Read Online Beneath the Burn by Pam Godwin - Free Book Online Page A

open, exposing a white expanse of torso that never saw daylight.
    She hung upside down, doubled over at the waist, and arms and thighs squeezed to her chest by ratchet style straps. Her ankles were bound together and dangled below her face.
    Choosing the punishment was not the same as choosing to be punished. The beating would’ve happened with or without her consent. There was no power exchange. No safe word. Choosing the method gave her an illusion of control, and in the monster’s lair, illusion was better than reality.
    The whip of the flogger caught her labium. She loosened her muscles, held her expression sedate, and embraced it.
    Another strike. Upper thigh. A burn flared her sinuses. She breathed through it, and for better or worse, said in her toughest voice, “Again.”
    He stumbled mid-lunge, and the lashing fell short. His expression was so openly bewildered, it drew his brows inward over dark eyes searching hers. Here he was, Master of the Dungeon, and he seemed unsure of how to proceed.
    Then he smiled, and it chilled the air. “Whatever you’re up to”—he raised his arm—”it’s making me hard as hell.”
    The flogger swung down. She held his eyes and adapted to the pain, in all its twisted faces.

9
    The van pulled off the interstate and parked at a rest area in Alabama…Mississippi…hell, Jay didn’t know where. He hadn’t looked up from his acoustic and notepad since they left Georgia that morning.
    The heat of the summer sun baked the windows, and the A/C cranked on high. With his guitar cradled in his lap and his socked feet on the dash, he was too comfortable to move. Laz and Wil were out of the van before Rio killed the motor. The tight quarters and endless driving must have been wearing on them.
    Rio lingered, as did his stare.
    Jay didn’t look up from his scrawled lyrics. “Don’t you need to hit the head?”
    A huff. Rio wadded up his envelope of flavored candy sugar he’d been licking out of for the past hour and threw it at the windshield. The crumpled ball bounced off the dash and fell amongst the litter on the floorboard.
    A smile pulled at Jay’s lips. “Who took the fun out of your Fun Dip?”
    “You did, Jay. That’s who.”
    Rio’s glare eclipsed Jay’s periphery. Was the big guy seriously pouting? Jay twisted in the seat to face him. “How did I do that exactly?”
    “You’ve been strumming funeral hymns for five-hundred miles. I’m about to off myself emo-style.”
    Friggin’ drama queen. And it wasn’t a funeral hymn. “Just don’t do it while you’re driving”.
    “Which song are you working on?” Rio arched his neck to look at Jay’s notes, his tanned bald head catching the glare of the sun.
    Jay angled his lyrics out of view just to be a dick. “Whichever one I want.”
    “You can work on whatever you want…as long as it’s
Cuntapus
.”
    How could Rio say that ridiculous word without busting a smile? Yet he maintained his unflinching glare.
    Jay tucked his pencil behind his ear and dug his phone out of the console. “I will never write a song about cunt, pussy, or any other term for the female anatomy.” He wanted to be taken seriously as a musician. Not sell out with shocking song titles.
    Rio’s half-growl, half-groan was a heavy, continuous reverberation as he stretched his ogreish biceps toward the roof. The dude was big and carried his intimidation the way he carried his muscle mass. Viscerally and without force. It just sort of clung to him, much like the rough-hewed women who made up a good portion of their fan base.
    “I want high energy.” Rio glowered and stressed every syllable. “Lots of aggressive, wet dripping beats. I want
Cuntapus
.”
    Said the drummer who could tap out a mellow ride with more dynamism than the fast double strokes of a punker. He met his glare. “No.”
    The sudden tilt of Rio’s lips cracked his stony mask. “I guess you can’t write about cuntapus when you aren’t getting cuntapus.”
    Whatever.