by Piper Stone
“You can’t spank me for disagreeing with you!” She folded her arms right back at him.
“Well, technically, I can spank you for anything I want, but absolutely for throwing a tantrum,” he said.
“I am not throwing a tantrum.” Lily deliberately lowered her voice. “I am righteously upset at a wrong you are doing. Maybe I should spank you.”
For some reason the infuriating male smiled. “That wouldn’t work. My butt isn’t nearly as cute as yours, and I’m the guy who owns the hairbrush.”
“It’s my hairbrush!” She all but shouted that time.
He stalked to the bathroom. “But it’s in my hand.”
“Don’t you dare.” She glared at him and crossed her arms again, rising to her full height. “I will not be spanked like a child! I forbid it.”
“You forbid it?”
She hated that he seemed amused. “Yes! I forbid it! You’re doing a bad thing and I forbid that too!”
“Now you are just being ridiculous,” he said, pulling the dreaded chair to the middle of the room. She knew she was in for it, but just couldn’t stop.
“I am not being ridiculous! I’m being sane and practical and you can’t spank me for feeling bad for a mom about to lose her baby!” Because she was so adult she stamped her foot at him, and felt her anger rise as his lips twitched a little. She wasn’t teasing. He needed to get mad so they could have a fight.
“I’m not going to spank you for feeling bad for her, I’m going to spank you for having a tantrum and not listening to me. You know what I do, I help fathers see their kids.”
“You take them away from their moms in the process!” Her voice rose again, despite her best effort.
He sighed, and seemed to grow impatient. “I’m done with this conversation.”
Two steps and he was at her side, pulling her to the chair, while she dragged her feet and tried to get away.
“NO!”
No didn’t seem to work and immediately as he sat down, she was over his lap. She was not accepting this though. “No, I said!” she shouted.
“Yes, I said.” The hairbrush slammed down, then her pants came down and she yelled as the next one stung almost unbearably.
“Stop it!”
“No!”
“Ow! Sam, don’t! I mean it!”
“I mean it more.”
Suddenly she couldn’t speak anymore as the hairbrush came down swiftly and harshly. Kicking and trying to get off his lap, she wasn’t going to make this easy on him.
He wasn’t making it easy on her either. He continued spanking her until she couldn’t fight anymore.
He’d broken her, she could tell. Her bottom was on fire and it was never going to stop. Never. He was going to spank her forever. He held her firmly and she couldn’t get away, no matter how hard she twisted and kicked. “No more, no more!”
Finally, she realized that she was on her feet, and rubbing her bottom frantically. “It hurts!” she howled, and rose on her toes, trying to get the burn out. Dancing a little, she saw that she’d kicked her pants off, and didn’t care. She rubbed her bottom and cried, until he grabbed her and pulled her onto his lap again.
She sobbed onto his shirt. “I just feel so bad. I know how much it hurts to have your baby taken away from you and there is nothing you can do about it. I hate that you help people do that to mothers.”
“Things work out, honey. No one is taking the baby away from his mom, although I’m sure she thinks of it that way right now. The kid will be better off long term with his father in his life.” He petted her and said soft soothing words as she cried.
Lily tried to calm down. He’d given her a severe spanking and she didn’t want any more. She needed to try and see his side of things. Men didn’t understand what it was like to be pregnant and scared though. They just couldn’t.
Chapter 5
“Are you calm?” Sam asked his nervous bride. She looked as if she could come apart at the seams right now. Her first big party as his wife. His dad and brother had gotten in last night, her folks were coming, her brother and his family, all their friends, the people he worked with, his professional colleagues, her co-workers from the florist shop. Hell, he’d be surprised if she hadn’t invited Tyler’s entire classroom or the PTO. He didn’t care. This was part of her perfect Christmas and he hoped it went well for her. Personally, he’d probably be drinking beer and socializing, two things he did very well. He would have been glad to do more, but she kept insisting that she had it all under control.
That thumb, raw from where she was nibbling and the worry lines across her forehead told him differently, however. Sometimes a spanking helped her calm down. Should he? He settled for a hard hug and two quick smacks to her adorable butt. “It’s going to be great. Believe me,” he said into her beautiful green eyes. “Merry Christmas, wife.”
“I just want it to be perfect,” she said with a decided edge to her voice.
“Nothing is ever perfect, “ he said and smiled at her, trying to get the edge off. “How about if we settle for, oh, say, fun?” He handed her a glass of wine, which she refused.
“What if I’m pregnant?” she asked him.
He wasn’t going to argue with her, so he sipped it instead. “People will be here in an hour. What can I help do?”
The doorbell rang and she rushed off before she answered. “Brenda!” he heard. The flowers were here. Let the party begin.
“Hi, Dad,” he said, going into the hallway. “Did you sleep well?”
“Cold up here. Why are you up here again?” His dad grinned to let him know he was kidding.
“Work, Dad. Someone needs to bring in the big bucks in this family.”
“I thought that was going to be my job.” His brother Dawson joined them.
“Aren’t you majoring in football?” Sam punched his shoulder as Tyler came up behind him.
“I like football,” he said, looking at Dawon in something akin to awe. He’d been asleep when they came in last night.
“This is Tyler,” he said.
“Hello, Tyler, I’m your Grandpa Ben,” his dad said.
“And I’m your Uncle Dawson and you and I can throw the football around later, okay?”
“My dad gave me a football, I’ll go get it!” Tyler took off running and Sam didn’t even bother to tell him not to run in the house.
“He’s a good one.” His dad patted his shoulder and said, “We’re lucky to have him in the family.”
Sam felt an almost overwhelming sense of gratitude to his family for accepting Tyler so readily. He worked with divorced people every day, and not every family did. “How’s school?” he asked Dawson. “You doing anything besides playing ball?”
“Not much,” he said, cheerfully. “Well, graduating this May. You coming?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” Sam said, as they all heard the doorbell ring again. “Let’s go to the party. I can’t wait for you to meet Lily’s family.”
As they walked toward the main area of the house, Sam heard the smoke alarm go off and took off running as fast as Tyler had. Probably just an overflow of something she’d basted the ham with earlier, in the oven, he told himself. But then he smelled burning paper, and got to the kitchen just in time to see Lily holding the fire extinguisher and aiming it at the stove. “The flowers!” she yelled and pulled the trigger so foam went all over the stove. Thick black smoke billowed from the hot surface. It looked like a box that flowers came in, as he grabbed an edge and threw it in the sink. Then, coughing, he reached over and shut off the burner. Why had it been on?
“There was a box on the stove?” he asked, noticing his dad and brother behind him.
“I guess,” Lily said, standing with the fire extinguisher, looking wild-eyed. He turned on the oven vent and opened the window over the stove, then waved a towel at the smoke alarm to shut it off.
The doorbell rang again and his dad said, “I’ll get it.”
“Mom!” Tyler yelled from another room.
“Dawson, could you?” Sam jerked his head toward Tyler’s voice.
“Sure, unless you need help here?”
“We have it,” he said. “Lily, are you all right?”
“I must have put the box on the stove while it was still on,” she said, her voice rising. “I’m sorry!”
“Nothing to be sorry about. Let’s get this cleaned up.”
“Honey, are you okay?” That was Violet, Lily’s mom. “What happened?”
“I put the flowers on the stove!” Lily wailed. “Mom!”
“Why did you put the flowers on the stove?” she asked, clearly amused. “Hello, Sam.”
“Hello, Violet, and the jury is out on why the flower box was on the stove. Would you like a glass of wine?” he offered, while Lily frantically tried to clean up the mess the extinguisher made. The bell chimed again, and he hoped his dad was still on door duty. He grabbed the mop from the small utility closet and began mopping. “Watch your step.”
Violet rolled her sleeves up and grabbed a paper towel. “Calm down, Lily. It’s just a little mess. Nothing that everyone hasn’t seen before.”
“It smells like smoke in here and my flowers!” she wailed.
“They’re only a little scorched,” she said soothingly, winking at Sam. “We’ll just put those to the back. Now, is there anything in that oven that needs to come out? Hello, Stormy!”
“Don’t bring Elliot in here!” Lily cried. “It smells like smoke!”
“Cade has him in the other room, showing him the tree,” Stormy said.
The doorbell went off again and Sam decided to let the women deal with the kitchen and he’d make sure his dad knew where coats went and see if he wanted relief. He grabbed a tray of full wine glasses to hand out. Shaking his head, he remembered that Lily had a bunch of smelly candles sitting around. He’d light some of those in a minute. That would help.
Smiling and greeting people, he had his wine tray emptied before he got to the front door, but not before it chimed twice more. Maybe she had invited the entire town. How much was his liquor bill going to be? Where were they all parking?
“Thanks for taking door duty, Dad,” he said. “Lily rented a coat rack, it’s in the study.” Pointing to a side door, he picked up an armful of coats that had been piled on a chair and started to walk to the study when he heard a crash and a chorus of “Oh, no!” coming from the dining room. Now what?
Dropping the coats back on the chair and wading through a sea of people while he heard the doorbell yet again, he saw Lily’s exquisitely decorated tree on the floor, and Tyler and Dawson looking chagrined, as a hush fell over the room, while everyone stared.
“My fault, bro,” Dawson said. “We shouldn’t have been throwing the football in the house. Who knew the kid had such a strong arm?”
“Mom’s going to be so mad,” Tyler said worriedly.
Sam looked at the tree on the ground, lights broken, ornaments smashed, tinsel everywhere, at the same time he heard a shriek behind him. Yeah. Mom was going to be mad.
“Caterer’s here,” Lily’s dad said from the door into the silent room. “Damn. Who broke the tree?”
Sam tried not to laugh. He really did. It didn’t work. At the same time he started laughing, the doorbell rang again, and both seemed to break the frozen spell as people sprang into action. The men righted the tree, the women swept up the broken glass. Sam put Dawson in charge of the caterers, since he apparently needed to do something helpful. He had Stormy light candles to get the smoke smell from the house, and put Lily’s dad in charge of the door since his dad was in a corner chatting up Lily’s boss, Brenda.
Oh, great, there was Lily’s friend, Ronnie, and she seemed drunk again, already. Well, what was one more disaster?
Talia and Lucas were the latest arrivals after Ronnie, and he sent her experienced self to the kitchen to see what needed to be done, and then went to find his missing wife. He hadn’t seen or heard her since the shriek. The doorbell went off again.
Where was she? Not in Tyler’s room, so he made his way across the living room, now packed with people laughing and someone switched the music on. The candles were starting to dissipate the smoke smell and as he looked in the dining room, he saw half a dozen people redecorating the tree. Talia had pulled the ham Lily made from the oven, and the caterers were setting out food. Smiling, he walked down the hall to their room. The door was locked, but he took care of that quickly. “Lily?”
There she was, huddled on the bed, her knees to her chest, and still. Too still. He could deal with hysterics and tantrums, but this?
“Hey, baby,” he said, biting his tongue before he said, ‘what’s wrong’. He knew what was wrong. “You’re missing the party.”
“I know,” she said, woodenly. “It needs to be missed. Everything is going wrong.”
“What’s going wrong?” he said, pulling her up to sit on his lap. She was like a wooden doll, stiff and unemotional. “Listen.”
Laughter, music, and the smell of delicious food floated to them and her stomach growled. “You haven’t eaten today, have you?” he asked and kissed the top of her head.
Shaking her head, she whispered, “I just wanted Christmas to be perfect.”
“Nothing is ever perfect, but you have to admit, this is what memories are made of. Is Tyler ever going to forget the year he knocked the tree over or Brenda the year her flowers caught on fire or—” He stopped as all the lights went out, and a chorus of groans went through the house. “The year we blew a fuse?” He threw his hands in the air. “This, baby, is how you make a perfect Christmas.”
Lily’s mouth began to twitch and he took the opportunity to kiss her, as he saw her body relax. “Come on, let’s go make some memories.”
“A party no one will ever forget,” she said as the lights came back on.
Simultaneously, they heard Ronnie’s voice saying, “Where’s the drinks?” above the rest of the party noise.
“And a Christmas to remember.” He pulled her up from the bed, and kissed the top of her head.
A week later when his present under the tree was a positive pregnancy test, he knew nothing would top it. This was the perfect Christmas.
The End.
Other Titles
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Audio-Books
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Connect with Megan McCoy:
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Megan McCoy
Megan McCoy lives in the heartland of America, surrounded by corn, soybean fields and hot guys on tractors. At home, she's raising kids, Chinese Cresteds, and poodles, training them all with a tender hand and heart, while saving her sternness for the alpha males in her books. Getting up at three in the morning to write leaves her time for a few hobbies - gardening, canning, bike riding, bread baking and taking in strays.
Connect with Megan McCoy
www.meganmccoy.com
The Runaway Christmas Bride
12 Naughty Days of Christmas 2017
Viola Morne
©2017 by Blushing Books® and Viola Morne
All rights reserved.
No part of the book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Viola Morne
The Runaway Christmas Bride
Cover Art by ABCD Graphics & Design
This book is intended for adults only. Spanking and other sexual activities represented in this book are fantasies only, intended for adults. Nothing in this book should be interpreted as Blushing Books' or the author's advocating any non-consensual spanking activity or the spanking of minors.
Chapter 1
Bath, England, 1816
Arabella Linton stared wistfully at her reflection. The fawn silk bonnet was delightfully dashing, its high poke lined in crimson with matching ribbons. But the price of ten shillings was too expensive for her skimpy purse, even if her mother would allow her to wear it. She sighed and placed it back on the counter.
“It’s very flattering, miss,” the milliner told her.
“I believe it is.” Arabella fingered the ribbons wistfully. “But my mama would never approve, even if I could afford it. She insists I wear only pink and white and a particularly sickly shade of pale blue, so anemic.”
“Indeed, miss, a brunette with your ivory skin and dark eyes should wear vivid shades. But debutantes are not allowed bright colors. Once you are married, you may wear whichever colors you choose, and your husband will pay the bill.”
“Married?” Arabella shook her head. “I’ve spent the last two years immured in a girl’s school. I want to go to London and make a splash, balls and dances and handsome young men. Not be stuck with some stuffy old husband. I must have a Season.”