by Evelyn Adams
After the debacle at Bacchus, I’d gone looking for the Lexi the asshole wannabe said trained him. I might have embellished my role at the club to convince him I held his fate in my hands, but I had no problem getting him to turn over the contact information for the Gentleman’s Submissive. Hell, by the time I finished, he’d have turned over his mother to avoid having what happened at the club go public.
A bit of digging online led me to Back Door Cinema and their Gentleman’s Submissive film collection. Once they realized I was going to get them money and it wouldn’t cost them anything upfront, they jumped at the chance to become my new client. By the time I finished talking, the film company owner actually seemed to believe a professional submissive on the other side of the state had wronged the adult entertainment company he ran out of his garage. It took some legal massaging to justify the cease-and-desist, but I managed it.
The Gentleman’s Submissive website was fairly vague. Given the nature of the business, I hadn’t expected to find much information online and under normal circumstances, it probably wouldn’t be enough to prevail in this kind of suit. I was motivated. I was tired of seeing people playing pretend at something that was part of who I am. I doubted that Lexi, as her clients called her, had ever been to a dungeon or submitted to a real Dom. I pictured her as a spoiled girl wearing leather and playing around with something she didn’t understand.
Even that wouldn’t have mattered. Everyone should get to explore their sexuality the way they wanted, even if it meant making an ass of themselves. I was a huge proponent of self-expression. The problem I had was that she thought she could train people to do something she obviously didn’t understand, and that was fraud. Her fraud led to someone getting hurt, which was intolerable.
The chamber door opened, and I glanced over my shoulder to see Charlotte Ellis enter. I’d never gone up against the petite blonde before. I hadn’t even heard of her until I saw her name on the court papers and did a little research. She usually handled divorce cases, and she had a well-earned reputation for taking powerful men to the cleaners. She looked more like a China doll than a cutthroat attorney, and I didn’t doubt many men had made the mistake of underestimating her. I wouldn’t, but I still wasn’t sure what she was doing handling an intellectual property case. Unless the defendant was a friend of hers, or given her penchant for eating powerful men for lunch and her client’s patronizing business model, more likely they were both part of some women’s club that hated men.
“Ms. Ellis?” I said, offering her my hand. I knew from the picture on her firm’s website who she was, but it never hurt to ask an easy question, and it certainly never hurt to get someone used to saying yes before you asked for what you really wanted.
“Mr. Jensen.” She took my hand without so much as a nod of agreement, and there was steel in her clear blue eyes. No, it wouldn’t do to underestimate her.
I nodded, grinning in spite of myself as a side door opened and the judge and clerk entered the chambers. It was Judge Black, and I clenched my jaw to hide my grimace. The Honorable Judge Black was notorious for pushing for a settlement in civil cases. Regardless of what my client wanted, settling wouldn’t suit my purpose this time. I shouldn’t even be thinking like that. Again with the emotions. Lawyers were supposed to get the best deal he could for their clients and keep their own crap out of it. I couldn’t help it. I wasn’t going to be satisfied until the Gentleman’s Submissive was out of business. I wasn’t looking for just a punitive settlement; I wanted her gone.
“Counselors,” said the judge. “I assume you have proposed schedules for discovery and some requests for me.”
“Yes, Your Honor,” said Ms. Ellis. “I have our list of potential witnesses. Because of the nature of Ms. Smithson’s business, it would be irreparably damaging to her reputation should her client list be made public, not to mention the potential damage to many others’ reputations. Because the names of clients are not directly relevant to this case, I would urge Your Honor to deny any request made by the opposing counsel to subpoena the records.”
On the word urge, Judge Black arched an eyebrow and gave Ms. Ellis a look that said she’d overplayed her hand. She’d also jumped the gun, and I couldn’t help but grin at her obvious discomfort.
“The prosecution will not be asking to subpoena client records. There is no reason for the people who’ve already paid for Ms. Smithson’s training to be subjected to even more trouble as a result of Ms. Smithson’s questionable business practices.”
I was sure I’d caught Ms. Ellis off guard by not requesting a subpoena for the client list, but I wouldn’t be part of contributing to an invasion of the so-called clients’ privacy if I could help it.
“My client is obviously anxious to move things along as quickly as possible,” I said. “Every day the Gentleman’s Submissive is allowed to remain in business, it’s infringing on the rights of my client.”
“I understand your concern, Counselor,” said the judge. “But I will not be pushed for a trial date. I urge,” the judge glanced over at Ms. Ellis, “both parties to make every effort to come to a solution before going to trial.”
We bantered back and forth a bit about dates. Since neither party seemed interested in dragging out the process, there was surprisingly little disagreement about the schedule, and in less than half an hour, I was nodding to the judge as he left the chamber and snapping my briefcase closed. I tipped my head to Ms. Ellis, who was still tucking papers away as I made my way out the door. I barely managed to hide the break in my stride when I saw the beautiful young woman waiting on the bench in the hallway.
It was the woman from the bar. The one who’d almost fallen in front of me. The same woman who’d managed to rattle my concentration at the benefit. I’d gotten used to her invading my dreams, but I didn’t have any idea what she was doing here, looking like Gal Gadot when Steve Trevor tried to hide her under layers of tweed. The woman in front of me was all wide-eyed innocent and buttoned-up sex in her demure gray suit. Her soft-pink blouse was the only hint at the lush woman underneath the severely cut suit. I knew exactly how fantastic her body was hidden under all that gray. I’d felt it when I held her in my arms.
She stood as if she was there for me, and her gaze met mine. For a moment, it was as if there was some invisible thread tying us together. Some kind of current moving between us, which was fucking rubbish. She was a woman. I wanted her. If the look in her eyes was any indication, she wanted me too. Simple chemistry. It was not some kind of crazy fates colliding situation. The fact that I could still remember how she felt in my arms and that she pulled on every possessive urge I had was incidental.
As I watched, her gaze slid past me and over my shoulder. When I glanced back, Ms. Ellis was hurrying toward us.
“How did it go?” asked the woman I desperately needed to get to know better. Like naked tied to my bed better.
I gave my head a shake to clear away the image of peeling off that gray suit and sliding pink silk over warm flesh until I uncovered the soft, warm woman underneath. What the fuck was I thinking? At the very least, she was a close friend of the opposing counsel. Or she might be... Fuck me. Hard.
Ms. Ellis shook her head almost imperceptibly and the other woman’s eyes went wide, glancing from me to her attorney and back again, obviously coming to the same conclusion that just smacked me in the head.
“Alexandra Smithson,” I said, not bothering to phrase the words as a question when I already knew the answer. Unfucking believable. The woman who’d been playing a starring role in my dreams at night was the same woman I planned to ruin.
I watched the slender column of her throat—a throat I’d pictured with my hand wrapped gently around it as I surged inside her—move as she swallowed hard.
“Erik Jensen,” she said, sounding a little breathless.
I shouldn’t like the way my name sounded from her lips, but damn it to hell, I did.
“How do you two know each other?” asked Ms. Ellis, glancing
suspiciously from her client to me.
“We bumped into each other in front of a friend’s restaurant a few weeks ago, and again more recently at a domestic violence luncheon.” I had the pleasure of watching her brown eyes widen when she realized I’d noticed her at the benefit.
It was a short-lived triumph. She straightened, shifting her weight almost imperceptibly, and it was as if she’d slipped on another persona as easily as if she’d put on a coat. She took a deep breath, arching her back slightly and emphasizing her breasts. Without changing one article of clothing, she’d gone from innocent librarian to sex kitten.
The shift reminded me of exactly why we were there. Ms. Smithson used her sexuality for power and money. I’d just have to tell the protective part of me to shut the fuck up because I didn’t want anything she was selling. And I damn sure wouldn’t let anyone else get caught in her scheme.
“I will see you on the eighth for the start of discovery. I’ll allow myself the pleasure of conducting your interrogatory myself, Ms. Smithson.” I took a step closer, fully intending to put her off-balance and make her uncomfortable. It worked. She held her own, not giving any ground but her nostrils flared, and I saw her hands clench into fists at her sides. Good. I wanted her defensive. It would make my job that much easier. “And then after that,” I said, closing the last bit of distance between us, “I’ll make sure you stop playing with things you don’t understand and taking innocent people along with you.”
“That’s enough,” said Ms. Ellis, physically inserting herself between us.
“Not yet,” I said, backing away from the women. “But by the time I’m done, it will be. See you on the eighth, ladies.” I saw a flash of fear in Ms. Smithson’s dark eyes and had to remind myself of all the trouble she’d caused and the arrogance with which she conducted her business. I couldn’t let myself forget or I was afraid I’d do something I might regret. Part of me worried I already had.
I THUMBED THE ANTACID OUT of the top of the quickly diminishing roll as I waited for the receptionist to acknowledge me. Peter—no surprise—hadn’t called back for another appointment, and I’d put off the few new inquiries I’d gotten until after the eighth. It didn’t matter. My heart wasn’t in it. I found it increasingly difficult to think about work with the date for the interrogatories looming. The best I could hope for out of the day was pretty toes.
“Thanks so much for squeezing me in,” I said to the receptionist as I bit down on the antacid, chewing discreetly until the fruit taste filled my mouth.
I’d been practically living on the rolls of chalky goodness since my last encounter at the courthouse with Erik Jensen. I couldn’t think of him as Mr. Tall, Dark, and Dangerous any more, not when he had so clearly positioned himself in the Dangerous-only category.
“My pleasure,” said the receptionist. “Right this way.”
She came around the counter and led me toward one of the high leather chairs sitting in a row at the back of the salon.
“Can I get you something to drink? Coffee or champagne?” she asked.
“Champagne would be lovely, thank you.” It was barely noon, but nothing went better with antacids than champagne.
A petite Asian woman took the bottle of nail polish I’d chosen and set it on the rolling cart beside her. She placed my feet in the warm scented water, and the receptionist placed a champagne flute in my hand. For a few blissful minutes, my troubles vanished into the myriad bubbles. I loved getting pedicures. Next to sex, there was very little that felt as good, and despite my profession or maybe because of it, sometimes sex slid into second place.
I spent so much time cramming my feet into impossible high heels, a habit I had no intention of changing regardless of what happened with my business. It was heaven to have someone—even someone I paid or maybe especially because it was someone I paid—rub the knots out of my arches. It would be easy to get caught up in the class disparity, but as someone who made her living the way I did, I knew the woman with my foot in her hands didn’t need my condescension or pity. She needed my money and honest gratitude. She gave my arch another long stroke, involuntarily curling my toes, and I bit back a groan of disappointment when she set my foot back into the water and reached for her nail shaping tools.
Closing my eyes, I let my mind drift. The problem was, when it drifted, it always seemed to end up back at the eighth and the upcoming interrogatories. Nothing good could come of that. I dug in my pocket and fished out what was left of the roll of antacids, thumbing one off the top. As soon as the fruit-flavored chalk hit my tongue, I let out my breath and felt my chest relax a fraction of an inch.
My response to the pastel discs had become almost Pavlovian. It was worse than the brief time I’d smoked during college. It had gotten to the point where I couldn’t get through my day without the small rolls. The eighth had to hurry up and get here before my habit became an obsession. I sucked on the antacid instead of chewing it and closed my eyes, giving myself over to the slightly ticklish feeling of pale-pink nail polish being painted on my toes. Scarlet or hooker-red would have seemed a more obvious choice, but I’d found that for most of the men I worked with, they liked at least the initial illusion of innocence.
Not that any of that mattered if I lost the business I’d worked so hard to build. I bit down on the antacid, grinding it to powder with my teeth and wishing it was as easy to crush the specter of Erik Jensen and the looming deposition.
I’D SPENT MOST of the morning going over the questions for the interrogatory and cementing how I intended to handle Ms. Smithson. All of which got shot to shit the moment I walked into the conference room at Jones and Andrews and saw her sitting at the conference table looking simultaneously frightened and defiant. In her buttoned-up suit and with her wide, dark eyes, she was more cornered cat than sex kitten and damned if she wasn’t tempting as hell.
Every bit of her fire and vulnerability pulled at me. I wanted to cradle her in my arms until she felt safe and bend her over the table, shove up her skirt and fuck her senseless all at the same time. I wanted to save her from the monsters and be the monster in the same breath. I was so fucking screwed. And by proxy, so was my client if I couldn’t get my shit together.
“Ms. Ellis. Ms. Smithson,” I said, managing a curt nod to her counsel without allowing myself to meet Alexandra’s scared eyes. I needed to get a fucking grip on myself before I could do that. Sliding into the cool indifference I’d cultivated over the years was as comfortable as putting on an old coat and gave me a chance to re-establish the necessary professional distance between me and the woman I wanted to simultaneously worship and devour.
“Mr. Jensen,” said Ms. Ellis.
Alexandra stayed silent, and I was grateful not to have to deal with the way it felt to hear my name on her lips for a little while longer.
The stenographer adjusted her chair, started the recorder and we were off to the races.
“Ms. Smithson, are you the owner of the entity operating as the Gentleman’s Submissive?”
“Yes,” she said. She started to add more, but caught herself. Ms. Ellis must have coached her to only answer my questions without elaborating.
“And what is it the Gentleman’s Submissive does? What services do you offer?” I sat back a little in my chair, waiting to see how she would dance around the illicit nature of her business. She couldn’t incriminate herself by admitting to accepting money for sexual services, and since I hadn’t found any irregularities or problems with her business license or permits—she was operating under the same constraints sexual surrogates used—I assumed she must have developed a standard answer.
“I train Dominants,” she said, leaning forward. “Much in the way a life coach works, I help men—and occasionally women—find and develop their dominant natures.”
“You honestly believe you can train Doms?” I asked. The question was out of my mouth before I had a chance to consider it, and I always considered everything, especially where the law was concerned. This case�
��this woman—had me twisted up in ways that simply weren’t going to work.
“To be honest,” she said, and I saw Ms. Ellis lean closer to her, presumably to stop her if she went too far off the rails. “I’m not sure that there is such a thing as a real Dominant or submissive. We all have a bit of both inside us. I simply help the people who come to me develop the side they are most interested in cultivating.”
Unfucking believable. Here I was getting worked up because she was messing around with something she clearly didn’t understand, and the reality was she didn’t even seem sure she believed in what she was selling. I’d bet big money that she not only hadn’t experienced real submission with a true dominant, she didn’t believe it existed.
“So you don’t think you are a submissive?”
She actually had the audacity to snort when she laughed.
“No. I mean, I know there are people who believe they are but it’s not me. I saw a need and worked out a way to fill it. That’s all. It has little to do with my actual temperament and more to do with putting my degree to use.”
“And what degree is that?” I asked, not sure what I expected to hear.
“I have a doctorate in gender studies.”
Of course she did, and down the rabbit hole we went.
“Forgive me, Ms. Smithson—or perhaps Dr. Smithson is more accurate.” I watched her, waiting to see if my condescension would ruffle her feathers, but if anything, it seemed to have the opposite effect. “But could you please explain to me how a PhD in gender studies led you to believe you can train Dominants?” I honestly wasn’t sure what the degree qualified her for, aside from becoming a professor who taught gender studies.
She leaned forward in her chair, and I couldn’t help but notice the way the ivory silk moved and draped over her skin. Her blouse was modest—conservative even—but something about knowing there was nothing but a soft, whisper-thin bit of fabric hiding her lush curves had my mouth going uncharacteristically dry. Her skirt was camel colored today and pencil straight, more suited to a librarian than a woman who made her living cultivating the sexual desires of others. I was just grateful the conference table hid her legs. The last thing my lust-addled brain needed was a clear view of her delicate ankles and what I was sure was another killer pair of fuck-me heels.
