Missing Ink

by E J Frost

  Book 2.5 of the Daddy P.I. Casefiles

  E. J. Frost

  Missing Ink

  Copyright ©2020 (E. J. Frost)

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of the author. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable for criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  Missing ink is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, locales, business establishments or organizations is strictly coincidental.

  WARNING: This novel contains mature themes which may considered offensive by some readers. This book is for sale to adults only, as defined by the laws of the country in which the purchase is made.

  DISCLAIMER: This novel contains descriptions of practices which may be injurious to the practitioner’s health. It is not intended as a guide or handbook. The author is not responsible for any loss, harm, injury or death resulting from the use or demonstration of the acts or practices contained in this book.

  The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other electronic means without the permission of the author is illegal and punishable by law. By purchasing an authorized edition, you are supporting the author’s rights and encouraging the creation of more books. Thank you!

  Dedication

  In loving memory of my own Bebe J and Mother Kay.

  For the cheerleaders of The Green Room, Sprint Club and Aggressive Support Room, and the Badass Writers on the Ledge Room, who held me accountable. For Karen, who wanted a Daddy P.I. book without a daddy. For my writing buddies, Tara, Vivian, Dylan, and Ivy, who gave me endless encouragement and much eye candy. For Christina, who helped me recognize when I was writing stereotypes and for the goat curry. For Kitt, who inspired a tattoo. For Mawgan, Louise, the Michelles, KC, and other readers who loved Daddy P.I. and kept me writing in Logan and Emily’s world.

  And in the hopes that an authentic British tawse will help Vivian up her snatch game.

  Brenna and Mac’s story is for you, lovely, lovely ladies.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Epilogue

  Extras

  Glossary of Slang and Unusual Terms

  Characters in Missing Ink

  Master Mac’s Rules

  Daddy P.I. 3.0

  About the Author

  Other Books by E. J. Frost

  Chapter 1

  The world isn’t all sweetness and light. There are dark parts. Parts that leave scars. I should know. I’ve inked more than a few.

  I might even have a couple of my own.

  You’d never know there was any darkness in the world, though, watching the couple I’m watching. They’re lying on a bed a few feet from me, tangled in the aftermath of what looked like a seriously satisfying fuck. Logan’s lying on top, propped on his elbows so his two hundred pounds doesn’t crush the small woman under him. His submissive, Emily, is looking up at him like she’s watching the sun rise for the first time. He’s smiling down at her and the love in his eyes is so bright it could be that sun.

  It would make me puke if they weren’t so genuine.

  The man behind me, pounding into my hot, swollen ass, groans so loudly it echoes off the dungeon walls. I feel his cock jerk. He’ll only fuck me with a condom, even though I’ve offered him bareback more times than I can count, so there’s no warm spurt, just the little kick to let me know he’s done.

  I squeeze down hard to milk him. A trick he taught me to please my Dom. And I do it now, even though I don’t feel much like pleasing my Dom at the moment.

  Ten pulls out and I hear the rubber squelch as he ties off the condom. Logan’s still inside Emily, even though they finished several minutes ago. They’re still connected: body and spirit. The contrast makes me feel hollow. Ten doesn’t want any kind of connection with me. He’s given me two orgasms. That’s my lot. He’ll give me pleasure, and the kind of pain I want, but nothing more.

  He pats my ass. “Your head wasn’t in that at the end. Where’d you go?”

  I tip my chin toward the bed as much as the thick leather collar around my throat will allow. “Watching the show.”

  Ten grunts. He hasn’t always been best buds with Logan, but they seem to have warmed to each other over the last couple of months. They’re friendly enough to scene together now at any rate.

  “Fucking saccharine,” he mutters, keeping his voice low enough not to carry to the bed.

  In the past, I’d have agreed with him. I’d have treated Logan and Emily’s gone-on-you kind of love with contempt.

  Maybe I’m mellowing, or maybe I’ve just been hanging out with Emily too fucking much, but I don’t agree with him anymore.

  “We done, sir?” I ask.

  Ten comes around to stand in front of the bondage frame he’s got me locked into. He crosses his arms over his bare chest, flexing the heavy muscles of his biceps and pecs as he glowers down at me. He’s a big guy and he’s trying to intimidate me. It works. Sorta. I feel a flutter in my tummy. But it’s a cold, empty feeling and doesn’t translate into that electric rush through my veins that it used to.

  I really have been hanging out with Emily too much if Ten’s patented Dom glower isn’t doing anything for me anymore.

  “The fuck is up with you?” Ten asks.

  I don’t shrug because he’s locked me into the bondage frame by my boobs and hell if I’m moving my shoulder and yanking my girls against the two metal bars sandwiching them. “Sorry, I guess my head’s not in the right place today.”

  “You using your safe word?” Ten growls.

  “No.”

  I’m not at any kind of limit. I’m just not feeling the scene anymore. I figured he was done since he usually finishes a scene after he comes, and I’d kind of like to wash up and see if Emily will have a coffee with me. She’s a great listener and might help me make sense of my weird disinterest.

  “Then we fucking continue,” he says.

  He does, and both my tits and my ass are hotter, and a hell of a lot sorer, by the time he’s done. Emily and Logan leave while Ten’s still flogging my girls.

  My mind follows them, and I never do get my head back in the scene.

  *****

  I don’t usually stay for the weekend breakfast buffet at the club. I like to get into my shop early, make sure the ink and needle stations are clean and everything’s ready for when we open. Sometimes I get a quiet hour to sketch.

  But part of my current weird headspace is an aversion to the shop I’ve worked like a dog for over five years to build. It doesn’t help that with the cold weather, everyone’s pulled on their sweats and coats and stopped getting ink. Business is down a third in a month; I don’t even have any bookings until Monday, although there are often walk-ins over the weekend. Being at the shop without a client to work on gives me too much time to think. So I hit the buffet, find a table, and ignore how high the sun is in the sky through the windows.

  I’m alone at my table—by choice,
thank you—for less than five minutes before a slim, sparkly-pink-manicured hand reaches across me, steals my coffee cup, and puts down a steaming cup of faintly-colored water in its place.

  “Straight up, if you take away my coffee, I will cut a bitch,” I tell Emily as she sits down across from me with her own breakfast, her own cup of tea, and my appropriated coffee.

  “Just make it somewhere I can cover with a bathing suit,” she says breezily.

  “I hate you. Give me back my coffee.”

  “Peppermint tea is better for you. Drink your tea.”

  “Bitch,” I say but I can’t keep the fondness out of my voice. “Like Ten didn’t bully me enough. Aaand I sat here by myself because I want to be alone. Go the fuck away.”

  “Sure. Right after I finish my breakfast. Oh, and Daddy will be along in a minute, so, really, after he finishes his breakfast. Aaand if you wanted to be alone, you shouldn’t have stayed for the buffet.” She takes a sip of her own tea. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

  “Nothin’.” I shovel some eggs into my mouth so I don’t have to answer.

  “Uh-huh. I thought Master Ten was going to have an aneurism trying to beat you into subspace last night. You didn’t get there, did you?”

  I shake my head. I shouldn’t have agreed to play; shouldn’t even have come to the club since I wasn’t scheduled to work. But the same weirdness that spoiled the scene has been dogging me for a while. I can’t settle anywhere, at anything. I came to the club because I thought someone would be happy to beat the restlessness out of me.

  It didn’t work, and I should be kicking myself for wasting a scene with Ten, but I can’t muster a single fuck this morning.

  What the hell is wrong with me? I pined over Ten for a solid year when I first met him. I followed him around like a lost puppy; I gave him my anal cherry and begged for scenes with him on my knees. When did he stop being what I want?

  “Whatever it is,” Emily says softly. “I won’t judge.”

  She’s such a sweetie.

  I reach across the table, take her hand, and squeeze it. “I know you won’t, hon. My head’s all over the place right now.”

  “Start with the first thing that’s bothering you.”

  “My navel piercing’s infected,” I say, tossing out the thing that’s bothering me the least. Although it is infected. Again. My favorite leather pants catch it exactly wrong and I never remember to take the stupid thing out. I should probably buy new pants, but I love my oxblood leathers. They’re worn in just right. I can feel the leather cupping my ass I sit on this hard, wooden chair that the club’s sadists must have designed purposefully to aggravate sore, subbie bottoms.

  Hell no, the navel ring can go before I give up my favorite pants.

  “And that’s what you distracted you so badly that even Master Ten couldn’t get you to subspace.” Emily lifts an eyebrow at me.

  “Littles aren’t supposed to be snarky,” I tell her.

  “Being snarky isn’t against the rules. Unless it’s Daddy. Snark Daddy at your bottom’s peril.” She grins. “What substantially more important things are bothering you?”

  “I don’t know.” I take a sip of the tea she’s left me. It’s actually pretty good, but I grimace like I’ve bitten into a lemon anyway. “I just wasn’t feeling it last night. Ten’s probably really pissed off. He has every right to be. I shouldn’t have agreed to do the scene. I hope I didn’t hurt his feelings.”

  Emily breaks into a sweet, low giggle. I love her giggle. Emily’s giggle is like Christmas morning. Nothing bad could possibly survive that giggle.

  “You’re assuming Master Ten has feelings,” she says.

  “Jury is still out on that.” I lift my cup in acknowledgment of her point. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I was watching you and Logan and I just—”

  “Just what?” Emily asks gently.

  “You guys are so gone on each other. It’s kind of disgusting, actually.”

  Emily grins, not at all fooled.

  “Maybe you need a daddy to smother you in all the feels.”

  “Hell to the no. I’d projectile vomit through every scene.”

  “If Master Ten isn’t giving you the feels anymore, maybe it’s time to stop doing scenes with him, B,” Emily says, her eyes intent on me. She’s got these huge, hazel eyes, so big she looks like a manga character. She doesn’t wear any makeup; her big eyes are naturally rimmed with thick, dark lashes. I should really hate her.

  But I don’t. And she’s right.

  “I was kind of thinking the same thing,” I admit. “Which is stupid because he’s one of the most sought-after Masters here. Your stupid is rubbing off on me.”

  “What the fuck did you say?” A man growls from behind me, even as Emily breaks into giggles again.

  I glance over my shoulder. Logan’s standing just behind me, holding a plate of food, and scowling at me so hard it looks like his face is going to break.

  Shee-it.

  “It’s an expression, Daddy,” Emily says, still giggling. “DirtyGurl wasn’t saying I’m stupid.”

  “Better not be,” Logan says heavily as he sits down next to his submissive. She immediately leans into him. He slides his arm around her shoulders and kisses her forehead.

  My heart squeezes.

  “I, um, really liked your scene last night,” I say to patch over my own stupid.

  Master Logan isn’t my biggest fan. Before he met Emily, he never did scenes with me except for training. I always figured my dreads and ink put him off, since all his subs before Emily were clean-cut, classic lookers. He broke that mold with Emily, who is totally adorable, but doesn’t rate much higher than really pretty on the zero to supermodel scale. Not that I put any stock in appearances, but Logan seemed to. He also seemed to attract the biggest psycho-bitches on the planet; a type he’s finally broken away from with Emily, who is one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met. Given how sweet she is, and how little he seemed to think of me, I’m surprised he’s let Emily be friends with me.

  But Logan puts his subbie’s needs first. Emily needs friends who understand her littleness. It makes some of the other house subs uncomfortable, but I’ve always liked how uninhibited she is. I encouraged her to be little around me from the start. That seemed to win Logan over.

  Which pretty much makes him Dom of the Year in my book.

  Realization hits me like an uppercut to the jaw.

  Ten doesn’t give a shit about my needs. I didn’t need the extra flogging last night. He could tell I wasn’t in the right place, but instead of ending the scene, he kept going to prove he could continue to control me. Because that’s what he needed after my attention wandered.

  He doesn’t give a shit about what I need because he doesn’t give a shit about me.

  I put my hand over my eyes, to hide the fact they’ve suddenly filled. I hear the scrape of a chair and then Emily’s arm slips around my shoulders.

  “Come home with us. Spend the weekend. Whatever’s going on with you, you shouldn’t be alone.”

  “I’m not alone when I’m working,” I say thickly.

  “Please? I’ll ask Daddy to tie you up and kidnap you if you don’t. You know he will if I ask.”

  Logan probably would if Emily asked.

  “I really don’t like you,” I tell her.

  “I know.” She pushes my dreads back over my shoulder so she can kiss my cheek. “You can dislike me all you want while we make green tea cupcakes and watch the Avengers .”

  “I hate your green tea cupcakes,” I sniffle.

  I don’t, of course. They’re excellent. Sweet and creamy and tangy. With the green tea in them, I can even pretend they’re healthy.

  “I know.” Emily kisses my cheek again.

  *****

  I head in to my shop late in the afternoon after getting a text from my main tattooist, Nicky, saying two repeat clients have called for appointments.

  I’m trailed by my chirpy shadow. My employees,
and everyone else who walks into my shop over the next three hours, are entranced by her, even before she breaks out the two dozen cupcakes she’s brought. I swear, she has some weird Little power.

  While I work, she entertains herself. If my head wasn’t fucked sideways, what a perfect guest she is would annoy the hell out of me. Instead, I just feel pathetically grateful when I finish up my second client and find her curled up on the reception-area couch with my sample design book in her lap.

  I stage a token resistance anyway, because that’s just the way I roll.

  “I’m going home,” I tell her. “You should head out.”

  “We haven’t watched Infinity War yet,” Emily responds without looking up, her fingertips tracing the outline of a black unicorn design she’s found. She’s been teasing Logan for a while about getting a tattoo, something he’s not in favor of. “Or Guardians of the Galaxy . You promised.”

  “I don’t remember promising.”

  “You did. And you said you’d make pancakes for breakfast.”

  I might have said that when I was all sugared up from licking the cupcake batter bowl.

  “I don’t have any fresh clothes. I need to go home.”

  “Daddy only let us wear clothes this morning because the house was cold after we’d been at the club all night. It’ll be warm by the time we get back. You won’t need clothes.”

  I feel myself cave. “I hate you.”

  “I know. Do you want Chinese or sushi for dinner? Daddy wants to put in an order now.” She taps the phone sitting on the couch next to her thigh.

  A craving for hot and sour soup hits me so hard I have to wipe drool out of the corners of my mouth. “Chinese.”

  “Good call.” She picks up her phone and taps away at it. “Sushi’s really a warm-weather food. I keep telling Daddy, but he says sushi’s not seasonal.”

  “He’s right. And I’m paying.”

  “You can argue it out with Daddy.” She grins without taking her eyes off the phone. “Good luck with that.”

  “The two of you are horrible.”

  “I know. Master Theo, Max, and Cynnie are coming over, too,” she tells me, tapping. What the fuck is she typing, the great American novel? “We’re allowed to build a blanket fort and watch movies until midnight and sleep in the fort.”