The Locket Read online

  “He’s in there,” she said unnecessarily, because the closer they drew to the wide-open barn doors, the more clearly they heard what could only be described as plaintive weeping. That big, huge, scary-looking man was sitting on the ground where she had whacked him, holding his head in both hands and sobbing. Calling for his mother even, between blubbery sniffles and wails.

  “Braden?” Frozen in the open doorway, Robert stared at him before swinging around to fix Kylie with a look that was equal parts surprise and horror. “What did you do to him?”

  His gaze fell to the axe handle in her hand at the same time that Braden, hearing his voice, lifted his head from his hands and cried, “Robert! Robert, she h-hit my h-head!”

  “Damn right I did!” Kylie stepped out from behind Robert only just long enough to brandish the axe handle threateningly. “I’ll do it again, too! In a heartbeat!”

  Braden covered his head with both arms and shrieked, high-pitched and warbling, sounding almost like a little girl.

  “Nobody’s going to hit you, buddy,” Robert instantly soothed, but Braden was already braying for his mother again.

  Kylie’s jaw dropped. “The hell you say!”

  Catching hold of her arm, Robert dragged her off to one side, out of sight of the sobbing and almost hysterical man. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “What’s the matter with me? What’s the matter with you!” She yanked twice at her imprisoned arm before planting a hand against his chest, both pushing and pulling to finally win her freedom. She rubbed where he’d gripped her, but stopped long enough to wrench her weapon out of easy reach when he tried to take it from her. “Are you crazy? What? What?!”

  Robert stopped chasing after the axe and gave her a look that was almost tired. “You don’t need that.”

  “That man tried to rape me!”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “He was taking off his clothes!”

  “Yeah, he’s real proud of that appendix scar.”

  Kylie startled, staring at first Robert, and then the barn, and then finally at the back of her hand where a tiny white line had marred her since childhood.

  “Look, I’m sorry.” Robert tried again to disarm her, but Kylie had been scared too badly to want to relax just yet. She retreated from him yet again, twisting her body to put herself between the axe handle and him, frowning right back at him when he frowned at her. “I should have warned you. Braden comes over every couple weeks. He’s…not quite right…upstairs.”

  “He was taking off his clothes,” she snapped. “What was I supposed to think?” Out of the corner of her eye, Kylie glimpsed movement and turned in time to see Braden peeking at her from around the edge of the barn’s sliding door. Her fear might have given way, but her anger was still there, surging just under the surface of her skin. Babe Ruth she was not, but she still brandished that axe handle menacingly, and he took off running, his coverall clasps still thrown over his shoulders and bouncing off his heels, crying for his mother all the way back to the road.

  Robert snatched the axe from her hands while her back was turned.

  “Hey!”

  “He’s slow, I said,” he snapped back at her. “I know he looks big, but the man’s got the mind of a five-year-old.”

  “And the body of a Dallas linebacker! He was taking off his pants,” she repeated. “You’re damn right I hit him in the head. He had me pinned against the cider press, for Christ’s sa—”

  She caught herself, but too late. What little bit of sympathy was in his eyes vanished behind the dark disapproval that instantly filtered down through his features.

  “The last time made that little of an impression on you, did it?”

  “I-I didn’t mean to say that.” Kylie took an instant step back when he tossed the axe handle off in the general direction of the barn, not bothering even to see where it landed. She backed away, her empty hands braced against the air. “Honest to G—Pete! Pete! I-I didn’t m-m-mean to…It-It-It just…popped out of me.”

  “Apparently, it’s going to take more than one round before you start paying attention to what comes ‘popping’ out of your mouth.”

  When he took off his belt, Kylie fell all over her own feet, lurching backwards to evade his reaching arm. She took off running through the tall grass, following the half-flattened path Braden had left in his wake, all the way up to the house. Robert called after her once, but the way he snapped her name put wings on her feet. She took the porch steps two at a time, and the screen door slapped the wall from the force with which she threw it open. It bounced against the threshold behind her and she was halfway up the stairs to her bedroom before it banged shut for the last and final time.

  Her bedroom still had no locks, so she pressed her body against it, panting, her heart racing, her legs wobbling and weak and not just because of that mad-dash run up from the barn. How intent was Robert going to be about spanking her again? How could she possibly keep him out of here? And was he really going to use the belt? Oh please, not the belt!

  The sound of his footsteps entering the house below sent an ominous shiver up her already shaky legs. He came unerringly to the bottom of the steps and then slowly up them, the heavy sound of his boots crossing the short hall and coming straight to her door. Kylie was already on the verge of tears even as she braced her knees, flattening her back to the wood.

  “Please go away!” she cried, but the knob turned, and when Robert pushed, he was stronger and so inside he came.

  She couldn’t help it, a thrill that was pure unadulterated panic cascaded through her until it came pouring out her mouth as a horrified shriek. His head and shoulders and then one arm came around the side of the door to grab her by the arm.

  “Come here,” he said, prying her off the door.

  “No!” She balked, bracing her legs against the floor to keep from being dragged toward the bed and sliding uselessly in that direction anyway when he pulled her. In that moment, the panic in her voice sounded almost exactly like Braden, crumpled in the dirt of the barn, holding his head in his huge, square hands and sobbing for his mother. “You can’t, Robert! You can’t! You don’t—” ‘have the right’ became a moot point when he bodily picked her up under one arm and lugged her, kicking and flailing, to the foot of her own bed. “I didn’t mean to! Please, Robert! I was scared!”

  “You were mad,” he corrected, dropping the coil of his doubled-up belt on the comforter, and sat down. Even struggling and squirming and fighting as hard as she could, he still wrestled her across one broad knee, clamping her legs between the vise of his thighs to still her kicking. Her wail was one of defeat when he captured each of her wrists in turn and pinning them at the small of her back. “This isn’t about what you did to Braden anyway, and you know it.”

  Kylie stiffened when she felt that first strong tug at the back of her polkadot dress. “Oh nonoNo!”

  But with one last tug of ‘yes’, her dress came free from under the prison of his restraining leg and up it went, revealing the vulnerable curve of her already clenching buttocks. He tucked the folds under the cross of her own captured wrists, ensuring they stayed up and out of his way.

  “Oh please, please, please,” she wept when his fingers hooked the elastic of her underwear. The faint floral pattern on the comforter blurring as her eyes flooded with unshed tears. Her whole body tensed as he peeled that thin cotton barrier away, baring her bottom completely though she squeezed her thighs together in the most useless attempt to keep them up.

  Her tears spilled free, the last bastion of defense that she had, if only he weren’t so stalwart and utterly immune to them. Her panic surged when she felt the flat of his hand come to rest on the curve of her right bottom cheek and she cringed, crying out a confusion of mewling pleas for him not to use his belt and desperate curses because oh shit, oh shit, please no, there was just no way she could survive a second dose of that fire and laving agony on her bare skin.

  That combination of frantic tears an
d babbling made her breathless, and all her attention was so fixed and focused on the touch of his bare hand that she almost didn’t hear Robert speaking.

  “Did you hear what I said?” he asked, and Kylie sucked a frightened breath, twisting her head back so she could look at him. “We’re laying down a whole new set of house rules.”

  She released her pent-in breath and nodded. She blinked to clear the tears enough to see again, latching onto the sound of his voice like a drowning man catching hold of a lifeline. If he was talking, then he wasn’t spanking, and that was a miraculous reprieve. Her pinned hands flexed once, clawing at the empty air as if she could physically hang onto that.

  “Okay,” she gasped, hiccupping each breath, hardly able to suck them in past the tight lump of panic in her throat. “Okay, okay. New rules.”

  “No more cussing. At all. Period. Since you swear as often as you breathe and because I know this is going to be the hardest rule for you not to break, I’m willing to wean you off the habit gradually. You can have five mistakes a week, but six will have you breathing bubbles and seven gets you a hot butt. Now, are you hearing me?”

  She nodded, all of her focus so intently fixed on his voice that she didn’t dare try to speak.

  “Repeat what I said so I’ll know you understand.”

  “No more swearing,” she obediently echoed. “Mouth washed out after five words and spanked after six. But please not with the belt, Robert, please—”

  Her plea dissolved back into tears and his voice rose up back over hers, firm in tone, unyielding, “Blasphemy is not forgiven and will end with the belt each and every time.”

  “Please, I can’t! I’ll never say it again, Robert, I swear it. Please just this once. Let me go just this once and I’ll never say it again. I’ll cut out my own tongue before I say it again.”

  “Rule number two: You are never going to make me chase you again. In fact, after this not only are you going to accept you’ve got a whipping coming, but you’re going to ask me to give it to you.”

  Kylie caught her breath all over again. She held it until her head began to pound, certain that she had misunderstood him.

  “Now, did you understand that?”

  She haltingly shook her head. “But…but what if I don’t want a spanking?”

  “I don’t expect you to ever want one. What I do expect is for you to take responsibility for your actions, especially when you make a mistake. And since this seems to be a point of contention for you, from here on out when you break the rules, like you did today, I expect you to give me the right to correct you for it.”

  “H-h—” Her voice caught in her throat and she had to try again. “How?” She shook her head. “I-I can’t!”

  “You know how I feel about your using God to curse by.”

  Kylie began to cry all over again. “I didn’t mean to. It just slipped out.”

  “But you knew better, and you said it anyway. Because you were angry and you didn’t feel like controlling your language, isn’t that right?”

  The comforter was one gigantic blue squiggle, and in the center of her vision, that ugly brown coil of his belt. That belt that was going to cut fire across her bare backside until she was absolutely howling from the hurt of it. Her chin began to quiver and her shoulders shook. “Please, Robert,” she tried again, defeated. “Please not hard. Don’t spank me hard.”

  He didn’t answer her. He only repeated, “Isn’t that right?”

  Cringing all over again, Kylie nodded. “Please, don’t use the belt…”

  “And so the only reason you ran was because you knew you were in the wrong and didn’t want to accept the consequences of your actions. Isn’t that right?”

  Kylie keened through gritted teeth. Every nerve inside her so fixated on the coming pain that she could almost feel the heat of the fire already. She writhed on his knee, unable to get away, impossible to hold still. “Not hard. Not hard!” She tucked in, her bottom clenching tight when she felt his open palm left the curve of her trembling nethers. “Please not hard, please!”

  The word ended in a yelp because, taking her plea as acquiescence, when his hand came cracking down, it struck the center of her right bottom cheek incredibly hard indeed. Her legs couldn’t kick, her hands couldn’t cover and protect no matter how her fingers clawed and scratched to try. All Kylie could do was cry out, and then just plain cry. And of that she did plenty, especially when, not satisfied with lighting his burning, aching fire in the full round flesh of her bottom, he dropped his painful attentions to the tops of her defenseless thighs.

  “I’m sorry!” she wailed. “I’m sorry! I’m sor-ree! Please!”

  Her tears must have garbled the words, because it was a hot and torturous eternity before he accepted her remorse and his untiring arm fell for the last and final time. By then, Kylie really was sorry. Sorry for what she’d said, and sorry that she’d run away. But most of all, she was really, really sorry for thinking any room in the house of a dominant man to be a safe place to run to.

  At least he hadn’t used his belt. But as far as consolations went, that was a very small one.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Kylie stood in the corner, the back of her dress pinned up around her waist, facing the join of the country-papered walls with her hands laced behind her head and her bare bottom on full and bright-red display. She did her level best not to move, since moving—as she had quite painfully discovered—was a no-no. So was stamping her feet and bouncing in place, and rubbing…oh now, rubbing was an absolute no-no, as she’d learned early on when one rueful touch of her hand had resulted in a perfunctory up-ending while Robert’s broad right hand briskly rekindled the bonfire back under her skin. He couldn’t have given her more than ten or twelve good swats, and yet it was enough to leave her squirming and dancing for nearly five full minutes before the No-No rules went back into effect.

  “Get back in position and hold it,” Robert told her. Stern, unsmiling, implacable Robert, who sat at the foot of her bed and stayed there, watching her stoically to make sure she obeyed.

  So there Kylie stood, knees locked so she wouldn’t be tempted to bounce or squirm or do any of those pitifully pointless motions that hadn’t successfully thrown the hurt and burn off her bottom anyway. And she kept her hands folded behind her head, a small fistful of hair in each grip to keep from giving in to the temptation to cup, rub and soothe away the fire.

  There wasn’t a clock anywhere in the room, but at some magical point, Robert stood up and walked to the door. “Don’t move.”

  That ever-present temptation to rub surged the instant he disappeared beyond the threshold, but Kylie didn’t so much as twitch a muscle. That belt of his still lay coiled where he’d left it, a brown and weathered snake against the blue-blossomed crochet of the bedspread. Itching between her shoulderblades was the horrible, niggling fear that, despite the spankings he’d already given her, and despite all the burning and hurt pulsing deep down in the flesh of her already lividly-colored nethers, Robert might not consider them done yet.

  Her bottom sure felt done to her. Leaning her forehead against the wall, Kylie sniffled pitifully. Oh yeah, it couldn’t possibly get any more done, and she tightened her fingers in her hair before the urge to reach down and feel the blistering damage once again overcame her.

  A few minutes later, she heard Robert’s heavy footsteps coming back down the hall. He reappeared, a bar of soap in his hand. He not only held it up to her mouth for her, but he’d already wet it, getting the outside good and slimy.

  “Open,” he said. Not angry, not unkind, and certainly not about to yield no matter what she might try to dissuade him.

  Blinking back a whole new onslaught of tears, Kylie cringed even as she tremblingly opened her mouth.

  “Wider.” He waited until she was gaping as wide as she could before pressing the soap in past her lips. He seated it firmly into her mouth, giving her tongue no space to retreat and evade the horrible taste. “Bite.”


  With utmost reluctance, Kylie forced her jaw closed around the bar. The chemical bitterness made her gag, and she instantly bent forward to keep the flavor from running down her throat. As it was, it spread from tastebud to tastebud until all corners of her mouth were well and truly penetrated. It was in her saliva, between her teeth and running down her chin because she’d rather drool than swallow. That’s how Robert left her, returning to his perch at the foot of her bed, hands folded patiently in his lap as he waited.

  One minute bled into a small eternity of wheezing, gagging, soapy misery. Long before it was over, she lost the battle against her tears, which made her salivate even more, which also made her cry harder, until his voice cut through the cloying bitterness and said, “You can rinse your mouth now.”

  With the back of her dress pinned up and with folds of black and white polkadot fabric framing her cheery-red cheeks, Kylie ran all the way downstairs and out onto the back porch. She primed the pump, working the handle and spitting frantically into the grass until the water gushed clean and cold into the palm of her hand. She rinsed and rinsed and rinsed her mouth, but the flavor was there to stay.

  She had no idea that Robert had followed her out onto the porch, or that he was standing there, arms folded across his chest, watching silently, until he said, “All right, that’s enough. Back upstairs now. Let’s get this over with.”

  Kylie looked at him above the ebbing flow of the pump water, stricken. Only briefly did the idea of running flitter through her mind. If she wasn’t absolutely dead-pan certain that he’d catch her—probably within the first ten feet—she might actually have tried. Instead, defeat weighing on her shoulders, she made her way back up the porch steps and slipped past him into the house.

  She didn’t know whether it was safe now to rub or not, but she couldn’t help it. As she climbed that narrow flight of steps back up to her bedroom, she stole a few seconds on this step or that to try to soothe her aching flesh. Only a few stairs south of her, Robert made no objection. It didn’t even occur to her the kind of view she was giving him as she rubbed and climbed and rubbed some more. At least not until she reached the top, and by then it was too late anyway.