by Laura Hart
“We’re not going there,” was all he answered.
After another five minutes, he entered an underground parking garage, pulled into a numbered slot, and turned off the engine. Sadie looked around her curiously, but Max got out, slamming his car door behind him, and then came around and jerked open her door. “Get out.”
“Where are we?”
“You wanted to see my apartment, so here we are.”
She got out, and Max took her hand and walked quickly to an elevator which took them up to the fifth floor, which was also the top floor. They entered the only apartment on that level, and Sadie immediately walked to a window to see what the view was, but Max didn’t follow her. Instead he took out his phone and sent his father a message letting him know that Sadie was safe and with him. Then he sat down on the sofa.
“Come over here.”
Sadie turned around. “Why are you so upset? Fine, I didn’t stay in the apartment, but it’s hardly the end of the world.”
Max looked at her in complete amazement. “You really don’t get what’s going on here, do you?”
“Well, I know that you’re all in a twist, so I assume it’s because I went out.”
Max took out his phone, hit a couple buttons, and then held it towards here. “Do you want to explain this?”
Sadie moved closer so she could see what he was showing her and then took a step back in surprise. “You were spying on me?” she demanded, clearly outraged.
“I didn’t need to. My fine cousin, Aleksei Fedorovich, was kind enough to send me this picture.”
“Alex?”
“I see you’re on a first-name basis with him. How cozy.”
“What is your problem? Did you bring me here just so you could yell at me about my terrible crime of making my own decision?”
Max looked at her intently for a moment, anger still evident in his face.
“No, mishka, I didn’t bring you here just to yell at you, I brought you here to spank your disobedient little bottom until I’m quite sure you’ve learned a lesson.”
Sadie’s eyes got wide, and she took another step backwards. Her insides suddenly felt tight, but she responded with more bravado than she felt. “Who says I have lessons to learn?”
“I do. I’m the one who is trying to protect you from exactly this man you’ve befriended—from Alex, as you so casually call him. This is the man who is behind our current problems, and he’s the man who sent those other pictures. He obviously had one of his henchmen with him this morning to take the photo, because this is clearly not a selfie. Why do you think he would take this picture and send it with no message?”
“I don’t know.” She suddenly felt much less sure of herself, and the look on Max’s face was making her tummy feel not so good.
“I had a very good reason for telling you to stay inside, and I even shared it with you. You made a very deliberate decision to disobey me, to toss caution to the wind and simply go out anyway. We’re both very lucky that your foray didn’t end in disaster, but I’m going to make sure that you don’t take safety so casually in the future. Come over here.”
Sadie stood unmoving. She well remembered the spanking she’d gotten about safety when she ran the stop sign, and the idea of getting the same again scared her, but she didn’t see any way out. It was obvious Max meant business.
“Come over here,” he repeated impatiently, and suddenly her knees felt weak. She wasn’t even sure they’d hold her as she slowly moved in his direction.
“Take your pants down,” he ordered as she got near.
She hesitated. She couldn’t remember when she’d been so scared. She hadn’t known how much the other time was going to hurt, so she hadn’t been too upset ahead of time, but this time she knew, and that made it infinitely worse.
“Unless you want me to use my belt, you need to take your pants off right now.”
Sadie bit her lip but started undoing her pants, all the while avoiding his eyes. How had one last little picture-taking outing ended up like this? She slid her pants down and hesitated, but his voice cut in immediately. “Your panties, too. Everything down.”
She pushed her violet-colored panties down to where her pants were gathered just below her knees and then paused—an awful pause as she waited for her execution. She didn’t have long to wait.
Max took her arm and pulled her down firmly over his leg, centering her bare bottom directly on his hard thigh. He took her right arm in his left hand to keep it away from the action, and then said simply, “Next time you feel like disregarding your own safety, I hope you’ll remember what it leads to.”
He brought his hand down hard with a loud smacking sound.
“Ow!”
He ignored her cry and started smacking her bare backside in earnest, over and over with no pause. The horrible stinging slaps just kept on coming, covering her checks, her sit spot and even her upper thighs with the most painful sensation she’d ever experienced. Her skin was on fire but still he spanked.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” she cried, her voice so ragged she could hardly get the words out. “Please stop!”
Max ignored her and kept spanking, bringing his big hand down without pause on her flaming backside. Sadie thought she’d lose her mind. She was crying now and would have done anything to stop the torment he was raining on her poor bottom.
“Ow-w! Ow-w!” was all she could hiccup pitifully between her desperate sobs.
Suddenly, the gods smiled on her and the torture stopped. Max’s hand was still and instead rested lightly on her thigh. Was it really over? Every inch of her burning backside throbbed, and she could hardly breathe, but at least he wasn’t spanking her anymore. In fact, he wasn’t doing anything. He wasn’t talking and he wasn’t moving. He was just holding her there silently, as if waiting for something. Another sob escaped her chest, and she too waited.
“Do you think you’ve learned about safety, or do we need to continue?”
“No!”
“No, what?”
Sadie was still breathing raggedly, but she got out the necessary words. “I’ll be safe.”
Max looked at her flaming red bottom and felt a twinge of pity, but then he remembered the photo of Aleksei Fedorovich together with the woman he loved and he was filled with more than enough resolve to do whatever it took to keep her safe. He would even spank her more if he thought it was necessary, although he hoped it wouldn’t be.
They stayed there for several more minutes, Sadie over his knee, her bottom stinging in a way she couldn’t have imagined, and Max, his own hand stinging from the punishment it had just delivered, holding the woman who meant more to him than anything else in the world. Finally, though, he was ready to move on.
“You can get up now.”
It Was Simple but Complete
Sadie was stunned. She was still sniffling, and she instinctively put her hands back to rub her poor scorched backside. She didn’t know what to think. She loved Max, or at least she’d thought she did, but how could he spank her that way? Didn’t he know how much it hurt?
She leaned down and pulled her silky violet panties up again, but when she followed with her linen pants, another ‘ow-w’ slipped out of her mouth and she let them fall back down again. She moved awkwardly away from Max but wasn’t sure where to go. She didn’t feel like just standing there, and she knew she didn’t want to sit down on her poor backside quite yet, so she hesitated.
Max watched her with mixed emotions. Everything about her tugged at his heartstrings, and he wondered how much damage he’d done his cause. He didn’t regret the spanking one bit, but he might now have his work cut out for him to smooth things over again.
“Come here and let me help you step out of your pants.”
She looked at him with caution but inched her way back to him, her pants still around her knees. She put her hands on his shoulders and stepped out of them one leg at a time.
“Stay right here,” Max said as he got up and walked to the bedroom. He reappear
ed almost immediately holding two fluffy bed pillows which he brought with him back to the sofa. He sat down again, put the pillows on his lap, and then patted them in invitation. “Come sit with me so we can talk.”
“I don’t want to talk to you,” she said almost sullenly.
“Then listen, because I have things I need to say to you.”
Sadie hesitated but then reluctantly went back over to him and gingerly sat down on the pillows, whimpering slightly as she did. “It still hurts,” she complained as she shifted around searching for a comfortable position.
“I know.” He put his arms around her and pulled her close to his chest.
“You’re supposed to love me.” It came out with a small hiccup.
“I do love you, mishka. I love you so much that it makes me crazy, and that’s why I spanked you the way I did. If I didn’t love you, I wouldn’t care so much whether or not you were safe.”
Sadie sighed. She wanted to be mad at him, but she didn’t have the energy, so she rested her head against his chest. “I can hear your heart beat,” she said for lack of anything better to add to the conversation.
“Then you can hear how much I love you, because every time it beats, it loves you a little bit more.” He held her tightly for a few minutes without saying anything else, but finally he continued.
“Aleksei Fedorovich is a great threat to our business right now, and he recognized you as a weak spot for us. Criminals know that people will take chances with themselves that they won’t take with their loved ones. He was doing what his type has always done, pointing out that he could hurt something I loved if he chose to. It’s an unspoken threat that everyone understands. Do you know how crazy it makes me to think of anyone hurting you? I would give everything I have, including my own life, to prevent that.”
He ran his hand lightly over her hair and kissed her on her forehead. “You’re my beautiful Sadie, lovely to look at and fascinating to be with. I love you, and that means I want to protect you.” He tilted her face up, wiped away the last traces of tears under her lashes, and then kissed her gently on her mouth.
Nothing made sense anymore to Sadie. How had this man upended her life so completely? How had he changed her views, and how had he made her love him so much that she could forgive him spanking her the way he had? More than forgive, even. She understood what he was saying, and even with her aching bottom still silently screaming at her, she knew she might even love him more for the strong stand he took on her behalf.
“I love you, Sadie,” he repeated, gently rocking her, and she put her arms around his neck and whispered, “I love you, too.”
They spent several hours at the apartment, letting Sadie recover from her ordeal and then making passionate love twice. By the time they left, they were both starving, so Max called his mother and told her they were going to eat right then and so probably wouldn’t be at the apartment for dinner. Then he took Sadie to a restaurant where he knew the chairs were heavily padded.
* * *
“What shall we do on our next-to-last day here?” Max asked Sadie the next morning. “Is there any final thing you want to do or even go back to?”
“Could we go on a boat again? I really loved that.”
They spent several hours once again cruising the Neva River, enjoying the perfect weather while admiring the beautiful buildings lining the embankments, the sun making gold roofs glitter. Max was happy that Sadie didn’t seem to hold her punishment against him, but he did notice she was still sitting very carefully.
They returned to the family apartment late in the afternoon and decided to do some packing. Max’s phone rang while they were in the bedroom, and after a short discussion with his father, Max announced with a smile on his face that Aleksei Fedorovich had been arrested that afternoon on a charge completely unrelated to his harassment of The House of Orlov. It was a serious charge, and Max hoped it would keep his cousin out of circulation for a while.
“Well, if you’d just waited a day, you wouldn’t have had to worry about him and so you wouldn’t have had to destroy my poor backside.”
Max looked at her in surprise. “Did you miss the message, mishka?”
“What do you mean?”
“I didn’t spank you because of him in particular, I spanked you because you disregarded your own safety. It was the principal of the thing, not one person in particular.” He looked at her seriously.
“And I let you. You’ve made me into the kind of woman I always hated.”
“No, mishka. You’re still a strong and independent woman. I wouldn’t have it any other way. We Russians have a long tradition of strong women.”
“So why did you get so upset about everything?”
“I’ve already told you. I protect what I love.”
“Don’t your strong women ever protest?”
Max chuckled. “We also have another tradition, and that’s of even stronger men.”
* * *
It seemed to Sadie as if the family was particularly attentive that evening at dinner. She even caught both Anna and Max’s mother glancing towards her furtively when they thought she wasn’t watching. Maybe it was because they’d be leaving again so soon. She knew she was really going to miss this wonderful family of his, but she hoped she’d see them again.
After the meal finally ended, Max closeted himself with his father in the study for about ten minutes and then came to find Sadie again.
“Are you ready to go?” he asked. Tonight was Scarlet Sails Night, the highlight of the White Nights Festival, and they were going back to the embankment to fully enjoy themselves one last time.
“Ready.” She picked up her tote bag and joined him as they headed for a final fling in the city she’d come to love.
Everywhere they turned there were people, as if the whole city had turned out to celebrate. There were multiple stages set up with everything from hard rock to the symphony, and while they waited for the scarlet sails to arrive on the river, there were other entertainments like mock pirate battles and races.
Max and Sadie found a place to sit where they could hear one of the classical stages.
“Do you know the story of the scarlet sails?” he asked as they ate ice cream.
“Kind of, but you can tell me your version.” She grinned at him mischievously in invitation.
“It started back only a couple years after the revolution, when a few schools decided to combine efforts for a graduation celebration. Now, of course, it’s a world-famous event, but the original meaning still stands. The boat that will appear with all scarlet sails represents freedom after the school year and hope for a bright future.”
They finished their ice cream and decided to look for the stage that had Russian folk dancing on exhibit. They wandered among the crowds, hand in hand, Sadie trying to absorb enough of the festive atmosphere to last her a long time.
“It’s coming, it’s coming!” Max heard someone calling, and then the fireworks started in earnest over the river.
“Watch in that direction,” he said to Sadie as the excitement built.
“Oh-h, it’s beautiful!” Sadie watched as a magnificent old sailing ship with multiple scarlet-colored sails moved majestically along the river. The sky overhead was filled with constant bursts of multi-hued fireworks, lighting the sky and forming the backdrop for the boat. Max held her close as they watched, fidgeting with his pocket every couple minutes.
As the boat moved past them, he took a small malachite box out of his pocket and then dropped to one knee. Sadie inhaled sharply, suddenly aware that something even grander than the scarlet sails was happening.
Max opened the small green box, revealing a breathtaking ring, its perfectly cut diamond raised above an exquisitely designed platinum setting.
“Sadie Duval, will you marry me?” It was simple but complete. Nothing else was needed.
Sadie’s insides were jumping for joy. She’d never been more excited nor more sure of an answer.
“Yes.”
It was equally simple and equally complete. She was smiling from ear to ear.
Max took her hand and slipped the ring onto her finger, then kissed her fingers and stood up. As he took her in his arms, there was applause all around them, and they realized that others had seen what was going on and were cheering for them. Sadie giggled self-consciously, but Max grinned at the well-wishers. “I’m the luckiest man alive,” he announced in Russian to all within earshot.
Sadie couldn’t take her eyes off the stunning ring that she now wore. “It’s so beautiful. Where did you get it?”
Max chuckled. “I have a secret source for jewelry. I’ll tell you about it someday.”
Sadie just shook her head, too happy to joke. She was engaged to Max! “I can’t believe this,” she said as if to convince herself.
“Believe it,” replied Max, nuzzling her neck. “You know the ‘hope for the future’ part of the scarlet sails? That’s for us tonight. We’ll always remember that we had a beautiful boat sail by us as a symbol of our bright future.”
He kissed her and then added, “It’s you and I now, Sadie, and I promise you we’re going to have a great life together.”
As if to put the exclamation mark on his words, the finale of the fireworks burst forth, lighting up the sky as far as one could see in an exhilarating display.
“Let’s go home,” Max said as he kissed her one last time and then took her hand. “It’s time for our own celebration to begin.”
The End
Laura Hart
Laura’s been creating stories for as long as she can remember but only recently decided to go public. Having spent some of her childhood and then much of her married life living abroad, she has no true home and considers herself a global nomad. She now lives with her retired husband and their two Siamese cats in Mexico.
Laura’s had a lifelong interest in classical music, travel, and languages, and she’s a sucker for a tender animal story. She loves writing about alpha (gentle)men and the ladies in their lives.
