His Little Runaway (4 page)

“I also need to tell you,” he said gently, “what will happen if you don’t respect me.”

The crease in her brow deepened. “You’ll turn me in, right?”

“No.” Wes shook his head. “I don’t believe in that kind of discipline.”

Ashley’s eyes went so wide that the crease disappeared completely. “
Discipline
? Who said anything about
discipline
?”

“Actually,” Wes said, “we’ve been talking about discipline this whole time. Discipline is simply teaching someone to respect her boundaries and other people’s boundaries. Turning you in wouldn’t set good boundaries, and it wouldn’t teach you anything.”

In her eyes Wes could see that, as he had suspected it might, the word
discipline
had a special, hidden meaning for her. Ashley was indeed thinking of what he meant, but hoping with at least half her heart that she had got it wrong. She shook her head slightly, perhaps unconsciously.

“In a word, Ashley, I believe in
old-fashioned
discipline for young women.”

A startled little noise escaped her, like the tiny yelp of a puppy. The shaking of her head became clearly conscious and more pronounced.

“I may as well say,” Wes continued, “that for spoiled brats I also believe in returning a girl to younger way of life. You grew up without a firm hand to guide you. To help you learn, you’re going to become a little girl—a little lady—again, here in my house. You will respect me as your daddy, and call me
daddy
or
sir
,
the way a well brought up young lady does.”

Ashley’s mouth hung open again. Could Wes hear that her breathing had quickened slightly?

“And, Ashley, can you tell me what happens to little ladies who misbehave?”

Her head had poised mid-shake as Wes delivered the news about the younger way of life, but now it shook violently again.

“I’m completely sure, young lady, that you do know. You’ve already earned your first consequences for the lying and the disrespect, but I’m sure you don’t want to make it worse by pretending you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“Please, no,” she whispered.

“Call me
sir
,” Wesley said sternly. “I won’t make you call me
daddy
until you’re ready.”

“Please… sir… no. I can… I mean, like, I’ll do what you tell me. I promise.”

“I hope you will, honey. But you have to decide right now whether you’re going to agree to my conditions. If you do choose to stay, you’re going to have your first spanking right after you make this decision. I’ll send you into the bedroom to think about it and, if you decide to stay, you’ll get changed for your punishment, then come back out here and I’ll take you over my knee.”

“Can’t we… I mean, can’t we…” Ashley swallowed hard, clearly fighting for composure. “Can’t we say that I’ll, you know, do what you say from now on, and we can, like, start now?”

Wes looked back at her levelly. “No.”

Her face crumpled. “Please, sir!” Her hands clenched and unclenched in little fists.

Wes couldn’t resist: he reached out his own right hand and opened it, took her left gently inside. “I know you’re scared, honey. Have you ever been spanked before, at home?”

She shook her head as a tear trickled down her cheek. Wes could already tell that the very idea of being held accountable this way had started to produce beneficial effects.

“Well, it’s going to hurt, and you’re going to be one sorry little girl, but I promise it’s going to make you feel better afterward.”

Ashley bit her lip. “How?”

“You’ll feel more secure, knowing you have real boundaries now. That’s the way discipline works. The threat can’t do it all on its own, especially when you’ve already lied to me and used bad language. I have to make it completely clear to you that while you’re with me you will make better choices about your behavior, or you will pay the price, on your bare bottom.”

Her eyes went wide again. “Bare? No. Forget it.”

“Bare-bottom discipline is what young ladies get when they’re disrespectful, in an old-fashioned home. Knowing that your daddy won’t hesitate to take down your panties to punish you will make you think twice about your conduct from here on in.”

“But…”

“There are no buts about this, Ashley, except the one that’s going to be bare when you go over my knee.” Wes spoke sternly now. “Go ahead back into the bedroom. Put on my t-shirt again, with nothing under it. I’ll be waiting for you in the living room to spank you.”

She had lowered her eyes to her hand, held in his.

“Unless,” Wes continued, knowing he needed to offer her a real alternative, “you want to take your chances on your own. I’ll drive you to a gas station, and you can call your parents.”

She looked up at him sharply. She tried to pull her hand away but Wes held it for a moment, looking into her eyes, before he let it drop. When he did, though, she didn’t withdraw it fully, but left it there, next to her plate on the table, as if in hope that he would take it again in his.

She said very softly, “Does it really have to be on my bare bottom?”

Wes thought he could hear in her words that a reluctant fascination with the idea had begun to take hold. Ashley spoke as if she almost wanted him to say what he did indeed say.

“Yes, honey, I have to punish you that way. And if you’re very disrespectful, you’ll get an old-fashioned switching.”

“A what?” she asked in horror.

“A switching, honey. You’ll have to go out into the woods and cut a branch and bring it to me so I can whip you with it. It’s the old-fashioned way to make sure a girl remembers her manners.”

“You wouldn’t really do that, would you?” she pleaded.

“I would only switch you if you really needed it, but, yes, I would. A girl who’s had a switching has a sore bottom to remind her for a few days, and sometimes that’s what it takes.”

Now Ashley was definitely breathing a good deal harder.

“Time to get changed. If you’re going to stay, I want you back here in the t-shirt, ready for your spanking. If not, you can go ahead and come back wearing your own clothes. You can take as long as you want to make up your mind.”

Chapter Five

Ashley stayed in the bedroom, looking at Wes’ t-shirt, for a long time. What her mind couldn’t seem to get past was the difference between the horrible thing the warden had said about the paddle in his office, about how he didn’t mind tanning a girl’s hide, and what Wes had said.

Nothing in her heart or head had felt the slightest fascination or interest in bending over the warden’s desk so that he could take down her underwear and swat her with a wooden thing that had holes to make it hit harder. Nothing.

But… Wes.
Take you over my knee.

She didn’t want it. No, of course she didn’t want it.

But she did want to stay with him, and the things he said about discipline… if you took away the spanking, and the fear of the spanking, Ashley had to admit that she couldn’t argue with him in good faith. She
was
spoiled. If she hadn’t been so spoiled, she probably wouldn’t have been at the party, doing the underage drinking that all her spoiled friends did. She wouldn’t have crashed into the police car, and she wouldn’t have found herself sent to Tall Oaks.

In juvie, that spoiled part of her had become her defense against the horrors of the place: Westchester pride, seeing her through. Acting respectful enough to get by, but not
really
respectful. Certainly not respectful the way it seemed Wes had decided he would try to get Ashley to act. She had come to the conclusion, without doing any reasoning along the way, that she had formed her character—no, that Tall Oaks had formed her character. For better or worse, she had her pride, and she would keep it even after she left juvie. The world had done her an injustice in return for a youthful mistake with the drinking and driving, and Ashley Lewis would face the world with disdain and a hardened exterior that could see her through.

She would be a spoiled brat forever.

Ashley gazed down at the t-shirt, which had the name of what might be Wes’ college on the breast, though she didn’t recognize the name. He probably came from the Midwest and had gone to one of
those
colleges. But he had gone to college—she could tell, even if the t-shirt were somehow not from his own college, or not from a college at all. Ashley didn’t think all Navy SEALs went to college, but she knew a lot of them did, and more important, the way Wes spoke demonstrated absolutely that despite the rough-hewn appearance and the homemade furniture, he had had a good education even by the standards of Westchester.

Over my knee.
Why the hell was she thinking about his education when the choice in front of her, whether to put on the t-shirt—with no panties—or simply walk out of the room and out of his life as she was, demanded making. He had said she could have as much time as she needed. Suddenly she wished he hadn’t said that, wished he had said she could have five minutes, wished those five minutes were up now, and he was opening the door without knocking, telling her that if she wouldn’t put on the t-shirt he would just take down her jeans and panties right there and give her the bare-bottom discipline she needed without further ceremony.

Did she want to make sure the man who spanked her when she misbehaved—who planned to treat her like a little girl in order to bring her back up properly—had the necessary academic credentials? Despite everything, the thought made her smile.

She had no choice, though, really, did she? She would never find another person to help her, or a better place to hide. Strange as it seemed, facing her first spanking by a man she had known for only a few hours, Ashley knew how lucky she had gotten. Trying not to think about what would happen when she returned to the living room, she started to tug her own blue t-shirt over her head.

Ashley took off her panties last, after she had dropped Wes’ much bigger shirt over her head. She faced the door to the living room for a few seconds, trying to work up the courage to shed her last vestige of pride. How could she, of her own free will, pull down her own underwear in order that a man could punish her the way naughty little girls are punished? To have to get ready for her spanking, and acknowledge Wes’ right to discipline her the old-fashioned way, seemed at that moment a terrible loss of everything Ashley had tried to hold onto so tightly for the last eighteen months.

It would hurt so much. Wes’ hand, grasping hers gently at the table, seemed the size of a dinner plate. And he would pull up the t-shirt now and bring that hand down so hard on her poor bottom. Over and over, until Ashley couldn’t sit down, because she had behaved badly and gotten what she deserved.

She turned from the door, as if she didn’t want him to see her taking off her panties through the door somehow, from the front where he might catch a little flash of something he shouldn’t see. Something he
definitely
shouldn’t see, because… well, he shouldn’t.

She reached under the t-shirt and hooked her thumbs into the waistband. They came down in a tangle over her hips, and she stepped awkwardly out of them. She laid them on the bed and turned quickly away toward the door.

When she emerged into the living room, she found Wes sitting on a sturdy straight-backed wooden chair that he had set in the middle of the room, directly across from the bedroom door.
No arms
,
she thought.
So I can lay myself over his lap.

He looked straight into Ashley’s eyes and patted his right thigh. “Come here, young lady,” he said surprisingly gently. “Stand next to me here, and then lay yourself down for your spanking.”

Ashley took a step forward and then froze. An emotion she hadn’t expected rose in her chest: supplication—hope that the person in charge might hear a plea for mercy.

“Please, sir,” she said in a soft voice she hadn’t even known she possessed. “It’s my first time.”

Wes smiled in a kind, caring way whose effect on her took her by surprise. She felt her mouth turn up in a classic little-girl pout, and her heart started to beat very fast.

“I know, honey,” he said in the same gentle voice. “I need to teach you your lesson, but I promise that I won’t punish you more severely than will help you behave yourself. I’m going to turn your backside a nice bright red, because that’s what you earned, but once we have this first punishment out of the way I think you’ll understand much better why I’m taking you in hand like this.”

Taking you in hand.
Ashley swallowed hard, breathed in and out with two short pants, started to move forward in tiny steps.

“Hurry up, honey,” Wes said. “Let’s get this over with. Over my lap like a good girl, now.”

He patted his thigh again. Ashley tried to speed up, but her body didn’t want to obey her. She had never felt anything like the mix of dread and hope that now seemed to course through her body, making her knees grow weak and her heart race.

Wes didn’t speak again, but left her to move, unable now to meet his eyes, to his right side. She looked down at his enormous, sinewy thighs, covered in faded denim. How could she lay herself down of her own volition?

He helped her, though. She jumped as she felt his arm around her waist, but she felt grateful, too, for this little bit of guidance: he tugged, and she did bend, did feel her own thighs, scantily clad in the thin cotton of the t-shirt, come up against his.

“Reach forward and take the legs of the chair in your hands, Ashley,” he said, and now she could feel the way his deep voice seemed to make his whole body and even the chair itself rumble. “That will help you keep your butt nice and high for me.”

“What?” she whispered, truly mystified as to what he meant. She remained just slightly bent over, with Wes’ arm still around her waist.

“A girl who’s being punished needs to present her backside respectfully to her daddy. That shows she understands he’s spanking her for her own good.”

Ashley bit her lip. The notion seemed to make sense on some level, but her mind rebelled against it.