Polly: The Cuckoo Waltz

BOOK TWO in the BIRCHWOOD HALL NOVELS

 

 

Polly Bagshot disconnected the call and slipped her phone back into her bikini top. She had just performed an act of pure unadulterated altruism and it felt damn good.

 

‘Who was that, Polly?’

 

‘Just an old school friend.’ Was it a lie? Birchwood Hall was a school – of sorts – and Lilly was her friend. In fact Lilly had been the only one of her friends who had dared to speak out against Hugo and Polly was beginning to wonder if she’d been right.

 

‘What school? Not that place? Not that Lilly bitch? Give me your phone.’

 

‘No.’ Polly took it out of its holster and held it in her fist.

 

‘Don’t make a scene, Polly. Just give it to me and I’ll let this thing drop.’ Hugo Bagshot held out his hand and glared at his new wife.

 

‘No!’ Polly threw the little phone into the pool and smiled as it slowly sank to the bottom.

‘Oops!’ She looked up at her husband from behind a large pair of dark glasses that hid her red swollen eyes. No one should have to cry themselves to sleep on their honeymoon. ‘Sorry, darling. I appear to have dropped it.’ Polly smiled through gritted teeth.

 

‘Get up. I’m going to whip your behind for defying me. Is this what that school taught you – or is it the influence of that redheaded whore?’

 

‘How dare you talk about my friend that way?’ Polly knew she was going to pay for challenging him but there was only so long a person could hold in the sort of resentment she was beginning to feel for this man she thought she loved.

Polly took her time getting up off the poolside lounger and climbed the steps towards her father’s holiday villa with a slowness that only annoyed her husband all the more.

 

‘For Christ’s sake Polly; you’re behaving like a child.’

 

‘It’s hot. I’m tired.’

 

She stepped inside and stopped to close the door behind her. The cool of the large open plan ground floor was pleasant after the heat of the mid-day Mediterranean sun.

 

‘Had enough sun, kids?’ Her father was mixing cold drinks in the kitchen.

 

‘No, Daddy. Bagsy’s going to punish me for talking to a friend.’

 

Her father turned around and raised one eyebrow. She knew he was reluctant to interfere in her discipline now that she was married but Polly wasn’t happy.

 

‘That’s not entirely correct, sir,’ Hugo stuttered. ‘She was talking to that girl and when I asked for her phone she threw it into the pool.’

 

‘Was that really necessary, darling?’ Her father shook his head as if she was still a naughty child and Polly found herself wishing that she was. In all the years her father had been responsible for her discipline she had never once remembered feeling as angry as Hugo made her feel. There didn’t appear to be any love in his spankings. Bagsy had turned into nothing more than a cruel bully who got off on keeping her under his thumb and she was beginning to regret marrying him.