“What do you want then?”
“I want you to accept a punishment from me.”
From her expression, that took her back. “A punishment? What does that mean?”
“You’re not getting off scot-free. That’s done nothing for your attitude but worsen it. I think what you need, Lisa, is some good old-fashioned discipline. Sadly, your mother doesn’t provide it, and my father wouldn’t discipline you, not at this age. Me, though? That’s another story.” I held up my right hand and she looked at it, her expression wary. “In fact, my hand’s been itching to spank that ass of yours for some time now.”
At first, she stared, mouth hanging open, flabbergasted. It took her a minute. She flipped her long dark hair back, snorted, opened her mouth to speak some smart-ass comeback, I imagined, but I didn’t give her the chance.
“One weekend. You submit to me and I’ll shut up about this little incident.”
“One weekend? A whole weekend?”
I nodded.
She shook her head, then, as if having now heard what I’d said earlier, asked: “You want to spank me?”
“For starters.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Guess you’ll have to accept my terms to find out.”
“Fuck you.”
“No, fuck you.” As emotional as she was, I was the opposite. I was in control, calm, collected. At least, on the outside. Inside, I was doing a victory dance. It was kind of asshole-ish of me, I supposed, but there it was.
It took her a minute, again, which was funny considering Lisa’s tongue cut like a warrior’s sword on most occasions. Strange to see her without a retort. “You want to spank me?” she asked again.
“I think we’ve established that.”
“Fine, here.” She turned to the side and stuck her ass out at me. “Get your rocks off, perv.”
I laughed. “Oh no, it’ll be done on my terms. One weekend buys my silence. Complete submission to my every word, and I promise you’ll come out of it a better, more humbled, more likeable person.”
We both heard the car pull up the drive. Our parents were home.
I grinned.
She panicked.
“Jace, you’re being ridiculous.”
I shrugged my shoulders, picked up the beer I’d set down, and headed back in the direction of the living room to watch my show. “It’s up to you of course. I wouldn’t force you to do anything you don’t want to do.”
My stepmom giggled outside.
“Wait.”
I turned back to her, eyebrows raised.
“One weekend?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Which weekend?”
“This one. No sense in putting it off.”
“But tomorrow’s Valentine’s Day!”
“And you have plans?” She’d broken up with her latest in a string of guys not two days ago.
She shook her head no, but, if looks could kill, I’d be six feet under.
“Glad that’s settled.”
“So that’s it. You’ll shut up. I only have to do what you say?”
“Yep.”
The key turned in the lock and I waited, knowing her answer already. It was in her eyes, and it took all I had not to smile from ear to ear.
The door opened and our parents stepped inside.
“Fine. I’ll do it. But you’d better keep your promise.” She turned her face to her mom and forced herself to smile wide. Too wide. It looked awkward.
“Well, hello you two.” Lisa’s mom said, obviously surprised to see us standing here at a little after one in the morning, talking. We didn’t do that very much these days.
“Hey, Mom. How was your night?”
Lisa’s mom leaned her head against my dad’s shoulder. “Great. Really great.”
Lisa rolled her eyes and I kind of had to agree with her on that one. I mean, I was glad they’d found each other, but the gushing? It had to stop.
“Everything okay here?” my dad asked, always quick on the uptake.
“Sure is, Dad. Lisa and I were talking about spending the weekend at the beach house talking through some stuff,” I said, stepping close to Lisa and wrapping my arm around her shoulders to give her a hard hug that almost lifted her off her feet. “Isn’t that right, sis.”
“Sure is.” She tried to back away, and I knew why. She stank of pot. It was in her hair and clung to her clothes. Mom and Dad would smell it on her.
“We’ll leave around 8:00 a.m. Get there nice and early. What do you say?”
“Sounds good, but I’d better get to bed then,” she said, looking at her wrist as if checking the time even though she wore no watch. I almost laughed. This was going to be a fun weekend for me.