Pleasure Horse

By Michele Lee

Sammie would love to be an Olympic-level eventer ,but her teacher aid salary can barely handle weekly lessons. When her rival Archer McKinley hires her to work as his groom for a regional show she finds herself trapped in a hotel room with him, and suddenly privy to his secrets which are about to rock her world...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michele Lee
• Release date: Jan 25, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310790652

Michele Lee

Once upon a time Michele defended a Borders bookstore from an infestation of flesh-eating book-look-a-like monsters. On stormy April day she once single-handedly wrestled a bear into a bathtub and even got him to sit still for a nail trim. Mostly though, she writes stories of heartbroken werewolves (Wolf Heart), zombie with souls (Rot) and rock star hyena-girls (you’ll see). Follow along at michelelee.net

Book preview

Pleasure Horse

and

Deepdale Acres

are

©2013 Michele Lee Freel aka M. Lush

Smashwords Edition

All characters in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction of all or part of the materials or artwork herein is prohibited without the express written permission of the author.

This book contains explicit depictions of sexual acts between two consenting adults.

Cover by Michele Lee Freel from Stock art by flickr.com/delgadoligia

Please visit my website at michelelee.net

Pleasure Horse

Deepdale Acres #3

by M. Lush

1.

Gemma's forelegs folded under as her rear legs pushed her up over the white bar. Fake green brush moved past in a blur. On her back, Sammie held the reins tight for a moment to prevent the mare's habit of breaking into a full run as soon as all four feet were back on the ground. Sammie settled herself back into the saddle with a touch more bump than she would have liked.

At home in the ring this is when she usually started criticizing her own performance. But this wasn't her home ring, this wasn't practice, so Sammie gave the mare a touch more rein and looked straight forward to the triple combination. It was the tricky one. Three individual jumps only a few strides apart, and the last had the most shallow cups on the course, which meant it was the easiest to knock free...

Then Gemma's front legs were folding again and Sammie felt herself rise from the saddle, over Gemma's neck, her arms sliding forward to allow the mare to catch her own balance on the landing. Jump, stride. Jump, stride stride. Jump. When the crowd, one voice louder than the rest, cheered instead of booed Sammie let herself breathe. Not that they ever booed, but she'd expect it to come if the sound of poles clattering on the ground did as well.

Her chest tightened when the last fence rose up at her like an unexpected afterthought. Gemma took a tight, extra step before launching herself over. The jump was a bunny-hop. Gemma and Sammie popped over the fence, coming down before they were completely clear. Practice kept Sammie's face blank, but at home she'd have been cursing at herself for sure.

Inside she was. When she watched the Olympics this was when the crowd would hold their collective breath, or gasp, then clapping or aw would come, along with the announcer telling the at home audience the result of the knock. As this was a smaller, local show and not an international one, the audience never really hushed. But an announcer did crackle over the loudspeaker as she let Gemma trot out of the ring announcing Samantha Carter, no faults.

Sammie breathed in great lungfuls of air. No faults meant the bar hadn't come down despite the mess she'd made of the last jump. If this had been a hunter class she'd have been screwed for sure, since looking pretty and performing well was part of getting a clean round. But jumper classes were just about getting over the jumps without knocking anything down in the allotted time. It saved her ass this time, but she snarled at herself mentally, vowing not to let it happen again.

She couldn't let herself blame Gemma, who nodded her head, playing with the looser rein Sammie gave her now. Instead Sammie replayed the ride in her head, looking for when she'd gone wrong. There, right before the last jump her attention hiccuped and she hadn't been counting strides like she should have. She couldn't remember if she'd actually been counting strides, or only remembered counting because she'd done this so much before.

Great ride, a male voice called out. From the small circle, filled uncomfortably full with riders warming up, Archer McKinley--on yet another new horse, Sammie noted--gave her a smile and a thumbs up. He had the same look to him as he always did, perfect pale breeches, tailored dark jacket and shined boots in a saddle that gleamed and sitting astride a horse whose braided mane sported not single flyaway hair. Even the speckles on the peppered gray he rode this time looked uniform, like he'd filled in the bare bits with eyeliner or something.

Sammie offered him a polite nod, because any slip at politeness might be translated by the gossipers as a snub. Thanks, she said, blaming the shortness of her words on breathlessness after her ride.

Archer, offered a little bow in his saddle before riding up to wait for his turn.

Sammie let Gemma take her forward, away from the mess of riders and onlookers watching the classes. She used to hang back and watch the other competitors, but then she learned that just made her neurotic. It was easier to back completely away and watch the video of her class for analysis later. Dee tried to make the review, taped by an available barn hand for those who were trying to seriously compete, fun by ordering pizza and popping popcorn, half of which always ended up fed to the birds.

But today Sammie had a second reason to ride back to the Deepdale Acres vans in the lot and pull Gemma's saddle for a quick brush down.

Oh, fantastic! Dee, Deepdale's barn manager said when she came around the van and saw Sammie already brushing at the sweat spots on Gemma's back. Tabby has a flat class in twenty-five minutes. We're really lucky you pulled the fourth slot, now we have a little more wiggle room. I'll get Gemma some water.

Dee's cell phone beeped. After checking it Dee looked up at Sammie and grinned. You went clean, way to go!

After Dee rushed off again Sammie smirked and shook her head. Dee and Crista weren't fooling anyone. Dee always had to miss the action, organizing almost everything behind the scenes. Especially since this was the first big show of the season, meaning every student with an ounce of talent at the barn wanted a chance at a ribbon, making Dee's coordinating even more important. Dee's friend Crista's basic knowledge of horses limited her usefulness behind the scenes, but