Chapter 3: The Punishment
The days without him were a form of psychological torture. Scarlet moved through her routines—designing logos, meeting friends for coffee, grocery shopping—but she was a ghost haunting her own life. Every alleyway shadow held his shape. Every creak in her old apartment building was his footstep. She slept fitfully, and when she did sleep, she dreamed of cold steel and hot hands.
She took to sleeping in soft, button-up pajamas, a thin cotton armor. It felt like a provocation, a challenge she was casting into the dark. Come and take them off. The bruise was gone, but the memory of it was a brand.
On the fifth night, the rain came. It sheeted against her windows, a constant, whispering roar. She finally fell into a deeper sleep, lulled by the noise, one hand curled under her cheek.
The cold against her lips was not a dream.
It was precise, metallic, a circle of absolute zero tracing the seam of her mouth. Her eyes flew open.
He loomed above her in the dark, a massive silhouette blotted against the gray window light. Rain dripped from his leather jacket onto her duvet. The pistol’s muzzle pressed gently, insistently, against her lower lip.
“Make a sound,” he whispered, his voice raspy from the cold, “and this goes in your mouth a different way.”
Her heart was a wild, frantic drum against her ribs. But beneath the terror, a deep, shameful current of arousal ignited, so immediate it made her dizzy. She stared up into the shadows of his face, her breath puffing against the steel.
His other hand was already moving. It slipped beneath the hem of her pajama top, rough palm skimming her stomach, making her muscles quiver. He found the first button. A flick of his thumb, and it popped open. The second. The third. The cool air hit her skin, and then his hand was covering her breast, squeezing possessively. He gave a low, approving hum.
With a sharp yank, he parted the fabric. Her breasts spilled out, pale and full in the gloom, nipples tightening instantly.
He looked at them, then back at her eyes. “Pretty.”
He shifted the gun, letting the cold barrel drag down her chin, her throat, coming to rest in the valley between her breasts. With his now-free hand, he cupped her right breast, weighing it. Then he slapped it. Not hard, but with a crisp, stinging authority that made her gasp. The sound was sharp in the quiet room. Her nipple peaked into a tight, aching bud.
A dark groan rumbled from his chest. “Fuck. You like that.”
He slapped the other one, a little harder, watching the flesh flush and jiggle. A soft, broken moan escaped her. She was melting, a pool of liquid heat gathering between her legs. The gun was a terrifying anchor to reality, but her body was arching into his punishing hands.
“You’re fucking loving this,” he breathed, incredulous. He slapped each breast again, alternating, a steady, degrading rhythm that had her panting. “A gun to your throat and you’re getting wet. What does that make you, Scarlet?”
She didn’t have an answer. Her hips shifted restlessly on the bed. His eyes tracked the movement. He looked down her body, to the loose waistband of her pajama bottoms.
Instinctively, almost reflexively, she let her legs fall open.
A sharp, animal noise tore from him. He shoved the gun into the waistband of his jeans. Both hands went to her pants, ripping the button loose, dragging the fabric and her panties down her thighs in one violent motion. She kicked them off the rest of the way.
He stared at her exposed pussy, glistening already in the scant light. “Un-fucking-believable.”
He didn’t touch her there. Not yet. He put his hands on her inner thighs, his thumbs digging into the soft flesh, spreading her wider, exposing her completely to his gaze. The vulnerability was absolute. She felt a fresh trickle of arousal seep out.
Then, slowly, deliberately, she lifted her own hand. She kept her eyes locked on his, a challenge and a surrender in one. Her fingers trailed down her stomach, through her damp curls, and found her clit. She touched herself, a slow, circular motion, her breath catching.
His eyes widened, pupils swallowing the gray. A muscle ticked in his jaw.
She increased the pressure, her fingers slipping easily in her own wetness. A soft sigh left her lips. With her other hand, she reached up and cupped her own breast, mimicking his earlier slap, giving herself a sharp, sweet smack. Then the other.
He watched, mesmerized, a statue of tense hunger. “You dirty, filthy bitch,” he whispered, the words soaked in awe.
She was putting on a show for him, and it was the most empowering, degrading thing she’d ever done. Her fingers worked faster, sliding through her slick folds, plunging shallowly inside herself, then back to her swollen clit. The creaminess of her arousal was obscene, coating her fingers, making lewd, wet sounds. She slapped her breast in time with the frantic circling of her other hand.
“You see this?” she panted, her voice陌生 to her own ears. “This is what you do to me.” She showed him her glistening fingers.
That broke him. With a growl, he grabbed her wrist, pulling her hand away from her pussy. He brought her soaked fingers to his mouth and sucked them clean, his tongue winding around them, his eyes burning into hers. The taste of her own arousal on his tongue was the most erotic thing she’d ever seen.
Then he was on her. He didn’t bother taking off his jeans, just shoved them down his thighs. His cock, thick and veined and raging hard, sprung free. He positioned himself at her entrance, the head nudging through her drenched folds. He paused, still holding her gaze.
“Tell me.”
“Fuck me,” she begged, her composure shattered. “Please, Damon. Fuck me with the gun on.”
He drove into her with a force that slammed her head into the pillow. The stretch was breathtaking, a perfect, burning fullness. He set a ruthless, jackhammer pace, each thrust punching the air from her lungs. The denim of his jeans scraped against her inner thighs, a raw, abrasive counterpoint to the slick, hard heat pistoning inside her.
“Look at you,” he grunted, his hands fisting in the sheets by her head. “Taking it. Your greedy little cunt is sucking me right in. You dreamt of this, didn’t you? Dreamt of me holding you down and ruining you.”
“Yes!” she cried, her nails raking down his back, feeling the rigid canvas of his jacket.
“This what you needed? A criminal in your bed? A dirty fuck with a gun?” He was breathless, each word punctuated by a savage plunge. The metal of the pistol pressed cold against her hip.
She was tumbling, hurtling toward the edge. The combination of his words, his brutal possession, the dangerous weight of the weapon, it was too much. Her orgasm detonated without warning, a silent, screaming rupture that clamped her around him in vise-like pulses. She shook violently, her back bowing off the bed, a raw, torn sound ripped from her throat.
Feeling her convulse, his control snapped. With three final, deep, grinding thrusts, he buried himself and came. His roar was muffled against her neck, a hot, endless flood pulsing into her as his big body shuddered and went taut, then limp.
Silence, save for their ragged breathing and the relentless rain. The smell of sex, gun oil, and wet leather filled the room.
He was still inside her when his body went rigid again, but not with pleasure. It was a different kind of tension. Awareness. He slowly pulled out, the loss making her wince. He stood up, his movements suddenly stiff, and yanked his jeans up, fastening them with sharp, angry motions. He pulled the gun from his waistband, looked at it as if he’d never seen it before, and shoved it into a holster under his jacket.
He wouldn’t look at her.
Scarlet lay spent and exposed, watching him. The predator was gone. In his place was a man wrestling with a ghost.
“Damon?” she ventured, her voice small.
“Don’t.” The word was a blade. He ran a hand over his face. “I shouldn’t have brought the piece. Not here.”
It was the first crack she’d seen in his armor. The gun wasn’t just a tool for him; it was a part of a life he was realizing he didn’t want to drag into this room. Into her.
He finally looked at her, his expression bleak. “This is getting messed up.”
“I know,” she said softly.
He stared at her for a long moment, then turned and walked out. He didn’t disappear into the night. She heard him in her living room, the heavy sigh of her sofa cushions taking his weight. He was staying. Not in her bed, but in her space. Guarding the door, or perhaps guarding her from himself.
Scarlet pulled the covers over her sticky body. The fear was gone. In its place was a strange, aching clarity. He was just as ruined by this as she was. And neither of them knew how to stop.