The Carrot and the Stick (12 page)

She went on talking. ‘You'll find, T.J., when you know her better, just how naughty Celeste can be.' She smacked the younger girl's glorious bottom again, making her gasp and sway slightly.

Kearns had pulled out his cock and was stroking it gently, running a finger up and down the underside. It was as wide and as impressive as Beth remembered, and as rigid as a board.

‘The naughty little tart plays with herself, too,' Beth said, appearing to pay no attention to Kearns. ‘I've caught her at it.'

‘No, I don't,' Celeste objected pitifully.

‘Oh, yes you do,' Beth insisted, smacking her again. ‘Like you are just about to, aren't you?'

Celeste said nothing, so Beth smacked her hard several more times.

‘Aren't you?' she repeated.

Still Celeste said nothing, but the fingers of her right hand appeared between her legs, obscuring her labia. Kearns got out of his seat and moved forward until he was only a couple of feet from the two lovely girls. He was stroking his penis fully now, his hand moving up and down the shaft. The unseeing eye at its head pointed directly at Celeste's anus, as her forefinger disappeared between her moist lips. With her other hand she rubbed her clitoris, moaning slightly, and her bottom began to sway and her buttocks clench, encouraged by the smarting smacks delivered by Beth.

Beth knew the time had come for her to stop talking and to get spanking again. She took her beat from the movement of the man's hand, smacking Celeste hard on each stroke. As the bottom in front of her turned a deep red, she could hear Celeste's moans turn into panting pleasure, and she knew her friend well enough to know she was just about to come.

Kearns' fist was pumping with increasing vigour, Beth's hand was furiously smacking the proffered bottom, and Celeste's fingers were working avidly between her trembling thighs. The three moved independently but together, and just as Beth thought she could strike no faster, Kearns gave a strangled groan and a cascade of semen shot through the air in an arc and landed on Celeste's bottom, at the top of the shadowy valley. It began to trickle down towards her tiny anus as she wailed and her hips convulsed, her buttocks tensing and wetness shining like silver on her fingers. Beth stopped spanking her, but the grimacing man's second ejaculation occurred, albeit with less momentum, and fell warmly over her hand.

 

‘I don't believe you did that,' Celeste said ten minutes later as the two girls walked down the street away from the Rybix building.

‘Neither do I,' Beth confided, and then they had gone three or four more paces when she added, ‘What do you mean, you don't believe I did that? I don't believe
you
did that.'

‘Well, I don't believe either of us did that,' Celeste said, as they entered the same café as before.

They were giggling with relief as they ordered some coffee, like schoolgirls let out at the end of a long, hard exam.

‘You are a very, very naughty girl who should be ashamed of herself,' Beth said fondly, then let out a little whoop of delight. ‘But it worked. He's hiring you.'

‘And you,' Celeste said with mock severity, ‘are a witch. I never knew you were like that.'

‘I'm not really,' Beth replied. ‘I don't know what came over me.' She pretended to look glum, and then a mischievous smile lit up her face. ‘But let's go home and do it again.'

‘Yes, let's,' Celeste enthused. ‘Only this time we'll change places. You owe me.'

 

 

 

It was mid-morning, but in the studio the sun was setting. The back projection screen at one end of the airy room was a glorious dusky red. In front of the screen was a trellis covered in bougainvillaea, two small palm trees and a flowering hibiscus, a table and chairs of wrought iron painted white, and three girls in beachwear, shivering with cold.

The photographer, Peter Parnell, was walking around the room, pulling down blinds and switching on lights. ‘For goodness' sake, get them a blow heater,' he snapped at a pimply youth with long hair who was trying to look busy and interested in a light meter, as he cast covert glances at the breasts of a redhead in a bikini.

At the other end of the room, Beth sat in a chair with her arms folded and a clipboard and folder on her lap. She was present to supervise the shoot and she deliberately arrived early. As the Cross, Carstairs and Denton account manager for Rybix, this was her first big job for the company, a poster campaign promoting Rybix ice cream. She had made sure to hire Parnell, known to be irritable but a good photographer, and to choose the best looking models. Now it was up to them; there was not much she could do at this point while they were setting up.

She was glad of the momentary respite as she had a lot on her mind. Richard Cross, for one. She caught herself thinking about him often these days. But what exactly did she want from him?

An affair? Maybe.

To finish the unfinished business? That was more like it.

She could admit it to herself; she wanted Richard to make love to her properly, to respect her, if only for a short while. She wanted to prove to herself that she had power over him. So what had gone wrong? Why had nothing developed since that day she was naked on her knees in front of him and his wife walked in on them? Two weeks had gone by without any further moves from him, without any real contact at all. Two weeks of the month had already gone by and she'd hardly seen him since that day.

It cannot have been because of his wife, she thought. Both Richard and Helen acted as if they enjoyed every second of it - or at least as if they were in agreement. He had been busy since then, she knew, but it was more than that. The thought struck her that maybe it was the Rybix account she successfully secured for the company. Maybe that was it. What a quandary. Maybe he only fancied her when he wanted to punish her. And how could he punish her when she had just brought in an enormous new account? Could that be possible? Her success could be her own undoing. Stupid man; he could punish her any time he liked, she thought, imagining being across his lap again. She must discuss it with Dr Susskind at their next appointment.

‘Beth,' a voice called, and she looked up to find Parnell in front of her. ‘I'm ready,' he said, ‘but aren't there supposed to be four girls?'

‘Of course,' Beth replied, rifling through the papers on her lap. ‘Who's missing?' She looked at the set-up. The three girls, warmer now but bored, were acting up on behalf of the pimply youth looking at them through a camera viewfinder. As Beth watched they turned in a line away from him, bent down and pushed down the bottom halves of their bikinis, revealing three bottoms as pink as the sunset behind them. Then they collapsed into each other's arms, howling with laughter as the young man emerged from behind the camera looking all flustered. ‘Oh, a new girl, Natasha Perry,' she said.

‘Well she's late,' Parnell snapped impatiently. ‘She should be sacked before she starts.'

‘She should be smacked,' Beth corrected, under her breath.

‘Did someone mention my name?' asked a breathless voice from behind them. A small dark girl stood by the door, her cheeks pink as if she had been running.

Having chosen her from a composite Beth was glad to see the model in the flesh, and she liked what she saw. Natasha was cute and petit, and she would make a pleasing contrast to the comfortably endowed girls already present. And she was certainly very pretty.

‘Get out of your street clothes and into a swimsuit,' Parnell told her, pointing to a side door that led to a dressing room. ‘As quickly as you can.'

Five minutes later he was in his element, directing the four girls, a make-up artist and his assistant, as if he was staging a major production. ‘You're on the veranda of a grand house on a beautiful Caribbean island at the end of a perfect day,' he said. ‘You are the cool people, the jet set, enjoying what the cool people enjoy; ice cream.'

As the assistant placed tall glasses containing a pink concoction on the wrought iron table, Parnell went on. ‘Don't eat it, just pretend; it's really mashed potatoes. Cold, pink mashed potatoes. Real ice cream melts.'

Beth watched as Parnell positioned the girls and redirected the lights. The assistant turned on a fan, so that a breeze ruffled the girls' hair.

‘There,' Parnell said finally. ‘The coolest way to end the day.'

They'd have to work on that slogan, Beth thought, as the shooting began. She admired Parnell's uncharacteristic patience and his professionalism whilst shooting. She could see why he was amongst the best in the business; the pains he took to get everything, each strand of hair, each delicate flower, just right. Even the plain and dowdy looked their best in a Parnell picture, and the attractive looked utterly gorgeous.

The models were aware of his reputation. When the Rybix shoot was over they crowded around him, asking that he take portrait shots of them for their portfolios. He reluctantly agreed and although he shot the photographs quickly, he still took great care to do as good a job as he could within a short time. When they had left for the dressing room, talking excitedly amongst themselves, Parnell turned to Beth with a questioning look.

‘It looked good,' she said. ‘I can't wait to see the results.'

Parnell studied her face closely. ‘You know, you're prettier than that lot. I should photograph you, for your album.'

He turned away, dispatching his assistant to the dark room, and began to clear up the ‘veranda'. Beth followed him to help.

‘You really think so?' she asked, picking up the potted hibiscus, the germ of an idea forming in her head.

Parnell looked at her face again, now framed by white, scented flowers. ‘Sure,' he said. ‘I've got more than an hour left, and you're paying for my time anyway.'

‘Well, okay, but we'd better wait until the other girls have gone,' she said excitedly, carrying the plant to the door.

 

Fifteen minutes later the girls had gone and the pimply assistant, Joe, had been sent to lunch.

‘Let's get you into a good light,' Parnell said. ‘Soft and honey-coloured like your hair.' He fiddled around for ages, changing the lights and filters, shooting off test pictures, seeming to take far more care with Beth than he had with the portraits of the girls.

And Beth was flattered. ‘You don't have to try so hard, you know,' she said. ‘We'll still be coming back to you for more work.'

Parnell laughed her remark off. ‘But you're worth it,' he said. ‘You really are very lovely, and natural. I am trying to capture that.'

When finally he was happy with every detail, he shot off two complete films of her head and shoulders, muttering instructions every now and then. Eventually he told her to relax. ‘That should do,' he said. ‘One or two of them looked really good.'

‘Do... do you ever shoot nudes?' Beth ventured to ask, trying to appear casual, and instead of replying directly he beckoned her to a bookcase and selected a large green folder. Beth leafed through it. On each page was a different nude; men and women, very sexy but not obscene. Many of the subjects gleamed with oil and looked as if they had been burnished like polished brass. Beth was impressed. They were good enough for a gallery, especially the ones of the men. The men looked as if they had been photographed with love; the women with admiration.

Beth did not look at him. ‘Would, um, would you shoot me like that, in the nude, Peter?' she asked, adding, ‘It would be for a friend - a very close friend.'

‘Those take hours,' he said, nodding at the folder in her hands, but when she looked crestfallen he relented. ‘But I suppose we could do one or two, just to see how they look. Ah well, there goes my lunch.'

He waved her to the dressing room. ‘There should be a robe behind the door,' he told her.

As she was undressing, Beth remembered with delight that the diamond pendant was in her bag. She intended to take it to the jewellers that afternoon to be cleaned. When she was naked, she fastened it around her neck and admired herself in the full length mirror. Then, putting on the robe, it suddenly struck her how strange the situation was; a situation she had created. She was not worried about Parnell seeing her naked; he was a professional photographer and anyway, she had heard that he was gay. But she had also heard that he was an outrageous gossip, and that did suddenly worry her. She certainly did not want this, her taking advantage of a perk of her job, to backfire.

When she reappeared in the studio Parnell was bent behind the camera at the same set-up he had used for the portraits. Beth moved straight to her spot, dropped the robe and started posing, thrusting her full breasts towards the camera.

‘Wow,' Parnell muttered, straightening up and looking directly at her chest. He approached and cupped the diamond pendant in his hand, admiring it closely. Beth could not help smiling, because he hadn't even noticed the perfect twin cushions between which the pendant rested. So the stories she'd heard about him must be right; her natural female vanity certainly would not permit any other conclusion.