“Where’s Kayla?”
Marci smiled. “Not ‘good morning, Marci. So nice to see you.’ Just, ‘where’s Kayla?’”
Gage chuckled. Marci was good natured. He knew she was teasing. “Good morning, Marci. So nice to see you. Where’s Kayla?”
“Good one. She called in saying she would be a few minutes late. I’m covering for her until she gets here.”
“Then I’m sure you won’t mind telling me how she likes her coffee. I’m making a run.”
Marci lifted an eyebrow.
“And you too, of course. What can I get you?” Gage grimaced at the way he was handling this situation.
“Sure, stud. Whatever.” Marci rolled her eyes. “I’ll have mine black if you don’t mind. Kayla is a frufru girl. Let me write her order down for you.” Marci grabbed a Post-it note off the corner of the desk and jotted several words. She winked as she handed the note to him. “Good luck, stud. Leave Thor here with me. I hardly ever get to see him.”
Gage smiled and walked Thor around the front desk. “Stay with Marci, pal. Be right back.” He often took Thor with him across the street for coffee, but if Marci needed some lovin’, Gage could share.
Thor retired from the military at the same time as Gage. It worked out splendidly because Gage had worked with the dog for many years and two tours in Iraq. The two of them were attached at the hip, literally. When Gage heard he would be able to adopt Thor and keep him, he breathed a huge sigh of relief. Thor was nine, but showing no signs of slowing down.
Now that Gage worked as the in-house K-9 trainer, Thor came to work with him every day. Everyone adored him, and he was the perfect example to help train the new puppies coming in. Most days Gage wasn’t sure who earned his paycheck, Thor or himself.
Gage made his way across the street and back with three coffees before Kayla arrived. He left her iced, decaf, vanilla latte in the center of her desk and tucked a folded note under it. Lunch was all he said. No question mark. No name. She would know who it was from, and it wasn’t really negotiable.
He liked Kayla. Surely she hadn’t missed that detail. He’d been flirting with her forever it seemed, but the woman either never took the hint or didn’t return his affections. No. That wasn’t true. There was more to it than that. She was guarded. That shield of hers kept him at arm’s length. It didn’t mean she wasn’t interested. She had no choice but to face him today, though. No way was he going to let what happened Friday night slide without addressing it.
The morning was busy. Several new puppies had been placed with handlers recently, and he spent his days training the handlers to work with their dogs. It was the most fulfilling job in the world, and he was damn glad to have spent eight years training military dogs, which made him more than qualified to take this job when he opted not to reenlist.
By the time Gage rounded to the front of the building with Thor looking for Kayla, it was after twelve. He prayed she hadn’t already given up on him and left. A grin spread across his face as he found her bent over behind the desk, flipping through a filing cabinet. “Ready?” he asked without hesitation.
Kayla shot upright. “Oh. Crap. You scared me.” She set one hand on her chest.
“Sorry. I thought you heard me coming. Lunch?” Thor sat next to him and wagged his tail. If Gage didn’t know better, he would think Thor was excited by the prospect.
“I can’t do lunch today, Gage. I’m sorry. I was late getting in. It’s busy around here, and I’m struggling to play catch up all day.” She pulled out a file and sat at her desk. From the corner, she lifted a brown paper bag. “Besides, I brought my lunch,” she added as if that made all the difference in the world.
He leaned over the edge of the desk. “You’re avoiding me.”
“Nope. Just busy.” Her gaze shifted away from him.
“Dinner then. You didn’t bring that in a bag also, did you?”
He saw her flinch. “Gage, I can’t do that either. I don’t even have a car today.” She bit her lower lip as she lifted her gaze to him.
“Where’s your car?”
“In my garage. It wouldn’t start this morning. Luckily my neighbor was able to bring me to work. He’s going to pick me up at five.”
He? Some guy brought her to work? Why did that make him want to punch something? “He is, is he? Well, call him and tell him not to bother. You have a ride. We’ll swing by your place. I’ll look at your car, and then we’ll go to dinner.” He lifted a hand when her mouth popped open, undoubtedly with her next excuse on the tip of her tongue. “Kayla, I insist. We aren’t going to walk around here for weeks on end ignoring the elephant.”
She nodded, letting her mouth fall shut.
“’K then. Glad that’s settled. I’ll meet you here at five.” He turned toward the front door. As he reached to push it open, he heard her small voice one more time.
“He’s seventy-six, by the way.”
He turned to face her. “Who?”
“My neighbor.” She smiled broadly and turned her back to him.
Gage shook his head, his own smile spreading wider. So, she knew he was jealous. Good. Fine. Let her. She wasn’t wrong.
•●•
Kayla couldn’t think the rest of the day. She’d fully intended to deflect Gage’s advances, but the man hadn’t taken no for an answer. After her encounter with him at noon, she’d been a ball of nerves.
At five o’clock, she grabbed her purse from her bottom drawer and stood.
Gage rounded the corner from the K-9 unit moments later. “Ready?”
She nodded, glancing down at Thor. Her hands shook, and she clasped them at her sides, balling them into fists. It’s just a ride home…and dinner…and a look under your hood… God, she almost moaned at the last thought.
Gage set a hand at the small of her back as he led her to his Jeep Wrangler. Black of course. And high off the ground. It suited him. And it was functional, which was more than she could currently say about her ten-year-old, midnight-blue Camry she’d bought used when she moved back to Vegas two years ago. At the time she was pressed for funds. Hell, she still was. She wondered how much this repair was going to set her back.
Gage opened the passenger door and held her arm as she climbed inside. He reached for her seatbelt next, and she batted his hand away. “I can handle a seatbelt, Gage.”
“Right. Sorry.” He shut the door, circled the hood, opened the rear driver’s side door to let Thor in, and then settled himself in the driver’s seat and turned to Kayla. “Address?”
“Oh, right.” Kayla rattled off her address, and before she could give him more specific instructions, he nodded.
“Got it. I know that area.” He pulled out of the parking lot and onto the busy side streets of Vegas. He took all the back roads, even some she hadn’t ever figured out herself. He really did know where he was going. Neither of them said a word during the drive, making Kayla uncomfortable, but not enough to cause her to start a conversation. The only sound in the car was that of Thor breathing heavily in the back. The poor guy must have worked hard all day.
When they pulled up outside her condo, Kayla quickly opened her door and jumped down from her seat. She used the keypad on the garage door and waited for it to rise while Gage and Thor waited next to her. “You don’t have to do this, you know. I can call a tow truck.”
Gage frowned. “You may have to still, but let me have a look first. It could be something simple. Hate to see you waste time and money on a tow truck if it isn’t needed.”
“Okay.” How could she argue with that logic? If the man was willing…
He turned to Thor as he rounded the car. “Sit. Stay.” The dog obeyed without hesitation, plopping himself down next to the driver’s side door. Gage lifted his gaze to meet Kayla’s. “How old is this car?”
“About ten years. I’ve never had a problem with it until now.”
“You’ve had this car ten years?”
“No. Of course not. I bought it two years ago
used.”
“Ah.” Gage rounded the driver’s side and opened the front door to pop the hood.
Kayla watched, admiring the way he wore his uniform. He wore the same thing every single day at work, but today she took a sharper notice of how he managed to fill out his black polo shirt and the way his cargo pants hung around his hips. He still had on his utility belt. Even his boots were sexy. They made him seem incredibly masculine.
She startled when he spoke again. “What did it do when you tried to start it this morning?”
“Nothing.” She came up beside him and peered under the hood with him, as though she had a single clue in the world what she was looking at. He reached inside and fiddled with a few things, pushing his sleeve up above his forearm. His muscles bulged. Kayla licked her lips while she watched him work. She had no idea what he was doing, but looking at him was not a hardship.
She may have been celibate lately, but she wasn’t dead. She knew a sexy man when she saw one, and Gage was by far the sexiest specimen she’d seen in this lifetime. If only she could get that thought out of her head and stop staring.
He leaned down, and she watched his back ripple under the strain. His shirt pulled tight, and she suddenly found herself wishing he wasn’t wearing the black polo shirt at all.
Gage righted himself and turned to her. “Can you try to start it for me?”
“Oh. Sure.” Kayla pulled her keys from her purse and squeezed behind him to get to the driver’s side door. There was barely enough space for one person, let alone two at the hood of the car, so her front brushed against his ass on the way by. She swore he stiffened his butt cheeks. She even glanced down to stare at them on her way by.
Lord, she needed to stop this infatuation she had for the man. No way was she going to take a relationship with him, or any other man, further than the occasional scene at the club. Anything else would be more than she could handle. Possibly ever.
Kayla exhaled a breath as she slid into the car and turned the key. Nothing. She stepped back out. Thor glanced up, but he never moved.
“I’m betting it’s your battery. Have you ever replaced it?”
She shook her head.
“It’s very corroded, and since the car isn’t even trying to turn over…”
“So I need a tow truck then?”
He shook his head, holding his hands out to avoid touching anything. They were already black in some spots. “Of course not. I’ll pop this one out and run it up to the parts store. They can test it and sell me a new one. Won’t take half an hour.” He leaned back under the hood to detach the battery.
She felt useless, and frankly she was. She knew nothing about the mechanisms of a car.
Gage popped a black, icky box out and held it up. “I’ll be right back, and then we’ll drop off Thor and go to dinner.”
Kayla tried not to react. She didn’t want to spend more time with him than necessary. She feared getting to know him any better would make things worse. She never should have approached him at Extreme in the first place. That had been her first mistake. Her second had been letting him talk her into doing it again. And the list went on…
The problem was she trusted him. Not because she knew anything about him other than where he worked, but she’d always had a deep solid trust for anyone in law enforcement. It was ridiculous. But her dad had been a cop, and she’d grown to respect everyone she ever met in this office. When she first came back to town, she was too busy and too scared to seek out a fetish club. It had taken a few months. Once she finally began to attend Extreme and realized both Rider and Gage were members, she relaxed, marginally. Her irrational self said no harm could come to her with two cops in the building.
Even though Gage wasn’t a cop, he did work for the police academy. And he was sexy as all get out. It hadn’t taken much for her to decide to try a scene with him. She knew he would never tell a soul. There was an ethical code at Extreme. No way would a man like Gage break it.
Now she questioned her thought process. Playing with a man like Gage meant she also had to see him at work. And clearly he was unable to leave the club at the club. Though how could she blame him after the idiotic way she behaved on Friday?
The only reason she’d returned to BDSM was to fulfill her need for the incredible release she got when she submitted to a Dom. Not sexual. She could handle that herself at home. But the physical release from a spanking allowed her to chip away at the emotional burden she carried. Every time she submitted to a Dom, another piece of her stupid past, her bad judgment, her poor choices, and the mental anguish she carried for her part in all of it slowly dissipated.
Everything about it seemed irrational. But she didn’t care. She did what worked and to hell with the rest. She never crossed the line with any Dom. Never flirted. Never acted coy. Never offered more than the scene. And no one questioned her. It wasn’t uncommon for subs to ask Doms to scene with them without strings. And it suited her perfectly. Any time she felt an inkling of something more—a stiffening in her belly or wetness pooling at the V of her legs—she tamped it down. It didn’t happen often. It happened every time with Gage. Even last Friday night on that cross.
God. She needed to nip this in the bud.
“I’ll be back in a jiffy,” Gage repeated as he set the gross box on the floor behind his seat.
She hadn’t realized she’d followed him to the car.
“You want to come with me?”
“No. I mean, how about if I cook dinner while you go? It’s the least I can do. Thor can stay with me.” Cook? You don’t cook. She reached down and patted the German shepherd on the head.
Gage grinned. “Sounds perfect.” He swung up into his car and pulled away, leaving her standing in the driveway, wondering what the hell her big mouth had gotten her into now.
The only thing she’d been thinking at the time was how to get rid of his firm ass quicker. Cooking seemed like the most logical answer.
Kayla turned and entered her condo through the garage. “Come on, buddy. Let’s go inside.” She didn’t bother shutting the garage door. It wasn’t as though someone could steal her car.
As soon as she entered the kitchen, she grabbed the pizza coupon from the side of her refrigerator and placed an order. No way in hell was she going to subject Gage to her cooking.
•●•
Gage returned forty minutes later after sitting in traffic and waiting in line at the parts store. He popped the new battery into Kayla’s car, found the keys still in the ignition, and started the Camry without difficulty. He didn’t bother to knock as he shut the garage door and let himself into her condo.
He climbed up one story to the main level and immediately smelled pizza.
Thor lifted his head from where he lay comfortably curled on the floor next to the kitchen table, but somehow managed to snub Gage with a sigh of indifference.
Kayla stood on her tiptoes at the counter, reaching for some glasses in the cabinet. He admired her ass for a moment, knowing what the smooth white skin underneath looked and felt like intimately. He wondered if she still sported the faint lines of his flogging Friday night and hoped that wasn’t the case. He didn’t like his submissives to wear his marks that long. And her skin was so fair.
When she turned around, she shrieked, almost dropping the glasses she held in each hand. “Shit. Gage. I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.” He rushed forward, washed his hands at her sink, and took the glasses from her.
“Did you find a battery?”
“I did. And she started right up. You’re good to go.”
“How much do I owe you?”
“Not a cent.” He carried the glasses to the fridge and filled them with ice from the slot on the door, noticing she had a variety of sodas on the island.
“Gage…” Her voice was exasperated. “The battery at least. Come on. You can’t just replace my car parts.”
“I can.” He turned toward her and set the glas
ses on the island. “I did, in fact.” He smiled and then nodded at the giant box steaming next to the sodas. “So, this is your idea of cooking?”
Kayla’s face fell, and she fidgeted with several cans of soda as though it were important to line them up properly. “I… Yeah, I don’t actually cook… I mean I cook, but…”
What the hell was up with her? She looked like…well, scared.
He frowned. “Pizza’s good. I like pizza. I don’t care if you cook. I was teasing.”
“Oh.” She lifted her face and pasted on a fake smile. “Good. It’s my specialty.”
“Perfect.” Gage picked up the box and carried it to the table. He felt like he was walking on eggshells now. This woman was a pile of mysteries.
Kayla followed behind him, set the glasses down, and returned for several cans. “I have a variety of sodas.”
He didn’t care if he drank water, soda, or Drano at that point. He just wanted Kayla to relax. He grabbed a random can and filled his glass, keeping his gaze on Kayla most of the time.
“I wasn’t sure what you might like, so I got meat lovers.” She opened the box, and the rising steam brought with it the delicious scent of sauce and pepperoni.
“I’m easy. I eat almost anything. That looks delicious.”
Kayla passed him a napkin and reached for a slice. “Thanks for fixing my car. That’s a load off my mind. I was afraid it would be in the shop for days and I’d be scrambling for transportation.”
“No problem. Glad I could help. And you do realize I could come pick you up if you’re ever in a bind like that.”
She lifted her gaze. “Thanks.”
They ate several slices of pizza before Gage sat back. “Talk to me.”
She exhaled slowly. “Nothing to say, really.” She shrugged and didn’t meet his gaze. In fact, she ripped the corner of her napkin in tiny pieces, plucking away at the thin paper. “I haven’t done a flogging scene for a while. I thought I was ready. Please don’t read too much into it.”
Don’t read too much into it? Was she crazy? Gage hesitated to speak. He didn’t want her to freak out more than she clearly already was. Finally, he opened his mouth. “Kayla, look at me.”
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