by Loki Renard
A shiver went down Marnie’s spine. She loved his stern dominance. Seeing him battling with his emotions and letting her get away with stuff she wouldn’t ordinarily get away with, was almost as hard as hearing Sam tell her the place had been sold.
Sam raised an eyebrow. “I said, is that clear?”
Heat shot straight to Marnie’s loins. “Yes, Daddy,” she murmured. “But I still don’t want to leave.”
Sam put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her in close, kissing her forehead in that way she loved. “Neither do I. But the deal’s as good as done. Let’s just enjoy this trek, hey? You can come on this one. We’ll go to the waterfall. It’s a nice ride.”
Tears burned the back of her eyes and blurred her vision. How was she going to saddle up horses when she couldn’t see? Wiping them away with her sleeve was pointless because her eyes filled up again. Trixie knew something was up. As soon as she saw Marnie, she came trotting up to the fence, nickering, stretching her neck over the rails as far as it would go. Marnie went to her. Probably, Trixie would be one of the first to go. Her stomach clenched. She couldn’t do this, couldn’t say goodbye. Trixie was the first horse she’d been up close to, the first horse she’d really touched. She didn’t want to leave her behind. Giggling through her tears, she kissed the outstretched velvety muzzle, squirming as Trixie’s whiskers tickled her cheek. She’d miss this girl.
The ache in her heart worsened as she went about her chores. She should have been happy, mucking out stalls for probably the last time. Knowing she wouldn’t have to shovel any more shit should have made her happy. But it didn’t. She would clean up horse poo every day for the rest of her life, if it meant she got to stay here with Sam and he didn’t have to sell up.
Tears streamed down her face as she gathered the brushes and hoof picks she would need to groom the horses before tacking them up. When she’d first arrived she’d been terrified of the big beasts, she was too scared to get too close, too afraid of their size to run a brush over their body. Now she loved it. She knew all their names, knew their different personalities. She knew Taxi would stand there no matter what, but Ranger hated his near fore hoof lifted up. She knew Cosmo liked to nuzzle her neck and would nip her if she didn’t rub his nose enough, and she knew that Boxer would play up if he didn’t have on the right bridle. What would happen to all these horses? Sam had already said he wouldn’t be able to take them all.
She couldn’t cry like this. Sam still needed her, and the least she could do was be professional one time before it all came to an end. Wiping her eyes, she carried the tools out to the horses who stood patiently as they had a hundred times before, and she started combing out Taxi’s mane with a reverence she never imagined she’d feel working with a horse.
Sam was doing the same further down the line, his face set in a hard mask she knew was holding back a whole lot of emotion. The hollowness of it all kept resonating through her chest and belly. How could this be the end? It couldn’t be the end.
“What’s going to happen to them?” She risked the question, even though it made her choke up just to form the words.
“We’ll keep a couple. The rest we’ll have to sell.”
“Sell?”
“I reckon we can get ten acres after everything is paid out,” he said. “So we can have three or four there, but the rest will have to be sold to new riding homes. Can’t have twenty horses on ten acres.”
“Which ones will you sell?”
“I don’t know,” he sighed. “I haven’t got that far yet.”
“I don’t want to sell any of them.”
“I know,” he said, his jaw clenched tight.
Marnie closed her mouth. She knew Sam was just as upset as she was. Probably a lot more. Blinking back tears, she did as she was told and got on with the job she’d never wanted for what might be the very last time.
Chapter Eleven
It had been a very long, brutally hard day. Sam was exhausted and he knew Marnie was too. After her initial outburst, she’d taken the news much better than he thought she would. Together, they’d taken a small band of tourists up along mountain plains and through the valleys and rivers he knew and loved so well.
It was hard to believe this was all coming to an end. Sam had been riding these lands since he was just a kid. They’d been in the family since the first settlers came to the South Island. And now it was over, eroded by time and a world that changed far faster than the old farm could ever have kept up with.
She’d scooted inside before he had a chance to talk to her, and he’d let her be. Now he was hungry, and in addition to getting some tea, he needed to finish signing those forms. He’d been putting it off, but it was inevitable now. If they wanted to claw back anything from the sale of the farm, they needed to take this offer.
He went to the table where he’d left the paperwork that morning. None of it was there. Frowning to himself, Sam hunted around for it. He even went out to the barn to check if he’d left the contracts out there. Nope. Couldn’t find them anywhere. Weird.
He went back indoors and called up the stairs.
“Marnie?”
There was no response. Sam jogged up the stairs and checked the bedrooms as well as the bathroom. No Marnie. She was as mysteriously absent as the paperwork. Frowning to himself, he jogged back downstairs and went out the front and around the back of the house, calling for Marnie.
After about five minutes, she came out from behind the barn looking unmistakeably sheepish. She pushed something into the pocket of her jeans and put her hands behind her back as he got closer.
“What have you been doing, little girl?”
“Nothing,” she lied to his face. They both knew it was a lie the moment she said the word. Sam gritted his teeth. Now really wasn’t the time for her to start acting up, though of course it was almost inevitable that she would. This whole sale was going to be a nightmare on every level. Sam was determined not to let it come between him and Marnie, and he definitely wasn’t going to let it affect his discipline of her.
“I’m looking for the contracts,” he said. “Have you seen them?”
She hesitated for a moment and looked at the ground. “Yeah. I saw them this morning.”
“I mean, have you seen them more recently?”
She shrugged.
Sam let out a growl, reached out and took her by the chin, tipping her head up so he could look into her disobedient little face.
“Where are those papers?”
“You’re not signing them,” she said, finding defiance in the forced eye contact.
“Little girl…”
“No,” she said, trembling with defiance. “We’re not giving this place up. We’re not selling. You’re not signing.”
If only sheer determination could save the place, it would be with them forever, but reality was biting hard and the truth was, the place had been failing since long before either of them had gotten there. It wasn’t their fault that this was all falling apart any more than it had been Marnie’s fault that her city fell apart. He was sorry she had to go through this again, not even a year after the quakes. She was going to be more unsettled than ever, and her behaviour was probably going to reflect that.
“What did you do with the contracts?”
Marnie looked him dead in the eye. “I burned them.”
“You bloody what?” Sam released her jaw and stared at her.
“We’re not selling, so I burned them.”
“Marnie!” He shouldn’t have been shocked, but he was. “You burned them?”
“Yeah,” she said, folding her arms over her chest and tossing her hair. “I set them on fire and then they were burned and now the place isn’t being sold, so I fixed the problem.”
She wasn’t this naive. She knew it wasn’t going to work. It was the small, desperate part of her that had come up with a small, desperate plan to save Terako Treks.
“You know I’m just going to get them to send me another set of forms,
” he sighed.
“And I’ll burn those too,” Marnie said. “I’ll burn everything I need to.”
“Arson isn’t the answer, little girl.”
“Well, apparently working hard and trying everything I know how to do wasn’t the answer either,” she said bitterly. “So I’m just going with fire now. It’s easier.”
Again, he understood her frustration, but that didn’t mean he was going to tolerate it. She was in big trouble. He reached out, took her by the hand, and started walking her toward the house. She traipsed after him reluctantly, knowing exactly what she was in for.
Just as they got into the house, the phone started to ring.
“I’m going to take this call, and then I’m going to take my belt to your ass,” he growled sternly, making for the kitchen where the old corded phone still hung on the wall.
“Yes? This is Sam Cooper.”
* * *
She was in so much fucking trouble. Marnie knew burning the contracts wouldn’t help, but it had felt so goddamn good to watch fire lick around the edges of those dreaded papers and then consume the horrible typewritten text that represented the end of her life here with Sam.
Whoever was on the phone had only given her a very brief reprieve. That belt around his waist was thick and mean, and Sam sure had a hell of a lot of frustration to work out on her rear.
Marnie thought briefly about running away, but it was pointless. He’d just catch her and then whip her and that would be even worse than what was going to come anyway. She wasn’t sorry for what she’d done though, and she would do it again if she got the chance.
She’d been working so damn hard to increase the visibility of the place, taking out online ads, making pages, emailing websites; hell, she’d even uploaded Sam’s shirtless whip tricks, though that was more a brag than anything. There weren’t many women who could boast having a man like Sam. She was damn proud of him, even if he was going to put that incredible musculature to use punishing her very soon.
Standing nervously in the corner of the kitchen, Marnie watched Sam’s expression go from angry to confused to cautious… and then a big, broad smile broke over his face.
“Well, that sounds perfect,” he said. “Can’t wait to meet you. Talk soon.”
He hung up and looked at her with that grin that made her heart leap for a dozen different reasons. “Well, little girl,” he said with a smirk. “Seems you’ve been up to quite a lot I don’t know about.”
“Uhm, like what?”
“Apparently some video you posted online has been seen over ten million times. It’s trending? I don’t know what that means, but that was an investor. Someone who wants to not only help us keep this place, but update it.”
Marnie’s jaw dropped. “Are you serious?”
“Mhm. We’re going to meet with the group’s representatives soon,” he said. “If it all works out, we might just get to keep this place after all—assuming you don’t burn it down first.”
“Oh, my god, Sam!” Marnie screamed his name at a pitch pretty close to what only dogs could hear and threw herself into his arms. “We get to stay?”
“We get to stay, little girl,” he confirmed, drawing her into a big bear hug. “We at least get another chance to stay.”
His palm ran down her back and his fingers spread across her ass. “You did it, Marnie. If this works out, you saved Terako.”
“We did it,” she said with a teary grin. “I couldn’t have done it without posting semi-naked pictures of you on the internet.”
“You did what now?” Sam jerked his head back and looked down at her. “Are you serious, Marnie?”
“Well, you were wearing pants,” she grinned. “I mean, it was soft-core at best.”
“Little girl, you are the worst brat in the world, and the best woman any man could ever have by his side,” he declared, kissing her deeply. “And now, I’m going to spank this little ass of yours.”
“Hey, not fair!”
“Very fair,” he said sternly. “Even good little girls deserve spankings, and you’re pretty far from a good little girl.”
“I’m the best little girl,” Marnie declared.
And she was right.
Epilogue
“Ready? Now!” Ensuring the camera was firmly in its tripod, Marnie pressed ‘play’ and watched, both proud and aroused, as Sam’s handsome body danced in time to the music. The muscles in his back and shoulders rippled as he cracked his whips, one in each hand.
Crack, crack, crack, crack. His hips moved in time with the beat, the swivelling motion spreading through his body, as his biceps flexed with the exertion of cracking the whip.
Since the viral video that had saved Terako, Sam had become an internet sensation. Their YouTube channel had thousands of subscribers, along with the Facebook page and Instagram, and the website Marnie had set up had thousands of hits every day. Thanks to Sam and his sexy shirtless whip-cracking skills, Terako was busier than ever. So busy in fact, that it was hard to find the time between treks to film. And while there was plenty Marnie could and did do—everything from updating all the social media to mucking out stalls, and even leading a few shorter treks—there were some things, like this, she needed Sam for. No matter how hard she tried she couldn’t crack a whip. And even if she succeeded she’d never be in Sam’s class and she’d never ever in a million years look as good as he did without a shirt on.
Marnie had got the idea of Sam cracking a whip to music from something she’d seen online—an Australian guy had done it, and it had been the hottest thing she’d seen. She’d mentioned it to Sam, and now he had a whole repertoire of songs he liked to use, mostly stuff that was older than she was. Leaning back against the fence, she watched, totally enthralled, as Sam cracked his whips in time to the beat of ‘Achy Breaky Heart.’
Relaxing in the sunshine, Marnie couldn’t keep herself from smiling. They had come a long way. When he’d first seen the video of him that had gone viral, he’d hit the roof. He’d been mortified, and her backside had paid a heavy price. But then when he’d calmed down and read the comments, mostly of adulation from scores of admiring women, he’d decided that maybe she was onto something. Now, as often as possible, they filmed something new. And it was working. Terako Treks was the biggest, most well-known trekking place in the country, and they took out tourists from all over the world. It seemed that everyone wanted to see the shirtless whip cracker in action. Sam was famous. And he was hers. Sometimes, she still had to pinch herself to believe it.
The song ended; Marnie turned off the camera. The instant she turned her back to Sam, she felt the leather thong of his whip wrap around her waist.
“Come here, little girl,” he growled, his voice a gruff tone of authority. A tingle went down Marnie’s spine. She loved the sound of his voice, especially when he pretended that she was in trouble and injected a stern note into it.
“Have I told you lately how much I love you?” Tugging on the whip, he pulled her in toward him. Heat shot to her core as he bent down to kiss her nose.
“Nope, you haven’t,” Marnie insisted. “Not today, anyway.”
With a flick of his wrist, the whip unwrapped itself from around Marnie and dropped to the ground.
“I’ve got to tell you something,” he said, his voice dropping into a low timbre.
“What?” Marnie frowned a little as his arms replaced the whip in drawing her close to him. She hoped it wasn’t something bad. There had been enough trouble to last them a long time, but she still worried a little every day that something might still go wrong.
“We’ve done it, little girl,” he whispered in her ear, hugging her tight. “Terako Treks is mortgage-free. It’s ours. Forever.”
A squeal of pure joy escaped Marnie as he bent her back over his arm, her head dipping toward the ground as he literally swept her off her feet.
She flung her arms around his neck and squealed with shock. “Sam! Put me down!”
“Not a chance, little gi
rl. Now shut up and kiss me.”
The End
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Recent Stormy Night Books by Loki Renard
Broken by Him
Grabbed off the street, locked in a cell, and falsely accused of a terrible crime, Tara thought they had taken everything they could from her. But she was wrong. Terribly wrong.
They plan to take her modesty, her dignity, and her free will itself. They intend to break her.
Breaking women is Doctor Mark Kilroy’s job and he does it well. Tara will be stripped bare, thoroughly humiliated, and punished harshly for the slightest hint of disobedience. Her body will be pushed to its limits with pleasure so shameful and intense it will shatter her ability to resist his demands. When Mark is finished, he will not need to force himself on her. She will beg for it.
But Tara is not like any other woman Mark has broken. Even as her body surrenders to his mastery, her mind refuses to yield. Worse still, he finds himself yearning to cast aside protocol, abandon his duty, and claim her for himself. When the time comes for him to complete his task and put Tara’s conditioning to the test, will her defiance end in catastrophe for them both?