by Jane Henry
So she’d held her breath, ignored her beating heart, and told him she planned a quiet evening at home instead.
Which wasn’t a lie, right? She’d be home later and have a quiet evening after that. And she had been doing what she needed to do to protect herself and her kid.
“Everything okay?”
Alice guiltily glanced up from her phone at the man across from her, who watched her with sharp eyes and a slight frown. She’d been ignoring him.
“Er, fine,” she said. “Just a… work issue.”
“A work issue,” Gary muttered, “I had no idea waitresses had to be on call.”
Alice took a deep breath, mentally cursing Gary for his jerky comment. But her phone drew her gaze back like a magnet, and she scrolled further down.
That's ten, babe, with my hand, over my knee. One more time, or the next time we meet, you get the strap.
Yes, Daddy.
She felt her thighs clench and her belly flip in longing.
She shot a glance at Gary, who had cast his eyes to the ceiling and was pointedly (and, she thought, rather passive-aggressively) tapping his fingers on the table top, and gave a mental sigh. Now was not the time to dwell on Alexander Slater and his high-handedness… nor the way that high-handedness seemed to work for her in a major way.
Still, she could feel heat flood her cheeks when she read his final message. Good girl.
It’s not real. It’s a game to him, she reminded herself. Reality is right in front of you.
Taking a deep breath, Alice put down her phone.
“But honestly, Pedro’s served me the worst margarita I’ve ever had in my life,” Gary said with a shake of his head as he scooped up one last forkful of pasta. “I told the bartender, ‘I’m all for the authentic Mexican experience. I mean, I’ve been to Cabo San Lucas. But I want the sand under my feet, not in my glass.’ ” He chuckled at his own joke.
Alice attempted something like a smile, but it was a chore to get her muscles to move in the proper way. There were so many things wrong with the shit coming out of this guy’s mouth, she wasn’t sure where to begin. And she knew, based on her attempts to address the homophobic things he’d said during the salad course and the elitist bullshit he’d spewed before their pasta arrived, that he wouldn’t listen to a word she said anyway. This date was turning out to be a one-man show.
Which begged the question, of course, why she didn’t just get up and leave. If it had been Slay saying such awful things, she’d have leapt up and read him the riot act before marching out the door, no matter how many spankings he threatened her with. But with Douchebag Gary, she’d held her tongue and kept the peace. Why was it easier to be herself with Slay?
Why did she instinctively know that Slay would never say such nasty stuff in the first place?
Mom and Dad love Gary, she reminded herself. He’s a good person. He has a successful career. He goes to church. He’s dependable.
But the thought of him airing his opinions in Charlie’s hearing turned her stomach, and that’s when she couldn’t pretend to herself anymore. Charlie needed dependable; he didn’t need a dependable asshole. She would be polite and she wouldn’t make a scene, but she couldn’t date someone like Gary, no matter how perfect he seemed on paper.
She toyed with her pasta—some spaghetti carbonara dish that couldn’t hold a candle to the version Tony prepared at Cara—and then resolutely set her fork on the side of her plate with a clink.
“This has been a lovely evening,” she began.
Gary nodded and signaled to the waiter, who came over to clear their plates and ask if they’d like dessert.
“No!” Alice said loudly. In a softer voice, she repeated, “Er, no, thank you. I really should be getting home.”
The waiter, who had likely overheard just a little too much of Gary’s diatribes, shot her a sympathetic glance. “All right then,” he said. “I’ll just bring over the…”
“I’ll have the tiramisu and a coffee with amaretto,” Gary said, as though he hadn’t heard either of them. “She’ll have the same.”
Alice and the waiter exchanged a glance, and Alice lost her hold on her patience. “I don’t want tiramisu,” she said clearly, feeling her ears turn red as she rose to her feet. “Or coffee. In fact, I really need to be going…”
And then a deep voice came from behind her, a musky, smoky scent surrounded her, and she knew she was screwed.
“What’s your hurry, Allie-girl?”
A large hand clamped on her shoulder and gently pushed her back down. In one smooth move, Slay snagged an empty chair from a nearby table and placed it between her seat and Gary’s. Then he sat down, straddling it, folded his enormous tattooed forearms along the top of the chair back, and glanced from her to Gary with what seemed to be avid curiosity… if you couldn’t feel the absolute fury that pulsed beneath his skin. Alice could definitely, definitely feel it.
She shivered.
“So, what are we talking about, kids?”
Gary looked at Slay, and then at Alice, wordlessly demanding an explanation.
Good luck, Gary. I can’t explain it either, she thought furiously. What the hell was Slay doing here?
“Gary, this is Slay—er, Alex,” she corrected. “He’s a… coworker.”
Gary blinked. “You? Are a waiter?” he asked Slay, his gaze raking Slay from his shaved head, over his pierced ears and eyebrows, to the tattoos peeking over the top of his t-shirt and scrolling down both arms, and finally taking in the breadth of his muscular chest.
Slay gave him a smile that was anything but friendly. “Do I look like a waiter, Gary? Ask yourself, really look deep inside yourself, and think about it before you speak. Do I look like a waiter?”
Gary’s eyes widened. “No,” he whispered. “You look like a…”
Slay’s eyes narrowed, and his smile turned feral, daring Gary to finish the sentence. “Like a what, Gary?”
Alice held her breath and waited to hear what insulting thing Douchebag Gary would say. A thug? A criminal? I’ll kick him in the balls, she thought. And then blinked in shock at her instinctive need to defend Slay, even when he was being a total jerk.
But douchebag though he might be, Gary wasn’t a total idiot. “Like a manager,” he squeaked diplomatically.
Slay snickered and his eyes glinted with real humor. “There ya go!” He reached out one broad palm the size of Gary’s head, and clapped Gary on the shoulder in a friendly way that would likely leave a bruise. “You might just make it out of this in one piece.”
Slay’s voice was so pleasant that it took a minute for the meaning of his words to penetrate. Alice knew the second the threat registered, because Gary’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t think you know who I am,” Gary blustered.
Slay smiled his not-friendly smile again. “Funny you should say that, Gary, funny you should say that. Because that’s what first dates are all about, isn’t it? Getting to know each other?”
Slay turned to look at Alice fully for the first time. His brown eyes were nearly glowing with anger, but it was the hurt she glimpsed there, the betrayal, that made her catch her breath. Guilt churned in her stomach.
Slay continued, “I’d love to help you two along with that. Help you break the ice, see if there’s a real connection here. You see, Gary, I know a few key things about Alice that I think you should be aware of.”
Alice shook her head wildly, but Slay continued. “Like, did you know that our Alice is turning out to be a compulsive liar?”
Guilt turned to anger in her belly. “Slay, I am not!” she exclaimed.
Gary looked from her to Slay in confusion. “What are you talking about?”
“Well, first, she was caught smoking a cigarette after she said she didn’t smoke,” Slay explained, his eyes locked on Alice’s. “But her daddy already made it very clear that he doesn’t find that behavior acceptable, didn’t he, honey?”
Her breath caught in her throat. Oh, God, it was so wrong. She wanted t
o kill him, absolutely slaughter him… and yet his words made her thighs press together and her clit pulse.
Slay looked at her expectantly. “I said, ‘Didn’t he, honey?’ ” he demanded.
Alice sucked in a shaking breath. “He did,” she agreed. Anything to get him to stop before he said something worse, something that would get back to her parents. “Please, Slay, don’t…”
“And then tonight, she lied to her daddy,” Slay continued in that same confiding tone. “Told him she was going to be staying in for the night when she was out on a date.” Slay made a tsk-ing noise. “She’ll answer for that, too, though, Gary, believe me. Her daddy is none. too. pleased.”
Alice sucked in a sharp breath.
Gary shook his head. “That’s ridiculous. I know Miss Cavanaugh’s father, and he’s well aware that I’m taking his daughter out tonight. He gave me his blessing.”
Slay turned his focus to Gary. “Did he? Really? Hmm… I wonder. Because there are a few things I know about you, Gary, that I think Alice here should be aware of. And some things about your boss, too.”
Gary’s face flushed. “I think it’s time for you to leave,” he sputtered.
“Nah! Not when we’re just getting acquainted!” Slay disagreed. “Tell me, how’s Chalo doing?”
Gary’s face bled of color. “What?” he whispered.
Slay held his gaze and said nothing for a moment. Then turning to Alice, he explained, “Your friend Gary has some very questionable work associates, Allie. Not all of them are endorsed by the Chamber of Commerce.”
Alice looked at Gary, who looked back and forth between her and Slay with a look of mingled fear and outrage.
Huh. Maybe Gary’s job at Marlborough Investment Group wasn’t quite as boring as Alice had imagined. She suddenly wished she’d paid closer attention.
“That’s crazy!” Gary cried.
“True enough, man, true enough. The things I’ve seen your boss do to people who cross him are truly crazy,” Slay agreed, his voice sharp as a blade. “Shoulda read the fine print before you signed on to be his lapdog.”
Alice felt her eyebrows rise. How the heck did Slay know Gary’s boss?
“So here’s how this is going to work,” Slay said. His words were hard, no longer maintaining a pretense of affability now that his cards were on the table. “You’re gonna walk out of this place right now with a smile on your face, and let me pay for your dinner. You’ll go home and tell everyone that Alice, here, is a lovely and charming lady, but things just didn’t work out. And then you’ll forget that you ever knew her. You will lose her number. You will strike her name from your vocabulary. Understood?”
Gary appeared to be seething with anger and it was clear he wanted to argue, but couldn’t. “Fine,” he spat. Then he made as if to rise, but Slay put his hand on Gary’s shoulder once more and held him down.
“Oh, one more thing you need to know about Alice before you go, Gary. She’s mine. You need to get that, absorb it way down deep in every pore, and then pass the message along to all your, uh, colleagues. Anyone who breathes too close to her loses teeth, anyone who talks to her loses fingers, anyone who lays a hand on her loses more than that. Yeah?”
Gary looked Slay in the eye and what he saw there made him swallow. Hard. “Yeah,” he agreed sourly. Then he stood up and looked at Alice. “Lovely evening,” he said. He walked away muttering, “Fuck.”
Alice stared after him as he left, trying to get a handle on her emotions. What the hell had just happened? She felt outrage at Slay, some measure of guilt she was pretty sure was misplaced for not keeping him informed about her every movement, anger at Gary for being a douchebag, and disappointment in herself, both for agreeing to this clusterfuck of a date in the first place and then for not walking away an hour ago. And beneath it all, a warmer, deeper emotion that she didn’t want to acknowledge. Slay had rescued her. He cared.
Slay stood too. He reached for his wallet and threw a bunch of cash on the table, then grabbed her elbow and yanked her up. “Let’s go, Alice.”
She grabbed her coat and purse, and allowed him to steer her out of the restaurant without causing a scene, but when they reached the parking lot, she shrugged out of his grasp.
“Let me go, Slay. You’re hurting me.”
He wasn’t, not really, but she had no desire to talk to him right now. She needed to get home, calm down, make sense of what had happened before she discussed this.
She tried to stalk to her car.
He whirled her around to face him.
They were alone in the parking lot, but for a few empty cars. The cold air made Slay’s breath fog, and she could see his chest heaving as he fought to calm himself.
“What the fuck was that?” he demanded.
Fine. He wanted to have it out here, in a public parking lot, before she’d gotten a handle on herself?
She took a step closer and let her own fury loose.
“That was you being a total ass!” she cried.
“Me! You’re cheating on me with that… that… Jesus, Alice, I can’t even think of a word to describe him… and you think I’m being an ass?”
She threw out her hand. “You can’t cheat on someone if you’re not together, Slay!”
“Not together? Not together? You called me Daddy, Alice. You’ve been in the scene long enough, babe. You know what that means.”
She shook her head violently in denial. “No! There’s where you’re wrong! I have no fucking idea what it means! You ignore me for months, months! You reject me time and again. And then suddenly, you change your mind and come after me. You—” She broke off, glancing around to make sure they were still alone before lowering her voice to a harsh whisper. “You spank me, you fuck me against a wall, you make me call you Daddy while we’re having sex, and just like that I’m, what? Your submissive? You’ve been in the scene long enough, babe. You know it doesn’t work like that.”
She saw his jaw work back and forth while he absorbed this. Somewhere in the distance, a car alarm sounded, then shut off. The cold air slowly froze her cheeks and her fingers as they stared at one another.
“You lied,” he said eventually, calmer now.
She looked into his eyes, barely visible in the glow of the streetlight. Once again, she saw that below the anger was hurt, and she realized her mistake.
All along, she’d thought the daddy thing was just part of the kink, part of the sex, and she’d been going along with it, but telling herself it wasn’t real. That it would end as soon as he got tired of sleeping with her. But what if… what if he was being real? What if he really had intended to be her dominant, her daddy, long-term? That would mean that she had unknowingly been the one messing with him.
Damn.
She sucked in a breath and blew it out. “Yeah. I lied. I shouldn’t have done that.”
“You shouldn’t have been out with him to begin with,” he said angrily. “And let me be clear. I don’t want you to see that fucker, not even to talk to him. If you see him hanging around for whatever reason, if he calls you, texts you, emails you, sends you a freakin' telegram, you tell me immediately, and I’ll make sure he gets the message to go away, you get me?”
She shook her head. “Slay, I have no idea what’s happening here,” she said honestly. “Straight talk right now, okay? Total truth?”
He nodded once, shortly, and she continued, “I don’t know what you want from me beyond sex, and I’m not sure if this whole thing,” she gestured between them, “is right for me. For Charlie. For the record, I’d already figured out that Gary was an asshole, but I had no idea just how…”
She stopped as a thought occurred to her, chilled her far more than the cold night could.
“Slay?” she asked slowly. “How did you know where I was tonight?”
Nora and Tessa knew she was on a date, and, therefore, the whole crew likely knew. But no one but Gary knew the restaurant she’d chosen, and she doubted that Gary had confided in Slay.
/> “I had a guy tailing you,” Slay said. “A guy who does work with me, contract security work, has been watching you, protecting you, when I wasn’t around. Turns out, it was a good thing he was.”
She blinked and felt her jaw sag. He said it so matter-of-factly, like he wasn’t dropping a verbal bomb right here in this parking lot, like he hadn’t detoured so far into Wrongville he’d never find his way out.
When she couldn’t summon words from beneath her anger and outrage, he continued. “You’re mine, Alice.”
As though that explained his actions? As though it justified them? The unmitigated arrogance of his statement jogged her words loose.
“Oh, yeah? I’m yours? Because you suddenly decided you want me? Well, isn’t that super? Aren’t I lucky? How about you get this, Alex Slater? Get it, you know, deep in your pores or whatever the fuck,” she said, imitating the deep, threatening voice he’d used on Gary. “I haven’t decided if I want you yet!”
He folded his arms across his chest, unperturbed by her anger. “Thought this was straight talk, Allie,” he taunted. “Total truth. You want me. We both know it.”
She shook her head. “I don’t mean sexually, Slay.”
“I don’t either,” he growled, stepping towards her. “You want me to be your dom. You know you do. And part of me being your dom is protecting you.”
She bit back an instinctive denial. Total truth, she reminded herself.
“I want you to be my dom,” she admitted, watching heat flare in his eyes. “But I don’t know that you can give me what I need. I don’t want to be watched or babysat. Doing creepy stalker shit without my knowledge or consent doesn’t make me feel protected. It makes me feel threatened and coerced. Weak.”
His head went back and his arms crossed over his chest.
“Believe me, I have enough people in my life who’d love to boss me around and control me,” she continued, thinking of her parents, her neighbors, even some of her friends. “But I have a kid, Slay. I need to be strong. I need someone who’ll help make me stronger. I need a partner, not someone who wants me to play a role when it’s convenient for them.”
