I’m not going to let you interfere with my leadership in this home any longer. I am going to punish our daughters for their misbehavior, then I am going to come back here and we will discuss it. If you continue to disrespect me I will punish you as well.”
Her mouth formed an O and she stared at him speechless. Then she opened her mouth to protest. Joseph moved swiftly through the door of the woodshop and closed it behind him, deftly padlocking it shut. He could hear his wife screeching and cursing as she banged on the other side, issuing all manner of threats. It was going to be an interesting evening.
Joseph’s mind turned to his daughters as he made his way back into the house. Steeling his heart, he walked up the stairs to knock softly on their door.
“ Come in,” one of them called timidly.
Both his daughters lay in their nightgowns bent over their respective twin beds as they’d been taught as children. He was pleased he wouldn’t have to lengthen their punishments. Both their eyes sought the door hopefully after he entered, no doubt looking for their mother.
He rolled the sleeves of his shirt past his forearms. “Your mother is not going to save you,” he told them as he walked to their closet and removed the paddle from where it still hung on its hook.
“ Daddy, we’re really sorry,” Cassie said frantically. “We’ll never argue again. We swear!”
Joseph walked over to Candy, tapping the paddle lightly against his hand. “Ladies, you were told to stop arguing three times. Not only did you continue, but you started kicking one another in addition. We’ll have no more of that in this home. This should help you remember that.”
“ No Daddy!” Candy begged. “Cassie goes first. Remember?”
Joseph was puzzled for a moment before he remembered that Candy was the leader of the two and had usually instigated the problem that had earned previous paddlings. Hence she usually received a harsher punishment. Joseph always first paddled the bottom with the lighter sentence so that the bottom with the heavier penalty would witness the first and dread their own. But tonight Cassie’s bottom would suffer more since she’d instigated both the argument and the kicking match.
He placed his knee on the side of the bed and his hand firmly on Candy’s back. “Please, Daddy! Please!” she begged as a ten year old might, her bottom clenched.
Ignoring her pleas, he raised the paddle and began to spank until he was sure she'd thoroughly learned her lesson.
Afterwards he paddled Cassie until she seemed utterly repentant, as well. He waited until the wailing ended before he spoke. Both daughters looked at him with new respect in their eyes as he told them they were to stay in bed the remainder of the evening. They nodded in unison, tears still streaming down their faces.
Too old for a spanking? He didn’t think so.
Joseph tucked the paddle in the back waistband of his pants and walked back to his workshop, his jaw clenched. He knew his wife may very well divorce him for what he was about to do, but he realized the marriage was over anyway if something wasn’t done. He had nothing to lose.
When he unlocked the padlock and walked in, he gasped, his heart jumping into his throat. His wife stood tippy-toed on a pile of crates and boxes just over his tools in an effort to reach the small window near the top of the building. Didn’t she know she could fall on his sharp tools? He gritted his teeth as he flew across the room. The fool woman!
He grabbed Bonnie around her slender waist and dragged her down from her ramshackle platform. She screamed in protest and started to pull his hair. He landed a solid smack to the seat of the thin pants she wore, causing her to curse. He easily wrestled her over to the antique chair in the corner and bent her face down across his knees. She tried to bite him. He pushed her forward until her head was