Bunny's face looked on the verge of crumpling into tears. Sam did weird things sometimes, but never anything this bad.

Jess thought Bunny might be on the verge of bolting. If she did, Sam would chase her. Bunny wouldn't get far on the rough ground, not in bare feet. Jess had a mental image of Sam running the blonde girl down like a lioness running down a plump gazelle.

She sort of liked the image. In fact, she more than just liked it; it turned her on. The idea of Bunny as prey set her nipples tingling. Weird thoughts began sparking in her brain.

We could do anything we wanted to her out here. Anything at all. There's nobody for miles except for the guys back at the cabin, and they couldn't hear us. We could torture her, do anything we want. Make her cry...

The next moment she was shaking her head, trying to clear it. For god's sake! she thought. Stop it! Bunny's your friend and you're acting like some kind of psychopath! You're no better than Sam!

"What do you mean, 'punish?'" Bunny quavered.

"Well, how do you normally punish bad girls?" Samantha asked. Not taking her eyes off Bunny, she squatted down and picked up a long, whiplike stick from the ground.

"Where I come from," Sam went on, slapping the sticking into her palm. "Bad girls get switched." The stick slapped her palm again, making a quick, swishing sound in the air before it hit her skin.

"No way," Bunny said. "You're like crazy." But she made no move to run or resist her friend in any other way. It might have been simply because she was too scared, but Jess sensed a strange energy passing between her two friends. Bunny's body language seemed to show fear, but she was staring right into Sam's eyes with no

"Three switches," Sam told her. "Just three, on your big ol' Bunny-butt. Jess will hold your hands, since you're such a siss. And then we're done."

"Seriously?" Bunny asked, eyes widening. "Like, done done? You won't be mean to me no more after this?"

Sam smiled-not a particularly nice smile, Jess thought, but a smile nonetheless. "Not no more," she affirmed. "You'll be paid in full."

Jess wondered at the easy way Bunny accepted the last statement. Was Mark's suggestion of a threeway with Bunny only the tip of the iceberg? Had Bunny flirted with Mark before, or committed some other minor act of treachery that had Sam was still holding against her? Or was Bunny just so freaked out by Sam's mood that she was willing to grab onto any hope of making her stop?

Bunny licked her lips. Okay. But you can't do it like hard or anything?"

"I'll do it as hard as I want," Sam told her, slashing the stick through the air with a force that made both Jess and Bunny flinch. "And I want you bare-assed. Come on, you're already barefooted. What's a little tushie between friends?"

She's gone too far, Jess thought. Bunny won't agree to it, she hates pain, she won't even go to get a flu shot. But then, incredibly, Bunny began undoing her jeans and pulling them down. She turned around, as though presenting her ass for their inspection. It was round as an apple, clad in white panties with faded cartoon kittens cavorting across it.

"Do you want my panties down too?" she whispered, not looking at them.

If this was an attempt to win sympathy from Sam, it fell flat. "I said I did," Sam said, continuing to whip the stick idly through the air like a kid playing sword-fight. "What, are you deaf?"

There was no anger in Sam's voice, but no heat either, something Jess found hard to believe. She herself was now every bit as hot as she had been the previous night when Bunny had climbed in bed with her. She wanted badly to take the blonde's face in her hands and kiss the hell out of her. Bunny pulled her panties down, stepped out of them and left them on the stony ground. Watching her do it excited Jess; so did seeing Bunny standing with no pants, her pubes a golden puff between her legs.

Jess went up to the silent girl and took both her hands in her own. They were warm and a little sticky. Bunny stood staring at her with solemn blue eyes. Sam laughed.

"You're acting like you're getting married or something. Coupla dorks!"

With no more warning than that, Sam brought the stick across Bunny's ass, hard enough to make her scream and reflexively pull away from Jess. Jess didn't release her hands, but shifted her grip to her wrists, squeezing so she couldn't get away.

"Sam, that hurt!" Bunny wailed. She tried feebly to pull her hands free, but Jess was breathing hard and wouldn't let her go.

"That's Number One," Sam said, licking her lips. "That'll show you. Stand still, Bun-Bun."

"No! Sam! Jessie!"

"Here comes Number Two," Sam said, setting her feet firmly on the ground and taking aim. "Right on your little cotton-tail."