Lucinda (5 page)

“I choose to leave,” Lucinda answered, and headed for the door, gun in hand.  There was no way she would permit him to punish her!

“Big mistake, Miss Brat,” Henry told her.

Before she could react, he’d taken her rifle from her hands and tossed it onto a pile of straw.  She dropped her saddlebags, fully prepared to use every bit of the skill she had to take the Doctor down and escape what he had planned for her.  She kicked out, and found herself flipped through the air to land on her backside!  She was on her feet in the next instant, and tried once more to attack… with the same results.  It was as though Henry could read her mind.  She tried several more tactics, but eventually she realized she was no match for him.  He was looking at her in amusement.  “You aren’t the only one who has studied kung fu, Lucinda.  I’m bigger than you and a lot stronger.  You are the one who is going to end up bruised, not me.”  He gave his words time to register.  “Are you ready to peel these switches now?” he gave her one last chance to spare herself a more severe punishment, but she stubbornly shook her head ‘no’.  “Very well.  You sit right there and don’t move.”

Lucinda didn’t sit.  She jumped to her feet and ran for the barn door.  Henry caught her and brought her back.  “You let me go, you killer, you!”

“There isn’t a grown man in this town who wouldn’t hold you for me if I asked him to, little girl, especially Mac.  If you try to run out of this barn again, I’m not going to stop you; I’m just going to finish peeling these switches and then use them wherever I find you, and let me tell you right now, you’ll be plenty embarrassed because you aren’t going to have a stitch on from your waist to your ankles,” Henry promised the pretty brunette.

“You aren’t serious!” she gasped.  “That isn’t proper!” she sounded just like her prim and proper mother.

“I’m a Doctor; I’ve seen nude women before,” he kept right on peeling the switches, taking off the bark and the little nubs that could cut her skin.

“Not my body, you haven’t, and you’re not going to now, either!” she jumped to her feet.

“Yes, I am.  I am going to get your attention once and for all,” he promised as he finished the last switch.

“You have no right!”

“But you have a right to come here and disrupt my life; try to scare off my patients, and threaten my life?  You have the right to ride out into Apache Territory when the Indians are on the rampage… just to protect me so you can kill me?  Sorry, Lucinda, you brought this switching on by your actions and I aim to do a good job of striping you before sending you home to your parents.  Jake is probably turning over in his grave right now at your foolish behavior!”

“Don’t you dare say that!” Lucinda was instantly angry.  “Philip loved me!” she declared.

“Yes, he did,” Henry nodded.  “And he would expect me to do the right thing right now, and I am sure going to do so.  You can sit back down and take off those boots and then stand up and take off those britches and whatever you have on underneath, Lucinda.  I’m not going to spank you over your clothing this time.”

“I am not going to bare myself, and you are not going to beat me with those switches.  I didn’t do anything wrong,” she dared to argue with him.  “I am an adult and I have the right to go anywhere I wish, even into Indian Territory!” she stated.

Henry felt his temper flare again, and he decided he was through talking.  He moved to grab the little brunette, and within seconds, her gun belt was lying on the floor at her feet.

Lucinda struggled to get free, but the handsome doctor seemed to have at least six hands compared to her two.  When she tried to keep him from taking down her britches, he pulled off her boots. Then he removed the pants she was wearing, and her stockings followed, and then her drawers.  It was shocking to realize that Henry had bared her, like he promised.  Before she could grab up a horse blanket to cover herself, he picked her up and hung her upside down over a saddle on a rail!  Her feet and hands didn’t touch the floor, and when she tried to drop to her feet, Henry put his hand on the small of her back and held her in place quite effectively.  “No!” she shouted.

The first slice of the switch caught her full across both cheeks and it took only a second for a line of fire to spread across her bottom, causing her to cry out in pain!  The second was right below the first, and it only added to her misery. “Owwwww!”

“Still think you didn’t do anything wrong?” Henry asked, giving her another slice a bit lower.  Lucinda was squirming and trying to escape, but he wasn’t about to permit that to happen.  She needed a sound switching.

“I’m sorry!” she gasped, her pride be damned!  She didn’t even mind the fact she was bared to his eyes… The switch hurt so much she couldn’t stand it!  “Please, stop now.  I am so sorry!”

“Lucinda, the only reason you are sorry is because you’re getting your tail switched,” he stated, striping her again and again.  She cried out both times, and continued begging him to stop.  “I’m not going to stop until there isn’t an inch of your backside that isn’t welted, Miss Brat.  You went out of your way to earn this switching, and I’m going to do a thorough job of it.”

“Noooo!  Please!  Owwwwww!  I can’t stand pain!” she begged.  “Please stop!”

“You risked your life tonight, Lucinda.  Those Apache would have done a lot more to hurt you than stripe your backside with a switch, and now you’re going to take what you have coming to you.  I can’t believe that you and Jake are related.  He had some common sense!” Henry said, and Lucinda started sobbing.  He didn’t stop the switching.  He promised her she would feel all three, and that is exactly what was going to happen.  He tossed aside the first, picked up the second, and aimed lower on her thighs and the calves of her legs.  She hollered bloody murder, and he hoped that meant he was doing a thorough job of teaching her a much needed lesson.  “You don’t dare the Apache, Lucinda.  You don’t threaten a man’s livelihood, and you don’t go around threatening to kill people.”  He continued striping her until the second switch broke, and then he picked up the third one.

“No more, please!  I beg you, no more!  I can’t stand it!” Lucinda begged.  Her voice was hoarse from yelling, but Henry wouldn’t release her

“We have one more switch to wear out, Lucinda, and if you’ll remember, this is all your fault. I would have settled for one switch if you’d shown one little bit of remorse.  You didn’t, and so this lesson is necessary.  This last one will be the worst, and trust me, you won’t feel like sitting a saddle for several days.

“No!  I’m sorry!  I’m sorry!” she pleaded with Henry, but he brought the switch down right on the tender area between her bottom cheeks and her legs!  “Yeeeooooowwwww!” she cried out, and tried to kick and keep the switch from landing there, but Henry pushed her forward over the saddle to expose her more and he switched her sit spots until she was bawling so hard she couldn’t stop.  Then, and only then, did he have any mercy on her and let her slide backwards to stand on her feet.

Henry couldn’t help but feel sorry for the pretty Lucinda when he saw her tear streaked face.  He’d been hard on her, and he was positive that she wouldn’t be riding out of town into Apache territory any time soon.  Still, as necessary as the switching had been, it didn’t give him any pleasure to see her in so much pain, and he didn’t doubt for one second that she was in pain.  He wouldn’t have wanted to be on the other side of those switches, either.  The Doctor in him took over, and he reached for his medical bag.  “Come here, honey.  You’ve suffered enough now.”

“Please, just go away!  I’m not dressed!” Lucinda was mortified.  She wanted him to leave so she could cover herself and get to her room above the dressmaker’s store and crawl into bed… If she could walk!

“I can’t leave you here alone,” Henry argued.  “Anyone could come by and you’d be defenseless.  Come here now and let me put some ointment on those welts.”

“NO!  You are not touching me!  And, just for the record, I’m no longer going to kill you for Philip; I’m going to kill you for what you just did to me!  You had no right… None at all!  I hate you!”

Lucinda cried as she turned her back to him and somehow managed to get her drawers and her britches on.  Then she pulled on her boots, picked up her gear, and headed for the barn doors.  “The next time I see you, doctor, you’d better run for your life, because I’m tired of this.  I’m going to kill you on sight!” she promised.

“Maybe I should have cut a fourth switch?” Henry dared to ask her… and wondered if she would turn and shoot him.  She stiffened, but then left the livery and started walking as quickly as she could considering she was in some major pain, and her walk was in reality a slow limp, with her sniffling every step of the way.  Henry followed at a safe distance, wanting to be sure she got back to the hotel safely, but she didn’t go to the hotel.  She went to Miss McCrae’s Dress Shoppe, but when she walked inside, Miss McCrae pointed at the door and told her to get out.

Lucinda cried even harder.  The middle-aged spinster obviously thought she was a woman of loose morals and kicked her out of her room!  Her belongings were all in her trunk, but how was she to haul it to the hotel?  She didn’t dare let it sit on the street, or someone would take it!

“Do you need some help, Lucinda?” Henry asked politely, grinning at her and fueling her temper once again.

Chapter Four

Lucinda couldn’t believe the man who’d killed her brother and just switched her mercilessly was standing there mocking her because that prudish old Miss McCrae kicked her out of her rented room over the Dress Shoppe!  Henry Zabarski, or Doc Z, as nearly everyone called him, was grinning at her, and it was just too much for Lucinda’s temper.  Without even giving the matter serious consideration, she lashed out and kicked him as hard as she could, knocking him flat on his butt and out into the street.  “I hate you, Henry Zabarski, and I can’t wait to see you dead!”

Henry was on his feet quickly, and struggling to control his temper once again.  “You know, Miss Brat, you need to be spanked so soundly that you learn to think twice before giving in to childish tantrums.”

“I can’t believe you two are going at it again.  I’m about to lock both of you up for disturbing the peace.  I swear, Henry, you’re just as bad as she is,” Mac stated.  ”What the hell were you thinking to ride out of town like that with Dan Sanford when you knew the Apache were on the warpath?  I can’t believe you made it back here with your scalp… and you, Miss Jacobs, need to be spanked until you can’t sit down for riding out after Doc Z.  What were you trying to prove?” the lawman demanded, tearing a strip off of both of them.  “What is this trunk sitting here for?  Are you leaving for home?” he asked, looking at the young woman.

“He’s still alive, isn’t he?” Lucinda answered, doing her best to drag her trunk across the street and to the hotel.  To her disgust, the Sheriff sat down on the trunk, preventing her from moving it one inch.

“Girl, I’ve told you that Doc Z didn’t kill your brother.  They were good friends.  You best think on that, and a good question to ask yourself would be ‘why did Jake lie to you about his condition?’  Do you think it was because he didn’t want you to worry, or to jump on a stage and come out here?  I know he was embarrassed how he looked at last.  He was so thin you could see his bones.”

Henry felt sorry for Lucinda when he saw tears fill her lovely green eyes.  “Mac, she doesn’t need to hear that,” he warned.

“Yes, she does.  If she’s going to kill a man in cold blood, then she needs to know why she’s doing it.  The blunt facts aren’t pretty, Miss Jacobs.  Jake was a dying man when he arrived, and he knew it.  I don’t know why he wrote to you and told you different, but I do know that he spent the last part of his life with people who cared about and for him, and we did our best to make him laugh and enjoy the time he had left.  Henry did all that was humanly possible to keep Jake from suffering at the last, and he didn’t die pretty.  We asked him several times who we could notify, and he said he’d hired someone to do it.  We miss him, too, and it is an insult to have you come here accusing us of not caring for Jake.  I suggest you put your butt on tomorrow’s stage, or you are going to get one hell of a spanking from me, and then put on the stage… even if I have to lock you in the jail to keep an eye on you.”

Lucinda looked at the angry man’s expression and could see he was telling her the absolute truth.  She saw the concern in Henry’s eyes and remembered the way he’d cared for the Apache… The truth was evident, and it hurt to know that Philip lied to her.  Suddenly it was simply too much for her, and she started crying in great gulping sobs.

“Damn it, Mac!  Did you have to do that?” Henry scolded the lawman as he stepped forward and wrapped his arms protectively around little Lucinda.

“Would you rather she shot you, Doc Z?” Mac asked, feeling a bit guilty.

“No, but I could have handled it without upsetting her like this!” Henry growled, and then he scooped her up into his strong arms.  “Bring her trunk, Mac.  I’m taking her to my place so I can give her something to calm her down.”

Lucinda wasn’t even aware of what was happening.  Her grief was overwhelming, and now that she had no one to blame for Philip’s death, it was a shock to realize that no matter what she did, nothing was going to bring him back.  She felt a prick in her arm, and suddenly everything went black.

Henry carried her into his living quarters and put her down in his bed, removing her boots.

“Folks are going to talk about this, Henry,” Mac warned.

“I’m a doctor; she needs attention tonight.”

“I didn’t realize she would react like this,” Mac admitted sheepishly.  “I feel like a jackass.”

“Join the club… I wore out three switches on her earlier,” Henry admitted.  “She can barely stand right now, and when Miss McCrae tossed her out of her room above the Dress Shoppe, I teased her.  She’s been hiding her grief with anger.”

“Like you did when we lost Marilynn,” Mac nodded in understanding.  “What do we do now, Doc Z?” he asked, wanting to help in some way.  He hated seeing her so wounded, and much preferred the spitting wildcat in need of a spanking!