in Marie snapped to attention and she turned to face a rather less compliant Ali than she had seen the other night. She searched for her work voice and hoped she had located it as she declared to Ali, ‘Right then, young lady, let’s finish what we started last week.’
Ali stood and stared, her chin jutted out in a way that Marie had not seen before, and her stance somewhat relaxed, but also somewhat ‘come and get me if you think you are hard enough’. Marie paused for just a second, ignoring Ben as best she could, then took Ali’s wrist and sat on the chair as she yanked the girl over her lap. It was an undignified landing and Ali grunted softly as her stomach hit Marie’s thighs, but in a moment they were sorted out, Ali’s skirt was up and her knickers at half-mast.
Marie felt more confidence then, which was impressive considering the pain in her bum and how having a woman, even a petite one, over her lap made that swollen bum feel even less comfortable. She tried to think of something Toppy to say, but Ben would know she was nicking all his lines so she resorted to action.
Slapping sounds soon filled the room, but that was all. Marie did her best to light a fire in Ali’s bottom, and she knew she was getting some good ones in but it simply was not having an impact. Ali glared at the floor and, although Marie could not see her eyes, she knew how little effect she was having. She redoubled her efforts and tried with all she was worth to draw even a small squeal from Ali, but there was nothing. A sinking feeling grew in her stomach until suddenly she was reminded why Ali had been in trouble at work in the first place.
‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ the girl declared, ‘my grandmother can spank harder than that and she’s been dead five years.’
Marie heard Ben’s snort, which was rich considering that, if she had said that over his lap, she would have to write a letter of condolence to her own bottom. She looked down at the light pink globes and realised she was sunk. She did not have anywhere to take it.
‘God,’ she moaned, ‘you can be such a little bitch at times.’
She spanked harder as she lost her temper. She had tried so hard, planned so well, and it had felt so good the other night, that it was beyond thoughtless of the other two not to help her. The frustration and confusion she felt poured out of her hands and on to Ali’s darkening bottom.
Ali felt the loss of control, felt the change of tempo and dynamic, and twisted herself off Marie’s lap, landing in a heap on the floor.
‘A bitch? Seriously? Me? Have you even considered what you’re like?’ She stood and glared, and Marie stood to meet her eye to eye.
Neither had seen the other like this. Marie’s poise and confidence from work had flown from her, and Ali’s compliance and eagerness to please had gone the same way. With their roles gone, it felt less like a journey into submission and more like a battle of wills.
Ben recognised the signs in Marie that he knew preceded a vitriolic blow-up, and decided enough was enough.
‘My turn, I think.’ His deep, calm voice made both women turn, and he took Ali’s hand and pulled her firmly down over his knee as he sat in the chair Marie had vacated. ‘You.’ He barely glanced at Marie. ‘Corner.’
Marie, so fired up she could barely speak, uttered an indiscriminate sound of anger and searched for words to refuse him, but then she saw for the first time how Ben looked when he spanked a girl. She watched his strong forearm pump up and down in a measured and methodical manner. She watched the way his head bent over his task, and how futile and tiny Ali’s protests sounded.
She stripped down her knickers and put her nose to the corner and wondered, ‘Why couldn’t I get her to make a noise like that?’
But inside she knew the answer, she knew it as surely as she knew what she was, with her nose poking into the familiar corner of the room and her bottom still sore behind her.
She listened as the sounds from Ali grew urgent and distressed, almost angry, and how they journeyed to fearful, to weepy, and then to just little noises of pain.
She had not realised how vocal it was, how much a girl gives away when she is spanked.
It was a novel all of its own, she thought. This is the sound of submission. She knew she was not destined to create that sound in another.
It was as though Ben had heard her because at that moment he took the totally pliant and repentant Ali to the dining table and bent her gently over it. She started to panic and he put a warm hand on the small of her back while he instructed Marie to come and put herself next to Ali.
She obeyed, bending over the table one space to Ali’s right.
Ben left the room and the girls did not look at each other, but Marie whispered, ‘Are you OK?’ to Ali, who replied very softly, ‘Yes.’
Neither girl dared look back when Ben returned but when they heard the swishing sound they knew what he brought with him.
‘Ali.’ She jumped when he said her name and clenched her bum. ‘I think it only fair that Marie get the first set of these, don’t you agree?’
He did not wait for a response and Marie made a little ‘o’ of horror with her mouth before the first burning stripe bit. She did her best to be brave and not show Ali how much it hurt, but by number four she was begging him to stop. At six he did.
‘Your turn, Ali,’ he declared.
Ali had no idea what to expect, but Marie’s sobs told her that she should be afraid. He gave her three. At each stripe Ali shrieked and pushed her neat, tanned frame harder into the table, as if to slide through the wood and escape.
Ben went on, six more for Marie and three more for Ali, while the girls marked under his tutelage, while they altered. They pushed together on the table, holding hands, hot twisting fingers intertwined for support, and Ben knew he had done his job.
‘What is it you really wanted, girls? What is it you wanted to know? To explore?’ He knew the answer, of course. He knew Marie better than anyone, and Ali had told him all he needed in the kitchen.
The women struggled with themselves, then they looked into the other’s tear-muddled eyes and, still bent over the table, their red, marked bottoms facing him, they kissed.
‘I want to take you to bed,’ Marie whispered. It was a question, a plea, a hope, to Ali, to Ben, and to herself. ‘I want you to come too.’
Ben waited and looked at Ali, who held Marie’s hand and nodded, not quite looking up at him, but he could see the smile on her lips.
* * *
Ben lay on his side and watched at first.
The girls covered each other, their hands flew across the other’s skin like birds in mid-flight, tracing the currents and following a pattern of longing that only the other could know. They barely stopped kissing for breath, hands finding every tiny part, all questions answered. They knew how it felt to be touched. They knew where to travel so lightly that it was hardly a whisper, and where to insist deeper and more.
Marie’s head lowered, kissing Ali’s breasts and stomach and farther, seeking the place that would make her gasp and forget herself. She gave Ben a knowing look as she took Ali over the brink, and Ben held Ali safe as she bucked and came; a moment then of still, of calm and quiet, Ali
