THe Definitive Vicki Blue
by Vicki Blue
© Vicki Blue and Blushing Books, Copyright 2010
Respectable Wife Sample:
Nora Kittler willed her lip to stop trembling lest she betray how vulnerable she felt and thus prove her uncle right.
"How could you?" she asked. "How could you turn your back on your own flesh and blood?"
Levi Johnson looked at his 22-year-old niece and for a brief moment experienced a feeling of déjà vu. She wore the same scared look of hurt she had when brought to him as a confused five-year-old child trying to grasp the concept that her parents were dead. The weather had been unkind that winter, and when the flu claimed them both. Nora was left with the feeling that no one -not even the God she had been raised to trust - could be counted on. With no one else to turn to, she was sent to her only surviving relative - her father's brother.
But she had been a blessing to Levi and his late wife Naomi, who had longed for children but were unable to have any of their own.
Over the years they had loved her and coddled her in the misguided effort to somehow compensate her for the great loss of her parents. When they tried to set limits she rebelled. If they held firm she would look so sad that would soon find themselves capitulating. As they held her in their arms the pretty little manipulator with the shiny chestnut curls would have them where she wanted them.
Even now Levi resisted the urge to hold her. But Nora was no longer a child. She was a woman who should - no, he decided - must- be sent back to Jakob, her husband and the only person who had ever been able to handle her.
"But you don't understand!!" Nora cried, turning on the signature tears. "He beat me!!"
Levi stood up and stoked the fire, shaking his head as he did so. When he spoke his tone was one of uncharacteristic firmness.
"Nora Lynn, I've known Jakob Kittler since he was knee-high to a grasshopper," said Levi. "I've seen him deal with drunken farmhands and unbroken horses. I've seen him be firm with both but I have never seen him lose his temper, even where other men would have. Not ever!"
"I am neither a drunken farmhand nor a wild filly," said Nora. "And he did beat me!"
Jakob approached his niece and took her delicate, heart-shaped face in his hands.
"Nora, Nora," he said. "If I believed for a minute he had done that I'd be loading my rifle right now, but you aren't bruised. Your dress isn't even torn. Can't you see why I'm skeptical? How exactly did your husband beat you and do no damage?"
Nora tore herself away and sat down at the pine table, pushing the tin cup and plate away as she crossed her arms and put her head down to the surface of the cool wood. How could she tell her uncle the embarrassing truth?
She sighed and raised her head, determined to spit out the words. True, they may mean a moment's embarrassment for her but they'd spell much worse consequences for Jakob when Uncle Levi found out.
"The damage was done where you can't see. The marks are under my skirt," she said.
"Under your skirt?" Levi asked, and for a moment felt fury rise that perhaps the girl he raised was being subjected to some sort of perversions. Then he stopped, suddenly certain of what she meant.
"Nora, are you saying he spanked you?" Levi asked.
"Yes!!" Nora said, relieved that she didn't have to use that dread word herself. Spank. A short but powerful word that in her mind embodied subjecting one to the authority of another.
Saving Grace Sample
Clutching her umbrella in one hand and her briefcase in the other, the diminutive blonde in a navy blue business suit anxiously scanned the busy street for a cab.
On this morning she faced motivated competition. Given the persistent cold gray drizzle, a number of other people were equally eager of getting a ride to get them out of the rain and to their destinations.
But when it came to determination, few matched Grace Harper.
As she made her way to a group gathered on the corner, she kept her eye on a tall man standing in front of them on the curb. At about 6'4", he'd be likely to get a cabby's attention, she surmised. She was right. Moments later a taxi pulled over to the curb and the tall man opened the back door. When he leaned over to speak to the driver, Grace saw her chance.
Pushing through the group of surprised bystanders, she darted into the cab ahead of him, knocking one of his suitcases into a puddle in the process.
The man, Miles Fontaine, was clearly irritated as he picked up his bag and brushed it off.
"Sorry about that, sir," said the driver, who by now had come around to the back of the cab to load the man's luggage into the trunk. "There aren't a whole lot in the way of manners in this city some mornings."
"I'd say," Fontaine replied. Maybe bad manners were the norm for people here, but they weren't the norm where he came from. And he fully intended to have a few words with the rude little blonde. But when he got in the cab he found her talking on her cell phone.
"I need those files sent over this morning, Thelma," she was saying. There was a brief pause before Grace exploded. "I don't care if you think it's short notice. It's not your job to think; it's your job to gather information when you're told to do it."
"Excuse me," Fontaine said, trying to get Grace's attention.
"Hold on a sec," she said, pausing long enough to address the cabby. "Fourth and Mercer. And hurry. I have a meeting."
Undaunted at being so obviously ignored, Fontaine tried again addressing her with a definite Texas accent. "Excuse me, I'd like to have a word with you."
"Jesus…hold on just one more second, Thelma," she said to the person Fontaine figured to be the World's Most Patient Secretary. "Don't go anywhere."
Then turning to Fontaine she snapped, "What?"
"Not 'what', but 'why' is my question," Fontaine said. "Why did you do that back there?"
"Do what?" she asked impatiently.
"You really don't know?" Fontaine asked, wondering if anyone really could be that oblivious to others. "You jumped into a cab that I hailed and knocked my bag over into a puddle. You don't see anything wrong with that?"
Grace rolled her eyes. "Look pal…" she began.
Fontaine's felt his annoyance increase exponentially. "My name's not 'Pal'," he corrected. "It's Fontaine. Miles Fontaine."
"O.K., Mr. Fontaine," she snapped. "I've got an important meeting to go to. Now I could have stood there playing Polly Polite, but if I had I'd still be on that corner with the rest of those shmucks. So sorry if your wittle feewings are hurt but out here it's the survival of the fittest. It's not called the Concrete Jungle for nothing."
Grace turned back to the cell phone. "Thelma," she was saying. "Thelma, are you there? How dare she hang up before I'm finished with her! Goddamnit! Like she really has so much to do she can't hold the line for me."
"You seem to have as much respect for your staff as you do for total strangers," Fontaine observed aloud. "I don't know what kind of upbringing you had but I'll tell you that where I came from such rudeness would guarantee an immediate trip over the knee."
Grace fixed him with a gaze that was both icy and sarcastic. "Well, gee, Mr. Fontaine." she said, mocking his accent as she spoke. "While I appreciate your interest in my personal growth, I'm a little old to be spanked. But if the day ever comes that I need your assistance with my people skills I'll be sure to call you for advice."
"Here we are," the cabby was saying as he pulled over to the curb that marked Grace's destination. "That will be $5.75"
"Keep the change," Grace said to the driver, handing him a ten-dollar bill. "Let's just call it my good deed for the day.
Then with a smirk she turned to Fontaine. "Glad I got that over with."
And then she was gone, leaving her fellow passenger and the cab driver shaking their heads.
"I heard what you said to her," the driver said to Fontaine, laughing. "And you know what? I completely agree. It's a shame she's too old to use a good tanning because she rightly deserves one."
Still watching Grace walk away, when Fontaine replied it was as much to himself as it was to the cabby.
"You never know," he said. "Some people are never too old."
Sample from Stanton and Blue
The tick tock of the antique wall clock seemed annoyingly loud, I thought as I sat in the leather chair across from my boss' desk. Was it really that loud or was it just my nerves? I quickly decided it was just my nerves. I'd been in the office many times before delivering folders of information to my editor, Skip Stanton, and had never even noticed the clock. But now, sitting in the silence and waiting for Mr. Stanton's arrival, my nervousness magnified every sound I heard.
Even after three years I still couldn't believe my luck at landing a job on the magazine, Coastal Weekly. A college dropout, I had initially started as a researcher during a period when the magazine was new and applicants were scarce. As the readership had grown, so had my role on the publication. I soon caught the attention of our old editor, Maxwell James, who was from the old school and realized that talent wasn't necessarily something you picked up in the halls of academia. We had spent many hours in this secluded office, upstairs and away from the rest of the noise and hubbub of the beehive of reporters downstairs. Max was like a kindly grandfather and besides mentoring me had expanded my role beyond research to feature writing. Now I was pleased that my byline was being displayed more often. I was even more pleased that in an office filled with college graduates and brown-nosers I was making my way up on my own merits and without fucking anyone in the process, either literally or figuratively.
I still missed Maxwell since his retirement three months ago and wasn't too fond of his replacement, the stoic Skip Stanton. What a stupid name I thought. Skip. Obviously a holdover nickname from his jock days, judging by the football trophies lining the walls. Hey, I thought, maybe I'll do a cheer for him when he comes in to lighten the mood a little. I was wearing a short pleated skirt that looked a little like a cheerleader's skirt. Maybe if I did a little pom-pom routine he'd forget the whole thing.
The chime of the wall clock caused me to jump and snap back to reality. There would be no reason for cheering today. I was in some serious trouble, I surmised. Just how serious would depend on how good a sense of humor "Skip" had.
The memo had been a joke, after all, albeit a bad one. Entitled "Suggestions For Getting The New Boss To Lighten Up", it included a few bawdy recommendations that were borderline disrespectful. I had meant to send it to a few close friends in the office but had accidentally hit the "Send To All" button. Within seconds everyone in our offices, including Mr. Stanton, had received the offensive memo in their email. All day I had been stopped by co-workers laughing at my suggestions, but it suddenly wasn't so funny when his secretary handed me a note reading, "Mr. Stanton wants to see you in his office at three o'clock. Sharp."
I was listening to the clock chime the three o'clock hour when the door opened and Mr. Stanton came into the room. He was a tall, solid guy. Mid forties. Glasses and a receding hairline did little to diminish his good looks. He was still very attractive. He obviously worked out and was in good shape. He was dressed in blue slacks, a white button-down shirt and silk tie. I started to break the ice by saying something nice about his tie, but decided to just keep my mouth shut. I really didn't like the tie, anyway.
Stanton didn't speak as he sat down in his desk. He simply began to leaf through the folder he had walked in with. I sat up a little and angled my neck to see what he was looking at. My heart jumped when I realized he was looking through my personnel folder. "Damn", I thought. After a few minutes of silence he picked up the phone and spoke his secretary. "Lila, hold all my calls and tell anyone who asks that I'm not seeing anyone else for the rest of the day."
Stanton finally shut the folder and leaned back in his chair. "Well, well," he said. "You've done quite well making a name for yourself despite you lack of a degree."
"Thank you, sir", I mumbled. Maybe this wasn't going to be too bad after all.
"It's a shame that with all the lessons you've learned on your own you never learned the one about respecting your superiors". Maybe it wasn't going to go so great.
"I can explain," I began
"No, I don't think you can and even if you could I wouldn't want to hear it. If folks in this office see me as an inflexible boss who demands the highest standards then it's because I am. I'm fair and will listen to any grievance. But I will not tolerate disrespect in any form. Because of your little prank I had one of the office managers approach me this morning and offer to 'wax my bald spot'." He snapped up the memo off his desk.
"Let's see. I believe that is suggestion number sixteen. Look at me when I'm speaking to you, Vicki," he suddenly boomed. I had been nervously tracing the pleats on my skirt with my finger while he spoke and hearing him say my name caused me to start a little. I looked at him with eyes betraying more apprehension than I was comfortable revealing.
"You think you're quite the clown, don't you?"
"Sir," I said, trying to smile. "It was only intended as a joke."
"We don't have room for jesters here on Coastal Weekly, Ms. Blue, not even talented ones. Sadly enough you'll have a hard time finding work with your lack of degree and your disrespect for authority noted on your employment record."
I sat forward in my chair, suddenly numb. I felt weak as his words sunk in. He was right. With the colleges turning out English majors with Masters degrees who were more than willing to take entry-level jobs, even with my experience I'd have a hard time finding a comparable job.
"You're firing me?" I asked.
"That depends on you, Vicki," said Stanton. He came and stood over by the chair where I was sitting. Why was I so afraid of this man? I'm not one to be intimidated but I could feel my heart beating in my chest. "I'm giving you a choice. You can be terminated or you can accept an official reprimand."
"An official reprimand?" I asked. I tried not to show my relief as visions of a warning letter collecting dust in my personnel file filled my thoughts. "You mean, like, a letter or something?"
Stanton still stood by my chair. "No, I was thinking along the lines of something that would make more of an impression. The perfect penalty for adults who play childish pranks. The kind of reprimand I had in mind for you was a good old fashioned over-the-knee spanking."
Sample from Mack and Tara: The Sting
"That's not uncomfortable, is it?" Sharon asked as she adjusted the tape holding the wire to my ribcage.
"Nah, it's fine," I said.
"Can you hear me, Gus?" I asked.
From the next room someone knocked on the wall. Yes, he could hear me.
I was relieved. Knowing that Gus, Sharon and two others from the vice squad were in the same hotel made me feel more secure. All through the planning phase of this undercover sting operation, I had felt confident. Now - just an hour before I was scheduled to meet the Charles Edward Darby - otherwise known as Councilman Darby - made me more nervous than I wanted to admit.
For months it had been suspected that Darby frequented north Fourth Street to pick up prostitutes. But no one so far had been able to catch him. The sting wasn't to ruin this man's career, however. It was to make sure he didn't hurt another woman.
Just two weeks ago we had finally gotten a positive I.D. from his latest victim, an 18-year-old prostitute who may have been cheerleader pretty had she been lucky enough to have had a decent childhood. But Casey Landers had been on the street for two years. Her shock of blonde-white hair, frizzy from too many cheap dye jobs, had caught my eye when I walked into the room.
But it was the bruises I'll always remember.
Laying on her belly, Casey turned her head as best she could to look at me.
"I want you to see what he did to me," she said. "And I want you to catch him."
I had already seen the photos. Dark purple welts some of them oozing blood crisscrossed every inch of skin from her lower back to the middle of her calves. Her wrists and ankles also bore bruise marks where - mindless with pain - she had pulled against the leather restraints.
Even though it was 24 hours since she had been found - still tied to the bed and drifting in and out of consciousness - and treated by doctors, the ugly marks that lay under her gown still churned my stomach. I gently lowered her garment and covered her with the blanket. She winced as she continued.
"I thought he was just another john," she said. "He seemed normal enough…"
Casey stopped, a tear traveling from the corner of her eye to the corner of her mouth. She swallowed, willing herself to continue.
I pulled a Kleenex from the box at her bedside and dabbed the tear away, knowing little else to do.
"I had dressed the way he wanted - like a schoolgirl. It's not unusual. A lot of guys like that little-girl look. So then he started the regular talk. Told me I was a bad girl and all that stuff. He reached under my skirt and squeezed my ass, like they all do. Then, he started saying that it was…whores….like me who were causing the downfall of our country. He said I needed to be taught a lesson."
I dabbed Casey's eyes again with the tissue. "If this is too hard for you.."I began.
"No," she said. "I want to finish, Detective…."
"Morgan. Tara Morgan, "I offered. "You can call me Tara."
She took a deep breath.
"I don't even remember how I ended up on the bed. It was so fast. I knew when he grabbed me this wasn't like any other scene. I felt something was really wrong. I tried to get away but he slapped me. I felt like the room was spinning and the next minute he had me face down on the mattress and I couldn't move my hands or legs.
I was scared. Real scared. I told him to let me up - that the date was over. But he just gagged me."
She stopped, lifting herself in an attempt to reach a plastic cup of water on her bedside table. I reached for it first and, gently urging her to lie down as I guided the flexible plastic straw to her mouth. After a few sips she continued.
"He said I was just a sinful whore and the sooner women like me stopped leading men into wickedness then the better off our society would be. He told me he was going to punish me for being a Jezebel. He told me that I was to take my punishment like a big girl and said if I ever even thought of going to the cops he'd kill me. He pushed my skirt up and pulled my panties down to my ankles. And then he started hitting me."
"Did you see what he used?" I asked.
"It was some sort of stick - like a switch only thicker. It felt like it was maybe made of plastic or something," she said. "I couldn't see it but I could hear it. I remember hearing this swishing sound and then everything was just pain. I passed out and when I came to he was still hitting me. I passed out again. That's all I remember until the hotel maid came in and called the cops."
"Jesus." I said under my breath and then pulled my chair closer to her.
"Casey, could you identify him from a picture?"
"I know I could," she said. "He looked like someone I've seen before but I couldn't place him."
I reached into my document bag and casually pulled out a book of photos. With great effort Casey raised herself up on her elbows to look at the book as I placed it on her pillow. She examined the first five pages without comment. Then on the sixth page her eyes widened.
"That's him."
"Which one?" I asked.
"That one," she said, pointing to a mug shot of Darby taken last year after he was arrested for an alleged home improvement scam. He was acquitted just a few months ago under rumors involving bribed jury members.
I felt my heart leap at her confirmation of what we had expected. For months there had been whispers of suspicion that the councilman was involved in more than just crooked business deals and politics. Two other prostitutes who suffered beatings similar to Casey's had been afraid to talk, probably because he had threatened to kill them as well.
The threat was obviously still on Casey's mind.
"I want him stopped," she said. "Can you get him before he kills me?"
I felt a stab of sympathy for the girl on the bed.
"Casey, no one is going to kill you," I said. "We're keeping an officer by your door and when you are well enough to go home we'll make sure you're protected. I promise."
I had meant what I said because there was something about that girl on the bed that inspired me. She wasn't the first victim, but so far she had been the bravest. She'd also been the only one who probably hadn't secretly believed that her life on the streets entitled men to abuse them without repercussions. I could identify with her spirit. I could identify with her feeling worthy even when the world told her she wasn't. I had been there myself once.
So I had volunteered – no, I had insisted - to go undercover in this case. I fit the profile of what Darby seemed to like - blonde with a nice body that was fit without being too thin.
I knew I could get the job done.
The only cloud on the horizon of this latest adventure in law enforcement was my husband, Mack. Seven years my senior, Mack was a homicide detective. I had noticed him in the hallways when I started out on the force as a patrol officer three years earlier. He had always smiled when he saw me and I always felt a twinge when he did. Head and shoulders taller than me, he always looked so handsome in his starched shirts and pleated pants, his shield glimmering beside the gun holstered by his hip.
We started dating a year after I made detective but I realized early in that Mack was a man of values - old-fashioned ones. He did all those charming things you'd associate with old-fashioned values; he opened doors, held the umbrella for me and wouldn't allow me to carry anything heavy as long as he was there to do it. And although we never talked about it, from the very beginning he wordlessly established himself as the leader.
It began as gentle admonitions for missteps he saw in my characters - a tendency towards little white lies ("Oh, just tell her I'm not home") and harsher reprimands for habits he simply wouldn't tolerate, such as my smoking.
I improved in a lot of areas but the smoking was difficult. But because I didn't want to displease him I continued to smoke but on the sly, feeling what he didn't know wouldn't hurt him. But one afternoon I realized that what he found out would hurt me when he came home early and caught me puffing away on the balcony of the apartment we shared just two days after I had told him I had kicked the habit.
I hadn't expected him to come home, and the look on his face was a mixture of disgust and righteous anger. Wordlessly he snatched the smoking Marlboro from my hand and dropped it in the glass of iced tea that sat on the railing. The next thing I knew he had propelled me into the apartment, slamming the French doors behind us. He shoved me none to gently onto the couch before walking briskly around the room to draw the blinds.
I watched him, too scared to ask what was going to happen that he wouldn't want others to see.
I quickly found out. With a look of grim determination he pulled me to my feet and deftly unbuttoned my denim shorts. I felt them skim my bottom and thighs as they traveled downward. For a brief second I thought he was preparing me for a "quickie" but down deep I knew this wasn't about sex. I don't even think I was surprised when I went over his knee.
I had never been spanked - not even in any of the thirteen foster homes I had drifted through in my youth. State law forbade physical correction or "abuse" of any kind. So - lucky me - mine had all been mental. Forever told by social workers and foster parents that I was "incorrigible", I had lived up to my reputation. The first time I heard different was when - as a surly and pierced seventeen-year old - I found myself sitting across from a kindly district attorney who offered to get my shoplifting charge reduced if I'd agree to see a recruiter with the local community college's law enforcement program.
Feeling it was better than jail I took the offer. The rest was history. The instructors there and at the police academy later taught me the value of structure and discipline. After years of abuse those two things were just what I needed and were what ultimately drew me to the force - and to Mack. Now, face down over his lap I was distressed but not angry. I recognized the difference between abuse and a punishment earned.
But still I wasn't prepared for the impact of the first blow to what had been my virgin bottom.