Stop or I'll Spank

by Samantha Danvers

Stephanie Burke was starting to think that maybe it hadn’t been such a good idea to spring this surprise dinner on her boyfriend, Declan Sinclair. It had seemed like a good plan at the time, but seeing the look on his face when his sister and her boyfriend had arrived made her think otherwise. Declan looked more than a little irritated.

Both Declan and his sister’s boyfriend, Reese, were SFPD detectives, and had been partners and good friends for several years. But all that had changed when Declan had discovered that Reese had committed the unpardonable sin of falling in love with Declan’s sister, Kat. Declan had made it no secret that he didn’t want Kat dating a cop, so she and Reese had kept their relationship secret rather than risk Declan’s anger. But the whole thing had come out a week ago when a psycho that Declan had arrested and put in prison got out on parole and kidnapped Kat. Of course, Reese had tracked the man down and rescued Kat, but Declan didn’t care. As far as he was concerned, Reese wasn’t good enough for his sister.

Now, a week later, Declan was still furious with both his partner and his sister. Stephanie had been going out with Declan long enough to know that he could be a very stubborn man, and she also knew that without a push from her, he was likely to stay mad at them for years. That’s why she had decided to play the role of mediator. And the dinner had seemed like a great way to bring everyone together and get them to make peace. But it wasn’t working. The two men hadn’t spoken to each other since Kat and Reese had gotten there. As immature as it sounded, it was obvious that neither one was going to say something until the other did. That left Stephanie and Kat trying to fill in the awkward silence. Both women did their best to draw the men into the conversation, but all they got were noncommittal grunts in reply.

Thoroughly frustrated with both men by the time the time dinner was over, Stephanie could think of only one other thing to do to get them talking, and that was to leave Declan and Reese alone together for a little while. They would either talk to each other or get in a fight. Right then, she didn’t much care which one it was. All she wanted was for them to get it out of their system. To that end, she smiled brightly and pushed back her chair.

“How about some coffee with dessert?” she said, and then hurried on before either man could refuse. “Kat, would you mind helping me in the kitchen?”

The other girl’s gaze went from Reese to Declan, and then back to her boyfriend again, before she nodded. “Of course.”

Giving the two men another worried look, Kat picked up Reese’s empty plate and stacked it on top her own before following Stephanie into the kitchen.

“Are you sure it’s safe to leave them alone?” Kat asked as she set the plates down on the counter.

Stephanie placed her own stack of plates on the counter and gave her friend a shrug. “It might be the only way to get them to talk to each other,” she said as she opened the dishwasher.

Kat folded her arms and leaned back against the counter. “This is so stupid,” she said miserably. “I was really hoping that Reese and Declan would have sorted this out by now.”

Stephanie gave the other girl a small smile. “It’s only been a week since Declan found out about you and Reese,” she said as she began loading the dishwasher. “Your brother just has to get used to the idea of you two being together, that’s all. You’re his little sister. It may just take a little while.”

The other girl let out a sigh. “And what if he doesn’t?” she said. “What if Declan never accepts my relationship with Reese?”

Stephanie closed the door of the dishwasher and tucked her long, dark hair behind her ear. “He will, Kat,” she assured the other girl. “Declan can be stubborn, but sooner or later, he’ll figure out that he’s being petty, and that this isn’t something important enough to come between the two of you.”

But even as she said the words, Stephanie wasn’t so sure. As far as she was concerned, her boyfriend was the most wonderful man in the world. But sometimes, Declan could also be the most obstinate man in the world, too. And his need to take care of his little sister bordered on the obsessive. Stephanie wasn’t sure than Declan would ever think that any man was good enough for Kat.

But then again, maybe Declan would surprise her, Stephanie thought. Anything was possible. He had certainly been surprising her lately. After a year of dating, she thought she knew him cover to cover, but then out of the blue, he’d totally surprised her by asking her to move in with him. So, maybe he’d surprise her again and come around where Kat and Reese were concerned, too. She certainly hoped so. For right now though, Stephanie would consider the evening a success if she could get the two men to talk to each other without a fight breaking out.

Declan clenched his jaw as Stephanie and Kat left the room. He still couldn’t believe that Steph had actually invited Kat and Reese over for dinner. His girlfriend knew how he felt about the situation. What the hell had she been thinking? It wasn’t as if a home-cooked meal was just going to make everything better. He had every right to be pissed off, and she knew it.

“Don’t you just want your sister to be happy?” Steph had asked him the other day, as if it should be as simple as that.

But that wasn’t the issue, or at least all of it. It was bad enough that they were involved with each other, but what really bothered him was that Kat and Reese had gone behind his back. They both should have had enough respect for him to tell him to his face.

But they hadn’t. And as much as he hated to admit it, there was at least a part of him that could understand why. As Steph constantly pointed out, he wasn’t the most accepting guy in the world. If they had come out and told him they were dating, would he have handled it any better than he was now? Probably not, he admitted. More likely, he would have yelled and screamed and done his best to break them up.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to his sister to be happy. He would just have preferred her to be happy with someone else. Not that he didn’t think Reese wasn’t a good man, but he was a cop, and after seeing the aggravation his own mother had gone through from being married to a cop, Declan would do just about anything to protect his sister from that same heartache.

But since it was obvious that Kat wasn’t going to stop seeing Reese, Declan was left with two choices. He could either turn his back on both his sister and his partner, or he could accept their relationship. And regardless of how much he complained about it now, he knew that in the end, he wouldn’t be able to turn his back on the people who mattered most to him.

Across the table from him, Reese leaned back in his chair and cleared his throat. “So,” his partner said. “How are things going with Stephanie?”

Declan said nothing for a moment, mainly because he was a little surprised that Reese had actually spoken. Since there had been this rift between them, he and Reese hadn’t said more than a dozen words to each other. They obviously had to communicate at work, but they kept conversation to a minimum. Most of the time, they just gave each other a wide berth. And tonight hadn’t been any different. They hadn’t spoken a single word to each other the whole time. But carrying on this cold-shoulder routine was getting exhausting, and right then, it just seemed easier to answer Reese than to keep up the effort.

“Pretty good, actually,” he said, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Though I have to admit, living with her has taken some getting used to.”

Reese nodded in agreement. “I know what you mean,” he said. “Women can have some strange hang-ups. Like Kat. She has this thing about putting the roll of toilet paper on the right way.” He shook his head. “I mean, I didn’t know there was a right way. Who cares if it comes off from the bottom or the top?”

Declan couldn’t help but laugh a little at that. “Steph does the same thing,” he said. “I can’t believe how upset she gets when I put it on upside down.”

“Yeah,” Reese agreed. “And does she get all over you about putting the toilet seat down?”

“Definitely,” Declan said. “She’s big about that. And rearranging furniture, that’s her other big thing. Does Kat do that, too?”

Reese shook his head. “No, not really,” he said. “At least she hasn’t done it yet. Then again, I moved in with her, so she already has everything the way she likes it.” He thought a moment, his brow furrowing. “How often can you move furniture around anyway?”

Declan chuckled. “You’d be surprised,” he said. “We’ve moved the couch every weekend since she moved in with me. And it doesn’t stop there. Now, she wants to redecorate the whole apartment.”

Just then, Stephanie and Kat walked back into the dining room, his girlfriend carrying a pot of coffee in one hand and mugs in the other, while his sister had a stack of dessert plates. Declan wasn’t sure which of the women looked more surprised to see him and Reese actually talking to each other. No doubt, the two women had probably thought he and his partner would be at each other’s throats the moment they had left the room.

Stephanie recovered first, giving Declan a smile as she set the mugs down on the table. “What a coincidence,” she said as began pouring the coffee. “I was just telling your sister about our plans to redecorate, too.”

Declan lifted a brow. “Our plans to redecorate?” he asked, his mouth quirking with amusement. “We actually have a plan now? When did that happen?”

Across the table from him, Reese chuckled, and Stephanie made a face. “You seemed to think it was a good idea when I brought it up,” she said to Declan.

He let out a snort of laughter as he reached for the mug his girlfriend set in front of him. “I don’t remember having a choice.”

Stephanie put the coffee pot down to give him an exasperated look. “Honey, these walls are crying out for color, and you know it,” she said.

“She’s right,” Kat agreed.

“Not you, too,” Declan groaned. He should have known that his sister would encourage Steph. She was an interior decorator, after all. He glanced at Reese, who was grinning. “A little help here.”

But the other man just laughed. “You’re on your own with this one, partner.”

Stephanie couldn’t help but smile at their teasing banter. Obviously, the cold war going on between the two men had thawed somewhat. When she and Kat had gone into the kitchen, Declan and Reese had looked like they couldn’t stand to be in the same room with each other, and now not only were they talking to each other, they were even laughing and joking. She didn’t know what had transpired between them, and she didn’t care, as long as things were getting back to normal.

As they had dessert, brownies she had made and topped with hot fudge sauce, Stephanie told Kat and Reese all about how she was going to redecorate the apartment. But after awhile, all the talk about paint colors and fabric swatches must have gotten to be too boring for the men because before she knew it, they had turned the conversation toward one of the cases they were working on. She should have known that they would both be more interested in talking about police work than redecorating.

Though she normally wouldn’t have paid much attention to their conversation, Stephanie’s ears perked up when she heard them mention the name of the company they were investigating, Dalpoe Chemicals. Their corporate headquarters shared office space with Stephanie’s company at the Met-Plaza building downtown. Stephanie’s company, Ashton-Austin International, had joined up with Dalpoe to reduce facility costs by combining a lot of their infrastructure. The two companies shared break rooms, bathrooms, administrative resources, even a lot of their computer assets. That meant Stephanie knew a lot of people at Dalpoe, and she’d been hearing strange rumors for the past couple of days.

According to Declan and Reese, Chuck Saunders, one of the company executives, had disappeared several days ago. Though there was no obvious evidence of foul play, Saunders was the second employee to go missing from the company in the last six weeks. Which meant that the police were extremely interested in what was going on in the secretive company.

Declan and Reese didn’t know anything for sure yet, but there were a lot of rumors about Dalpoe being involved in some shady business practices as a way to increase profits. Everyone down at the police station assumed that the missing executives had either stumbled onto something they weren’t supposed to see, or had threatened to go public with what they knew. Either way, the prime suspect was the CEO of the company, Fred Markam. Unfortunately, Markam seemed to be good at covering his tracks because Declan and Reese hadn’t found anything solid to pin on him. They couldn’t even say for sure that the two executives had actually met with foul play.

Even though she was part of the joint tech-support department for the two companies, Stephanie had never had any dealings with Markam. She hadn’t even ever met the CEO actually, but it was pretty spooky to think she worked in a building with a guy that could do something like that.

Stephanie’s brow furrowed as she looked at her boyfriend. “I didn’t know you were working that case,” she said. “Do you really think a high-level executive like Fred Markam could be involved in something like this?”

Declan glanced at Reese before answering. “Like I said, we don’t have anything on him yet, but every time we talk to him, my gut tells me he’s involved.”

She thought a moment, an idea coming to her. “You know, I could poke around, see if anyone knows anything.”

Declan’s brows drew together. “Absolutely not,” he told her. “If this guys Markam is involved, I don’t want you getting anywhere near him.”

She frowned. “But...”

Her boyfriend gave her a hard look. “I mean it, Stephanie,” he said. “I don’t want you poking your nose where it doesn’t belong. Whoever is behind this whole thing has already made two people disappear, and I don’t want you getting involved. Understood?”

Stephanie opened her mouth to argue the point, but then decided against it. Instead, she nodded her head and told Declan that she wouldn’t get involved. That seemed to satisfy her boyfriend because when Kat steered the conversation away from police work toward the new movie she and Reese were going to see that weekend, Declan was more than willing to let the matter drop.

By the time Kat and Reese left, Stephanie was congratulating herself on how well the evening had gone. Not only were Declan and his sister back on good terms, but so were the two men. Everything had gone great!

But when she closed the door behind the other couple and turned to face her boyfriend, it was to find him standing there with his arms folded across his broad chest and a scowl on his handsome face

Stephanie let out a sigh as she walked over to him. “I know what you’re going to say,” she told him. “You’re going to say that I shouldn’t have invited Kat and Reese over for dinner without asking you first.”

Declan inclined his head. “You’re right,” he agreed. “I completely understand why you did it, but you shouldn’t have. You were being blatantly manipulative, and I’m going to make sure that you understand the error of your ways so that you don’t try to pull a stunt like that again.”

Her brow furrowed at that. Declan had a stern look on his face, but he didn’t actually look angry, so at first she thought he was kidding. But before she could ask what he meant, her boyfriend took by the arm and was leading her over to the couch. Thinking that he meant to sit her down and give her a stern lecture about going behind his back, she opened her mouth to apologize, only to gasp in surprise when Declan took a seat on the couch and guided her over his knee instead.

Off balance, Stephanie automatically placed her hands on the carpeted floor to steady herself. She needn’t have worried though, because Declan’s strong hand on her back kept her from going anywhere. “Declan, what are you doing?” she demanded, craning her neck to look over her shoulder at him.

“That should be obvious. I’m teaching you a lesson, sweetheart,” he told her. “I think a good spanking should have you thinking twice before you do something so scheming again.”

Stephanie’s dark eyes went wide. Declan had spanked her a few times before as foreplay, and she had always liked it, but this was different. He had never given her a spanking for being bad, and she wasn’t sure what she thought of that. But before she could protest however, her boyfriend brought his hand down on her upturned bottom with a resounding smack!

“Owwwww!” she yelped. “Honey, that hurt!”

“It’s supposed to hurt,” he said, bringing his hand down on her other cheek, this time even harder. “How else are you going to learn your lesson?”

Her lesson? Stephanie felt herself blush and squirm at the authoritative tone in his voice. She had never heard him use that tone before, and she was astonished to discover that it was having an unusual effect on her. The sting on her bottom was one thing, but the scolding tone of his voice was literally making her tingle all over. That thought made her blush even more and she quickly turned around to stare down at the floor so that her boyfriend wouldn’t see her blushing. For some reason, that seemed more embarrassing than getting spanked!

A dozen more spanks landed in rapid succession, making her kick and protest. If it weren’t for his hand on her back, she probably would have fallen off his lap.

“But the evening was a success,” she argued, crying out as he smacked her ass again. “You and Reese are back on speaking terms.”

“That’s beside the point,” Declan said, bringing his hand down yet again, this time aiming for the particular sensitive area of her sit-spots. “You took it upon yourself to do something without asking me, knowing full well that I wouldn’t like it.”

“Well, yes but it was for your own good...owwwww!”

“And this is for your own good,” he told her.

Stephanie squirmed as he delivered a hard spank to her right cheek. She couldn’t believe how much it stung through the thin material of her skirt! And the scolding he was giving her only made it sting that much more. The other spankings he’d given her had been light pats compared to this, more for fun than anything else.

“But the only reason I did it was because I knew you wouldn’t like the idea, honey,” she said. The moment she said it, she wished she hadn’t, because it only made him return to those sensitive little spots right where her cheeks met her thighs.

“And that’s exactly the point isn’t it? You went out of your way to do something you knew I wouldn’t like. What’s to say that you won’t do it again when you think I won’t like the next idea you come up with?” he asked, punctuating the words with a series of hard spanks.

She let out another yelp. “Because I won’t!”

Above her, Declan paused for a moment, and Stephanie gasped for breath as she felt heat spread across her bottom. Ouch!

“I don’t know if I believe you, Stephanie,” her boyfriend said, his hand resting on the curve of her bottom. “I think maybe I should spank you some more just to be sure.”

More? Stephanie opened her mouth to protest, but Declan was already pushing up her short skirt. She blushed as she imagined him admiring her long, shapely legs and panty-covered ass. An ass that was almost certainly glowing red by now! When Declan had spanked her before, it had been during sex, so she was already usually naked, but there was something decidedly different this time. This time it wasn’t about foreplay. It was about spanking her because he thought she deserved it. And she suddenly realized that this kind of spanking, combined with the scolding, was turning her on like she’d never been turned on before! She was literally panting, she was so hot!

Declan ran his hand up the back of her thigh to give her ass a gentle squeeze, and Stephanie caught her breath. His touch was making her bottom tingle even more, and she swore that if he did that for just another minute, she was going to start to come.

Then Declan was spanking her again, his hand coming down over and over on her bottom, first one cheek, and then the other until she was squirming around on his lap so wildly that she thought she might actually have fallen off if he weren’t holding onto her. Though the panties she wore offered little protection from the smacks, her boyfriend wasted no time in yanking them down, and soon his hand was falling on her bare bottom.

Fire spread over Stephanie’s asscheeks, but now she was squealing more in pleasure than she was in protest. Even though the spanking stung fiercely, she was getting closer and closer to orgasm with every smack.

But just that quickly, Declan stopped. Taking her hand, he helped her to her feet.

“I hope that will make you think twice about trying something like that again,” he admonished her.

She stood there, rubbing her bottom with her free hand while she waited for Declan to take her in his arms and carry her off to the bedroom. He had to know how turned on she was!

But instead, he glanced at his watch. “It’s late, and I have to get up early in the morning,” he said. “I’m going to go to bed.”

Stephanie’s mouth dropped open as she watched her boyfriend head down the hallway toward their bedroom. No way was he going to leave her in this condition, she thought. Absolutely not!

Pushing her panties down the rest of the way, she stepped out of them and took off after him. Declan must have heard her coming because he turned around just as she threw her arms around his neck. With a laugh, she pushed him back onto the bed.

“I take it this means you aren’t ready to go to bed yet?” he said with a grin.

She returned his smile. “Just shut up and kiss me!”

He did.

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