Chapter One

IT IS A truth universally acknowledged that a single dom in possession of a whip must be in want of a sub.

Or is it? Leaving aside my problem with the depersonalising labels of dom and sub, it seems far from truth and very far from universal acknowledgement. Even to identify oneself as a person with an interest in the kinky side of things is a risk many prefer not to take. We lurk behind the vanilla lines, looking wistfully over at the dungeon parties on the other side, getting our thrills by internet proxy.

This was how I came to find myself at a hopelessly vanilla, horribly Sex in the-City-esque speed dating event at a bar in Gunwharf Quays.

‘I’m really not sure about this.’

But Louisa was already at the bar, ordering white wine spritzers.

‘So what are you going to do? Sit in your flat for ever more? It’s been six months, Chez. I bet Gareth’s met someone else over the summer holidays.’

‘I couldn’t give a toss. In fact, I hope he has. Some cheerleader type who’s happy to stand on sidelines in all weathers. No, I mean I’m not sure about speed dating. It’s not very … organic.’

‘Neither is this wine, but that doesn’t seem to bother you.’

‘I mean, it’s a bit forced. Desperate, even.’

‘Yeah, well, I am desperate,’ said Lou, necking back a big swig of wine. ‘If I don’t get a shag soon, I’m going to start hanging around the dockyard gates in a basque and suspenders.’

‘Ah, all the nice girls love a sailor. But do sailors love nice girls?’

I looked out through the window at the warship radar towers looming in the distance.

‘I’m not a nice girl,’ pointed out Lou. ‘Not like you.’

Oh, if you only knew.

But I couldn’t tell her, and I couldn’t tell Gareth, even though a large proportion of my reasons for fancying him centred on his size and breadth and large hands and capacity to fling me around like a rag doll. Not that he ever used it. He crushed me to a pulp in the missionary position thrice weekly, panting for five minutes then roaring, ‘You’re fucked, girl,’ before indulging in some target practice with the condom and the wastepaper basket.

When I found myself planning a lesson on composition theory during sex, I realised it was time to send Gareth and his vast collection of rugby shirts back into the world of singledom.

‘So, what’s the talent like?’ wondered Lou, casting her eyes around the room. ‘Anything take your fancy?’

I shrugged. It looked like the usual selection of chancers in cheap suits to me. I wanted to choke from the miasma of conflicting fragrance in the room.

‘I’m guessing Hugo Boss is here somewhere,’ I said, sniffing. ‘I bet he’s worth a few bob. Plus, I like his name.’

‘Hugo?’

‘No. Boss.’

‘You like a man who wears the trousers?’

Ooh, close to the bone. I have to deflect this line of reasoning.

‘Yeah,’ I said lightly. ‘Though I wouldn’t rule out Eddie Izzard either. Or even Grayson Perry.’

She laughed and a bell rang. It was time to speed date.

Time to start a dozen abortive, pointless conversations with strange men.

Eleven of the conversations went like this:

Him: Hi, I’m Jim/Joe/Harry/Kamil.

Me: I’m Cherry, pleased to meet you. What do you do?

Him: I’m an insurance salesman/physiotherapist/ paralegal/electrician. How about you?

Me: I’m a teacher.

Him: (leering) Oh yeah? I bet you could teach me a thing or two.

Me: headdesk.

The twelfth took a different course.

Him: That’s a lovely choker.

Me: Oh, thank you. It’s one of my favourites too.

Him: I’ve often wondered how those feel, around your neck. Do they constrict your breathing at all?

Me: Not really. You are sort of aware of it all the time, though.

Him: (smiling dangerously) I like the sound of that.

Me: (speechless, suddenly quivery, giving him a long, hard second look)

Him: It’s a good present from a lover, isn’t it? Like having his hand wrapped around your neck all night. His mark on you.

Me: (gabbling) Are you a possessive type, then?

Him: Oh yes. Not particularly jealous, though, and certainly not in an abusive way. But if a girl likes to feel possessed, then I’m happy to oblige.

Me: How do you … make her feel like that, then?

Him: I’d love to show you.

Me: (quailing beneath keen grey stare, predatory curl of lip, broad shouldered swoop forward) Oh. Really?

Him: Yes, really. Come with me.

A direct order. I can never defy one of those, and I didn’t want to anyway. His suit was well cut and, while he must have been in his forties at least, he had that still, calm air of authority that floored me and filled my dreams.

He stood, gesturing me up, and I followed him to the bar, where he bought me – without asking what I would like – a mineral water, plus a whisky for himself.

‘I don’t want to be accused of taking advantage of tipsiness,’ he told me, nudging the water glass down the polished bar top. ‘Now, let’s sort a few things out. You strike me as curious about certain aspects of human sexuality, am I right?’

I coughed into my glass, feeling as transparent as the crystal waters within.

‘Is it obvious?’

‘To me it is. Probably not to the world in general. How curious are you?’

‘Moderately.’

‘There’s nothing moderate about what I do … What’s your name?’

‘Cherry.’

‘Stuart.’

‘Pleased to meet you.’

‘Well, Cherry, I like to be master in my own bedroom, if you catch my drift. Does that interest you?’

I gulped. What should I say? I rather thought the fiery spreading blush on my face was saying it for me.

‘It might,’ I muttered.

‘Does it or doesn’t it? I don’t have time to waste.’

His stern tone caught me right between the thighs.

‘Yeah. I suppose it does,’ I admitted, a mite sulkily.

‘Good. Though I think we’ll need to discuss your tone, young lady.’

Oh my God, he was killing me. “Young lady”. I was positively pre-orgasmic, especially when he raised an eyebrow in a way that couldn’t say “you’re getting spanked” any louder or clearer.

‘Drink up,’ he ordered. ‘Are you here alone?’

‘No, with a friend.’

‘Good. You can tell her you’re going home with me, and that you’ll call her by eleven so that she knows you’re safe.’

‘I’ll … tell her that.’ I looked around the bar for her, finally locating her in a darkened alcove, snogging some guy with a beard like a King of Leon. Sex on fire indeed.

I passed on the message, slipping it between her and the hairy one like a credit card of information. Her reply was a swallowed grunt.

‘I’ll be at home then,’ I reminded her brightly, feeling a broad hand descend on my shoulder. SM Stuart was not about to let me get away. I had been hooked like an unsuspecting fish, and now I was in the net I wouldn’t get out until I was being sizzled over the flames of his fire.

‘Where do you live?’ he asked, yanking me backwards, away from the bar.

‘Near South Parade Pier.’

‘Good. Not too far.’

It wasn’t until we were in the taxi that the insane foolishness of the idea hit home. Taking a strange man home for kinky sex – how on earth would that stack up on the risk assessment form? Not well at all, I realised with a sickening lurch of the stomach.

But then he pulled me towards him and into a long, hard kiss, and the lurching became something else, something much sweeter and less easily dismissed, something that squeezed all of my good sense into a tiny ball and batted it down between my legs, which were trembling.

It was mad and it was stupid, but I wanted sex – real, good sex – so much that I was prepared to follow my cunt wherever it led me that night.

Stuart’s mouth was firm and hungry, and his hand landed with a wondrous heaviness on my thigh, edging up the hem of my skirt, kneading its way to heaven, regardless of the taxi driver.

Luckily, the ride was not long enough for him to reach my stocking tops. The skirt was mid-thigh when he paid the fare, helped me out of the cab, and escorted me, hand on elbow, up the path to my apartment block.

Once inside the door, he held me out at arm’s length and said, ‘You’re wearing stockings and suspenders, aren’t you?’

I nodded.

‘Sounds to me like you were out looking for somebody to take you home and fuck you. You don’t wear stockings if you don’t think they’ll be seen.’

‘They make me feel sexy,’ I defended myself.

‘You want to feel sexy because you want a good seeing-to, Cherry. Am I right?’

I chewed my lip, avoiding his eye.

‘Maybe.’

‘I’m right. And what kind of girl wants a good seeing-to, hmm?’

He pulled me closer, sliding one hand down my hip and around to pat a bum cheek. Oh, I could see where this was heading. And I liked it very, very much.

‘A bad girl,’ I said softly.

His lips quirked, and his hand fell a little harder on my quivering bottom.

‘That’s right, Cherry. A bad girl. And what do bad girls get?’

Good sex.

‘They get punished?’

‘Try adding a “sir” to that.’

‘They get punished, sir.’

‘Nice. And true. They do get punished. But first, since you’re dying to show off your naughty underwear, I want you to stand over by that chair and lift your skirt for me.’

He dropped my arm and nudged me back a couple of feet, so that I was in a good position for him to rake his eyes from my bob-cut hair to my strappy sandals. Standing with his arms folded and his brows gathered, he waited for me to follow the instruction.

I felt like laughing and shivering at the same time, but I did as I was told, turned up the hem of my skirt and lifted it coyly to my waist.

‘Oh yes, I see,’ he said. ‘Very nice. And do you call those knickers?’

I stared down at my shaking hands on the fabric. They weren’t exactly substantial, it was true. I was glad I hadn’t opted for the Spanx tonight after all – though, on second thoughts, they would at least have been appropriate.

The knickers I was wearing were tiny breaths of lacy air, patterned with glittery starbursts. I only knew they were there at all because they were soaking wet at the crotch. I wondered if the damp patch was visible. If not, it was certainly sniffable. I could smell myself all right.

‘Turn around,’ he said, and I was grateful to remove myself from the intense scrutiny and present my back view instead. The knickers weren’t thong-backed, but they stretched tightly across my rear, almost transparent, so that he would be able to follow each curve to its conclusion.

‘That’s a lovely bottom you have there,’ he commented, moving up behind me. ‘No, don’t let go of the skirt.’ He put a hand on my lacy cheeks and rubbed them slowly up and down. I let out a tiny moan, bending my spine infinitesimally forward to give him optimum access, hoping for a quick dip between my legs. ‘And one that needs a lot of attention, I think.’

He removed his hands and sat down in my armchair.

‘Now put your lovely bottom over my knee, Cherry, where it belongs.’

Christ, I was more turned on than I’d ever expected to be outside my horniest fantasies. For a dizzying moment, I thought this was worth any risk, even though my rational mind knew that only a brain-dead, sex-crazed zombie would entertain that thought.

I drooped over his lap, trying to work out how to get over it in the most dignified manner, though God knows what any remnants of dignity were doing in my fevered brain at that point. Unable to compute logistics, I kind of threw myself across the middle section of his thighs, kicking my legs in the air until he smacked them down so my toes brushed the carpet.

‘Now, think about where you are,’ he said softly, his hand renewing its hypnotic circular pattern across my exposed bum cheeks. ‘Take a moment for the full humiliating reality of your position to sink in. Where are you, Cherry?’

I clenched my thighs, his low, authoritative voice tickling the space between them like a sonic vibrator. I wished I’d had more to drink. It would have made the verbal aspect of this scenario so much easier.

‘I’m over your knee.’

‘That’s right. But you missed a bit, Cherry. An important little word.’ His palm hovered dangerously over my rear curves.

‘I’m over your damn knee?’ I hazarded, with an irrepressible snort. Oh dear. It seemed I was discovering a hitherto-unknown minxy side of myself.

The smack was swift and remorseless. I yelped, quivering beneath his hand.

‘I’m surprised at you, young lady,’ he told me. ‘I see I’m going to have to deal with you quite thoroughly. No, the missing word you are looking for is “sir”. Now, repeat the sentence for me, Cherry.’

I couldn’t say it in my natural voice. It came out in a sort of sing-song comedy Deep Southern drawl.

‘I’m over your knee, sirrrr.’

‘That’s right, but who is this fugitive from the Grand Ole Opry I seem to have acquired? Where is Cherry?’

I humphed and tried to kick a leg, but he secured it with a well-placed foot, waiting, hand poised.

‘I’m over your knee, sir,’ I ground out, a mite sulkily.

‘Much better, Cherry. I think we’re in for a long session at this rate. Now, I need you to tell me why you think you are over my knee?’

My God, this man must have had forebears in the Spanish Inquisition. Stuart was not a particularly Spanish name, though. Perhaps his surname was. I didn’t know his surname! I was over the knee of a man whose surname I didn’t know.

‘I think something’s going to happen,’ I said.

His hand began to pat my rump compulsively.

‘Yes,’ he conceded. ‘Something is going to happen. But what?’

‘I think you might have some dastardly kind of plan to … spank me … sir.’

‘That’s almost the right answer. Less of the dastardly, though, eh? You’re certainly setting yourself up for a seriously sore bottom, young lady.’

‘Oh dear,’ I moaned, squirming deliciously.

‘Yes, “oh dear” is a valid response,’ he taunted. ‘Last question. What are you going to be spanked for?’

I was stymied. I had to come up with a reason for my own erotic punishment? Was “because I want you to” also a valid response?

‘For …’ I gave it some thought, which was difficult with the ever-present hand gliding across my buttocks, occasionally following the line that separated them, almost to the wet spot at its base. ‘For taking strange men home to my flat, sir,’ I said, inspired.

‘Very good,’ he said. ‘That definitely deserves quite a firm spanking, I would say. Now then. Let’s get this bottom nice and high. How long will it take me to turn it red, I wonder? I do like a physiological experiment.’

His physiological experiment began with a series of sharp slaps, falling quickly on each cheek in turn.

‘If it gets too much for you, or you decide this kind of fun is not for you, just say my name. You promise you’ll do that?’

‘Yes, sir,’ I sighed, gyrating my hips to push my bottom up higher, revelling in the firecracker sparks he rained down on me.

‘Good girl. Or rather, bad girl. Flaunting yourself in that bar and taking strange men home for kinky sex. You need a sound lesson, young lady. Believe me, your slutty behaviour will be dealt with.’

His hand felt harder, the smacks loud as pistol shots. Would the neighbours hear? I began to suffer a little, feeling the heat build.

When he stopped, after about fifty of these strokes, I flopped, exhaling deeply. But he had not finished, not by a long chalk.

‘I think we’ll have these knickers down now,’ he decreed.

With exquisite care and attention, he edged the barely-there lace down over my stinging hindquarters, making sure the elastic dragged, awakening little darts of extra sensation on the way. Down my thighs they travelled, only to be brought to a halt at the buffers of my suspender snaps. But that was far enough for Stuart’s purposes, and he left them there, moving his palms back up to rest briefly between my legs.

Oh yes! I wriggled welcomingly, hoping he would part those lips and dive in.

Instead, he dabbed his fingers in just enough to coat them in my scent, then moved back up to my warm pink bottom.

‘Dirty girl,’ he whispered. ‘You like being spanked, don’t you?’

‘No, sir, honestly!’ I protested, but I was caught red-handed. Or red-arsed.

‘Don’t lie!’ he said sharply, making my bottom feel the weight of his displeasure. ‘Lying will earn you extras with my belt, young lady.’

Oh, his belt! Leather, smooth and cold, the image of him unbuckling and snapping it through the air. I wanted to move my hand down to my clit at the thought, but he wouldn’t allow that.

‘Oh no, I would hate to be whipped with your belt!’ I moaned. ‘That’s a lie, by the way, sir.’

He wanted to laugh, I could tell, but he simply spanked me harder and faster, so that I jerked and squeaked about on his lap as if electrically shocked, his large hand covering every inch of skin from my stocking tops to the rounded crest of my bum until it all burned with uniform heat.

‘You have a lot to learn about submission,’ he informed me, smacking away merrily. ‘And it would be so much fun to teach you.’ I sensed a “but”, but I didn’t want to hear it, so I ignored it for the moment, preferring to focus on this gorgeous ocean wave of pleasure-pain.

‘No begging for mercy so far,’ he noted, giving his arm a rest. ‘You’re made for this. And so is your arse. Perfectly spankable.’

I felt like reminding him that my cunt was also perfectly fingerable and lickable and fuckable, should he choose to further his experimentation, but I didn’t want to lead the scene. Something told me that would be contrary to etiquette. So instead, I merely raised my hips and parted my thighs a little.

His hand began to slide, so slowly, so tantalisingly, down the crack of my bum and into that humid delta beyond. When it hit the swollen target of my clit, I gasped and jiggled furiously.

‘Have you never been spanked before?’ he asked, incredulous.

‘No. I’ve wanted to. But never had the nerve to ask, or bring the subject up.’

‘You need it so badly. You were built to be spanked. Every day, good and hard. Your arse just looks wrong unless it’s red.’

‘Oh, I know.’ His fingers were manipulating me with firm expertise, bringing me closer and closer to that ultimate surrender.

‘I don’t know what you do for a living, love, but I think you need to tell your boss, every day, that you can’t go home until he or she has spanked you hard, just the way you need it. Put you in the corner with your knickers down and your red bum out until the caretaker comes in to lock up.’

I was bucking now, so close, so close, but his words made me giggle amidst the pre-orgasmic groaning.

‘I work in a school,’ I told him.

‘Oh, interesting. So your headmaster might have one of those old school canes hiding in a cupboard somewhere. Six of the best would do you the world of good.’

‘Oh God, you’re evil, I’m going to come …’

He pulled his fingers out and I reached back blindly, trying to catch his arm.

‘Please!’

‘Not yet, you oversexed little brat. You have some business with my belt first.’

‘Oh, you’re so mean!’ I sounded like a child denied sweets, but I obeyed his command to stand up and get my pert red bottom over the arm of the sofa nonetheless.

The heat on my bum didn’t seem to last particularly long. It was already fading as I watched him take his sweet time unbuckling his wicked-looking black leather belt and removing it from his trouser loops. My skin was still pleasantly tight and a little sore, though.

When Stuart looped the belt around his fist and began whipping it down into his palm, I began to consider the wisdom of my actions. The very sound of it was fearsome, the sight of it knicker-wettingly sexy, but was it all window-dressing, softening me up for a pain I might not be capable of bearing?

While I didn’t want Stuart to be disappointed, the wobbling of my legs betrayed me. I was really scared.

Stuart put a hand on the small of my back, stilling me.

‘Hey, little girl,’ he said softly. ‘Nobody is going to make you do this. If you want to stop, or try something else instead, that’s your prerogative.’

His words steeled me. My calves tautened and I pushed out my bum. This might be beyond my endurance, but I wouldn’t know unless I tried, would I? And all I had to do to make it stop was call Stuart’s name.

‘You will stop if I ask you, won’t you?’

‘Of course. Just say the word. Brave girl.’

He patted my back and then stepped behind me.

I felt the leather dangle over my behind, brushing its crimson blush, slipping smoothly between my cheeks and stroking downward. I welcomed its cool caress, lulled by it, even though it added to my torment of unsatiated lust.

Then it was gone. There was a moment of tense silence, then a whoosh, then a crisp, sharp crack across the width of my still-warm arse. I jolted forward, my face finding a cushion to howl into, my fingernails tearing at the upholstery.

‘Oh, ow!’

‘Painful, eh? So it should be. Ten of these, young lady, should teach you a lesson in good conduct. Push your bottom back out, please.’

I took a moment to recover, then did as I was told, enjoying the spreading afterburn of the first stroke far too much to deny myself the rest of the leathering.

He laid each stroke with deadly accuracy, below its predecessor, moving down my bottom until it was evenly striped, then placing the final four on exactly the same spot – the meeting of arse and thigh, just where I would feel it when I sat down.

I pouted, I snivelled, I hopped up and down on my tiptoes, I pressed the cushion to my face and howled for the last two searing scorchers, but I was never once tempted to cry out his name and end it all.

The tenth stroke delivered, I lay panting and triumphant, buzzing with endorphins and seething with lust. I had been soundly and thoroughly dealt with, and it felt a lot like falling in love.

Stuart put his hand on the small of my back again, then pressed his other palm into my burning, ridged backside.

‘You took that so well,’ he said thickly. ‘God, your arse is on fire, girl. Spread your thighs wider.’

I obeyed, while he took the cushion I had been drooling into and replaced it beneath my hips so that my bottom was even higher up and my feet left the floor. He used his thumbs to open my sex lips and crouched behind me, breathing on them before giving them one long luscious lick, all around my needy clit.

‘So you want me to fuck you?’ he asked gruffly. I heard him pat at his suit jacket before throwing it off, then his trousers came down.

‘Please, sir,’ I whimpered.

‘Just as well. Because a good seeing-to is what you’re getting.’

I heard the snap of the condom, smelled its latex tang, then Stuart’s hands were on my hips, holding me still. Ah, there it was. The tip of his cock, butting my soaked cunt, stretching it until he was all the way in.

The warmth and tightness of my arse, rubbed against by his pelvis, added a delicious dimension to the feeling of fullness and I pushed myself back, squeezing my muscles around his cock, holding it there for one long second of inescapable penetration.

Then he uttered some strangulated sound and he was off, pumping and thrusting while I clutched the sofa cushion and yelped into it. I hoped the downstairs neighbours would not be disturbed by the jolting of the sofa on the wooden floor, but then he placed a thumb on my clit. I forgot all about the neighbours, concentrating only on getting my bottom higher and my cunt wider and my clit square on the pad of his thumb tip. I was in a boiling mess of shame and submission, lust and vulnerability. I was getting a proper hard fucking from the man who had just lit up my arse like the lanterns on the Promenade. It was heaven, hell, and everything in between. His weight pushed me forward, guiding his cock unerringly to my G-spot. I came, sobbing and thanking him in a frenzy over the knock-knock-knock of the sofa. He parted the cheeks of my bum and pressed a finger down into the crack before coming himself. I squealed at the rudeness of it, thrashing a little, but incapable of moving much underneath his solid bulk.

We slumped forward, on to the sofa, where he rearranged me into his half-clothed arms and stroked my damp forehead.

‘There. Was that what you wanted? What you expected?’

‘It was incredible. Blew my mind.’

He laughed. ‘Good. That’s what I was aiming for.’

‘You’ve done this a lot, I guess.’

‘Every time I get the chance. My ex-wife wasn’t keen, so once the divorce was final, I suppose I got out there and made up for lost time.’

‘Wild oats in reverse.’

‘I suppose.’

‘Is that what split you up?’

‘No, no, God, no. There was much more to it than that. Divorce is very common in my line of work. But I’d prefer not to talk about that now, if you don’t mind.’

‘Oh. OK. Do you want a drink?’

‘Maybe a glass of water.’

I staggered to the kitchen and admired the state of my arse in the shiny glass of the cooker door before making with the cups and taps. Wow. It looked angry. Dark, dark red, with a kind of self-stripe effect, slightly raised from the belt.

The sight of it turned me on again. I wondered if Stuart would be up for a bit more, perhaps minus the spanking this time, or I would be standing for the whole of the first week of term, and teaching was hard enough on the legs as it was.

‘Can you stay?’ I asked, handing him the glass.

He put an arm around me and pulled me close to him before replying.

‘I can’t, I’m afraid.’

It was a blow, I can’t deny. Between filling the glass and offering it to him, I had constructed a rosy fog of kinky romance around us, imagining that I would be spending the rest of the weekend tied to the bed with my legs spread-eagled.

But I didn’t know this man, when it came down to it, except at this peculiar and intense level of our mutual enjoyment of BDSM.

‘That’s a shame,’ I said tentatively. I wanted to ask why, but equally I didn’t want the answer.

‘Yes.’ He sipped. ‘It is.’

‘Maybe …’

‘There’s an awful lot I’d love to teach you, Cherry. But I just can’t. Because I won’t be here. My ship sails for the Persian Gulf tomorrow, you see.’

‘Oh! You’re a sailor.’

‘Yes. A medical officer.’

‘So is that why you split up?’

‘Yes, pretty much. I retire in two years as well.’ He shrugged.

‘Two years isn’t such a long time.’

‘I hope you’re not offering to wait for me, young lady. Because that wouldn’t be fair on you.’

He kissed my forehead.

‘Go out, find a good man with a good whip, and seize your fun while you’re young. Perhaps if you’re still single and still interested in two years’ time … but you won’t be.’

‘I might be.’

‘You won’t be.’

‘Well, if I am, I’ll be at that bar in Gunwharf Quays, two years from this date. Yes?’

‘OK. It’s a date. Of sorts. So you aren’t angry with me?’

‘Oh, this is one of my favourite teacher lines. I’m not angry with you, Stuart, I’m just a bit disappointed.’

He laughed loud and long, squeezing me tight.

‘I’d love to do detention with you,’ he said. ‘Who knows? Perhaps one day.’

He tapped my shoulder, then extricated himself.

‘I really have to go. Forgive me for taking advantage of you.’

‘You didn’t take advantage of me. I wanted to do this – I’ve always wanted to do it – and now I know how it feels.’

‘Good.’ He stood, looking around for his coat. ‘Well, thank you, Cherry. You’ve made my last night of shore leave very memorable indeed.’

‘De nada,’ I said, awkward now. How does one wrap up a session of this nature? Is there a formal etiquette?

He put on his coat and then pulled my nearly-nude body to his, imprisoning my head between his hands for a long, luscious kiss.

‘You’re gorgeous and you deserve better,’ he whispered. ‘But I’ll be at Gunwharf Quays in two years, if some other lucky bastard hasn’t snagged you by then. In the meantime, get out there and get spanked.’

I giggled, but the giggle wanted quite badly to mutate into something embarrassing and tearful.

‘I’ll try.’

‘See that you do. Or I’ll have to come back and spank you myself.’

‘That would be awful.’

‘Hmm. Goodbye, then.’

‘Take care. Don’t get sunk. Don’t get scurvy. Pack plenty of limes.’

‘I rarely have to treat scurvy these days, but I’ll bear it in mind.’

‘Watch out for pirates.’

‘I will. And now I really must go.’

And he really did go.