3

That was crazy. That was stupid.

"Karen." I tried to think of something to say. "Why--"

Karen cowered even more. "I thought you'd like this top."

I was speechless. I was befuddled. Karen's cowering and begging made me feel very uncomfortable.

Karen whimpered, "Please don't spank me again."

Fuck it. If spanking her would get her to stop, I'd spank her. And why not? She had let me spank her last week. Who was I to not play along with her this week?

Still, I couldn't bring myself to yell at Karen. Instead, I said firmly, "Karen, you've been a very bad girl."

"Please don't be angry with me."

"Good girls like you shouldn't dress up like that for the brothers. You know that, don't you?" Karen nodded her head as she continued to fake cower in front of the table. I stepped closer to her. "And you know what happens to bad girls, don't you?"

"Please don't spank me. Please don't."

This was so surreal. There was no point in Karen asking me to not spank her because if she didn't want to be spanked, all she had to do was walk away. I could only spank her if she let me, but why would she let me spank her? Was this a Fifty Shades thing?

I had reached Karen now. I took the handcuffs off the table, gently grabbed her arm, secured her wrist, and secured the other end to the balustrade. She offered no resistance.

"Please don't spank me, Mark. I'm your sister. This is so embarrassing."

"You shouldn't have been bad, Karen." I took the ankle cuffs. "You need to be taught a lesson." I grabbed her left arm. "You'll be a good girl after I give you this lesson, won't you?" I secured her left wrist and then secured the other end to a balustrade. Karen was once again slightly bent over the table, facing away from me.

I had to admit there was something deeply erotic about what we were doing. At least for me. I couldn't imagine it being so for Karen, but why else would she be having me do this?

Karen said, "I promise to be good from now on. You won't spank me, will you?"

I moved into spanking position. "It's a little late for that promise. You've been a bad girl and deserve to be spanked. I didn't spank you hard last week, but I'm going to spank you hard this time."

"No, Mark. Please God, no! I'm your little sister!" As she said that, she wiggled her butt, making it a very tempting target. My sister had a great ass, small with just a hint of curves.

I swatted Karen gently. "That hurt, didn't it?"

"Yes, it did. Please stop, Mark!" She wiggled her butt again. I almost laughed.

I swatted her bottom again, saying "Pow!" as I struck.

"That hurts so much, Mark!"

I swatted her two more times, and after each time Karen wiggled her butt at me. It was goofy, silly fun now.

I said, "I'm really going to spank you hard this time. You're not going to be able to sit down for a week after this spanking." I spanked her a little harder, but not much.

I inadvertently left my hand on her butt after the last swat. When Karen wiggled her butt, my hand slid back and forth across her butt cheeks.

"Now you're groping me! This is so humiliating, Mark." She pushed her butt more firmly into my hand and wiggled it some more.

Again, I suppressed the urge to laugh. This was so crazy. Why would she want me to feel her butt?

I said, "Well, spanking alone wasn't a good enough lesson. Maybe me getting some cheap feels will teach you to be a good girl."

I gave her butt a good squeeze and then released the cuffs from the balustrade. Karen raced upstairs with the cuffs still attached to her wrists.

I chuckled. Whatever. Karen played along with me last week, so I played along with her this week. I went into the kitchen to see what was on the menu. Once I read the directions for tonight's casserole, I set a timer for when I was to put it in the oven and then sat down in the living room with my book.

* * * *

I was getting concerned about Karen as she stayed upstairs until dinner was ready. When she came down, she was all smiles so I relaxed. Over dinner, we traded our usual barbs, but the delivery was more of a gentle tease now. I kept an eye on Mom to see if she noticed the more light-heartedness to our barbs. She was sighing and rolling her eyes, exasperated as always that her kids didn't get along.

When Karen was done eating dinner, she said to Mom, "I'm going to make some cookies."

"What type?" I asked.

"None of your business. They're not for you." She turned back to Mom. "I'm going over to Gwen's tomorrow and thought I'd bring some along."

"Karen," said Mom in her long-suffering voice. She said slowly, "If you make cookies, you should give some to your brother. It'd be rude not to."

"Do I have to?" Karen asked with a hint of a whine.

"Yes, you do," Mom said slowly and firmly.

My sister sighed and went into the kitchen. Mom fled to the living room and the emotional warmth of the Hallmark Channel. I asked Karen, "Do you want any help?"

"No, I'm fine. I'm going to make chocolate chip cookies. It's the type my friends will like." And then she winked at me.

I got my book and read at the dining room table. When the first batch of cookies was done, Karen brought me a big plate full and a glass of milk. She gave me a big smile and said, "Do you want more cookies?"

I smiled back. "No. This is perfect."

I shook my head. My sister was such a nut case. Whatever. As long as she was happy, I wasn't going to worry about what we had done.

* * * *

Things returned to normal. Karen had had her one evening of craziness and then went back to being my normal, annoying little sister.

Until the next Thursday. When I walked in the door, I smelled something freshly baked bread. Karen was standing next to the entryway table in another sexy crochet top. We played her game just like we had the week before, though this time I did manage to raise my voice more, and it went on a little longer. And after dinner, Karen served me up a big slice of chocolate cake.

The Thursday after that, I came home to Karen in yet another sexy crochet top, but the cuffs weren't on the entryway table. After I "got angry", Karen ran into the dining room, where the handcuffs were. I spanked her with her hands secured behind her back while she lay across the dining room table. That was the longest and hottest yet.

After dinner, as I ate cookies again, I said to Karen, "You know what I want more than your yummy desserts?"

"What?"

We were standing side-by-side in the kitchen, leaning over the counter. Mom was watching the Hallmark Channel in the living room. Karen and I talked quietly, conspiratorially. "I'm sick of the same old casseroles. Totally sick of them. I've thought about trying to make my own from scratch, but I don't know the first thing about cooking. You do. If you could make one casserole a week, it'd be wonderful." Karen looked thoughtful, so I added. "Look, I'll do anything to help - get out ingredients, go to the store. You name it, I'll do it."

"Let me think on it." Karen looked thoughtful for a while and then said, "You know, I have a fairly high pain tolerance." She said that with the air of this is something I've been meaning to bring up and now seems an appropriate time.

"You have a high pain tolerance?" I didn't understand her point.

"Yeah. And I think with female runners, guys tend to baby us. I'm not made of china. I know how to shrug off pain. I think guys working out with female runners are too concerned about not hurting them and don't push them hard enough."

I struggled to understand what my sister was saying. Why would she talk to me about guys training female runners? I didn't train female runners. I had nothing to do with her running. What she was saying made no sense.

Suddenly it hit me - was she talking about the game? We had never discussed it. Was she talking about training because she didn't want to talk directly about the game? Possibly. What would having a high pain tolerance mean then? Suddenly, I had it - she was saying that she wanted me to spank her harder, that she could handle the pain of me spanking her harder. It was the only part of the game where she experienced pain.

Why would someone ask to be spanked harder? I looked at Karen. Her patient expression gave me no clues. I had the feeling she was offering me a quid pro quo, that if I agreed to spank her harder then she'd start making the occasional casserole. It made no sense to me, but then again I didn't see what she got out of the game.

Everything about the game was something I struggled with. I knew we shouldn't be doing it. If Mom came home early and caught us in the middle of one of our sessions...I couldn't even imagine how ballistic she'd go. Thinking the littlest bit about her catching us gave me the willies. The game was also something I knew I'd never be able to discuss with anyone. Hey, Terrence. Have you ever handcuffed your sister, spanked her, and then taken advantage of her? People would think I was some creepy pervert if they knew I had played the game with a girlfriend. With my sister? Forget it.

And yet, my relationship with Karen had improved so much since we started the game. We were getting along better than we ever had. Once a week, Karen wanted to step out of her YA life and cut loose by playing a silly game with a lot of sexual overtones. The other 99.9% of the time, we were a normal brother and sister. I wasn't going to tell her she couldn't have fun the way she wanted to. I played the game the way I thought she wanted me to, and I had fun doing so. If she chose to have me spank her harder, I'd go along with her choice.

I said, "When I work out next with a female runner, I'll go hard and let her tell me if I need to back off."

Karen smiled. "Perfect."

* * * *

Saturday when I was about to leave to go get Grandma, Karen told me she'd be going with me. "I talked with her last night, and this weekend is going to be a little different." Karen normally spent Saturday morning with some crafting friends. On the ride over, Karen only smiled and changed the subject when I asked her why she was going with me. I told her about a woman I had been flirting with at work. As she was several years older than me, I didn't expect to get anywhere with her, but she was the only romantic option I had at the moment.

When I arrived at Grandma's apartment, I got the first inkling of what was up. After Grandma hugged me and Karen, she happily told me, "Karen asked me to teach her a few of my favorite recipes this weekend." Grandma had several boxes for us to take to our house, but the first run to the car was to haul a four-foot rolling pin and a large, thin, rectangular wooden board.

We stopped at a local chain grocery store on the way back to our house. Grandma said to me, "Get me a grocery cart. It's easier for me to walk if I have something to lean on." I got her a cart, and we walked slowly through the parking lot and eventually to the produce section. The whole time, Karen talked about her latest crafting achievements with Grandma. I was quite content to just listen in.

Once we were in the produce section, Karen handed me her tablet. "Video everything Grandma says. I'll take notes, but I think it'd be best if you video it as well." Grandma then started walking slowly through the produce section, telling Karen what to look for in different vegetables. Karen furiously scribbled notes, but there was no way she could keep up with the deluge of knowledge. And a lot of it was about the proper color of a ripe, flavorful vegetable, which Karen wouldn't be able to capture on paper.

We moved on to the cheese department. Grandma emphasized the importance of buying cheese made in Italy. She talked about the relative quality of different brands of cheese and lamented that the store no longer carried a couple of brands. A woman around Grandma's age showed up and got into a spirited debate with Grandma about the merits of different brands. When I was beginning to think that I was going to have to physically separate them, the other woman stormed away, cursing Grandma in Italian while waving her arms.

We slowly made our way to the meat department, where Grandma delivered another master lecture. It was way too much for me to absorb, but somehow Karen followed it well enough to regularly ask questions. Grandma complained constantly about the cost of meat before putting some pork, chicken, and beef into our cart, all of which had bones and were marked way down. Then Grandma took us over to the baking and spice aisle and talked some more. Our grocery cart steadily filled up with supplies. I enjoyed listening to this far more than the usual retirement center gossip.

We drove home, and I brought everything in as Grandma greeted Mom and Dad. Once I had everything in the kitchen, Grandma and Karen started cooking while I videoed. The first thing was cooking the meat. We placed the pieces in a couple of frying pans, added some water, covered them, and let them cook. Grandma then had an involved discussion with Karen on the proper proportions of meat, egg, and flour. Once the meat was cooked to Grandma's satisfaction, she wielded a knife like a ninja to remove the bones from a couple of pieces of meat. Then she gave the knife to Karen for her to do the same. I kept my distance while videoing that part.

Grandma kept talking non-stop, and Karen did her best to take notes. The only cooking job I felt comfortable doing was grinding the meat in a hand-crank meat grinder that Grandma had brought. While the meat was cooling in the refrigerator, Grandma taught Karen how to make fresh pasta. After Karen had kneaded the pasta dough for a while, Grandma had me take a turn. I quickly decided I had a future in instructional videos - "And now Mark will demonstrate all of the common mistakes."

When the pasta was ready, and the meat was cool enough, Grandma said, "It's time to make cappellettis." She said that last word like she was speaking Italian. She put a little bit of meat mixture in the center of a pasta square, did some magic with her fingers, and made a shape that looked like a little hat. Karen quickly picked up how to make them.

Grandma said, "Mark, it's now your turn to try."

"Grandma, if I tried that, I'd just toss pasta and meat all over the kitchen."

Karen laughed.

That night for dinner, Grandma coached Karen through making cappellettis with mushrooms in a white wine sauce. It was to freaking die for.

Sunday, Grandma taught Karen how to make fresh fettuccine. I cranked the handle on the pasta machine. We had fettuccine alfredo for lunch, and, God, it was delicious. Then Grandma taught Karen how to make pepper cookies, which have lots of different spices in them. They blew chocolate chip cookies out of the water.

Then it was time for me to take Grandma to Sunday evening mass. When I started to box up the items Grandma had brought, she said, "Don't. Leave them here."

"Why?"

"They only take up space in my apartment. I don't have a kitchen."

"Oh."

Karen went with us on the drive to church, and she reviewed her notes with Grandma the whole time. I had never had a more enjoyable weekend with Grandma. After Grandma hugged us, she said, "That was a very, very good weekend."

* * * *

Wednesday evening, I was reading on the bed in the craft room. Karen had made cappellettis for dinner, and I had gorged myself on their awesomeness. In the evenings when I was home, I had taken to coming to the craft room to read. I'd take breaks from reading to tell Karen about what I had just read. She'd take breaks from her crafting to show off what she was working on. And tonight, there was a happy anticipation of what we'd do tomorrow when I got home from work.

As much as I enjoyed playing the game with Karen, it was sexually frustrating for me. The game was hot as hell and would always leave me close to exploding but masturbating later was such a letdown. I was toying with an idea for solving that, but I wasn't sure if I really wanted to take that step. What would Karen think? Did I really want to do that with my sister? It'd make the game ten times more perverted. I knew I shouldn't do it, but I so wanted to do it.

Karen held up one of the royal blue crochet tops she had looked so incredible in a few weeks ago. "All ready to be shipped."

"To a happy customer?"

"I hope so." She stood up and went over to where she kept her shipping boxes. "The crochet tops have been good sellers, but I think I've hit the saturation point with new designs. I'm finalizing one new design, and then I'm going to focus on developing designs for other things." I nodded. I took that to mean a new crochet top tomorrow and no more after that. "I had only three designs done when I showed you the first one, and I hadn't intended to do anymore." Karen smiled at me. "But then I was inspired to create a few more."

It took a few moments for what she had said to sink in. Was that Thursday going to be the last time she was going to model a crochet top for me? And if I had done nothing, she would have stopped on her own? I shook my head. I didn't know how I felt about that.

Karen added. "I wish I could hire a professional model to model my crochet tops. I think they'd sell a lot better if people could see them on a real person." She pointed to a plastic bust she had in the room. "I've been using pictures of them on her for my catalog."

"Why don't you use pictures of yourself wearing them?"

"I don't want any pictures of me on the Internet," Karen said indignantly. "And certainly not of me wearing my crochet tops. If Mom saw a picture of me wearing one of my tops, she'd probably have a heart attack. And I don't want guys I don't know ogling me."

But she was fine with her brother ogling her. "Do you have any pictures of you wearing your designs?"

"No." Karen sounded slightly embarrassed.

"I'll take a picture of you wearing one."

She shook her head. "I don't want you to have a picture of me wearing one of my crochet tops."

"How are you going to know how much better they'd look on a model if you don't have some pictures of a real person wearing at least one?" That seemed to have Karen on the verge of agreeing. "Look, give me your phone, and I'll take a picture of you wearing one of your crochet tops. If you don't like it, you can delete it."

Karen gave me a small smile. "Well, okay. Let's go to my room."

We went over to her bedroom. Karen closed and locked the door after us. She handed me her phone and said, "Turn around."

I turned around. I heard some rustling of clothes, a drawer open then close, and some more rustling.

Karen said, "Okay, you can turn around."

Karen was wearing the green top she had modeled for me the very first time. I lifted her phone up, zoomed in a little so that only her top half was in the picture, and said, "Smile." Karen smiled, and I took the picture. I pulled up the picture in the photo gallery and showed it to Karen.

Karen said disappointedly, "I wouldn't sell a lot of these tops."

"I didn't take a very good picture of you. Let me try again."

Karen gave me a really? look. "Oh, okay."

Karen made the same pose and the same smile. I knew that if I took that picture, it would be the same as the first one. I said, "Put one hand behind your head."

"What?"

"I said, 'Put one hand behind your head'. You know how to look sexier than that." I thought about referencing how she'd model her tops for me when we were playing the game but decided against it.

Karen put her right hand behind her head with her elbow at a 45-degree angle from her body. "Like this?"

"Like that." I took a picture. "Now rotate your elbow more to the right." Karen did. Because of her small size, Karen's tits looked huge, and the green top did a great job of presenting them. "Much sexier." I took another picture. "Tilt your head back a little." Her blond hair was now behind her back, giving an unobstructed view of her chest. Click. "Turn a little to your left." Click.