by Gray Gardner
“Okay, Kid,” Connor said, in a deep morning voice, right in Burton’s ear. She trembled with excitement as she awoke. “I have to take the unit out with Captain Gwinn again today, so your task for this morning is to read the next few entries in your journal.”
The smile left her face as she rubbed her eyes and rolled over. Connor was leaning over next to the bed in his fatigues, ready to go. She sat up and held the covers around her naked body.
“What are they doing today?” she asked, interested.
“We’re simulating desert conditions. There’s an island that’s a mile long when the tide’s out, so we’re dropping everyone off for five hours.”
“Sounds fun,” she sighed, looking at the journal he’d dropped on the bed.
He held her chin and kissed her, letting his hands roam her down her body that was now becoming more familiar.
“Be back this afternoon,” he said, backing up and grinning. “Be good.”
“Yeah,” she called, staring at her journal. It was the last thing she wanted to read.
She jumped out of bed and showered, then threw on Connor’s boxers and a t-shirt which were the only clean clothes around, and which absolutely swallowed her, and ran into his office. She dug though the boxes, finding intimate details about her life, the pictures of her when she was young, in high school, college, and grad school, and Ferguson’s phone number. She’d get spanked for this for sure…but somehow the thought of Connor catching her wasn’t too daunting.
“Ferguson.”
“You wanker!” she yelled into the black portable phone. “How could you give him all of this stuff? All of my private stuff! This was supposed to be forgotten so that I could have a new beginning! That’s why we didn’t change my name! This was supposed to be destroyed!”
“Bayluh?”
She replied in an accent, “Yes, of course, you bleeding idiot! This is Baylor! I’m not finished with you, either! I was happy and I was moving on! What in the hell are you doing?”
“I’m doing my job, Baylor!” he shouted. “I told you I wasn’t left with much choice! And I only kept one copy of the files locked away in my office. Everything else is gone. They took it.”
“Including my journal?”
“That’s not fair. You told me your parents made you keep a journal for posterity or something!”
“I didn’t know you had it at the time!” she cried, holding her head and pacing the office. “Is that how you did it? Is that how you got me to fall in love with you?”
“Baylor, sweetheart, I really did love you.”
“Yes, and you loved Marissa, too! Apparently, you loved her several times on my fucking bed!”
“Please.”
She slammed the receiver into the desk a few times and hung it up. He was so horrible. He’d made her fall for him. He’d charmed her with his good manners and funny quips and dashing looks, and she’d fallen for it. She was the bleeding idiot.
She sighed as she walked back into the bedroom and smiled at the thought of Connor. He was worth a million John Fergusons.
Taking the journal, she walked to the kitchen and got some coffee, then sat in an arm chair and stared at the journal. She had to open it herself this time, and she wasn’t sure she could.
June 6
I buried my parents today. I don’t remember the service, but everyone told me it was nice. The cops still won’t tell me who killed them or how. Ashley’s parents just offered to let me stay with them. I wish I could, but something just happened that turned my life from upside down to all twisted and rolled around. That’s why I have time to write right now. I’m sitting in the Reagan Airport Lounge.
Apparently I have an Aunt Nina.
She’s old and has papers that say she’s my dad’s half-sister. The CPS imbecile just let me go with her, no thorough background check or anything. I guess she looks like my dad. She speaks to me in Russian, I answer in English. This makes her smile and rub my head, so I’m going to stop answering all together. And she can’t stop crying. It’s not like she was close to my dad or anything. I’ve never met her and I’m seventeen.
Here’s the worst part. It’s the end of my Junior year, and instead of spending my Senior year at my high school with my friends, she’s moving me half way around the world to her house in London, England. She says she’s lived there since she and my dad were young, and that she even went to the all-girls school next to my dad’s. Evidently the all-girls school is gone now but the school my dad went to has turned co-ed.
So, it’s difficult to abate my excitement at this moment. I’m at the airport, my parents are six feet under, I just had to say goodbye to all of my friends, I have to move to a new city in a new country, and I have to go to school where my dad reminded me time and again he was paddled by his professors. And this aunt of mine won’t stop crying. My life really does suck now.
June 7, London
Okay, so Aunt Nina’s house isn’t so much a house as a resort. Strangely enough, she’s a writer just like my dad. She must be just as successful as he was, because her backyard runs down a hill and all of the way into the Thames. We’re going on a ride in her boat in a second. She has a chauffeur who drives us around in a stretch Bentley who is also going to drive us around in the boat.
June 11
Aunt Nina and I drove around the countryside and went to 3 different spas. She must be very important over here because we got the royal treatment everywhere. She’s so interested in hearing about my dad, it makes me wish that I knew him better, then it just makes me miss him. I think she can tell because she keeps telling me what a family treasure I am. She’s started speaking to me in English, now. Her accent is very sophisticated, and it makes her sound a little pretentious, but it’s better than speaking in Russian. I get tired of it. She only says a few sayings in Russian to me, and they don’t really make any sense, but then again neither does placing ten consonants and two vowels in one word, so I don’t object.
I don’t think Aunt Nina ever had any kids, because I don’t see any pictures of children in her museum of a house. Maybe that’s why she likes me so much. I’m the last of her bloodline.
June 30
There’s nothing to report. It’s the same every day, which is neither good nor bad. I miss my home so much, and I talk to my friends twice a week.
July 4
I made fireworks in the tool shed and set them off by the river tonight, and the police came. They had a different accent than the rest of the people in this neighborhood, which is slightly unfortunate because it made me laugh. That didn’t help my cause, and Aunt Nina yelled and shook her finger, but I escaped unscathed by the fuzz or my aunt.
July 20
School starts so early over here! I have to go to that school in 2 weeks. Most of the students are day students now, so there’s no hope of meeting an American boarder like I’d thought before. The chauffer, whose name is Winston, by the way, took me to buy my books today. He waited outside while I took my list and bought the books inside the big store. Luckily, I’ve already read about half of these, and the others look daunting but not impossible. I’m still nervous.
I think I’m nervous about new kids who will undoubtedly hate me, new teachers who will be annoyed that I’m coming in on my last year of school, and then the headmaster. I’ve never had a headmaster. And if he’s anything like my dad used to talk about, I really don’t want to ever meet him.
July 29
I met the headmaster today. His name is Dr. Harry Hutchins, and everyone is looking at me like I’m a crazy American. He gave us a tour of the school, which was very nice, and reminded me of the Ivy League schools I toured with my parents.
Then we went to his office and I almost wet my pants, no lie. He pulled out a paddle like my dad had in his study. He said that when my dad was at the school it had been used on him, and if my aunt signed a consent form, it could be used on me! And the Judas signed it! I thought she was on my side, but apparently not! Then she and Hutchi
ns began laughing about some old saying and we left.
There are so many rules. My behavior had always been fine, but that was in America. I feel so paranoid. I don’t think I can handle any kind of attack. Verbal or physical. I really think that my greatest fear is getting in trouble in my new British school.
Burton closed her journal and set her coffee cup down. Her greatest fear. It was right there in black and white, in her own handwriting. She shook her head as she tried to remember writing it. Memories were flooding back in, but she couldn’t remember writing that in her journal that day. She could still smell the musty old wood of the school, she could still see the teachers’ scowls, she could still remember looking at the paddle as Hutchins waved it around, but she didn’t realize that she’d ever verbalized her fears. She stared blankly at the wall for a while, trying to remember a part of her life that she’d worked so hard to forget, then opened the journal and began reading again.
The memories were so fuzzy, like a dream. She wanted them to be sharper. She wanted to remember more.
“You still here?” Connor asked, as she heard him come in the back door.
She grinned and set the book down.
“Good news! I’ve figured out what my greatest fear is! It’s written right here!” she called, standing up and meeting him in the hallway. “I’m afraid of…”
She paused as Captain Gwinn walked in behind Connor and paused.
“Should I leave you two kids alone?” he asked, with a smirk, looking her up and down.
“Jesus Christ,” Burton huffed, dropping her shoulders and walking back to the couch.
“Uh,” Connor said, taking the grocery sack Gwinn was holding and setting it on the kitchen counter. “Y-you remember Gwinn, don’t you?”
She pulled a tan throw pillow over her head as she lay flat on the couch. This was humiliating. She was in Connor’s underwear.
“Burton,” Gwinn grinned, grabbing a beer out of the fridge. He nodded at Connor to go over to the couch.
“So, you read on, then,” Connor said, sitting on the arm of the couch.
Burton reached out to the coffee table and grabbed the remote, turning the television on and ignoring him. Connor rubbed his knees and pressed his lips together in thought.
“You know, I think you might be slightly off about your greatest fear.”
“Oh really?” she whispered loudly, sitting up and glancing at Gwinn and then back at Connor. Great. That meant he’d read her journal. “Look, right here. ‘I really think that my greatest fear is getting in trouble in my new British school.’”
“Yes,” Connor nodded, recalling the first time he had read it. “But do you know what’s not written in there? My observations…I just think there’s more to it. Your disappointment in yourself for disappointing your father, your need to constantly succeed, your intolerance for failure. I think your greatest fear is losing control. Your greatest fear is surrendering your power to authority.”
“Authority?” she repeated, frowning at him. She’d never given much thought to what she feared before, but it actually made a little bit of sense. Why else did she become so stupid when people yelled at her?
“How could she be afraid of authority if she’s in the military?” Gwinn asked, crunching on some chips.
Connor closed his eyes and looked over at his friend. “Not helping, Gwinn.”
“Sorry,” he said, mouth full.
“You fear letting down people who supersede you. Your father gave you a negative consequence for this failure, and since he died before you could resolve it, you’ve carried this with you for all these years. I mean, don’t you see? Anyone who has the authority over you like your dad did makes you tremble in your boots when they get angry with you. Am I wrong?”
She stared at Connor, who wasn’t mad, or giving her any strange looks. He just seemed concerned. She swallowed and rubbed her neck. She knew she’d been carrying something with her for all of that time.
“I’m afraid of failing people who have command over me?”
“I’m almost positive,” Connor nodded.
She frowned as she looked down at the floor in thought. That actually explained a lot, but she couldn’t imagine herself to be afraid of something like that. She was brave. She was so certain that she was brave.
“What happened to your office?” Gwinn called from the other room.
Connor narrowed his eyes down at her as he walked to the back of his house, knowing what he’d find.
“Baylor!” he scolded, picking up his broken portable phone off of the cradle as he skidded around on the papers sprayed all over the floor.
As he’d instructed after finding his office, she was waiting while he and Gwinn had a quick dinner and watched part of the game on TV. She had to sit on his bed quietly waiting. If it couldn’t get even more humiliating, he’d walked in to check on her a hundred times. She felt punished but she knew he wasn’t done with her.
“Baby,” he began, finding her exactly how he wanted her after Gwinn had left. It had been agonizing knowing his little Baylor was waiting for a spanking in his bedroom for him, but he’d had to entertain his friend and make her wait.
She turned her head away from him as he sat on the edge of the bed casually and calmly. He frowned when he noticed she was crying.
“Why are you crying?” he gently asked, turning her head and quickly wiping away her tears.
His look of concern made her cry even harder, though she didn’t know why.
“Tell me,” he prodded, rubbing her bare back as he pulled her up on his lap and held her.
“I don’t even know,” she whispered into his gray shirt, liking his hand rubbing her back but not liking that he was probably just dying to embarrass her with another spanking.
“I’m not disappointed,” he stated firmly, feeling her stiffen but hearing that her sniffles had stopped. “I’m not even mad, Baylor. I kind of expected it, actually. Who did you call that made you smash my phone?”
“John, Agent Ferguson,” she almost growled, hating that man more and more.
“Baylor,” he fussed, looking down at her until she turned her watery green eyes up to him. “Don’t call him again.”
“Don’t worry.”
Connor stood and rubbed her upturned ass as he lay her on the bed, holding her as she squirmed around.
“You’re still getting spanked for going into my office and destroying it,” he smirked, watching her ears turn pink. “And again, you’ll be rewarded for being a good girl during your spanking.”
He smacked his hand down without any force, but she kicked her legs and clenched her fists anyway. He kept pushing her back down as she tried to get up, taking his time and making it a long, long punishment. He slipped his boxers down her legs and continued smacking her pink behind. He didn’t really want it to end because at his angle he could see everything between her lean little legs, and when his hand finally became too hot he swiped a finger gently between her soft, moist lips.
“Connor!” she protested, her ass hot but her tears dry. She wasn’t expecting a fingering and when she turned her head to tell him she found him sucking on his finger.
“You’re such a good girl, Baylor. Would you like your reward?” he asked, loving the astonished look on her face. His cock was ready and he knew she was too, so when she only kind of squeaked out a response he climbed behind her, held her hips, and sank into her slowly. Her red-hot ass rubbing against him made him as hard as possible, and he realized Gwinn had been on to something when he’d told him about spanking girlfriends.
Baylor cried out as he entered her from behind, but when he snaked a finger around and began teasing her clitoris in slow, tantalizing circles she let go of an orgasm she hadn’t even realized she’d been building. Christ, did she like being spanked? No. Yes. Maybe. She liked Connor. She definitely knew that when he flipped her over and drilled into her again, driving them both into a toe-curling orgasm.
Yes, she definitely felt something s
trong for Connor, and that would be a big problem once she joined the ranks of Central Intelligence.
“Breathe out. Now, don’t pull it. Just squeeze the trigger,” Connor quietly instructed, standing beside Burton as she aimed her Beretta at the target. The gun went off and a hole appeared in the metal panel, just right of the center.
“Piece of cake,” Burton grinned, reloading the weapon. “Now I just need to learn to do it faster.”
She’d been practicing with various weapons all week, mostly at her own request. She wasn’t about to become a victim, and in her mind, if she ever found herself close enough to the scum who wanted to hurt children, she’d just use her own persuasive ways to make them stop.
“You’re getting there,” Connor replied, inspecting the target. “Nice aim.”
“Don’t forget it,” she winked, grabbing a slice of pizza and sitting on a concrete wall as the sun set on the shooting range.
Connor joined her and looked her up and down as she ate. She had been practicing disarming people, her Russian, and now her aim. She was tough, but they hadn’t really revisited her fears in a few days. Or her journal. It made him sad to know that there was more to her story. Much, much more. He was trying to approach it as delicately as possible.
“Eubanks and Payne are coming in a few days,” he said, mouth full.
She swallowed and wiped her mouth. She despised that pair and didn’t want to talk about them while she ate her dinner. She knew what was next, though, and she didn’t like it. “I, uh, I guess that means we have to finish up my journal, then…”
“I think it might help,” he sighed, as clouds rumbled overhead.
She pressed her lips together as she shook her head with resolve. “It won’t help.”
“It’s why you have those horrible nightmares,” he said, unintentionally evoking some heightened emotions. Almost every single night she woke up in a fright.
“Unless you can erase my memory I don’t think reliving that day can help me!” she shouted as it began to drizzle and dusk was turning into night.
“Can you just try?” he asked, standing and zipping up his jacket, the rain drizzling down on them.