peaches had been a bundle of nerves ever since the scheme had been conceived. She had lost sleep with each passing day, and the guilt was weighing down on her.
But what could she do? She needed out, and her Master didn’t want to release her. She didn’t want to do the website anymore, but she also didn’t have a dime to her name, either. She had her Master to thank
for that. She had to find a way out, but things were getting completely out of control.
Jail was not an option. In her mind, that was worse than the hell that she was dealing with before Aris died.
She could still see the look in his eyes when he realized that he was going to die, before the hood was placed over his head, and the look of pure shock when she emerged from the shadows and he figured out what she was part of the cause of all that had befallen him.
That look would haunt her forever.
She had to get her power back. That was what the others had told her.
She had her power back, but at what cost? What price had she paid just to get away?
“I’m going to Dominic and tell him everything,” peaches finally told Dana, fidgeting with a shot glass in her hands. “If it means that I go to jail, at least I won’t be alone.”
“You’re making a fatal mistake, peaches,” Dana warned, turning her body towards peaches. “I would rather that you reconsider your decision.”
“I’m not scared of you anymore,” peaches replied while standing from her stool and turning to leave. “It’s time that I stopped being a victim.”
peaches walked out of the bar despite hearing some yelling coming from behind her from Dana, the music making the screaming inaudible. But what peaches didn’t realize was that Dana wasn’t yelling at her, she was yelling over the earpiece on her cell phone, beckoning the person on the other line to tie up yet another loose end to keep her secret safe.
peaches was in a cab heading from her former residence down I-85 South, heading towards Hartsfield-Jackson. She didn’t notice the car that had been following her cab from the moment that she left the residence, at least not while she was packing for the cab.
But she wasn’t able to ignore it anymore.
She kept wondering if she was being paranoid. Every turn the driver made, the suspicious car made with him. She urged the driver to go faster, keeping a vigilant eye on the car the entire time.
She lost sight of her would-be pursuer during the transition off the highway and onto the airport complex. For the moment, she felt that she would be free.
All she needed to do was to get to the security gates and whoever was stalking her would be unable to get to her.
Baggage claim, no sign of any trouble.
Ticket counter… still nothing.
No signs of anyone that might have been following her.
Or so she thought.
But then she had a disturbing thought.
She had no idea as to whether the person was male or female, black or white, nothing that would help her get a security officer alerted to her plight.
She scanned for people that seemed out of place, anyone that might want to do her harm. She kept scanning as she walked, trying desperately to place a face to her panicking demeanor.
She didn’t even hear the agent trying to get her attention to place the boarding pass into her hands.
Almost there, she told herself.
Then, peaches spotted a man glaring at her, a look so menacing that she pegged him for the person that
followed her down to the airport by car.
In her desperation, she quickly ducked into a women’s restroom to gather her thoughts and figure out how to get in touch with an officer. Someone, anyone that might be able to set her free from the prison that her guilt had created for her.
She was startled by a calming hand on her shoulder. peaches turned around and saw a stunning woman, dressed in an airport security uniform, staring back at her.
The woman looked maybe early 40’s, and she possessed a maternal spirit about her, a spirit that immediately put peaches in a tranquil state.
“Are you ready to leave, young lady?” was the only question that the woman asked her.
peaches nodded, placing her hand in the woman’s palm.
The woman’s eyes were so trusting, peaches mused, so reassuring.
She could set me free, peaches thought again.
The woman’s eyes had captured her, so much so that peaches didn’t immediately feel the heat of the blade that the woman had brandished from her waist piercing across her throat.
“You will be there soon, child,” the woman stated, almost as if she were reading peaches’ mind.
peaches could feel herself taking flight as she heard the woman reciting something that she couldn’t make out. It was as if she were telling the next world that another would soon be among them, and to welcome her home.
Finally… she was free.
~Fifteen~
I took a couple of days off after the episode at the hotel.
It was needed for all of us, that much was certain. So, we basically vegged out in the hotel room for a couple of days, developing a deeper bond between the three of us and giving housekeeping a reason to change the sheets every morning while we went out for breakfast.
As much as I wanted to stay out of the mix a little while longer, Natasha and I still had work to do on the other case involving Aris.
We were in my office brainstorming on what other motives and suspects could be out there to sift through.
“I think someone killed Aris because of the way he was treating his submissives,” I said as I sat up and walked away from the bed. After a long minute Natasha answered me.
“Because of Jenna?”
“Yeah, because of Jenna. Ariel said she was a real love slave, devoted,” I replied. “I’m guessing she had the same sort of cult-like obedience that peaches has. I want to find out what happened to her.”
“Consider it done, Sir,” Niki immediately complied. “It shouldn’t take more than a few days to get you that information.”
“Explain peaches to me, Dom,” Natasha said as she walked into the living room and pulled her dress on. “Just from the description that Niki gave me, she sounds like she’s really been worked over.”
“Where do I begin?” I wondered aloud, my eyes stealing some last glimpses of her exquisite body. “People get turned on by lots of things. Some of them are pretty sick. Some are just strange. Consider financial slaves; some women make a good living by allowing men to send them money. In return for the money, the men get abuse. It was mostly e-mails, sometimes letters and phone calls.”
“That’s it, money for abuse? What’s the point?” Natasha interrupted, which ruined my train of thought for a brief moment.
I wanted to tell her to shut up and let me finish; maybe gag her. I found it just a little bit amusing that my kink was acting up while I was castigating the kinks of others.
“The point is the poor bastards get a kick out of it. They find pleasure and satisfaction in the arrangement. Is it healthy?” I asked rhetorically. “Debate at your leisure, but peaches is another thing. She was interested in the control. And I think she went too far into the fantasy. Giving all the money she made at a demeaning job to Aris was just one way of demonstrating the control he had over her. She loved it, too. But I think Aris took things beyond the usual range of kink, and because peaches wasn’t the first one he did it to, I wonder who was. Maybe Jenna was a victim? But Ariel said he told her Jenna was dead. So I wonder...”
“Where are the women that came between Jenna and peaches?” Natasha finished.
I nodded. “Yeah, I’ve got no idea how I’m going to run that down. Please do me a favor and write a memo thanking me for my work and telling me that it’s not needed any longer.”
“Why?”
“Because a nice thank you letter from the police is a good thing to have and I suspect I might have to use investigational methods that would be frowned upon,” I r
esponded.
I wasn’t stupid; the way that this Aris murder was going, I was good as replaced anyway. The case was starting to get cold, and the only way to keep things on the front burner was to do things as a PI that I could never have been able to do as a cop.
“Like restraining a source and beating her with a whip?” Niki broke me out of my thoughts.
“A flogger, baby,” I corrected her.
She slipped her shoes on and stood up from the chair, walking over and standing so close I could smell the faint remnants of the perfume she’d worn the nights before when we were all together. She gave me a long, long look. “Be careful, baby. Someone killed Aris and they might have tried to kill you. I’m not about to lose you… not when I just found you.”
I waited until she turned and walked away before swallowing.
“And I might not care that much about my career, Dom. I’ve got to think it through,” Niki stated as she leaned down to kiss Natasha goodbye and then passing by me again to leave a kiss on my lips and neck.
Then she was out the door.
“What was she talking about, Dom?” Natasha asked, still stretching her naked body.
“I have a feeling that you and Niki have been talking about the possibility of being with me,” I took a stab in the dark. “Niki’s trying to figure out whether she can be in both worlds, especially when she’s about to be an assistant D.A.”
“Dom, I think you realize that we both want you,” Natasha leaned her body down to the floor, crawling between my legs as if she were a cat needing to be stroked. “It’s not going to be easy being cops and submissive to you, but I think we’re both willing to try.”
“Natasha, I don’t have a problem with having the both of you, but I can’t think about that possibility right now when we’re still in the middle of a homicide case,” I cautioned her, more trying to stall for time than anything.
It’s every man’s dream to have more than one woman devoted completely to him. Lord knows that I’ve seen both Ramesses and Amenhotep have the beauties that they have that adore the ground that they walk on.
But over the last few days of my enjoying the both of them in every way that my mind could conceive, I couldn’t help but feel a little apprehensive about the responsibility of having them openly both in my life. I mean, I had the same power when I was in college and I completely abused it, so, it stood to reason that I needed to check myself when I see that I was in the same position now.
So, for now, I was going to have to keep a level head about how I proceeded.
I wanted them both, I’d decided that much, definitely.
But I was not making the same mistakes twice.
I looked at the loveliness that was on her knees looking up at me, and I told her, “We will all discuss this, once this last case is over with, okay?”
“Yes, Sir,” Natasha cooed in my lap. “If there is anything that I can do to help with this case, now that the one we’re working on is almost wrapped up, I’ll be happy to help with when I’m not dealing with the drama at the PD.”
I spent the day on the phone and the computer, spending company money on an investigation that technically I hadn’t been hired to solve, but actually we were hired to solve if you think about it. Sometimes you just have to trust your instincts. My instincts were telling me that Aris was a bad, bad man who’d deserved the death he’d gotten.
I played several scenarios in my head. At first, I thought that it was a hit that was covered up to make it look like a kink scene gone wrong. But the problem with that was the type of equipment that was used.
Only an experienced player would know how to do the damage that was done to Aris. Mobsters might be efficient, but they’re not that efficient.
Next was the possibility that Aris might actually have been one of those Dominants that liked to be bottoms from time to time, and he might have gotten with someone that might have had a ‘moment’ and decided that since he was there for the taking, that they went ahead and took him out. I mean, you never know how a person is until you get them behind closed doors.
Look what happened with Natasha and Niki both.
Who would have thought?
The scenarios were coming fast and furious to me, but none of them fit the profile of how the body was found, as well as the person or persons that were responsible for the murder.
Our company computer hacker had gotten back to me while I was in the middle of my madness. The Acquiescent Sluts website was owned by Pucci Entertainment, a company out of Houston, Texas. He’d found video footage of six women who’d been in the apartment before peaches, but he hadn’t been able to identify any of them. They all had ‘stage’ names like ‘Sir Fucksalot’.
I’m not making this up, that’s an actual example.
I spent an hour e-mailing pictures of those faces to the various contacts and asking if they had a name or information to go with the face. Then I started calling back the people I’d talked to about Aris’ subs.
By the time evening rolled around I had a lot of notes, but still no answers to my questions. Apparently I had been a little lenient in my assessments of my fellow kinksters; Aris was as unpopular with them as he was with me, albeit for different reasons. It seemed Aris had rubbed a lot of folks the wrong way.
Rude was a term frequently used.
Domineering, and not in a good way, was another.
He’d been quick to demand obedience and respect from everyone and hadn’t done much to earn either. But finally I was reduced to scanning my notes, and hoped my brain would turn up a connection when the phone rang.
“Law,” I answered.
“Law, this is Santiago. I’m at the airport and I’m looking at the body of Kimberly Stevenson, a.k.a peaches,” her voice was completely professional, which let me know that it was serious.
“Shit!” I cursed out loud.
“There’s a newspaper guy from the AJC here asking why we allowed a witness to be murdered,” she was sounding more irritated by the minute.
“You know that she wasn’t a witness,” I started to say, but that was stupid of me. Niki knew she wasn’t a witness, especially after going through most of it with Natasha and me.
But the reporter knew there was a connection between peaches and Aris, and basically it caught her off guard when she arrived on scene. “Thank you for the heads up, baby.”
“You owe me,” she said as she hung up.
This thing was starting to blow completely out of proportion, and the only thing that I could do was do as much damage control as humanly possible. I was seriously hoping that the television cameras weren’t too focused on this case.
I had Sinsual on speed dial. I knew she wasn’t going to be pleased about this at all, but I needed her help to keep the community calm.
“Dominic?”
“peaches is dead, Ma’am.”
“Damn it! Have You told Ramesses?”
I bypassed that question, because I knew he would find out before I got off the phone with her. “It gets worse, there’s a newspaper reporter who knows about the connection between peaches and Aris.”
“You’re supposed to be making this go away, Dominic,” she said sternly, almost chastising me for letting this slip through.
“If You want miracles, go to New Birth. I sent You some pictures, Ma’am. I need to know who these women are and You know everyone in the local scene.”
I didn’t ask for her help because I didn’t have to. Besides, when Dominants started playing power games with each other, things tended to get irrationally messy.
“Don’t call Me to follow up on this, Dominic, I’ll contact you,” she said and hung up on me.
Dinner was shrimp primavera and fresh strawberries on the side, washed down with a bottle of red wine.
Don’t look so surprised, cooking helps me relax and I like to eat well. My kitchen is probably the best maintained area in my house, it’s certainly the cleanest. I had a funny feeling that the girls would be changing all
that if I had my way, though.
I was debating the merits of a warm fudge brownie when the phone rang.
“I’ve got another game for You, Sir.”
Ariel.
“I’ve got another appointment, Ariel. I don’t have time for games right now,” I lied. “Would you take a double header later?”
“I’d really rather that it would be ‘Game on’, Sir. Perhaps I could come by Your place later?” Ariel was pretty insistent this time around, which was not like her. Something was up, but I really wasn’t in the mood at that point.
“I’d rather it be ‘Game on’, too, but I’ve got a case I’m working on,” I politely tried to brush her off.
Yeah, more lies, I was a private investigator, remember?
“Hmm.... Okay. But these are good statistics and I want a really good double header, perhaps You and Your mentor?” she teased it in such a way that I was able to read between the lines and figure out that she was telling me that I’m going to really need to put this game into overtime.
“You have My attention, Ariel,” I replied. This might be the break I’ve been looking for.
“That submissive I told You about, Dana? I saw her picture in the AJC today, on the society page. She’s wearing the black evening gown. I will see You sooner, I would hope, Sir.”
“Yeah,” I hung up the phone and pulled a pair of shoes on. Out of habit I strapped my SIG-Sauers to my shoulder harness and pulled my coat down over them. I don’t like to repeat my mistakes, so I looked to see if anyone was obviously waiting outside my home with a gun.
I didn’t spot anyone, which wasn’t the same as saying there wasn’t anyone there, so I walked out, got in the truck and headed down the street to pick up a paper.
I got down to the coffee shop that I normally frequent in downtown Fairburn to pick up the AJC really quick, and I flipped to the section where the society announcements were located. There, live and in living color, was a striking brunette in a strapless evening gown with a gentleman, I assumed was her husband, that was standing next to her in the photograph.
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