The Carrot and the Stick

by C. P. Vanner

  ‘And yours,’ Beth muttered into the counterpane, remembering her friend’s buttocks as they had been a few minutes before when she dried and powdered them. The delicate skin was smudged with pink and purple blotches.

  Celeste smoothed the cream over the two soft mounds and down into the valley between. ‘We need someone else to help us take the strain, and the pain.’

  ‘Mm,’ Beth murmured, enjoying Celeste’s touch. ‘I’ve been thinking the same thing.’ She opened her legs to allow Celeste greater access. ‘There could be someone...’

  Celeste smoothed the cream into the lips of Beth’s sex. ‘Oh? Tell momma.’

  Beth raised her hips so that Celeste’s finger slid inside, a place already so wet that no cream was needed. ‘Well, I think the person I am thinking about might be one of us. I’ll say no more for the moment. Just let your fingers do the talking for now.’

  Chapter 11

  Beth was on the telephone in the office talking to Peter Parnell. She thanked him effusively for the proofs of the Rybix shoot and asked him about his availability for another job. Just before saying goodbye, she asked casually, ‘Peter, you don’t have the home telephone number of Natasha Perry, do you?’

  ‘Natasha who?’

  ‘Perry. One of the girls in the Rybix shoot.’

  ‘I’ve probably got it here somewhere,’ he said. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I need it, Peter. Would you have a look?’

  ‘I will if you give me Charlie’s number,’ he said.

  ‘Her name is not Charlie,’ Beth retorted.

  ‘She’ll always be Charlie to me. Hang on, I’ll go have a look.’

  In less than a minute he was back with the number. ‘Remember you owe me, Beth. Send Charlie around here on another errand. She’s the sweetest creature I’ve ever met.’

  Beth laughed. ‘Don’t be offended, Peter, but I think she likes her men just a touch more masculine than you.’

  As soon as she’d said goodbye and put down the receiver, she picked it up again and dialled the number.

  ‘Natasha Perry,’ said the same bright voice that she recalled from before.

  ‘Natasha, this is Beth - Beth Forrester from Cross, Carstairs and Denton. You probably don’t remember me but we met...’

  ‘I remember you well, Beth,’ Natasha interrupted. ‘Very well indeed... and I’m extremely glad you’ve called.’

  ‘Oh, great,’ Beth said, the promising tone of the girl’s voice making her pulse quicken. ‘Well forgive me telephoning you at home, I know I should go through your agent, but as this is just an exploratory call, I thought you wouldn’t mind.’

  ‘Not at all, Beth,’ Natasha replied. ‘I’m only too pleased to hear from you. I’ve thought a lot about the other day...’

  Beth did not want to pursue that particular subject - not for now, at least. She tried to sound businesslike. ‘Good, well, I’m planning, or at least thinking about a new and different campaign. I thought you might be very good for it. You’ve the right looks.’

  ‘Sounds fascinating,’ Natasha said brightly. ‘I’m certainly game for anything. Things are rather quiet right now.’

  ‘Excellent. So we should meet, just to discuss things.’

  ‘Any time,’ Natasha said. ‘You say when and where, and I’ll be there.’

  ‘I noticed when I was calling you that you have the same telephone prefix as I have at home. Where do you live?’

  ‘Pimlico.’

  ‘Then we’re neighbours,’ Beth said. ‘What are you doing tonight? How about coming to dinner.’

  ‘Mm, I’d like that.’

  ‘It won’t be much,’ Beth warned. ‘Neither I nor my flatmate are cooks.’

  Natasha laughed. ‘I don’t mind. I’ll bring a bottle of cheap wine to kill the taste. What’s the address and what time?’

  At the appointed time that evening, Celeste called from the kitchen, ‘So where is she?’

  ‘Don’t worry about it; she’s always late,’ Beth replied, just as the doorbell rang.

  Natasha stood on the threshold holding out a bottle wrapped in tissue paper. Beth thought she looked adorable. Natasha was small and slender, dressed completely in black, in a polo-neck sweater, slacks and flat-soled shoes. Her black hair was loose and framed her face, curling inwards slightly under her chin.

  Beth smiled her welcome. ‘You don’t look old enough to drink,’ she said, taking the proffered bottle.

  ‘You’d be surprised,’ Natasha replied, walking into the sitting room.

  Beth introduced Celeste and fussed around pouring drinks. After chatting for five minutes or so about the pros and cons of living in Pimlico, Celeste started to ask Natasha about her life as a model, but Beth cut her off in mid-sentence. ‘Get back to the kitchen, wench,’ she said playfully. ‘I want to talk business with Natasha.’

  Celeste pouted, but got up anyway. ‘Remember, I can hear every word,’ she said, disappearing around the corner.

  To try to put her visitor at ease, Beth queried Natasha about herself and her background. ‘Where does your family live?’

  ‘I don’t have any family,’ Natasha replied bluntly.

  Beth flushed, fearing she had entered forbidden territory. ‘Do you live alone?’

  ‘Yes, just two streets away.’ Natasha looked around her. ‘But it is pretty squalid; nothing like this. May I look around?’

  ‘Don’t show her my room,’ Celeste called. ‘She hasn’t even seen squalid until she’s seen in there!’

  When the two were sitting down again, with their second glass of wine, Beth spoke about business. She talked at length about marketing and advertising, the difficulties of being an account manager, the need for fresh thinking and originality in each campaign, how each message should be geared to the medium that would carry it and how client companies judged only by results.

  Natasha listened carefully and when Beth stopped, she said, ‘It sounds fascinating, and so much more interesting than my job. I am nothing more than a clotheshorse.’

  Beth nodded. ‘It is fascinating, but it is also very demanding,’ she pointed out. ‘It takes all my skills, everything I’ve got.’

  She went on to explain that she was just thinking about a new campaign. It would be deliberately designed to shock, to command attention and to cause controversy, and would feature a series of photographs in underground magazines.

  ‘Is that where I come in?’ Natasha asked, sitting forward on the sofa, indicating her interest.

  ‘Possibly,’ Beth said. ‘You wore a swimsuit in the studio for the ice cream shoot. Have you ever modelled underwear?’

  ‘Yes,’ Natasha confirmed. ‘It’s all the same to me.’

  ‘You don’t think it’s degrading?’

  ‘Not at all. Why should I? It’s all money in the bank.’

  Beth poured Natasha a third glass of wine. ‘Would you consider posing in the nude or the semi-nude?’ she asked.

  Natasha smiled, looking directly into her eyes. ‘Like you did the other day?’

  Beth resumed her seat. ‘I hoped that was not going to come up, but yes, something like that.’

  Natasha stroked the stem of her glass. ‘I would,’ she said eventually. ‘I am not certain my body is attractive enough though; not as attractive as yours, leastways.’

  Beth waved a hand in the air dismissively, brushing Natasha’s protest aside. ‘We’re not talking about me here. Anyhow, as far as I can see you’ve got a gorgeous figure. You shouldn’t be so modest. Now, would you mind showing me?’

  Natasha put down her glass. ‘No, I don’t think I would... now?’

  When Beth nodded, she stood up and with natural sexiness pulled her sweater over her head and unfastened her waistband to wriggle her trousers down. Then she stood unselfconsciously in the centre of the room with her arms to her sides so t
hat Beth could study her. She wore a low-cut brassiere and a g-string, both of them black. Beth was pleasantly surprised how full Natasha’s breasts were, for someone so petit and slender. She had not really noticed the other day during the photo shoot and this evening they had, until now, been hidden under a loose sweater. Now they were standing full and proud, creamy flesh cradled in black lace.

  Beth let her gaze roam downwards. The bikini style pants hid little other than the slight mound of the girl’s sex. Her hips were gently rounded, her groin devoid of visible hair, the thighs slender and straight. Natasha obviously looked after herself, as a model always should.

  There was the sound of a low wolf-whistle from the doorway and both girls looked round to see Celeste standing there with a saucepan in her hands. ‘Not bad,’ she announced approvingly, and then added quickly to Beth, ‘It’s okay, I’m going. I know my place,’ before disappearing again.

  Beth smiled an apology to Natasha. ‘She’s right; you’re not bad... not bad at all.’

  She rose and led Natasha to her bookshelves, which stretched from floor to ceiling against one wall, and placed her with her back to the books. ‘Stand with your arms outstretched, feet together and head down,’ she instructed.

  Without another word Natasha adopted the pose, and Beth stood back to admire her model. ‘Perhaps without your bra,’ she decided.

  Again without a word, Natasha unhooked the skimpy lace garment and threw it onto the sofa with the rest of her clothes, and then resumed the pose with her head bowed and her black hair falling loosely forward. Beth thought she looked stunning. The girl’s breasts were even more beautiful than she had previously imagined, firm and proud with soft, pink nipples.

  ‘Turn around, would you?’ she said. ‘Arms above your head.’

  Natasha turned to face the books, raising her hands. Beth took a velvet tieback cord from one curtain and then stood on a chair to fasten Natasha’s wrists above her head, tying them to a metal stanchion that supported the top shelf. ‘Bondage,’ Natasha purred, as Beth climbed down and stood back to admire the sensual tableau.

  Her eyes travelled down Natasha’s slender arms to her smooth back, its muscles stretched and the spine indented, to a waist so narrow Beth was sure she could span it with two hands. A dimple on either side marked the place where the waist flared out into a bottom as round as an apple, the two perfect cheeks divided by the neat black line of the girl’s g-string.

  Beth could not resist it. She let her hand run down the length of the valley of the girl’s spine until it reached the waistband of the g-string. ‘You have glorious skin, so soft,’ she said, clearing her throat a little as she spoke. ‘Do you mind?’ she added, hooking her fingers into the g-string.

  When Natasha made no protest, Beth pushed it downwards, over the soft flesh and then down the girl’s legs. As she worked them off Natasha’s feet, she deliberately placed her cheek against the girl’s bottom, feeling the soft warmth pass from flesh to flesh. With some difficulty she resisted the urge to kiss it.

  ‘I’ll take a quick snap with my digital camera so you can see,’ she said, and she did, and then untied the girl, telling her to adopt the original pose. She used the viewfinder to study the innocent beauty from the front. Natasha’s skin was as white and as unflawed as the best porcelain, made even whiter by the pink of her nipples and the shiny black of the tiny patch of pubic hair discreetly obscuring her sex.

  ‘Beautiful,’ Beth breathed, using the camera to study the photos she’d taken.

  ‘Let me see,’ Natasha said eagerly, and seemed totally unconcerned by her nakedness, both in digital form and in reality.

  ‘Just one more,’ Beth said, when Natasha leant down to put the camera on the coffee table.

  ‘Let me guess,’ Natasha said sexily. ‘Would this last one have anything to do with corporal punishment? Is this how you want me, for example?’

  She turned away from Beth and bent at the hips, grasping her knees with both hands. ‘Isn’t this the way you were the other day, Beth?’ she said provocatively, looking back over her shoulder. ‘Does it give you any ideas? It certainly gives me ideas.’

  Beth said nothing. She stared at Natasha’s lovely bottom and at her sex peeping between her parted thighs, the neat line dividing the moist lips that, it seemed to Beth, were pouting an invitation. She wanted to smack those buttocks and kiss those lips, but instead she put the camera to her eye and pressed the button.

  ‘What do you think?’ Natasha asked, when she was dressed again and sitting on the sofa, drinking more wine.

  ‘I think you’re gorgeous,’ Beth said.

  ‘Do you really?’ Natasha replied thoughtfully. ‘Then that explains it.’

  ‘Explains what?’

  Natasha sipped her drink. ‘I’ve been posed like that before,’ she admitted. ‘Quite a few times, in fact, but I never knew what I looked like before. That’s why I stared at you so much in Parnell’s studio the other day. It must have annoyed you, but it brought back many memories for me.’

  She lifted her feet and lay back on the sofa, closing her eyes with a deep sigh.

  ‘Are you going to tell me then?’ Beth gently prompted, after a minute’s silence.

  ‘Tell you what?’ Celeste asked, entering the room. ‘It’s all cooking nicely. It’ll be about half an hour,’ she said, sitting down. ‘Tell you what?’

  Beth held a finger to her lips and nodded at Natasha, still lying with her eyes closed on the sofa. She was giving the girl time to think.

  Finally, Natasha spoke, still not opening her eyes. ‘It brought it all back,’ she said, ‘bending over in front of you.’

  She sat up, her normal bubbly self slightly deflated. ‘You asked me about my family. I never had a family; I never knew my parents.’ Beth and Celeste listened but said nothing, so Natasha went on.

  ‘I was raised by foster parents in Kidderminster. When I was about eight they thought I was too difficult to cope with properly. They had other children in their care, so I was moved on to other foster parents and so on. Between the ages of eight and thirteen I had four sets of foster parents. It didn’t make things better, you can imagine. I started to bunk off school, to smoke dope, things like that. I must have been pretty difficult.

  Anyway, when I was thirteen I was placed in a hostel. It was like a remand home for kids who had been in trouble with the law.’

  Natasha paused and drank some more wine. Celeste refilled her glass.

  ‘To start with I quite liked it,’ Natasha said, swirling the wine around in her glass. ‘In a funny way, I had more freedom. I liked being with the other kids. Then two of the boys got into trouble, serious trouble, and the regime changed. A new warden was appointed and everything became much stricter. By now I was sixteen and doing really well at school. By and large I behaved myself; I wasn’t interested in getting into trouble. But it didn’t work out like that. The chief warden, Mr Chambers, used to pick on me. He was always telling me off for tiny things, mostly imaginary misdemeanours and mistakes. He just liked telling me off.’

  She finished her wine in one gulp, and Celeste replenished all the glasses. ‘Go on,’ she said to Natasha. ‘I didn’t mean to interrupt.’

  ‘One Sunday when the place was empty I came across him in the corridor. He stopped me and said he’d received a complaint from another girl that I wasn’t showering often enough. It was a lie, of course; I used to shower every morning. I’ve always been very particular about cleanliness. I think he just made it up.

  ‘Anyway, he told me to go and have a shower immediately. I said I already had and he said I should have another one. Then, when I was in the shower, the door opened and he was standing there. He said he had come to make sure I washed properly. He made me wash my breasts, then between my legs, front and back, over and over again, and after I’d dried myself he inspected me - far more closely than he should have.

&n
bsp; ‘And that was the start of it. I wish now I had made a fuss at the time, reported him to someone, but I was too naïve and scared. After that, he used to pick on me all the time, usually when we were alone and no one else could see.

  ‘A week or two later he told me that he had a bad report from my school and that I should report to him that evening in his office. It wasn’t a bad report; it just wasn’t one of my best. After that though, because of him, my schoolwork did begin to go downhill.

  ‘Then one day, in his office, he told me he was going to punish me by spanking me. He made me lie over his lap and he turned up my skirt and pulled down my panties. I was crying even before he smacked me, I was so scared. It lasted a long time but he never hit me very hard. When it was all over I was extremely relieved. Then he told me to come back again the next evening, and when I went back he said he wanted to inspect the marks, to see if I was okay. He made me stand in front of him and pull down my panties. He poked and prodded me and then sent me away.

  ‘Dirty bastard,’ Celeste said, utterly engrossed in what Natasha was confiding in them.

  Natasha nodded. ‘He was, and I was just too young to understand. To me he was an authority figure, someone to be obeyed. After that he used to find fault with me as often as he could and it was always the same routine. He would spank me one night, usually late at night after lights out, and I would have to go back the next evening to show him my bottom. Hardly a night went by when I did not have to bare my bottom in front of him - either for a spanking or for an inspection of the results of the previous spanking.

  ‘And I used to hate the inspections more than the spanking. He got into the habit of making me lie over his lap for the assessment as if I was going to be spanked again. He never actually touched my sex, but he used to poke and prod me. He liked to run the palm of his hand round and round over my buttocks, pulling the cheeks of my bottom apart and asking me if it hurt. I have never told anyone this. Do you want me to go on?’

  ‘Yes, we do,’ Beth urged intensely, ‘so long as you don’t mind talking about it.’