Carolyn Brady smoothed down the front of her skirt and checked the seams of her stockings. Then with a deep sigh she knocked tentatively on the door to Wentworth’s office. A rather strained muffled voice answered and although Carolyn couldn’t quite work out what was said she guessed it was alright to go in.

She wasn’t entirely surprised to see Patty standing in the corner again, after all Bill Wentworth was an uncompromising man, but this time the secretary’s exposed bottom looked like a whole other level of sore.

“Gracious, whatever did you do?” Carolyn gasped.

“You don’t want to know,” Patty mumbled from the corner. Or more to the point, she didn’t want her to know. This time she did not dare even glance over her shoulder.

“I haven’t seen a tail like that since…” Carolyn was about to say back in college, but her own bottom had come close after her last session, “…yes well,” she stumbled to a pause.

“He said to go right in,” Patty said sullenly.

“Right then, I will…” Carolyn said more breezily than she felt.

But she dawdled for just a moment as she took one last apprehensive look at Patty’s bottom. Why did I ever start this?

*

The punishment frame was stark and threatening in the middle of the room. It looked like something out of an old prison movie and Carolyn blanched. Maybe she could run, she thought. After all who the hell could enforce the arrangement? But she knew Wentworth could and would and her head fizzed at the thought of it.

Worse still, next to the frame was a bucket of judicial sized birch rods and Carolyn pretended not to notice the prison strap draped over the padded beam.

“Don’t you think this has gone far enough?” she moaned, “I mean a spanking is one thing… but I mean… that is just barbaric.”

Wentworth set his squared jaw and regarded her with amusement. Keep talking lady and I’ll give you something to talk about, he thought. Some dames didn’t know when to shut up.

“Look… if you think… I-I haven’t done anything,” she whined, “I simply won’t do it.”

Wentworth cocked his right eye in surprised and his vaguely amused demeanour broke into an open grin. Carolyn didn’t notice him close the folder he was reading and check the clock.

“Take off your skirt and jacket… oh and that silly hat and lower your goddam panties. Then I want you tail up over the beam,” Wentworth ordered.

He hadn’t intended to use the paddle this time but her defiance meant she was asking for it.

“Mr Wentworth, come on please… please I’ll do anything,” Carolyn wailed.

“You are going to do what you’re told, that is the only anything I am interested right now,” he growled.

In her mind she made a dash for the door. The whole scene played out like a movie and she even got all the way to the street. Then accepting a reality check she swallowed hard and flushed. Then button by button she worked from the top and slowly removed her jacket. The silly hat had cost her 40 bucks, but now wasn’t the time to argue and that soon joined her pastel Mummery tunic on the chair.

The skirt came off even more reluctantly and as she fumbled for the zip she felt the blood screaming in her ears. When it came to her silk French panties she had to look at the floor before tugging them down. As much as he pretended nonchalance, she knew he was watching her.

She glanced at him and then back at the punishment frame.

“Look Mr Wentworth… I can’t really I can’t this is…” She didn’t finish but even half-naked she made a move for the door.

“Bend over right now.” Wentworth’s bark was loud and deliberate and each word jangled her nerves. He must have been one hell of a marine sergeant, she thought, for in an instant she was diving over the leather pad on the upper surface of the frame.

Wentworth gave her straining heroine-cast backside the once over with his eyes and then stood up. In the time he took to cross the room the strap was in his hands and a quick half dozen blazing blasts had seared her bare bottom.

Carolyn had no coherent words or thoughts with which to respond. One minute she was rueing her shame and the next she was howling banshee-style into the floor. Come back paddle all is forgotten.

Six more burned her as she rocked and bucked as she clawed at the frame. If she could have she would have rolled away and grabbed at her bottom, but gravity held her and the punishment contraption was so well designed that even though she was unsecured she could not reach back.

“Please,” Carolyn sobbed, “Oh please.”

This time no tears had to be wrung from her in drips, she just emptied a flood onto the floor as easily as summer rain. With them flowed her dignity, sense of self and whatever she had bottled within her for a misbegotten lifetime.

By the time the spanking strap took her to 30 she could no longer tell one flaming strike from the pauses in between and her bottom was just one epic stinging pain.

“Now that you are tender you are ready for the birch,” Wentworth said gently.

Tear dripped and snotty, Carolyn’s head dipped in a nod. Of course, for he was her master and she needed this and whatever he gave her. Only, only, only… she sobbed without the words… it hurt, godammit, it really hurt.

“I had planned on 36…” Wentworth told her, “But not across your bottom. They are for my next client as was the strap.”

Carolyn’s eyes widened in surprise and she sniffed her tears to a temporary halt.

“But…” she groaned.

“Don’t ever tell me what I will and won’t do,” Wentworth sighed. “I had meant only to spank you over my knee and then give you a small dose of the cane… this set-up was not for you until you opened your bratty mouth. You can thank heaven that I need the birch and don’t want to use it up and a tender tush like you.”

“Oh… ah…” Carolyn began and then more emphatically as the penny dropped, “Ooh. I thought…”

“Now you can get your snotty nose in that corner and stay there until I am ready to give you that spanking you deserve, any questions?” Wentworth asked.

“Nooo Sir,” Carolyn squeaked as she got painfully to her feet.

*

Carolyn didn’t think the bottom burn would ever end and even half an hour after she had been sent unceremoniously to the corner like a kid, it was all she could do not to give into a fresh bout of tears. Worst of all she had brought it entirely on herself, she decided ruefully, she had to concede that she probably deserved every bit of the spanking she still had coming.

“Mr Wentworth,” she said in a rather meek questioning voice, her nose not leaving the corner, “Are you really going to spank me?”

“What do you think?” Wentworth chuckled as he looked over from his desk.

“Oh shoot,” she groaned in a pouty voice, “I mean… I guess I kind of asked for it… but couldn’t you… I mean my tail is throbbing fit to burst still; I won’t sit down for a week. Couldn’t you add a bit next time?”

Wentworth snorted in amusement, Carolyn had grown-up some he guessed.

“Nope,” he answered.

Carolyn sighed and risked a sly brush of her bottom with her thumbs.

“There isn’t going to be a next time for you,” Wentworth continued, “You’re about done here I guess.”

Carolyn’s heart lurched. Surely that was good? But… why then did she feel such dismay?

“I already tore up all the contracts and if you want to skedaddle before I am ready to put you across my knee then I guess…” he added.

Carolyn offered him a pout over her shoulder and considered. Why was she still standing there?  Once when she was a kid she had been sent to summer camp. She hated every minute of it, but part of her had grieved on the last day when she knew she would never have that summer again? She had similar feelings about college and her sorority days… but what was holding her now?

“Mr Wentworth… do you… do you by any chance need any help? Not to… I mean… like Patty? Maybe someone with my perspective could help with the clients.” Carolyn had no idea where that had come from and she felt herself blushing.

Wentworth laughed. It wasn’t the first time he had been asked such a thing, although most of the women he handled couldn’t get away from him quick enough.

“I am afraid we don’t have the budget at the moment,” he said with a wink.

Carolyn suddenly felt a fool, not least because she was still standing in the corner with her bare bottom on show. This realisation made her squeal and set her scrambling for her clothes.

“No of course not… I mean you must think me an utter… yes well thank you Mr Wentworth it has been… eh…” she blustered.

Wentworth chose that moment to get up and go into the other room. Patty probably needed to go to the john by now anyway and was about ready to be cut loose from her own corner, besides she had work to do.

It took an age for Carolyn to compose herself and it was almost half an hour before she found the poise and courage to emerge from the inner office.

“Well eh… pleasure to eh… do business with you… I guess,” she blushed as she moved hesitantly towards the door. “I mean assuming you are done with me? I mean you’re not going to spank me after all I suppose?”

Wentworth extended his hand and she shook it politely. Even Patty limped from where she had been standing up for filing to give Carolyn a small squeeze.

“Goodbye Miss Brady,” Wentworth said warmly.

Carolyn smiled tersely and hurriedly left.

*

It took 10 minutes for Carolyn to knock on the office door again. Neither Wentworth nor Patty was surprised.

“This is the Justice Adjustment isn’t it?” she asked as if they were strangers, “Only I might have a job for you.”

“Another one?” Wentworth said with barely contained humour.

“Yes I was wondering if… if you might recommend someone who was good in a mentoring role?” Carolyn said matter-of-factly.

“You mean the sort who hands out good sound spankings?” Wentworth said innocently.

“That and other measures, only there is this girl who is a bit of an idiot and needs a firm hand. I really think she needs your help,” Carolyn chewed on her lower lip as she let her eyes look everywhere but at his.

“I guess you need that spanking after all,” Wentworth said sternly.

Carolyn’s eyes flared but she didn’t argue, although her still throbbing sore bottom urged her to leave.

“I’ll have Patty draw up a new contract, now you would step this way, I think we have time before my candidate for the birch arrives,” Wentworth said in a rather business-like manner.