by Jenny Plumb
Opening the gate, and leading her through, he reminded her, “Don’t touch the fence, it’s electric.”
That got a bit more breathing out of her, and her hand finally relaxed in his as he led her into the pasture his parents had built twenty years ago. He and his brothers had helped throughout the years, to bring out the best in the lush, rolling, green hills. “What do you think?”
He felt her shrug her arms up and down, apathetically, but he wasn’t worried. He had an ace up his sleeve. He led her around the pasture to the other side of the barn. “Here you go, Raina girl.” He opened the last stall and led her inside, closing it behind them.
Her soft gasp filled the room. The hay pile seemed to bounce up and down as six sets of black eyes peered out at them. Scrambling out, and tumbling over each other in a rush to be held and stroked, the fluffy balls of black and white fur mewled loudly, begging to be seen first.
Raina fell to her bottom with a laugh and squealed, delighted as they all pounced on her.
“Their mama died last month, so we’ve been taking care of them. We had to bottle feed them for a bit, but now they’re big enough to eat on their own.”
“They’re so tiny! Eeep!” She giggled as a white ball of fur scrambled over her head and settled on her chest. “I can’t even imagine how little they were at birth. They’re so cute.”
He’d had a feeling she would enjoy them, especially since, during the course of their last and only date, she’d mentioned her disappointment over never having animals while growing up. The way her eyes lit up, and her soft voice cooed at them as she giggled, took ten years off her tired face. This was the woman he remembered meeting – young, full of life and energy, ready to take on the world, all by herself if need be. He gave her a few more minutes to decompress with the sweet balls of fur, and laughed when one jumped onto his lap, scratched and fluffed – just barely missing an area he didn’t want made into a nest – turned a few more times, then curled up into a tight ball and started vibrating as it fell asleep.
“I’m okay now. Thanks.” She smiled up at him. “Sorry, I almost lost it. I just, I don’t know.” Her head tucked down to nuzzle against another grey kitten. “It was like all time froze; I couldn’t breathe; I couldn’t hear – it was like a tunnel. I’ve been having nightmares about her sneaking in and stealing Eli.”
That explained the dark circles.
“It’s dumb. I know they’re just dreams. The woman is dressed up in a ninja suit, and she climbs up the side of the building to our third story window. And I know Grace wouldn’t be caught dead in tennis shoes, let alone all black. But still.” She snuggled another kitten and a soft sigh escaped her. “You don’t know how evil she is. I bore the brunt of her emotional abuse because I had to. If she gets Eli...” A tear fled down her cheek, and he leaned over and wiped it away. “He’s good and sweet and softhearted. She’d kill him on the inside trying to shape him into a little her, like she tried to do with Thomas.” She shuddered and gripped the grey kitten a little too tightly, so it batted at her and jumped off her lap. “I can’t let him get hurt.”
John gingerly eased himself out from underneath his sleeping pile of vibrations and pulled Raina onto his lap. “I won’t let anything happen to you or Eli. I promise.”
“How can you promise something like that?” She wiped another tear away angrily. “She has all the money in the world, a ton of lawyers who owe her; her husband was a huge political figure before he died. I’m just… me.”
The fire in her eyes left, and she sagged, a defeated stance again encompassing her whole posture.
“Don’t you shut down on me again, little girl. Come on. Let’s keep talking about this.” He gave her a little shake, but she wasn’t budging, her breaths had gone shallow again. “Okay, we’re going to try something else.” He looked around to make sure the kittens were all out of the way. “And it’s not baby animals.”
Chapter 3
Raina shifted in his lap, and tried to gather her bearings, but it was so damn hard. Why was this happening to her every time Grace made an appearance? Why did she suddenly feel like the ground was shifting beneath her feet, like she couldn’t stand up straight, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, and couldn’t focus? She barely registered the steady pull of John’s hands.
She did finally catch her bearings when a mewling kitten pawed at her hair – she was looking straight at a pile of straw and a grey fluff ball that was still put out by losing her warm, snuggly nap place. John’s firm lap bore the weight of her hips and upper thighs and rumbly stomach.
“Baby, I can spank you,” he said, massaging her bottom cheeks. “I can give you something to help you release a bit of tension, but not without your permission.”
Turning her head, she met his soft gaze and warm eyes. Did she want to be spanked by Sheriff John Tate, the man who had promised to protect her, even from herself? He wouldn’t hurt her – she knew that much already. But spanking? Would he pull her dress up? Her panties down? Would he call her naughty names and make fun of her?
“I won’t do anything you don’t want me to, sweet girl.” He must have read her mind. “If you need me to stop, you just say ‘stop’, okay?” He leaned down and placed a warm kiss to her forehead. “Do you want me to help you?”
She nodded.
“Can you say the words, baby? I need to know you’re going to communicate with me.”
Taking a deep gulp of still, stagnant air that wouldn’t fill her lungs, she wiggled and got comfy over his lap. “John, I need to breathe again. And think real thoughts. And get away from this quicksand feeling. Please spank me.” It was embarrassing to say those words out loud. “Please?”
“Good girl. This won’t be as long as I would like. We need to get back to the party.”
She nodded, and closed her eyes as he pulled up her dress. She said a quick prayer of thanks that she had worn cute boy-cut briefs instead of the high-waisted granny panties that held her tummy tight.
A loud smack echoed throughout the barn, and the kittens scattered for the safety of the hay bale. “Sorry little guys.” He chuckled. “You better skedaddle so you don’t have to watch Mommy getting her bottom spanked.” Then his hand disappeared from her bottom, striking the other side of her panty-clad cheek.
The two smacks hadn’t hurt that badly. It was more like a massage. She giggled into his leg, a spanking massage from Deputy Dom.
The loud smacks continued for the next minute or two as her bottom slowly heated, and the fuzz gradually eased from her mind.
When he pulled her panties down, the cool air wafted across her bare bottom, and she shivered at the sudden change in temperature.
“Just a bit more, baby.”
She nodded. She wanted so much more – longer, harder smacks that would leave her breathless, take away the emotions of the day, help her to release all the pent-up aggression. Gosh, the things she would love to yell at her former mother-in-law, the things she would like to do to her that were not exactly ladylike and included a big mud pie that might not be mud. “Ouch!” She moaned at the sharp smack, but before she could catch her breath, he was heating up her warm skin faster and harder. She mewled and whimpered as his large hand connected with her hot cheeks, skin on skin contact at its most intimate as he took turns caressing and spanking, kneading and swatting, her rapidly searing cheeks.
She couldn’t take it anymore. His hard, unforgiving hand was lighting into her like a fourth of July firecracker. Without thinking, she placed her hand on her sore right cheek to protect it.
He took her hand and brought it forward to give it a soft kiss. “I’m almost done, Raina girl. Can you take just a little bit more? Can you trust me to get you through this?”
She whimpered and placed her hand under her head and laid her cheek next to the straw pile. She was so close. Close to what, she didn’t know. But she did trust John Tate. And if he could help her finish whatever this was, then she needed to let him. “Please help me finish this.”
“Okay, baby, just a few more.” He rubbed her sore cheeks. “We’re almost done, I promise.”
She let out a stuttered sigh, and he smacked her right cheek the hardest yet. “Ooh!” Her left cheek felt the sharp ache of his attentions next. “Ah!”
Two more smacks right below her bottom where her thighs met, and she lost it. She burst into tears as the smells of straw and dirty, adorable baby kittens, and wood assaulted her senses. She breathed in big gulps of air, thankful as her senses reloaded. The bright yellows and golds of the hay, the charcoal mixed with ebony and pure white on the kittens, the sweet, low purrs, finally the scent of barn, and the all-male smell of the man who had pulled her up onto his lap and was now stroking her head as she wept into his mountain-fresh scented tee shirt. Everything hit at once. She could breathe. She could think clearly – the fog had lifted. She was aching in several different places – one special area which was definitely not her bottom. God, it felt good.
“Th-thank you.” She barely got the words out as she mumbled into his shirt, still trying to get every last smell of him.
“Are you okay?”
“My butt hurts.” She shrugged and smiled. “But yes, I’m good. The best I’ve felt in a long time. Thank you.” She tilted her head back and nuzzled up his neck, running her tongue along his Adams apple up to his chin. He groaned and kissed her back, a lovely kiss that dominated her mouth and left her senseless again for a moment.
“Sorry, sweet girl, but we have to get back.” He kissed her again. “As much as I would like to lay you back in that pile of straw and have my way with you…” He kissed her again. “God, I want to spank you again, already, play with your sweet pussy, fuck you on your hands and knees, then again on your back…” He groaned and lifted her to her feet, his eyes a mixture of lust and regret. “But duty calls.”
She hugged him, and quickly said goodbye to the kittens. “Thanks, John. I needed that. I think I’m good to handle her now.”
“And if you can’t, you know who to come to.”
“Yes, sir.”
Chapter 4
John rubbed the back of his neck as hard as he could, trying to dispel the knot and the tension headache threatening to make him cry like a school kid. It wasn’t that he was sitting in front of the nursing home at eleven forty-five in the morning, waiting to see Raina. Raina had bloomed so beautifully for him this past week, both in bed and in his arms. He had fallen hard for this woman.
No, it was the job he had to do. As part-time process server, he had orders to deliver the summons to Raina Michaels. No matter how much it would kill him to see her eyes welling with tears, no matter how tightly her little fists would clench. No matter how hard she would cry, beg him to just forget giving her the summons until after Christmas.
It was his professional duty, and he had to follow through. He would walk into Fairvista Home for the elderly, hand her the summons to go to court to decide who could best care for Eli, hold her while she cried… then he would tell her his plan. No one would be taking her precious little boy from her – not now, not ever. But first he had to do his duty, and make the woman he loved, cry.
Raina had had a pretty rough day. She was exhausted from last night’s nightmare, and unable to fall asleep again, chose to instead sit beside her sweet son’s bed, watching his little chest rise and fall with breath, his angelic features soft and pure as he dreamt.
Mr. Haggerty had a heart attack while she was hosting a Christmas carol sing-along in the front lounge, and she had been the one to administer CPR while Mrs. McGillicuddy sobbed. She should have left an hour ago, desperately needing a nap and a long hot shower to decompress. But Granny had asked her to meet her during lunch, so she could check the place out. And as much as both she and Granny agreed that she wasn’t senile and didn’t need to be here, Granny had said that she knew John and her family were only trying to protect her – it couldn’t hurt to check it out. Maybe see if there were any other hot guys – Granny’s words.
Raina was just about to sit down with a hot cup of tea when she saw the man she loved in the doorway. Funny, how they had grown so close in such a short time. She was pretty sure John loved her. He hadn’t said the exact words, but wow, he certainly showed it. And it was okay, if it took him a while. She knew in her heart he loved her – and Eli. They had connected on such an intimate level during that spanking in the barn, and everything just built from there. Their energetic talks about politics and religion – she loved that they could respectfully disagree on certain areas, while finding other areas they fully agreed upon, like the amazing experimentation in the bedroom. The way he naturally took charge, and she naturally submitted to him. And wonderful sex and spankings were just the icing and cherry on top of Granny’s famous award-winning turtle cake. It was like they fit: his calm, authoritative grounding presence, to her excited, passionate desire to see the good in all people and all things. They fit. He was so handsome and tough, yet gentle; so dominant and kind; so professional and trustworthy.
This man, the man of her dreams was striding purposefully toward her, his sheriff’s badge on his chest, hat in hand, and a firm resolute look on his face. Her heart skipped a beat. He was here in a professional capacity and he was heading straight toward her.
That’s when she noticed what he was holding in his other hand, the envelope with the dark letters, tightly grasped in his hard fist. She had seen a summons before – when Thomas had unpaid parking tickets.
A summons would only come from one person and mean one thing only. Grace wanted Eli enough to take her to court. Her knees would have buckled if she had been standing. The hairs on the back of her neck stood so sharply, she winced as the ice cold dread flushed through her body. They couldn’t do this – not right before Christmas. It was so hard to breathe. The sounds of the off key singing from Mrs. Bannister sounded like it came from an out of tune piano playing from the other side of that underwater tunnel that went through to Canada.
He strode toward her, wincing as he held out the envelope in front of him. “I’m so sorry, baby.” His voice sounded tinny and far away, and finally she heard nothing but her own rapid heartbeat; his lips were moving, yet she heard nothing.
Snatching the paper from him, she focused on the words at the top. Summons... followed by her name, Grace’s, and finally, Eli’s. John was still saying something, but it may as well have been in a foreign language.
Her teacup shattered to the ground with her piercing wail as is in agony for her poor wretched soul, and John reached for her. “No. Just… Leave me alone.” She bolted. As fast as her legs would carry her out the door, she was down the steps and in her car faster than she ever thought she could have run.
John was sprinting out the doorway, yelling something that sounded like hate or bate. “Wait!” he bellowed again, but she shook her head, fisted away the tears that had started, and slammed on the gas, going backward out of her small parking space. He had almost caught up with her when she shoved her foot so hard to the floor, the car lurched forward, right toward the old woman in the burgundy sweater.
“Shit!” Raina screamed and slammed on the brakes. The car went careening past the woman with the wide-eyed terror, missing her by inches, and knocked into the mailbox on the corner of South and Main. “Oh my God, Oh my God! Granny?” Raina shrieked and flung herself out of her car, falling on her knees next to John’s sweet grandmother. “I’m so sorry. Please don’t die. Oh my God, please don’t die!” She thought she might faint, and weaved back and forth on her knees as she rubbed Granny’s whole body checking for injuries.
“You sit down, right over here.” John firmly took her by the arm and dragged her away from the group of people that had now formed a circle around the old woman. “Put your head between your legs and don’t move a damn muscle.” That, she heard.
“I’m fine, everyone. Just got the poop scared outta’ me. Back off now, and let me get up and check on Raina.”
Raina’s bitter laugh erupted f
rom her aching throat as she kept her head between her legs and didn’t move an inch – just like John commanded. Poor Granny had almost got hit by a car – her car – yet she was worried about Raina. “I’m so s-s-sorry, Granny,” she said, sobbing through short breaths as tears streamed down her face.
The sounds of people’s shocked exclamations, John’s barked orders, Granny’s loud irritated claims that she was fine and didn’t need an ambulance, and the sirens joined her own discordant carol of sobs and internal “what ifs”. She shut them all out, finally, until she couldn’t see, hear, smell anything. The world went white around her.
Chapter 5
“Are you sure you’re okay?” John handed Raina another cup of hot tea, and her hands only shook a little bit this time, a huge improvement over three hours ago.
Nodding, she took a long sip and shifted in the pile of blankets he had cocooned her in on his couch. “I’m okay, John.” She wiggled her feet underneath the blue and purple part of the crocheted afghan his grandmother had knitted for him for his eighteenth birthday.
Granted, the blue, purple and turquoise colors would have gone better in a woman’s apartment, but he knew, even as a young eighteen year old punk, not to diminish a thoughtful gift made with love. So it was now wrapped tightly over the love of his life, who had finally regained some color in her cheeks. “I just checked on Eli. His play date at Mark’s is going great, and they have even offered to let him sleep over. He sounds pretty excited, but it’s up to you, sweet girl.” He knelt over and kissed her on the forehead and she leaned up for another kiss. “Do you want a break for the night so you can rest? You can stay here. Or do you want me to pick Eli up while we’re on the way back to your place?”
