Taming Texanna (4 page)

Colt turned and stared intently at Texanna, his whole attention focused on her, but she couldn’t face him so she stared at her feet. She knew he was watching her because she took a small peek up at him before dropping her head quickly. She had that odd ache again low down and wondered at it. Then her nipples hardened even more. What was wrong with her? Colton was watching her, she was having a hard time breathing, and her girlie parts were throbbing. Heat flushed her face all the way to the top of her head, and she couldn’t risk him knowing her thoughts.

Texanna knew she was considered a cute little thing by most accounts she was made aware of, but she just was not attracting any respectable men. Men wanted a woman, not a sweet girl. The teenagers that wanted her were just that, boys, and she had no time for immature ruffians. Colton McFadden, however, was one beautiful example of God’s creation. He looked tanned like most men did and her pa said he was Indian, but he had those startling blue eyes that made a gal wonder what else he might be. She wondered if he might be interested in her if she put some effort into it.

What kind of woman would the marshal be looking for? If she dressed more like a woman and strolled past his office, with her hair in a loose bun, maybe have it slip out of its confines, on accident of course, just as she was within sight of him. Would that bring him out to talk to her and possibly admire her some? Maybe she could bring him lunch and share it with him. Her pa would never allow it, but she didn’t have to let him know.

Besides, the men, it seemed, couldn’t get around the fact that she was painfully petite. Having babies, well, was important to cattlemen, and she didn’t look like those big hipped women common to the area. Colt was a big man. Not heavy but powerfully built and typically tall enough to take notice of when he came into view. He would breed big babies. Texanna was shocked that she had that stray thought when she was looking at some serious standing time after he got through talking with her pa, which she was sure he would want to do. They all did. That is if she decided to stay to take that whipping.

The sheriff had needed to speak to her father when she was caught looking into the saloon through the back door just to satisfy her curiosity about what went on behind those swinging gates. The stable owner talked to him because she spent too much time distracting the boys in there by asking questions and slipping forbidden treats to the mares. Last week, she was there just to see the new puppies, not distract the boys from their work, but neither saw it that way. It was as though her existence in the stables bothered them even when she didn’t even talk to them.

The other week she had knocked over a display in the mercantile. No one seemed to care that she was trying to stop two little hellions with an absent mother from tearing the place down all by themselves. Even the preacher thought poorly of her improper behavior during the last social. She had thought just yesterday that if she got into any more trouble, she might just take off for some other place. Men did it all the time. Yeah, but since she was a woman, traveling alone was a harebrained idea. She looked and thought that at least she had these trousers she could wear. But it was only as a last resort.

“Well, I guess I’m going to have to take a ride out to your daddy’s place and have a talk with him.”

Her head shot up and her eyes met his briefly. “I guess. But, Mr. McFadden, Colton,” she risked calling him by his first name and it felt right. “Do you think you might be able to just… um… forget it this once?” She looked up despondently biting her lip and then licking the spot.

“Well, I wish I could honey but I already have Mandy waiting for her whipping. If I don’t do my duty by both of you, I wouldn’t be fair. I pride myself on being a just man. You need to get home, and I’ll come by after I deal with Mandy. Maybe it won’t be so bad once he finds out that you didn’t know what you would be looking at and didn’t get a look at anything.”

“That would be a miracle,” she mumbled. “Miracles don’t happen in my life.”

“What do you mean?” he asked with concern.

She shrugged. “Well, I’ve been getting into some trouble rather often these days or, at least, I’ve gotten more than my share of punishments. My pa isn’t going to care that I didn’t have any idea what was behind that wall. He’d ask why anyone would do anything they didn’t know what it was first. Then he’s going to take strips off my hide like he promised if I get into trouble one more time. That is if I stay around to let him.”

“I see. Maybe he forgot or his anger of past experiences has lessened some.”

She gave him a look of derision. “It was last week that he said it. He remembers what day of the week I got my first tooth. When I climbed out the window for the first time, and the exact day of the week, month and year that my mother left. He’s not inclined to forget something this big.”

Texanna could tell that Colton was a bit stunned to hear all she said in that sentence and its deliverance.

“I see what you mean. I’m sorry, but I kind of agree with him. You should have asked. You know Mandy; she’s not one to think things through.”

She kicked the dirt to punctuate her frustration. “I know. I was just trying to keep her out of trouble and then fell under her charm again.”

They were silent for a moment and then she jerked her head up showing her lip being worried by her teeth and said, “Hey, would you just take care of it?”

“Take care of what?”

“My whipping. Please, Colton?”

“Oh, no, that’s not my place. That is your daddy’s place.”

“Not if he doesn’t know about it. That is perfect. Please, oh please. You would be staying true to your fairness principles and I’ll live to see another day.”

Colton groaned.

Chapter Two

Her eyes pleaded with him. He always wondered about the color of Texanna’s eyes. It was hard to tell what shade those eyes were really, but they were kind of like what you saw in some babies. It was like a dust storm, swirling and easy to get lost in. He pulled himself out of the abyss and looked at her expression. Tears were gathering in her eyes. She was very beautiful with that glorious hair that was slipping out from under her hat and her well-proportioned body. She was slight in overall build but that innocently mischievous look on her face could do him in.   Her plight tugged at his heart. Damn.

“Honey, if I strapped you, you wouldn’t be able to sit for a month of Sundays,” he said hoping to discourage her request. The impropriety of it all could ruin her. He spanked on the bare, and she wasn’t his to spank. He allowed his mind to drift again at what a privilege that would be if she were his. He thought he could settle down with this honeycomb, bees and all.

“There would, at least, come a day that I would have the potential eventuality of sitting again. There would be no hope with my pa. I’m worried he might send me to my aunt’s in St. Louis if I keep getting in hot water. I spent the summer with her when I was fourteen, the year my brother Ben left. Pa thought that I might want to stay there with her instead of staying home with just him.”

She sighed and shrugged her shoulders. “I was a little excited until I got there and I don’t think I went two days without that woman bringing out her crop or my hairbrush. She kept a switch on the side bureau and when she wore it out, she would send me for another. I know why her daughter married as soon as she could. I was never so glad to get home. You know, I think that woman liked smacking me.”

She took a breath before she spoke in a bewildered tone, “The thing is, I don’t see what I’m doing, most of the time, that is so wrong.”

Colton coughed his chuckle. He wanted to ask more questions, but they had been out there too long as it was. He didn’t like the way the men coming in and out of the saloon were looking at Texanna. He was going to start swinging soon. Her hair had begun to fall out of its confines so she had taken her hat off and let it all tumble down. All that glorious auburn mane to draw men’s eyes to her and that cock hardening body with rounded hips and perfectly sized breasts and that rounded bottom. Inwardly groaning, he decided he might as well give in. If he was spanking one, he might as well spank two. On top of that, Texanna was old enough to be able to consent to it. He wondered about her consent to other things like kissing.

He longed to taste those lips, bite them where she was biting them. He’d like to taste a few other places as well. Colton was not the prude his cousin had labeled him. He’d visited Miss Jonquil’s a time or two in the past among other places. That had been to scratch an itch. What he wanted with Texanna was so much more. What he wanted to share with her, he never wanted another man to share with her. Her kisses were his, her woman’s treasures were his, and her little sighs were for him. And his seed was for her. Shocked at the last thought, he shook his head to get rid of the thought.

“Well, I have to take care of Mandy first. I imagine she has stewed just about enough to practically beg me to get it over with quickly. I’m going to sit you in my office. The sheriff is gone for another couple of days. You wait for me. If you don’t change your mind and are still there when I get back, then I’ll take care of your punishment. I’m not going to be lenient because you didn’t know. Next time you ask some questions. Don’t get yourself in a fix so you find you’re caught doing things like spying on a man in his birthday suit. You understand me?”

“Yes, sir. I will. I mean, I won’t. I mean, thank you.”

“Well, you might better hold those appreciations for when you have had your tail lit on fire. Now let’s get you situated.”

***

She sat in that jail for quite a while. She thought it would be just a fifteen-minute wait, but he had been gone more than half an hour, and she began to feel some apprehension about her choice. Maybe it would be better if she didn’t stay and just take her chances with her pa. If she didn’t have his dinner when he was done working, then she would catch it anyway and all of this would be for nothing. The more she thought about it, the more anxious she became and looked around for a piece of scrap paper to write on. She had the desk drawer gaping when she heard the door open.

She looked up and stared at him while she was digging in his private things. The thought didn’t click right away, that she should stop. She was mesmerized by his eyes in his darker face, like a farmer’s tanned face. From her position, sitting in his desk chair, he looked much larger and then, of course, she had her hand rummaging in his desk. That probably didn’t look so good either. Suddenly, her tummy churned.

“Um, I was looking for some kind of paper.”

“Huh. Why?” His look of expectation caught her attention, and she thought how good looking he really was. Astonishingly, he had listened to her each time she had responded, today. He was taking her answers into account, something she was not used to experiencing. She looked down at the gaping drawer and then shoved it closed, hard; pushing back from it like it was a viper.

“Why? Oh, you took longer than I thought, and I can’t stay gone all day. I mean, I have to start supper.”

He nodded his head. “I thought so, that is why I tried to hurry but some things just take the time they take. Ready?”

“Is everything all right? With Mandy, I mean.”

“Yep, she’s just fine. She’ll be standing for dinner but not much more than that. I would like to think that she will consider the consequence first next time, but I don’t hold out much hope.”

He locked the door and then pulled the shades and pulled out the straight-backed chair. She expected him to sit in it, but he motioned her to the-hands-on-chair position. Her look of consternation must have triggered his next words for he answered her unspoken question.

“You don’t need to drop your drawers, but I’ll be pulling down your trousers.”

Heat rushed her cheeks, burned them. Should she tell him? Oh, Lord, how did she get herself into these messes? She was about to go from the frying pan right into the fire, literally. What would he say? She was so nervous she needed to relieve herself but she didn’t dare ask. She lifted her feet a few times, as she tried to stop the jumping in her stomach. She bit her lip and then licked it.

“Oh, well, um. Okay.”

“I can see there is already a problem. I can just as easily take you on home. I would prefer that anyway.”

“No. It’s just that. Oh, never mind.”

“You’re sure?”

“I am.” She put words to action and leaned over to grasp the seat of the chair with her hands. She thought she might better hold tight to the piece of furniture to help her keep her position. Her pa hated it when she stood up in the middle of a whipping.

She peeked over toward Colton. She watched him take off his gun belt and worried he would use it to punish her but relaxed when she saw him take off another one he had looped through his pants.

“Eyes down.”

“Yes, sir.”

She worried what his reaction would be when he found out. Oh well, there was nothing she could do about it now. On the other hand, there wasn’t anything that she
would
do about it either. She had committed and she needed to see it through. She reassured herself that it was the best thing for her. She felt him come up behind her and then the breeze hit her exposed skin as the trousers came down. There was an audible intake of breath.

“What the hell?”

She jumped straight up forgetting to hold position; her hands flying back to cover her exposed bottom. She watched as he frantically tried to find the nonexistent drawers and when it was obvious there was none, he swore again.

“Where the hell are your underthings?”

“Um, well, I washed them and since I was already bare for most of the day, I figured I wouldn’t soil one. I would just wait until tomorrow.” She looked up at Colton with a worried expression. “I, that is, lots of girls never wear them, I hear.”

“You thought, lots never-why didn’t you say something?”

“Well, I thought you wouldn’t go through with it if you knew.”

“And you would have been right.”

“Well, now that you have seen, you know, it is too late so you can just do the deed, and I can go back and start pa’s supper. It is coming up on the time I should do that.” Her implication and expectation were clear. He had committed a bigger crime than she had if anyone found out about it.