Bound By Love

By Libby Campbell

She’s supposed to be his ward but he’s treating her like a prisoner.

Stuck on a massive estate where she has no family or friends, Jules decides to unlock the Kedrant magic that is her heritage. Forbidden to do so, she must conceal the rituals that will liberate her heart and soul.
Major domo Xane has been trusted to safeguard her from her dangerous impulses. If she won’t listen to reason, then perhaps some old-fashioned discipline will teach her to obey.
While trying to tame Jules’s wild heart, Xane risks losing his.

Disclaimer: Bound By Love takes place on The planet of Devmaer which isn’t a world of political correctness. It includes spankings and sexual scenes If you don’t like a spicy tale of a woman’s submission, please don’t buy this book. This book is independent of but leads into the Lighthouses of Devmaer series

• Language: English
• Publisher: Libby Campbell
• Release date: Sep 17, 2023
• ISBN: 9781999552435

Libby Campbell

My romance novels feature strong, self-reliant women and the powerful men who love them. Romantic by nature, I write the stories I want to read: those that feature a spicy power exchange and deliver a sting in the tale.Canadian by birth, I also lived in Australia for a couple of decades. While living there I overcame my aversion to saucer-sized spiders and, as a condition of marriage to my Aussie Prince Charming, I swore a lifelong allegiance to the Melbourne Football Club.Then family called and my husband and I packed up and moved. We now live on a rocky island on Canada’s West Coast, close to beaches that once were frequented by smugglers and rumrunners.My passions are reading and writing. I adore all animals and love hiking, beachcombing, and an occasional night of dancing.

Book preview

Bound By Love

BOUND BY LOVE

TALES OF DEVMAER, STORY 1

LIBBY CAMPBELL

Tales of Devmaer #1: Bound by Love

© 2020 by Libby Campbell

ISBN: 978-1-9995524-3-5

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously. Any resemblance to persons alive or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information and retrieval systems, without permission from the author, other than short excerpts for the purposes of review, discussion, or promotion.

Warning: Devmaer isn’t a world of political correctness. If spicy tales of a woman’s submission including spanking don’t appeal to you, please stop reading now.

Cover design: https://www.fiverr.com/samharbor

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CONTENTS

Prologue

1. Asking for Permission

2. Ignoring the rules

3. The ceremony

4. Caught

5. Shadow in the darkness

6. Magic woman

7. The major domo weighs in

8. Earning forgiveness

9. Building trust

10. Just rewards

11. Loving support

12. Celebration

Epilogue

Glossary

More from Libby Campbell:

The Lighthouses of Devmaer series

Tales of Devmaer: Novellas attached to The Lighthouses of Devmaer series:

His to Hold Series

Without Mercy – An exciting mystery series!

Bad Girls Grumpy Bosses

Other books by Libby Campbell:

Connect with Libby Campbell:

Libby Campbell in her own words:

PROLOGUE

In the year 3817 CE, as Earth collapsed under the ravages of climate change, fleets of spaceships were launched in a last-ditch effort to save the human species. They traveled to far galaxies looking for another world to call home, carrying with them elements of earth cultures as well as earth-based plants and animals.

A solar flare scrambled the navigation systems and scattered the fleet. One lone ship drifted aimlessly for months. With the crew on the brink of starvation and their fuel almost exhausted, the captain landed the ship on an uncharted planet where the readings indicated an ecosystem hospitable to human life.

The humanoid residents of Devmaer, of Devmaerean and Kedrant origins, nursed the earth-born visitors back to health and welcomed them to their abundant planet. The humans quickly assimilated.

Three hundred years later….

1

ASKING FOR PERMISSION

To celebrate the end of her house arrest, Jules planned to go to the city for shopping and lunch with friends. First, she needed Xane’s permission.

She crept down the hallway to his office, to the place of her recent personal humiliation. Allowing herself a few seconds to gather her courage, she held her breath and stood in front of the heavy wooden door. The memory of the afternoon sessions sent a burning wave of shame, and something more complicated, something slightly delicious, up her neck.

Xane was the major domo of Lockriddle Manor. In the absence of the owner, his rule was law. A full-blooded Devmaerean, he was taller than her by two heads. He was blue-skinned and as bald as an egg. He also had a muscular body that made Jules’s heart skip when he towered over her, arms folded, and lectured her about the foolish risks she’d taken that had almost cost her life.

The first few sessions had been simple: she’d waited on a chair in the corner until he cleared his desk and indicated that she should bend over it. He actually used the words I invite you to bend over my desk now as though she had the right to refuse. Then, on a day when she had squirmed to avoid his falling hand, he’d lifted her effortlessly and laid her over his knee. From that day forward he varied his routine. Sometimes he made her bend over the desk. Other times he ordered her across his lap.

Some things were always the same: the dread as she waited for her penalty, the blush of shame when her skirt was raised to expose her pantied bottom, the sting of the spanking, and the willing way she accepted his comfort once the punishment was over.

When he rocked her in his arms afterwards, she wanted him to take it further, to cover her mouth with his and quench the thirst he’d aroused. But he never did. He simply comforted her until her distress settled and then sent her on her way.

Ten days. Ten spankings.

Ten afternoons when time stood still as she presented herself over his desk or knee, depending on his mood. Each time he spanked her with his bare hand. He said the sessions only lasted five minutes. To her they seemed more like several lifetimes.

All because she’d run away from Lockriddle Manor, chasing a man she thought loved her. Now that the sentence had been served, Xane should have no objections to her leaving the estate for a day.

But she would never go into his office again without recalling those mortifying visits. Staring at the closed door, she tried to bury the memory of her humiliation and the tangled, damp feeling that the spankings stirred in her.

She exhaled silently and knocked.

Come in. His melodious deep voice resonated with its usual cool authority.

Nervously, she pushed the door open. It creaked slightly as it always did, a far too familiar sound. Once again, she entered the room with a heart half full of dread and half full of wonder.

Xane made a steeple with his index fingers in front of his mouth.

The memory of the way those hands ran over her pantied bottom before he started each spanking, stoked the fire rising up her neck.

Yes Juliette? He was the only person who called her by her full name and he’d only started that with the spankings.

I’m not grounded any longer, right? she asked.

Correct.

Freja is going to Grenvilleton to shop. May I go with her?

Of course. As long as Déak is going too.

Jules shrugged. No. He’s gone to Foxglen to help his parents with the harvest.

She caught the faint scent of blackberries lingering on the air, a fragrance that would forever remind her of this handsome man, this office, and, more than anything, of her submission to him. Before her nipples could embarrass her by hardening at the shameful, hot recollections, she made herself think about the day ahead.

She was going to have lunch in the sun with friends. Even though she’d been denied that simple pleasure for less than two weeks, the penalty had seemed to drag on forever.

Asta’s coming, she said to reassure Xane.

He thought for a long moment, fixing his amethyst eyes on her. The three of you will be together at all times?

I promise.

And you’ll avoid the dock area?

Yes.

You’ll stay in the main shopping district away from any blind alleys or back streets?

Yes, yes, yes, she teased. And I’ll look both ways before I cross the street and won’t take candy from strangers.

Xane’s dimples creased as a rare smile softened his austere countenance. Don’t talk yourself into more trouble then.

He dismissed her with a wave and Jules bolted before he changed his mind.

The punishment sessions hadn’t been as bad as she’d first dreaded. They always finished with delicious aftercare when Xane held her on his lap and rubbed her back, making her feel safe and protected in a way she hadn’t known since childhood.

She’d savored those sweet intimate moments unlike anything she’d known before. The spankings were meant to have a lasting effect on her, but she wasn’t sure if what she remembered most about them was the intended message.

Asta and Freja were waiting for her in the staff hall. Asta paced circles in front of the big fireplace, jingling the keys to the estate’s hovertruck. Freja was bent over a notebook, scribbling a few last items onto the list of things they needed for the ceremony they planned to conduct under the full moons that night.

A forbidden ceremony. Forbidden by Xane.

When Jules flashed a thumb’s