I was at work, bored and contemplating what I could do to Mr Loverman to help pass the time. The day before I had forced him to speak with a lisp for the entire day. News of his peculiar impediment swept through the office and the poor little man was completely humiliated as people queued up to speak to him. "What's three times twenty?" Maria asked him. "What was the name of that French singer - no, not Aznavour, the other one - yes that's it, Sacha Distel." Poor Mr Loverman: he looked like he was regurgitating a frog as he tried to negotiate that one. It was a moment which was destined to go into the folklore of the office and I was struggling to find something to top it when a text arrived on my mobile phone. Picking it up, I saw it was from Carina. 'www.chatcam.com,' it read, but nothing else. Intrigued, I logged on and typed the url. As it loaded I saw it was an adult webcam site, promising everlasting friendships and international goodwill. And free wank material, it could have added, but didn't. There were different menus for women, men and couples online who were ready and waiting to chat - and more. I searched round the site, not sure what I was looking for, until I saw the name of one of the webcams: carina&midge. The three unfortunate salesmen who had become our quarry had been nicknamed Mary, Mungo and Midge: Midge was Adam, Carina's target. With keen anticipation, I clicked on the cam and it opened up, to reveal a room I recognised instantly as Carina's living room. I laughed aloud, clapping my hands.

"Fantastic, girl!" I yelled. "What a star!" Not only was Carina capturing her conquest on video, as required to win the challenge, she was broadcasting it live over the internet for the whole world to see. She deserved a special prize for that, and I suspected I might be in a position to present it to her later that evening. Still chortling, I picked up the phone. "Pamela? Hi babe, I think you'd better come to my office. And round up Maria on the way. There's something you need to see."

I waited a few minutes and finally saw some activity on the cam. A couple of ghostly apparitions sped past, too fast to be able to discern what they were, but eventually things slowed down enough for me to see Carina, dressed in vampish leather and fishnets. Clever girl, I thought: play to the male fantasy and success becomes so, so easy. She strode about the room with an easy grace, clearly in control of what she was doing. A knock on the door heralded the arrival of Pamela and Maria, and with a wide grin I swung the monitor round for them to see.

"What is it?" asked Pamela.

"Look closely," I replied smugly.

"Hold on - is that Carina?" said Maria, peering at the screen in disbelief.

"It certainly is. Live and uncut, as it were. And any minute now, I expect, we will see today's victim."

"Well damn me, the little bitch, she's gone and done it," breathed Pamela. "She looks pretty bloody hot, too - that's some outfit."

"What's that in her hand?"

"It's a paddle, isn't it?"

"Paddle? Jesus, looks more like a cricket bat. That's going to sting a bit. Pity the arse that's on the receiving end of that 3;"

"And talking of which 3;"

"Woo hoo!"

Into the picture appeared the sacrificial lamb, little Midge, poor Adam. He was naked. And he was on all fours, crawling across the floor. He stopped in front of Carina and remained with his head bowed, looking at the carpet. It was clear that he was following instructions and Carina was shouting at him, gesticulating wildly and brandishing her paddle as she did so. She stepped forward until she was standing directly in front of him and grabbed his hair, pulling his head up so that his eyes were at the level of her leather skirt, his face brushing against it. Had he but known, this was as close to satisfaction as he was ever going to come.

We watched intently as she pulled him to his feet and flung him onto the settee, positioning him so that his arms were draped around the back and his legs were spread wide, backside thrust out ready for attention. She gave him a couple of smacks with her hand to warm him up and we could see him flinch: good god, I thought, if he reacted like that to a little pat with the palm, he was in for a rude awakening when the paddle got to him.

With Adam facing away from us, Carina stepped towards the webcam and her face filled the screen, grinning broadly. She waved and held up a piece of paper. 'Office chatroom,' it said. I searched for the chat icon and found the list of rooms. And there it was, the 'Office' room, with one person in it. I entered.

A message appeared on the screen from Carina. "hi," it said.

"hi," I typed. "well done."

"are the others there?"

"yes."

"great. watch and learn, girls, watch and learn." On the screen, Carina was laughing heartily.

Pamela reached over me and began to type. "well done carina. guess you win."

"i sure do," the reply appeared. "and just remember - what you are about to see will soon happen to you too."

I laughed. Pamela had gone rather white and Maria was shocked into silence. Carina's grinning face winked at us, then she turned away towards her victim. She blew a kiss at us, took aim, and flattened an almighty blow on the upturned arse of poor Adam.

"Ouch," said Pamela and Maria in unison.