Chapter Four: The Stilton Saddle & The Forbidden Fruit
The "Training Room" in the basement was less of a pantry and more of a dojo designed by a gourmet sadist. It smelled of sawdust, beeswax, and the lingering, terrified sweat of previous maids.
Mrs. Hardrind stood in the center of the room like a granite monolith. In her right hand, she clutched the riding crop—a sleek, black leather instrument she called "The Auditor." It swished through the air with a sound like a zipper screaming for mercy.
"Posture, Plumb!" Hardrind barked, circling me. "If the maid slumps, the soufflé falls. And we are serving eight kilos of dense dairy. Your spine must be a column of steel. Currently, you look like a damp noodle."
"I’m trying," I grunted. I was currently weighted down by two ten-pound sandbags strapped to my waist. "But I feel like a pack mule."
"You look like a fortress," a deep voice rumbled.
Barnaby stepped out of the shadows, carrying a coil of thick, red velvet rope. In the dim basement light, he looked even more ridiculous—and handsome—than usual. He was wearing a tight black t-shirt that struggled to contain his shoulders, which seemed to have their own postcode.
"The sandbags are just the appetizer," Barnaby said softly, kneeling beside me. Unlike Hardrind’s clinical glare, his eyes were warm, the colour of expensive whiskey. "Now, we bind."
"The Colonel requires a diamond-hitch pattern to support the main platter," Hardrind instructed, tapping the crop against her thigh. Thwap. Thwap. "And remember, Plumb: We stick to the classics. Hard cheeses. Stable cheeses. We do not improvise."
She stopped pacing and fixed me with a haunted look.
"We tried a tropical theme in the summer of '04," she whispered darkly.
Barnaby flinched visibly, his hands pausing on the rope. "The Pineapple Incident."
"We do not speak of the Pineapple," Hardrind hissed, clutching her crop tighter. "The spikes... the uneven center of gravity... the juice leakage. It took three weeks to get the stickiness out of the velvet. The maid was never the same."
"She moved to swindon," Barnaby muttered. "Became a librarian. Said she needed silence."
"Precisely," Hardrind snapped. "No tropicals. Now, secure the Stilton Saddle."
Barnaby uncoiled the velvet rope, shaking off the memory of the fruit-based disaster. "Arms up," he murmured.
I obeyed. He moved with a heavy, deliberate grace. He wrapped the rope around my ribcage, pulling it tight. Then he moved lower. He threaded the velvet between my thighs, looping it around my hips in a complex figure-eight.
"This is going to feel... intrusive," he warned, his voice dropping an octave. "I have to cinch it. We can't risk a wobble."
"Do it," I breathed. "I don't want to be the Pineapple."
He pulled. The rope tightened with a sudden, violent force, locking my hips into a vice grip. The air left my lungs in a rush. It should have been uncomfortable. It was uncomfortable. But as the velvet bit into my waist and thighs, holding me rigid, a strange sensation washed over me.
Security.
For a woman whose life was a chaotic mess of unpaid bills and temp jobs, the sensation of being physically bolted together was confusingly pleasant. I felt sturdy. I felt held.
"You've gone very pink, Miss Plumb," Barnaby noted, his knuckles brushing the small of my back as he tied a knot.
"It’s the circulation," I lied. "Cutting off the blood flow to the sarcasm centre of my brain."
"Silence!" Hardrind snapped. She stepped closer, inspecting Barnaby’s handiwork. She poked my lower back with the handle of the crop. "Too much sway in the lumbar region. You are not a belly dancer, Plumb. You are a table. Be the wood."
She walked behind me. I could hear the swish of the crop.
"Arch," she commanded.
I straightened my spine, fighting the pull of the ropes. The tension was intoxicating. I looked at Barnaby; he was watching me with an intensity that made my knees wobble, which was dangerous considering my knees were currently structural supports.
I listened to Hardrind’s footsteps. Click. Click. Click.
I thought about the "Auditor" in her hand. I thought about the sting. And then, a thought bubbled up from the darkest, most repressively British part of my brain: I wonder if she really means it?
"Hold the position," Hardrind warned. "One inch of slip results in structural failure."
I looked straight ahead. And then, with a deliberation that shocked me, I let my left hip drop. Just an inch. A lazy, sloppy slump.
THWACK.
The crop connected with my right buttock. It was a sharp, stinging slap that echoed off the stone walls.
"Correction applied!" Hardrind shouted.
I gasped, my eyes widening. The sting was electric. It didn't hurt—well, it did, but it was a clarifying fire. It woke up every nerve ending I had. My spine snapped straight instantly, my posture becoming perfect, rigid, and undeniable.
"Better," Hardrind purred. "Much better. I see the focus in your eyes now, Plumb. You enjoyed the correction."
"I... I am the wood," I stammered, my face burning. I didn't hate it. God help me, I didn't hate it at all.
"She’s ready for the payload," Hardrind declared.
Barnaby picked up the "Stunt Cheese"—a massive, yellow block of high-density polyurethane used for calibration. He stepped behind me.
"You took that like a champ," he whispered in my ear, his breath hot against my neck. "Hardrind used to be 'The Iron Platter' back in the nineties. She doesn't miss."
"Load me up, Hunk," I said, my voice steadier than it had ever been.
He lowered the heavy rubber cheese onto the flat of my back. The weight drove me down, pressing me harder into the velvet ropes. The sting on my backside throbbed in time with my heartbeat.
"Stable," Barnaby announced.
I stood there, bound in velvet, carrying a fake cheese, with a stinging bum and a handsome gardener staring at me like I was a prize-winning heifer.
"Triple pay," I whispered to the empty room. "Definitely triple pay."