by Loki Renard
Mattie smirked. “And what’s that supposed to mean? Worried your girlfriend might like me a little more than she likes you?”
Miles snorted and held his tongue. He had been left in no doubt as to how much Cash liked him. Mattie didn’t need to know that though. Far be it for him to cast aspersions on her ladykiller status.
“If I were you, Miss Dwyer, I’d have some breakfast. It wouldn’t do to be spanked on an empty stomach.”
“Oh shut up,” she said, pushing up from the chair.
“Manners, Miss Dwyer,” he chided gently as she stomped away.
*
Upon Kevin’s return, Miles made sure to meet him outside the suite. He wanted to have a little private conversation first – and satisfy himself that Kevin was in working condition. To Miles’ pleasure, Kevin was looking pretty good for someone who’d been in the wars. There was some residual bruising around his right eye and hairline, but the spark was back in his eyes and he looked like his old resilient self, his easy smile plastered across his face as Miles met him with a hearty embrace.
“Good to see you back. Thought we might lose you.”
“Never,” Kevin said with a wry smile. “How are the girls?”
He had changed the subject quickly. Miles let him.
“They’re fine,” Miles replied. “But we need to have a talk about Mattie.”
He related the tale to Kevin, omitting only the details about the intimate aftermath.
“What a brat,” Kevin chuckled.
“Brat doesn’t begin to cover it,” Miles agreed. “She’s convinced she’s going to get away with it too.”
“We’ll see about that,” Kevin said, composing his features into a grim expression. “What do you reckon?” He pointed at his face. “Scary enough?”
“Your face has always been the scariest part of you,” Miles teased.
Snorting, Kevin shook his head. “Nice, Miles, real nice. Especially coming from someone with a model mug like yours. Holy sideburns, Batman! The fifties called, they want their hair back.”
Rolling his eyes as Kevin teased him, Miles moved toward the suite. He was about to open the door, but before he got the chance Cash threw it open, rushed past him and greeted Kevin effusively. She wrapped her arms around him and squeezed him with great affection.
“I was worried about you! Miles wouldn’t let me come and see you.”
“It’s okay, Cash, I was just lying around anyway,” Kevin winked down at her and gently disentangled himself and looked around the room. “Now what’s this I hear about you and Mattie?”
Cash dropped her arms and backed away from him. “I already got in trouble for that.”
“I bet you did,” Kevin said, glancing across at Miles. “Now, where’s Mattie?”
Whilst Cash stammered for an answer, Kevin stepped into the suite, shrugging off his jacket and unbuttoning his shirtsleeves as he went. He stopped, tossed his jacket over an armchair and began rolling his sleeves up over his forearms in a way that made Cash’s eyes bulge.
“In her room, I think,” she gulped. “I haven’t seen her this morning actually.”
But Mattie wasn’t in her bedroom. Nor was she in anybody else’s room. She seemed to have disappeared from the suite entirely.
“Cash, are you sure you don’t know where Mattie is?” Miles made the inquiry, noting the way Cash squirmed as she shook her head.
Miles and Kevin exchanged looks.
“You know it’s going to be much worse for her if she hides,” Kevin said conversationally. “In fact, if I don’t find her in the next thirty seconds, I’m going to call down to reception for a paddle. They have that sort of thing on hand in this country.”
“No they don’t,” Cash said skeptically.
“This is where discipline originated,” Miles said, backing Kevin up. “Canes are household items here.”
“I knew there was a reason I didn’t like this place,” Cash muttered, folding her arms over her chest. “I’m not a snitch,” she said. “You can’t make me tell you anything.”
“Mattie!” Kevin raised his voice. “Stop hiding like a little girl and come and say hello.”
There was a rumble of discontent. Miles spotted its source. One of the almost floor length curtains had grown a pair of black boot clad feet. He glanced at Kevin, caught the man’s eye, then glanced toward the offending shoes.
Nodding, Kevin smirked slightly and began moving towards the curtain. “Come out now, Mattie,” he said. “You’re busted, my girl.”
There was no response, so he reached out and snapped the curtain back. Cash let out a high-pitched giggle of glee as it was revealed that Mattie was not there. Only her boots were.
“A decoy,” Kevin noted. “Cute.”
Cash devolved further into giggles, until Miles gave her a swat on the bottom to snap her out of them. She yelped, rubbed her backside and then started giggling again. “You’ll never find her.”
Kevin sighed. “Oh well,” he said, locking the door of the suite. “I guess we’ve lost Mattie.”
“I suppose we have,” Miles said, playing along. “Want to watch the game?”
“Sure.”
The two men settled in front of the television, which was suitably huge. Naturally the hotel had a satellite connection and more sports channels than you could wave a cane at. Cash seemed disappointed as the men settled in, cracked a couple of beers and began watching the first game that came to hand.
“You’re not even going to look for her?”
“No,” Kevin said. “She’ll keep. I figure this’ll work on a time penalty system. The longer she hides, the worse it will be.”
“That’s not fair!” Cash exclaimed heatedly.
“Life isn’t.”
The platitude sent Cash scuttling off into her bedroom. A few seconds later, Mattie emerged. She was covered in dust and bits of what looked like insulation. Miles and Kevin exchanged incredulous looks.
“Fine,” she said, blowing dust away from her own lips. “Here I am.”
“I’ll deal with you after the game,” Kevin said, pretending to ignore her.
“What? Fuck off!” Mattie screeched, stamping her foot. “I came out!”
“Time you learned things don’t always happen on your schedule, girl,” Kevin said, casting a look over at her. “If I were you, I’d have a shower. Insulation can be nasty stuff. Don’t want that on your skin.”
“You suck!” Mattie exclaimed. “And you’re not going to do anything to me!”
Kevin ignored that.
Mattie stomped off, slamming doors as she went.
Hovering with a confused expression on her face, Cash clearly didn’t know what was going on. “Aren’t you happy to see her?”
“Of course I am, and I’ll tell her that when she stops acting like a brat,” Kevin replied. “After the game.”
“She was worried about you,” Cash persisted.
Miles reached out, looped an arm around her waist and drew her down into his lap. “Cash, sweetheart,” he said. “Kevin knows what he’s doing. Don’t worry about Mattie.”
Frowning slightly, Cash settled into his arms. She didn’t seem terribly interested in the game, but she did like to cuddle. Miles was pleased to note that Kevin didn’t seem to have much of a problem with their casual intimacy. He didn’t intend on hiding their relationship from Kevin. It was one thing to play it cool in public, but he had no intention of sneaking around with Cash like a couple of teenagers – not in the privacy of their own suite.
“It’s stupid that you two are sitting here drinking beer and you’re going to get on Mattie’s case for practically the same thing,” Cash pointed out.
“It’s not the same thing,” Kevin said. “We’re not giving you any.” He winked at Cash’s resulting pout.
“This is not fair,” Cash said. In spite of her complaints, she snuggled more deeply against Miles, curling up on his lap. He smiled to himself. She really couldn’t have been more perfect, a beautif
ul young woman who liked it when he set limits.
Mattie, on the other hand, was not intending on accepting the regime change quite so graciously. When the game was over it was clear that she’d taken Kevin’s advice and had a shower. She emerged from her bedroom with wet hair and a scowl, wearing a t-shirt and jeans. As usual she had a cigarette in hand.
“Smoke that later,” Kevin said, “you and I need to have a talk, don’t we?”
“Fuck off,” Mattie swore at him, pushing past. It was quite something to see someone half Kevin’s size shoulder-barge past him, but she managed it admirably. She didn’t get far though.
“Come here,” Kevin said, taking her by the hand and giving her very little choice in the matter. In an instant, her compact body was caught across his hard thigh and he was slapping her jean clad bottom very soundly – leaving Miles making a mental note to tell Kevin not to bother spanking over jeans.
In spite of the fact that he was working over thick denim Kevin soon seemed to be making an impression on Mattie. He didn’t speak much as he spanked her, his hand landing over and over again on the same spot right at the base of her bottom between her cheeks. She, on the other hand, was a non-stop shriek machine of dire threats and curse words. The air in the suite was practically blue with her rage. Cash even ended up covering her ears and moving away as Mattie’s shrieks rose to an offensive pitch.
“RIBS!” She finally shrieked a word that made Kevin pause. “You’re fucking KILLING my ribs!”
He stopped immediately. “Am I really?”
There was a pause whilst Mattie caught her breath for a moment.
“No,” she admitted.
“You little brat!” Kevin redoubled his efforts for a solid minute of hard spanking, then paused again. “Don’t you lie to me, missy, you understand?”
“Fuck yourself, Kevin,” Mattie swore.
“Sounds like someone needs her pants and panties down,” Miles suggested.
“I agree,” Kevin said grimly. “You mind giving us a little privacy?”
“Not at all,” Miles agreed. “Come on, Cash.” He took her by the hand and drew her away. She’d been looking on with a sort of stunned mullet expression, he didn’t know if it was because she was surprised by Kevin spanking Mattie, or by Mattie’s impressive command of slurs and epithets.
“Don’t leave me! Cash!” Mattie squealed.
Kevin paused halfway through pulling her jeans down. They were not particularly tight and were sliding down over her cheeks; their movement eased by the silk boxer shorts Mattie was wearing underneath.
“You want to be spanked bare in front of everyone?”
“No!” Mattie squealed. For the first time, a little sniffle was in her voice. It wasn’t quite regret, but it was getting close.
“Well you’re going to be getting one,” Kevin said. “That’s what the language and the rudeness gets you.”
“Kevin!” Mattie squealed as he wrangled her jeans to mid-thigh, leaving her with only the thin protection of high cut boxer shorts that revealed the lower curve of her already pink cheeks. “I’m sorry!”
“Are you? Or are you sorry you’re about to get the thrashing you deserve?”
“Kevin, please!”
He slapped her bottom, catching the bare skin. She squealed as if she’d been branded. Miss Dwyer clearly didn’t have all that much in the way of natural pain tolerance. When Kevin applied several more measured slaps to her cheeks she started drumming her feet against the floor and squealing in a high-pitched tone only dogs and Cash could hear.
“Stop!” It was Cash who was upset now. “You’re really hurting her.”
“He’s not hurting her,” Miles said. “You know he isn’t, don’t you?” He turned her to face him, his hands resting lightly on her upper arms. “You know what it feels like. It’s uncomfortable, but it’s not going to do her any harm.”
“Speak for yourself, Muscles,” Mattie cut in as Kevin paused and began rubbing her cheeks. “If this doesn’t stop I will actually die. Of death.”
“Brat,” Kevin said again, swatting her lightly. “Are you learning anything? Or do I have to do this all over again?”
“No!” Mattie said quickly. “I’m sorry, okay? Serious.”
“It’s not your job to corrupt Cash,” he lectured, holding her in place, pink bottomed over his knee. “And I don’t appreciate being cursed at either, understand?”
“I understand,” Mattie said, wriggling uncomfortably.
“Good.” Kevin released his grip and let Mattie scramble off his lap.
She yanked her pants up, her face bright red from embarrassment and all the screaming she’d been doing.
“It didn’t even hurt,” she declared, skittering off to her room to hide.
Kevin shook his head. “Little liar,” he said, rubbing his hands together, dissipating some of the sting. “That… was quite satisfying,” he mused to himself. “I should go check on her, make sure she’s not actually hurt.”
“Wow,” Cash said, staring after Kevin as he went. “I hope he never gets mad at me.”
“You’ve got bigger things to worry about, Miss Raine,” Miles reminded her.
“You sized things,” she agreed, smiling as her drew her into a hug.
Chapter Eleven
Later that evening Kevin and Miles sat down with a couple of beers. Kevin didn’t want to talk about what had happened to him, but they had to talk about who was behind the attacks. The authorities weren’t of any help because being on tour meant constantly moving between jurisdictions. As far as getting to the bottom of the matter went, they were it.
“We’ve got a problem,” Miles began.
“Hell yes we do,” Kevin agreed. “We’ve got a tail. There’s no way a casual stalker would be able to follow us like this.”
“Right” Miles agreed. “He always manages to strike when we’re at our weakest and he never comes anywhere near me. This is someone who knows where I am. We’re not dealing with some Sherlock Holmes mystery. We’re dealing with someone who is hiding in plain sight, right under our noses.”
“A traitor.”
“Precisely.”
Kevin swigged his beer, contemplating the world through narrowed eyes. “So what do we do about that? Set a trap?”
“We keep our eyes open,” Miles said. “We watch. We don’t leave ourselves open to attack and we don’t leave Cash or Mattie open either.”
“Except concerts,” Kevin said. “I’d rather be hit over the head any day than be stuck in a room with thousands of shrieking fans.”
“Except concerts,” Miles agreed.
*
The next day they were on the road again. A collective sigh of relief was heaved as their party left London and headed out onto the motorway. They were pleased to escape into the green and pleasant landscape, even if it was liberally littered with plastic bags sticking out of bushes and clinging to tree branches.
Cash and Mattie were in particularly high spirits. They retreated into a girly huddle in the bedroom at the back of the bus. There was a lot of humming and giggling, and it looked like they were doing something vaguely like work. Miles left them to it at first. He was pleased that Mattie hadn’t gone into too deep of a sulk after her trip over Kevin’s lap. It had given her a bit of a shock, he was sure, but she seemed to have accepted it fairly gracefully.
Kevin was still pretty worn out from the incident, and perhaps from whatever drugs he was taking to even out his mood. Miles was sure he’d been prescribed something by the doctors, though he didn’t ask Kevin directly. Kevin was touchy about that sort of thing; he didn’t like to talk about the terrors that dogged him. He wanted to pretend he was normal. Miles could respect that. He knew better than anyone how difficult it was to slip back into everyday life after a tour of duty. He wasn’t sure it was actually possible.
Meeting Cash had been a godsend in more ways than one. Working the tour, Miles didn’t have to pretend as though everything was humdrum. It wasn’
t. In many ways it was a tactical operation, complete with people to manage and dangers to guard against.
A burst of cackling laughter from the rear of the vehicle made him smile. It was nice to hear Mattie and Cash laughing again. There had been too much solemn silence and worry of late. He made his way back to see what they were doing, and found them sitting on the bed, surrounded by scrawled upon pieces of paper.
“What on earth are you two up to?”
“How did you like the concert the other night?” Cash answered his question with one of her own.
“It was great,” Miles said. “I liked your new stuff.”
“Shhh, keep it down.” Her eyes sparkled. “What if I told you that the new stuff wasn’t exactly authorized?”
“How do you mean?”
“I mean me and Mattie wrote some lyrics for me to sing in her songs. We didn’t run it past Kevin, because Kevin never comes to the shows. And Kevin would never say yes.”
“We’re going to write more,” Mattie chimed in. “We’re going to perform them all over Europe…”
“And people will record it, you know, with their cell phones and stuff,” Cash took over, her excitement rising. “And then it will be on the internet. And then they’ll have to start green lighting the sort of songs I want to sing.”
Miles nodded. “That’s one way to take the bull by the horns, Miss Raine.”
“No way, man,” Mattie cut in, “we’re not taking the bull by the horns, we’re taking him by his fucking testicles.”
Wincing, Miles indicated that he got the general idea. He left Cash and Mattie to it, figuring song writing was the least of anyone’s worries.
The next few weeks of the tour went surprisingly smoothly. The concert in Manchester went off without a hitch, and so did the next one in Dublin. With a grueling schedule and a concert almost every night there was little time for Cash or Mattie to get into trouble, and with the need to be vigilant, there was little time for Miles to indulge any amorous impulses.