Page 41 of Cowgirl Omega

Oh God. Could Logan smell that? His face was only a few inches away from her bent-over backside. He showed no response yet, so maybe the suppressant was still masking her omega scent, but she didn’t know how much longer that would last. Based on the hot, needy feelings welling up inside her, she didn’t think it would be long.

She tried to wriggle out of his grip. “I can walk, you know. Please put me down and I—”

“Quiet!”

The alpha’s free hand smacked Shannon hard on her bottom, jolting a cry from her lips.

“Mr. Summerhill! How dare y—”

A second blow, even harder than the first, shocked her into silence. It was clear if she continued talking, the alpha would continue spanking her, and Shannon couldn’t endure that. It wasn’t the pain that bothered her. It was the arousal it excited within her. What had started as a trickle between her legs was suddenly threatening to become a flood.

Yet the alpha still hadn’t smelled her, or if he had, he showed no indication of it.

But how much longer?

Thankfully, it only took a few minutes for Logan to carry her back to camp. Shannon was ashamed to realize just how little distance she’d actually covered before Logan had caught up with her. What a fool she’d been to think she could actually get away from him.

Had she even truly wanted to escape, she wondered. Or had her goal all along been to anger the alpha, to provoke him into punishing her. She’d thought it had been the woman in her that had caused her to run away like that, but now she was starting to think it was the omega.

At the spring, Logan set her down so he could retie Stormy to the picket line with the other horses. Then he seized her arm in his big fist and walked her roughly toward the fire.

Shannon had hoped his anger had abated during their walk back to camp. She realized now it hadn’t.

“Sit.”

Shannon sat. She had no choice in the matter. The alpha’s commanding voice forced her down onto her butt just the same as if he’d used his hands. She winced a little as her backside touched the ground. She was still tender from those two licks he’d given her out in the desert.

Logan sat down directly in front of her and crossed his legs. His eyes reflected the flames of the campfire, and it seemed like they were not eyes at all but two windows looking inward at the fiery rage blazing inside his head. Shannon’s heart pounded in her chest.

“What did you lose back there in the canyon?” the alpha asked.

“Nothing.”

“Don’t give me that shit, woman. You weren’t riding off to get yourself killed in a snake infested canyon for nothing. Now tell me what you lost back there.”

Shannon tried to think of a lie, but nothing would come.

“I… I can’t tell you.”

All of a sudden, she was lying face down across the alpha’s legs. She didn’t see him reach out to grab her. She barely even felt it. One second she was sitting across from him, the next she was bent over his lap. The sensation was so strange, for a moment she thought this was another one of her dreams.

Then the alpha’s open hand made contact with her backside, and she knew it was real.

The sound of the first smack echoed like a gunshot, and Shannon gasped in shock. The alpha brought his hand down a second time, branding her backside with a blazing imprint of his fingers and palm.

“Stop it!” Shannon cried. “Please, you must stop!”

“I’ll stop when you tell me what I want to know, woman! Now what did you lose back in that canyon?”

Before she even had a chance to answer, he struck her again. The third blow landed a little lower on her body, and a surge of wetness spilled out of her, soaking the fabric of her jeans. She could tell right away that it was not ordinary arousal fluid—it was thick, fragrant omega slick.

The spanking stopped. Above and behind her, the alpha sniffed, and Shannon realized he must be sniffing the wetness on his own hand.

He knew. The alpha finally knew.

That last impact seemed to have knocked something loose within her. All semblance of self-control was gone, and her omega urges were free to run wild. A sound was welling in her breast and rising up her throat. She closed her eyes, tossed her head back, and howled like an animal in heat.

But her howl only lasted for a fraction of a second. Almost immediately, a huge, rough hand clapped across her mouth, muffling her voice. At first she thought it was Logan who had done that. Then she opened her eyes and saw who it really was.

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