by Lisabet Sarai, Trina Lane, Elizabeth Coldwell, Charlotte Stein, Jane Davitt, Justine Elyot
“Better. Perhaps we’ll have to work on presentation and posture. Next time.”
Oooh, next time. I quivered and moistened beneath the inadequate cotton crotch of my leggings. He meant business. Business with my rear end.
“Ouch!”
I overreacted to the first swipe, which was not hard, but came out of nowhere. His hand had landed on my arse. It was so loud! Much louder than I’d thought it would be. I yanked up my head and looked around me, worrying vaguely about the neighbours, though I was sure they were at work all day anyway.
“Did that hurt?” Dexter sounded surprised.
“No, not really,” I admitted. “Just…the feeling. It’s new. And it’s loud.”
“It seems louder than it really is,” said Dexter. “Though if you’re really worried about noise, there are quieter implements. Ironically, those tend to be the ones that make their recipient shout the loudest, though.”
“Oh, yes, that’s very ironic, ouch!” I said, caught once more by the strange, hand-shaped pain alighting on my left bum cheek.
“Your pain threshold is quite low. These are just pats.”
Dexter sounded disappointed, and I wanted very badly to dispel that disappointment, if that wasn’t too weird of me.
“Again—just surprise, Dexter. It feels…not at all bad.” It felt good! A rush of stimulating sensation across the globes and down into the valleys, making me push out for more, harder, more.
“You’re enjoying it?”
“I…well, yeah. Oh!”
Dexter tried a harder smack, and it did hurt, but not enough for me to want him to stop—nowhere near enough for that. So he tried a few more, his spanking hand travelling across each peach, down as far as my thighs, until I felt so deliciously warm and wet that I feared my leggings might soon melt. I squirmed in his lap, forgetting to worry about how I looked or what he thought of me, just letting myself fall into the heady sensation of submission. It’s so easy, I crowed to myself, grinding my hips and gasping more from arousal than distress. It’s so easy to take a spanking! Why would anyone not enjoy this? Why is it ever considered a punishment?
“Is this what you wanted?” Dexter asked politely. “Is this the way forward?”
“Ohhh yes, I think so,” I purred, and then, without warning, he picked up pace to a diabolical degree, slapping hard and fast across both cheeks and I began to squeal, began to dance in earnest, and now he’d answered my question. Now I knew why it would be considered a punishment. It was painful!
“Ah! Oh! Ah! Ouch! No! It hurts! Dexter! Oh! Ouch!” I was writhing strenuously, keen to elude his relentless hail of spanks, and I put up a hand in a desperate attempt to shield my bottom. He grabbed the wrist, held it tight above the small of my back, and stopped.
“That’s a real spanking,” he said. “Hurts, doesn’t it? Not like the fantasy version.”
“Yes,” I peeped, ashamed at my pathetically poor tolerance level.
“So what do you think?”
I couldn’t see him, still hanging off his lap with one arm twisted in his grasp, so my thoughts came slowly and without much coherence.
“What do I think? Of spanking? Or…?”
“Do you like it?”
“I think so.”
“Would you want me to go harder? Faster? To make it really sting? Because that was nothing, Lara. That was nothing at all.”
“I think…if you made it harder, it really would be a punishment. It wouldn’t be a pleasure at all.”
“I see. Do you still want to use it as a disciplinary measure?”
I felt that he was waiting for me to climb down and apologise and admit that I had no idea what I was talking about. Then our relationship would go back to what it was—paid organiser and disorganised client, consumer and service provider.
But could a consumer who’d been spanked by the service provider ever go back to the original footing? I couldn’t see a way back from this. He’d had me over his lap and made my bottom sore. Everything had changed, and I didn’t want to lose this new and intriguing facet of our relationship. Even as my bottom glowed and the skin felt uncomfortably tight, I knew I was going to want him to spank me again. Often, perhaps.
“I…can I think about it?”
“Of course,” he said, letting me up.
I stood beside him against the kitchen table and placed a curious hand against my bottom. Warm. Like a radiator. Nice.
“Lots of people fantasise about being taken in hand,” he told me. “But most don’t really want it to happen.” He sighed.
“I do!” I said impulsively.
He turned to me, his face slightly alarmed, but the kind of alarm that comes from the extreme closeness of a wish fulfilled—that ‘is this real?’ kind of alarm. His eyes behind the spectacles were fathomlessly hopeful. He was attractive, much more attractive than his dress and manner gave him credit for. I wanted to kiss him, but I didn’t dare.
“You just asked for time to think. Don’t you want that any more?”
“I want to be held to account,” I said, softly. “I want you to do it.”
“And you won’t backslide just because you like what I do to you?”
“No. I promise. I’ll try just as hard as I would have done anyway.”
“Then we have an understanding. But I hope you’ll understand that I need to test your resolve.”
“My resolve?”
“I can’t just spank you and leave. Domination and submission creates an intense experience that leads to a bond between the participants. I would be negligent towards you if I didn’t offer a little bit more.”
“A little bit more?”
“Let me put it this way.” He put out a hand and pulled me over to stand in front of him, our knees touching, mine shivering, his firm. “Are you wet?”
I drew in a breath, colouring to the same red as my bottom. I could not meet his eyes, but eventually I nodded.
“Look at me,” he said. The softness of his voice hid an edge of true steel.
I dragged my eyes from my feet.
“Tell me, Lara.”
“Yes,” I whispered.
“Good. I need to test your obedience now. You can say no, but if you do, I will leave and we’ll speak no more of this. Put your hand down inside your knickers.”
The calm way he delivered the order sent further floods of wetness to stain the already damp cotton of my leggings. In a kind of spell, or dream, I held my mouth open, tried to keep breathing, and did as I was told.
“Good girl,” he said gently, waiting for my fingers to settle between my gushing lips, watching the outline of my knuckles stretching the fabric. “What do you feel there?”
“I feel…wet.” I wanted to add, ‘Sir,’ but felt too self-conscious initially—but then I figured that he would love it if I did, so I bit my lip, looked him full in the eye and said, “Very wet, Sir.”
His cheek muscles flickered. A smile of pleasure was being tactically suppressed.
“Why do you think that is?” he asked.
“I…don’t know.” I knew he wouldn’t accept this cop out, but I needed a moment to compose the words into a combination that wasn’t too mortifying.
“Of course you know, Lara. I must have an answer or I’ll have to punish you again.”
Oh God, those words. I pressed a fingertip to my clit; it was swollen and it throbbed with need.
“Because…I get aroused…by submitting to you, Sir.”
He tilted his head forward, acknowledging the truth of my answer. “And what does that make you?” he asked lightly.
I swallowed, fingering my clit more urgently now. “It makes me…I don’t know…a bad girl, Sir?”
“That’s right. It makes you a bad girl. Now I want you to stand there and finger yourself until you come. And while you do it, I want you to look me in the eye. And when you come, I want to hear you say my name.”
A keen mélange of shame and excitement and unbearable desire held me in my tracks
for a second or two. Then I began to rub and circle, to flick and flutter, watching him watching me, knowing that he registered every twitch and flush, that he could see me lose my grip on myself inch by dirty inch…that he saw what I was, reduced to my basest essence, brazenly bringing myself off under his command.
I wanted so badly to shut my eyes when the first sticky swirl of orgasm began at the pit of my stomach. I had to fight to keep the eyelids up, had to arm myself with some of his icy-blue artillery and imagine the fearsome punishment I might earn for disobeying him in this regard. But once the climax blew through me, I forgot to care, and my eyelids flew wide and my eyes stared out in desperation while I panted and whimpered to the conclusion, remembering at the last minute to say the word.
“Dexter. Oh thank you, Dexter.”
“My pleasure,” he said, taking my wrists and bringing me to sit, gratefully floppy, on his lap. “Or rather, mostly your pleasure. But we’ll rectify that another time.” He stroked my hair, which was clinging to my forehead. “Good girl, Lara,” he said into the crown of my head. “This could be a very…mutually beneficial arrangement. You know I have high standards, and high expectations of you now. Please don’t let me down.”
Please don’t let me down.
* * * *
With five minutes to go until our meeting, the bills were paid, the flat was clean, I’d been to the gym my allotted three times, I’d met the two deadlines I had, the fridge and cupboards were full, I’d dealt with the court summons for non-payment of parking fines and…that was it. There was really nothing. Nothing he could reproach me for. I cast my eyes around the flat, looking for something out of place. No. It was all perfect. Well, apart from the dirty dishes under the sink and the pile of unopened post behind the sofa cushions—but he couldn’t expect me to be superhuman, surely. And besides, he wouldn’t see them.
I was already basking in the advanced glow of his approval, even as a tiny part of me regretted that I wouldn’t get a trip over his knee today. I wanted to please him. I wanted to prove that I was capable of meeting his stringent demands.
I peeked through my shiny sparkly window, looking out for the first sign of him. When I spotted his tall figure rounding a corner, laptop bag in hand, I got this heartburn sensation, then an entire tropical forest of butterflies fluttered to life. My hands were shaking! I couldn’t let them shake! What if I spilt his boiling green tea on him?
Even though I saw him press the buzzer, it still made me jump.
My voice was foreign to me as I piped, “Come on up.”
He looked almost as nervous as I felt when I opened the door to him, and he couldn’t seem to make up his mind whether to smile and be friendly, or continue with the stiff formality. Now spanking and sexual tension stood between us, a shared experience, and neither of us had much of a clue how to negotiate this brave new chapter in the story—an intimate act that nonetheless had no effect on the semi-formal footing of our involvement.
“How are you, Lara?” he asked politely, moving straight into the kitchen and unzipping his bag as always.
“Fine, thanks. Green tea?”
“Thank you.”
I had minutes of respite now, with an excuse to turn my back on him and shilly-shally with teacups and kettles. But, oh horror, there were no clean cups—just glasses.
“Or perhaps you’d prefer water? Or fruit juice?” I asked hopefully, eyeing the clean glasses in their display cabinet.
“Green tea is fine.”
Could I open that cupboard under the sink just an inch and slip a hand inside for a dirty cup to give it a quick blast under the taps? Did I dare? I jumbled it all in, in rather a rush. I wasn’t confident. But neither could I confess. I didn’t want to blot my copybook on the first meeting of the new regime.
I touched the handle of the cupboard, hoping that the whir of his booting computer and the steaming of the kettle would mask any clink or chink from inside. He was deep into the set-up, opening browsers and files and whatnot. He wasn’t watching me. I decided to chance it.
The merest crack threatened to set off a cacophonous chain reaction of tumbling china. I shut the door. Shit. Wasn’t it supposed to be quite sophisticated to drink tea from a glass? People did it, I’m sure. In posh hotels and dramas about the colonial past. Okay, there was nothing else for it. I reached for a tall tumbler and popped the teabag inside, half-filling it with boiling water then topping it up with cold from the fridge, just as he always specified. It looked quite drinkable, in a sludgy green-brownish kind of way. Shame the glass didn’t have one of those metal holders with a handle, but I wasn’t running a bloody café. It would have to do.
I plonked it down in front of him and turned swiftly back to the kettle, hoping that my speed would make up for my failure at projecting a nonchalant air. How do you do nonchalance? Should I whistle a jaunty tune or something? Ask him about the traffic?
“Lalala,” I sang in a high-pitched, panic-attacked attempt to sound relaxed.
“Lara.”
Oh God. I wanted to collapse on the counter with my head in my hands and howl with shame.
“Yes?” I didn’t turn around. I didn’t want to see his face.
“Don’t you have any cups?”
I was going to have to face him. “Cups?” I trilled, leaning back on the cupboards, smiling weakly.
He smiled back, not so weakly. “Yes. Cups. China receptacles for the consumption of hot beverages. You’ve heard of them, I take it?”
Oh, ha, ha. Mind you, I’d never heard Dexter trying to be funny before, so perhaps it wasn’t such a bad sign.
“Yeah. You, um. You want a cup?”
“Ideally. Glass gets quite hot, you know. When it’s got boiling water in it. Don’t want to burn my fingers or drop it.”
“No. Right.” I chewed my lip.
“I’m sensing a problem.” Dexter swivelled towards me, averting his eyes from the computer screen, his face pleasantly expectant. He knows.
“It’s just…I don’t have any.”
“Don’t have any? You had them last time I was here. What happened?”
Visit from the cup monster? Theft? Mass breakage? Not a single convincing explanation sprang to my deceitful mind.
“I do have some,” I muttered sheepishly. “They’re just…I haven’t got round to washing them up yet.”
“Oh.” Dexter watched me, rather hawkishly, for a moment or two, then he swung back round to the computer and tapped at the spreadsheet. “Yes. Washing up. As and when necessary. Did you not consider it necessary to wash up when you found you had no clean cups?”
“Didn’t have time. Been busy. I’ve done everything else,” I wailed in a sudden outpouring of guilty defensiveness.
“Have you, Lara? Everything?” He smiled sadly. “Tell you what. Why don’t you wash up a cup and I’ll pour this brew into it. Then you can sit down here and we’ll go through the list together.”
He hadn’t mentioned a punishment. Perhaps he would let me off. Perhaps he was quite a generous-spirited kind of automaton after all. I smiled gratefully and pulled open the cupboard door. An ear-splitting crash of falling crockery and aluminium rent the air.
“Oh. Dear.”
* * * *
“You’ve done extraordinarily well,” he told me, closing the spreadsheet and turning to me with a melancholy smile. “So much better than I would have expected at this stage. I think our little motivational scheme might be working.”
I glowed in the sunshine of his praise, then the inevitable shadow chilled the air.
“Of course, I don’t expect perfection, and I’m almost inclined to be lenient with regard to what happened earlier.”
“The Teacup Incident,” I said, having already christened it in my mind so that its notoriety would live forever.
“The Teacup Incident.” He smiled.
He really was so much more human and…approachable…since I gave him the green light to redden my bottom.
“After all, you will
have to replace all that broken china from your own pocket, and, judging by the finances we’ve just trawled through, that won’t be easy. A punishment that truly fits the crime.”
I perked up, and yet at the same time, my heart sank. Was he letting me off? Did I want him to?
“So I’m not going to punish you for hiding the washing up.”
“Oh. Are you not?”
He chuckled at the note of disapproval in my voice.
“Don’t worry, I’m taking everything just as seriously as you need me to. I might not spank you for hiding dirty plates. But concealing them and lying to me about it…that’s quite a different matter.”
It had taken a mere millisecond for him to snap back into that terrifying mode and my lips parted, suddenly dry, like the back of my throat.
“If you lie to me, Lara, what are you achieving? Can you tell me?”
I looked at my hands. “I get to…look good. I get…to win.”
“Are appearances so important to you? I’m so very disappointed. I thought you were genuine in your desire to change and improve your organisational skills. But it seems that you’ve been fooling both yourself and me. You aren’t serious, are you? It’s all a game to you.”
I opened and closed my mouth. I wanted to protest, but I felt so terribly guilty—really guilty! Not the fake, fun kind of guilty. I was even close to tears.
“Please don’t…I do want to be better,” I blurted. “I really do. I’m just…it’s hard. It’s scary.”
“I understand that it’s hard, Lara. That’s why it’s so important that you’re one hundred percent honest with me. If you lie to me…well, for one thing, I will know. And for another, I will have to withdraw from our arrangement. With the greatest regret. But I would always, always prefer for you to fall short and confess your shortcoming, than to believe you’re sailing through without a struggle when you still need my help. You need my help, don’t you? Still?”
“Yes, I do, I really do, I’m really sorry.” A tear trickled out. The sight of it seemed to affect him, because he wound up the lecture and handed me a handkerchief.