Unfortunately, Vidar had had a hunch that she would do just that, and had given her a very severe spanking for not at least putting the debit card into her purse. He couldn’t force her to use it, but he at least wanted to know she had it in case of an emergency.
One day he picked her up at Tracy’s, which was a little tense at best, but he was as much of a gentleman with her as he was with any woman, and he managed to charm even crusty Tracy. When they got out on the highway, she noticed they weren’t heading in the right direction to go home.
“Where’re we going?” she asked, settling back into the plush seats of the Porsche Boxster he’d bought just recently for them to run around in.
“Ever been kidnapped?” he asked with a roguish grin.
Liz just smiled and turned herself over to his hands – as she had already done with nearly every aspect of her life.
* * * * *
They ended up eating at a small café that had a gorgeous view of the White Mountains, where Liz had never been before. Just like natives in New York City who had never seen the Empire State Building or the Statue of Liberty, she had never been into the White Mountain National Forest even though it was in her own back yard.
They stuffed themselves silly with junk food, then rode home with the top down, completely messing up what little hairdo Liz had left, not that either of them cared. When they finally got home, not long after sunset, he carried her into the house and into their newly redecorated bedroom, undressing her as if she were a child, then having her sit between his legs as he leaned back against the headboard and brushed out her hair, gently detangling it until it shone like spun gold.
Then he tucked her beneath him after binding her wrists with the restraints he had permanently attached to the bedposts, not bothering to undress himself but just reaching down and freeing himself enough to allow himself access to her. Vidar made slow, sweet love to her, tantalizing himself as well as her as he made them both wait, timing his orgasm as close to hers as he could until they were both screaming and panting and grinding against each other.
But it was far from bliss like that all the time – especially since he was quite miserly when it came to allowing her to orgasm. Liz figured the ratio was probably about five to one – five or more spankings to one orgasm.
Not that he didn’t touch her and tease her constantly – he did. It was very hard for him to keep his hands off her. And she was often very close to her own culmination while he took her purely for his own pleasure in whatever manner struck his fancy. She thought that it was that aspect, perversely, that got her so hot – the fact that he wasn’t trying to please her but was concentrating on his own desires. Somehow, that made whatever he did to her at those times unbearably delicious.
She probably earned somewhere in the neighborhood of one spanking a day, sometimes more. It was rare – especially in the beginning – when he didn’t put her to bed with a very sore backside. And he did put her to bed, and establish a bedtime for her during the week, from which she could very rarely convince him to deviate.
Vidar had been horrified to realize that she often stayed up into the wee hours of the morning working on her cause, but then she’d be up early the next morning, only to do the same thing that night. She was severely sleep-deprived, and he wouldn’t allow it.
At first he put her to bed at ten o’clock, and worse was that she was actually falling asleep, usually because he had worn out her bottom just prior to tenderly placing her under the covers. So no matter how much she railed about that restriction in particular – especially since it made her feel so much like a child – he always pointed out that she wasn’t lying there wide awake. She was asleep within minutes of him putting her to bed.
Eventually, when he thought she was more caught-up, he adjusted her bedtime a bit, to eleven, but insisted that she get at least eight full hours of sleep a night. When she did balk, complaining that she didn’t feel like sleeping yet, he offered to give her something to help her.
Liz understood quite well. She knew that he wasn’t going to bring her to great sexual heights in order to induce sleep. He was going to use the hairbrush he’d bought specially for that purpose, or – gulp – the paddle, to assure that she fell asleep quickly once he had her stripped nude and tucked into bed.
So she always turned down his gracious offer, and she inevitably fell asleep with a bottom that was already quite uncomfortable anyway, either from a spanking the previous day or that morning.
Sunday mornings were nearly always spent luxuriating in their big bed with the Sunday paper and some sort of treat for breakfast that he had bought the day before. Usually it was bagels and cream cheese, or a fresh fruit smoothie or gourmet bran muffins. Only very rarely was it ever doughnuts or waffles, and that was always at his behest, never hers.
He continued to work in the office, which he had greatly updated from when her daddy used it. In place of the old 386 processor that predated Windows, he had the latest model Macintosh available with the largest screen. Where her father had sheet rocked and painted the room burgundy to blend with the black leather furniture, somehow Vidar had stripped away the sheetrock and replaced it with white pine boards, leaving them unstained but polished with a polyurethane finish to make them glow. The floor covering was replaced with a thick, new luxurious carpet in a deep pine green color. Vidar had a fax machine, high-speed satellite Internet, and several phone lines installed.
Liz, of course, didn’t have quite as elaborate a setup. In fact, she didn’t have any set up whatsoever, except for her habit of surrounding herself with papers while she sat in the sunroom. When Vidar had first observed how she worked, he merely shook his head, a small smile playing about his lips.
She had looked up at him and stuck her tongue out. He thought her work habits were haphazard at best, but each to their own, he supposed.
That evening, though, after her nap and just before dinner, she found that she desperately needed to receive a fax of some information about the proposed rally on the sixth. And although she was very hesitant to do so, she decided she needed to use his fax machine. The weather outside was abominable, unseasonably cold and rainy, and she knew he wasn’t going to allow her to go out in all that, and that she didn’t want to make him drive her, either.
So she really had no choice. But she absolutely hated to ask him for anything. She considered herself an independent – if submissive – woman, and she liked to take care of things on her own – especially since this involved a very delicate matter between them.
Liz dragged her feet – literally – on the way down the hall to stand in the doorway of his home office, such as it was.
He looked up immediately. Somehow Vidar always seemed to know exactly where she was, and she hadn’t yet been able to sneak up on him at all – or sneak around any of the rules he’d set, which included chores she really didn’t want to do. He caught her every time she tried to sweep dirt under the rug or hide evidence of unauthorized cookies in the very back of the freezer, where he was never supposed to look. He always found her out, damn him.
He extended his hand to her in silent command, which she obeyed immediately. She had gotten much better at that, out of self-preservation. Her bottom fared much better when she simply obeyed him. She got into enough trouble without causing more.
Vidar settled her on his lap, her panty clad bottom – and he’d made her throw away every one of her thongs in favor of actual panties – resting, as always, on the ample – and perpetual – evidence of his desire.
“To what do I owe this visit?” he asked, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear. She rarely disturbed him when he was at work, even if it was in their home.
Liz bit her lip, and he knew immediately that she was about to tell or ask him something she didn’t want to. He’d tried to make himself approachable, always leaving his door open, always listening to everything she had to say and not interrupting. He always asked pertinent questions so that he had all the information he ne
eded before he either replied back to her with a suggestion or made a decision – and often a new rule – based on the information she provided.
“I need to borrow your fax machine,” she spit it out quickly.
“Of course – no problem. Here’s the number.” He hated that she looked so hesitant when there was absolutely no need. She never asked him for anything when he would have gladly given her the world. He didn’t know what more he could do to ease her nervousness about it. “Hey, I don’t really need this room to myself, and you’re home more than I am, anyway. We could get a partners desk, if you like, and both work in here?”
“Oh, I don’t want to impose at all. I just need to use your fax. I promise it’ll just be this once.”
His head lowered just enough to warn her of what was coming. “Elizabeth Dagmar, do you need a spanking?”
Her hands automatically went to her bottom. “No, Sir.”
She’d begun calling him “Sir” a lot lately, and he had to admit he liked the sound of it.
“Well, then stop talking to me as if I’m some stranger rather than the man who paddles your bottom with alarming regularity. You can’t impose on me, silly. I don’t mean that you have to share the office with me, but if you ever do want to, we can easily rearrange things in here.”
Liz still looked a bit frightened around the edges, as if she expected him to spank her for her efforts, when that was the last thing he would ever do.
So he hugged her tightly, rubbing her back until she relaxed against him. “I actually have to run in to White Hall to pick up batteries and printer ink. I won’t be very long.” He pushed her a bit away from him and said as he looked sternly into her eyes, “You use anything you need to in here, okay, any time at all.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Good girl.”
Just after he’d left, Liz heard the fax machine wheezing and heaving, so she went into his office to see if it was her fax, scanning it quickly without trying to see it, as best she could. She did not intend to violate his privacy in any way.
But the information contained on those pages was damned hard to miss, or stop reading once she’d started. It seemed to be something about selling some real estate that he owned, which apparently included the very house she was standing in, along with the properties of several of the neighbors whom she had thought were on her side.
As far as she could tell, the bastard was going to sell her parents’ cabin right out from under her and go ahead with the casino regardless of what she did, or whether the community approved. Without ever mentioning it or talking to her about it or anything. She realized the place was his to sell. That had never been in dispute. But she had thought . . . well, hoped, that they could live there, or at the very least keep it as a summer home. She had forgotten – in the sexual haze he’d surrounded her with – how advantageous it would be for him, business-wise, to simply wave big bags of money in front of debt-ridden lower middle class families and defeat her cause that way, barely having to lift a finger.
It didn’t have to be a casino – any kind of big resort in this area would kill the tranquility and ruin the old-growth forests that surrounded the lake, in favor of paved highways and camera-toting tourists.
Liz didn’t even bother to fumble for his big chair; she sank to the ground right where she was, her knees no longer able to support her. She couldn’t believe it. She felt as if all of the air in the room had been sucked out all at once. She panted and sobbed heart-wrenchingly until there were no tears left inside her.
Long moments later – she didn’t know how long as she sat there in a daze – she heard a car come down the driveway and got up, not bothering to look at her face in a mirror, or comb her hair or change out of her sweats and ancient T-shirt. She did keep tight hold of the fax pages, grabbed her purse and keys and met him on his way in.
“Hey, did you get your fax?” he asked before he got a good look at the expression on her face.
“No, but you did.” Liz plastered the incriminating papers on his chest and then just walked on by him as if he wasn’t there, heading for the car he had just come out of.
Vidar took one look at what she had practically thrown at him and swallowed hard. Of all the things for her to see.
He turned quickly and saw her hit the button on her remote to open the car door. He immediately locked it again, so that nothing would open it until he allowed it to be opened.
Liz couldn’t imagine what was wrong. She’d heard the doors unlock, she knew she had, but then they’d locked again, and no matter how many times she pushed that blasted button, it staunchly refused to work.
“Son of a bitch!” she yelled, tears flowing down her cheeks, pressing on the button fit to break it and her thumb.
Vidar appeared at her side, silently as usual, as if he were a ghost instead of a man, reaching to take the remote from her hand and drop it in to the pocket of his jeans.
“Look,” he began, his hands up and extended towards her as if he thought he would touch her, but then thought better of the idea. “I know what you saw was pretty damning, but I’d like you to give me the chance to explain.”
Liz couldn’t even look at him. She had already dodged neatly around him and was busily stalking up the long dirt driveway in her bunny slippers.
He was right there within seconds, of course, using her own momentum against her and catching her arm to turn her towards him as he pled his case. “Beth, you’ve got to give me the benefit of the doubt. Those papers don’t mean what you think. Remember your new rule, that we will discuss things between us calmly and clearly.”
Vidar could see the evidence right before his eyes that she had been devastated by what she saw. Her eyes were red-rimmed and puffy, and she was a pale, pasty white. All he wanted to do at that moment was to tug her into his arms and get them back to the house, to their bed, where he could tell her exactly what was going on.
She didn’t look in the least inclined to go along with that, and a muscle began to tic in his jaw as he wrestled with what to do. She was pulling on her arm, and screaming at him to let her go.
An instant later, they were in their bedroom, and she had no idea how they got there. One moment she was halfway up the drive, trying to extricate her arm from his strong grip, and the next they were standing at the end of their bed. She saw that Vidar still had the original papers in his left hand when he raised his right and a new set appeared. “If you’re going to condemn me for something, at least let it be the right thing. Read these. They came through at my office. The ones you read weren’t intended to come here because I didn’t want you to get wind of what I was going to do, but my assistant apparently got the numbers screwed up.”
Liz couldn’t believe what was happening. She thought she must be dreaming, or having a nightmare – which was much more as this bizarre situation would dictate. First they get transported somehow from outside to indoors, and then papers start magically appearing right in front of her. What in hell was going on?
“Go ahead. Read these.”
She wasn’t at all sure she wanted to touch pages he had conjured from thin air, but he seemed very adamant, and she supposed she owed him at least that much.
She was glad she did. He was selling the properties. To her. For a dollar. Liz sank down on the end of the bed as she continued to read. He was in the process of transferring deeds of ownership of the whole shebang into her name – the casino project, the camps along the lake who had sold out to him, and the cabin. Everything of any import to him in the state of New Hampshire.
All of the rest of the paperwork was there – documents they needed to sign, deeds, title searches, everything, including a letter from his lawyer and several people who were his partners in the project, going up one side and down the other to him about how stupid a move this was, and raving about how much money he – and they – were going to lose if he went through with his plan.
“Why?” she asked as she looked up at him.
Vidar sa
nk down onto the end of the bed. “Because I love you, and I don’t want anything stupid like this to come between us.”
“It’s not stupid to want to protect your home from something you think is going to harm it,” Liz protested.
He could see he was screwing this entirely up somehow. Nothing he said was coming out right. “I didn’t mean that you were stupid for feeling that way, I meant that the idea that a business deal might be a wedge between us – I just couldn’t have it. So I had my lawyer draw up the necessary paperwork so that I could transfer control of the whole mess over to you, to do with as you pleased.”
Her pocketbook appeared in her lap.
“Got a dollar?” he asked.
She didn’t have a bill – she never kept actual money on her any more – but she gave him enough change as he watched her scrape the bottom of her purse for pennies.
When she poured it all into his waiting palm, he handed her a wad of paperwork to sign, saying, “Congratulations. The Scrimshaw Lake Casino – or lack thereof – is entirely in your hands.”
Liz was a bundle of nerves and tears as she launched herself into his arms. “I love you, you crazy, domineering, incredibly stupid yet adorable, adorable man! Sh! Don’t argue with me. Just shut up and make love to me immediately!”
Vidar should have spanked her for any number of reasons – jumping to conclusions, damning him without a trial, swearing, or even daring to order him about. But he was too pleased at the outcome of this latest disaster that he, for once, obeyed her.
Later, as they lay naked and relaxed in the peach-and-blue cabbage rose bedding of their new cherry wood four-poster bed, Liz had other serious thoughts on her mind. Vidar could see the slight scowl on her forehead, sense her nervousness, and waited – somewhat impatiently – for her to bring it up.
Forever Wife Page 14
