CHAPTER FOUR
Saturday dawned bright and clear. Grant woke to sun streaming in from the window overlooking the backyard. He stretched slowly, smiling. Beside him, Lainie was still sleeping soundly, curled onto her side. He debated waking her to take advantage of the quiet, private time before the girls woke but ultimately decided to let her sleep. He got up and went into the bathroom, throwing on a T-shirt and shorts in case one of the girls decided to get up early, not that he expected them to. Being teenagers, or nearly teenagers in Natalie’s case, they could and would, given the opportunity, sleep until noon. As he made his way toward the kitchen, he couldn’t help but smile again. Save for the few boxes still stacked in the office, you wouldn’t even know they had just moved in a few days ago. The way the community had come together and helped them was amazing. Though they had been living here for less than a week, it already felt a lot like home.
He started coffee and leaned against the counter, waiting for it to brew. He felt happier and more optimistic than he had in a long time. He was already loving their new home in the community, and he was looking forward to starting his new job on Monday. He had known almost immediately upon seeing the Corbin’s Bend website that this was the place for them. So far, his expectation had been proven true. Colorado was going to be really good for them.
Kathleen remained the only fly in the milk. As Lainie had predicted, she had been utterly miserable over her grounding and had made a concerted effort to make the rest of them miserable right along with her. It was only the threat of extending the restriction that managed to quell her temporarily. More than once, Grant had questioned his decision. Lainie did have a pretty good point about isolating Kathleen. He knew Kathleen needed friends, and he didn’t want to cut her off from them. At the same time, he had to get her attention. She was rude and disrespectful, and it had to stop.
And then there was Lainie. On the one hand, she seemed to be settling in well. He was relieved beyond measure that she had slotted in well with the other women here. He knew she had been worried about it, and truthfully, he had worried about it no little himself. Lainie was a social person and generally made friends easily, but she had a lot of preconceived notions about DD. She had somehow gotten the crazy idea that being Taken In Hand turned a woman into some kind of creepy Stepford Wife. He’d worried that might make her resistant to getting to know the other women. He was thrilled that it hadn’t. The other women could help her understand in ways he couldn’t even begin to attempt. Not to mention he would be forever indebted to them for introducing Lainie to the concept of erotic spanking. That alone had improved their sex life considerably. Hell, he was half hard now just from the memory. With one thing and then another, they hadn’t been able to try it again after that first night, but they would. He’d make sure of it.
Now if she would only take as easily to his making decision in other areas, especially with the kids. He hated it when she contradicted him when he tried to discipline the girls. She had the right to speak up of course. They were her children as much as his, and to be fair, she had been the one who had done the bulk of raising them, but it seemed like every time she intervened, it was trying to get them out of a deserved consequence. It felt like the more he tried to enforce discipline the more she undermined it. The other night when he had grounded Kathleen was a perfect example. She wasn’t even arguing because she disagreed with him. She was only arguing to get out of having to deal with Kathleen. If she had truly had concerns about his decision, he didn’t think it would bother as much. As it was, she was whining as much in her own way as Kathleen was, and it was driving him crazy.
Should he have spanked her for it? Was he making matters worse by not being more forceful with her? She had agreed to incorporate domestic discipline, but he still wasn’t sure how to actually go about it. Though he had considerable experience on the receiving end, he knew next to nothing about the giving side of things. Sure, he knew the basic mechanics well enough, but how did you know when it was the right thing to do? More importantly, how would he know he wasn’t hurting her? It was all so damned confusing.
The phone rang just as the coffee was finishing. He snatched it up quickly, hoping it wouldn’t disturb the rest of the household.
“Taylor,” he said, tucking the phone between his ear and shoulder so he could pour himself a cup of coffee.
“Grant, it’s Matt,” the voice on the other end said. “I just wanted to tell you that we’ll be at the pool today if you and Lainie and the girls wanted to come by. It’s usually packed on the weekends during the summer. Everybody wants to take advantage of the warm weather before winter hits so it might be a good way to get to know some people.”
“That sounds great,” Grant agreed. “Let me check with Lainie, but I’m sure we can at least come by for a while.”
“Good, we’ll see you soon then,” Matt replied before saying goodbye and hanging up.
* * * * *
Lainie readily agreed, and as Grant had expected, Natalie was overjoyed at the prospect of spending the day at the pool. Kathleen wouldn’t dare risk showing enthusiasm for anything but had agreed with a speed that suggested she was interested as well, even if she wouldn’t dare show it, but even enthusiastic teenage girls took a lifetime to get ready.
It was nearly an hour later by the time they made it to the community pool, tucked in behind the community center and administration building that was known locally as the Dome, a reference to the massive building’s domed structure. As Matt had predicted, the pool area was packed. The pool itself was filled with children, swimming, splashing, and diving. A few braver women swam and played alongside the children or lounged in the shallow end, but most of the women were lounging on chairs along the edge of the pool. Interestingly, there were almost no men in sight. Lainie and the girls went immediately inside the gate, staking out a chair and shedding coverups in preparation to swim. Grant lingered at the fence, watching them and feeling distinctly awkward. Matt had said he would be here too, and he was pretty sure that was Matt’s wife, Julie, Lainie was talking to. Where was he? Where were all the men, for that matter?
Just then, Matt came out of the building behind him and called his name. “I’m glad you decided to come out,” Matt said, coming up beside him.
“I don’t think Natalie would have forgiven us if we hadn’t,” Grant replied. “As soon as I mentioned it, she was all for it.”
“Most of the kids around here love it,” Matt agreed. “I know mine do.” He smiled fondly in the direction of where his two oldest children were splashing around in the shallow end of the pool near where Julie sat lounging in the water, one hand on the swim ring the baby was floating in. “Come on, I have something to show you.”
Grant followed Matt into the Dome and down one of the long hallways. There was a doorway at the end of the hall. Matt opened it to reveal a descending staircase. Growing more curious by the minute, Grant followed him down. He reached the bottom of the stairs and stopped dead. The entire basement of the dome was one room decked out in the manner of a large recreation area. Only this area had clearly been designed with men in mind. There were multiple television screens on the walls and large leather couches and recliners scattered around in seating areas. There were a couple pool tables and even a bar.
“Wow!” Grant said, stunned. “This wasn’t on the tour when we came before. I’m sure I would’ve remembered it if it were.”
Brent, who was sitting on one of the leather couches, turned and grinned at him. “We can’t give away all our secrets.”
“That’s right,” Jonathan, the executive assistant for the community, piped up from where he was perched on the arm of a chair in the group that had gathered around Brent. “We keep the outsiders away from the man cave and the paddles in the supply closet upstairs.” Jonathan flashed a cheeky grin and several of the men around him laughed. For a moment, Grant was too surprised to react, but eventually he joined in the laughter too. Jonathan was clearly joking. He had to be.
Then again, thinking of the paddle they had received in their welcome basket, he might not be either.
“Man cave?” Grant asked.
Brent nodded. “That’s what Matt christened it when he first moved in. It fits. It’s our one place where we can just hang out and be men. Most of us spend a good bit of time down here, especially on the weekends during the summer when all the women and kids are at the pool.”
Looking around, Grant quickly realized that despite there being a number of small groups scattered throughout the room, the population was entirely male. That answered the question of where all the men had gone.
“Well, come on,” Matt said, drawing him further into the room. “Don’t just stand there. Have a seat. Relax. You want a beer?”
Grant shook his head. “Better not. It’s early yet.” Despite Matt’s invitation, Grant remained standing by one of the pool tables, trailing a hand absently over the felt top, not quite sure how to join in.
“You play?” Matt asked.
“I used to,” Grant replied. “I played a lot back when I was at the police academy, but I haven’t played in years.”
“Oh good,” someone, Grant wasn’t sure who, called out. “Matt might stand a chance against you then.”
“Bite me,” Matt shot back, good-naturedly, but he was already racking up. “What do you say, Grant? Want to play?”
Grant shrugged. “Sure, why not?” He chose a cue from the rack on the wall, and Matt did the same. They flipped a coin for the break, which Matt called. Despite the good-natured teasing, it soon became apparent that Matt wasn’t as bad as the others liked to make him appear to be. If anything, he and Grant were fairly evenly matched. The first game, which Grant won, quickly turned into a best of three.
Sometime during the second game, Matt asked, “So how are you settling in?”
“Pretty well,” Grant told him. “Thanks to everyone’s help, we’ve gotten the house pretty much in order. I start my new job on Monday.”
“That’s great,” Matt said, neatly depositing his ball into the pocket. “Where are you working?”
“I’m with the campus police department at Sandy Ridge College,” Grant answered. “It’s a bit different from what I’ve done before. I was a sheriff’s deputy back in North Carolina, and I suppose I could have tried to get on in Denver or Boulder, but I was ready for something different. Something that wouldn’t be so much of a time commitment. That was part of the problem before. I was always busy and ended up never being home. I didn’t want to fall back in that trap again.”
Matt missed his next shot and settled back to watch Grant play. “That makes sense,” he said. “Not that I know anything about law enforcement, but it seems like security on a small college would be a lot less stressful than being on a city police force.”
“That’s what I’m hoping,” Grant agreed. “By some miracle, I managed to get a day shift slot so for once, Lainie and I will actually be working on similar schedules, although I will be teaching a self-defense class one night a week.”
“Hey, that’s a good idea,” Jonathan said from the sidelines where a small crowd had gathered to watch them play. “Would you be interested in teaching one here?”
“Here?” Grant echoed. “Surely you don’t have a need for that here. Everyone seems to get along so well; I can’t see where knowing how to physically defend yourself would ever be necessary.”
“I hope it never will be, but we have run into an occasional bad situation,” Jonathan went on. “I could put some feelers out, and see if anyone is interested.”
“That would work,” Grant conceded. “If there’s enough interest, let me know, and we will see what we can work out.” Grant actually wasn’t at all opposed to the idea, if there was interest. He liked the idea of being able to contribute something to his new community.
“Would you want it to be adults only, or would you be willing to open it to the teenagers too?” Jonathan asked.
Grant made a careful shot before replying, “I’m open for either. I’m going to be teaching mostly young adults at work so teenagers shouldn’t be much different.”
“Speaking of teenagers,” Matt put in, “how are your girls liking it here?”
“Natalie seems to be excited about being here. She’s really looking forward to getting to know some of the other kids in the neighborhood. Kathleen, on the other hand, is another story.” Grant sighed. “She seems to be determined to hate it here.”
“It can’t be easy,” Matt said, “moving all the way across the country and away from all her friends.”
“That’s what Lainie keeps telling me,” Grant told him. “She says it is natural that she will be angry, and I guess I can understand that, but it’s the being rude, and mouthy, and disrespectful part of it that is driving me crazy.” That was absolutely true, but Grant was slightly surprised that he had said it. He hadn’t even really said that much to Lainie. Somehow, it felt like he could say it here though, like the other men would understand.
“It would me too,” Matt said, confirming Grant’s thoughts. “Have you told her that?”
Grant ran a hand through his hair. “I’ve tried. I’ve tried explaining that there are ways to express how she feels without being rude or disrespectful, but I might as well be talking to a wall.”
“What else have you tried?” Matt asked.
“She’s lost her electronics for the week for her most recent tantrum, but Lainie seems to think that’s only making the problem worse by cutting her off from her friends,” Grant explained.
“So Lainie isn’t in agreement with you?” Matt questioned.
“Hardly ever,” Grant said. “She agreed to letting me be Head of Household and said that included making final decisions, but it seems like every time I try to make a decision, especially when it comes to disciplining the girls, she rushes to their defense and argues with everything I try to do.”
“And what are you doing about that?” Matt wanted to know.
“What is there to do about it?” Grant said. “I hate it, but I can’t just magically make her stop doing it.”
“Maybe not,” Matt agreed, “but you can certainly make it uncomfortable for her to keep doing it. Look, I don’t know what you’re agreement with Lainie is like or what your rules are, but if Julie were doing that, I would consider it extremely disrespectful, and it would be grounds for punishment.” That said, Matt sank the eight ball, easily winning the second game.
Grant wasn’t at all surprised. His mind was barely on the game now. He hadn’t realized until he started talking just how much this whole situation with Lainie had been bothering him. “We do have a rule about being respectful, but they’re her children as much as mine, and truthfully, she’s had the bulk of the raising of them up until now. Who am I to say she can’t speak her mind about it?”
“Their father, her husband, and most importantly, her HoH,” Matt replied. “She gave you authority over the family when she agreed to this type of relationship. Besides, I’m not saying she doesn’t get a say. There are ways to express an opinion privately without being confrontational or undermining about it. Maybe you should make a point of talking to her before you decide on any sort of discipline or consequence with the kids, if this is a problem, but you’ve got to make it clear to her that you feel the way she’s going about it now is disrespectful, if that’s the case.”
“It is. I told her if she did it again, I would spank her,” Grant admitted quietly.
“Good,” Matt said. “If you ask me, that’s a step in the right direction.”
For the most part, Grant thought so too, but doubts still nagged at him. The idea of actually spanking Lainie was at once intriguing and terrifying. At a gut level, he knew it was right. He had seen the closeness and solidarity this type of relationship brought his parents and grandparents. He wanted that for his own marriage, but at the same time, he was deathly afraid of hurting Lainie.
“I haven’t actually spanked her before,” he confessed. H
e felt the heat rising on the back of his neck. Somehow, here, among this group of men, that felt like a monumental failure in the HoH department. “Not for discipline at least. She heard some of the other women talking about erotic spanking and was curious so we tried that.”
“And how’d that work out?” Matt wanted to know.
“Great,” Grant replied, unable to stop a grin from spreading across his face. “I wish I’d brought it up with her ten years ago. I’ll owe your wife forever for mentioning it to her.”
Matt chuckled and began racking up the pool balls for their final game. “Why does it not surprise me Julie was involved in that conversation?” he said, watching Grant take his shot. A moment later, he continued, “You know, even though most of us incorporate spanking as both discipline and sex play, you don’t have to. Some people here only do one or the other and that’s fine. Practicing DD isn’t a requirement.”
“I want to though,” Grant insisted. “Lainie isn’t as sure about it, but she agreed to it.”
“Fair enough,” Matt agreed. “So what are you doing in terms of DD?”
“We’ve talked about it and made up a list of rules, and of course, we moved here,” Grant answered.
“Rules are a good first step,” Matt said carefully. “That’s where we all started at one point. So how long have the two of you had this agreement?”
“Since we decided to apply to move here,” Grant replied. He lined up and took another shot. It missed his target by a mile, which didn’t surprise him considering the state of his focus and what they were talking about. “Six months or so.”
“So basically, you’re telling me you’ve had an agreement and you’ve had rules for six months, but you haven’t been enforcing them,” Matt summarized. “Why on earth not?”
Grant winced inwardly. When you put it like that, it sounded like he had completely flaked out on his responsibility. That was the last thing he was trying to do. If anything, he’d been trying to take on more responsibility by making more of the decisions. “I don’t want to hurt her,” he said quietly.
Learning to Live Again (Corbin's Bend, Season Two Book 9) Page 7
