The Virgin and the Beast Read online

  I can’t help the involuntary step forward I take in protest. Or the words that spring out of my mouth. “That’s not what I’m here for.”

  The only response I get is the lift of that damn eyebrow. Oh, so now Mr. Loquacious is going to go back to clamming up.

  I lift my gloved hands and gesture all around us at the stinking barn. “I did not sign on to be some freaking ranch hand!” I toss my pitchfork to the ground for emphasis.

  “You keep bringing this up—” His voice is chilly as he takes a step toward me and places his foot on the pitchfork I just tossed to the barn floor in my little rant. “—What you did and did not agree to in coming here. It was my understanding that your father was in dire circumstances. I was the only one in the entire world offering to help him. One might think you’d show some gratitude to the man who saved your father’s life. Your father,” his eyes narrow and his jaw tenses, “who was, by the way, busy stealing the pensions of thousands of honest, hardworking people.”

  By the end of this small speech, I remember that oh shit, right, while I might have been lulled by the sight of the sweet horse whisperer I’ve been witnessing all day, this man can also go stone cold. And things don’t always go pleasantly for me when that happens.

  “Right,” I grit my own teeth, looking at the floor and seeing bits of hay that I missed while sweeping. Oh my gosh, I’ve only been at this one day, and I already hate mucking out stalls with the fire of a thousand suns.

  “Fine.” I kick petulantly at the stupid hay, scattering it over the ground.

  Almost immediately, Xavier’s hand is underneath my chin, lifting my head so that I meet his gaze. “What I mean is that you need to abandon all your expectations. You are here now. For the time being, nothing else matters. It is you and me, and when the time is right,” his hand drops low on my abdomen, “the child.”

  He says it all with such certainty. Like he has decided how everything will go in his universe and thus it will be so.

  “Now, on your knees.” He nods behind me. “Elbows on the bench.”

  I feel my eyes widen as I swing around to look at where he’s indicating. There is indeed a bench along the back wall of the horse stalls, near the spigot and deep basin sink where we do washing and fill up the horse water buckets.

  He’s got to be… joking.

  But with a sinking stomach, I know he’s not. How many times have I had that thought since meeting this man? Never once has any of the outrageous requests he’s made been a joke.

  Just once it’d be really great if he could break that record. I turn back to him to check if maybe this time…?

  Nope, the serious expression on his face tells me all I need to know.

  Sighing, I turn around. Right before I can get to my knees on the hard concrete, Xavier tosses a horse blanket down.

  Ever the gentleman. So I get to crouch on a horse blanket while he, what? Fucks me doggie style in a dirty barn?

  Or would that be more accurately termed horsey style in this situation?

  At least all the horses are out to pasture. I think it would be more humiliating if they were here to watch.

  I get down on my knees on the blanket.

  “Elbows on the bench.”

  I comply.

  Behind me, out of sight, I hear the spigot turn on and the sound of splashing water. Is he getting a drink? Or washing up?

  I swallow and shift where I sit on my knees. I glance around the empty stable. I’ve still had so few sexual experiences. Especially since it’s Xavier, I have no idea what to expect. It’s impossible not to tense up while waiting for him to do… whatever it is he’s about to do.

  But then, sooner than I expect him, his hands reach around the front of my jeans, unbutton them, and tug them roughly down around my knees. Next they go to my panties. He seems impatient.

  Immediately his hands are on my ass, stroking the globes. He lets out a low hiss before grabbing them and giving a hard squeeze. I jump at the unexpected pressure.

  He chuckles. “That’s right, remember Master’s touch.” He squeezes and massages my cheeks in circles, pulling them apart and then smooshing them together. Then he leans over my back.

  “And remember how much you like it.” He pulls the cheeks apart again, squeezing extra hard. Then he lifts a hand in front of my face and shoves his thumb in my mouth. “Suck.”

  I breathe in sharply but do as he asks. I suck on his thumb. It’s clean and has the sharp residual taste of hand soap.

  “That’s my good girl,” he praises. Using the same language he did with the fucking horses.

  That’s screwed up in a big way. Right? It’s not just me?

  But then there’s something brushing at my entrance. Not his fingers.

  Startled, I look down.

  It’s a large, flat brush.

  Is that a…?

  A horse brush. He’s teasing my clit with a fucking horse brush.

  “Grooming is an important part of everyday life on the ranch,” he murmurs. “A fine, gentle brush is a must on the most sensitive areas.”

  He pushes down the back collar of my shirt and his lips descend on my neck. His teeth immediately nip as well.

  “Of course, you still have to apply pressure to make sure the job is done.” He begins to move the brush in circles over my clitoris and I jolt forward. The bristles are still somewhat rough and I can’t decide if it feels good or disturbing.

  But the way he keeps nibbling on the back of my neck and whispering in my ear… and how his other hand has begun exploring at the lips of my pussy, a spasm rocks through my body.

  “That’s right,” he whispers soothingly, his fingers teasing at my entrance, massaging and dipping just the littlest bit inside. “You’ll notice the mare start to respond to your touch when you’re grooming her just the way she likes.” He presses the brush hard against my bud and wetness gushes over his fingers.

  “Grooming can be a sweet time of connection between Master and mare,” his teeth nip harder still, right at the skin behind my earlobe, which sends shivers up and down my entire body, “because she learns to trust that he knows just the way she likes to be stroked.”

  He dips one of his long, thick fingers inside me. “Grooming, just like all of horsemanship, if you’re doing it right, should be about trust and pleasure, for both involved.” He pulls back with the brush until he’s applying the barest of touches and then he teases around and around my bud, then up and down, then around and around. I gasp and press forward for more pressure, but he pulls it away again, at the same time slipping another finger inside me.

  And then both brush and his fingers disappear. My senses go on alert. I wait to hear the sound of his buckle and his pants being undone. Instead, I feel something at my entrance pressing in. I startle slightly and his hand comes to my back.

  “Shh, girl, hold steady, you’re all right.”

  What the hell? Did he undo his pants and I didn’t notice?

  But when I look down and crane my neck so I can see between my legs, I see that it’s not any part of him sliding inside me. No, it’s some kind of wooden pole with a… is that a condom over it?

  I jerk forward and it hits an awkward, uncomfortable angle.

  “Steady,” he warns, his hand firm on my back.

  But when I look behind me and I see that holy shit—he’s feeding the grip handle end of the fucking pitchfork inside me.

  “What the fuck!”

  “Language,” he snaps, eyes coming up to mine, a scowl on his face. “Trust and pleasure.”

  “Well did you stick any farm implements up a fucking horse’s cooch?”

  I get the eyebrow lift for that one. “No, I am not into bestiality.”

  I breathe out heavily. That’s a relief, at least.

  “Bend over,” he orders. “Eyes closed.”

  I lift my eyes to the ceiling. Am I really going to… I mean, holy crap, this is just beyond—

  “Over. Now.”

  It’s not a req
uest.

  I lean forward on the bench, propped on my elbows and squeeze my eyes shut.

  “Good girl.” He pats my ass and then the pole continues its penetration.

  My eyes flick nervously behind my eyelids. Those pitchforks were heavy. And he’s— I mean, he’s—

  He’s fucking you with it, Mel. That’s what he’s doing with it.

  Oh my God. Will the insanity never stop or even slow down for a second with this man?

  And the even crazier thing? When his other hand not manipulating the pitchfork handle comes around to play with my clitoris already so sensitized by the grooming brush and his mouth descends to the back of my neck again?

  I clench around the pole.

  I’m turned on. To my utter goddamned shame and humiliation, I’m getting off on this whole fucked up scene.

  “Such a good girl. Look at you squirting your sweet juices for me,” he murmurs in between suckling and nipping at my neck. Your little cunt is so wet for anything and everything I could ever do. That’s right, you’re doing so well. That’s riiiiiiight. It feels so good, doesn’t it?”

  His finger toying with my clit is as gentle as the pole inside me is relentless. He circles the bud this way and that, then presses before removing the pressure entirely and focusing on the pitchfork pole. It’s so lubricated with my juices that it slides in and out, the ribbed rubber handle dragging along my walls and driving me crazy with each pass.

  “My precious little dirty girl. Look how sopping you are. I’m fucking you with a pitchfork and you can’t get enough of it. Your little cunt greedily sucks it back inside. That’s right, clamp down on it. I know you wish it was my cock, but greedy little girls don’t get Master’s cock until they beg.”

  His fingers come back to my clit, rubbing and circling and oh, oh God—

  “I can see how much you wish this was my cock. You wish it was Master, bending you over this bench and driving my huge cock inside you. Just like the day when I first took this tight little virgin hole.”

  His words, they’re so filthy and wrong. And they’re driving my orgasm closer and closer. I’m so close to the edge with how wrong and fucking hot every second of this is.

  “Oh you loved that, didn’t you? You lost your mind from my cock, juicing right up and getting so wet for me. Your sweet little body was so ready from me to come and take what was mine. Just like now. I’m so hard I’m about to bust the zipper on my goddamn pants you make me so fucking crazy—”

  The rod lands deep inside me and his fingers on my clit press down and I scream out my orgasm.

  I’m still shaking and blinking as I come down when Xavier withdraws the pitchfork and tosses it to the side. Then there’s the noise of his buckle coming undone.

  Is he finally going to…?

  But when I look over my shoulder, it’s only to see him jerking on his cock roughly, up and down. The next second, he shoves up my shirt and then comes on my back. I can’t look away from his face. His features are knit in the most beautiful expression of pleasure, pain, and relief. Then he slumps over on my back, his long, hard cock sandwiched between our bodies.

  Why didn’t he come inside me? It feels like rejection, as ridiculous as that is.

  He uses the shirt he pulls off to clean up my back and then he pulls me into his lap a few moments later.

  “Why?” I ask as he brushes my hair out of my face. “Why do it that way with the—” I gesture at the discarded pitchfork. “I mean, okay, whatever, you’ve got your own way of doing things, but still—” He’s got everything so jumbled in my head. “I don’t get it. Isn’t the point of this to get a baby?”

  I hope he can see my confusion but not my hurt. God, I don’t want to reveal that. And I need to understand.

  I’m not sure what I expect his answer to be, but it’s not for him to caress my cheek and then grip the hair at the base of my neck. He looks me in the eye, “Pet, my first priority is to have you out of your mind and desperate for my cock. You don’t get me inside you again until you’re begging for it, so the baby-making will just have to wait.”

  Chapter 12

  What follows are two and a half weeks of relative calm.

  Well, if you call hard ass work mucking out stalls and learning to groom and care for horses calm. Oh, and we can’t forget the part where I’m getting screwed into oblivion every night or, you know, at random points throughout the day whenever Xavier gets a wild hair that it seems like a good time to give Mel an orgasm and or to fuck her with whatever implement he might happen to have on hand.

  Of course, never with his almighty cock. No, because apparently, I’d have to beg for that.

  Ha. As if. He’s as crazy as he is inventive.

  You see, he’s a big fan of improvisation. He always gives whatever object he’s decided to pleasure me with a good washing beforehand and he always sheaths it. He’s even prepared ahead of time and bought several things new just for this reason—such as one riding crop that he’s particularly fond of. He has a special leather bag in the stable full of his favorites. I have my own grooming brush, the crop, a bridle and bit he puts on me sometimes, and several other little toys.

  At night inside the house is another story. There he has all different sizes and shapes of dildos he ordered for me. He gets an especially delighted grin every time he pulls a new one out of the box.

  Sometimes he masturbates along with what he’s doing to me. Other times he doesn’t.

  And even though I come every night, or hell, sometimes multiple times a day, I can’t help the mounting frustration that’s building. I don’t know what he wants from me.

  Or I guess, God, that’s not true. He told me that first day out in the stables what he wants. For me to be out of my mind for him. And to freaking beg him?

  I shake my head even as I scrape the pitchfork along the floor of the stall to separate Lulu’s clean bedding from the dirty. Then separate out the soiled hay. Lulu’s stall is one of the easiest. Maybe it’s because she was raised from a foal, but she always poops in one part of the stall and pees on the hay in another without getting her bedding too messed. I always leave hers for last because it’s a relative joy.

  If only Lulu herself would warm up to me. But nope, while most of the other horses will let me approach them and I’ve even started grooming Pioneer, Bob, Paddyshack, and my favorite—Sugar—Lulu is still not a happy camper when I’m around.

  She neighs and gets agitated, stepping back and forth, her eyes going crazy. Xavier says it’s something we need to work on and that she’s picking up on my anxiety, but I’m happy to just go groom one of the other nicer horses. Thankfully he hasn’t pressed the point.

  And he has his hands full with Samson and the other animals.

  He always spends a portion of his morning and evening with Holy Hellfire. He must have a special affection or relationship with the old ornery racehorse. Or rather, the racehorse who refused to race, I guess I should say. He puts ice packs on the aging horse’s hooves morning and night and feeds him a special grain. I’ll see him out there some evenings just standing and brushing his comb down the horse’s body long after the grooming should be done. If I wasn’t bound and determined to see Xavier for the bastard he is, I might almost think it was sweet. But nope, I’m far too clear-eyed for that.

  Even if he did stop with the lasso around my waist after a couple of days. I swear, it’s like he’s extra assholish on purpose so then I’m brainwashed into thinking he’s being a good guy when he stops. Like how I felt all grateful after the dog kennel. And now with letting me off the lasso. When he pulls back and gives me back a modicum of freedom, he’s suddenly my knight in shining armor? Such BS.

  The petty politics people used to play back in the corporate world have nothing on this guy. Though, I don’t know, I go back and forth from being sure he’s a master manipulator and then thinking he’s just making up everything as he goes along, completely on the fly.

  Because when he’s working with the horses, he
seems like the most natural and guileless person on the planet.

  Now that I’m not forced to watch him training Samson, I find myself wandering out to the front paddock between my other chores.

  The progression has been sloooooooow, but Xavier has made headway with the beast. At first it was a lot of standing around staring at each other. Samson would bolt every so often until Xavier walked close, hemming the horse in until he finally stood still again. Commence another stare-off.

  After a couple days, Samson would stop long enough for Xavier to come near enough to touch his muzzle. By day three, Xavier was able to scratch up his long nose and touch his neck.

  Then I swear he spends the rest of the week just doing that.

  Just touching the horse.

  Oh, and whispering to him. Can’t forget that. The secret Xavier-horse language he’s developed.

  He is a horse whisperer. Like, a real one. He whispers to the animals and they respond with their horse noises. So much so that after three weeks, the jacked up, crazy-eyed Samson I met the first day doesn’t look much like himself. I come out after cleaning Lulu’s stall and put my arms on the fence to watch Xavier with him.

  For the past two days, Xavier’s been tossing a small blanket over Samson’s back, then pulling it off again. Then tossing it on. Pulling it off.

  I thought at this point Xavier could get away with anything, but at first, Samson seemed quite spooked at having something on his back.

  Now as I watch, I see where Xavier is going with the whole exercise. Not only is the blanket on Samson’s back, but now Xavier’s hefting a whole saddle on as well.

  Samson paws the ground nervously but Xavier gets it on. Then he pauses and goes to the front of the horse, whispering to him and cuddling him, forehead to nose. I can only shake my head in wonder.

  Oh yeah, Samson’s already under Xavier’s spell big time. He might be putting up some last token resistance, but he’s already a goner.