Mattie Read online

  As soon as she opened the door, a den of laughter and talking met her ears. Clyde and McCloud were sitting at a table playing chess. Clyde looked up as she came in.

  “Just practicing up for you,” he winked.

  Dusty and Buck were making a ruckus in the shower room, as they yelled at each other and then laughed at whatever they were talking about. Buck came through the door with a towel wrapped around his waist and Dusty was right behind him, but he was drying his hair with his towel and otherwise, was stark naked. Mattie felt her face turning red and tried to look away, but not soon enough.

  “Are you getting embarrassed looking at real men?” Dusty asked, coming up alongside her. “Don’t worry, you’ll grow bigger too,” he said patting himself, as her eyes involuntarily gazed at him below the waist. “And if you want any lessons in pleasing a lady,” he winked, “I’ll give you all my secrets,” he chuckled. “I was just thinking about the pretty miss I was with last night. Did I tell you about her big tits, Buck?” he asked turning towards Buck.

  He looked down at himself.

  “See, just thinking about her turns me on all over again.”

  Mattie stared at him and swallowed hard.

  “How long you think it is?” he asked Mattie, suddenly laughing at her obvious embarrassment. “Bring that measuring tape over here, Buck,” he called. “Gonna let Mattie here measure me.”

  Mattie shook her head.

  “Don’t be shy now. We’re all built the same, sort of,” he laughed. “Either you can hold it while I measure or I can hold it while you measure,” he said, handing her the tape measure.

  “Why’s it so important to know?” she asked, in an astonished voice as she examined him a little closer.

  “To please the ladies,” he said. “The longer and bigger, the better they like it,” he informed her.

  “Really?” she asked.

  “Guess you never been with a woman before, have you?”

  “No,” Mattie said truthfully.

  “You know how they are built though, don’t you?”

  “She nodded.”

  “Well, I’m sure you’ve seen the horses do it, you owning a stud and all. You know how you have to get a mare all ready to take the stud. Sometimes they use a half cut gelding, or a less important stud to get her all worked up. I’m sure you’ve heard the expression ‘hung like a horse’? Women like you hung like a horse. Think about that the next time you see your stud showing the mares what he’s got. How long do you think your horse’s rod is?” he asked.

  She shrugged.

  “Wouldn’t know, and couldn’t care,” she said.

  “I bet he can please a mare though,” Dusty laughed.

  “He has,” she said boldly, and the memory of it suddenly came back to her. At the time it had intrigued her, but she never thought to compare it to men and women…”

  “Well, don’t just sit there, measure up,” he said. “Here, take it to the bottom and hold it there. I’ll pull it to the top.”

  Mattie merely stood there, frowning at him.

  “What you so afraid of?” he teased. “maybe I’m not impressing you with my size. Give it a little rub there, cutie pie,” he said to Mattie, “that might do the trick.”

  “What?” she asked astonished.

  She was already mortified that he had even insisted she hold the tape against him. Memories of her father started shooting through her head and she had to force herself not to shake.

  “You, know how it’s done,” he snickered. “You have probably been doing it in the dark to yourself over the years. Come on, I’m starting to get cold standing here all buck naked.”

  “Stop teasing the kid,” Buck said as he pulled on his jeans. “Can’t you see he’s uncomfortable with this?”

  “Gotta teach him something sometime,” Dusty said. “Come on, kid, give it a try.” He reached down and took her hand, but she jerked it away.

  “No,” Mattie mumbled. “You want someone to rub your private parts, you can get one of your chums here to do it!”

  “You’re no fun,” Dusty complained.

  “I didn’t come here to have fun,” she muttered. “I came here to work horses,” Mattie told him.

  “Nothing wrong with having fun on the side,” Dusty insisted.

  “You think so?” Mattie said, raising her eyebrows. “Doesn’t look like you got enough to bother with anyway,” she snickered.

  “Hell, I got seven inches or more,” he bragged.

  “So the ladies like you?” Mattie asked boldly.

  “Yeah, they like me well enough,” Dusty smiled.

  “Well, if you want to keep what size you got, you had better not be asking me to touch you. You may regret it if you know what I mean.”

  “Don’t let him get to you,” Buck said. “We don’t want any trouble. Matthew would give us what-for. You need to lighten up some.”

  “Really?” Mattie said. “Everyone says I have a cute butt and I’m getting a might tired of it!”

  “No one meant anything by it,” Buck told her.

  “Yeah, I’m sure they were just giving me a bad time,” Mattie shrugged. “Only I don’t take kindly to it. Maybe I should ask Matthew what the bunkhouse rules are. He said you would probably tease me, but this beats the cake!”

  Dusty stepped back a little.

  “Don’t be getting Matthew involved,” he muttered.

  “You don’t want to know how long you are anymore?” she asked, pushing the tape back inside the case.

  “It seems irrelevant now,” Dusty shrugged.

  “What’s going on in here?” It was Matthew, who was striding over to where Dusty and Mattie were.

  “Come on Matthew. The kid wanted to measure me to see how long I could get. You’re screwing up the fun.”

  “Really?” Matthew said, looking down at Mattie. “You want to be doing this, kid?” he asked.

  Mattie swallowed. “Nothing I haven’t seen before,” she said truthfully, thinking of her daddy. “Besides, I told you I could take care of myself.”

  “I told you they were crude,” he whispered, touching her shoulder.

  “Their just horny men. Not much unusual about that,” she whispered back.

  “So this doesn’t bother you?”

  “I didn’t say it didn’t bother me. It might excite me a little though, I just don’t know which thing is the strongest right now. You wanna watch?” She gave him a sly smile.

  “Not particularly,” Matthew said and turned from the room.

  “He is just a stick in the mud,” Dusty lamented, “and look, I lost it all while he stood there gawking at us. Thanks for not complaining to Matthew.”

  “Funny, my daddy was trying to show me one time what makes a woman feel good, and I wouldn’t let him, well not much. He did teach me something I didn’t know at the time.”

  “Such as?”

  “That my daddy was pretty rude when he got drunk,” she said.

  “You said he was mean,” Dusty reminded her.

  “Yeah, he was,” she said as she absently started to play with the tape measure, pulling the tape in and out. “Only that night, it was all about trying to show me what pleasure was all about. It’s just that having your daddy showing you, is kind of kinky, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah, you’re probably right. Sorry if I upset you any.”

  The other men had gathered around as they were talking. Mattie looked around.

  “Don’t go thinking I am going to be measuring any of you boys. I have never fooled around like this before. You got a virgin on your hands, here,”

  “Maybe we could teach you a thing or two unless your daddy touched all the bases,” Dusty offered.

  “Don’t push the kid,” Clyde said. “You said you were sorry for upsetting the kid. This could be considered sexual harassment. Matthew was not happy as it was, seeing what you were up to.”

  “It’s up to you, then Mattie,” Dusty said.

  Mattie looked around at
the eyes staring at them. “You guys really like this kind of stuff, don’t you?” she said.

  She was thinking how men were pretty degrading, and anything for a sexual thrill was strangely anticipated. At the same time, she was learning what really did turn men on, which gave her a sense of power and understanding.

  “If it’s up to me, then I guess this game is over unless you all want to start measuring each other, or whatever else turns you on.

  “To tell you the truth, you kinda turn me on,” Dusty smiled. “You’re a young kid. You look all pretty. It’s hard to think of you as a man,” he admitted. “If I didn’t know better, I would say you were a girl.”

  Mattie turned away, fearing that they were all going to discover her secret.

  “What? McCloud isn’t pretty enough?” she asked, giving a nervous laugh.

  McCloud laughed too.

  “You’re pretty too, Dusty,” she said. “I hear the ladies think you are, so does that mean they think you’re a girl?”

  “Probably not,” Dusty admitted.

  “Well, I guess that says it all. This game is over,” Mattie said, standing up and moving over to the door. “You want any more measuring done on your dick, you can get one of your pals here to perform it for you,” she said, and opened the door, escaping the room and stomping off to Apache, who had his head hanging over the fence rail.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Mattie climbed through the railing and put her arms around Apache’s neck and buried her face in his coat. Apache nudged her with his nose in a comforting sort of way. Well, at least she had shown the men they couldn’t taunt her and she hoped that would be the end of their teasing or trying to use her naivety to take advantage of her.

  Matthew looked out of his bedroom window. His brows were drawn. He did not like what Dusty had been doing with Mattie. But he also knew that Mattie was trying to hold his own so the boys would accept him readily and not tease him for looking so pretty and feminine. He couldn’t insist he stop doing something that he chose to do, and it wasn’t his place to put a damper on what the boys did in their own bunkhouse. They weren’t breaking the law or anything, he reasoned. Still, there was a protective part of him that wanted to save Mattie from the crudeness that life was sure to bring him, especially after what he must have gone through with his father. And Mattie was under-aged. The boys could get in big trouble for doing what they were up to if it turned wrong. He wanted to wring every one of those men’s neck, but then Mattie would get mad at him for giving him preferential treatment and he didn’t know which would be worse.

  His eyes roamed out over the pasture and then he noticed Mattie out with his horse, hugging its neck, and he could feel the mortification that the kid must be feeling. He wondered how far Dusty let the kid go before the little party was over? Mattie looked upset and Matthew turned from the window, making his way out of the house and over to the pasture where Mattie and Apache were.

  He ducked through the railing and came up behind Mattie, placing his hand on her shoulder.

  “How you doing, kid?” he asked, his voice low and husky with unexpressed emotions, that he didn’t even realize he was feeling for that pretty kid hugging his horse. He just knew he sympathized with Mattie.

  “I’m okay,” she said, shrugging his hand away, but he replaced it.

  “You shouldn’t have let Dusty make you do that,” he said to her.

  “Why? It was just fun and games,” she said, quietly.

  “Was it? They were using you, Mattie. They knew you wanted to be accepted, and they were putting you through the paces.”

  “I already knew that,” she said, peeking around and then leaning back against Apache as she looked up at him.

  Matthew rested his hand on Apache’s back, as he tilted his head towards her.

  “Then why didn’t you just walk out? You could have when I came in, and no one would have blamed you. Only you acted like it was no big deal.”

  “I couldn’t, or they would have thought I was a bad sport. Dusty claimed I was so pretty, I turned him on like a girl.”

  “So what did you do?” Matthew asked.

  “Well, I told Dusty he was a pretty-boy too and maybe guys might think he was a girl and thought the same thing about him. I guess saying that made him see the light. Then I told him the game was over and left.”

  Matthew started laughing. “You sure got spunk, Mattie. You are one pure surprise after another. I don’t know why your daddy wouldn’t be proud of you.”

  “Cause he’s a drunk,” she said flatly.

  “You mean, he was a drunk,” Matthew corrected.

  “Yeah, I mean was…” she amended.

  “Well, I guess I don’t have to worry much about you anymore, then, right?”

  “Not unless you can make something up to worry about,” she said, laughing up at his face.

  “You have the prettiest laugh,” he grinned. “I think God made a big mistake when he made you a boy instead of a girl. I can see why Dusty said what he did about you.”

  “Maybe I have a twin somewhere,” Mattie smiled, “that is a girl but looks more like a boy,” she joked.

  “Heaven forbid,” he laughed. “Dinner is going to be ready pretty soon, why don’t you come in the house and talk to the cook while you are waiting. He is all anxious to meet you, after hearing of the rave reviews you have been getting from my Dad. He just loved that show you put on this morning.”

  “Not as much as the boys loved the show they were putting on for me in the bunkhouse,” Mattie smiled.

  “I should have stayed to see how you handled it,” he told her.

  “Yeah, maybe you could have offered up your dick to be measured,” she joked.

  Matthew’s brows drew together. “Don’t joke about it, Mattie. Sex isn’t about how good you think you are built. It is supposed to be accompanied by love for the woman you are doing it with. Just remember that when you get a little older.”

  “My daddy tried to teach me about sex once,” she said. “But he never told me that. He just said something about pleasing the other person and how good it feels.”

  “Don’t listen to your daddy, Mattie. It can feel good, but when it is shared with someone you truly have deep feelings for, it is more than just feeling good.”

  “Have you had sex with someone you had deep feelings for?” she asked.

  “Only once. My first love. I was eighteen at the time and it turned out that I was not her first love, nor the only one. Sort of made me realize how we can sometimes be blinded by what we think we feel and what is really there.”

  “That’s why you say women are a bother,” Mattie said, suddenly realizing by the look in his eye, that he didn’t trust women anymore.

  “Well ,I haven’t met one that wasn’t,” he grinned, “but the sex part is always enjoyable.”

  “So you do it with women you don’t love?” she asked, feeling a little disappointed in him.

  “Yeah, the hypocrite that I am. It just feels too damn good to refuse them, but they are few and far between at the moment,” he admitted.

  “So much for sex being more than feeling good or how you are built,” she criticized, giving him an accusing stare. “What kind of woman do you like? I mean the one you looking for, to have deep feelings about“” she asked, suddenly wanting to know the answer. “I suppose the others are just for having a good time,” she added.

  Matthew paused. The question had caught him off guard. He had come out here to comfort Mattie and discovered Mattie could fend for himself. Now the kid wanted to know his innermost secrets. Oh, what the heck, he thought, and smiled down at Mattie. The kid had a way of getting right under his skin, he grumbled to himself. Somewhat like a woman, he realized.

  “Of course, she has to be halfway decent looking,” Matthew grinned. “I mean, she doesn’t have to be a raving beauty, but pretty would help, sort of like you,” he winked, and she slugged his arm.

  “Owe! You are pretty strong for a kid,” he said.r />
  “Yeah, and I can beat you in arm wrestling too,” she predicted.

  “Really?”

  “Really. But get back to what you were saying about the kind of woman you like.”

  “I like someone who has a head on her shoulders, I mean a little brains upstairs, like you being able to beat me in chess. I mean I wouldn’t want her to beat me every time, but someone who could give me a run for my money, anyway. And by the way, I am going to continue to play you until I can win at least one game,” he chuckled. “Okay, let me think. She has to be independent. You know, someone who can make decisions on her own. Someday I plan to own this horse ranch when my dad passes on and I will need someone who is not afraid to take some of the responsibility. Which leads to the next quality. She needs to know her horses. Man, Mattie, if you were only a girl, you have a lot of those qualification,” he breathed.

  “You hitting on me again?” she asked.

  “Trying not to,” he laughed. “Okay, pretty boy, she has to be a good kisser.”

  “How can you tell a good kisser from a bad one?” Mattie asked. She had only been kissed once, and that was by her drunk daddy. The thought of it turned her stomach.

  “Well, that is kind of hard to describe. Her lips should be full and soft…sort of like yours…”

  “Cut it out, Matthew,” Mattie hissed.

  “Well you do have full lips and I bet they are soft.”

  “But you aren’t going to try them, are you?” she smiled, lifting her chin and putting her lips up towards him as a tease.

  Matthew, stopped and looked down at her.

  “There’s something about you, Mattie, more than just a cute butt, and the way you walk sort of feminine like. I am finding myself damn attracted to you and I don’t get attracted to boys. My body would rebel at the very thought of it.”

  “Then how do you account for it?” Mattie asked, looking innocently up at him.

  “Maybe I should give it a test. I never thought Dusty would want a boy touching him and, yet, he seemed just itching for you to do it.”

  “What sort of test are you talking about?” Mattie asked, starting to feel nervous.