Across my Knee by Various

Author:Various [Various]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2012-03-18T16:00:00+00:00

The Holiday

Poppy St Vincent

North London, June, Dusk

Finally the door clicked behind him. Anna had never known one man take so long to get himself out to the gym as her husband. He made more false starts than a primary school egg-and-spoon race. Still, he was gone now and his study was unguarded.

Anna stood outside his door and shook a little. There was precious little reason for her shaking. David was not the sort of man to make his wife shake. He was an editor but she was not one of his authors. She was his wife. It was perfectly normal for her to go and tidy his office. She opened the door.

Anna moved quietly, as though he were still in the house, and every time she heard a sound she stopped mouse-still. As she started to open his computer and wait for it to let her in, she supposed that she could just ask him to let her look at his work and say, ‘David, you don’t know this, but you know those spanking books you edit? Well, I would love to be spanked. You know the sort of thing? Call me naughty and tip me over your knee; and would you like me to dress as a schoolgirl or a maid? So, if you wouldn’t mind, I will just read them and then you could pretend to catch me and punish me for it.’

Anna gave a tight little smile as she imagined the ridiculous scene. She could see with total clarity the inevitable look of disgust on his handsome face. She could never bear his disapproval. She hung her head for a moment, her pretty blonde bob falling forward as the pout of resignation came to her lips.

It was not hard to find the stories. There they were, rows upon rows of them, all tucked-up like toy soldiers in his documents file. There, she found the author she always hunted out when David left her alone with his work, Michael Marsters.

As a child and an avid reader, Anna would often get lost in a book for hours. At such times, she would lose the rest of the world and exist solely in the pages in front of her, which is exactly how David found her.

It took her several minutes to realise he was there. The story in front of her, with a rugged cowboy and a tempestuous heroine who got put in her place by his large rough hands, had prevented her from hearing the front door, his call of hello or his steps on the stairs.

It was his shoes she noticed first. The end of a chapter fell near the bottom of the screen and she paused in her reverie to detect a pair of familiar dark leather brogues that made her feel ill. Her mind, the coward, had gone elsewhere and left her to face David alone.

‘I was just catching up on your new book, about trees … I mean the one you are writing yourself for a change.

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