Kayla & the Rancher, Paige Tyler [story read aloud TXT] 📗

she gazed transfixed at her reflection, she felt a tingling between her thighs.

Kayla caught her breath. Could it be that she actually enjoyed being

spanked? she wondered. She didn’t understand how that could be possible,

but it was there just the same. Fresh color rushed to her face, and she hastily looked away from the mirror. But as she stood there, contemplating the

strange things she was feeling, her gaze kept drifting over her shoulder and back to the reflection of her reddened bottom.

Chapter Three

Kayla couldn’t stop thinking about the spanking Cord had given her the

previous night. Or her reaction to it. Which made sitting across the table from him during dinner that evening very awkward. She couldn’t seem to look at

him without blushing. It didn’t help that her bottom had still been hot and stinging, either, and she had quickly excused herself after dinner to hurry up to her room.

Not surprisingly, Cord insisted that one of the ranch hands take her into town the next day. Rachel, who was with a customer when Kayla entered the

general store, told her to go on up to the small living space above the store that she shared with Matthew, saying that she would be there in a little while.

With a smile and a wave, Kayla hurried up the stairs. She immediately went to the sewing machine and began working on the wedding dress, hoping the

task would distract her from thoughts of being over Cord’s knee. It did, at least for a little while, until Rachel came upstairs and reminded her about it.

“The whole town is talking about you playing poker at the saloon yesterday,”

the blond girl said the moment she came into the apartment. “If Cord doesn’t know already, he will soon, Abigail, so my advice would be to tell him yourself before he finds out from someone else.”

Kayla didn’t look at the other girl, but continued to focus on the hemline she was sewing. “He already knows,” she said quietly. “One of the hands was in town and saw me.”

“What did he say?” Rachel asked.

Kayla thought not so much of what Cord had said, but of what he’d done, and she felt herself blush. “He told me that a saloon is no place for a lady, and that he doesn’t want me going in there again,” she said with a shrug.

“That sounds like Cord,” Rachel said, sitting down on the chair beside the sewing machine table. “But whatever would possess you to go into the saloon in the first place? And to play poker, no less. Matthew would be absolutely furious if I ever did something like that”

Finishing the hem, Kayla cut the thread and tied it off with a small knot. “I played a few times back home and enjoyed it,” she told Rachel. “I didn’t think anyone would make a big deal about it.”

The other girl sighed. “Abigail, this is the west, not Boston,” she said quietly.

“Out here, a woman’s place is very well defined, and men expect their wives to act accordingly. Cord’s pretty open-minded, but he’s not much different when it comes to that.” She paused. “Please don’t think that I’m berating you, Abigail, because I’m not. It’s just that you and Cord are so perfect together, and I don’t want you to start your marriage off on the wrong foot.”

Kayla had been studying the hemline she’d just done, but at the other girl’s words, her fingers stilled. To her surprise, tears stung her eyes, and she hastily blinked them back. But not before Rachel saw them.

“Abigail, what is it?” the blond girl asked, her voice full of concern.

Kayla didn’t answer. What could she say? That she had been lying to Cord

the entire time she’d been in Copper Creek? That she’d never had any

intention of marrying him, but had only let him believe she was his mail-order bride because it could get her something?

Rachel reached out and covered Kayla’s hand with hers. “Abigail, I didn’t

mean to make you think that Cord wouldn’t marry you simply because you

played one little game of poker at the saloon,” she said, and then smiled. “If you want to know the truth, I think that Cord was already half in love with you before you even came out here.”

She looked at the other girl in surprise, and Rachel nodded. “Before you got here, he’d come into the store and we’d end up talking about you. There was something in his voice when he talked about you, Abigail.”

Kayla chewed on her lower lip. She had had lots of girlfriends back home in New York that she could talk to, and it wasn’t until now that she realized how much she missed having them to confide in. Pretending to be Abigail Murray was suddenly too much for her, and she desperately needed to talk to

someone. It felt like she would explode if she didn’t tell someone soon.

“Rachel, I haven’t been completely honest with Cord,” she said quietly. “Or with you. Or with anyone else in this town.”

Her friend’s brow furrowed in confusion. “About what?”

Kayla fingered the finely embroidered material of the dress, and let the words come out in a rush. “I’m not Cord’s mail-order bride. My name isn’t Abigail Murray, and I’m not from Boston.” She paused to glance at Rachel, and saw

that the other girl was looking at her in opened-mouth surprise. Taking a deep breath, she let it out slowly before continuing. “My name is Kayla Mathison, and I’m from New York. I was on the stage heading toward San Francisco,

running away from an arranged marriage myself, when I met Abigail. She

couldn’t go through with being a mail-order bride, and she asked me if I would tell Cord that she had changed her mind about marrying him.”

“So you decided to take her place, instead?” Rachel asked. She didn’t sound accusing, merely curious.

Kayla shook her head. “Not in the beginning,” she