by Jenny Plumb
Sir Thomas’s Bride – Thomas and Margaret’s tale. Masterful Husbands Book One By Vanessa Brooks.
Viscount Weston’s Bride – Charles and Imogene’s tale. Masterful Husbands Book Two By Vanessa Brooks.
The Colonel’s Bride – Masterful Husbands Book Three By Vanessa Brooks.
The Santa Wrangler
Megan McCoy
Chapter 1
Did Ben know who she was? He didn’t act like it. Nope, he sat there, cool and calm, and if he remembered baring her butt and blistering it as red as the berries on that holly branch decorating his desk, he was an excellent actor. Heather Ryan knew she needed to focus on the interview. It didn’t matter who he was, how hot he was or how her cheeks burned in mortification, she needed this job. Getting fired right before Christmas sucked. Well, it sucked anytime of year, but this was a really bad time. She desperately needed this job, even if it was only a temp job. It was easier to get a job when you had a job, and once she got this one, she could start looking for something long term.
“So I’d basically be wrangling Santa?” she asked carefully, trying not to look into those steel gray eyes, staring at his mouth instead. No, that didn’t work. His kiss had been memorable, just like the spanking he’d given her.
“Santas, multiple. I have a chain of ten stores in this area and I’m having Santas in all of them for the first time. My store personnel are all busy with the holiday season and the extra work that involves and I need someone to make sure the Santas all show up for work, the photographers are there, the elves to pass out candy, the backdrops are set up and,” he continued to talk about the job duties while she kept trying to focus. How soon could she leave? Her head swam and her ears buzzed as she remembered that day.
The day he’d bared her bottom and spanked her until she sobbed like a baby. Then he’d refused to let her pull her pants up; but instead sat her on his lap, and held her there until she finally fell asleep. When she woke up, he’d been asleep too, and she’d slipped off his lap, run out of the room, holding her pants up with one hand and hadn’t seen him again till now.
“Heather, are you paying attention?” he asked sternly.
She nodded, too emphatically. “I am. This is a temp job, then, right?” She stood up. “I really am looking for something permanent.”
“Sit,” he commanded.
She looked at him and didn’t know why she sat. What? She wasn’t a puppy. Yet, she sat there quietly and waited.
“Yes, obviously because of the season, this is a temp position, but I’m always looking for good people for management and I hire from within, if at all possible. If you do a good job with this, there are a lot of opportunities in my company.”
Heather crossed her legs. Okay. She understood that. Plus, it would be a paycheck until she found something else – if it didn’t work out.
“I can wrangle Santas,” she said, looked him right in the eye, ignoring the butterflies in her belly. Did he have to be so darn handsome? Steel gray eyes, dark hair and eyebrows, tall, well muscled, geeze. He should have everyone in the world wanting to work for him.
“You do have a lot of managerial experience,” he said, scanning her resume again.
“I’ve run a small real estate company since I was eighteen,” she said. “I worked for two bosses, and unfortunately, they closed the company when he had a stroke and her mother died in the same week. They sold it to someone else who apparently didn’t need me.”
He made a note on her resume, which made her nervous for some reason, more nervous, extra nervous.
“Are you afraid of snakes?” he asked, turning those eyes on her again. Obviously, he had a direct line to the butterflies in her stomach.
“No?”
“Was that a question?” he asked. “What is your opinion on dog poop?”
“I have none?” What? Had she ever handled dog poop in real life?
“Okay, for one night we’re doing pet pictures with Santa at a couple stores, and I need to make sure that my wrangler won’t run screaming.”
“I rarely run screaming,” she said. That was true. She couldn’t think of one instance where she had. She must have had a charmed life.
“That sounds like a challenge.” He smiled at her and she felt her stomach flip, shivered, and didn’t know what to say.
Heather’s heart raced. Did she even want this job? Did it matter? She needed the money. Her last job had been interesting and quiet, and this one would be fun, challenging and paid well. Something different was always good. Really, though, she just wanted to work for Ben. Even if she thought this job would suck, she wanted to work with and for him. She might as well admit it. She’d figured out that you could lie, if you wanted to, but it never worked out when you lied to yourself. She’d had a crush on him since college.
“Good. Then meet me here tomorrow at eight and we will go visit all the stores. Bring a notebook or tablet so you can take notes. I’ll introduce you to all the managers and show you where the Santas will be set up. Then after that, we’ll meet with the set staging company, and you’ll be overseeing all that, and also the woman sending out the photographers. Wear your walking shoes. Now, go down to HR and get your paperwork done. I’ll see you tomorrow morning, right here, and don’t be late.”
He got up, gave her a little wink, and walked out of the room as she realized that more than likely he did know who she was, he remembered what she did, and also, that she had a job and would be able to pay her rent. Heather had no idea if she was happy or mortified. Both, she could be both.
Chapter 1
Chicago was just miserably cold in the winter. Heather figured she should have known that by now. She’d lived here all her life, but it still came as a shock every year just how nasty icky sleet and frigid, bitter wind were. She remembered when she was a kid and how she was too cool to wear coats and hats. Glad that she was an adult now and could bundle up to the top of her head, she stepped out of her apartment door into the sleet and waited for the Uber driver to show up. Usually she would have cabbed it or taken the “L” but she did not want to be late. She knew the consequences of things with Ben Thompson and she did not want to take any chances. Even though she was all grown up now, and he wouldn’t dare. Right?
Twenty minutes later, she reluctantly left the warmth of the car and hurried inside. The girls in the movies always looked so adorable in the snow. Their boots never got slushy wet and their hair glistened with snowflakes. She just looked like a drowned cat with a red nose. At least her feet were dry. She had worn her black, knee-high walking boots. They’d been a splurge last year, but well worth it. Between slushy sidewalks and puddle-filled streets, they were the most comfortable pair of boots she’d ever owned. They kept her feet dry, at least, and never looked bad when they got wet. Frowning, she realized that while she looked pathetic with her wet hair and red nose, at least her boots glistened like a movie girl’s would – better than nothing.
Hesitating just a minute after she got into the building, she realized she didn’t know where she was going. His office? HR? Wait here for him? Thankfully, she heard his voice, and then a laugh. He laughed! He wasn’t always stern and commanding. She loved that laugh, she decided, and would have to figure out how to get him to do that for her, with her.
Heather had stared at the ceiling for a few hours last night, remembering their last meeting. She’d never thought she’d see him again. It had been years now, and she still thought about him often. None of the men she dated were like him. Even though he, too, had been young at the time, his confidence, the self-assured way he talked, and yet the kindness that seemed to emanate from him, was a rare combination that she sought out, craved. The fact that he’d spanked her had nothing to do with it, she told herself. Besides, he was her boss now, and that sort of thing didn’t happen in an office setting, just in books and movies.
Her brain wouldn’t shut down, so she had finally gotten up and found her small box of Christmas decorations. It wasn’t a big amount. H
er mom had always had boxes and boxes of things, and yet, she and her dad were vacationing in the Bahamas for the holidays this year. Heather was on her own. That was okay, she’d be working.
Standing by the door, she watched him walk toward her. “Heather, you’re right on time.” He smiled at her and she couldn’t help but feel a rush of warmth as she smiled back. He seemed to be in a good mood. “Got your notebook and your walking shoes?”
“Yes, sir, I do,” she told him and pulled her brimmed hat down lower, as they seemed to be heading out the door.
“You can call me Ben,” he assured her. “Unless sir just feels right.”
Blushing, a small giggle escaped her. Maybe this wouldn’t be such an awkward day.
Three hours later, brain spinning dizzily with all the names, places and details, she felt exhausted. Too tired to care about being nervous or apprehensive or even embarrassed about anything in their shared past, she gladly followed Ben into a small coffee shop.
“Need to give you some sustenance,” he said. “I know I’ve thrown a lot at you, but as you can tell, we’ve got a lot to do in a short amount of time. It will be insane from Black Friday to Christmas Eve. That night of pet pictures in two of our stores is going to be challenging too, but it will bring a lot of new people into the stores who might not have come before. The photographers are paid on commission, so they’re going to want to get people in and out as fast as possible; but of course, it’s all about the kids and the Santas.”
She settled into the small booth across from him and pulled out her notebook. She’d been scribbling notes, but planned to transfer all the information to her tablet when she got home this evening.
“Other places are putting their Santas out the week before Thanksgiving,” she told him. “But we’re waiting till Black Friday. How come?”
“When I was a kid, I remember seeing Santa at the end of the Macy’s parade every year, and that was our first glimpse of him for the season. He was busy making toys, up at the North Pole, you know.” He smiled at her again.
Dang, what she wouldn’t do for that smile! Confused by her thought process, she looked down at her notes again as he continued.
“I want all the backdrops set by Monday that week, though, with signs that say the Santa hours. I want all the people there by six-thirty for our seven AM Black Friday morning opening, and then they will go to the regular hours after that. We have ten Santas full time and three part timers who will do sick days and days off. It will be your job to make sure someone is at every store every day. They all know they’re working six days a week till Christmas Eve. So will you, sometimes even seven, but this is a temp job, so hopefully I can make it worth your while.”
“I’m not afraid of hard work,” she assured him.
“I know that,” he said. “That’s why I picked you for the job.”
“Did you have lots of applications?” she asked politely, but she really wanted to ask if he picked her because they had a bit of a history. But despite his wink yesterday, he hadn’t brought it up and she sure wasn’t going to bring it up to him. That would be mortifying. What if he didn’t remember her?
“Enough to know you were the right person for the job,” he said, and ordered them both coffee, juice and a ham and cheese omelet. Looking at him, she felt her stomach flip again. He’d just ordered for her. She’d never had anyone order for her since she was a child.
He hadn’t asked if she wanted him to, if she drank coffee, or even ate eggs. Or meat. The gall of the man turned her on intensely. Where was her pride? Her feminine outrage? Who cared?
“It’s starting to look like Christmas out already,” she said, changing the subject.
“It’s my favorite time of year,” he confessed. “I love the high energy and even the sappy songs you hear everywhere. I don’t like that some places start it in August. It’s a pet peeve of mine.”
“Fall is my favorite time of the year,” Heather said. “I love the colors and crisp air and the anticipation of the holiday season beginning.”
“Well, this year your favorite season will be Christmas because from now on, it’s all Christmas all the time. I hope you don’t have huge Thanksgiving plans because you should rest up. You’ll be hitting the ground running come Black Friday morning and not stopping till noon on Christmas Eve.”
“Noon?” she asked faintly. Well, she could do a month’s worth of running, right? She’d run a 5K three years ago. It probably just came back to you, like riding a bike – another thing she hadn’t done in a few years.
“We close at noon on Christmas Eve, and are closed until the day after Christmas. My employees work hard and deserve a few holidays with their families. I make enough money, I can close early and make the people who earn their salaries happy.” Ben turned to the server and said a polite “Thank you” as she put the food down.
Heather noticed how her hand brushed his and felt a weird stab of jealousy – ridiculous on all counts. But she could barely force herself to say thank you when the waitress put her eggs, hash browns and toast in front of her.
After the server left, she looked at her plate and said, “That’s a lot of food.”
“Eat it,” he said in that tone she remembered from right before he’d put her over his lap. “You’re going to need your energy.”
It didn’t occur to her to say no. Picking up her knife and fork, she started eating. “This is really good,” she said, surprised. She’d never been too impressed with omelets before. They all tasted the same, nothing special though. These were fluffy and infused with flavors. She wasn’t sure what did it, because she wasn’t much of a cook or an eater, but this was just wonderful.
“I like the good things in life,” he said, looking directly at her and making her stomach twist with nerves.
They ate in silence for a few minutes, and then he asked, “Do you want to talk about the elephant in the room?”
Mouth full, she contemplated just shaking her head a firm no. Then she realized that despite his tone, it wasn’t a question and now they’d be discussing it.
“Might as well get it over with,” Ben said. “Otherwise you’re going to be jumpy as a kitten till we do.”
Swallowing, Heather picked up her coffee mug with shaky hands and wrapped her fingers around it firmly. “Do we have to?” She tried not to let a whiney tone creep in her voice, and felt her cheeks bloom red again. She was going to save so much money on blush around him.
“It would be the best thing for our working relationship,” he said. “Get it over with.”
“Sort of like the spanking you know you’re going to get?” she teased, and then lowered her eyes. Had she really said that out loud? What was wrong with her?
His laugh was low and intimate and warmed her to her toes. “Exactly like that.”
Heather shook her head and smoothed a dark curl from her eyes. “I still don’t want to.”
“Sort of like the spanking you know you deserve and still don’t want?” he said gently, and those butterflies kicked in again. What this man did to her with just his tone baffled her. This was how she wanted to feel in a relationship and yet never had. Butterflies and nerves and anticipation – it wasn’t too much to ask.
But she didn’t want to feel like this around her boss.
“I’m not a teenager anymore,” she said, sounding more confident than she felt. “I’m an adult and don’t need spankings anymore.” Quickly, she shoveled another bite of omelet in her mouth, while industriously peeling the crust off her toast.
His mouth twitched. “So you realize you did back then?” he asked.
Shaking her head again, she said, “I can’t admit to that.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
Contemplating, she shrugged and said, “I don’t know.”
“Well, that’s honest,” Ben answered and reached over to remove the decimated toast from her suddenly cold fingers. “Don’t worry, you’re safe with me. I won’t spank you again, unless you really need it, o
r just want one – I’m considerate that way.”
Don’t worry? What kind of talk was that? And want one? Who would want one? She still remembered how much it had hurt. It was the spanking she would be worried about! Not if he would do it or not. What was wrong with his thinking?
“You ready to go to the rest of the stores now?” he asked, and motioned for the check. She liked that he had brought this up, she guessed, feeling a little calmer for some reason, but wasn’t certain how the afternoon would go. Would she be able to concentrate on work? She’d better. She suddenly shivered, he’d already told her the consequences of what would happen if she didn’t.
What was his idea of needing a good spanking and why was she even considering it?
At the end of the day, he hailed a cab to take them back to the office. “Tomorrow you’ll be on your own. You can call me anytime with any questions. This project is very important to me and if you do well, I have some other projects in mind.”
“You mean it might not be a temp job?” she asked, suddenly feeling better. He’d said that before, but confirmation would be wonderful.
“We’ll evaluate at the end of December and we can talk,” he said. “Although, I expect you to communicate with me daily. You answer directly to me, and you have my cell number. Text if you only have an update, call if you have a question, and if I don’t answer, leave a message and I’ll call you back as soon as I’m free. But I need to know what’s going on and what the issues are. This is the first time we’ve done this and I need someone who can hit the ground running, keep me informed, and get it up and going. I need the reports, because I’m hoping next year the stores can handle it themselves, once we get the groundwork set and the kinks worked out this year.”
“I’m your girl,” she said.
“I know you are,” he said softly, and once again she shivered. What he did to her body temperature was just wrong. He made her hot, made her cheeks blush and then made her shiver in almost a frozen state. Wondering if the coldness was nerves or desire got her nowhere. She hadn’t seen him for ten years after she’d spent a memorable hour, and then one night with him. She was not his girl, she was his employee. Beside that fact, she wasn’t a teenager anymore. She was a woman, strong and capable and not anyone’s girl to be spanked.