Lucinda (13 page)

“You’ve got a spanking coming first.”  Henry wasn’t about to let her postpone the punishment she’d earned.  “You can pull up your skirts and bend over the table and we’ll take care of the matter right here,” he announced, his hands going to his belt.

“Can’t you just use your hand, Henry?” she pleaded with him.

“No.  You flat out disobeyed me and risked your life in the process.  While I understand that you saved your father and Miss McCrae, I am not going to permit you to disobey me and get away with it.  Do as you were told, Lucy, or I’ll double what you’ve earned.”

He was serious, and it showed on his handsome face.  Lucy knew it wasn’t time to argue.  She’d made the choice to disobey Henry, and now she needed to make a choice to accept the consequences, or she would earn extra punishment.  She wanted to cry, but instead, she pulled up her skirts and then lay across the kitchen table, knowing the next few minutes were not going to be pleasant.  She was relieved that Henry permitted her to keep her drawers.  They were thin, and wouldn’t give much protection from the leather of his belt, but they were much better than lying there all bare.  The first lick of the belt caught her then, and she gasped in shock and pain, but instead of another stripe, she felt Henry’s hand at her waist and in the next second, her drawers were lying in a puddle at her feet!  “Oh no!” she whispered.

“Oh yes!” he insisted, and the doubled belt caught her again, causing her to dance in place.  Henry was determined to give his pretty little wife a thorough lesson.  He watched her backside turn white and then stain a brilliant red as welts rose on her delicate skin.  He knew the welts had to be burning, but Lucy somehow managed to stay in position and accept her strapping.

Lucy was crying and pleading with Henry to stop long before he finally decided she’d had enough.  When she heard him putting his belt through the loops on his pants, she was grateful he was done, and she made the mistake of trying to get up.

“I did not tell you to get up, Lucinda.”

“I thought you were done, Henry!” she cried out.  “Oh, darling, please be done!” she begged as she realized he intended to punish her further.

“I’ll be done when I decide to be done, young lady.”  She gasped as he pulled her upright and then over to his chair where he took a seat and put her over his lap.  “Pull up your skirts, wife!” he ordered firmly, giving her a hard spank.

Lucy obeyed him, and Henry gave her a long and hard spanking over the top of the welts left by the strapping.  It hurt, but Henry scolded and kept her attention focused on exactly why she was being spanking.  By the time he finished, Lucy knew that she wouldn’t be sitting any time soon!  She was in some serious hurt.

“I love you, Lucinda Zabarski, and this is only a small sample of the tanning you’ll get if you ever disobey me like this again.”  He held her then and offered comfort.

Across town two unkempt men were accepting a huge packet of money to kidnap the lovely brunette…

Chapter Nine

His beautiful wife certainly knew how to make him feel guilty! Henry thought to himself as she sniffled as she placed his supper in front of him.  She was still crying over the spanking he gave her, and she damned well deserved the spanking… in spite of what Miss McCrae, his former father-in-law, and the rest of the town thought.  She put her life in danger, and single-handedly saved the whole town from Razz Fencil and his drovers.  But, damn it, he couldn’t let her get away with doing things like that!  She was tiny, and he loved her.

“Aren’t you going to eat?” he demanded when she continued to move around the kitchen.

“I’ve lost my appetite,” Lucinda answered, sounding wounded.

“You need to eat something,” Henry insisted.

“No, Henry,” she said firmly.  “Eat your supper and leave me in peace.”  She stomped into the bedroom and shut the door with a soft click that sounded as final as a loud slam.

He scowled and tried to take a bite of his food.  It turned to sawdust in his mouth, and he pushed the plate away in disgust.  Maybe Mac was right and Lucy was more upset over her father than she let on?  Or maybe she thought her husband was a cruel bastard? Henry condemned himself.

He got up and went into the bedroom and darned if he didn’t catch her standing on the bed and looking at her backside in the mirror on the vanity.  Lucy quickly dropped her skirts and he noticed her drawers were lying on the floor in the corner.  Her butt looked angry and sore and he suddenly realized she was in too much pain to sit down, or to eat.  He left the room without a word and went to the infirmary to get some ointment.  When he returned she was lying on the bed, sobbing as if her heart would break.  “Oh, Lucy…!  Don’t cry!” he pleaded with her.  “I’ll put some ointment on your welts and it will relieve the pain.  Pull up your skirts, honey,” he ordered gently.

“No!” she refused.

“Why not?” he asked, stunned by her refusal.

“Because I’m mad at you!”

“Yeah, I’m a real bastard,” he agreed.  “I shouldn’t have spanked you on top of the strapping.  It was more than enough.”

“You aren’t a bastard!” she argued.  “Don’t you say that, Henry Zabarski!”

“Then why are you mad at me, honey, if it’s not for tanning you?”

“I can’t be perfect, Henry!  I can’t.  I’m me, and I have to do what is right, just as you do.  You aren’t a lawman, but you went and stood with the law today.  I might be your wife, but I have a sense of duty, too.  I did what was right for me to do.  I know you don’t understand that… but it isn’t fair for me to get a severe punishment and you to get praised for being a ‘man of principles’!  You had no right to threaten Miss McCrae, either, and I expect you to apologize to her tomorrow!”

“Lucy, you risked your life!” he argued.

“So did you!  I don’t like it when you do that, but did I punish you?” she angrily demanded.

“It’s different,” he stubbornly declared.

“No it isn’t.  The only difference is that you are a man and I am a woman.  Can’t a woman have honor and principles, too?  If you want a mindless creature who will sit home and knit, Henry Zabarski, you picked the wrong woman.  I am who I am.  I will never ever stand by and do nothing when you are in danger.  I don’t care if I am Miss McCrae’s age, if you need saving, then I’m going to do my damndest to save you, and to hell with the consequences, so put that in your damn pipe and smoke it!” she said, and then shoved him off the bed.  “You can just sleep in the infirmary until my butt stops hurting!”

“I brought this in here to help you and now I’m of a mind to bare you and spank you again!” Henry angrily declared, getting to his feet in one fluid movement.

“You do that and see if I cook for you tomorrow!” Lucinda threatened, her eyes snapping with fury.  “Just get out of here, Henry.  I am angry and in no mood for any of your foolishness tonight!”

He gave her a hard look and headed for the door.

“A decent husband would leave the ointment!” she called out.

“Like hell!” he muttered, and slammed the door on his way out.

Henry busied himself doing bookwork and doing an inventory of supplies he needed to order.  Lucinda didn’t come out of their bedroom, and if she did, she certainly didn’t bring him so much as a cup of coffee as she normally did.  He finally went to the kitchen and cleaned up their uneaten supper and washed the dishes.  Henry wanted to look in on his wife, but he didn’t feel like another scold.  He felt rotten for denying her the simple relief the ointment would have provided, but his temper was as rotten as hers.  He debated about getting the jar and just going in there and making peace, but before he could do just that, there was a knock on the office door.  He went to answer, and wondered yet again why so many babies decided to be born at night.

* * *

Lucy found a scrawled note on Henry’s desk telling her that he was delivering the Cole’s baby.  She took advantage of his being gone to help herself to some ointment for her very sore bottom, and winced as she gingerly applied it.  She’d acted badly last night when Henry came to her to offer aid, and she owed him an apology.  She shouldn’t have kicked him out of bed because she’d gone out of her way to earn a punishment.  It wasn’t as though she hadn’t known what to expect.  She was angry because she hadn’t expected the spanking to be as harsh as it was.  She’d frightened Henry, and Henry spanked when he was frightened.  The spanking was merely a reflection of how much and how deeply he loved her…  She would make it right with him when he came home from delivering the baby.  Bringing a new life into the world always put him in a good mood.

She heard the door on the office open and close and she went to see who it was and tell them that Henry was out on a call.  To her surprise it was Mac.  “How are you doing this morning, Mac?” she asked with a worried frown.

“I’ve still got a headache, but I’ll live,” he stated.  “Just wanted to make sure you’re doin’ okay?  Your Pa is one mean hombre…”

Lucinda shrugged.  “I’m used to it.  Hopefully he will leave on today’s stage and we’ll never see him again.”

“I’ll see to it he’s on that stage, and in the meantime, you avoid him, Lucy.  I don’t trust him not to try and drag you along with him.”

“Over my dead body,” she said with such conviction that Mac had no doubt in his mind that she was serious.  “Seriously, Mac.  Any love I held for that man was gone before I was old enough to ever remembering loving him.  He wasn’t a kind father, even when I was small.  Not to me, and only to my brother when it suited him.  He is not a nice man, and he treats my mother with nothing but contempt.  He holds no power over me, so don’t be afraid I will feel loyalty to him over Henry.”

“Good for you, Lucy,” Mac said with a smile for her.   “You were brave yesterday, and you kept a lot of good people from being killed.  I want you to know that I appreciate that, even though I hope Doc warmed your backside good and proper for risking your neck!  I know that sounds like I’m on both sides of the fence, and I am.  It would kill the Doc to lose you.  Please don’t take chances with your safety, Lucy.”  He leaned down and gave her a brotherly peck on the cheek, and then stomped out of the waiting room without another word.

“Men!” Lucy muttered to herself, and then headed for the kitchen, determined to bake some cookies.  She’d just placed the last tray inside the oven when she heard the door on the office open again.  She wiped her hands on her apron and went to see what someone needed.  She didn’t like the looks of the man standing there, but she’d learned from Henry that all people deserved medical care.  “May I help you?”

“Lady, my wife is havin’ ‘er a baby, and somethin’ ain’t right.  I need the Doc…” he said.

“I’m sorry, but the Doctor is on another call right now.”

“You ‘is wife?” he asked hopefully, and Lucy nodded.  “Could you come?  My Izzy is plumb skeered to death.”

Some instinct told Lucy not to go with the man.  “I’m sorry, but I’m not trained to deal with an emergency.  If you tell me where to find you, I’ll send Henry as soon as he gets back, which should be shortly.”

“Ma’am, please.  I beg you to come… Izzy is hurtin’ somethin’ awful, and I don’t know what to do.”

“Let me get my cookies out of the oven, and I’ll be right with you.”  She would leave Henry a note…  The second she turned her back on the man, he stepped forward and pressed a chloroform soaked cloth over her mouth and nose, and even though she struggled, the drug put her under so quickly she couldn’t get away.  The man wrapped her in a blanket and carried her outside and put her in the back of the wagon, and anyone looking on would have thought she was leaving from a visit with Doc Z in a loving husband’s arms.

* * *

Henry took a deep breath and then steeled himself to go inside.  He was in for a huge scolding, and he knew it, but he had to do the right thing.  The bell on the door jingled and a few seconds later Miss McCrae came walking through the curtains and into her dress shop.  Her eyes widened and her cheeks turned pink with outrage and embarrassment.  Before she could speak, he raised his hand with the palm outward and said, “I’ve come to apologize, Miss McCrae.”

“Well, I should hope so!” she declared, indignation pouring from her every pore.

“I was scared out of my mind that Lucy could have been hurt yesterday.  I love her and I want to keep her safe.  I don’t react well when she does things to risk her safety, like riding out of town after me and right into the Apache.  She’s a brave woman, and I’d be a liar if I said that her being a woman didn’t make it hard for me to swallow that she protected all of us.  If she were a man, I would have applauded her for her quick thinking. Instead, I acted like a fool.”

“Nonsense.  You acted like a husband who loves his wife, Doc Z.  That isn’t a crime,” the elderly woman said with a sweet, forgiving smile.

“I’m sorry I snapped at you and threatened you.  I embarrassed you, and I feel terrible about that.”

“I shouldn’t have poked you with my hat pin,” she said, and then giggled.  “I am much too old for a spanking, young man.  I am old enough to be your great-aunt!” she declared.

“No woman ever gets too old for a good spanking,” he said with a smile.  “Forgive me for embarrassing you?” he asked.

“Of course I do.  And I hope you weren’t too hard on Lucinda.  She might be different from the sort of woman that I and most of the other women in the town were raised to be, but she is definitely a lady, and she isn’t afraid to stand beside her man when he is in trouble.  She has character, Doc Z, and that is something you can’t buy in a wife.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You stop dilly-dallying here with me and get yourself on home and tell her that you love her.  Women need to hear those words, especially if they’re too sore to sit down.”  She winked at him, and he thanked her and took his leave, thankful he got off as lightly as he did.

As he was crossing the street, Mac intercepted him.  “How’s the head, Mac?”

“Hurts like hell,” Mac replied.  “I put that son of a bitch pa of Lucy’s on the stage and told him to stay the hell away from her or I’d find a reason to lock him up.  He said he’d remember that someday.  I don’t trust him, Doc Z.  You keep a tight hold on Lucy for a few days.”