Chasing Cindy Pt. 02

I probably could have shifted into my panther form and had a much better chance at killing Ricardo, but I was just as outnumbered as Logan was. And I had no idea what kind of shifters we were dealing with. Still...I wasn't going to be raped or even fondled against my will without one hell of a fight. I felt bad that Logan was being forced to witness another man putting his hands on me. It was the ultimate torture for a mated male. It was a direct insult to a man's pride as his woman's protector.

Ricardo knew exactly what he was doing...that fucker. He was deliberately taunting Logan. Warning him not to put up a fight in one moment, and making sure he wanted to struggle against his bonds in the next. He was just looking for a reason to kill my mate for the fun of it. When Ricardo shoved my legs open and thrust a finger inside of me, he made the mistake of getting close enough that I could bite him. And I wasn't about to use my human teeth to do it.

When Ricardo went to nuzzle my neck as he was violating me with his fingers, I let out my fangs and bit into his ear lobe. He screamed like a girl and shoved me to the ground, but not before I could take a hunk of skin with me. I spat the bottom of his ear lobe at him, my mouth filled with his blood as I laughed in his face. I should have been thinking about what he might do to me, or to Logan for that matter. But my rage had taken over, and I had acted on instinct.

"Let's see if you can grow that back, asshole." I hissed. Shifters healed within minutes from most wounds, but we couldn't grow back severed parts of our bodies. "I won't make a very good hooker for you if I bite the dicks off of any man you give me to." I added sarcastically.

The bleeding on Ricardo's ear stopped almost immediately, and he yanked me up off the floor and threw me over his shoulder. He stormed out of the room with Logan being pulled along by his men. When I pounded my fists on his back, Ricardo spanked me hard enough to leave bruises. By the time we reached our destination, I was exhausted from fighting his hold on me, and I was terrified of what he was going to do to me.

We were in a large bedroom. There was a St. Andrews cross in the middle of the room, and a huge bed against the wall. One entire wall was covered with all manner of painful looking instruments. There were whips, and floggers, and even a row of canes. I saw a dozen hooks that held collars, leather cuffs, and even a few leashes. I didn't even want to think of what was in the dresser that was sitting in the corner of the room.

My level of fear went into orbit when Ricardo started to secure me to the cross as Logan fought tooth and nail against his handlers to get to me. I fought like a feral cat, but once he had my wrists tied, there wasn't much I could do to get away from him. He made quick work of my ankles, and within moments...I was helpless.

"Secure her mate to the bed." Ricardo told his men. The odds might have been against Logan, but by the time he had been restrained on the bed, both of Ricardo's men had suffered bloody injuries. When two naked women came into the room, my outrage made me want to shift. But it was impossible in the position I was in. And Ricardo knew it.

When the women crawled onto the bed with my mate and began caressing his body, I roared with the rage I was feeling. My panther wanted out, and I was powerless to let her do her worst to the women who were touching my man.

Logan clenched his eyes shut and struggled in his bonds, but he couldn't get out of them. The women were licking and sucking his cock right in front of me, but we all knew that he wouldn't be able to get an erection for anyone but me. We were mated, and he wouldn't be capable of fucking anyone else.

But just seeing other women with their hands and mouths all over him had me seeing red. I snarled with rage and wiggled in my restraints to no avail. Ricardo went over to the wall and chose a heavy looking flogger. He returned to stand in front of me, momentarily blocking my view of Logan.

I flinched when he started running the handle of the flogger over my breasts and down to my stomach. When he reached my pussy, I snapped at him with my fangs. He immediately stepped back in a moment of fear before regaining his composure, and I saw the anger in his eyes at my continued defiance. I cried out in pain when he smacked the flogger against my exposed sex. Logan's eyes popped open and saw what Ricardo was doing to me.

"You sick fucker! I'll kill you!" He bellowed, squirming as best he could in an effort to get away from the women who were still touching him. He saw the hurt in my eyes, and I knew he understood that seeing him in such a compromising position was killing me inside.

"I'm making you watch as other women touch your mate to hurt you emotionally." Ricardo told me. He was completely ignoring Logan's threats as he moved behind me and leaned down to speak in my ear. "Now I'm going to use the flogger on you to hurt him. To show him that you belong to me now. And there isn't a damn thing he can do about it."

When Ricardo snapped his fingers, the women on the bed stopped what they were doing and left the room. He wanted my mate's undivided attention. Logan watched as Ricardo took a few steps back, giving himself the room he needed to wield the flogger. I had never been hit like this before. A little spank here and there in the heat of a playful moment with a lover, but this was going to be different.

I hissed loudly from the pain when I felt the first strike. Logan's face surely mirrored the agony on mine as he kept eye contact me, offering me the only support he could. The second strike was even harder than the first, and I knew I would be left with marks when it was over. But I refused to scream. I wasn't going to give Ricardo the satisfaction of knowing how successful his efforts at breaking my spirit were.

He hit me a total of ten times, and I was sagging against the cross in misery when he was finally done. I was surprised when I saw tears on Logan's cheeks. I had closed my eyes for the last two blows, not wanting my mate to see just how much I was hurting. It seemed that Ricardo had been using all of his strength as he rained down one strike after another on my back and ass.

My head was hanging from exhaustion when Ricardo came around to stand in front of me again. He grabbed my hair and pulled my head up so that I had to look at him. I had cried, and I knew how defeated I must have looked to him. But I was holding on to my defiance by the skin of my rattling teeth as I glared at him, letting him know that I wasn't as broken as he thought I was.

"Are you going to behave now?" He asked me menacingly. "You see that your mate can't protect you." He added, glancing over his shoulder to smile at Logan. "Or do I have to use the whip on you?"

I shook in my restraints at his threatening words. The flogger had been bad enough on my virgin skin. But I knew he would break that fragile skin with a whip just to show his dominance over me. And, because I would heal from it quickly...I knew he'd be especially brutal.

"Don't hurt her anymore. Please." Logan begged. I couldn't believe my ears. He had always seemed so strong. I guess seeing me like that broke something in him. I remembered my father telling me that there was nothing more important to a male shifter than being able to protect his woman, especially from rivals. A man would sacrifice anything, even his pride...to keep his mate safe from harm.

Ricardo walked over to him then. He looked so smug that I wished I could shift into my panther form and show him what I was capable of. Ricardo's men had left the room. But I was afraid he would give me to them once he had finished torturing me. He hadn't raped me, but I was terrified that he was going to do exactly that, and I knew that Logan might not be able to recover from witnessing something like that.

"I don't need to hurt her anymore." He said. "You're her mate." He added with a wicked smile in my direction. "You can simply tell her to obey me, and she'll do it."

My panic instantly made my heart beat so hard that I was afraid I'd have a heart attack on the spot. That probably would have been preferable to what Ricardo had in mind. As Logan's mate, I had no choice but to obey his commands. If he told me to be obedient to Ricardo, I would do it whether I liked it or not. My inner animal would force my compliance.

"Don't you even think about it, Logan!" I yelled at him. "I'd rather be dead!" I screached at the top of my lungs. Ricardo laughed at my hysterics...that twisted fucker. I knew that once Logan spoke the words, I'd be screwed. But I also knew that he'd let me go...even give me to another man, if it meant keeping me alive. It was the way of mated shifters.

"I mean it! I'll never forgive you if you do this."

Ricardo was clearly enjoying seeing us both suffer. He had never been given the opportunity to have a shifter woman in his harem who simply didn't have any choice on a cellular level but to obey his demands. His other women had probably been seduced into working for him, or threatened into it. But I was going to be a willing, docile whore for him if Logan said the words that would bind me to him.

I could tell that Logan was about to give in, no matter how much it killed him. In fact, it wouldn't have surprised me if he had given me to Ricardo and then slit his wrists over betraying me. After all, shifters only ever got one fated mate in their lives. He'd never be able to have sex with anyone else, and he'd never fall in love with another woman. His heart, his soul, his love, and his body, belonged to me...forever.

When Logan locked eyes with me again, his pained expression broke my heart into a million tiny pieces. He was filled with regret and anger for what he was about to do. But the compulsion to keep me safe was too strong. I had resisted developing feelings for him before he had claimed me because I didn't want to be a slave to him if it turned out we were mates. Now...that's all I wanted.

"He won't need to give me to you." I said flatly, giving Ricardo a look of pure anguish. "I don't want my free will taken away from me. Please. I'll cooperate."

The look of triumph on Ricardo's face turned my stomach. And the look of relief on Logan's face was evident. He was going to lose me, but he wouldn't be giving me away. It was a subtle difference that wouldn't have made a bit of sense to humans. But for mated shifters, it meant everything. It meant that he'd still have a chance at getting me back, if he could just figure out how to do it.

"But you have to let Logan go." I added. That's my only condition. You want my compliance? My submission? Then let my mate go."

Ricardo came over to me and gently stroked the side of my face. His expression was almost euphoric. He had won. And we all knew it. I was almost surprised when he released me from the cross. He even rubbed my wrists and ankles to relieve the numbness in my limbs.

"I accept your conditions." He said happily. "I've never had a panther before. You're going to make me a very rich man." He added. "But I want you to see that I'm not the heartless prick you think I am. I'll give you an hour alone with your mate before I send him on his way. You have my word that no harm will come to him."

His word? What was that worth? I had no idea. What choice did I really have but to believe him? I waited for him to release Logan from his restraints, but he didn't. Instead, he showed me the key to the cuffs that had been used to shackle him to the bed before he put it back in his pocket.

"I think I'll keep your mate locked up for the moment. You'll just have to be the one in charge for your last time together." He said, making one last jab at Logan's masculinity. I don't think I had ever hated anyone more in my whole life than I did at that moment.

He was laughing as he left us in the room after telling me that he'd return in an hour to release Logan. I ran over to the bed and tried to get the cuffs open. But they were indeed locked with a key. I couldn't get them off, and I sobbed into Logan's chest. He rubbed his chin along the top of my head.

"I'm so sorry I failed you." He barely whispered. I couldn't stand to see him so emotionally wounded. I didn't blame him for the predicament I was in. He had done his best to be a good mate, and I shushed him as I straddled his waist. Logan didn't stay soft for long as I moved my body against his, rubbing my breasts along his torso and nibbling on his neck.

"I'll find you." He growled as I impaled myself on his cock. "No matter where he takes you." He said, the strength and conviction of his words increasing with each moment that he was inside me. I rode him gently, wanting it to last. I didn't respond to his promise, because...deep down, I didn't believe him. I knew what was going to happen to me the minute Logan was let go.

I was going to be turned into a prostitute. And as long as Ricardo kept his word not to hurt my mate, I would keep my word as well. I'd obey on my own terms, while keeping my free will intact. But I had no idea what it would be like having sex with other men now that I was mated. I didn't want to find out either. But my fate was sealed.

And I didn't know if the woman that Logan would find later would be a person he even wanted anymore. I shuddered and burst into uncontrollable tears when I finally found my release. Logan came a few moments later, sending his seed into me one final time.

We made love twice more before the hour was up. He apologized more times that I could count, and he swore on everything he held dear that he would rescue me. He would find a way. And he was just stubborn enough to do it. But I knew in my heart that what he would find would be an empty shell of the woman he had claimed as his mate.

Logan was almost too numb to walk from being restrained for so long when Ricardo came in and released him. He had two men with him, just to make sure that Logan didn't try to take me with him. He was given clothes and shoes, and Ricardo even let me say good bye to my mate outside the building. I clung to him and kissed him with all the passion I held inside of me. He returned my tender passion with the unspoken promise of revenge.

"How much do you know about the connection between fated mates?" Ricardo asked us. I was surprised by his question. I didn't really know much about it, so I only looked at him in confusion.

"If one of you dies, the other will feel it. No matter where in the world you are. Your souls will know it if their other half perishes." He explained, ignoring Logan and looking at me. "That's how you'll know I've kept my word about not killing your mate. As long as he lives, you'll obey me. Say it."

I was actually relieved that I'd have the comfort of knowing if Ricardo broke his word. "As long as my mate lives, I'll obey." I promised him, selling my soul to the devil as I watched Logan walk away from me before I was led back into the building.

TO BE CONTINUED...