Evernight Publishing ®
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Copyright© 2015 Evernight Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-77233-256-8
Cover Artist: Jay Aheer
Editor: Karyn White
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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.
UNIFORM FETISH
10 AUTHOR ANTHOLOGY
Cat’s Rescue by Doris O’Connor
To Serve and Protect by Sandra Bunino
Wilde Start by Susan Hayes
Person of Interest by Lila Shaw
A Passionate Witness by Moira Callahan
Always by Donina Lynn
Wings of Gold by Evie Knight
Unshakable Me by S.J. Maylee
Welcome Home, Jason by Wren Michaels
First Class by Meredith J. Scott
CAT’S RESCUE
Doris O’Connor
Copyright © 2015
Chapter One
The incessant wailing of a cat penetrated through Cat’s sleep befuddled brain, and she groaned. Pulling the cushion over her head achieved nothing. She could still hear Miss Pitty Pat, as her stone deaf elderly neighbor’s cat was called. The calls were becoming more urgent, and downright pitiful.
Damn it. Ethel would never hear her, and the little white cat wasn’t normally this insistent. Maybe she was hurt? That thought galvanized Cat into action, and she swung her legs out of bed to investigate. Frigid air assaulted her when she did so, and Cat grimaced anew. It was nice and cozy under her covers, but despite the Indian Summer they were having, temperatures dropped sharply at night, and Cat shivered in her negligee-type nightie. She was a sucker for pretty lingerie, but they weren’t exactly suited to rescuing cats at—she glanced at her phone and groaned—2:00 AM.
Glancing through her window she could just about see Miss Pitty Pat perched on the ledge outside, and her stomach lurched. The little cat’s pristine white fur was covered in dark patches, of … oh my God, is that blood?
Adrenaline surged through Cat’s system at the thought that Ethel’s beloved cat was injured, and not thinking any further than her immediate need to check on the cat, she yanked up her old fashioned window, and stuck her head out. Another blast of cold air greeted her, and Cat shivered.
“Here, Pitty Pat, here. Come on, baby, you can do it.” Miss Pitty Pat’s wailing stopped, but the animal didn’t make a move toward Cat. Just regarded her through narrow slits of her feline eyes, and backed away more.
“Damn it.” The feline hissed at Cat’s curse, and she mentally berated herself. If the adorable fluff ball was hurt then, of course she would be wary, even of her. The fact that Cat had taken Miss Pitty Pat in countless times in the past, when she had managed to slip away from Ethel, counted for nothing right now, it seemed. There was only one thing for it.
With a wary glance up and down the moonlit street, Cat swung a leg out of her window until her bare feet reached the rough stone ledge. Frigid cold traveled up her leg, and her naked ass scraped along the windowsill as she turned to get her other leg out, giving anyone who might pass by a direct view up her knicker-less state.
Cat swallowed her embarrassment and once fully out on the ledge, inched her way across it slowly, while making soothing noises for the feline’s benefit. The hissing stopped, and Cat breathed a sigh of relief, short lived as it was. No sooner had she reached the cat, than the precarious lock on her window gave way, and the frame slid down with an ominous thud. One click of the lock later and Cat’s fate was sealed.
She was stuck on a ledge three stories up, wearing nothing but a silky night dress with no means of getting down. Oh my God, down.
Cat’s breathing sped up, when she made the fatal mistake of actually looking down. In her concern for Ethel’s cat she had completely forgotten about her unreasonable fear of heights. She made a hasty grab for the cat, earning herself some scratches in the process, and screwed her eyes shut. If she didn’t look down she would be just fine. Someone would pass by soon, and rescue her. They had to. All she had to do was not panic, and not fall off this ledge.
"Now, I'm either already asleep, having another erotic dream about the hot teacher from across the road, or you're really stuck up a ledge in the middle of the night. Either way, I sure appreciate the view."
The deep, gravelly voice of the street's resident hunk wrapped itself around Cat's senses, and heat burned her cheeks.
Yep, her humiliation was complete. Rhys Jones, firefighter and sex god, stood just behind the rose bushes, arms crossed over his expansive chest. The street light reflected off the side strips of his uniform, and she groaned. Just her damn luck, he had to walk by on his way home from his shift and find her like this.
Too late his actual words registered. He thinks I'm hot? Maybe I’m the one dreaming, or stuck in an erotic novel. That thought made her grin despite the situation.
“Say something, little cat. Just to reassure me that you’re not a figment of my imagination.” Amusement laced his words, and he laughed when Miss Pitty Pat gave a rather loud meow.
“Okay. That’ll have to do. So, what happened, you decided the cat needed rescuing, and you got yourself stuck in the process?”
Cat tried to speak, she really did, but another gust of wind whipped the hem of her nightdress up, and made her shriek instead. Definitely not dreaming then. She flattened herself against the wall as much as she could without squashing an indignant ball of fluff, and started to pray in her head. Please don’t let me fall.
“Say, Cat, are you okay up there?” Concern laced that deep rumble of his this time, and Cat managed a careful shake of her head. Even that small action made her stomach roil precariously, and she whimpered.
“So we’re clear, you decided to rescue Ethel’s cat, and got stuck yourself?” At her tentative nod, he sighed, and she was sure he mumbled something far from complimentary under his breath. Then again he could have said anything, and she wouldn’t have heard him over the rushing in her ears.
“Cat, did you hear me?” There was an unmistakable edge of command in his tone of voice this time that meant her eyes snapped open and she sought his gaze without any conscious effort on her part.
“That’s my little cat.” His voice dropped further, sending shivers across her skin that had nothing to do with the frigid night air, and everything with the sheer presence of this man. Being under his intense scrutiny did strange things to her equilibrium, and almost let her forget the fact that she was about to fall to her death—almost.
“What I was saying is that I’m going to go and get my ladder, and then we’ll get you off of there. You just stay right there, and be a good girl, now. You’re safe. That ledge is wide enough to hold you. So, just breathe and think happy thoughts, and I’ll be right back, before you can say cat rescue.”
He winked at her, and Cat nodded. After one last searching glance over her shivering form, Rhys turned and jogged across the road. Despite her situation Cat barely suppressed a sigh of feminine appreciation at the poetry in motion that was Rhys’s clenching ass, as he jogged off. The man was just so sexy, it wasn’t even real. Standing at almost six and a half feet, Rhys was every woman’s dream of muscled hunk, with his messy short brown hair, eyes the color of deep chestnut, and a smile to charm the birds out of the trees, or hapless females off ledges, it seemed.
Cat smirked
at those thought processes. It really was beyond ridiculous. How many times had she swooned on the spot when he’d glanced her way as he’d been cutting the grass, or doing some handy work around the place? Ethel had had him over for coffee more times than she could count on one hand, and had done her best to push you two young folks together, as she’d put it, but Cat usually ran the other way, far too tongue-tied around the sexy firefighter. He could grace a calendar for flip’s sake, he was that damn good looking, with those cute dimples when he smiled, and he was kind to old ladies to boot.
And silly females stranded on ledges in their nightwear. Where was a hole to hide in when you needed it? God, I have turned into such a fuckin’ cliché.
****
Rhys grabbed the ladder he kept in his garage and made it back across the road in record time. He still couldn’t believe his luck. After all this time, he finally got his little cat on her own. It was the flash of white halfway up Cat’s block of flats that had snared his attention out of the corner of his eye, as he’d walked back from his shift. It had been one hell of a day, and he hadn’t been at all sure he wasn’t hallucinating. After all, his eyes still felt gritty from the earlier smoke inhalation. It was all in a day’s job, of course, and he’d managed to save the kids trapped upstairs in the house fire. He crunched his jaw in disgust, remembering the scene. Some folks weren’t fit to be parents. Passed out on a cocktail of booze and drugs, their mother’s lit cigarette had caused the house fire that had robbed those kids not only of their home, but also the family dog. It had been his barking that had alerted the neighbors to the fire. Without the mongrel, who hadn’t made it out alive, the outcome could have been very different.
Rhys pushed the disturbing thoughts to the back of his mind, and looked up at the small, forlorn figure of Catherine Martin. She’d snared his interest from the minute she’d taken her class of disabled children for a visit to his station, and when he’d learnt that she was in fact one of his neighbors, he’d tried everything possible to get to know her. She was just his type. Intelligent, curvy, with wonderfully pale skin that would mark so beautifully under his hands, and long strawberry blonde hair that reminded him of the fires he fought. Rhys clenched his jaw at the thought processes that made his balls twitch. You’ve got it bad, man, and for someone who is determined to avoid you.
Cat, as she preferred to be called, kept her distance from him, seemingly immune to any of his usual seduction techniques. She seemed to have him pegged for just another one of the guys out for a good time, thanks to a throwaway comment his station commander had made when he’d introduced Rhys to Cat that day at the station.
“Meet Rhys, also known as our panties melting Don Juan.”
Cat’s brilliant smile had dipped at those words, and Chief had slapped him on the back with a short laugh.
“Just kidding, he’s one of our best, and the kids love him, so you’re in good hands.”
The damage had been done, however, and she’d refused any of Rhys’s attempts to get to know her better outside of work. He’d settled for being around, and he knew she wasn’t as impervious to him as she’d made out to be. More than once he’d caught her watching him when he was doing yard work, or helping her neighbor out, and it had only fueled his obsession with her. Something had to give sooner or later. It was damn difficult climbing ladders with a hard on brought on by merely thinking about her.
What’s more no other woman had got his cock even remotely interested, and even the boys at the station had commented on his sudden lack of interest in the opposite sex. Blue balls syndrome was not a condition he normally suffered from.
Rhys glanced up at her frightened stiff form huddled on that ledge, and smirked. Maybe that was about to change. Right now she was at his mercy, and the way she had responded to his dominance so far had simultaneously made him hard enough to pound concrete and planted a simmer of hope in his chest.
He hadn’t meant to go all Dom on her, but she’d looked at the verge of freaking out, and the last thing he needed was for her to panic and fall off that ledge. She would hurt herself, and he had plans for that luscious ass he could see. Another gust of wind had kicked up the hem of the surprisingly racy night dress she wore, and he swallowed his groan, and adjusted his dick.
From his position underneath her he could tell that that she was bare underneath that negligee, and that thought turned him on even more. Who knew his little cat had a penchant for naughtiness, as well as a submissive personality? Once he got her off that ledge they would have to explore that some more.
“How are you doing up there, little cat?” he asked. A frightened yelp was his response, when the ladder scraped up the wall just next to her head, and a wave off protectiveness floored him.
“I’m going to come up and then we’ll get you down. I need you to let go of Miss Pitty Pat.”
He ascended the ladder as he spoke, and Cat jumped when he put his hand on her shoulder. Cold clammy skin greeted his fingertips, and Rhys swallowed a curse.
“How long have you been up here, Cat?” he asked, and when she didn’t respond he took another step up the ladder until he could wrap both his arms around her. A shudder went through her frame, and he pulled her closer into his body to shelter her from the breeze. It was getting stronger up here, and she was so damn cold.
“Answer me, girl.” Rhys dropped his voice further and tilted her head up with one hand to make her look at him. Fuck, she was so beautiful. With not a speck of makeup on her face, her skin had a flawless quality about it. Her almond shaped eyes spoke of some Asian heritage in her past. It made an interesting contradiction to the mane of sun-kissed hair that he wanted to bury his fists in. Her full lips trembled and her green eyes widened as they focused on him, and the cutest crease marred her forehead as she seemed to think his question over. Rhys ran his thumb over her bottom lip, fascinated by the contrast of his dark fingers on her pale skin.
“I-I don’t know. It was like two, when I noticed her.”
Rhys swallowed another curse bubbling on his tongue. It was now past three in the morning. No wonder his little cat was half frozen. He didn’t even stop to examine that possessive pronoun he’d just called her in her head. He thought of her as his for a long time now. And she damn well would be his, just as soon as he’d coaxed her off this bloody ledge.
“Time to get you off here, baby.” Her eyes widened further at the endearment he’d let slip, but she nodded just once and then grimaced.
“I’m not sure how. I can’t move.” Her voice trembled, and her eyes filled with tears. She swallowed nervously, and heat stained her cheeks as though she was embarrassed by that admission.
“Afraid of heights?” he asked, and she nodded just once. Affection swamped him at the fact that she risked all to rescue a little cat, as misguided as that had been. As far as he could tell there was nothing wrong with Miss Pitty Pat. She looked perfectly content perched in the clutch hold Cat had her in, and he was pretty sure the damn animal was even purring. In his experience cats never needed rescuing, yet it didn’t stop folks from trying, and sure enough Cat’s next halting words confirmed this.
“She was hurt. Couldn’t just leave … her.”
Miss Pitty Pat’s purrs grew louder, and Cat looked down at her with her a frown as the feline’s contented state seemed to dawn on her.
“I don’t understand. She was crying, and she’s covered in…” She swallowed hard and brought her expressive green eyes back to his gaze. “Blood.” She whispered that last word, and Rhys took a closer look at the cat.
Sure enough her white fur was bloodstained, but judging by the fine feathers that also stuck to her, little Miss Pitty Pat here had gotten herself a midnight snack of the feathery variety, and her howling had been nothing more than an attempt to get back into the warmth of her owner’s flat.
“She looks fine to me. I don’t think that blood is hers. Like I said I need you to let go of her, so that I can bring you down, and—”
Cat’s vigorous
head shake made the ladder wobble and cut him off.
“No, I can’t do that. It’s cold out here, and she shouldn’t be out. Ethel will be worried, and … yikes, put me down. No, damn you … oh shit.”
Rhys did the only thing he could do. Grab that delicious, if misguided, bundle of curves and fling her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. The cat hissed and clawed, getting both him and Cat in the process, but somehow he got them all safely down the ladder.
Cat rallied at him to put her down the minute they were on terra firma, but he paid her no heed, and on impulse swatted her ass twice with the flat of his hand. He massaged the sting away, and let his fingers linger. Oh yes, she liked that. Cat went limp over his shoulder, and finally let go of Miss Pitty Pat, who landed gracefully on her paws and stalked away from them with an indignant look over her shoulder.
“Enough, little cat.” He indulged himself by swatting her ass once more, gratified to hear her sharp intake of breath, and then strolled across the street.
“You’re coming home with me, so that I can take care of you. Now stop protesting or I will put you over my knee and give you the punishment you deserve for scaring me half to death like that in the first place.”
Chapter Two
Cat knew the feminist in her should be outraged at the way Rhys was manhandling her, but that side of her brain seemed to have stalked off with as much indignation as Miss Pitty Pat. Damn the feline for getting her into this predicament. Rhys must think her a right fool, and no way would he miss her body’s reaction to him. She might be half frozen, but this close to him every feminine cell in her body sighed in submission at this man’s dominance. Flung over his shoulder like a sack of spuds Cat had the perfect view of his ass, and she said a silent prayer of thanks that this was happening in the middle of the night, and no one else could see her large backside displayed for all to see. As it was Rhys would no doubt notice how wet she was.
Uniform Fetish Page 1
