Mistress of Redemption (11 page)

“What will you do? Spank me?” she

muttered.

Lucifer sent her spinning out of His

plane with a mere flicker of a

thought, knowing she’d land hard

before the portal to the oasis reality,

possibly with palm tree fronds up her

defiant backside. The spark of humor

that flickered through Him was brief,

however. Tossing the goblet into the

fire, He curled His lip back in a

snarl. “He’s dragging her down, as I

said he would. We will destroy her

with this madness.”

The flames shifted and He saw Her

face there, the suggestion of the body

that She’d chosen for the moment.

“You care about her. But this meeting

between them was meant to be. Soul

mates cannot deny their bonds here.

You said as much to her.”

“This man has dedicated his mortal

life to destroying the souls of women.

You know what could happen to her

soul if it is destroyed by her own

soul mate. It’s not him I worry about.

The Cycle will take him where he

needs to go.”

“You had to do something. Her soul

mate, as immature as he yet is, may

do what we have been unable to do.

Make her believe that she is

deserving of love again.

Perhaps the two of them together can

accomplish what they cannot alone.”

The fire flared out, surrounding Him.

He passed his fingers through it,

feeling Her within as well as

without. “Love creates miracles, my

Lord. That is what we are. Dona is

strong, one of the strongest

Mistresses of Redemption who has

ever served you. Have faith.”

“Faith is your department. Justice is

mine.”

Her soft breath touched Him. “Oh,

you are so wrong, dearest. How

could I have the faith to come out and

shine in the fullness of the moon at

night if I did not feel the heat of your

rays lingering from the daylight

warming me? Your justice is

balanced by my mercy, but my mercy

comes from the love you give me as a

gift. For every half a heart there is

another heart. You could have cast

him into Hell’s fires, but since he is

hers, you gave her the choice. You

have faith.”

“Know me so well, do you?” His

brow quirked, a mortal gesture, but

one She enjoyed, evidenced by the

fact She raised fingers of flame that

were cool as water and stroked it,

reached in and touched the light

energy of Him, twining it with Her

own.

“As I know my own heart. We are

One, as we have always been.”

43

Joey W. Hill

* * * * *

They were done. Mariah sat on the

grass several yards from Nathan,

combing out her copper red hair and

watching the leopard play with the

fiery ends. They’d released her

slave’s head and neck, taken his arms

from behind his back and tethered

them out to his sides with some slack,

but his ankles and thighs remained

bound. The D-rings gleamed at his

nipples and the head of his cock,

making her lust stir despite the

emotional upheaval her visit to

Lucifer had caused her.

As Dona circled him, she saw the

silver of the one in his scrotum. It

was just visible under the fold of his

cock. They’d cleaned up the blood,

but he was pale, bathed in sweat

from what she was certain was

throbbing, excruciating pain. His jaw

was tight, his teeth clamped on a

metal bit they’d placed between his

teeth and fastened tightly around his

head, stretching the corners of his

mouth cruelly. Fiona’s doing, she

was sure. The leopard woman had an

appealing vindictive streak.

Squatting, Dona lifted his semi-erect

member and examined the ladder of

barbells they’d run all the way up

from the base to below the flare of

the head. They’d hooked a chain to

each bar and latched the end to the

scrotum ring so as he became fully

erect the tension would pull on all the

inserted metal bars, increasing the

sensation.

She was tempted to stroke him, see if

she could do just that. Holding him

like this so intimately, feeling him

watching her every movement, unable

to speak to her, made her want to do

even more. Take him somewhere that

wasn’t about Redemption, Hell or

anything other than just exploring this

fluttery tug of feeling as he watched

her.

What would it be like, to have the

leisure to do that? She hadn’t thought

of the things of the mortal world in

some time, not in relation to herself.

Now she visualized herself in her

living room, the gas logs flickering.

Maybe it was a Friday night and

they’d planned to go out to a club.

She was in a short blue silk dress that

fit like a second skin. He wore slacks

and a dress shirt that strained over

his broad shoulders as he went to his

knees before her and tried to tease

her into staying home. His lips

nibbling up her ankle, his gaze full of

nothing but her and hot desire as he

tried to coax her into parting her legs.

She imagined pushing him back.

Perhaps he’d resist her at first, prove

to her he was stronger by capturing

her and rolling her to the floor,

holding her pinned under him as he

teased her neck with his mouth,

pressed his hardness beneath the

slacks between her legs.

Because he knew he was her slave,

which had nothing to do with

strength, at length he’d obey her and

roll to his back. Tremors would run

through those fine muscles as she

stroked him, made him stay still at

her command. Opening his dress

shirt, she’d spread it out to look at

his fine chest. She’d stand over him,

straddling him so he’d get teasing

glances of the bare skin in the

shadows beneath her short skirt. As

she performed a slow, writhing

dance over him, one hand playing

with the folds of the skirt, inching it

up, the other rising to trace the curve

of her breast in the plunging neckline,

she’d tease him with her words as

well.

44

Mistress of Redemption

She’d tell him how she planned to

take him to the club, make him sit at a

table on the edge of the dance floor

while she did a fuck-me-now dance

just like this, attracting the attention

of other men. She knew her slave,

knew how possessive and jealous he

could get.

She’d dance out under the flashing

strobe lights, watch his eyes get more

heated until she could feel the violent

need of his passion at a hundred

paces, his fury with the men who

dared get near his Mistress. Only

then would she call him to her so she

could do that sensual dance against

him, prove that he was the only one

she wanted. She’d make him

agonizingly hard so all the women

would see and be envious if they

didn’t have such a fine, large cock to

call their own.

As she taunted him with the picture in

their living room, she’d slowly peel

the dress away from her flesh, the

firelight dappling her skin. He’d beg

her to fuck him then. Knees pressing

into the carpet, she’d go down on

him, her heart full of the look in his

face, her skin shivering under his

touch as he disobeyed and reached

for her, overwhelmed by the feeling

swamping them both…

That was what she would do with

Nathan. Jonathan had no place in her

fantasy.

His alter ego had the upper hand in

him right now, his malice and fear

infecting his actions the same way

they infected his soul.

Evil preyed on fear and insecurity.

Used it as the pathway to dig into a

soul, corrupt and turn it. Her job was

no different from an exorcist’s. With

surgical precision, she removed the

tentacles of evil that grew around the

soul and reminded it of its strength

and purity. If the evil had already

permeated it, then the soul was

beyond her help. The scalding fires

of Hell were needed to burn it to

ashes. Like a phoenix, it would be

reborn, with no memory of any

lessons learned.

As Lucifer had implied, Nathan was

a borderline case. Decay was a

spider web throughout his soul, but

the mass of it was on the outside, not

in the marrow. Hell would be the

most efficient solution, no doubt. But

because he was connected to her in a

way she couldn’t deny, she couldn’t

accept that Hell’s fire was his fate. It

made her angry, because she knew

Lucifer was never wrong.

She’d told herself repeatedly that

soul mates were just an instinct, a

physical addiction that had forced

open her mouth and made her beg to

take him on. Eventually, as Lucifer

had said, she’d have to release

Nathan, whether to Hell or to

Purgatory.

Really, it was a relief to know she

didn’t
have
to resist this feeling. She could explore it as much as she

wanted without danger to herself,

because he was going to be taken

from her whether she could bear to

let him go or not.

She was so tired. It was an unusual

feeling down here where needs of the

body could be optional, though lust

and sex in this instance had been

turned on full force to tap into

Nathan’s soul where he was most

vulnerable. One of her strongest

compulsions in her mortal life was

her most expertly used tool here, the

ability to sexually dominate a man.

45

Joey W. Hill

He reminded her of the tender side of

that compulsion. Things she’d long

ago lost faith in, such that Hell had

seemed a better place to be than

anything the Hall of Souls or

reincarnation could offer.

I’ll do the job. Then it will be over.

I’ll figure out a way to convince

Lucifer to let me stay, so
I never
have to go down that road again.

There were people who thought that

refusing to go forward was

stagnation. She knew progress was

just a mislabeled road sign for “this

way to self-annihilation”.

“Beautifully done, ladies.” Dropping

onto her knees next to his head at last,

she gazed down into his lovely blue

eyes. In them she saw agony, fury,

fear…and relief to see her. She could

tell that confused the hell out of him.

Her heart twisted in her chest with

understanding. She wasn’t any less

confused just because she had the

ability to give the connection

between them a name.

Reaching around his head, she

removed the bit and guided it out of

his mouth, touching Nathan’s finely

shaped lips as she did so. She noted

the redness and blue bruising at his

nipples, same as at his cock. From

the strain in his face, she knew he

was still feeling the pain keenly. Yet

his hand rose, albeit trembling with

that agony. She watched, mesmerized

as he almost made it to her face

before the restraints on his arms

brought him up short. When she

leaned forward, closing the distance,

he cupped her cheek, his thumb

brushing her jaw just below her lips,

as if he did not dare to presume so

much as to touch her mouth.

“Did he hurt you?” he asked thickly.

He’d apparently bitten his tongue,

explaining why they’d employed the

bit as an afterthought. “It looks…in

your eyes. It looks like he did.”

She looked for charm or duplicity in

his expression. While she didn’t see

any, she knew he was very clever.

Because she saw the soul that was

Nathan speaking through him, trying

to struggle through the wreckage

Jonathan had made of him, she gave

him honesty back. “That’s what those

who love you do. God’s no different

in that.”

His eyes crinkled, his lips drawing

back into a grimace, showing her that

the corners of his mouth were torn by

the bit. His body shuddered with a

harsh chuckle. “I always…figured…

God ran Hell.”

If he genuinely smiled, teased her

without malice, she knew she’d do

anything to rescue him
from himself.

Fiona had returned to Dona’s side.

Dona felt the leopard press against

her back. She reached back, found his

chin and gave him a passing scratch,

though her gaze remained on Nathan.

“He’s having an endorphin rush.

That’s what’s making him so loopy

and

disjointed,” Fiona observed.

Dona touched her fingers to the raw

corners of his mouth. “Tell me

what’s going through your head,