Red Hots

by Hines, Yvette

  “Profitable.” Masaun lowered his gaze back to the computer and spreadsheets before him as he entered a few more numbers before giving his brother his full attention.

  “Profitable?” Sweet leaned forward, resting his hands on the back of the chair across from the desk. “Most people use words like well, good, exciting…”

  Raising a brow at him, Masaun leaned back in his chair and sighed. “It’s a store not an amusement park.”

  Sweet tilted his head and squinted at him. “Tell me, Masaun, when was the last time you were at an amusement park…any park for that matter?”

  “When were you?” he countered.

  His brother sighed. “Touché.” Sweet claimed the chair, slouching in the seat to rest his head on the back and placing one ankle on top of the other knee. “Connie said you’re taking a delivery today. What gives?”

  He laced his fingers over his abdomen and shoved away the annoyance of the time he was about to lose. “Yes. Lolli came into the store today and placed an order.”

  “Dom Razor’s submissive, Lolli?” Sweet lifted his hand and rested the side of his face in the L made by his thumb and index finger.

  “Yes,” Masaun hissed.

  “You matched them together at The Dollhouse and it seems to have worked out well. Maybe you can incorporate some of your skills in selecting a sub for yourself. Don’t think I haven’t noticed it has been years since you did more than just scene with a submissive.”

  Eyeing his brother, he said, “I’m not even going to attempt to decipher your point. Yes, it has gone well for Razor and Lolli. However, if you’d like to talk about the dungeon, might I suggest you close the door first?”

  Sweet didn’t even glance over his shoulder at the door he’d left standing much wider than the small crack Masaun normally maintained when he was inside working.

  “What we do in our personal lives isn’t anything to be ashamed of or hid—”

  Masaun allowed a single brow to creep slowly up his forehead, ending in a high arc above the eye.

  “Fine. I’ll drop it.” Sweet’s exhalation of frustration was loud and harsh, but he ended the discussion. “The delivery?”

  Relaxing some, he said, “Apparently, Lolli feels it’s important to send a basket of support to a guy on the Commonwealth Attorney’s team, today.”

  “Ah…your old playground. Makes perfect sense now why you’re being such a controlling, arrogant ass.”

  Masaun growled.

  Sweet smirked, a small twinkle reflecting in his brother’s eyes before it was extinguished by the shadows over that haunted his soul for too many years.

  His younger brother was the only person Masaun would allow to find humor in the things he did. If it wasn’t for his love and respect for Sweet and both of their healthy fear of their mother, he would have taken a strap to the man across the desk from him.

  “Anyway.”

  “I can take the job if you’d like,” Sweet volunteered.

  Masaun sighed. “No. I’m sure you have plans for the two cases of chocolate and other confectionery supplies that came today.”

  A kind of crooked smirk twisted his brother’s mouth, not even close to a smile. Creating decadent treats truly was a joy and a love for Sweet, however, no one could tell it by his stoic face. Another joy for Sweet used to be being a Dom as well, but Masaun kept that to himself even as he wondered what it would take to get his brother invested again.

  “I would.”

  “Figured. Don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of it.” Masaun glanced at his watch, seeing it was about time to head out. He rose.

  Sweet stood too. “Alright. I’ll be here until about nine or so tonight so I won’t be at the house until around ten.”

  He knew his brother meant The Dollhouse but was being respectful of the fact he’d just asked him not to mention it at work.

  “Got it.” Moving to the door, he felt the need to swing by his house and put on a suit before entering his old realm. It wasn’t that he was dressed like a slob in his slacks, shirt and tie with the store logo on it. It just felt insufficient at the moment.

  However, he easily pushed those feelings aside as he watched his brother turn right toward the kitchen of the business. This was their store; they had built this together and pride in that knowledge and having a stress free life was more than worth it. The only thing that was better to him was being a Dom.

  ~YH~

  After thirty-five minutes driving through the start of rush hour traffic, Masaun walked into the Virginia Beach Court House building, carrying the mammoth nostalgic candy basket. He felt like at any time someone was going to ask him to sing. After passing through the security check and having the package wand-scanned three times, he was allowed to continue into building ten where the CA and his team had been housed since the new court house was built eighteen years ago.

  As he came to the reception desk, a wooden nameplate rested declaring the woman as the CA office’s executive assistant. The brown-haired woman who looked as if she had her hands full at the end of the day glanced up at him. “How may I help you?” Her voice was soft, professional and heavily southern laced.

  “Yes. I’m delivering this for a Mr. Lang—”

  “One second.” She held a finger to Masaun and cut him off as a man came out of the elevator and strutted down the hall past them, definitely an attorney. Grabbing a file, she bolted down the hall after him. “Mr. Compton.”

  Masaun watched the woman disappear around the corner as she chased the man’s long strides to either his office or an important meeting. Not a patient man, Masaun decided he would locate Mr. Langston himself, drop the package at the desk if it was open and leave. Traffic would be bad enough as he headed home, so no need for him to stand here twiddling his thumbs.

  Deciding to start in the opposite direction from where the executive assistant went, he went along the hall reading the different name plates on the doors. He passed a conference room that had several people boxed in around piles of legal papers, files and books filled with historical case references. Shaking his head, he reflected he didn’t miss that.

  Two doors down, he located a brass plaque with Assistant Commonwealth Attorney Kin Langston. Moving before the open doorway, he froze. Before him wasn’t a male attorney, Asian, he had surmised by the spelling of the first name, but all woman.

  She was standing behind her desk talking on the phone, with her free hand in a fist on her hip. The statuesque black woman wore her thick ebony hair with brown highlights in twisted waves that hung over the front of her olive, form-fitting suit. Her hair was parted down the middle, causing the tresses to caress the sides of the creamy chestnut complexion of her face. A face that took his breath away, made heat spread in his gut and caused his cock to instantly awaken in his slacks when she gazed up at him.

  CHAPTER two

  “I don’t give a damn what their excuse is in your department, I want that information. This asshole is a perverted son of a bitch that preys on little children and when he’s done, he disposes of them in the most heinous way.” Even as Kindle listened to the clerk on the phone her gaze was fixed on the man before her.

  The clerk was hemming and hawing about why they didn’t have parts of the documentation one of her assistants had gone to pick up. The coroner’s report was an important piece for her case. However, she didn’t even comprehend any of his words. It was virtually impossible to think, hear or breathe with such a sexy man before her.

  In her profession, she was around more men than women. A lot of them were attractive and overly confident but none of them seemed to compare to the man standing in her doorway, holding a gigantic package in his hand. For that point alone, she should have been distracted enough not to see the man. But she not only saw him, she was reacting to him in a completely biological way.

  It shocked her that she could even recognize a biological response in herself since the last time she felt this way had been more than four years ago when she was on a d
ate. Try to deny her attraction if she could, but she stood staring at him as she gave mindless verbal cues to the person on the other end of the phone. She probably sounded like an idiot. But, she could not find it in herself to care, just like she couldn’t find the strength to pull her gaze away.

  She’d always been a sucker for bold, direct eyes. Eyes that seemed to see deep inside of her, beyond her own awareness of herself, and he had them. He had her trapped in his laurel green eyes. The clear, greenish-gray combination was doing things to her. It didn’t help that he was also a sexy, six-two, brown haired, broad shouldered hunk.

  She wasn’t the only one taking in her fill. The delivery man was doing the same to her. His gaze roamed her face and traveled down her body, causing heat to follow in its wake. The urge to be able to read his mind and know what he thought had her skin tightening, caging her inside of herself. When he lifted his striking eyes back to her face, she was knocked speechless by the intense heat and curiosity she saw there. In that heartbeat, she knew he had been assessing her. For what purpose she didn’t know. Yes, there was a sexual undertone but something else she couldn’t decipher.

  “Hello. Hello…you still there?” The man on the phone barked in her ear.

  Jarred out of her fixation, Kindle looked down at the notepad on her desk and took a deep breath. She realized that there wasn’t only a quivering low in her belly, but her knees were shaking too. What the hell?

  “Of course I am,” she snapped, angrier at herself for getting distracted by a pretty face and wide shoulders. She didn’t have time for wool gathering, not with the case set before her. “Look, tomorrow morning I will have someone there to pick up that report and it better be ready.” Ending the call, she set the receiver back in the cradle.

  Lowering her professional veneer over her face, she pinned the visitor with a sharp look that had strong men trembling on the witness stand and trying to gird up their loins for her verbal barrage of questions. “Are you lost? I’m sure the exec assistant at the front can help you.” She picked up her legal pad and pen and looked down to review her notes.

  It was her way of telling the man that whatever silly delivery he had from one lovesick spouse to another, he had stopped at the wrong office for help.

  “She had her hands full.”

  Exhaling loudly, Kindle lifted her eyes first then raised her head slowly. It was her ‘I don’t have time for this’ act. Most people usually went scurrying, but not this man. It was probably best she point him in the right direction so he could go away, quickly.

  “Who’s it for?” She dropped the pad onto her desk so that it smacked against the high gloss wood desktop.

  “You.” He moved into the office, holding out the monstrosity. Unhindered by the heavy bundle, he strutted upright, even and confident.

  “What? That can’t be possible.” He was standing so close to her now that she could clearly see that the package contained candy…lots of candy. Bewildered, she rounded her desk.

  “Are you Kin Langston?” His voice was a low, deep timbre, just husky enough to make her think about late night pillow talk.

  Squeezing her hands into quick tight fists to get control, she said, “Yes.”

  “Then I have the right person.” He set it down on the corner of her desk, making sure the base was resting evenly on the top.

  “Who’s it from?” She couldn’t help but feel giddy at seeing all the candy she’d grown up loving—licorice whips, sugar daddies, bit-o-honeys, now or laters, Mary Janes and so much more.

  “There’s a card inside, but I believe the customer said she was a good friend of yours.” He pointed to the small purple envelope in the front.

  Standing less than an arm length away from him, she would have expected to be able to smell his cologne or aftershave like most of the suited men she worked around, but she couldn’t. There was a soft sugar scent coming from the candy bouquet but that was it. She shoved away the slightly disappointed feeling. This man was just a delivery guy that she’d never see again, so the thought was foolish, she chided herself.

  “Emmalee,” she murmured, more to herself than the man standing beside her. Even without opening the card, she knew her best friend’s work. She and Emmalee Eagleton had been friends since they were preteens.

  “Evidently, your friend seems to think you’re stressed and in need of something.” He paused. “A stress relief.”

  There was something in his voice that pulled her gaze away from the sugar treats and to his face. For a moment, she allowed her gaze to roam from his face, down the shirt, the tie with ‘Decadent Treats’ written on the bottom of it, his grey slacks to his soft leather black shoes. Were those pants breakaway? At any moment, was this guy going to start some kind of striptease candy-gram?

  It wasn’t a stretch at all to imagine this man as a stripper, not with his handsome face and build. She could easily see through his conservative work outfit that he kept himself in shape. Neither was it out of the realm of possibility that Emmalee would do something like that. Her best friend was the same one who dragged her out to a male review show after Kindle found out she passed the bar, Emmalee saying they both had been too consumed by school for too long. Emmalee at that time had been in the thick of getting her doctorate in physics. Now she was a professor at Old Dominion and one of the smartest and kindest people Kindle knew.

  “Emmalee would know.” She fingered a loose strand behind her ear and let out a nervous laugh. “What job isn’t stressful nowadays?”

  “It’s all in your perspective sometimes. However, being a lawyer on big cases can be worse than most.” He crossed his arms over his broad chest.

  There was something in the tone of his voice that made her think he understood how demanding her job could be. Maybe he delivered to a lot of lawyers. She shrugged mentally. “You have that right, especially when the most public, high-profile and heinous of cases come to your boss and trickles down.”

  She wasn’t sure why she was opening up to this man, confessing some of the emotional stress she was carrying deep in her gut that no one knew about. Not even Emmalee was privy to that. Kindle didn’t like to add to her friend’s concern.

  Now here I am pouring out to the candy man like a drunk to a bartender. Damn, Kindle, are you about to lose it?

  It had to be the ‘stranger effect.’ Unable to resist and needing something to do besides stare at the sexy, intense man beside her, she unwrapped the cellophane that was shrink-wrapped around the basket, creating a loud crinkling sound in the room, and pulled out a pack of sugar babies.

  “Do you mind me asking you what you do to relieve that stress, after work?”

  Placing one hand on her hip and shaking the pack of candy, she asked, “This isn’t your lead in to asking me out, is it?”

  His face, too serious by far for a delivery guy, became even more stern with a slow lifting of a single eyebrow. Kindle could swear she could actually count the seconds it took to reach its peak height. She’d never seen a man, anyone, with that much control. The simple action had her heart racing and that boggled her mind. Too often she found herself doing interviews and cross examinations of violent criminals and she always remained steady, but she could feel her stomach tighten with a slight quiver under the look of this man.

  “No.” One word and no further explanation or smile to soften the blow. Way too intense.

  Even though she didn’t have the time or space in her life for a date, she still felt crestfallen and offended. As if there was something wrong with her that an attractive man without a ring on his finger wouldn’t be trying to pick her up. She shook that feeling away, realizing the man most likely believed she was above his dating pay-grade. Not that she was a social elitist.

  “Nothing. My job is twenty-four-seven,” she informed him.

  “Wow, a government law practice that’s run like a corner convenience store.” He gave a quick glance around her office. “I’m surprised you don’t have a couch in here to sleep on at nights. Guess
you do it in the car.”

  Is this jackass making fun of me? It was past time for him to leave. The hell if she would allow someone to be condescending to her in her own office.

  Crossing her arms over her breasts, she looked at him as if he wasn’t playing with a full stack. Evidently he didn’t realize all that went into being a criminal lawyer. Often people watched law shows that had people having time for social gatherings in the evening at a bar or illicit romance outside of work. Those shows didn’t reveal the real grind of the job; like how much time the team spent going through old cases or reviewing deposition after deposition, trying to find holes to plug or creating holes in the defense’s argument. Hell, with all the cases she’d had fall into her lap lately, she hadn’t seen her dining room table for months, maybe even the last year.

  “Not literally. I just meant it’s a lot of late hours and taking things home. It leaves little room for anything else if you want to be the best and elevate your career.” She sighed and moved behind the desk to get her purse out of her bottom drawer. “Anyway, work calls. Do I owe you a tip?”

  “No.” Again with the single word.

  Halting her movements, she inhaled and stood to her full height. “If there’s nothing else.”

  He reached into his back pocket and removed his wallet.

  Is he about to tip me? But she saw him pull a card out.

  “Pen, please.”

  Without questioning him, or thinking, she grabbed the pen she’d been using from the top of her legal pad.

  His fingers brushed the tips of hers when he took it from her. The light contact sent an electric current zinging up her arm, and her heart beat hard against her ribcage. Pulling her hand away, she squeezed it into a fist and tried to figure out what had happened.

  Carpet electricity most likely. Had to be.

  She picked up her notepad and a file and held them both to her chest; one, to show him she needed to get going and two, as a shield. Something about this man was causing her to act outside her normal abrupt nature. A disposition she’d cultivated over the nine years she’d been practicing law. They called her No Nonsense Langston to her face and Barracuda Langston behind her back and she was proud of both of them.