* * *
Max was humming to herself when Rafe buzzed her on the intercom. “Maxine, meet me at the truck. We’re going to lunch.”
“Okay,” she said with a grin and barely managed to keep from leaping from her desk in full song. I feel pretty… I feel pretty… see the pretty girl in that mirror there… What mirror where…
“Max, did you finish the report on Cummings Diesel?”
She jumped; thank goodness she hadn’t been singing out loud! “Hi, Bob! Here it is, see you later, I have a hot date!” Max grinned at him after handing over the report and grabbing her purse. “See ya after lunch!”
Rafe was already sitting in the driver’s seat when Max climbed in next to him. She frowned; he didn’t turn to her with a kiss or even a smile.
“Is something wrong?”
“We’ll talk about it over lunch.”
Max felt her heart drop into her shoes. He was going to break up with her! She spent the rest of the drive staring morosely out the window. Stupid jerk! He should never have made her fall in love with him. She should have stuck with Ted from the mailroom, someone she could manage.
Rafe pulled into a parking spot at Cracker Barrel; Max just turned to him with a glare. “I don’t feel like eating.”
“Tough,” he said succinctly as he got out of the car. She watched him walk around to her side and open the door. Max just looked at him.
“I’d rather not.”
“Come along, Maxine, we have things to discuss,” Rafe said firmly, taking her arm to pull her from the truck and then after him into the restaurant.
“Quit pulling, I’m coming! Under duress but I’m coming,” Max muttered sourly.
Rafe leaned down to whisper in her ear, “You’re in enough trouble, young lady, don’t make it worse.”
She blinked; in trouble? What did she do now? Part of her was relieved, maybe he didn’t want to break up, but the other part was indignant he felt he had the right to take her to task over anything.
It wasn’t crowded yet so they were seated quickly. Max frowned again when Rafe immediately handed the menus back to the server. “We’ll both just have the chicken salad sandwich with chips and a glass of sweet tea.”
“What if I didn’t want chicken salad?” Max asked in outrage.
“You always order chicken salad when we get food here. Stop looking for an argument,” he said firmly.
Part of her was flattered he remembered her preference, but Max wasn’t ready to climb down off her high horse yet. “Maybe I didn’t want chicken salad today.”
“Enough, Maxine,” he said flatly. “I had an interesting conversation with the mechanic working on your car today.”
Max brightened. “Is it ready?”
“Yes, but that’s not why he called. He wanted to know if you wanted your glasses.” Rafe’s voice rose a bit as he pulled her orange glasses case with a Yorkie puppy on it from his pocket and plunked it down on the table between them.
She winced and gave a nervous laugh. “You don’t say?”
“Maxine.”
“It’s not that big of a deal,” Max said with a frown.
“You can’t mess with your eyes, Maxine. If you need glasses, you should be wearing them. I can’t remember ever seeing you in a pair of glasses so you obviously aren’t taking care of your eyes.”
Max deflated the beginnings of a pout forming on her face. “I don’t really need them that bad.”
“They’re bifocals!” Rafe said loudly.
Max and the waitress who was bringing their food both jumped.
“Really, Rafe, is it necessary to yell? Besides, they’re ugly!” she snapped back at him in exasperation.
Rafe took a deep breath before turning to the waitress. “Could you bag that up to go, please?”
Max felt her bottom cheeks clench; perhaps contrite would have been a better approach. “Rafe, I know I should have…”
“Too late.”
“But…”
“Save it,” he said with a glare.
“I’m going to the ladies’ room,” she said with a disdainful sniff.
“Fine. I’ll meet you at the cash register. It’ll give me time to browse.”
Max rolled her eyes as she walked through the country store in the lobby on her way to the restroom. The man had all but told the entire dining room he was going to bust her butt and now he was browsing? The whole situation was preposterous!
It wasn’t like she was used to answering to anyone. She’d ignored her need for glasses long before they were dating. Long before he’d ever spanked her. It wasn’t fair for him to bring up past failings. While Max recognized this particular past failing was also a current one, it wasn’t as if she’d been able to take care of it. After all, her car was in the shop and the glasses had been in the car.
Deciding this was the approach to take, Max headed out to meet Rafe at the register, and promptly froze when she saw what he was handing to the clerk behind the counter.
It was a paddle ball! Max was mortified. She looked nervously at the clerk. “That’s not for me… it’s for my nephew… he collects paddles… I mean paddle balls… he really likes the game!” Max knew the red heat climbing into her face was totally belying her words.
Rafe snorted as he paid the suddenly tongue-tied clerk, who was blushing almost as much as Max. “Have a nice day.” she said rather weakly to Max before she turned to follow Rafe’s determined stride out the door.
“I can’t believe you did that to me!” Max yelled as she climbed into the truck.
“I didn’t do anything, Maxine, you were the one who gave the game away and I refuse to take any responsibility for the scene you just played out in there,” Rafe said firmly.
“I will never eat at Cracker Barrel again,” she exclaimed.
Rafe just grunted and continued to drive. Max frowned as she realized they were driving back to her apartment. “I have to go back to work!”
“No, you don’t. I called while you were in the bathroom and said you weren’t feeling well.”
“I feel fine!” she squeaked.
“You won’t by the time I’m finished with you,” Rafe said matter-of-factly.
Max gulped and stared at the sack sitting innocuously on top of the dash with morbid fascination.
“I’ve learned my lesson!”
He just snorted in disbelief.
“It’s not fair. We weren’t dating when I stopped wearing my glasses and since we started dating, my car’s been in the shop with my glasses! Isn’t there some sort of grandfather clause that says you can’t spank me for things in the past?”
“I’m using the grandfather clause that states I can spank you if the thing in the past is still of an outstanding nature.”
“But my car is in the shop and my glasses have been in the car!”
“Why is your car in the shop?” he asked as if curious.
“Because I hit you, but that’s beside the point!”
“Actually, Maxine, that is exactly the point; all of the past two weeks are an example of you behaving in an irresponsible manner. All you had to do was say you needed your glasses from the car, but you chose not to do so. It’s all tied together and I think we need to nip this rebellious irresponsibility in the bud.”
“Consider it nipped!” she squawked as he parked in front of her building.
“It’s about to be well and truly nipped,” he said resolutely.
This time Max practically raced him to her door; maybe if she got there before him she could… no such luck. Silly long-legged man!
“Corner.”
“Don’t you want to talk about this?”
“I think everything’s been pretty much said. Corner. One…”
“Fine!” Max yelled as she stomped to the corner, where she stood fidgeting from one foot to the other. He had a paddle… how bad was it going to be… worse than his hand? As bad as the belt?
Rafe set the sandwich plates down on the counter before sitting
down on the couch with his other purchase. She watched out of the corner of her eye as he painstakingly pulled the large staple holding the rubber string and ball out of the lightweight paddle. It was smaller than the ones from the grocery store, more compact but a tad thicker. All in all it was sturdy little fly-back paddle. She shuddered when he swished it in the air experimentally and grinned, apparently satisfied it would serve his purposes.
“Come here, Maxine,” he ordered.
Max stayed in the corner, her nose pressed tightly into it. “I’m still reflecting on the error of my ways.”
“Now, Maxine.”
Her shoulders slumped in defeat before Max turned to face him and walked slowly to her doom. Stupid paddle… stupid scary paddle…
When she was standing before him, Rafe wasted no time pulling her down across his thighs and baring her bottom to his gaze and to the paddle.
He didn’t take any time for a warm-up but just got to business bringing the little paddle down with a loud crack that seemed to echo around the living room.
Max yowled as the sting filled her backside with fire, barely having time to absorb it before the paddle fell a second time and then a third. She quickly lost count as it fell again and again rapidly across her writhing bottom.
Rafe kept up a quick and steady rhythm, watching as he painted her bottom several shades of red then an intriguing shade of scarlet.
Max hung limply over his knee feeling as if her bottom would explode into flames any minute and set the wicked little paddle on fire. She would not mourn its demise.
A shuddering sigh of relief ran through her as Rafe stopped for a moment, then she realized he was only tipping her further over so he could pay special attention to the spot where her thighs and bottom met and she started crying anew.
Rafe blazed another path of glory across the sweet spot now opened up to him and continued to paddle her as if he would never stop.
Max suddenly felt as if something cracked open inside her and released every bit of tension held within her body in a mighty sigh of surrender, letting go of her last bit of control. She sobbed loudly, not even registering the spanking had stopped. She gave him everything that was within her and with the release came freedom and blessed peace.
Rafe loved her; no matter how far up the cliff was, he would catch her… Rafe was her net. When she lost control, he would be there to bring her back in focus, he would give her clarity.
He would love her. She was his and he was hers.
Chapter Seven
The next morning Max awoke to Rafe handing her the little red cell phone she’d so desperately missed and her car keys.
He seemed distant and not at all like the man who’d held her in his arms during the night.
“I don’t understand. I thought you said I couldn’t have my car for…”
“Something’s come up, my old boss called this morning and I’m needed in Washington for a few weeks. I think you’ve learned your lesson. I’ll drop you at work and then someone will deliver your car before you get off for the day,” he explained.
“What about… well, I mean… I…” She sniffled as her eyes began to fill without her permission.
“Don’t, Maxine,” Rafe said softly, pulling her gently into his chest as he stroked a hand down her back. “I’ll be back, I promise.”
Then he kissed her gently and dropped her off at work.
* * *
She was able to convince herself he was coming back for the first month. By the end of the second month she began to doubt everything they’d shared. Sure, he’d managed to call a few times, but the calls were short and the conversation stilted. There was the distance between them, and there was the worry about his safety, and then there was the strangeness of his calls, and soon Max began to have doubts. She wasn’t sure she could handle it if he got hurt or even killed. It would be easier if he’d just been a fling. Then she could be angry, rather than worried. When each phone call was more and more stilted and magnified the distance between them, she realized it wasn’t better at all; she missed him. After the third month passed, she decided it was all a lie; nothing had been real. Rafe had just wanted sex and the added kink of smacking her bottom.
Max had handed herself to him on a silver platter when she rear-ended him with a phone screen full of spanking stories. She’d made it so easy.
She was determined to never be such an easy mark for any man again. Max began to drop weight at an alarming rate; she had a hard time eating since her appetite was non-existent.
Rafe had talked about how beautiful her strawberry blond locks were, so Max cut them short and dyed her hair black. She began going out with some girls from work to happy hour and quickly found solace in vodka and losing herself on the dance floor.
Oddly now that she was almost too thin, men came at her in droves. She wasn’t interested in anything but dancing and drinking as she tried to forget.
Max took to wearing kohl around her eyes, making them look like big cat eyes, stark in her pale face fringed by short black curls. Her glasses were a thing of the past; since the last spanking from Rafe about her glasses, Max had had Crystal Lens surgery to correct her vision.
Her breasts were still large looking, somewhat out of balance on her new thin frame.
* * *
When Rafe had been gone about four months, Tom, her boss, tried to talk with her about Rafe. “Max, I’m worried about you. You’re far too thin and I know Rafe would…”
Max froze then looked up at him with a frown. “Rafe? I’m not sure what he has to do with anything, Tom. He doesn’t work here anymore.”
“Rafe will be back, Max,” Tom said firmly.
“I’m sure that has nothing to do with me,” Max said resolutely. “I need to finish these reports before I leave for the day, so if there is nothing else?”
She pointedly stared at the wall over his left shoulder until Tom sighed and left with a short goodbye.
* * *
Rafe was finally back in Washington; he’d been imbedded deep in the deserts of Iraq and Syria for the last five months on a black op pinpointing small ISIS cells so a crew could come in and clean out each nest.
He’d only agreed to the op for a few weeks until the man he was filling in for came back after the birth of his first child. The problem was after the birth of his child, the man no longer wished to participate in black ops.
It took Rafe the next four months to convince his superiors that he now had a reason to come home as well. He no longer felt like risking his own life so cavalierly. He’d done his part and parcel for his country. Now he wanted to spend the rest of his life loving his woman. Loving Maxine.
The first chance he got he called her, eager to tell her he was coming home; he closed his eyes when Max answered the phone. Hearing her sweet voice was enough to bring tears to his eyes.
“Hello, Maxine,” he said softly. Silence greeted his words. “Max? It’s Rafe.”
“I know who it is, I just have no idea why you would be calling me,” Max said harshly.
“I told you I’d be back, Maxine,” Rafe said firmly.
“You said you’d be back in a few weeks, but of course that was a lie just like everything else. I don’t know why you’re bothering to call me, Rafe. You won’t find me easy pickings this time,” Max said coldly.
“Nothing between us was a lie, Maxine,” Rafe told her.
“Whatever, Rafe. I really don’t have time to talk. I’m due to meet some friends at the club. Don’t call again.”
“Maxine, don’t you dare…” He stopped when he realized he was talking to a dial tone. The little minx had hung up on him! Everything between them a lie indeed; he wondered how much of a lie she’d think it was next time he was blistering her backside.
Rafe told her when she gave herself to him that it was forever and she should have heeded his words, because he was home and he was going to reclaim everything that was his.
* * *
Max was reeling; why had h
e called now? Just when she was finally starting to feel normal again?
She put him determinedly from her mind; perhaps it was time to sleep with one of the guys at the club. Many had made a play for her attentions; the problem was none of them stirred her.
Not the way he did; even now just from the sound of his voice, her traitorous body was coming back to life. Every nerve was pulsing with an answering throb between her legs as the telling moisture began to seep from her core where she ached for his possession.
Max glared at her reflection in the mirror. No way was she going there again. The satisfaction he’d give her would be short-lived and the pain when he dumped her again would be something she might not recover from a second time.
Nope, Rafe was better left to memory… memories she could pull out in the dark of night and use her vibrator to assuage the yearnings of her body.
She studied her reflection once more before leaving for the club; the mermaid hair dye she’d used gave her an odd but striking look. Gone were the black tresses she’d sported for the previous few months; now her hair hung around her shoulders bleeding from purple on the crown of her head to a brilliant blue then finally to the turquoise that swung freely around her shoulders.
Max shrugged; she wasn’t entirely sure she liked it but it would do for now. One thing she’d really enjoyed in the last several months was continually reinventing herself. The weight hadn’t really been deliberate. She’d just lost her appetite for anything except the blessed relief the vodka gave her. When she was drunk and muzzy-headed, she was able to laugh and dance and for a little while forget all about Rafe Jennings.
Before Rafe she’d never really drank, she was really quite the goody-goody. But after he left, in an effort to pull her from her dark depression, her coworker Sally had finally convinced her to try happy hour.
After the first few drinks, Max had discovered peace from her busy thoughts of Rafe and whatever she did to drive him away. Blessed silence in her meandering mind… suddenly she was able to live in the moment and to her surprise the alcohol also served to get past the natural reserve and shyness she’d always experienced in social situations.
Unacceptable Behavior Page 5