by Maggie Ryan
Rescuing Ruby Red
The Red Petticoat Saloon Series
By
Maggie Ryan
©2016 by Blushing Books® and Maggie Ryan
All rights reserved.
No part of the book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Ryan, Maggie
Rescuing Ruby Red
eBook ISBN: 978-1-68259-536-7
Cover Design by ABCD Graphics & Design
This book is intended for adults only. Spanking and other sexual activities represented in this book are fantasies only, intended for adults. Nothing in this book should be interpreted as Blushing Books' or the Author's advocating any non-consensual spanking activity or the spanking of minors.
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Table of Contents:
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
A Note to my Readers:
About Maggie Ryan
Ebook Offer
Blushing Books Newsletter
About Blushing Books
Chapter One
A shiver coursed through her body as she crept towards the building. It was far creepier and much darker than she'd realized it would be. With the moon slipping behind the clouds, there was no longer even a glimmer of light to help guide her. Part of her was grateful for the darkness as it kept her from clearly seeing the branches of trees that seemed to be reaching out to grab her. Ducking beneath the lines strung around massive trunks, she finally slipped through the back door. Forcing herself to continue and with her hands waving out in front of her, Rebekah found her way to the counter. The silence was broken with her small, barely contained shriek when her hands encountered something soft and fuzzy only to send it to the floor to land on the tips of her boots. Her heart was pounding until she realized that she hadn't touched some animal intent on attacking her but had knocked a stack of neatly folded clothing off its resting place.
"It's only laundry," she muttered as she bent down to remove the weight from her feet. "Damn it!" were her next words. Instead of a nice bundle, the clothing was unfettered and had sprawled across the floor. "He can't even tie the fucking twine to keep it neat!" Gathering the shirts, pants and the flannel union suit that she'd brushed her hands against, she piled them onto the counter. Turning away, she took a step before shaking her head and turning back. Regardless of how angry she was at her former employer, the customer who paid for the service didn't deserve to find his hard earned money had earned him nothing but a wrinkled wad of clothing. Not needing light as she'd performed the task a gazillion times, she shook out each item before carefully folding them again and piling one atop another until she had the pile neatly stacked. It took her another few minutes to pull a length of twine from the holder mounted to the wall and cut it with the small knife hanging from a string. Having accomplished the task a thousand times before, she was able to wrap the twine around the items, securing them without wrinkling and tying the twine off in a neat bow. Not able to see the bill that would normally be tucked under the twine, she had to be satisfied she'd done the best she could.
Her vision had grown accustomed to the blackness and allowed her to see her way to the small office where Mr. March sat in comfort while she sweated in the sweltering heat or shivered in the cutting cold out in the yard, her dress soaked as she scrubbed load after load of filthy clothing in a huge cauldron. Her hands would become red and raw from the coarse lye soap and her back and shoulders would grow numb from lifting the drenched items, wringing them out as much as possible and then hanging them on one of the many lines that ran from tree to tree in the yard at the back of the laundry. The work was hard, the hours long but she hadn't truly minded… not until the day he'd refused to give her what she'd earned.
"Stingy bastard," she hissed as she began to open drawers of his desk. Not finding what she sought, she slammed the drawer closed and grabbed the pull of the last one. When it refused to open at her tug, she cursed but also grinned. This had to be where he'd stashed what was hers. She returned to the front room and cut the knife free from its tether. Sliding to the floor behind the desk, she attempted to pick the lock on the front of the drawer. Several frustrating minutes later, she cursed and slipped the knife into her pocket.
It was too risky to light the lantern to see her way around the lock but she was not yet defeated. While still locked, she had felt some definite give when pulling on the drawer. Settling onto her backside, she braced her feet against the frame of the desk and tried again. Leaning back and pushing with her feet at the same time, she grunted and then squealed when the drawer gave up the fight, sending her to topple backwards into a table, causing items on its surface to fall to the floor. Rebekah wasn't sure which scared her the most—the shattering of the lamp which threw glass shards onto her or the bloom of light that appeared in the room. Shaking her head, she rubbed her fingers against the lump that was forming on the back of her head where it had connected with the table. "Well, hell, that hurt!" she exclaimed and then looked up, freezing instantly to see a large form leaning over the desk.
"Don't move," a voice commanded which instantly had her attempting to scramble away only to cry out in pain. "I said not to move. There is glass everywhere…"
"Fuck!" she snarled, lifting her hand to discover a shard of glass protruding from her palm. "Ow, ow," she whimpered, her fingers shaking as she began to draw the glass from her skin, her tummy churning at the sight of the blood welling. God, she hated blood and from her place on the floor, in the shadow of the desk, the blood looked black and copious. "Fuck, fuck…" she moaned, the shard evidently much deeper than she'd thought.
"No need to curse," Jebidiah said, going around the desk to squat before her. "Leave it, sweetie, we'll…"
"Sweetie?" A loud grunt told of the presence of another man. "I hardly think it's right to call her sweetie. Hell, she's nothing but a thief! I demand you throw her ass into that jail of yours!"
"Now, Harry, calm down. I'm sure we can straighten this out…"
"I caught her red-handed," Harry interrupted. "And I'm not just talking about that blood." He ignored the moan from the floor and waved his hand holding the lamp in the air. Rebekah, already feeling nauseated from the blood that continued to well, felt her stomach flip as the light seemed to skitter and bounce. She moaned, her concern no longer on the fact that she'd been caught. Instead, she was desperately praying she'd manage not to lose her meager supper. Spying one of several canvas bags that had spilled out of the drawer, she was reaching for it when the sheriff spoke.
"Touch that and I'll have to arrest you," Jeb said.
"Arrest her now!" Harry demanded, joining them behind the desk and bending to snatch the bag from the floor. Her eyes slammed closed to shut out the dancing light caused by his actions even as she felt herself being lifted from the floor.
"Hey, watch it! She's got blood all over her. It's dripping everywhere!" As Jeb shifted his burden carefully so as not to disturb her injured hand, Harry stomped from the room, following the two, calling out when the sheriff moved towards the counter. "No! You can't put her there! I've got clean laundry ready to be picked up. You know how difficult it is to get blood out of clothing?"
"I need to check on her hand…"
"You can do that in her cell," Harry said. "Hell, if she were some man, you'd have him behind locked doors already! I'm the injured party here…"
Jeb shook his head. "As I said, we'll discuss that later." When Harry began to protest, he said, "You want this to go any faster, you can go get Dr. Norwood."
"Fine, but you take the little thief to the jail right now! No telling what she's stolen before we caught her! God knows what she is hiding beneath her clothes! I want her stripped and searched!"
Rebekah lifted her head from where she'd laid it against the sheriff's chest. "What? You shit! I'm not a thief!"
"You are," Harry countered with a disbelieving huff as he stormed out the door, leaving Jeb and his burden in the dark.
"I'm not a thief!" she began again only to stop as her stomach clutched when she attempted to curl her hand into a fist. The pain had her whimpering.
"Shh, be still," Jeb said. "Let's worry about that after Doc fixes you up." When she began to struggle, he moved one hand to slap against the back of her skirt. "Be still. I don't want any glass on your clothing to cut you. You need to be still until we can get your dress off…"
"Fuck that," Rebekah hissed, "you can't…" Another swat of his hand changed the direction of her thoughts. "Stop swatting me! Put me down!"
"No," Jeb said, easily adjusting his hold as he strode down the dark street towards the jail. "I said we'd discuss this later, but I'm warning you; if I hear you cursing again, I'll be doing a great deal more than popping your behind." A third swat demonstrated his sincerity as she squirmed again before stilling.
Rebekah didn't know which was worse, the throbbing in her hand or the threat of being spanked by the sheriff. She didn't remember him being so… big. No, not big; he was huge, carrying her as easily as if she weighed no more than a feather. It wasn't until he pushed through the door of the jail that another fear flooded through her. She'd never been inside the building before and the sight of a pair of cells, one door open waiting to swallow her whole and to lock her away from freedom had her head swimming and her pulse racing. The soft whimpers she'd been issuing turned into a much louder moan as fear gripped her insides.
"Shh, the doctor should be here soon," Jeb said, setting his burden down, not inside the jail cell but on a chair that sat beside his desk. "Sit still," he instructed, lifting her arm and placing it on top of his desk. "I'll be right back."
Rebekah kept her eyes away from her palm which was sticky with blood and watched as he stepped through a door at the back of the room. She gave a soft squeal when a loud sound told her she wasn't alone. She was pushing to her feet when his voice filled the room.
"Try to run, little girl, and I'll make sure you don't feel comfortable sitting for a week."
She could feel heat infuse her cheeks at the threat—no, it sounded far more like a promise than a threat. The sheriff was not known for being a soft man. His reputation was that he was stern and tolerated no nonsense in his town, especially since gold had been discovered in the foothills that surrounded Culpepper Cove. She'd known him for years but had managed to avoid him in any official capacity until tonight. Her heart skipped a beat as the memory of being in his arms replayed in her mind. He'd not yelled at her as she'd expected. Instead, despite his size which was double her own, he'd been exceptionally gentle. Well, if you didn't count those swats.
Sinking down again, she squirmed a bit as she wondered if it were proper to threaten to spank a prisoner. Another snort drew her eyes to the cells to see the blanket moving on one of the cots. Evidently she wasn't the only citizen to be in trouble this evening. Grateful the prisoner was deeply asleep and snoring, unable to witness her humiliation, she was in place when Jeb returned with a basin of water and a cloth.
He placed the items on his desk after moving a stack of paperwork to the other side just as the door opened to admit the doctor and Harry.
***
"Why isn't she in a cell?" Harry demanded, waving the lamp.
"Put that down," Jeb said, "Red… Miss McTavish's clothing and hair are wet from the oil from the broken lamp. I thank God she hadn't lit it and I have no desire to set her on fire now." At Rebekah's sneer, which was directed toward the blustering man, he added, "at least nothing more than her backside." He was quite pleased to see her look change to one of shock and then embarrassment as her eyes darted to his.
"I still say that if she were a man, you'd not give a fuck…"
"Harry, please," Dr. Norwood said, placing his black bag on the desk next to the ewer of water. "Calm down before you have an apoplexy. I can only deal with one patient at a time."
Ignoring the man's irritated huff, the doctor washed his hands and then smiled down at Rebekah. "I'm gonna wash your hand, Rebekah." At her whimper, he said, "Now, you know I'm not going to hurt you. I promise I'll be gentle but, honey, I need to be able to see clearly." He reached for her hand and she flinched, pulling away.
Jeb was about to chastise her when he saw tears sliding down her cheeks that h
ad lost all of the color her embarrassment had painted on her pale skin. When she began to keen and sway, he rushed to her before she could topple out of the chair.
"Whoa, easy, honey, I've got you," he said, picking her up once more and taking her place in the chair. Settling her on his lap, he kept her in place with one arm around her waist as he took a gentle hold on her wrist, pinning it to the desk. "Just don't look," he suggested and was pleased when she buried her face in his shirt. He continued to make soothing sounds as the doctor slowly and gently pried her fingers from their curl until her hand was flat and the piece of glass became visible.
"Good grief," Harry muttered, his disdain for the attention given the little criminal obvious. "It's just a piece of fuck…"
"Harry, why don't you go get some of Rebekah's clothing so that she can change?" Jeb suggested, tightening his hold on Rebekah when she began to squirm. "I can see glass in her skirts and in her hair. I'm sure you don't want her to be injured further."
"I don't know where to find them," Harry said, "she moved all her stuff out when she quit."
Jeb's eyebrow rose as he looked down at the girl on his lap. "You quit?"
She managed a small nod. "I'm a gem now."
If she'd said she had found the mother-lode, he wouldn't have been as shocked. "How is that possible?" he asked.
"Miss Jewel hired me," Rebekah said with a small shrug. "She doesn't think I'm a thief... ow!"
"Just relax, Rebekah," the doctor said, dabbing the soaped cloth around the wound. "It won't hurt as much if you just relax. You can hold onto Jeb's hand if you need."
Even as her fingers curled around his, Jeb was shaking his head. "We'll be discussing that as well," he warned, linking his fingers with hers, a bit amazed at the strength of her hold. Looking up from her pale face where her freckles were becoming more prominent by the minute, he again addressed Harry.