Evernight Publishing ®
www.evernightpublishing.com
Copyright© 2015 Raven McAllan
ISBN: 978-1-77233-221-6
Cover Artist: Jay Aheer
Editor: JS Cook
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
To Eva, as promised, this is your name in a book.
JoAnne, Doris, and the RavDor Chicks, for all your help and support
HIS BOSS, HER DOM
Raven McAllan
Copyright © 2015
Chapter One
"Bloody stupid, idiotic…" Eva muttered as a particularly vicious nettle decided she needed to feel its sting. She might like to feel a sting, but not like that. Mind you it was so long since she'd had that sweet pleasure, she may well have changed her mind. The nearest Eva had got to anything remotely kinky—or remotely anything non-kinky for that matter—was in her bedtime reading. Life was mundane at the moment. Busy, but boring.
Thank goodness for bullets and self help.
"Damned puppy. Russ, come here, here, boy." Eva crooned the words without much hope that Russ—the four month old, escapologist Jack Russell puppy—would hear, or if he did, pay attention. That only happened if it suited him, which wasn't often.
With a sigh and the odd gasp and swear word—the brambles were vicious—Eva made her way gingerly through the bushes and nettles toward the shed she was sure Russ had wriggled into. Why couldn't people mend rotten wood, and keep their premises Russ-proof? Or if not, why couldn't Russ make a hole she could see through and therefore into the large shed with its peeling paint and several oversized padlocks. Given a guaranteed neighbor-free ten minutes and her personal, illegal lock picking set, Eva could have got inside without any problem, but she reckoned there was as much chance of that as learning to play squash like a champion. The only time she'd played, her brother had refused to take her again, saying he feared for his head—she had no sense of where the ball was—so the likelihood of either scenario was infinitesimal
If these new neighbors caught her skulking around like an undercover cop, there would be hell to pay, and not just from them. They'd already showed they were about as friendly as a shoal of sharks on a food foray. Her one smile as they passed her cottage, much too fast in a top of the range, unsuitable Mercedes had been well and truly ignored. The only time she'd walked up the track since they'd moved in was when she took Russ for a walk. She’d seen a tall stereotypical hard guy washing the car, and he'd stared so nastily, she almost felt she needed to apologize for living.
"Russ, you cloth eared numpty. Do you want to be cat food or something? They won't want you nosing around. Come on, out now." She hissed the words, and even though the situation was serious, she could see the humor in it. Whispering to a dog, who had selective hearing at the best of times. "Silly nitwit. Do you have one brain cell inside that skull of yours?"
"Probably." The voice was amused. "At least one. Eva McEwan?"
Eva yelped in surprise, turned around and lost her balance. The nettles and brambles loomed ever closer and she slid toward them. A muscular pair of arms, luckily attached to the hottest body she'd ever seen, saved her.
Sheesh, he's worth almost getting nettle and bramble rash for.
"Sign here." The hot-bod hoisted her over the bushes as if she was a featherweight—and she certainly wasn't, a glance in her mirror told her that—and set her down on the crazy paving that meandered from the cottage to the shed.
Eh? Eva registered the fact the guy was in a postman's uniform. His tanned legs showed to perfection below regulation, well pressed, navy shorts and his short-sleeved pale blue shirt with its red logo over one pocket enhanced his muscular arms. And oh grief was that a tattoo peeking from under the sleeve? She was a sucker for tattoos. It was with difficulty that Eva firmed her lips to stop herself drooling.
"Where's Jimmy?" she asked as she scrawled her name. "And why accost me here?"
"Jimmy?" He looked confused for a moment and then his face cleared. "Oh, your usual postie. He's gone down with some lurgy or another. This area is short staffed so they've brought me in to cover. And you confused me because my name is James, though I get called Jamie. Jamie Parlane at your service."
No you're not. Neither Jamie Parlane nor at my service, and oh shit life is gonna get complicated. Why is he here? Playing postie? All of a sudden Eva had recognized the guy in front of her. The clothes he wore had thrown her at first.
Wrong uniform.
A nasty itch set about teasing her shoulder blades. Why don't I know about it? I'm only on a week's leave at home, not in Acapulco or Australia or sommat. Heads are about to roll.
"Hello," she said evenly. His eyes narrowed. Well it wasn't the most gracious of greetings. Tough. "So, why track me to here?"
"I have to get you to sign for this letter," he said as he handed it over. "Eva McEwan, Lochan Cottage."
Eva took it, and glanced down at the small padded envelope. She recognized the typeface and the assumed name on the back. Probably it was arriving an hour or so too late.
"But I don't live here. I live about half a mile down the track toward the village. This is Gorse Cottage. I'm trying to get my bloody dog to come out of that shed before the owners come back and give me laldy. They're the sort that give unpleasant a bad name." She raised her voice. "Russ, get your backside here now, or no treats for a week."
There was a rustle and a joyful bark as a black and white bundle shot between her legs and jumped up in apparent pleasure to see her. Then it spun around three times and leaped up at Jamie. To Eva's amazement, Jamie picked the squirming bundle up and held the puppy far enough away not to have his face washed.
"Enough. Yes, you're gorgeous, but give over now." He tucked Russ firmly under his arm and looked directly at Eva. "It's not Lochan Cottage?"
She shook her head.
"So what are you doing here then? Being neighborly?"
It was a fair question. Eva pointed at the now still and apparently comfortable Russ. "Hardly, they aren't the neighborly type. No it was him and his Houdini tendencies. He seems to think the shed here is his meaning for living. God knows what's in it, but if he ever gets off his lead and out of the garden he makes a beeline, or a dog line to it." She didn't add she also wondered what on earth was in the building. "You must have missed my home."
Jamie grinned. "So where's Lochan Cottage then?"
"It's set back behind trees a bit. Look can we get away from here? I have one of those nasty unpleasant itches between my shoulder blades. The sort that says something unpleasant could well happen if we don't." She wasn’t sure why, but experience had taught her never to ignore it. Shit was about to hit the fan if she did.
There was the noise of a vehicle approaching and then stopping. Doors slammed and high voices were heard.
"Oh fucking shit." Eva stared up at her companion. "You might talk your way out of this predicament, by showing your badge. I won't." And she couldn't show her badge anyway. Even if she had a mind to—which she didn't— it was at home.
"Here," Jamie thrust Russ at her. "Can you slip away through the trees? I'll fend them off. I do have something for this house as it happens. Then I'll meet you at yours." He swung round and walked swiftly and silently to the door. Was it serendipity that the cottage was set back to front and the
front door faced the garden, not the road? The letterbox was in it, so a postie would have a need to circle the house to be able to deliver a letter.
Eva watched and admired his ass for a few seconds and then made her way behind the shed and through the only bit of fence that hadn't been renewed. Most of the old ramshackle planks had been replaced, and would be impenetrable. For now there was a three-foot section with a couple of planks missing. She held firmly onto Russ as she wriggled through the nearest twelve-inch gap, and walked along a tiny deer track. A hundred yards or so on, she branched off at a tangent and made her way toward her own cottage. Luckily the deer track went up the side of the hill and didn't keep to the floor of the valley toward her home. She didn't want her neighbors to find how accessible they were.
As she walked Eva turned her current situation over in her mind. So what was Jamie Swinton, presently known as Parlane doing masquerading as a postie? Was it pure bad luck that she recognized him? After all, their acquaintance was very slight. If she'd hadn't taught him on one occasion, and recognized him on one other memorable one, he'd have pulled his impersonation off. She wasn't sure whether to be thankful, amused or dismayed that he hadn't recognized her.
A happy yip from Russ brought her out of her musing and back to the present. She'd reached the boundary of her land, and across the garden Jamie was sitting on the bench next to her back door, his long legs stretched out in front of him. Her house was built the correct way round, and her back door faced the rear garden, with its fruit bushes, scrap of lawn, and roughly dug earth, that Russ thought was his personal bone burying land.
Russ wriggled and she let him down on the ground. He scampered off to Jamie and squirmed with pleasure as Jamie leaned forward and stroked his ears.
Jamie looked up as Eva approached him. "Hi, you made it, and so did I it seems. Such pleasant neighbors you have. I was told in no uncertain terms to leave their post in the village. I told them they'd need to go and sign to have that happen."
"Would they?" Eva asked, intrigued at the insight into all things Royal Mail.
"No, idea, I've never come across that yet, but it was enough to annoy them. Something about the guy I spoke to put my back up. Not very professional, but—" he shrugged. "I'm only human. They were not best pleased, and muttered something about privacy and invasion of such things, and I had no right on their land. Then I pointed out them there was no such thing as trespass in Scotland. I wonder what they have to hide?"
Eva had pondered long and hard over that herself. So much so, she'd made discrete enquiries at work. That made her remember the letter she'd stuffed down her waistband so she could keep a firm hold on a wriggling Russ. "Yeah, I wonder as well. Hold on, S… a sec." She mentally cursed the fact she almost called him Sir. That would really let the cat out of the bag, and until she found out why Jamie Swinton, cop and Dom was pretending to be James Parlane, postie, she wanted to keep the fact she knew who he was to herself.
Because as Eva would be the first to admit, even though at work she was known mockingly as Superbitch, the Domme Detective, or more properly Superintendent Evelyn McEwan, in her private life she was anything but. Given the chance—sadly not often these days—Eva was an out and out sub.
Chapter Two
Why the hell did she look familiar? Jamie scratched the ears of Russ, and searched his brain. He'd seen her before, he was sure of it, but for the life of him couldn't think where. He hoped to god it wasn't somewhere that could jeopardize this job.
The voluptuous woman standing in front of him was, he judged, in her early to mid forties, so around ten or twelve years older than him, with a body he itched to taste. Those curves were made for him to touch and hold and…whoa, hold it there. She's not one of the subbies who want a little bit of pain, nipple clamps, a nice crop mark over their ass, and a butt plug. She's just someone on this postal round that may or may not know something to help me. More's the pity. He coughed to regain her attention.
"Bad news?"
"What?" The woman—Eva—looked up from the paper in her hand with a peculiar smile on her face. "Oh no just the opposite. Am I last on your route like normal?"
He nodded. "Well you're last on my route anyway."
"Good, then you can come in and tell me all about it." She unlocked the door and preceded him into the kitchen. "Russ can come in as well. I can't be doing with chasing after him again. Although he has a well honed sense of preservation, and after the first kick up the jacksie the asshole, sorry my neighbor gave him, he only heads off in that direction when their car has gone down the lane."
Jamie shut the door behind them. Even though the day passed as warm for Scotland, there was enough humidity to make the midges a pain in the ass. A pain everywhere in all honesty. He scratched a bite and made a mental note to put repellant in the van the next day.
"Here." Eva handed him a small bottle. "Antihistamine. It'll stop you itching. At this time of year the midges are horrendous. Lovely long evenings that I admire from behind glass, and watch clouds of the buggers trying to get in. Remember, repellent is your best friend on this route." She picked up the kettle and turned on the tap.
Jamie laughed. "Yes, Ma'am."
Eva spun round from the sink, unheeding of the water that spilled over her hands and dripped onto the floor. "Why did you call me Ma’am?"
Now he was confused. "Well, you sounded bossy. Sorry, I thought you'd get the joke. You know Ma’am, in charge sort of thing. I'm sorry if it upset you." Shit, I hope she's not one of those touchy feminist types.
"Not at all. I just wondered why Ma’am." She turned back to the sink, switched the tap off and then the kettle on before mopping the floor. Only then did she swivel around to face him again. "And yes, Sergeant, you can call me Ma’am, if you want to. Otherwise, here, Eva will be fine."
He knew fine well his jaw dropped. She'd made him? How the fuck?
Eva smiled at him. "Sorry Sergeant." She waved the letter he'd brought, and she'd signed for. "It doesn't matter how often I tell them that post to this neck of the woods takes longer than in the city, do they ever listen?" she asked—rhetorically he assumed. "Oh no," she went on. "They post this at some stupid hour of the night and expect me to get it the day after. Not only that some penny pinching asshat put a second class stamp on it. So, Sergeant James Swinton, from a different area of the force, How about telling me what you've found out."
He shut his mouth, and swallowed heavily. "Ah. Oh bollocks, am I deep in the shit?"
"Ah, indeed." Eva reached into a drawer and took out small leather wallet. "And no, not at all, unless you think you should be for not recognizing me." She went bright red. "Although I've only had brief contact with you. I…er…taught a session when you were on a training course last year." She, handed him the wallet, and he saw what was inside.
A warrant card with her photo on and stating she was a Chief Inspector in the Scottish Police force. Okay, he'd buy that, even though it was the biggest cock deflator since Sadie Stewart laughed at his attempt to find her clit. Mind you he was only a teenager at the time, and his aim and attention to the female body had improved considerably since then.
"Ma’am." He snapped to attention and she laughed.
"I'm allegedly on holiday, and you're allegedly a postie, so we can cut the formalities I reckon. Time enough to get out the tags and labels when we have to. You're a long way from home, why did they choose you?"
Why did he think she was deliberately changing the subject? Oh she'd taught him, he didn't disbelieve that, but there was something else, he'd stake his pension on it. Now he thought about it, he couldn't believe he'd missed the connection. However this luscious woman with, he reckoned, braless breasts covered in a soft lawn gypsy style blouse, teamed with a long almost see through maxi skirt was nothing like the stern-faced woman in uniform that had addressed his class. Only the eyes were the same. A deep glittering blue-green that reminded him of the Caribbean Sea. As he stared into her eyes, a dim memory teased him. Where else had
he seen eyes that beautiful color?
"Yes, I remember." He omitted the Ma’am this time and her eyes danced. "Well so far I've found zilch."
"Hmm, hold on let me make what, tea? Coffee? Then we can chat."
Jamie looked at his watch. "I've got about half an hour before I need to empty the post boxes in the afternoon uplift. I might be a policeman undercover, but it was made clear to me if I didn't do the job I'm in now, I'd be out on my ear. I even had to do the training before they let me loose on my own. Well, if you can call it that. Two days with Jimmy, who thinks I'm an eejit working somewhere where I don't know the Blacks live next door to the Greens and the Browns live across the crescent." He rolled his eyes. "All those people with colors for their names. So Scottish, but I bet people down south would think I was making it up."
"Very likely, but where's the Greys?"
"Next street."
Eva sniggered because it was true. "So, how did they get Jimmy to take leave?" She sounded genuinely interested. "All my letter says is you're here to see what you can find out without letting them know who you are."
"Evidently the post office ran a who's the best postie thing, and he won two weeks leave and some money to spend on a holiday."
"They did?"
"They didn't but someone put up the money."
Eva looked at her letter again. "I see it. Then when can we talk?"
"Once I've emptied the post boxes, I'm off shift. Could I come back then please Ma’am?" This time he did use her title. "From then, until seven in the morning, I'm off duty from both the police and the post office. So, are you the contact I was told I'd have?"
"It seems so, Sergeant." She also used his rank, and he was sure, on purpose. As if he would forget this woman he lusted after was his superior officer. "Are you plainclothes now? It doesn't say so here."
His Boss, Her Dom Page 1