And They're Off . . .

Having permitted the other mothers to precede them in the march -- so as, Danielle smiled to herself devilishly, to maximize the crowd's focus on her splendor -- Mrs. Parnell and Will had only just reached their own horse as the "competition" was helping their little jockeys up on theirs. Just as the haughty beauty had planned, all eyes were therefore transfixed on her as Will got ready to climb aboard his ride. Unfortunately, just as Danielle prepared to assist her son onto his ride, aptly named Vengeance, the young man dropped his goggles to the ground and, as he bent down to retrieve the protective spectacles heard and felt the failure of the back seam on his pants. The over-matched garment, that Will had dutifully worn for this race each year since he was 12, finally gave up the ghost and tore wide open to reveal the poor boy's silk, white and blue polka dotted briefs that Danielle had insisted he wear for the race.

"Mom, my pants," cried Will as the crowd -- including a giggling Sharon Miras -- laughed at his misfortune.

"Stop being such a baby," his domineering mother demanded as she spun towards her son with a stern look on her face, "no one is looking at your underwear -- now grow up and get on that horse."

To the impending distress of mother and son alike, when Danielle turned to scold her young offspring the feathers of her fancy hat brushed the nose of Vengeance and set off what would be for all in the crowd but two a most wonderful chain of events. Alarmed and annoyed by the plumage that had tickled his nose, Will's pony began to buck just as Mrs. Parnell hoisted her son onto the now irritated mammal's back. Will in turn wrapped his legs around the horse's midsection for dear life not realizing that in so doing he had both caused his riding pants to split even further and trapped the flared bottom of his mother's fashionable dress between his riding boot and Vengeance's flank.

As many of the gathered women, including Karen Manley, Lauren Butcher and the wives of SmythKnight's most important clients' chieftains, began to laugh at the ordinarily haughty Mrs. Parnell's obvious distress in getting Will situated, Billy Miras, who had been tasked by the Club as the "starter" for the pony race, saw a chance to avenge his own family's earlier undoing. Before Will could get balanced or Danielle (or anyone else but Billy) noticed that the usually cool alpha-mom's skirt was pinned by Will's boot to her son's horse, the perennial prankster pushed the starter's button thereby opening the gates that held the ponies at bay and sounding off a bell that caused them to begin the race.

As the voice of the Polo Club's president belted out the time honored mantra "and they're off," which in a moment would relate as much to the Parnell family's clothing as to the ponies bolting from the gate, time appeared to slow to a crawl. As Vengeance surged onto the course at the sound of the bell, the gathered crowd stared slack-jawed as a confounded Danielle Parnell whose dress remained pinned to the diminutive beast, was forced into a rapid pirouette the result of which, in an instant, was to separate her fashionable Carolina Herrera frock from her fabulously fit body.

Disoriented by the sudden spin, and unaware as of yet that she was now bedecked only in her 4.5" navy peep toe heels, blue and white polka dotted thong and very sophisticated derby-day hat, the tottering tease sought to regain her balance by grabbing onto the closest thing she could find -- the quickly departing Will.

Unfortunately for her son, as Mrs. Parnell pitched forward toward the now fleeing Vengeance who along with the rest of the horse and riders headed away from the gate, she managed to grab with one hand the tattered waist band of Will's riding pants and with the other an errant tail of his polka dotted silk shirt. Although her desperate grasp had the intended effect of righting her balance on the terrace, thereby preventing her from toppling headlong onto the track, it likewise unintentionally but to the uproarious laughter of the crowd, separated the hapless Will both from Vengeance, who now riderless was racing away, and from his riding togs, which as the boy came crashing down ass-first onto the cedar boards of the deck in only his boots, polka-dotted silk briefs and riding helmet, floated ruined down into the mud.

As mother and son alike stood dis-dressed in their matching underwear the crowd that had watched much of the scene before them in shocked silence, burst into a tumult of deafening laughter. Still somewhat disoriented from spinning in place, and still unaware of her own fate, Danielle Marie Parnell was irate that the club's guests and members, as unsophisticated as she thought them to be, would point and laugh at her son's misfortune. As poor Will did his best to cover up, his mother, always quick to defend his honor and noting in her mind that she would be firing Karen Manley and Lauren Butcher who she saw pointing and laughing along with the rest, raged at the howling crowd before them.

"How dare you laugh at my son, you miscreants" she began.

"Mom," will squeaked trying to get her attention while simultaneously transfixed by the view he had from behind his self-righteous mother, a view he had obviously never seen before.

"Be quiet, Will," his mother scolded taking a momentary break from castigating the laughing throng, before again addressing what she viewed as an assembly of hecklers.

"You should all be ashamed of yourselves, he's just a boy," she went on furiously. "And you two, she pointed at Karen and Lauren -- you're both finished do you hear me."

"But mom," Will tried again to get his mother's attention while at the same time feeling an all too familiar stirring in his pubescent nether regions.

Having grown tired of her son's interruptions while she was doing her best to defend him, the arrogant alpha-mom spun around on her high heels and, as authoritatively as ever, bellowed at the young boy, "WHAT IS IT WILL???"

As he looked up at his mother towering over him in naught but her heels, translucent panties and fancy dress hat, and quickly taking off his helmet to hide the growing bulge in his own polka-dotted briefs, the slack-jawed, practically catatonic Will Parnell croaked, "mommy, you're not wearing any clothes . . . I can see your boobies."

Quickly looking down at her nearly nude body, the truth of her son's statement finally hit the imperious suburban sexpot who, as Will passed out in front of her from his own humiliation, toppling from the veranda into a very wet puddle of mud as an errant nail tore from him the last remaining shred of his polka-dotted dignity, screamed out, "oh my God, I'm practically naked!"

As the crowd -- including the Miras family and Karen Manley and Lauren Butcher who only minutes before had suffered what they now realized would be the last of Danielle's barbs -- celebrated her comeuppance, the disgraced diva stood practically frozen before them, racking her addled brain to try comprehend her circumstances. Where is my beautiful dress, she thought to herself, and then . . . they're not just laughing at Will . . . everyone is laughing at me -- at me. This can't be happening . . . I've come completely undone. Oh my God, my clients, whatever will they think of me -- I'm not even wearing a bra. And Will, did I really strip my own son? Did he truly see his mommy's boobies?

With her befuddled mind attempting to comprehend her current situation, the nearly denuded debutante's body was having a reaction of its own. As the crowd laughed on, Mrs. Parnell's knees snapped tightly together while her bejeweled hands alternated between covering her thong encased bottom and shielding her oh-so pert tits the nipples of which were standing at attention in response to a mix of humiliation and wanton terror. Her always perfectly tan face began to take on the redness of abject embarrassment, its gorgeous but smug look replaced with the silent scream of "stop looking at me!"

For the now salivating CEOs who had long wondered what their hot little lawyer looked like under her power suits and formal-wear, the site of the near naked Danielle Parnell would provide a lust-evoking memory for the remainder of their years to come. For the club's female patrons, especially those over whom Little Miss Perfect had lorded the very body now on display before them, revenge had never been sweeter -- or so they thought.

As her self-awareness finally began to return, Mrs. Danielle Parnell, the Polo Club's one time Queen Bee, at last made a break for cover. Sprinting as best she could in her towering heels, while covering up her deliciously exposed body, Mrs. Parnell ran recklessly toward the building's lobby -- and safety -- before crashing headlong into Edith Gauge, the elderly wife of one of her client's now completely aroused CEOs.

With rage in her eyes, and momentarily forgetting her own exposure, the haughty Mrs. Parnell chided, "get out of my way you old crone," before attempting to push the frail woman aside.

What happened next was the proverbial icing on the cake of Danielle's downfall. For instead of folding into the couch above which she stood, the 75 year-old Mrs. Gauge -- spouse of SmythKnight's largest client's chairman and CEO -- not only stood firm but, after stopping the preening Mrs. Parnell dead in her tracks, pulled the once powerful lawyer over her bony knee and, relieving her of her polka dotted panties began to rain spanks onto her spectacular and now naked bottom.

"I've had just about enough of you young lady," Danielle's spry if aged assailant began.

"First you cast me and these other lovely women aside like yesterday's rubbish," she continued, gesturing at the other CEOs' wives, "and proceed to shamelessly tease our husbands while we watch. And then you embarrass your own partners in front of us before humiliating your poor son. Well that all ends right now do you hear me."

"Clark," pleaded a veritably infantilized Danielle looking up into the eyes of her tormentor's husband, "please Clark, make her stop . . . she's hurting my . . . she's hurting my . . . my tushy . . . please."

Although Clark Gauge thought about coming to the comely counselor's defense, one look into his wife's eyes quickly disabused him of that course of action. Having cowed her feckless husband with her stern gaze, Mrs. Gauge made it clear to Danielle that the nearly broken tease would have no rescuer today.

"Forget about it honey," the determined but smiling septuagenarian laughed while continuing to tan the broken diva's hide, "he may have the title of CEO -- and may like to watch you strut your stuff -- but I'm the one who owns the company that my father founded. And as of today, our account is going to be handled by Ms. Manley and Ms. Butcher because you're fired."

As the remaining CEOs looked into the eyes of their own wives -- none of whom had the same business leverage over the corporate titans as Edith Gauge had over her own husband but each of whom struck terror into her husband's heart -- they knew they had to follow suit and, almost in concert, likewise announced that their accounts would henceforth be managed by Karen and Lauren -- Mrs. Parnell was finished.

Mortified by the public crumbling of her career, the base from which all of her power emanated, Danielle Parnell, regaining her feet after being released from the grasp of Edith Gauge, and with Karen Manley and Lauren Butcher now sneering down at her as she once did at them, began to ramble incoherently, "please Mrs. Gauge . . . gentlemen . . . please don't fire me . . . I'll be a good little girl . . . I promise . . . I'll . . . I'll . . ."

As those cries fell on deaf ears, SmythKnight's soon to be ex-managing partner began obsequiously to beg her former underlings for compassion, "Karen . . . Lauren . . . I'm sure we can work something out . . . I . . . I could . . . "

It was Lauren Butcher, who on more than one occasion her now humiliated former partner had referred to as "lurch" and "prairie hair" who put an end to Danielle's entreaties.

"I'm very sorry Ms. Parnell but your inappropriate behavior today leaves us no choice but to put your removal from the partnership up for a vote on Monday. And just so we're clear sweetie," Lauren Butcher smiled broadly, "with the votes that Karen and I now control that only means one thing -- YOU'RE FIRED!!"

Stunned by her complete and total undoing, and retreating from the laughing crowd before her as she attempted futilely to cover her now naked body, the utterly disgraced diva failed to realize she had backed herself nearly to the edge of the giant cedar terrace. She was also unaware, with her eyes the size of saucers and a daffy, blank look on her once imperious face, that her son Will was at that moment immediately below her attempting to climb from the mud hole into which he'd fallen only a few short minutes before.

The last sight the howling crowd had of the once powerful Danielle Marie Parnell, as Will's frail, disembodied hand reached over the terrace and, in search of some leverage, accidentally grabbed his mother's ankle, was her falling, ass-first in only her high heels and fancy feathered hat, into the very puddle of muck from which her son was trying to climb. As the laughter grew to a crescendo, the now mud-soaked and completely disgraced former MILF, crying like a baby, could be heard shouting up to her again stupefied son, "Will . . . don't look down . . . mommy is a very dirty girl!"

The Miras family had been avenged.