“You renounce the scoundrel?” he questioned her, pausing a moment with the strikes.
“He’s a hardly a scoundrel,” she objected.
For that, Michael laid on another six swift cuts, reducing the terrorized woman to sobs. She slumped to her knees against the cold stone, though it stretched her so much she could hardly remain so awkwardly posed.
“I’m sorry, so sorry, of course I renounce him, he means nothing to me,” she declared though her tears.
“No more of this!” he advised her, beginning to calm.
“Oh, no more, never. I promise,” she replied.
Erin could feel the falseness in the woman’s heart, how Edwina still imagined that soldier’s handsome prick coming for her. But she was false enough to say anything to get her husband to end the punishment.
Once he stopped he undid her bonds but l
