms until she’s cradled against my chest. The anger trying to break through the surface is only magnified by how upset she is.
“Of course it matters, dove. Someone hurt you and I want to know why.” I brush my fingers down her back gently, hoping it will soothe the onslaught of tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Stop,” she whispers, pressing her hands into my chest in an attempt to get away. “Now you can see I’m used up goods, just let me go.”
It’s long moments before I process her words enough to understand the meaning behind them. Used up goods. Wynter is a lot of things, but she’ll never be that. She could have fucked every guy in Chicago in the last eight years but she’d always be mine. “You are not used goods, Wynter. Why the fuck would you say that?” I growl. Barely controlled violent rage simmers under the surface, but I channel it all into making sure she’s okay.
“Because that’s what he said,” Wynter sobs, burying her face into my chest as hot tears roll down her cheeks.
Seeing her cry has always been the hardest thing for me. When she was a teenager and broke her ankle right before a big ballet recital, I held her for hours as she sobbed, and every single moment was pure torture for me. A man like me doesn’t usually have a heart, not one that hurts for other people, but mine beats for Wynter, it always has, and it always will.
I take a deep breath to steady my racing heart. “Who said that to you, Wynter?”
She shakes her head against my chest, but she doesn’t respond and I don’t know how to make her tell me what happened. Because I need to know, there’s no chance I’m letting her out of his room without some answers, and even then the chances are getting dicier by the second. This is the only place I can keep her safe, and if it’s the difference between her being safe and hating me, or free and dying, I’m going to take the former every single time.
“Do your siblings know about this?” I ask once her choked sobs ease.
“Storm knows. He dealt with it,” she whispers.
A fresh wave of anger rolls over me like a wave in the ocean. Why the fuck didn’t he tell me? We had a deal when I left that I was to know anything and everything that happened in Wynter’s life and being beaten by what I can only assume was a belt seems like something I should have fucking known about.
“I asked him not to tell you. It wasn’t long after you left and I went to college, and I didn’t think you would care, but in case you did and came back just to leave again… I couldn’t handle it. So I asked him not to tell anyone, including Rayne and Snow.”
The explanation does little to calm the vibrant red in my vision. It does nothing to help ease the tension so tight I’m almost certain my entire body is going to snap, and it doesn’t even begin to remove my own self-loathing. She was hurt because I wasn’t there. If I never left, she wouldn’t have been in that position, because I never would have let that happen.
“Don’t be angry at him. It was my own stupidity, and it’s dealt with already.”
Before I can think better of it, I’m flipping her onto her back and leaning over her, my fingers grasping her chin so she’s forced to look at me. “Of course I’m angry, dove. I’m fucking livid that someone hurt you and I wasn’t the one to kill them. I’m furious that my best friend didn’t tell me someone hurt my woman. And I’m fucking devastated that someone else has marked you and therefore you think you’re used goods.” I force the words through gritted teeth, barely controlling my need to cover her body with my own marks.
Wynter’s mouth drops open and I can’t help but focus on her luscious lips quivering under my gaze. She looks perfect when she’s underneath me, exactly where she belongs. “I wasn’t yours then,” she whispers.
“You have always been mine, Wynter. And you always will be.” I rest my forehead on hers for a moment, taking the time to breathe her in. The intoxicating mixture of vanilla and sin fills my nose, and it takes all I have not to take her right here and now. But there are secrets we’re both holding close to our chests, and until they’re out in the open, I’ll have to keep my hands to myself.
