by Maren Smith
“Is that nice, little bunny?” he murmurs, just teasing my clit through my underwear. “Do you want daddy to make you come?”
“Mm,” I manage, running my hands up his arms and holding onto his shoulders. I want to come so badly that my pussy is aching. I wonder if I’m brave enough to ask him to finger fuck me.
“Is it okay if I call myself daddy when I touch you? You don’t have to say it back.”
I nod quickly. I like hearing that name on his lips. Each time, it sounds sweeter and sweeter, and I start to yearn to say it myself.
Trey hooks his finger inside my underwear. He groans, feeling how wet I am, and slides two fingers firmly up and down my sex, against my clit and through my folds.
“Sink into me,” I whisper, begging him with my eyes.
The corner of his mouth quicks. “Say please, bunny.”
“Please, please, please.”
“Good girl for telling me what you want.”
A champagne feeling fizzes through me at those two words. Good girl. I want to hear him say that again and again. His middle finger slides through my sex and pushes at my entrance, but before I can feel myself stretch around him, there’s a knock at my door.
He looks up, annoyed. “Are you expecting anyone?”
“Not that I can remember.”
“Don’t answer it.”
As much as I’m aching for Trey’s expert fingers to rub against my G-spot, I sit up breathlessly. I’ll feel bad if it’s a delivery and they have to come back. “It’s probably an order I forgot. I’ll be one minute.”
I quickly rearrange my bra and pull my top back on. The door is around the corner and Trey stays where he is on the sofa.
Trey, my personal trainer. Trey is in my apartment, and I think we’re going to have sex. This week is nuts. I’m so happy.
When I open the front door, I discover just how nuts this week is. Standing in front of me is Piers, my stupid, asshole ex-boyfriend.
He’s wearing a blue polo shirt tucked into jeans and gives me his familiar smirk. “Hey, Livia. Guess it’s your lucky day.”
It was my lucky day. All the rainbows and sparkles that have been bursting through my body for the last half an hour are replaced by a thrill of trepidation. “Piers? What are you doing here?”
I hear footsteps behind me. Heavy, angry footsteps. A warm hand touches my shoulder.
“Everything all right?” Trey murmurs, looking down at me.
I wrap my arms around myself. Everything was all right but now I feel frozen with terror.
Trey’s flinty gaze arrows into Piers. “Can we help you?”
From anyone else, the presumptuous way he says we would irritate me, but from Trey I feel protected.
Piers gazes at Trey with naked dislike, and then his eyes travel to me. I sense nasty words on the tip of his tongue. Couldn’t wait to spread your legs for another man, could you, Livia? Slut. Whore.
I’m not a slut. It’s been six months since Piers dumped me and I spent all of that time feeling broken and lonely. It’s like he sensed I was moving on, and it brought him back to my apartment like a bad penny.
“I’m here to talk to Livia, actually,” Piers sneers at Trey.
Trey turns to me. “Do you want to talk to this man?”
I shake my head.
Trey steps past me and forces Piers back from the doorway. When they’re both outside, he turns to me. “I’ll head out, too. I’ll see you tomorrow at the usual place.” Then he turns to Piers and claps a hand on his shoulder, steering him back toward the stairs. “Come on. I’ll see you out of the building.”
Piers looks furious and shrugs Trey off on the way to the elevator. Trey turns back to wave at me.
Thank you, I mouth at him, wishing he didn’t have to go, too.
He gives me one of his beautiful smiles, and I watch him disappear into the lift after Piers.
I give a ragged sigh and put my face in my hands. The last hour has given me whiplash.
Chapter Six
Trey
Piers rounds on me the second we leave Livia’s apartment building. “Who the fuck are you? How do you know Livia?”
I eye him coldly. He’s got shitty ex-boyfriend written all over him. I’d lay bets that this is the toxic dom I’ve suspected of being in Livia’s life before me. The man who made her believe she was unattractive and worthless, and that ‘safe, sane and consensual’ isn’t a thing.
It burns that I can’t tell this dickhead that I’m Livia’s boyfriend now and he needs to fuck off forever from her life. We’re not quite there yet, but we damn well are going to be. “It’s none of your damn business how I know Livia, or who the fuck I am.”
His eyes drop to my T-shirt. I came from work and I’m still wearing the one that says TREY across the front.
Piers snorts with derision. “Okay, Trey.”
He stays where he is as if waiting for something. I am, too. I’m waiting for him to leave. Finally, this creep gets the message that I intend to stand guard over her door, and turns and walks away. I stay where I am and the idiot actually comes back after five minutes, sees me still standing there, gives me the finger, and leaves.
“Not on my watch,” I mutter to myself. After thirty minutes of no sign of the asshole, I head home.
All evening, I can’t relax for thinking about that creep showing up at Livia’s apartment again. I wish I could call her. I consider going through the files at Dom Fitness to get Livia’s number, but that would be majorly overstepping boundaries. I’ll just have to wait and hope that she turns up for her session tomorrow.
If she doesn’t, then I’ll start overstepping boundaries.
To my relief, Livia’s waiting for me at Dom Fitness when I meet her at our appointed time. She seems pale and tired, but determined to get started, so I decide to save my questions for after our workout when she’s more relaxed.
Livia doesn’t want to wait that long, though. As she sits on the stationary bike for her warm-up, she says, “I’m sorry about yesterday.”
I study her face. Which part of yesterday? I’m not sorry for making out with her, or seeing off her toxic ex.
“My ex can be a real jerk,” she finishes.
I want to ask her a hundred questions about her past with that man and what he did to her, but I’m conscious that that conversation is too personal for Dom Fitness and I’ve broken enough rules already.
“I’m just happy I was there. Let me know if he comes back, okay?”
We move to the free weights area, and Livia does everything I tell her to do but seems distracted the whole time. If I touch her shoulder or arm to correct her movements, then her eyes flick up to mine, big and liquid, as if she’s begging me to kiss her.
I can’t. I want to, but I just can’t.
All Livia’s movements are effortful and it’s taking all her strength and concentration to get through her workout. We get through the warm-up and the weights, and as we head over to the bikes for her cardio, I murmur, “Well done, bunny.”
Livia’s face suddenly crumples and tears well in her eyes. Oh, god, I’ve made Livia cry and I was trying to be so gentle with her.
“Livia?”
She sobs into her hands, and people are starting to look despite the no-staring rule. I glare at a few of them and their trainers correct their focuses, but there are still too many people looking at Livia. This is her worst nightmare and I can’t bear it.
I take her gently by the arm and steer her toward a door marked STAFF, and then down a corridor into an empty meeting room. I close the door behind us and we’re alone.
This isn’t allowed, but it’s Livia. Fuck the rules.
I take her in my arms and wrap my arms around her. “It’s all right, bunny. No one can see you but me. Let it all out.”
She sobs brokenly for several moments against my chest, and I just hold her.
When she starts to get her breath back, she whispers, “I’m sorry for crying and messing up the workout. You
were being so sweet to me and I didn’t deserve it.”
I smooth her hair back from her damp face. “What do you mean, you didn’t deserve it?”
“Just now. I wasn’t doing well with that workout at all. I was waiting and waiting for you to tell me how terrible I was doing and then you said, ‘well done’ and I couldn’t bear it. You should be punishing me.”
My brow creases in concern. “But you were doing your best. I would never punish you for trying your best.”
Livia sobs harder. I stroke her hair, a tight ball of anger forms in my guts. What the hell did that asshole do to Livia?
“I’m sorry,” she whimpers. “I feel so raw, like all my defenses have been stripped away and I’m overreacting to everything.”
“You’re reacting, not overreacting. Would you like to talk about it?”
She chews her lip and nods, but then seems lost as how to go on.
“Have your feelings today got something to do with that man who showed up at your apartment yesterday?”
Livia nods again.
I’ll fucking kill him. Livia reacted with such violent dislike to this place and what we do here at first, and I think I’ve finally hit on the reason why. “Was he your dom? Did he make you call him sir or daddy?”
“Yeah,” she whispers. “He told me to call him sir. We were dating for about a year. It was an ordinary relationship for a few months. Then he started introducing ropes and things into the bedroom and telling me what to wear. When I wasn’t sure about any of it, he dismissed me as frigid and boring, so I went along with it. I was so stupid. Things kind of snowballed from there.”
I take a deep breath and try to rein in my temper, listening as she keeps talking.
“I thought I might like some of the things he was asking for and I was interested in trying them, but I never seemed to feel happy afterward. I don’t understand why I let him call me names and hurt me for so long. I must be so weak.”
“You got away from him, didn’t you?”
She nods.
“Then you’re strong.” I’ve heard subs talk about toxic relationships and it sounds a lot like what Livia is describing. Selfish so-called doms who are attracted to the idea of hurting and belittling someone and don’t understand that that isn’t the same as caring for a sub. A sub is a privilege.
Livia gazes up at me and her fingers tighten on my shirt. “I’m so confused. Are you my personal trainer or are we something more? I mean, you haven’t asked me out on a date so I don’t want to be presumptuous—”
I cover her mouth in a swift kiss. I can’t help myself. She moans softly in my arms, twining her arms around my neck and giving into the kiss.
I pull away and smooth her hair back from her face. “The only reason I haven’t asked you on a date is because I’m afraid you’ll say no and stop showing up here, and then I’ll never see you again.”
“And because of the rules here?”
“Those, too. Mostly I’ve been waiting for the right time to tell you that taking you out to dinner would be the highlight of my year.”
She smiles shyly up at me. “Really? I don’t think I’ve ever been the highlight of anyone’s year.”
That’s beyond my understanding because she’s lighting up my whole goddamn life. I kiss her again, my heart beating fast. I knew from the moment I set eyes on this girl that she was going to be special to me.
Livia strokes the letter T on my shirt. “What is it you want in terms of us? I think I need a straight answer.”
I’ll happily give her a straight answer. I’ve got nothing to hide. “I want to be your daddy.”
“What does that mean, though?”
“It means taking care of you and making you feel good. Correcting you when you go outside the lines that you draw for yourself. And most of all, making you feel happy.”
Livia gazes up at me, doubt still flickering in her eyes. She doesn’t quite believe that that’s what a daddy/little girl relationship is.
“Is that how it’s supposed to be?”
“That’s how I love to be a daddy.”
Her lips curve into a smile. “Then I want you to daddy me.”
I give a soft growl at the back of my throat and press my forehead against hers. Those words just sound so fucking sweet from her. “I’ve found my little bunny. I’ve waited for you so long, sweetheart.”
My lips touch hers, and the door flies open. Both of us look up and see Dom standing there. His expression transforms into one of fury as he sees me holding a client in my arms, one of my hands cupping her ass.
Slowly, I straighten up. I’m not going to shove Livia away just to assuage my boss. “You go finish your workout and head home, okay?” I tell her, putting my hand on her shoulder.
Livia gives me a scared look, and then squeezes past Dom and out the door. Dom glares at her as she goes.
“Hey. Don’t look at her like that.”
Dom turns to me. “I’ll look at her how I want. You two are breaking so many goddamn rules. I thought I could trust you, Trey.”
“I know the rules and I respect them. I met Livia before she became a client here.”
“You respect my rules? Don’t lie to my face. She’s a member of this gym and so you shouldn’t be touching her, let alone bringing her back here into a staff area.”
I feel my jaw tighten around the word hypocrite. Everyone knows that Amelia was a client here when things got heated between the two of them. “I kissed Livia before she ever stepped foot in here. She needs me. I need her.”
“This is not a place you can pick up women.”
“I know that. I’m not using it that way. I’ve got dozens of clients, but Livia’s special.”
Dom continues to glare at me. I’m not going to explain myself any more to him. If he wants to fire me, then he can fire me.
He points a finger at me. “I’m not happy with you.”
Then he slams out of the room.
I push a hand through my hair and sigh. I guess that’s fair. I’ll just have to show Dom that what Livia and I have is something special, like how it is between him and Amelia. I’m not some player trying to fuck his way through the clients here.
That can wait, though. Right now, I have to go and see Livia.
Chapter Seven
Livia
I pace up and down my lounge, feeling sick to my stomach. I think I got Trey fired. It’s all my fault. If I hadn’t burst into tears then he wouldn’t have had to comfort me. Trey’s going to be so angry with me.
Dread and despair wash over me. What if he’s like Piers when he’s angry? I can’t go through that again. People think it’s easy to walk away from an abusive relationship, but they don’t understand how men like that can warp your mind so much that you don’t trust your instincts anymore. My thoughts weren’t, He’s hitting me, which makes him an asshole and a criminal and I need to dump him. They were, He’s hitting me because it’s all my fault and I screwed up again. I deserve this.
There’s a knock at my door, and the sick feeling in my stomach doubles. I stand frozen to the spot, too scared to move.
A muffled voice calls, “Livia? It’s me.”
It’s Trey, and he doesn’t sound angry at all. Relieved, I run to the door and pull it open, and then throw myself into his arms. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
Trey holds me back as hard as he can. “You’ve got nothing to be sorry about. Are you all right?”
I suck in a shuddering breath. “I’m all right. But I understand if you have to punish me.”
Trey closes the door behind him and takes me through to the lounge. He sits with me on the sofa and holds my hands in his. “Sweet bunny, I could never punish you while you’re upset. And you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I caused so much trouble. You can’t call that doing nothing wrong. Were you fired?”
Trey smiles. “The trouble was a joint effort, but mostly it was me causing the trouble, if you think about it. And no, I wasn’t
fired. Not yet, anyway.”
I grab his hands in panic. “I’m so, so sorry—”
“If I am fired, then Dom’s an ass and I don’t want to work for a man like him. He’s got a temper, but when he calms down he’ll see sense. He and his partner met at Dom Fitness. You saw them together. She’s the bratty strawberry blonde.”
I remember Dom and a woman with red-blonde hair from my first session. She was lying on the floor complaining how tired she was as Dom didn’t look the least impressed or sympathetic. A brat and her daddy. Even though I’d never behave like that, they were pretty cute together.
It’s a relief to know that Dom and Amelia broke a few rules, too. Maybe after he’s calmed down, Dom will be happy for us.
I lift my tentative gaze to Trey’s handsome face. “So, you’re my daddy, then.”
He breaks into a smile. “Yeah, I am. I feel pretty great about that. How about you?”
“Excited, but nervous, too. I don’t know what to expect.”
“It’s a lot like how we are at the gym. Rules and expectations, and lots and lots of charts. I’m pretty obsessed with charts.”
“I bet you loved the group projects at school,” I joke, trying to hide my nervousness.
He kisses my nose, and then kisses my mouth. “Most of all, though, it’s about us being happy, so don’t be afraid.”
I feel some of the tension melt out of me. Trey’s not going to turn into a monster just because we’ve made this official.
“Do you like the idea of having rules?”
A buzz of anticipation goes through me. I’ve always enjoyed checklists and goals, but I’m hit and miss about sticking to them. Having someone manage them with me, keeping me focused and rewarding me when I achieve my goals sounds amazing. “Yes, please. Where do we start?”
He pulls my workout and meal plans from the gym. “Let’s start with these. Is there anything you’d like to change about them?”
I look over them and shake my head. I’ve been enjoying my workouts and the vegan eating plan has been going well since the first blip. I grin down at the pages. Seeing them makes me feel stupidly proud. I’m so used to feeling like I’m always disappointing everyone and myself.
