by Cathryn Cade
Daisy laughed. “Oh, you should see your face. Honey, Jake isn’t gonna be into that weird stuff. I…don’t think. Just doesn’t seem to fit him, you know?” She shook her head and disappeared behind the curtain.
“‘I don’t think’,” Carlie mimicked under her breath as she closed the curtain of her own cubicle. “He better not be, or I’m out of there.”
“Well, one thing you need to remember,” Daisy said, her voice muffled as she pulled something over her head. “He’s a dom. He’ll be making the decisions, not you. So let him. Let him make you deliriously happy.”
Carlie blew out a breath, stripping off her sleeveless top and pulling one of the black dresses from the hanger. “That, I’m ready for.” She grinned at herself in the mirror.
She was not smiling a few moments later. Instead she felt like plunking herself down in the upholstered gray chair in her black lace bra and panties and crying—again. None of the three dresses fit. Well, one did, but she was not parading into the club with everything fighting to burst free from spangled black Lycra.
“What do you think of this?” Daisy flung open the curtain to Carlie’s cubicle and posed. She was clad in a startling black piece of fabric. Carlie guessed it was a dress, although there was so little of it, she wasn’t sure. But Daisy looked cute in it, as always, even when she frowned, disappointed. “Didn’t like any of those? Well then, maybe it’s time to call in an expert.” Before Carlie could protest, Daisy was gone, out of the dressing room.
Carlie shook her head and picked up her own dress. Then she clutched it in front of her, eyes wide as the curtain flew open to reveal not the goth clerk who had greeted them when they walked into the boutique, but another woman.
She was as dramatic as the store itself. Her long, straight hair was jet black with a red stripe, her skin milk chocolate, her eyes dramatic in dark shadows, her lips full in brilliant red lipstick. She wore a red bustier and black leather pants, tucked into stiletto-heeled boots, and she was not a thin woman. She narrowed her eyes at Carlie and smiled slowly.
“Well, well, what have we here?” she purred. “A club virgin, come to my store to find play clothes? Perfect. I’m Ebony Black.”
“Hello,” Carlie said politely. “I’m Carlie.” And where the heck was Daisy? Some best friend she’d turned out to be. “I, um, don’t really think your things suit me—”
Ebony Black—right, like that was really her name—cocked her hip, and smoothed one hand down her leather-clad thigh. “Not suit you? Girl, are you not looking at me? We have nearly the same figure. And if I look this fabulous, so can you. Oh, I can see you wouldn’t wear my things on the street, you have a classic style. But we’re not talking the street now, are we?” She winked at Carlie and ran her tongue over her bottom lip. “We’re talking sexy kink.”
Couldn’t argue with that, or at least Carlie didn’t have time to frame one before the woman shook a manicured finger at her. “You stay right there, and I will bring you some of my special collection.”
“Special?” Carlie breathed as the woman turned away. That sounded ominous.
“For real women,” Ebony Black flung over her shoulder, already striding away. “With actual curves.”
Carlie grimaced. Great, kink-wear for chub-ettes. Although this woman certainly rocked her full figure. Carlie wished she had that kind of self-confidence.
“Stop that,” Daisy scolded, pausing in the doorway. “Whatever you’re thinking, lose it. Sara knocks herself for being too slim, not enough curves, and here you are putting yours down. Aghh!”
“I’ll try,” Carlie promised, but she did it doubtfully.
Daisy nodded. “Good enough. I’m getting this bustier. And I’m betting you’ll walk out of here with at least one outfit too.”
Much to her shock, Carlie did.
Thirty minutes later, she and Daisy were on their way, both carrying shopping bags adorned with red metallic lips pursed for a kiss. Carlie’s bag was larger than Daisy’s because it contained twice as many garments.
She sure hoped Jake liked the things she’d chosen, or she was out a few hundred dollars. Dressing slutty in a classy way did not come cheap.
Jake lay in bed for a while the next morning. This was something he usually didn’t do, but this morning he stretched hard, enjoying the feel of old cotton sheets sliding against his bare skin and then relaxed, one arm behind his head. Staring blankly at the strips of summer morning sun making their way through the blinds on the south window, he instead looked inward, chasing memories. With his other hand, he reached down absently and gave a soothing stroke through his shorts to his usual morning wood.
He’d had a real interesting dream featuring Carlie. They hadn’t been at the club, where he might expect to dream about her, but at the gym. She’d been in that dress she’d worn Saturday night. Deep purple, with long sleeves and a draped neckline she probably thought was modest. And on any other woman it might be, but when it skimmed her rich curves, swelling over her breasts, nipping into her little waist and then outward again in swirls of fluttery fabric over her hips and thighs to end at her knees, it was like the wrapping on the best gift ever. One a man couldn’t wait to dive into.
He couldn’t remember much about the action in his dream, just that she’d been standing by one of the exercise machines, beckoning to him. He’d seen her just as Gerry appeared, out of nowhere the way people did in dreams, to stand at her side. He smirked at Jake and put his hand on Carlie, cupping the back of her neck like he owned her, like Jake’s warning and punishment had never been delivered.
Pure, possessive rage roaring through him, Jake had stepped forward to claim her, but found that he couldn’t move, his body mired in immobility. That was pretty much all he remembered.
He scrubbed his hands over his face, and curled up to a seated position. Damn dreams always seemed to find that one worry and blow it up like a jumbo digital screen at a sporting event. His worry? That Carlie would decide not to come to the club, or if she did, she’d decide he wasn’t the dom she wanted. If she did, he couldn’t very well intimidate her or the man she chose—however much he might want to. It wasn’t the way things worked. A sub had to consent fully, or no one touched her.
Well, one thing he knew for sure, that fuck-head Gerry wasn’t getting his hands on her again. If he so much as looked at Carlie wrong, Jake would take pleasure in rearranging his face—this time permanently. He’d hit him once, and for Carlie he’d do it again. Hell, for any woman. Unless she was a cock-tease who got off on leading men on and then shooting them down, no woman deserved to be spoken to that way. And even then, there was a right way to express anger. Telling a woman he would be doing her a favor to fuck her was not okay under any circumstances.
And Carlie was, from what he’d observed, far from manipulative. She was smart, funny, shy around men—at least him—but she spoke her mind, even when doing so clearly took her out of her comfort zone. He fuckin’ loved watching a rosy blush bloom over those high, round cheekbones of hers, and that mouth priss up like a big rosebud. He couldn’t understand why some guy, some smart dude who worked in a big office and wore a tie to work, played golf on the weekends and went to church on Sundays, hadn’t snapped her up and put a ring on her finger, gotten her pregnant already.
Whatever, it would be Jake’s gain.
Tossing back the covers, he slid out of his bed and turned back to straighten the pillows and pull the blue comforter over the king-size expanse. He bent to pick up the two big throw pillows he’d bought in a coordinating blue-and-cream check and tossed them up near the head of the bed. That done, he was ready for his day.
This was his first really good bed, purchased for this house. This was because the bungalow was the first place he’d ever lived that was his—well, his and the bank’s—and he wanted it to be comfortable and look nice. He wasn’t into fancy shit, but he knew what he liked and, thanks to his retirement pay from the Marines and his salary as Big Iron Fitness manager, he could afford to
buy well-made stuff.
The club would show a nice profit one day too, but for now, the corporation he, Dack and Trace had formed, Three Iron Ltd, was plowing all club profits back into the club and into a slush fund, because with a new business, you never knew. Shit happened, especially at a kinky sex club. Members signed a liability waiver, but that wasn’t perfect protection from lawsuits.
He’d chosen his king-size bed because he liked to sprawl and he’d been thinking about getting a dog. When he did, it would be a big one like a Lab or a German shepherd, and it might want to sleep on the foot of the bed sometimes. That would be okay with him, as long as it stayed off his pillows. Floors got cold during damp, chilly Pacific Northwest winters.
Walking into his master bath was, as always, a treat. He’d had it done in rustic tile, beige and cream, with two sinks set in a long counter before a big double mirror with medicine cabinets behind, and plenty of storage below the counters. The glassed-in shower was on the left, an enclosed toilet next to that, and the end of the room was taken up by a big whirlpool tub with a wide-tiled surround. Awesome place to lie back and let the jets pummel away the soreness of a hard workout. He’d had to bust a hole in the outside wall to get the tub unit in, but it had been worth every bit of trouble and expense.
All this was a far cry from the succession of dingy trailers and apartments in which he’d grown up. Usually furnished with odds and ends previous residents had left behind, and beat-up crap from Goodwill. Thanks to his dad’s choice of avocation, they’d left more than one rental in the middle of the night, taking only what they could pack in a hurry into the old Buick Le Sabre.
Under the hot spray of double showerheads, Jake remembered that he was expecting a phone call from dear old Dad. His father was getting out of Coffee Creek today, the big correctional facility south of Portland for minimum and medium offenders. He’d lucked out the last time he was arrested for theft in Portland—he’d had less than an ounce of weed on him, so they couldn’t bust him for selling, just possession. Also, he hadn’t been in a stolen vehicle that time, just had some tools he claimed he’d “found”, valued under two hundred dollars. Another misdemeanor.
Right on cue, as Jake stepped out of the shower and toweled off, his phone rang. He stepped over to the counter to check the display and his jaw tightened, his gut along with it. Yup.
He let it ring while he slapped his damp towel on the rack. He looked in the mirrors at his grim, unshaven face as he put the phone to his ear. The hell with shaving; it was his day off.
“Hey, Ray,” he said evenly. “How’s it goin’?”
“Son,” Rayburn Stone rasped, his voice gravelly from a lifetime of smoking whatever he could get his hands on. “Goin’ good. I’m breathin’ the free air.” For his…what was this, fourth time?
Jake walked into the big closet between the bathroom and bedroom and reached for a pair of faded, comfortable khaki shorts. “Good for you. So what’s next?”
His father paused, and Jake waited for the jovial suggestion that he might like a bunk mate for a while. A suggestion that he’d steeled himself for the first time to refuse. He planned to stay in this neighborhood. He didn’t need the old man around, giving him a bad name with the neighbors and local law enforcement. Because Ray would behave for a while, but then he’d get bored and drunk or stoned, and wind up in trouble again. He always did. And Jake would be watching him shuffle out of a courtroom in an orange jumpsuit and handcuffs one more time.
But then his father shocked the hell out of him by saying quietly, almost hesitantly, “Well, son, I know I promised you a visit when I got out, but I, uh…I met someone. Think I’ll stay with her for a while, be up to see you in a couple weeks.”
“You met someone?” Jake echoed, dumbfounded. How the hell did a man meet someone in minimum security lockup, unless he was gay, which Ray Stone was not? “What, one of the nurses, or something?”
Ray chuckled. “Nah, they’re all strappin’ young fellas like you. Charlene has a son in Coffee Creek, matter of fact—in for bustin’ up a bar pretty good. She visits him regular. He introduced us. She’s a real nice lady.”
Jake just bet she was. He could picture her now, dressed twenty years too young for her age, with too much makeup, artificial nails and hair dyed some improbable shade of red. His dad had always had a weakness for hard-partying women—starting with Jake’s mother.
“Well, hope that works out for you,” he said.
Ray paused. “Me too, son. Me too. Gettin’ tired of fast cars and faster women, y’know?”
Jake rolled his eyes as he pulled up his shorts one-handed and grabbed a T-shirt from a closet shelf. He carried it with him out of the bedroom and across the living room, dim and quiet with the shades closed for the night. He’d pull them up as soon as he got his coffee going.
“Well, you’re an adult now,” he said dryly. “Maybe it’s time to think about more productive ways to spend your time.”
His dad laughed, although it ended in a smoker’s hacking cough. Jake winced, holding the phone away from his ear as he walked into his small kitchen. He opened the fridge and pulled out the carton of orange juice, opening it one-handed. Tipping it up, he took a long drink. The tart, chilled juice slid down his throat.
“Besides, Charlene told me I go back in, we’re through,” Ray said. “She’s a good woman, and she said she ain’t visitin’ two men behind bars.”
Jake swallowed and lowered the carton. “Better listen to her. Remember what the judge said. You get caught again, with anything, you’re goin’ to maximum security.”
His father shuddered audibly. “Nope. Ain’t goin’ there, son. Swear to God, I ain’t.”
Jake hoped not. Much as his father pissed him off, which was a lot and often, the state pen was not where he wanted his old man to end his days. Ray never meant any harm; he just had a way of convincing himself—when he’d been drinking or smoking weed—that whatever he wanted to do on the spur of the moment was what he should do. “So, where’s this Charlene live?”
“Little wide spot on the road by the Wilson River, out toward the coast. She runs a café and bar, gets a lot of fishermen and tourists. Thought I might help her out tendin’ bar.”
“Great.” Jake could imagine how long that would last, like setting a fox to watch the chicken house. “Her son bust up her place?”
“No, no. He was in Portland. Benny’s, down on Stark Street.”
Jake grunted. He knew the place, never been there. “Well, good luck to you.”
“Thanks, son. I’ll be talkin’ to you soon, don’t you worry.”
“Take your time.”
Jake was worried, but not that Ray would not call or show up. He was worried that when he did, it would be with law enforcement in pursuit and Ray needing money for a lawyer.
He set his phone on the beat-up kitchen counter and rolled his shoulders restlessly, throwing off the tightness inevitably caused by a conversation with his father. Since he was in his early twenties, home on leave from his enlistment in the Marines, he’d realized he was the only adult in their relationship. For whatever reason, his father was never going to mature past the kind of rowdy, impulsive behavior that got him in trouble again and again. At least this time Ray would be raising his hell somewhere other than here.
After he ground coffee beans and set up the coffeemaker to brew his usual three cups of strong, dark coffee, Jake leaned back against the counter and looked around the small, dingy kitchen. This fall, when the weather turned chilly and wet and he no longer wanted to spend as much time as possible outdoors, he planned to tear the room apart. Break out the wall behind him and open up the kitchen to include the long, narrow pantry.
Then he’d rip out the inner wall and put in a peninsula instead with hanging cupboards above, so the kitchen was divided from the dining area and living room, but not completely isolated. New cabinets, granite countertops and some top-of-the-line appliances would turn the cramped space into an enjoyable place to coo
k and eat, even have friends over.
He liked to eat, and a man couldn’t eat out all the time, wasn’t healthy, so he’d taught himself to cook. He wasn’t great, but he wasn’t bad. One thing he could do well was barbecue. The Weber grill cookbook was his bible, and he’d studied it faithfully.
Many weight-lifters lived on protein drinks, turkey breast and shit like that. Jake wanted to be healthy, but he wasn’t involved in competition, so he ate pretty much what he wanted within reason. He also drank beer when he wanted.
He pulled a bowl from the cupboard along with granola and a spoon, then added blueberries and milk from the fridge and took his breakfast and mug of coffee out onto his little back patio to watch the day begin. His backyard was quiet, nothing moving except a duck wandering along the other side of the fence.
Too damn quiet. Maybe he’d look into that dog now, instead of waiting.
He ate his cereal, drank his coffee and thought about the club, and Carlie.
Soon, he promised himself. Soon.
Chapter Eleven
When Carlie walked into work Friday morning, the reception desk was empty, a surprise, as Monica liked to be there to glance ostentatiously at the clock if any of the staff walked in past eight o’clock. Carlie passed into the office proper, and the hair on the back of her neck stood up. Since she had carefully done her hair up in a French roll to go with her dressy, sleeveless, champagne-hued fitted jacket and knee-length skirt, she thought at first it was a blast of air-conditioning. But heads turned all over the office. Her coworkers looked at her, then quickly away. A few smiled. Two of the computer techs, hanging out by the water cooler already, put their heads together and murmured.
She brushed her free hand down the front of her skirt. Crap, had she spilled her coffee? No, because she’d checked her appearance in the mirror outside in the foyer. Was her hair sticking out funny? No, she would have noticed that too.