“I don’t have a lecture until eleven,” I defend myself.
“That is beside the point. While you are in my house, Beth, you will do as I tell you. Are you able to do this or not?”
“I…yes. I will. I can. I’m sorry. Sir.” I shake my fringe winningly into my eyes, praying that he will now lighten up and fry me a rasher. He called me Beth! That has to be a good sign, doesn’t it?
“We shall see,” he says contemplatively. “I’m going to make my point completely clear, Beth.” He stands and I quiver. Something bad is going to happen. “Bend over the kitchen chair, Beth, with your palms flat on the seat.”
Wild mute appeal pours from my eyes but he isn’t buying. He takes a wooden spatula from a hook over the granite work surface. Oooooh no. He makes an impatient gesture to me, noting that I am still upright, and I plunge forward into the rather compromising position he has outlined.
I don’t like being bent like this with my arse in the air; I feel the humiliation of my plight keenly, and never more so than when Sinclair swishes up behind me and pulls my leggings down around my knees. Thank Christ I didn’t wear a thong today.
“I think we’ll have a stroke for every minute I was made to wait, Beth,” says Sinclair calmly. “That makes twenty four. A good round dozen for each cheek.”
I hold my breath, waiting for the onslaught to commence. The first stroke brings it shuddering out in a long squeal as the flat wooden end makes a loud whapping noise on my backside.
“That really hurts!” I object.
“Yes,” he says equably, slamming on the second. Incipient heat radiates symmetrically through both hemispheres of my behind and I’m not quite sure I can handle another twenty two strokes. Sinclair accompanies the hard paddling with an encomium against the perils of late rising and sloth, telling me that I will be getting up no later than seven thirty from now on unless I want to greet every day in this painful manner.
When eventually the twenty fourth stinger is landed, I am gripping the chair so tightly my knuckles are white, chewing my lip to avoid the mortification of crying out too much and amazed at how hot it is possible for a bottom to get without actually catching fire.
Sinclair replaces the horrid thing on its hook – can’t push fried eggs around a pan with it now without having an inevitable mental association – and drawls, “Lesson learned?”
“Yes, Sir,” I quiver. No more lie-ins for me. Boo hoo.
I have only just pulled the leggings over my throbbing bum, wincing as the elastic brushes the tender flesh, when a hard-faced woman of fifty or so materialises in the room.
“Ah, Nerys,” says Sinclair genially. “Good morning. I need to introduce my new lodger to you. Beth, this is Nerys, my housekeeper. Nerys, this is Beth, who is staying in my guest bedroom for the time being.”
“Hi,” I say, plastering an ingratiating smile on my flushed face, wondering how much of what just happened she might have heard.
“Hello,” she says coldly in a strong Welsh accent.
“Please let me know, Nerys, if any of Beth’s habits inconvenience you, or cause a problem. I will deal with it.”
“I will,” says Nerys. “I’ll start with the bathroom if I may.”
Sinclair inclines his head graciously, like a bloody feudal lord. “Thank you,” he intones. “I really ought to get on now.”
Nerys leaves the room and Sinclair honours me with a quick pep talk before leaving for the university. “If I were you, Beth, I’d spend these unaccustomed morning hours making a start on my Laclos essay. My spare key is here; take care of it. I expect any room you use to be left exactly as you found it; Nerys will let me know if anything is out of place.”
He moves out to the hallway, sorting through some papers on a table and putting them in his briefcase. I follow him, willing him to bugger off so I can go back to bed. Or perhaps I could nip over to Cliveden; give Emily a knock and get eggs on toast in the White Rose Café.
“I want you back here by seven,” he says, heading for the door.
“Seven?” I blurt. “Why?”
“Dinner,” he says, raising an eyebrow. “You’re cooking.”
“I’m…not!” I hiccup, aghast, but he is out of the door before my dismay registers on his dial.
*
So what to do now? I am seriously discombobulated by the whole dinner thing. I fan my essay notes out on the living room floor but there is no way I can concentrate on fictional seductions when the real-life version is wedged at the forefront of my mind. Besides, the fierce sting of my wakey-wakey spanking has settled into a somewhat pleasurable warm throb, spreading down below in a way that is tempting me back to bed for some, er, self-catering.
But that is out of the question with that pinch-faced harridan clattering around the place. I can just imagine her reporting back to Sinclair. Your lodger spent the morning masturbating. It was very inconvenient, I couldn’t get in to change the bedding. Shudder. Anyway, I have a candlelight supper to arrange. Oysters, champagne, lots of whipped cream. Maybe some new underwear. Is he a stockings and suspenders man, I wonder? I think he is.
I compromise on Sinclair’s suggestion of a morning of study; I do indeed go to the library, but my perusal is of recipes rather than literary commentaries. Then I nip over to Emily’s and borrow fifty quid which I spend with delirious ease in Agent Provocateur on an eau-de-nil and black tulle bra and knicker set. The knickers are dead cool, with a burlesque-esque fountain of frills and suspender straps. I leave the shop relieved that I resisted the temptation of nipple tassles and open crotches. Maybe next week…