Cowboy of Her Dreams

by Kira Barcelo

  “You calling a tow?” Stone asked.

  “Friend of mine has a truck. He’s not but ten minutes away from here. ’Course, that’s if he’s not out and about for the night.” Tom nodded at Stone. “I’ll wait here for him. You and the girls can go on home.”

  “I’ll wait with you, Tom,” Jenna offered.

  “Waiting for a tow truck sounds like a fun end to a fun night,” Stone quipped, much to everyone’s amusement.

  Everyone…but Ashley.

  “Tell you what: You can all sit here and sing ‘Kumbaya’,” she snapped. “I’m going back to the ranch now!”

  “Whoa, Ashley! You are not walking around out here at this hour by yourself.”

  Jenna recognized that stern tone of voice. Stone looked as if he’d run out of patience with the Hollywood Princess.

  “Oh? Why? Get a lot of crime out here in the sticks, do you?” She fastened her hands to her hips and stared him down.

  “It’s like anywhere else. Anything can happen. You’re a woman walking out here all alone, at night. I won’t have that.”

  Tom piped up, “It won’t be too long, honey. Just sit tight and rest with us for a few. We’ll have you home in no time.”

  “And I said I don’t want to wait. What part of that didn’t you freaking people understand?”

  Turning, she nearly stumbled again and cussed loudly as she kicked off her shoes in a flurry.

  “You know, Ashley,” Stone called after her, “I’ve never approved of you cursing like a sailor.”

  “Oh, kiss my ass, Stone!”

  “Too bad we don’t have access to soap and water out here,” Tom remarked. “You could wash her mouth out with that.”

  Overhearing the comment, an infuriated Ashley sputtered, “Try it, cowboy! Or better yet, how about you make good on your silly threat and spank me?”

  Jenna stifled a gasp. Calmly, Tom nodded and glanced at Stone, who stood beside him in a casual stance, with his thumbs hooked into his belt.

  “Sounds like the lady would like me to do the honors,” Tom teased.

  “Hmmm. Does sound that way, don’t it? So…” Stone waved an arm in her direction. “Be my guest, sir!”

  Jenna turned to watch Ashley, whose face turned crimson with rage.

  “Un-frickin’-believable! Just you try it, cowboy! You are so not man enough to scare me. The hell with all of you!”

  For all her big talk, Ashley was moving fast—or trying to, now that her feet were bare. Tom handed his cell to Jenna with the words, “Do me a favor, honey, and call Travis. His phone’s in my contacts. I got a naughty bottom that really needs my attention right now.”

  Jenna had never seen that side of Tom Riley before. He wasn’t angry, either, but there was a solid determination in his gait. Ashley’s clumsy walking was no match for those long strides of his legs. Jenna had to admit she had a sense of satisfaction in seeing that haughty, self-important brat looking nervously back over her shoulder at him.

  “You must think I’m one of your little country girls!” she tossed back at him. “Well, you have another guess coming! I’ll scratch your eyes out if you so dare as touch me!”

  “Oh, trust me, darlin’. I’m shakin’ in my boots, I’m so scared of you!”

  Jenna giggled and was surprised to see Stone having a hearty laugh beside her. He turned and his eyes were shining playfully.

  “Oh—I’d better make that call,” she said, more to herself.

  “You might want to step away so you can hear better, Jenna. I have a feeling it’s about to get very noisy around here.”

  “You big—ooooh—cowboy!”Ashley hollered when he caught up with her. “Let me go! Let me go, you big jackass!”

  “Now, see, that’s the kind of attitude that you got you into this mess, young lady,” Tom chided.

  Despite her flailing around and her fists mostly punching at the air, he hoisted her over his hip and held her steady. Even so, she continued to curse a blue streak and kick her feet in the air, none of which was doing her any good at all.

  “Over there looks like a good spot,” Jenna suggested helpfully, pointing out a boulder that was flat enough to offer Tom a seat while he took care of business.

  “Thank you, darlin’!” Tom waved at her with his free hand. “And I do believe you can wait till I’m through to call Travis. I don’t want you to miss this very memorable performance of Miss Ashley Covington’s.”

  “Oooooh! You bast—jerk!” Ashley reacted as soon as he sat himself down on the boulder, draping her across his lap. Jenna noted she corrected herself before swearing again. “Stone Farrell, if you let this monster do this to me, I swear it’s over between you and me!”

  “Would you prefer to get your spanking from me?” Stone called out to her. “Because one way or the other, Ash, you’re getting your bottom blistered tonight. I trust Tom will do a thorough job.”

  “Thank you very much for that vote of confidence, man,” Tom said, then turned his attention fully to the woman thrashing about over his knee.

  Jenna guessed that, out of respect for Stone, Tom didn’t go further than to pull that tight skirt over those perfectly rounded orbs. Then, amusingly enough, he seemed to realize it wasn’t necessary to pull down her panties—considering the woman was wearing a lacy pair of thong panties. Her ivory bottom was totally bare as it was, save for the slender line of black fabric tucked between both ample cheeks. Ashley must have felt the cool of the air on her skin because she groaned, knowing she was fully exposed. She reached her fingers down under Tom’s pants legs to scratch at his legs in childish retaliation.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Miss Covington. Or should I say…Miss Cropper? That’s your real name, isn’t it, Miss Uppity?”

  Ashley’s bottom bounced comically in response to that first stinging clap of Tom’s hand. Her back arched as he delivered another and then another, landing each spank on different spots. His hand was large, but for a slim woman she had a sizeable rear end. With each spank, she yelped and cried out indignantly.

  “Stop it! Ohhhhh—owwwwwwww!—stop it!”

  “Thorough,” Tom mumbled, repeating the word Stone had used. “Yep. I will do a thorough job of teaching you manners, young lady.”

  Jenna grinned when he paused long enough to wink at her. She felt the weight of Stone’s stare on her and glanced at him. He wasn’t angry; he just looked worried, like he was trying to figure out the relationship she and Tom shared.

  Unexpectedly, she found herself feeling sorry for Ashley. In spite of the fact that the actress had treated her shabbily, Jenna conceded that Ashley had to have been smarting something awful by then.

  Tom was in no hurry, either, even stopping briefly to trap Ashley’s kicking legs with his own. His hand peppered her tail with smack after fiery smack, painting her tender flesh a shimmery pink that was fast approaching a blazing shade of red. Through it, she progressed from shouting obscenities at him in a futile attempt to rebel to howling and promising she’d behave herself.

  Ashley had surely underestimated Tom’s strength. Then again, Jenna imagined that most of the men the woman had encountered, other than Stone, were too afraid of her or too beta to attempt what Tom, who was a very alpha male, was doing right then.

  Again he stopped, holding her waist with an iron grip.

  “Now aren’t you embarrassed, Ashley?” Tom scolded. “Getting spanked over a cowboy’s knee like a bad little girl?”

  Ashley sputtered and hiccoughed. “Y-y-yes…”

  “Good. You should be embarrassed. You ready to apologize for the way you behaved? For being disrespectful to everybody?”

  She reached back with her hand, trying to rub out some of the fire in her poor bottom. Tom pushed her hand away.

  “Aw, no, ma’am, you can’t do that. Not yet. I want you to feel that heat in your backside. Now you gonna apolo—”

  “Ooooh, never! You—you can kiss my ass first, cowboy!”

  Jenna winced at Tom’s darke
ning expression.

  “Now, Ashley, if you’re going to be stubborn about this—”

  “Kiss…my…ass!” Ashley screeched out the words and wriggled her swollen behind, fighting desperately to free herself.

  “Okey-dokey. Have it your way…”

  Having rested for a few moments, Tom resumed the spanking with renewed vigor. Jenna thought his hand had to be hurting—maybe not as much as Ashley’s bottom, but it had to hurt. For this round, he picked up the pace, bringing his hand down in rapid-fire swats that heated up the tops of her thighs as well as her already sore behind.

  Finally, Ashley began apologizing in between her sobs and yelps. She’d stopped fighting and only held onto his denim-clad legs. She didn’t seem to notice when the spanking was over.

  “Oh, no more! No more, pleeeeeeeease, no more!” Her voice trailed off. “I’ll be-behave myself, Tom. Pleeeeeease! Owwwwww! I won’t curse anymore, I promise, and I’ll be nice, please, please, please, I promise, no more spanking, pleasepleaseplease, Tom!”

  “All right, honey. Apology accepted. No more spanking.” He let her rest for a few moments, even rubbing her back.

  If Jenna wasn’t mistaken, Tom’s gaze lingered a little longer than necessary on Ashley’s scorched bottom. She wasn’t imagining it: Her friend and once-boyfriend was barely able to contain himself, completely turned on by the experience. Somehow, though, he managed to compose himself.

  At that, she looked over at Stone. Was he aroused, too? If he was, it wasn’t because of Ashley. Jenna took a deep breath; he was staring back at her with intense longing.

  “There ya go, honey,” Tom was saying as he helped Ashley to her feet. “Oh—uh-uh. You see that tree over there? You go stand and face that tree for a few minutes. At least until Travis gets here with the truck.”

  Ashley’s face was a mess. Her mascara was running and her hair was disheveled, and she was dancing around and rubbing her behind.

  “Do I have to?” she whined.

  “Yes, ma’am, you do. I say so, so you do. There’s no corner, so the tree will have to do. And no rubbing that bottom till I say you can. You hear?”

  By that point, Ashley must have known better than to argue with a cowboy. Anyone could tell she wasn’t happy about being made to stand with her nose inches from the tree, but she obediently did so, sniffling. Tom tugged her skirt down over her reddened bottom.

  It was time to make that call. As Jenna heard Travis’ phone ringing on the other line, she caught sight of Ashley looking at Tom over her shoulder. She reached back with her hands and then brought them back, remembering the admonition that she wasn’t to rub her bottom yet.

  “I’ll get you a tissue from the car, darlin’, so you can blow your nose,” he said softly.

  “Thank you, baby.”

  She kissed her fingertip then, transferring the kiss to his cheek. Tom chuckled and gave her behind a soothing, affectionate rub, then a couple of gentle pats.

  “I knew there was a good girl in there somewhere,” he said with a grin.

  Jenna smiled. Tom had never looked at her that way. She was right in her assessment: That cowboy was smitten right down to his boots. Smitten hard!

  To her relief, Stone wasn’t behaving jealously because of the exchange between Tom and his supposed fiancée. Instead, he gave Jenna a wink and a nod.

  That had to have been the most interesting date she’d been on in a long time.

  “Miss Covington’s been a whole lot nicer after you all went out last night. What brought about that change?”

  For a teen, Jake was exceptionally observant. Nothing got past that kid. Jenna stood on the other side of the kitchen island, snapping off the ends of the fresh string beans she was making for dinner as he sipped at a glass of milk.

  “Nothing happened. Why do you think something happened?” Coyly, she avoided her brother’s eyes.

  “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because she was prancing around here like she was too good for everybody else when she first got here. Now she’s being sweet as honey. So what’s up?”

  “Well, maybe she’s just had a change of heart. Or maybe country life suits her.”

  Jake made a face. “I don’t think so. Is Stone going back with her? To Hollywood, I mean?”

  Oh, I hope not. Jenna shook her head. “I don’t know. I sure hope not. We need him around here.”

  “I think, you know, if he’d met you first, he would’ve married you instead of her.”

  At last she looked up at Jake. “Is it that obvious?”

  “You mean the way you feel about Stone? I only know because you’re my sister and I know you well.”

  She sighed. “Well, don’t go talking like that. I know she’s still in bed—”

  “She just got up a little while ago. And it’s after two.”

  “Oh, please. You’d do that, too, if I didn’t get your butt up outta bed. Anyway, she might hear you.”

  “I doubt it, Jen. She’s on the phone with somebody right now. Sounds like it’s her agent or somebody like that.”

  Jenna pursed her lips. “Now how would you know that…Noseybody?”

  Jake grinned. “She’s got her cell on speaker. Kinda hard not to overhear. Sounds like they’re talking about a part in a new TV show or something.”

  “Kinda hard not to overhear, especially when you’re outside in the hallway with your ear to the door.”

  “You got that right!” Her kid brother laughed and dodged a string bean soaring at him. “Hey, I think I hear her. She’s coming down the stairs. I’m going to ride Pepper for a while.”

  In the doorway, he almost collided with Ashley, both of them trying to give each other berth.

  “You go ahead, ma’am,” Jake said.

  “All right, honey. Thanks.”

  It was hard to be mean to someone who was speaking gently to her brother. Jenna greeted Ashley with a nod, the actress mumbling a “Good afternoon” as she came around to the other side of the island.

  “Breakfast and lunch are both over,” Jenna announced. “Sorry. There’s some granola and milk, if you’d like. Or you can fix yourself a sandwich. Or…I don’t mind fixing it for you.”

  “I appreciate that. But I’ll just feast on this delicious banana.” Ashley tore one from the bunch on the counter. “Any coffee left?”

  “I made a pot a little while ago. I don’t think it’s mud yet.”

  “Oh, too bad. I like my coffee muddy.” She wasn’t being testy; there was a friendly, teasing lilt to her voice. “Is Stone around?”

  “He’s out there, working.”

  “Oh.” Ashley seated herself on a stool carefully, gasping when her still-sore bottom met that hard seat. Quickly, she shot to her feet. “Maybe I’ll just, um…not sit right now. I’m still sore from…you know.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.” Jenna’s eyes flashed mischievously, and she smiled when Ashley laughed.

  “You know, I’m not always such a…a bitch,” Ashley began.

  “I never said you were. And for the record, I wasn’t very nice to you, either.”

  “Well, I just didn’t like you because I—I knew you had your heart set on Stone. But I wasn’t really jealous.”

  I was. Very jealous. Still jealous. Choosing to keep that fact to herself, Jenna said, “I understand. This is…kind of unusual. Me, living here under the same roof with Stone, and you being his fiancée and all—”

  “Was his fiancée. I’m not anymore.”

  Jenna had been running water over the vegetables in a pot but stopped. “What—what happened?”

  “You didn’t talk to him yet?”

  “No. He’s been busy, I’ve been busy.”

  “I…gave him back his ring. The engagement’s off.”

  “Because Tom spanked you?”

  “What? No!” Ashley’s laugh relaxed her. “Don’t be silly! That has nothing to do with it. I broke it off because…well, I think Stone and I were infatuated with each other at first. I feel comfortable with him an
d I think he’s comfortable with me, but I think we were together only because we’re both…I don’t know. Sometimes, unlike a lot of people we deal with all the time, deep down we’re both real.

  “But I don’t belong to him. Not really. And I know he doesn’t belong to me.” The actress hesitated, setting her fruit down. “I know you have feelings for him. I don’t know you very well, but I think you’re in love with him.”

  Awkwardly, Jenna stared back at her. She wanted to speak but didn’t know what to say, standing there awkwardly, drying her hands with a dish towel.

  “And I think he’s falling in love with you, too,” Ashley added.

  Somewhere along the line in that conversation, the two women had passed the line where it was now too awkward to proceed. Maybe if Jenna had been more familiar with Ashley, but she wasn’t. Her heart was beating hard with anticipation, with hoping that this woman—who, in all honesty, knew Stone better than she did—was correct. Still, she changed the subject to something easier to handle.

  “My—my brother overheard you talking to someone on the phone upstairs—”

  “Yeah, that was my agent. She was calling me with good news!” Her face aglow with excitement, Ashley took a small nibble of her banana before going on. “I’ll be doing a pilot for a new TV show. If it’s picked up, I’ll have something fun to add to my resume.”

  “Something fun? Really? What is it?”

  “It’s called Secrets of the City. I play a woman who changes into a cat by night, and she goes out fighting crime. Sort of like a sci-fi/superhero story. Yes—I know! It sounds goofy.” Laughing good-naturedly, Ashley went on, “But, hey, it sounds more interesting than some of the other stuff I’ve done. My agent says it’s a juicy role, with lots of great costume changes that I’ll love.”

  “That sounds great! I’ll watch it just because you’re in it, but I bet I won’t want to miss an episode.”

  “Jenna!” Reaching across the island, Ashley squeezed her hand. “That’s a very nice thing of you to say. Look, I really am sorry for the way I treated you.”