Why ever?”
“First of all, let me say that your sister is a little idiot. What does she do today but parade in front of my recruitment office with a goddamned peace sign!”
“No!”
“It’s true. I guess she was on the way to that big anti-war rally outside the State House, but as soon as she saw me, she just had to make trouble. I warned her to beat it, more than once, but she just kept challenging my authority until finally...”
“Yes, finally what?”
“I told her if she didn’t move away from the office I’d spank her.”
“No!”
“But she kept standing there and arguing with me.”
“And did you really do it? Spank her?”
“I did,” Doug admitted.
“Gee, I wish I could have been there to see that!” said Veronica, pressing the traffic button for a green light on Beacon Street. They crossed over and headed towards the public garden.
“So the thought of me spanking your annoying little sister doesn’t make you mad?” Doug asked, feeling suddenly wildly exhilarated. He’d never noticed that the sky above Boston proper could be so completely crammed with stars.
“Sure, mad with envy. I never meet any men who think of spanking me,” she confided, leading the way into the gardens.
“Why? You don’t think that’s a bad thing?”
“No, I think it sounds exciting.”
“Really? Do you?”
“Not that you were right to spank my sister. You’ll be lucky if she doesn’t sue you for battering a civilian.”
“Your sister’s a goddamned hippie.”
“Hey, show a little respect. Thanks to hippie culture, you just got laid for free.”
“God, you’re a fresh girl.”
“Go on, deny that you’d be headed for the combat zone right around now if you hadn’t met me earlier?”
“You know, I was thinking that very thing earlier,” he admitted, “how there used to be good girls and bad girls, but now there are only good girls who behave badly.”
Veronica smiled.
“Come over here and sit with me,” he said, leading her to a stone bench under a tree along a side path. “Should I show you what I did to your sister?” he asked, taking her smooth upper arm in his hand and pulling her easily across his lap.
“Right here? Right now?”
“It will only take a few minutes,” he promised, patting her shapely bottom through her denim shorts and anchoring her waist to his lap with his free hand.
“Why don’t we go back to my place?” she asked, leaning up.
“We can later,” he pushed her back down and smacked her right cheek, then her left, somewhat sharply. “Now you need to be spanked.”
Veronica squirmed on Doug’s lap as the few dozen swats rained down on her upturned seat. “But, in public!” she cried, straining to get free.
“It was good enough for your sister. She courted the attention,” he replied, ending the impromptu spanking with ten hard swats and setting her back on her feet.
“Oh!” she cried, flushed to the roots and humiliated to the depths when a young couple passed by smiling at them. “How could you do that in public?” she complained furiously, folding her arms and turning away from him.
“If you pout I’ll do it again,” he threatened. She began to walk away, her hands buried in her pockets. He caught up with her, picked her up and arranged her over one shoulder.
“Doug, put me down!”
“I’d rather carry you home,” he replied cheerfully.
“If you want to be invited to sleep over you’ll stop being horrid this instant!” she cried imperiously. Doug immediately put her down.
They walked along quietly for a few moments.
“You have a very hard hand,” she said at last.
“You didn’t like it, did you?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“I spanked your sister a lot harder than that!”
“Well, I’m not used to it.”
“You could get used to it.”
“What would be the incentive?”
“This time let me spank you just before we have sex. Then I bet you will come.”
“I bet I will too,” she agreed.
“Can we be sure your sister won’t walk in?”
“Let’s go back and see if she calls. She may decide to spend the night away.”
The phone rang just a few minutes after they reentered the apartment. It was Virginia calling Veronica to let her sister know that she’d be spending the night with friends. Thus the gods continued to smile on their warrior.
“Obviously, it’s no coincidence I picked you up,” Veronica said, lighting her new lover’s cigarette as they shared a brandy nightcap on the roof. “My sister came home this afternoon and told me about what happened in the street. Naturally, I was intrigued and when she told me you were kind of cute, I couldn’t resist checking you out myself.”
“Jesus, you must really be into it,” Doug commented, noticing the stars were even closer now.
“I am. I always have been.”
“Me too!” he agreed, astonished to be saying this out loud.
“So, how many women have you spanked?”
“Let’s just say I’ve seized any opportunity presented.”
“How about prostitutes? Have you spanked a lot of prostitutes?”
“No, of course not.”
“Why not?”
“They wouldn’t understand.”
“Not even those cute Asian ones?”
“Maybe a couple of swats, but nothing to write home about.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t push that angle, into it as you seem. I mean, you just grabbed my sister, didn’t you?”
“She
