by Mia Madison
I get out of Stephanie's house as soon as I can. I'll arrange to see Katie another day. There's still no sign of Gemma at her house—pity. I would have liked to catch a glimpse. I text her.
“I'm right outside your place. Just saw Katie and Rob at Stephanie's. Can you get out?”
“Sorry, chaos here, Mum panicking over how many roast potatoes and sprouts she needs. See you tomorrow xxx”
“Does triple x means you're thinking bad thoughts?”
“lol I'd need a lot more Champagne to feel like that here with my gran, parents and aunt. xxx will have to wait until tomorrow.”
“It's a deal. xxx right back at you.”
“I'll walk Sully later. Have to work off all the potatoes Mum is going to force feed me.”
“Thanks. Wrap up warm it's freezing xxx.”
“Will do xxx.”
I have to go then. Stephanie is looking out of the window at me and I'm still texting on her drive. I wouldn't put it past her to come out and force feed me either. I'll eat at the station with the team. Hopefully we'll get through dinner without an emergency.
I get home early in the morning. It was quiet after all, and we managed to doze on and off through the night.
There's a note on the kitchen counter from Gemma. It reads:
Thank you for my gift, yours is in your room.
She's moved the little Christmas tree there, and there are a few little parcels tied to the branches. Each little parcel has a label with a number.
Number one says “Eat Me” I unwrap it to find one of Katie's pies—my favorite. Maybe Gemma asked her somehow without giving the game away. The next parcel says “Drink Me” and it’s a fine malt whiskey miniature and I have no idea how she knows I like that—maybe she's been snooping about my drinks collection. The third parcel says “Stroke Me.” It's a soft blue scarf. She's pinned a note on it “To keep you warm when it's your turn to walk Sullivan.”
But it's the fourth gift that catches my breath. It says “Taste Me” and she's wrapped up a box containing a selfie of her wearing the sexy peach camisole set I gave her today.
I thought I might need to sleep for a few hours before meeting her today but there's no way I can sleep now. I'm rock hard just thinking of her. I text her right away.
“I love my gifts. Number 4 is my favorite. Got to shower, then I'll be waiting for you. See you soon. xxx. No relatives, sprouts or potatoes here I promise.”
By the time I come out of the bathroom, Sullivan and Bertie are running around the kitchen like they hadn't seen each other for a month and Gemma is sitting at the table.
“Did you get any sleep?” she asks after I go over and kiss her long and slow.
“Enough. You managed to get away okay?”
“No problem. They can fight over the leftovers themselves today. You liked your presents, then.”
“I did. Are you wearing mine?”
She nods shyly. “I thought you might like to unwrap it again.”
“You thought right.”
It's a couple of hours before we're ready to drive into the country. It could have been longer, a lot longer, but the dogs were getting antsy, and I had promised Gemma a camera day. Not that she seemed that anxious to get out in the fresh air.
Once we’re out it's great, though. It's bright and sunny, though bitterly cold. I just mess around with the dogs, throwing sticks and toys to them, and Gemma clicks away taking a shitload of pictures, her eyes bright, her cheeks flushed from the cold or maybe it's from excitement, a mixture of both probably. I'm pretty fucking excited myself after the morning. Damn! She looked good in that peachy outfit.
We're supposed to be finding a pub for lunch so Gemma can carry on taking pictures in the afternoon, but she says she has enough pictures, she'd rather go back to my place. I recognize the look she gives me.
“You're a very bad girl, Gemma Taylor,” I tell her. “It's a wonder Santa brought you any presents at all.”
She laughs and I kiss her and that kiss lasts so long I'm sure we would have started getting naked right there against that tree if it wasn't so fucking cold. But as it's below freezing, we pile the dogs back into the car and give them some water so we can go home and get warm.
I light the fire when we get in and settle the dogs down in the utility room with something to eat, closing the door so they can't get out and come to investigate what Gemma and I are up to.
“Are you hungry?” I ask Gemma.
“A little. But I can wait if you like.” She grins.
I bring a couple of glasses of wine and some snacks and we eat them on the rug by the fire because I can see it might be ages before we have a meal otherwise.
“I was hungrier than I thought,” she says, wiping her mouth on the paper napkins I brought through from the kitchen. Half a Camembert cheese and a pound of grapes has disappeared along with crackers and a box of chocolates that Katie gave me. I'm sure Gemma had her fair share.
“You have a good appetite for...cheese.” I grin at her.
“And other things.”
“Yes, very dirty things. I really ought to take you over my knee. Your punishment is long overdue.”
“What are you punishing me for again?”
“I have no idea. I forget now. I'm sure there was something.”
“Yes. I'm sure too. I expect I was very wicked indeed.”
I get up and sit on the couch. “Over here then.” I point to my lap. “Oh, you'll have to take off your jeans first.”
She blushes and then unzips them and pulls them down along with her socks. It's the sexiest thing ever to see her preparing to be spanked.
“Now over here.” I pat my knee. “I'm not going to spank you hard but if it's too much just say the word, something other than stop or no.”
“Like what?”
“Cheese will do. That's a good safeword. You're not likely to say cheese and mean anything else.”
“You're crazy.” She laughs.
“I wouldn't call me that when I'm about to spank your bottom until it turns pink.”
“And if I never say ‘cheese’? What happens then?”
“We carry on until I think you've had enough or you beg me to fuck you.”
“Maybe I'll just beg you now and cut out the spanking.” I love the little pout she has when she pretends to be difficult.
“Your choice.”
She tuts and settles herself over my lap. I pull the back of her T-shirt up and the peach silk panties down, then cup the globes of her ass in my hands, squeezing her flesh, massaging slowly and then I hold onto her waist with one hand, tucking her against my body and raise my other hand bringing it down with a loud slap on her behind.
She gasps at that. I think that was harder than the playful slaps I gave her before.
“Do you want to stop? Remember to say cheese if you do,” I tell her and then I slap her a few more times. Each slap makes her squeal but she doesn't say “cheese.”
After my hand has come down hard on her behind a few more times, her cheeks start to redden, a beautiful rosy color and she's wiggling on my lap with each. I stop and massage her flesh again and she moans. I bring my knees up, raising her bottom a little. Fuck! the sight and feel of her on my lap is almost too much. I dip my fingers down between her legs. There's no doubt she's enjoying this, she's so very wet, but I don't want to take it too far. She must be sore by now. I pull up her panties.
“But I didn't say cheese,” she says. So fucking unexpected. I love that.
CHAPTER 11
Gemma
My bottom is smarting but I wish he hadn't stopped. There's something about this kind of “punishment” that makes me incredibly, disturbingly turned on, not to mention wet. Who knew? Well, I guess Ben knows now.
“You want more?” he asks.
“Yes, more.” I'm embarrassed at liking something so taboo but I love the feel of his hands on me, the glow of my skin, burning, alive. I don't think I've ever been fully alive before.
�
��Ten more then. I'll make them count,” he says, pulling my panties down again.
And fuck, he does make every slap count—and then some. Every one adds a level of stinging to my behind until I'm crying out and kicking my legs half way through. But when he's done, he gathers me up and holds me in his arms on his lap, my hot skin against his hard jean covered thighs, and he kisses my hair, my face, my neck.
He spanked me and it hurt but it felt so good. And now I want Ben. I start to undo his jeans but I'm clumsy with need.
“Allow me,” he says and tackles the buckle, button and zipper far faster than I could in this state. He pulls off his sweater and T-shirt and I drink in the sight of his naked torso again, then he pulls off my T-shirt and camisole. I already lost my panties sometime in that last set of ten. I don't know when I kicked them off. He lays me naked down on the rug, then sheds the rest of his clothes and joins me.
“Ride me,” he says. “I want to watch you move on my cock.”
He doesn't need to ask me twice. The fire crackles as I lower myself onto him, my legs on each side of his hips.
“The hills were beautiful, today,” he says, “but the view doesn't get any better than this.”
I start to move up and down slowly and deliberately, teasing him, grinding against him, over and over.
“I should have spanked you harder,” he groans. “You're killing me.”
I laugh but he's not to be outdone. He grabs my hips, holding me down, his cock deep inside me, and then he flips me over onto my back where he thoroughly fucks me, my hot bottom against the rough rug, until I squeal out his name and come, shattering into a million pieces, like nothing I ever experienced.
I sense Ben is trying to hold back to take me over the edge again but this time he can't. He pauses, trying to contain himself, then groans out some obscenity I can't quite make out, and plunges in once more, releasing into me.
*
Many hours later, Ben drops me and Bertie off home. I just want to say hello to Mum and Dad and then go to my room to think about Ben, to relive the whole fantastic day.
“Vince called,” my mother says. “He's home for Christmas for a few days. He wants to speak to you.”
“Well, I don't want to speak to him.”
“You'll have to. I invited him around tomorrow night,” she says.
“Why did you do that?”
“It was the only time he had free and you weren't here to ask. Don't blame me.”
My mother and the twenty-first century! Honestly. Couldn't she have sent a text?
But she's there before me. “I sent you a text,” she says.
Eek! Now she's actually learned to send messages on her phone, and it has to be the day when I wasn't exactly in a position to look at mine.
*
Even during the worst of my misery after the accident, I didn't want Vince back. Funny that I wasn't heartbroken about losing him as much as miserable about losing what I imagined my future would be with him. I see now, I never really lost anything because I never had it in the first place.
Instead of sitting around making excruciatingly polite conversation, I take Vince to the village pub when he shows up. If he's got something to say he can say it there. We can't say anything in front of my parents. Especially not the “fuck off” I want to say to him. My mother would have apoplexy over the Devonshire scones so the sooner we get out of the house the better.
I take Bertie on his lead for moral support (one male who loves me, at least). They don't mind dogs at the pub and if I end up walking home alone (likely) I will be happier with my dog in the dark, though it's not far to the pub from my house.
Vince says nothing other than how cold it is on the way. There's no way I'm striking up any topic of conversation. I just let him stew and wonder if he's working up the courage to speak again. Obviously, he hasn't learned his lesson the last time about speaking at the first opportunity. Maybe a plane will fall from the sky or something this time, seeing as we’re not driving.
There are only a few people in the pub and I sit down at a table away from prying eyes and ears while Vince fetches the drinks. He doesn't even ask me what I want, as if he can just assume I'll always have the usual glass of Sauvignon Blanc and never change. I don't bother to correct him. I'm not planning on staying long anyway. It might not take a whole drink.
“I missed you in London,” Vince says, when he brings the drinks and sits down. “I thought we were done but now I realize how special you are.”
“Is that right, Vince? How come I wasn't special before you went? How come I wasn't special enough to visit as soon as you came home for Christmas?” I know just what his little game is. He must be lonely in London. He hasn't made any friends yet and there are no girls falling at his feet. He's thinking, “I may as well put up with Gemma until I find someone better.” Maybe he's always thought that, even when we were together.
He reaches out for my hand but I remove it from the table and he picks up a beer mat and fidgets with that as if that was what he meant to do all along.
“I'm sorry I left in such a hurry after the accident,” he says. “It was the shock.”
The shock! He's the one who left me. I don't know how long he had been planning that little speech. He's the one who ran into a tree and went off to London leaving me in the hospital. I'm almost speechless with the audacity of the man. But really, what do I care? I just want to get out of there and send him on his way.
My phone buzzes. I'd usually pick up the message later if I was out with Vince but I don't feel any need to give him my full attention or be polite to him now. In fact, I hope it riles him that I answer it. It’s from Ben.
“Saw you go into the pub with your dog. I was just on my way back from giving Katie a lift home. I'm coming in. Interesting companion. Are you going to introduce me?”
“You already know him; he's called Bertie.”
“Very funny. Looks like Hot Wheels I dragged out of the car. Wtf are you doing with him?”
“Wtf does it look like? I'm having a drink and telling him where to go.”
“It looks too chummy for that.”
I give up texting. I don't know who I'm most annoyed at right now, Ben or Vince.
I turn to Vince. “You finished with me. You had your reasons. Not that you shared them with me. Whatever. I'm not interested in getting back together.”
“Don't be like that, Gemma.”
Ben comes in with Sullivan on the lead. He must have had the dog in the car with him too. Ben makes straight for our table. His face is like thunder. Bertie gives a woof of recognition when he sees Sullivan and comes out from under the table. We'll have to get out if the dogs start making any kind of ruckus. But it’s not the dogs I’m worried about right now.
“You heard her, she's not interested,” Ben says to Vince. “What part of that do you not understand?”
“Who the hell are you?” Vince is clearly not expecting anyone else to join in his come back to me speech.
Ben grabs a seat from another table and sits down between Vince and me, commanding Sullivan to sit. The dog complies but his ears prick up as if to say this is going to get interesting. Bertie slumps back under the table. I reach down and pat his head for comfort—his comfort or mine, I'm not sure.
Despite how it must look to an outsider—a picture with three “friends” and a couple of dogs sitting around in a cozy English country pub, log fire in the grate, dimmed lights, Christmas spirit all around, happy tinkling of the pub cash register and good cheer of the few other patrons, the air around our table is bristling with resentment and testosterone.
“Who am I?” Ben says. “I'm just the guy who extracted Gemma and you from your car when you happened to wrap it around a tree.”
“Oh!” Apparently, Vince wasn't expecting that. I note he also doesn't say “technically the car wasn't wrapped around a tree. The tree was in the car.” Very sensible of him though normally he's a stickler for using words correctly.
Ben c
ontinues. “I am also the guy who is taking Gemma and her dog home right now.”
“We're not finished here,” Vince says.
“You're definitely finished. Just like Gemma said.”
Ben gets up and picks up my coat. “ Gemma?”
I stand up and let him help me into it. I'm going. It doesn't seem like I have much choice unless I want to make Ben look small. “Bye, Vince,” I say.
He sits there open-mouthed but he doesn't challenge Ben. Probably another wise move on Vince's part, given the look of rage on Ben's face.
I wait until we are out the pub and then I turn to Ben. “Did you have to do that? You're so infuriating!”
CHAPTER 12
Ben
She says I'm infuriating. What the fuck! “Excuse me for stepping in and getting you out of there. Did you want to stay with him?”
“No, but I didn't need any help. I can fight my own battles, thank you very much.”
“I'm sure you can, but I couldn't just stand by and let the little weasel try and get you back.”
“He didn't have a chance.”
“Good. I'll take you home.” I open the door for her.
“I'll walk, thank you,” she says.
“Then I'll walk with you.” She doesn't try to stop me, though I don't know how she could. I'm walking with her whether she likes it or not. But she holds her coat around herself like a shield. We manage to avoid patches of mud from the ice that barely melted during the day, though the dogs as usual find every muddy spot.
The air is freezing. I want to hug her to me and stop her walking so briskly. I want to kiss her and make up for interfering when she was dealing with her ex but it's not the kind of night to linger outside. I guess by morning the mud will be frozen solid again. It's only a ten-minute walk to Gemma's from the village, but it's done nothing to thaw us out in any way. She hasn't spoken a word to me on the way back. When we're at her door, I say, “Please don't go in like this.”
