“I’m sure you are now that you see your utter foolishness. But you’ll have plenty of opportunity to pay for your mistakes, when I get back.” His brown eyes flashed in their hot dark way, so she was certain to get his message. “Now lock the doors and windows. If the man’s no more than a bully, which I suspect is all he is, I should be back within the hour.”
Aaron left briskly, Abigail watching from the kitchen window as she saw her husband cross the yard, enter the barn and emerge a few minutes later on horseback.
It was terrifying waiting for Aaron to return, not knowing what might greet him at the barn. Certainly her virile young husband was more than man enough to handle Burt, but still, the danger to him and her best friend could not be diminished. All kinds of frightening thoughts raced through her head as she paced the floor waiting for Aaron’s return.
Over an hour later, Abigail finally heard the sound of hoof beats in the yard. Racing toward the kitchen windows, she saw Aaron with Darcy riding in front of him. Flying from the house, ready to grab them both, her act was met with a nasty scowl from Aaron.
“I told you not to leave the house!” he said.
“But …”
“Get back inside, we’ll be there in a few minutes,” he ordered.
Stopped short, Abigail was bewildered. But she had no choice but to obey Aaron’s command. And returning to the kitchen, she stood at the doorway and watched as the two dismounted the horse and Aaron led a somewhat limp and weary Darcy inside.
“Put her in her room, she needs some sleep,” Aaron said. “And then you come to bed. I think we’ve had enough excitement for one night.”
“But tell me what happened,” Abigail asked as she took Darcy into her arms.
“I’m sure Darcy will be glad to share the story but in the morning,” Aaron said. “Now we all need our sleep.”
As Abigail and Darcy made their way together up the stairs, the weakened young woman whispered the details of the harrowing night.
“It was horrible, Abigail,” she began. “Burt glared at me all evening long. He was drinking, getting more surly with each gulp of liquor. I tried twice to leave, but the man has a dark heart. If I’d only been stronger, I’m sure I’d have gotten away. But then Aaron arrived. Put the wrath of God in Burt. Knocked him out, tied him up and before we came home, he roused the sheriff to take care of him tomorrow.”
By the time Darcy had finished the sketchy tale, the two were in Darcy’s bedroom. Abigail was pulling off her friend’s damp clothes and tossing a nightgown over her shoulders. Pushing her into bed, she pulled a hefty comforter over Darcy’s exhausted body.
“Abigail!” Aaron spoke sharply from outside the door.
“Yes, yes, I’m coming,” she replied.
“I’ll be all right,” Darcy whispered to her. “I’m better, I really am, but I’m so tired.” She didn’t have to say more, for she was fast asleep before Abigail left the room. “Aren’t you going to say anything?” Abigail asked her stoic husband once she’d joined him in their bedroom.
“Talk about tonight? No. There will be plenty of time to talk in the morning. Right now you’re going to sleep and so am I.”
“Aaron please, let me explain,” Abigail cried.
Aaron gazed up at his sorrowful looking wife, but he wasn’t moved by her sad face. “Explanations are not important now. But your growing up, my fair brat, is. And that we’ll talk about in the morning.”
Aaron said no more, but climbed into bed, making it clear that he expected Abigail to follow. Fear and wonder filled her heart, as she thought about the punishment he was likely to mete out. She could already feel a warm sensation on her bottom. What was worse however, was what Aaron meant by “grow up”. She couldn’t be sure what he had in mind. One thing she was sure of, their young marriage had clearly taken a dramatic turn, and life in Aaron Barrow’s house was certain to change.
Chapter Five
Abigail and Aaron Barrow sat at the kitchen table eating their breakfast in silence. All Abby could think about was her horrible day with knife-wielding scoundrel, a furious husband and a sick best friend. She had a lot to worry about.
“You’re going to punish me, aren’t you?” Abigail said breaking the silence, as she sipped from her mug of steaming coffee. She didn’t even want to think of how her poor bottom was going to pay for this most recent travesty, but it was hard not to. Aaron had already warned her she’d be disciplined before he went off to rescue Darcy, and she knew this would be a harrowing one.
“You think I need to?” Aaron asked her. For a man as angry as he’d been the night before, he had an almost amused looked on his face as he eyed his penitent wife.
“Well, I was sure you would,” she said. “After all the…”
“After all the what? The lies, the deceit, the thievery, the utter stupidity of your plans with Darcy?” He seemed to be enjoying giving her a full litany of her crimes.
“Aaron wait,” another voice rang out. Darcy appeared in the doorway interrupting the couple’s conversation. She looked dressed and ready to leave the house, with her satchel of belongings in her hand. “Don’t punish her,” Darcy went on. “It’s really my fault.”
Aaron eyed the incorrigible brat for an instant, his expression quite stern. “What’s between my wife and me, Darcy, is none of your business,” he said.
“Whip my ass for this, Aaron,” Darcy said. “I’m sure it could use a good walloping right now.”
“You’re right about that,” Aaron agreed. “But right now, brat, you’re going to march your sick body up to bed and get your rest. Your constitution wouldn’t take the licking I’m going to give you. You need to get well.”
“No, Aaron. I’ve got to leave now. I’m better off getting away from you and Abigail. All I am is trouble.”
“Trouble you are,” Aaron said. “But that doesn’t change the fact that we’re your friends, and if you weren’t so damn independent in the first place, you wouldn’t be in this fix. Now get upstairs where you belong. And get well.” He was adamant.
It was rare to see Darcy put in her place. But she didn’t seem to have the strength to argue more. She trudged back up the stairs, and after watching her all the way, Aaron turned back to his breakfast.
“So was this all Darcy’s fault?” Aaron asked his wife. “You were just an innocent pawn in her foolhardy games?”
“No, Aaron, it wasn’t all Darcy’s fault,” Abigail admitted. “I was just so desperate.”
“Don’t you suppose you could have told me at the beginning that she needed money? Do you think I’d have denied her? Do you think I’d have left her to the wiles of that vagrant, bully?”
“I… . I, don’t know.”
For all his calm earlier, Aaron’s temper was beginning to rise, but just slightly. He still spoke in a calm measured voice.
“Well, you’d better know, my love. You’re the most important thing to me in this life. What troubles you, troubles me, what trials you face—even if they’re trials with the likes of Darcy Greenwood—are trials that we’ll face together. If I can’t expect honesty from you, always the absolute truth, then we don’t have much of a marriage, do we?”
“No, I suppose not,” Abigail said, a little taken aback by the ferocity of Aaron’s lecture.
“There’s no doubt you’ll pay in many ways for this stupid stunt, but for now I want you to think about your misadventure of the last few days and what it means for us. When you’re ready to take the first installment of your correction, you come get me.”
“You’re not going to do it now?” she asked.
“No.”
“You’re going to made me decide?”
“Yes.” His grin was absolutely devious. The amusement that had begun their morning had returned. And having finished his meal, Aaron rose from his seat and walked out of the house, leaving a stunned Abigail to stew in the juices of what her misguided behavior had wrought.
Abigail wrestled with Aaron’s message most of t
he morning. The thought that she might have averted the whole horror of the past week with just a little honesty had never really occurred to her. She realized how one lie led to another, and another, until she was so steeped in her deceit that there was no way out. What was worst of all was how she’d disappointed Aaron. In spite of his sometimes ruthless tactics to keep her in line, he did love her beyond words. The measure of his love had been proven by his faithfulness to her, even when she was so reckless with the truth. The more she thought of what her behavior had caused, the more guilty she felt—as if she might have put her whole marriage in jeopardy, even though it seemed that there was nothing that Aaron wouldn’t forgive her for.
With all these realizations, it felt as if she couldn’t remain the feisty adolescent anymore. She was growing up, perhaps that was what Aaron was trying to tell her. If she wanted her marriage with Aaron to succeed, there were some childish notions she had to give up.
It was the middle of the afternoon before Abigail made her way to the mill. Aaron hadn’t come home at the dinner hour. She was sure he hadn’t just so she’d have to brood by herself over her impending punishment. She marveled at how her husband could be so wise and honest and at the same time understanding, in his own way. And how resolved. He’d placed the question of her discipline in her own hands, making it one she’d have to ask for.
As Abigail approached the mill, she trembled knowing how fierce her punishment was likely to be. Her whole body tingled, but especially her bottom, as if her bottom cheeks were already rosy red and hot for the paddle that she held in her hands. Yes, she’d chosen the paddle deliberately, because she liked its sting least of all. If this was to be a payment on her account of misdeeds, she wanted it to be a big one.
Inside the mill, the sounds of the machinery filled her ears, so as she approached Aaron at his work, they couldn’t think of conversing about anything without shouting. She was glad that Aaron’s two employees didn’t take much notice of her, though she imagined that from the corners of their eyes, they could see what was about to take place. Replacing words with a simple sign language, Abigail watched as Aaron motioned her to his office at the other end of the mill. When he didn’t follow her immediately, she sat down in a chair and waited for him, noting how each instant that passed fueled the ever-present agitation in the pit of her stomach. When Aaron finally came through the door, she could hardly speak for her nervousness.
“So, is there something you want?” Aaron asked, when he closed the office door behind him, and the sound of the mill was slightly muted.
“Yes, well… .” she tried.
“And what is it?” he asked as if he had no idea.
“You’re going to make me say it?” she wondered aloud.
“I’m going to make you very conscious of this one, Abigail McPhearson Barrow. So tell, what is it you want?”
“I want to make amends to you. I don’t want anymore lies, ever. I hate this, I hated it when it was happening. But I guess I just didn’t realize how understanding you might be. I want to make it right. And I promise it’s not going to happen again.”
Aaron looked at her as if he didn’t believe her.
“Aaron, I know my lies were foolish.”
“And dangerous,” he added.
“And dangerous. I know that I often behave like a kid, and well,” she hedged. “I don’t want to be a kid anymore.”
“Humph.” Aaron mulled over her confession with a calculated interest.
“I am sincere,” Abigail said, her words taking a pleading tone. “And … I think that I need this,” she said handing him the wooden paddle.
“Just once?”
“No,” she hesitated. “But I’ll let you be the judge of that.”
Aaron took a deep breath as he took the paddle from his wife’s hand.
“You know, I actually think you’re sincere this time,” he said. “But I don’t have any illusions about your future behavior. You’re going to have to prove your trustworthiness to me. Trust between us took a big step backward this week.”
“I know,” she agreed.
Aaron stood in front of her, leaning back against the edge of his desk looking down into her soulful eyes. She could almost hear his thoughts, though she waited anxiously for him to speak.
“Well, Abigail, what I’m going to do is blister your bottom with this today.” He smacked the paddle on his hand so she could hear the noxious sound. “And,” he continued, “once a week for at least the next four weeks.”
Abigail’s eyes widened hearing her sentence, but she said nothing.
“And, in-between your sessions over my lap, you’re going to pay with a bit of hard labor right here in the mill. You and Darcy both, once she gets well. You’re both going to pay me back and then some, for the money you took and the worry you caused.”
“I guess we deserve that,” Abigail admitted.
“You know you do.”
“And are you going to paddle Darcy too.”
“What do you think?”
“I think she needs it,” Abigail answered.
“Well then, don’t worry, she’ll get her due, though it’s you I’m most concerned about. It’s you that I love with all my heart.”
Such a strange mix of messages, the affection from his heart, the sternness of his resolve, the dedication to their relationship, and the ruthlessness of the sentence passed for her crimes. Did she deserve it all, the love and the punishment? She wasn’t sure, but she’d take it all to make right what she’d managed to mess up so well.
With the confession over and the sentence passed, Aaron reached for his wife and pulled her to her feet. Sitting, his broad lap was ready and waiting for her submitting body.
“Just for good measure, to start this right, let’s remove the dress. It’ll be out of the way.”
In the mill, with squealing sound of sawing boards the only accompaniment to the scene, Abigail obeyed her husband, removing her dress and placing it on her husband’s desk. She stood before him with just a simple shift and her stockings, feeling much like the child she’d always been. Rebellious, that’s how she’d always lived her life, and so there had been many scenes just like this between father and daughter, and now husband and wife. Abigail shivered to her core, knowing that while she dreaded the next awful minutes, there was a rightness to the scenario. It always set thing straight. Even though now, Aaron was asking her—and she was asking herself—to give up the lies, the childish pranks and the behaviors that made her little more than an unruly adolescent. She really hoped that this chastisement would be the last real one she’d ever have.
“Come here,” Aaron motioned her to his side.
She walked on tiptoe in fear, how many times she’d gone through this, the same trepidation always made her weak. At her husband’s side, she was over his knee a second later, his firm warm hand pulling the shift up over her behind exposing the target of his designs.
He waited for at least a minute, perhaps deliberately to make the moment more impossible to deal with. Though Abigail said nothing. By the time the first smack landed, she’d been lulled into a little mindless reverie, and the impact woke her instantly with the sound, the sting, and the howl that issued from her lips.
Another smack followed the first, another and another, until in a very few minutes time the sting was an appalling burn. Efficiently, Aaron leveled the paddle, first on the center of her cheeks. When it was clear that she was hurting badly in those two places, he moved the smacks around, making sure to cover every inch of her once lily-white skin.
“Oh, my god, Aaron, I can’t stand anymore,” she finally wailed.
The punishment had been at least ten minutes long, though she had no way of really knowing. Aaron paused for an instant hearing his wife’s complaint.
“Can’t stand anymore? You want to quit now?” he asked.
“Yes, yes, oh yes,” she gasped, hoping that he was finished.
“Sure, I’ll stop now,” he said, “but it just
adds up, my darling. What you don’t get today, you’ll next time.”
“Oh, no, you mean you’ll just make the next one longer?” she asked.
“I certainly do. But it’s up to you.”
“Oh, please, I don’t know.” She was crying hard, afraid to go on and afraid to stop, and it was all her choice. “Okay, go on,” she finally said as she gritted her teeth and clenched her bottom cheeks.
Aaron resumed the spanking, starting up again where he’d left off, the wooden paddle landing strike after strike against punished red flesh. She cried, she kicked, though it didn’t matter. The loathsome paddle landed like a rain of fire until it seemed that she was beyond pain, and her cries became sobs and her body was much too weary to take anymore.
In the quiet that followed, Aaron let his wife rest against his lap. He ignored the temptation to fondle the fiery hot orbs. It would be a delicious treat for them both to take her tingling body to the brink of an erotic moment. But she wouldn’t learn her lesson that way, and he had to divorce himself from the tremendous desire. That would wait for another time.
“All right,” he said sternly. He pushed her a bit off his lap, until she got the message and struggled her way to her feet. “Now, until the burns fades, you’ll stand in the corner,” he said. “Hold your shift in front of you. Over your bottom so I can seen when the red is gone.”
Abigail, having thought that the worst of the horror was over, looked at her husband in disbelief. “But what if someone comes in?” she protested.
“Then someone will see,” he said plainly.
“Aaron, you can’t. What if …”
“Perhaps you’d like a taste of a birch rod?” he said. “I suppose that could be substituted for a little humiliation.”
“Oh, never!” she gasped, the very thought of the birch on top of her already wounded bottom made her quake to her core.
“Act like a child, I’ll deal with you like a child. We’ll see if you really want to change your behavior, my rebellious one.”
Abigail could see the beauty of her punishment. By the time the four weeks were over, there was little doubt that her punished bottom would be whispered about all over the mill, by employees and customers too. Aaron would have been paid back for his losses, and she’d have such a dose of punishment so that she would forever remember the consequences of her bad behavior.
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