He continued to swat her vigorously as he spoke, and Tess began to long for the improbable protection of her tiny panties. At least it would be something between her blazing bottom and his leathery palm. “I can’t imagine why you would be so careless. Your inspection sticker was almost a year out of date! Your registration sticker lapsed six months ago. What if you were stopped by a cop?”
Should she tell him that she’d already been there, done that? Hell no, she answered herself quietly within her own mind. What he didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her and besides, how could she stop crying long enough to tell her that the nice officer had given her two weeks to get whatever needed to be done to her car and get it inspected. He’d even gone the extra mile and said that if she did it within that timeframe, and brought him proof of it, he would tear up the ticket.
That was over three months ago, of course. She had been pouring every cent back into the shop, and didn’t plan to spare any money towards fixing up the car until she absolutely had to – that would be when she turned the key and it refused to start. Then she would put money into her transportation, and not a second before.
Now, though, as her poor butt became redder and redder from his tender ministrations, she knew that those days were gone. Even if she ended up owing him a partnership in her shop, she was going to do whatever she needed to avoid ending up back here.
Those vows were wholeheartedly reinforced when he took a step back and to the side of her, and she heard the tinkling of a belt buckle being loosened. Her heart skipped a beat.
He was going to take his belt to her backside! She was already sobbing and crying and begging just from his hand – how was she ever going to survive being flailed by that well-worn strip of leather?
Sean wasn’t of a mind to give her time to dwell on that question. There was an unmistakable sound as the belt slid through its loops. In one motion, he doubled it and brought it down across the backs of her thighs, a place to which he had heretofore paid little attention.
Tess couldn’t help it. She reared up, threw her head back and let loose a long, loud scream that she was sure his neighbors could hear, even though his closest was a mile away. It was the only time Sean had wavered during one of her punishments, wondering if, perhaps, he was being too hard on her. Then he remembered that she had repeatedly passed him every morning on those bald tires, doing at least seventy-five in a fifty mile-an-hour zone. Resolutely, he striped her again with the leather, this time diagonally across her bottom, so that any subsequent strokes would crisscross.
He made sure that there were plenty more; his belt again and again sliced through the air, striping her bottom and thighs. Slowly, her mind began to travel; she had come to a place beyond the point of beyond-control, then beyond that; touching down at a place of complete submission. Tess was helpless to stop him and didn’t even want to. Through the agony of the stinging blows of the belt she felt Sean’s love and caring. He was doing what he was doing to keep her safe, and in spite of the discomfort, Tess was lifting her bottom up to meet the blows now, screaming for forgiveness with each one but not even trying to fight.
When Sean realized this, he literally threw the belt away, not caring whether it marred his babied hardwood floors. Reaching down, he pulled her into his arms, tucking her head against his neck as he walked down the hall into his bedroom to lay her, with infinite gentleness, down onto his big bed. He refused to let go of her as he twisted back to grab a box of Kleenex off the nightstand, not even offering it to her but taking several out himself and dabbing her face, then holding one up to her nose so that she could blow. When her face was clean and she had begun to recover, he stretched his legs out and pulled her on top of him, figuring she wouldn’t want to be sitting or even leaning on that backside for quite some time.
“We have put this matter to rest,” he said gently. “I won’t say another word to you about this unless I see that you’re not taking care of your car again. Regardless of where we go together – whether we’re together forever or you decide you hate my guts tomorrow – you are always to come to me with any mechanical problems. I will take care of it. That’s something I always can and will do for you, because I always want to know that you’re safe.”
“What if I can’t afford to pay you?” Tess could see that his jaw was already flexing, but asked anyway. It was a very pertinent question, as far as she was concerned.
“Then we’ll get you on a convenient payment plan and you’ll pay me what you can, when you can, just like I said. And no more than that, understand?”
“Yes, Sir.” The words just fell out of her mouth, and she didn’t like that at all. He was looking entirely too self-satisfied about it, but then he’d been a military officer. He was used to people addressing him that way. Although she had no interest in following in their footsteps, it just seemed somehow right in this situation.
“That’s what I like to hear,” he breathed as he melded their lips together.
Tess knew she should raise some sort of objection – Lord knows she didn’t want him to think that she was always going to address him as “Sir” – but the taste and
