Discipline by Chris Owen, Jodi Payne Page A

battered leather coat off and passed it over as he moved past Noah in the hall.
    "Comfort? You mean like popcorn and chocolate? Mac and cheese?"
    "Grilled cheese and fries." Noah hung up his coat and herded him along. "And chocolate for dessert." He stopped in the middle of the kitchen and gave Phan a hug. "It's so good to see you. You look great."
    Phan hugged him back, his head resting on Noah's shoulder for a moment. "I look like hell," he corrected. "But that's okay. Not a worry, anyway. Thanks for letting me come back."
    "Well, okay," Noah conceded, "You do look better than I expected, though. And don't be stupid, you know I like these visits. Sit."
    With a snort Phan said, "Yes, sir," and plopped himself into his chair. "Oh, yum. Masses of trans-fats.
    Yay !"
    "Just the thing to put a positive spin on the evening, don't you think?" Noah laughed, and served fries.
    "So how is Master Bradford?"

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    "Scary."
    "Scary?" Noah raised an eyebrow and sat. "Scary how?"
    "Scary the way only a man on a mission can be. He's really intense, Noah. Or maybe I'm just out of practice." Phan reached for a fry. "That's probably it. It's been a while since I had so many rules. He glares."
    Noah laughed. "Yeah, he does. And he doesn't budge at all. If he wants you still and you twitch a finger, you're in the doghouse. I remember that about him."
    "He sighs a lot, too." Phan grinned and grabbed another fry. "That's worse. That whole 'you aren't paying attention again, Phantom, and you know what that means...' thing. I think he actually has three sighs."
    "Oh? What are they?" Noah was genuinely interested. He took a big bite of his sandwich and watched Phan.
    Phan looked thoughtful as he chewed, and as soon as he'd swallowed he reached for the water bottle he'd brought. The label said it was raspberry, and it hissed when the top was loosened, the bubbles suddenly active. With a weary sigh, Phan poured a glass. "That's the 'I've told you three times' sigh. It gets followed by 'Phantom. Corner.'"
    He winked and drank, then set the glass down carefully. He gave a barely audible sigh and shook his head. "That's the 'Okay, enough for now, you can expect two more strokes' sigh. The last one, though, I hear all the damn time. It's loud and obvious and so put on it makes me cringe."
    Noah chuckled and leaned forward to pour himself some as well. "What? What is it?" He was grinning.
    "Oh, roughly?" Phan grinned back and then put on a glower. "It means 'Phantom, you are a very naughty boy and I know you can learn, but God didn't have enough patience in his bag to make anyone deal with the kind of shit you give me, so I think I'll just stare at you until you figure out what you've done wrong, apologize, correct the error, and swear to never ever do it again. And then you may push your nose into the carpet 'cause I'm gonna spank your ass in a not fun way.' But just roughly."
    Noah covered his mouth. Maybe he shouldn't laugh at that? Except it was hilarious, and he couldn't hold it back. He let himself laugh out loud, leaning back in his chair. "Oh... oh, my side hurts..." he said finally with a gasp. "Oh, Phan, you really are out of practice, aren't you?" His laughter didn't fade one bit.
    "I'm almost hopeless," Phan said, giggling madly and reaching for his sandwich. "But I got three less spankings today than I did yesterday."
    The fact that Phan was glad to receive fewer spankings wasn't at all lost on Noah. "Well, that's a start."
    He was still giggling. "How many total did you get today?"
    "Fifteen."
    Noah winced. "Damn."
    "Uh-huh. Told you he was scary."

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    "I think the highest number of punishment strokes Sir has ever given me was six? Maybe seven." And Noah had found that to be quite enough, thankyou.
    "Master Tobias and Master Bradford are... different," Phan said thoughtfully. "Not that one is