The Maestro's Butterfly (20 page)

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Claudio made a flamboyant gesture of smoothing her hair away from her face with the backs of his fingers, then ran their tips along her naked form from lips to pubis and back again. Miranda arched in pleasure. She was beginning to wish he would just mount her and fuck her, and didn’t care who saw it happen, but he only fed. When she realized what he planned to do, Miranda offered up her throat to him, and he took her to thunderous applause. Afterward, while she lay on the altar, dazed, he removed her restraints, pausing here and there to move her hand away from her crotch. She wanted to pleasure herself so badly, she ached.

“Later, butterfly,” he whispered. He picked her up in his arms and carried her nude form into the shadows, then backstage to sit her in a chair. “I have to take my bows,” he said. “I will return in a moment.”

She gave him a clumsy nod. She felt drunk.

Within moments, however, she was much better, and began looking around for something to cover up with, surprised to find her jeans, top and shoes on a nearby table. She had just enough time to put them on before the musicians returned from the stage. Catching sight of Claudio, she smiled and ran to him. “They loved it!” she said.

“You’re a genius.”

The look he gave her chilled her all over. “Yes,” he said. “It was a success. I have to mingle with the crowd. Wait for me in my dressing room.”

“Don’t I get to mingle too?”

“You will wait for me and think about what you’ve done and what almost happened. We have this to discuss when we are at home.”

Tears welled up in her eyes. “You’re not being fair,” she said. “At least let me have some fun before you do whatever it is you’re going to do.”

He tightened his jaw and quickly took her by the arm, leading her through the theatre to his dressing room. She caught Seth’s gaze for a moment. He shook his head and turned to speak with a girl Miranda had not seen before. The girl watched Claudio leading Miranda with interest.

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Keeping a hand on Miranda’s arm, he closed the door once they were inside, then stood behind Miranda and yanked her toward him, unbuttoning her jeans. “Hey, what?” she said as he pulled them down roughly. Then he held her in front of him with his left hand and stung her bottom hard with his right, again and again, until she began to squirm. Tears stung her eyes.

When it was over, he took her shoulders and turned her to face him. “Do not ever question something I tell you to do.”

She nodded, too startled to say anything, then pulled up her jeans hastily as he turned and left the room.

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Miranda rode back to the estate with Claudio and the musicians in the sedan, which Adam had abandoned within a couple of days of leaving. She sat in the middle of the backseat, between Seth and Chloe, while the new violinist rode nervously beside Claudio, who drove.

Chloe smirked at Miranda, and whispered, “Runaway. You are in so much trouble.”

Seth snickered and turned away to look out the window.

“Do you know what happens to runaways?” she taunted.

Claudio said a single word to her in French. The sight of his black eyes in the rearview mirror caused Miranda’s throat to constrict, as she remembered the spanking in the dressing room. She was trying very hard not to imagine what happened to runaways at Claudio’s house. The look he gave through the mirror caused Chloe to toss him a startled look, then give Miranda a self-satisfied glance and settle into her seat to stare out the window like Seth. Seth, however, gave Miranda a reassuring pat on the knee and smiled at her, then leaned his head back and closed his eyes.

Miranda stared at her hands most of the ride home, listening to Claudio talk to the new guy about upcoming performances.

When they arrived home, Claudio said, “Seth, bring in the violins and keep Matthew company. Chloe, go to your room. Miranda, come with me.”

Hot liquid poured into her stomach when he said her name. She and Chloe followed him into the house. Chloe kept her eyes down and pouted. Miranda looked around frantically, afraid she may lose her dinner.

Inside, he opened the door to the basement and held it for them. Chloe pushed her way around Miranda and leapt down several at a time, disappearing through the 150

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shadows toward her room. Claudio turned on the light and motioned Miranda through.

She walked through the door, but before she had gone very far down, she hesitated and grabbed the rail tightly.

Claudio loomed behind her. “Go,” he said.

After that, she slipped, but caught herself with a dry sob. She was trembling.

In his bedchamber, he locked the door, just as he had on her first night here.

He took off his coat. She scuttled away. “Let me take yours,” he said, and hung both garments in the wardrobe before he began to speak.

“One of the highest crimes you can commit here is to leave without my permission.”

Tears fell from her eyes now. “Claudio—”

He held up a finger to silence her and pulled her top over her head, exposing her breasts. She felt embarrassed by her own frightened acquiescence. Claudio glanced at something over her shoulder. She followed his gaze to see her double in the tilted mirror over the headboard. “I’ve been very generous with you,” he continued. “I’ve shielded you from unpleasant things. I’ve treated you better than anyone here, and you’ve repaid me by running away.”

There was a high-pitched desperation in her voice. “But I came back—”

“How can I trust you now, hmm?” He unzipped her jeans and crouched in front of her to pull them down. When she didn’t move, he looked up into her face with his brows raised. Understanding, she stepped out of her heels and the jeans and stood clutching one arm in front of her. He draped her clothing over his chair, then went to a drawer and took out two leather cuffs, attached to short lengths of chain. He tossed one on the mattress and took her trembling arm in his hand to fit the other around her tiny wrist. She watched him work and looked up at him with round, questioning eyes.

He turned her roughly and raised her arm to attach the chain to the thick ring high on his bedpost. She twisted to see him over her shoulder, but he had already taken her other wrist. She looked from one cuff to the other, wondering if her desperate 152

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movements, or perhaps her pubis pressed against the footboard, excited him.

Miranda stared at the bedspread, avoiding her reflection, and his, letting the tears come. She was frightened. There was no denying it. She was scared to death of what he was about to do.

Claudio left the room and returned with two large towels, one of which he placed under her feet, the other of which he draped over the footboard between the wood and her crotch. Then he went to the closet and chose a little dog quirt. He returned to embrace her from behind, pressing the implement against her quivering abdomen.

He rubbed his cheek against her hair and opened his lips. “Ah,
papillon,
” he breathed. “You have no idea how I’ve wanted to do this.” He gazed at her reflection and tickled the rough leather against her underside, stretched and vulnerable. “Open your eyes, my dear. We look like a painting in this light.” Her breath hitched as she obeyed, and her body quaked as though with a sickness. Claudio ran his palm over her smooth back and her round
derrière.

“You cry as though this were an execution,” he said softly.

The observation caused her to weep harder, and search for compassion in his eyes. “I won’t run away again.”

“No,” he said, pulling away. “I don’t think you will.”

He backed away from her and watched himself in the mirror as he rolled up his sleeves. Their eyes met in the glass, and a surprising progression of emotions crossed her face. Shock, before he ever raised the whip, and then shame. She hung her head, letting it bob between her shoulders as beads of clear liquid trickled down her leg to dampen the towel under her feet.

With the falling of the first lash, a wild seizure took hold of Miranda’s body. She screamed. Dangling chains chinked against the wood bedposts. The second blow stilled her struggles. With each successive lash, sweat began to dot her arms and the backs of her thighs. Again and again the whip fell on her bare skin, making her cry out, but 152

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Claudio did not stop. His body fell easily into the rhythm of whipping her, as though he were making love.

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Miranda lay, facedown, on Claudio’s bed, on another towel he had placed across the mattress, as if in a trance, while he unfastened the leather cuffs and removed them from her wrists. He spoke to her as he worked, sometimes in English, sometimes in French. “You will be a new creature now,” he said. “You will learn to serve your master the way he wishes to be served. And you will please me very much.”

He kissed the chafe marks on her wrists, and the sweat on her temple. She closed her eyes. With his lips, he brushed away escaping tears. “Shhh,” he murmured.

“Don’t cry.”

“I wet myself,” she said.

“It’s all right. It’s understandable. You are not the first.”

She tucked her hand under her chest. He pet her head.

“I’m going to leave you for a few moments,” he said. “Rest here until I come back. And don’t worry, my darling. No more punishment tonight.”

“When?” Her voice was tiny.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “Are you cold?”

“No.”

He squeezed her arm and left. She waited, listening to the sound of water gushing in the bathroom. When he returned, nude, her eyes followed his movements, still fearful. He helped her to her feet and carried her to the bathroom, then lowered her into the water. She did not flinch when he touched the bleeding welts, but drew her knees to her chest and bowed her head. He climbed in behind her, surrounding her with his legs.

He poured water over her back. She drew in her breath and clenched her fists.

“Will I have scars?” she asked.

“No. No scars. You belong to a vampire. There will be no scars.” He pulled back 154

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her hair, dampening it with his wet hands. Washing the bitter, fear-filled sweat from her arms and her breasts, his touch as light as a spider’s footfalls.

“My butterfly,” he murmured.

She found the pain strangely comforting and wondered what kind of new creature she was to be. His gentle touch, wiping away the remaining blood, soothed her.

“Soon, I will tell you the story of my making,” he said. “Or perhaps Chloe will tell it. She enjoys recounting it more than I do.” After that, neither spoke for a long while. Claudio began to hum a happy little tune, his voice reverberating off the tile.

The candles flickered with his movements. “Will you make love to me later?”

Miranda found herself asking.

“Of course, my pet,” he said.

She nodded, feeling glad, as though it would be a sort of consummation. She would open to him as she had never opened to anyone, and he would take her, and make her whole.

THE END

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