The Rancher's Woman

Tessa moves out west to build a new life and start a vegetable, herb, and flower nursery business.  Everything seems to be going fine for Tessa until a fire erupts in her cottage sending a no nonsense fireman by the name of Chance to her door.  Tessa and Chance seem to hit it off immediately.  Tessa recognizes Chances dominant nature straightaway, but it takes her a while to reconcile her reaction to it.  When she finally realizes that she is turned on by his bossy ways, she throws him a bit of sass that he just couldn’t ignore.

Chance straightened, a determined green blaze in his eyes, steel in his tone. “You sure know how to live up to those flame-colored tresses of yours, missy. That’s quite an attitude you have on you. One that’s earned you a sore spanking that’s gonna leave that beautiful backside of yours a lot redder than your hair.”

 

Despite all her pushing, the surreal nature of what was happening astonished Tessa when he reached out and, with one swift motion, turned her over his knee. Stunned, she didn’t fight him. Instead, she steadied herself with one hand on his lower thigh. Keeping her in place with his arm cinched in a firm hold around her waist, he angled her body so she was supported by the couch. Telling herself dignified disdain was her best route, she buried her burning face in its soft, worn leather. Now that he was actually following through with his threat, she’d no intention of gracing his caveman tactics with a reaction.

 

Until the first smack landed.

 

Even through her jeans it burned atrociously. Chance was clearly intent on getting his message across. He systematically brought his large hand down hard, covering the middle of each cheek with a fiery smack. Rhythmically alternating backwards and forwards between both buttocks, he laid on the tanning to her jeans he’d promised. A tanning that had her twisting and turning on his knees trying to avoid it. Not that it helped much. Chance just followed her movements, spanking relentlessly, keeping up the tempo and force of his blows with each of her frantic, alternating shifts across his muscled thighs.

 

She was soon yelping and throwing her hand back in a dual attempt to protect her bottom and stop his blows. He didn’t even break stride, simply blocking her movements with one hand while the other raised such a fire in her butt it was all she could do not to blubber like a little girl. All her bravado left her and she was mortified to hear her own voice howling and pleading for him to stop. “Oww! Ouch! Oh, it hurts! How can a spanking hurt so much? Stop, Chance, stop!”

 

Ignoring her pleas, he changed his pattern, spanking her thoroughly across her whole bottom randomly again and again. Lifting one thigh, he upended her even more so he could pay plenty of attention to her tender sit spots at the underside of her buttocks. Finally his hand stilled. He rubbed the base of her back and then righted her to sit on his knees. She tried to scramble off, but he held her fast. “No, you don’t, missy. We’re not done yet.” Taking her chin in his hands, he asked her firmly, “You want me to stop? For your spanking to be over? Is that it, Therese Marie?”

 

Rubbing her abused cheeks, she glared at him mutinously. “How can you do this to me? You hardly know me. You have no right.” Now she was no longer in the humiliating position across his knee and his hard hand was no longer burning her butt, her bravado foolishly returned.

 

“Wrong answer, babe.” To her horror, he turned her back face down over his knees in the opposite direction, resuming the spanking. In this position, from a new angle and with his other hand, he seemed to find new spots to spank and redden, as well as reviving the burn of his previous smacking. Unlike the last bout, when he spanked without speaking, this time he lectured.

 

“No right, huh?” Smack. Smack. “Let me tell you about rights.” Crack. “Not.” Smack. “Only.” Smack. “Do I have the right.” Smack. “I’ve the responsibility.” Smack. Crack. “Even if there weren’t strong feelings between us and I didn’t have serious intentions toward you, which there are…” Crack. “…and I do.” Smack.

 

He stopped for a few moments while Tessa lay across his knees, squirming at the furious sting in her backside, kicking her legs, bucking, yelping, and whimpering, any attempts at maintaining dignity long abandoned. Jeez. Who’d believe it! All those weeks of seemingly ignoring her while she crushed on him and now, less than a day after finally getting to know her, not only was he spanking her, but he was declaring the intensity of their feelings and the seriousness of his intentions while doing it!

 

Her respite was short-lived as he soon began spanking her again, raining down five much harder smacks in quick succession to her left sit spot. Resuming his admonishments, he applied the same treatment to her right sit spot. “You’re in my house and my town. According to my lights that means you’re in my care.” Smack. “Mostly you can expect me to be tender with you, but misbehave and you can expect this.” Smack. Crack. Crack. “You might object to it, but you’ll just need to get used to it.” Crack.

 

“Oh. Oh! It hurts, it hurts! Please, no more, Chance.” His hand stilled and came to rest at the top of her cleft. Tessa reached round to clutch her well-smacked buttocks, easing the burn in her searing sit spots.  Chance allowed this, giving her hope that maybe the chastisement was over. Her bottom was blazing. She could feel the searing heat on her hands through her jeans. She’d absolutely no doubt that he’d carried out his promise to turn her bottom redder than her hair. It felt like it might be purple!

 

Chance ran his hands comfortingly over her back and legs, leaving her the freedom to soothe her soundly spanked cheeks. “That depends, babe. You have something to say to me?”

 

“What? Oh.” Tessa’s heart sank. He was only going to stop if she apologized. Apologize? She felt like cursing at him all over again, but she wanted the spanking to stop. Besides, she knew she was out of line. “I’m sorry I was rude and swore at you,” she offered grudgingly. It was obvious from her tone that she was not wholly remorseful, but to her relief, Chance accepted the muttered apology. Setting her on her feet in front of him, he ran a caressing hand over her freshly chastised cheeks before pulling her in for a cuddle on his lap.

 

She winced as her tender flesh met his hard thighs. She felt she should probably pull indignantly out of his arms and order him from the house, maybe even call the sheriff, but she was shaken by her uncontrolled tantrum and his decisive handling of her. Her rear end was ablaze and she never wanted to face him again, so cuddling into his chest was the most appealing alternative, especially when he angled her to relieve the pressure on her backside, making it accessible to his soothing strokes. He used his other hand to stroke her hair, dropping a kiss on her head that was bowed as she buried her face in his chest. Now that it was over, the heat of the spanking was having a settling effect. His cuddles and caresses combined with the aftermath of the spanking swept a soft lethargy through her, erasing any desire to challenge him.

 

“It’s alright, babe. You’ll be okay.” Chance continued his caresses, calming her as he spoke in a tender tone. “Judging by your reaction, I’m guessin’ this is your first spanking, hon. Am I right?”

 

He paused, waiting for her response. His caresses continued to mellow Tessa’s indignation. Relaxing her body, she sniffed and nodded. Rallying a little, she added without looking at him, “I… I was spanked a couple of times as a kid, but not like this. It was just a few swats standing up. Not this much or so hard and not… not over the knee.”

 

She sensed him nodding. “Yeah, well, you’re a grown woman now and you just got a woman’s spanking.”

I enjoyed Tessa and Chance’s story, but I wish the characters would have had a little more depth.  When the reader is introduced to Chance, it becomes very clear that he believes in domestic discipline and takes safety VERY seriously.  But we don’t get to know too much more about him.  The reader has more of a relationship with Tessa, but watching her make so many careless mistakes without any regard to her safety or to the fact that her boyfriend is likely to go ballistic when he figures out what she’s been up to is unnerving.  When Tessa’s antics finally catch up with her, Chance disciplines her severely.  As stated in the book description and as Chance’s character has alluded to throughout the book, Chance doesn’t mess around when it comes to discipline.  He spanks.  Hard.  And he punishes Tessa anally and sexually.  And Tessa enjoys it, or at least enjoys the notion of it.  So while it may have bothered me a little bit when Chance threatened “punishment sex” before they ever had regular sex or made love, it didn’t bother Tessa.

The Rancher’s Woman was not my favorite spanking novel, but it was the first book I’ve read from Helen Karol and it has me intrigued enough to read more of her other books soon.  I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a quick spanky read featuring a hunky fireman/cowboy who likes to punish a girl’s bottom inside and out.