WHACK! Aaahh!! WHACK! Assshh!! No more mother, please! WHACK! Yaaah! Stop!! You're killing me!! WHACK! Aaahhhhh! I'm not a whore! Let me go!!

In the quietness of an early Saturday morning in June, the noise coming from my neighbour's kitchen sounded loudly through the shared wall of the semi-detached house. The teenaged girl was receiving another beating from her self-righteous, bully of a mother, the third beating I'd heard in the six months they'd lived next door and it sounded by far the worst. I'd no idea how many other times the mother had thrashed the girl but this time I resolved to intervene.

Apart from actually having been born in the local hospital and going away for holidays, I'd lived all 26 years of my life in the house my parents bought new about twenty years before. Officially it was a two bedroomed house and my sister Karen, older than me by ten years, had the second, smaller, bedroom upstairs. When I became old enough to need a bedroom of my own, father converted the small downstairs dining area for me but I still had to trek upstairs to the bathroom and toilet. When Karen, married and moved to another part of the country when she was twenty-one, I took over her bedroom and Dad knocked the wall down between my old bedroom and the kitchen to give mother more space for cooking. Unfortunately, that was one of the last jobs he did on the house; he suffered a heart attack soon after and died at work.

Mum and I continued to live there on our own while I went through the local college and university and obtained a degree in Chemistry. I now have the official title of Dr. John Barlow, although to most people I am just 'John'. During that time Mum became increasingly infirm and had great difficulty in climbing the stairs to the toilet and when it got to the stage that she had to have a commode downstairs and use a small bed in the lounge, Karen offered to let her live with them in their bungalow.

It didn't take long for me to become adept at living alone, partly because I'd honed my cooking and domestic skills while looking after mother, and when she left I converted the small bedroom into a computer study room and slept in the main bedroom. During this time, I had several girlfriends but no relationship lasted for more than a month or two. The usual reason or excuse for them ending was that I wasn't a social person and didn't go out much and when I did, I found the noise and smoke of the pubs and clubs too much of a distraction and, not being a night-owl person, wanted to return home earlier than they would have liked.

My qualifications allowed me to teach chemistry and maths at school and college level but there was no post available locally and, not wanting to give up my independence and the house, I took a lesser-paid job as a technician in the college I'd attended earlier. Less money, but less hassle, and always an 8:30 - 4:30 job with no evening meetings, no parents to deal with, and no reports to fill in. It suited me.

Until nearly a year ago, Mrs. Williams lived next door. Like my parents, she and her husband bought the house from new and she continued to live there when he died. I always got on well with the old lady and after she became a widow, did jobs around the house and, until I went to university, kept the garden more or less under control but when, with my coursework, I hadn't the time, she got a local gardener to come in regularly.

I disliked Mrs. Emerson our new neighbour almost from her arrival. A tall, buxom woman, with a sharp tongue and a short temper, she sort to treat me like I was a cheap dogsbody. A week after moving in she came to my door to demand I repaired the chain-link fence between our properties. Had she asked I might have done it or at least helped, but no, she tried to make out it was my job and my fault the repairs were needed. Pointing out that as the fence posts were on her side of the fence, it was her responsibility to see to the repairs. I told her to get a fencing firm to fix the fence. The repairs have never been done.

Her sixteen-year-old daughter, Theresa, or Terri as she liked to be called, was quite different. A little over 5 feet tall, fairly slim with short dark hair and, although she always dressed plainly and wore no make-up or jewellery, I thought she was attractive. At least she was polite, friendly and well spoken when we were both in the garden and I managed to have a few words with her out of earshot and sight of her mother.

Long ago dad installed a gate between our two back gardens so we could get from one house to the other easily. It was through this gate I hurried to see what I could do to stop the beating.

The scene revealed when I peered though the kitchen window could have been erotic in the right circumstances but it actually revolted me and added fuel to my anger. Naked and held struggling and howling on the kitchen table by her powerful, belt wielding mother, Terry screamed with the agony of each blow. Her bottom and thighs were already blistered and bruised and there appeared no sign that her mother was ready to let up. I tried the door; locked. I tapped the window. Mrs. Emerson looked up and momentarily lost her grip on Terri whose writhing caused her to fall to the floor and curl into a protective ball. Fixing me with a glare that should have withered my resolve, her mother continued to lash the belt on any part of her daughter's body that presented itself and I knew I had to do something quickly. Pressing my mobile phone to the window, I took a picture of the scene hoping and praying the flash would distract the woman. It did. At least she stopped and came towards the kitchen door. I started to dial 999 but only got the first two digits when the door opened and I faced the angry woman. She still held the belt and raised it threateningly. "What did you want to poke your nose in for? I'm just giving the slut what she wants, what she needs."

"She needs to be taken away to somewhere safe, somewhere where she won't be hurt, somewhere where she will be cared for and get treated for the pain she is in," I interrupted, trying to push my way inside. There was no way my relatively small body would get passed her but it wasn't necessary. To my amazement she stood aside.

"You want to care for her, you take her and find out for yourself what she's like. Find out for yourself what the cunning little bitch really wants and asked for. There's no place for a slut like her in this house. You want a whore, you take her."

Carefully I helped the screaming, crying girl to her feet, wrapped the robe that had fallen to the floor around her battered body, and half carried her to my house. At this stage I am not sure if she realised much of what was happening. Although her screaming abated a little, her body shook with pain and I guessed she feared what I might do. For several minutes I held her close, hoping to gain her trust and to show I was ready to protect her but I doubted that trust would come easily or quickly. We were still embraced when the door opened and her mother threw in a plastic carrier bag of books. Several fell out and slid across the floor; they were all bondage and slavery paperbacks. "That's what the slut wants to be! A sex slave! God help her. I've tried to raise her decently and then find she's into this smut," the woman yelled as she closed the door and left.

"It's ... not ... what ... it looks ... like ... John," she stammered through her sobs, "I..."

"Hush Terri, we can talk later but for now we must try to ease your pain. Do you want me to take you to the hospital or get the police? It's assault, even though your mother did it."

"No ... she is my mother ... I'll get sent to a home ... I'll have to go to ... court ... I don't..."

"Okay, I'll go with it for now, at least until I see how serious your injuries are. You'll have to trust me and co-operate with what I need to do to help you. Terry, I'm going to take you upstairs into the bathroom to bathe your welts and to find some painkillers. I will be removing your dressing gown but I won't interfere with you otherwise. Understand?" A slow nod but I could see the confusion in her eyes as she realised she'd be naked with a man only ten years older than herself; a man whose erection was pressing against her thigh albeit, it was hidden by his shorts. Maybe she was even worried about her virginity but I've no doubt the pain she was in, blocked out most other thoughts.

The welting was horrific and in my anger at her treatment, I almost reneged on my agreement not to call the police or take her to the hospital, but I didn't. Selfish reasons lurking in the back of my mind came to the fore. I liked the idea of having the young girl with me, I liked being the Good Samaritan, the knight in shining armour rescuing the damsel in distress and maybe, just maybe, I would be able to get her into bed and willingly have sex with me. Perhaps she would be a sex slave like her mother said.

Half an hour later, I helped her from the bath and gently dried her with the softest towel I had. She'd quietened down considerably but I knew she was still in a great deal of pain even after the pain killers had started to take effect, and I also knew she worried over my hard prick that still tented my shorts. I couldn't control it, not when I had an attractive, naked girl before me. It didn't help that I'd removed my shirt when I bathed her, so apart from my shorts and slippers, I was near naked too. I tried, I really did, to be chaste in my washing and drying of her but I know I spent more time than necessary on her pert breasts and genitals but I certainly didn't neglect her blisters either even though the gentlest of touches caused her further pain.

During the time in the bathroom, our conversation was restricted to monosyllabic instructions and answers but before entering my bedroom she hesitantly asked, "John? Are you going to ... have sex with me?" The last part came out in a hurry.

"Not until you're healed and then only if you want to." That seemed to satisfy her and she laid herself face down on my bed and allowed me to smear Nivea cream, the only cream I had, on her welts.

A fresh outburst of crying stopped me from leaving her and letting her rest. "What is going to happen to me now?" Will I be sent away? Sent back to mother? I found those books you know, I didn't buy them."

"I know you didn't. From the colour of the paper, they are old and have been well used. We'll worry about the books some other time but the question of what will happen to you is one I cannot answer at the moment. Too much depends on your mother and whether or not she wants you to return..."

"I'm not going back!"

"I understand that and you are old enough, just, to be able to decide that for yourself. If she tries to make you return, then I have the photos on my mobile to show what she did."

"You took more?"

"Just before I put the cream on. I doubt she will insist because I suspect that when she calms down, she'll realise she could be put away for abuse. We will have to go back to get your stuff, if you decide to stay here, however long that may be. It will take a while for you to heal and to walk normally and certainly you won't be going to school on Monday."