Return to Wilder

by Carl Hamlin

  Return to Wilder

  By

  Carl Hamlin

  ©2013 by Blushing Books® and Carl Hamlin

  Copyright © 2013 by Blushing Books® and Carl Hamlin

  All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

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  Hamlin, Carl

  Return to Wilder

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-60968-979-7

  Cover Art by Owlight Designs

  This book is intended for adults only. Spanking and other sexual activities represented in this book are fantasies only, intended for adults. Nothing in this book should be interpreted as Blushing Books' or the author's advocating any non-consensual spanking activity or the spanking of minors.

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  Kara’s View of Autumn

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  Table of Contents:

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter One:

  Jessica Marin sat beneath the bright, hot lights of the studio and watched for the mouthed countdown from the producer, indicating when she would again be live on camera. She was halfway through her final morning news program before taking two weeks of vacation. In addition to the countdown, Jessica watched for the “okay” sign from the same man, her friend who also served as her “modesty monitor” as she called him. He would check the two cameras to be used during the segment, checking to see that his star anchor showed off her legendary legs, but not any glimpses of undergarment.

  Jessica Marin was already a staple on web sites highlighting attractive news program celebrities. At the same time, she did not want any wardrobe mistakes to go viral on video or photo sites.

  To add to her already well-established allure and legend, she had just been featured in a popular culture magazine, highlighted in a section titled “Sexy at Fifty”. She was uncertain as to how she felt about the title, but she was flattered nonetheless to be featured on the cover. Her face had graced the cover of regional and Chicago-based magazines and Sunday newspaper inserts, but this time she had gone national and international.

  The countdown concluded, and Jessica began: “And now, for all of you here in the Windy City, officials at the Chicago city hall announced yesterday that the policy regulating the sale of new and used....”

  She finished the story, and then segued into a feature on the delights of Lake Michigan recreational boating to be presented by her co-anchor, Patrick Reardon. After he finished the segment, she smiled, commented on how inviting the lake looked that morning as she left for the studio, and the program went to a commercial for the Cubs’ upcoming home game against the Reds and Dodgers.

  She looked at Reardon and asked how he intended to introduce a later story on two new homeless shelters in the downtown area. She listened to his response and suggested he alter his opening. Jessica explained how she would set the tone if she were doing the story. As was typical of the co-workers, they disagreed but concealed their tensions from the producer.

  She considered him to be pompous. He considered her to be self-centered to her detriment. He would whisper to others that Jessica would explain her opinions in the context of what was good for the station, but he felt that she was usually looking out for herself.

  When it was her turn to do the whispering, she would accuse Reardon of attempting to use the program as a stepping-stone to a New York based position with one of the three big networks. The bottom line was that both were professionals, and the viewers would be led to believe that the two anchors were inseparable and close friends.

  It was to be a long commercial break and the producer, Tom Merrill, walked over to where Jessica sat on the sofa. He handed her a summary of the stories they would be reporting during the remaining segments, and called the make-up artist over to give Jessica a quick touch-up. The co-anchor would be absent from the set during the next portion of the show, then take over for the remainder as Jessica made her getaway. Viewers would not see her traditional sign-off smile and her shout-out to her friends in her hometown of Wilder, Indiana. As for those Wilder residents, they would not mind. Jessica was heading home to see them.

  Jessica clarified how Merrill wanted a story on police union negotiations reported, and then the producer pledged to her that no one from the program would attempt to interrupt her vacation.

  Jessica tugged at Merrill’s trouser leg. “Do I look ravishing this morning?”

  Merrill did not look up as he looked over another page of notes. “I have been tempted all morning to pounce on you on live television and take you from behind. Of course, I would settle for any position with you, you hot little vixen.”

  Smiling and scanning the first page of notes, Jessica exclaimed, “Tom Merrill, I dearly love yo
u, but you really are a dirty old man.”

  Merrill displayed mock indignation. “I am not old. And if I were to ever commit an act of sexual harassment, you, my dear, would be the object of my criminality even at your advanced age. So are you looking forward to going home to - let’s see - is that Mayberry or Dogpatch?”

  The countdown to going live commenced, and Jessica sat with her tongue sticking out at the producer until the count went to one.

  Within thirty seconds of finishing her final segment, Jessica was on the elevator for the long ride to the basement-level parking garage. She had just finished a story on gang violence in Chicago, and was still rattled by the information she had provided about an innocent teenager who died from a stray bullet. It was an added incentive to take some time away from the city and refresh her mind by returning to her roots for a few days.

  A security guard was waiting to escort her to her car. A woman with her celebrity status, let alone her looks, caused station management to insist on that much protection for their star anchor whenever she was in their care and custody. Stalkers were always a concern, and she did occasionally make the assorted criminal or politician unhappy.

  She drove slowly through the garage, and then halted when she reached the exit to allow her eyes to adjust to the bright sunlight. She was pleased that this would be a sunny day, as she did not relish driving in the Chicago metropolitan area even under optimum conditions.

  Two blocks from the tall building that housed the station, she was in traffic stalled by construction. She began to calculate the new arrival time she could plan on, then admonished herself that she was going on vacation, and a schedule and anticipated time of arrival in Wilder should not factor in and bring about silly stress.

  She was relieved to finally reach the freeway, and then once she had blended into the flow, she was nervous about the traffic she was coping with. It took an hour of driving with a tight grip on the wheel before the traffic began to thin out. When she began seeing more trees and less city, she knew that the worst was behind her.

  Jessica was four hours from Chicago when she finally felt herself totally unwind. She leaned back against the headrest of her Lincoln Town Car and sighed. It was the first time in weeks she had felt that alien sensation, relaxation. The Indiana countryside was flat in all directions, and in spite of her years of living away, it was always the same emotion on her annual visit to the small town of her youth. She was going home, and the arrival brought tears of happiness and wistfulness to her eyes.

  She was always pleased to reach the point of the long drive where she would leave the freeway and exit onto the two-lane state highway that would take her to yet another highway and then to the highway that ran through Wilder. Wilder was not a town that people generally traveled through on the way to somewhere else. Those driving into Wilder were almost always bound for the small town and the immediate area.

  When she reached the expansive fields that told her she was once again in the heart of the Indiana farmland, she saw the large white houses and red barns that made her feel welcome to be back. She was now less than an hour from Wilder.

  That final hour of driving passed quickly. In the distance, she could see the familiar blue water tower that served the town of nearly three thousand regular folks. There was the sign that always brought a smile to her face: Welcome to Wilder, Indiana, population 2,984.

  As she approached the box factory on the edge of the town, she recalled her summer working there before her first year at Purdue. She could close her eyes and summon the scent of the cardboard and the oily smoke from the forklifts that moved pallets of flat but finished boxes to the loading dock to be taken away.

  She operated the machine that wrapped a narrow metal band around each pallet. That required her to wear goggles and a helmet. The factory was hot and dusty, but on many days, the breeze would whisper across the surrounding farmland to usher fresh air through the immense doors at either end of the large brick building, bringing a welcome chill to the brow and damp shirt of the then eighteen year-old Jessica.

  Jessica had just turned fifty, but her memories of Wilder were vivid and precious. That was the real reason she went back for a few days each summer. In the age of cell phones, Twitter and e-mail, she did not really have to personally return to the large farm she had inherited and meet with the farmer and his sons who worked the land that had been her parents’. Stanley Fenton and his three large and muscular adult sons were more than capable without the obligatory yearly questions from the property owner who trusted them without reservation.

  Her parents had both passed on in the course of the last ten years, so she had returned to Wilder as often as possible to help them through their illnesses and to bury them in the town’s lone cemetery. Then, during each of the last three summer visits, Jessica had visited the graves upon her first day home.

  On the side of the road opposite the box factory was Pleasant Oak Cemetery, and Jessica turned the large car through the iron gates and cruised slowly to the back portion of the burial ground. Even before getting out of the car, she could spot the double marker with “Marin” etched in large letters. Jessica stood in teary-eyed silence for a while, and placed some flowers at the site. As she had done over the recent years, she spoke quietly to her parents for a few minutes, telling them of the goings-on in her life and telling them how much she loved and missed them. She strolled a few yards away to visit the graves of four grandparents she could just vaguely remember, due to their early demise, then wiped the tears from her face and walked back to her car.

  As she drove away, she gazed again at the marker and hoped she had done well by the kind and gentle people she had loved more than anyone else in her life. In fact, Riley and Marjorie Marin had been pleased to see their daughter, their only child, go on to college. If Riley had been disappointed to not have a son to work the land, he hid it well.

  He had not tried to make the girl a tomboy, but he was happy when she asked to play catch, and just was beside himself with happiness and pride when the ten-year-old pleaded to drive the tractor. He would thank God for his good fortune for this one child, who would harvest corn on a Saturday afternoon and emerge from her room a few hours later in a satin dress, looking like a princess.

  As for Marjorie Marin, she soon gave up on teaching the spirited girl her own traditions of sewing and cooking. She knew that Jessica was not going to be a traditional woman as she had been. She was proud of her daughter, and even envied her in ways that she would never confess to her husband or her closest friends.

  Riley frequently bragged at the diner about his little girl who had become a newspaper reporter, then been hired as a television reporter for a Chicago station. Her confidence and quick thinking had allowed her to regularly scoop some more experienced newshounds in the big city. It was a jump from her days as editor of the small high school’s monthly newspaper, but the experience had been enough to help her set her course in life and choose a college major.

  Upon graduation, a job offer came quickly. Her resume was thin, as with other new graduates, but her enthusiasm came through in interviews.

  Jessica was pleased that her fine work as an assignment reporter had been appreciated, and that she had been offered a more prestigious position with her station. She was also realistic, and while it was never spoken for the sake of legal correctness, Jessica knew that her striking appearance was a factor.

  She was rewarded with an anchor position on a morning news program. The men in the diner would never admit to Riley that most of them tuned in to watch her program to see the vision that was Jessica in a short skirt or dress as she sat on the sofa with her co-host. Her mother did twice mention to her that she was showing a considerable amount of leg, but Jessica knew that she had a valuable asset in those shapely limbs, along with the flawless face and the brown, shoulder-length hair. She was now fifty, but she was hot and she knew it.

  Jessica had won awards for regional news reporting and for her duties as program host.
However, she had turned down chances to go to New York, only accepting occasional fill-in days for a network anchor. Chicago was large enough for her.

  When she returned to Wilder, the fussy makeup staff and hair stylists were left behind. She left Chicago in a short red dress, but during her days in the town, she would stroll the streets greeting old friends in jeans, shorts, or a short denim skirt or an even shorter denim skirt. With no makeup or with her hair pulled back and held by a band, Jessica Marin was still gorgeous enough to make some men stammer when speaking.

  She had driven around town in the early evening, waiving to some familiar faces. It was 7:59, nearly closing time for the town’s one grocery, but she got in the door as the owner, Helen Franks, was turning the sign to “Closed”.

  After getting a hug from the older woman who had frequently been her babysitter and helped her husband farm before buying the store, Jessica paid for the groceries that had been delivered to the family farmhouse earlier in the day. Helen had knowledge of which rock under which a key was hidden, and Jessica suggested that the delivery boy could be trusted with entrance to the old house. It was not much of a trek, as the store was in sight of the house. The Marin farm bordered the town, and the house was just forty feet from the edge of the property and across the road from the Walters home and the complicated memories of the fellow who grew up there.

  Jessica asked if she could stop by and visit Helen in the morning, then drove on to her house. As she pulled up in front of the white, two-story home, she was filled with conflicting sadness and contentment. She loved the home, but knew that it was empty.