Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 73013 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 365(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73013 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 365(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
“Look, Dee,” Rick said, stepping toward me, his arms open. “Come here. Let me hug you while I explain.”
I shook my head slowly, looking into his face, seeing his resolution, clutching my bottom-cheeks, backing up until I felt my arms make contact with the wall opposite the bed. To my dismay and confusion, when I tightened my fingers behind me and felt the taut flesh through the denim and my cotton panties, the tension there awoke the same trembling, fluttery, terribly embarrassing feeling I knew from my naughty cuddling with Rick during our courtship.
A wave of humiliated heat swept through my body at the realization, along with the defiant resolution never to let Rick know, even if we did stay married. I shook my head more firmly, in a fruitless attempt to rid my brain of the thought.
Rick took a deep breath through his nose, his broad shoulders rising in his white Oxford shirt. He let it out, his nostrils flaring a little with the force of the air. I felt my face crumple at the effect my husband’s sheer physical presence had on me.
Sir. He told me to call him sir. How… how could I…?
And yet part of me knew, and the knowledge sent another hot blush to my cheeks.
I’ll never tell.
“Have it your way,” Rick said, slowly and evenly. “Here’s the thing. I gave Selecta permission to analyze your online behavior, and I filled out a form for the New Modesty where I described what happened on our honeymoon, and—”
“What?” I demanded. “You—”
Rick put his hands up. “It was all anonymous, Dee. And they do the data-scrape anonymously, too. Nobody can match the data to a particular person. The agents—Miss Haddon and Miss Perth—for example… they just know that we’re here to go to a New Modesty community, and they know that… well…”
I bit my lip at the endearing hesitation. I could see in Rick’s face and hear in his voice that he loved me and wanted us to be happy, despite his apparently having decided that our happiness lay in this insane direction. As if at the sight of my troubled face, his own grew more determined.
“They know that often a young wife traveling with the Inquirers’ Program needs to learn a lesson along the way. They know that that kind of young wife—like you, Mandy—sometimes needs a whipping, even if she doesn’t know it.”
CHAPTER 9
Mandy
“But…” I tried again, getting no further than I had before.
“Get the pillows and put them in the middle of the bed, Dee,” Rick said. “Or this is going to get a lot worse, and you’re not going to sit comfortably on the plane.”
I pressed myself further back, clutching my backside more firmly and feeling another unwelcome jolt of arousal at the sensation.
You’re not going to sit comfortably.
The words and the physical sensation of my hands on the seat of my jeans… and the fear and the… the…
Need.
What the fuck is wrong with me?
I gave a tiny, humiliating whimper through my bitten lip. I couldn’t understand it, and I didn’t want to: the way my hands behind me, seeking to defend me from this loony idea my husband had of disciplining me the ‘old-fashioned way,’ seemed to change how I thought about the horrible notion. Something about the physical sensation… the way it tightened my jeans in front when my fingers tightened around my bottom-cheeks in back…
Need.
I heard Heather Franklin give another wailing cry as her husband taught her her own awful lesson in wifely obedience. What implement had John Franklin chosen? The wooden paddle? The cane? His belt?
Why had my mind even gone there?
“Please… Ricky…”
The look in his eye brought a sob of fear from deep in my chest. Then I said it, without knowing why but knowing that I had to. That I had no choice.
“Sir.”
My whole body seemed to fill with warmth at the little smile with which my husband responded. Some of that heat came from embarrassment. Some came from the love for him I knew I couldn’t let go of even if we split up because we just couldn’t make it work.
And some came from the other place.
Need.
I chewed on my lower lip, looking into Rick’s eyes. He looked back, his face radiating a confidence and a dominance I hadn’t thought I would ever want to see there when he looked at me.
“Please,” I whispered, as another distant sobbing cry came from the Franklins’ private room. My knees wobbled under me. “Just your hand? Over… over my jeans?”
Rick tilted his chin toward me, his eyes taking in every inch of me, it felt like.
“It’s my first time,” I whispered. The words seemed to come from some place deep inside I hadn’t ever wanted to admit was there. Part of me saw how showing that part of myself would make my husband think I had accepted this insane idea about old-fashioned family discipline.