Property Of (5 page)

“Jesus, Nic, where’s the love?” Finn demanded. “Triplet code clearly states that any and all photo shoots with sexy friends should be supervised by your brothers.”

“Get out,” I gritted out between my teeth as I framed my shot. Then I saw Kasey’s face through the lens of my camera. She’d had a crush on Finn in high school and now that she was divorced, and if the flirty grin she was throwing his direction was any indicator, it seemed that crush had returned. Her eyes were bright as she grinned at Finn. When I looked over my shoulder and watched him wink at her, matching her grin, I sighed. Oh, boy, here we go again. I only hoped this time around it didn’t include midnight phone calls to analyze every look or comment Finn sent her way.

***

It had been two days since we created the fake profiles on POF and SSD, and I was chomping at the bit to see what kind of messages we received. I’d admit now that the lack of control I had over this process was unnerving me to the point that I considered opening my own accounts in secret, but so far I hadn’t given in to the impulse. Currently, I was in one of Kasey’s yoga classes with the girls on mats, winding down. I was exhaling on a downward facing dog and could feel my muscles relaxing.

Kasey’s yoga studio was next door to Gypsy’s, and it faced the busy street. She’d hired two instructors and between the three of them offered classes from six a.m. until nine p.m. She catered to those who went to work early and stayed late furthering their careers. Her clientele was mostly high-stress professionals who needed to unwind at the end of the day, or zen out before heading into work.

To attract business, she’d had the bright idea to put her rooms in the front with big windows so women passing by would be drawn in, and men walking past would see women’s asses in the air and want to join for the show. It was a brilliant marketing plan and it worked. The number of men who’d joined was actually higher than the women. I couldn’t have been prouder of Kasey for making a success out of her business, but at this exact moment, while my ass was in the air, I could have killed her with my bare hands for putting me in this position.

Picture it . . .

Nicola, the fair-haired maiden, was stretching out her Gluteus Maximus when the dark and dangerous hero passed by the window. Imagine if you will how the color rushed further into her face when a familiar pair of boots stopped suddenly in her line of sight. Her eyes looked up between her legs and saw the same gleaming honey-colored eyes with dark, heavy brows staring back at her. Also, imagine, how the sight of those eyes sent her heart racing and her balance waning as she tried to lower said ass to the ground. Unfortunately, the fair-haired maiden was not as graceful as her friends were, you see, evidence to this fact was when she tried to recover. Down she went taking Angela with her as she tried to turn over. Nay, she was unsuccessful in righting her body before the handsome hero seemingly crushed his cup of coffee between his fingers, spilling it yet again down his front.

Get the picture?

“What the hell?” Angela laughed as I tried to climb off of her.

“Sorry, sorry,” I replied, embarrassed as I watched Triple D (Drop Dead Delicious) storm down the sidewalk heading back toward Gypsy’s.

“Quiet, please,” Toni Roseneau, the master yoga instructor, whisper-shouted.

Crawling on my knees and moving back into plank position, I inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly as I prayed to God Triple D would be gone from Gypsy’s by the time we were finished.
Good Lord, I don’t know why this guy makes me nervous.
My initial reaction to him made sense, but two days later. I should have shrugged it off and laughed about it by now.

At least this time it wasn’t my fault he spilled his coffee.

Shoo!

Paranoid that he’d come back and see my ass in the air again, I kept looking back over my shoulder to check.

“Nicola, you can’t focus your mind and relax your body if you keep looking over your shoulder,” Toni sighed in aggravation.

“Right, right, sorry,” I mumbled.

Angela nudged me on the shoulder and gave me a “what gives?” look. Rolling my eyes I whispered, “Detective Drop Dead Delicious caught me with my ass in the air.”

“Sweet, maybe it gave him ideas,” she whispered back. “Maybe, right now, he’s thinking about that golden pussy you possess and he’s waiting for you to finish this class.”

“Who has a golden pussy?” Kasey demanded as she leaned in from my other side, whisper shouting as well.

“Nicola does,” Angela told her.

“Guys—” I tried to break in as I watched Toni make her way toward us.

“Who’s waiting to find out?” Kasey kept going, smiling at me.

“Detective Triple D,” I added as I smiled in apology at Toni, who was now standing in front of me. Then I added since I was already in trouble, “My golden you-know-what is closed for business until it’s been buffed and shined. The playground is closed right now so drop it. ”

“Triple D?” Kasey asked, ignoring Toni as she glared at us.

“Later,” I whispered as I avoided Toni’s glare.

Toni could be a little hardcore about her classes. She didn’t care that her boss was a part of those interrupting one of her classes; all she cared about was a State of Zen for her pupils. With hands on her hips, Toni raised a brow and shook her head at the three of us.

“Our bodies and our minds have to work together to bring us into harmony. If you can’t zip it, then take it outside,” she ordered.

The three of us bit our lips to keep from laughing; then, like properly chastised children, we apologized.

“Sorry,” we replied in unison as we swan-dived into forward fold while I still kept my eyes on the window.

When class was over, I dragged myself out of the studio with the girls to head to Gypsy’s and get down to the business at hand. It had been at least ten minutes since I’d caught the detective staring at my ass, and I hoped he’d left.

As we walked the short distance from the studio to the coffee house, I heard a motorcycle start across the street. As anyone did when you heard the thundering roar of pipes, I glanced behind me and saw the detective on the bike. I stopped suddenly and stared since he seemed to have his eyes directed at me. There was no grin this time, not even a wink. He seemed almost angry as he sat there, perched on his silver beast of a bike, one leg on the ground.

He reminded me of a warlord on a horse, with the western sky at his back, the sun setting with shades of orange and yellow backlighting him like a conquering hero. It was reminiscent of one of my Highlanders as he sat atop his trusty steed surveying his land. He revved the bike again, interrupting my thoughts, then pulled away from the curb and shot past me without another glance.

“Damn, we missed him,” Angela cried out as she watched him turn toward the heart of downtown.

“He’s just some guy I spilled coffee on. There was no reason for him to wait,” I explained, more for me than for her.

Angela and Kasey made eyes at each other when I pulled open the door to Gypsy’s. I ignored their looks because I knew if I made more out of it than I already had, they’d keep at me.

The coffee house was quiet, thankfully, commuters going home had stopped in already, but the evening crowd hadn’t arrived yet. This worked for me since we were a large group and needed space in order to be comfortable. When our coffees were ready, we found a table big enough for all of us to spread out with the computer in front of us. Janeane pulled up the websites onto two separate tabs, and it began, the process of plotting a story. First were the characters. I had Triple D as the hero, Kasey as the heroine, now I needed a bad guy. A nasty, scary, want to hide under your bed while you read the story bad guy.

“Holy shit,” Janeane whispered. “We’ve got over a hundred messages on POF and fifty-four on SSD.”

“Open the first one,” Kasey told her.

“Ok, first one is from Fit and Freaky from Edmond. He says,
‘You’re hot, I’m down to drive an hour to meet you if you’re DTF’.
“

“DTF?” I questioned.

“Down to fuck,” Janeane replied laughing.

“Seriously?” I questioned as I opened my notebook and wrote down the definition.

“What does he look like?” Kristina asked. “If he’s hot, maybe Nicola could use him to break her dry spell.”

“I’m not sleeping with some random guy,” I huffed, shoving her in the shoulder.

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” she laughed back.

“See if my catfish messaged her. We put in the same info I had, so Taryn Rivers should have matched with him.

We’d chosen the name Taryn Rivers because we knew a girl in high school who was a real bitch and a fake friend. She'd gone after every boy one of us had dated until we’d caught her in the act. Since our profile was fake, we figured the name was fitting.

“Bingo,” Janeane laughed.
“’Hey, beautiful, saw you’re new on here and thought I’d send you a message. Just got home from a Thunder game, but I’ll be up for a while if you want to chat.’”

“Pfft, he used the same line on me. He said he had season tickets. He even asked me to go to a game with him, the fucker.”

I could tell Kasey was getting riled up, so I asked Janeane, “Check the submissive site, and see what we have on there.”

Janeane looked at Kasey then back to me and nodded. As she scrolled through the names, she started laughing.

“What?” Kristina asked.

“Well, your choices are a guy dressed as Robin Hood, a guy who should never have posted a penis picture since he’s about three inches long and . . . Hey, watch it”

The Robin Hood comment had us all shoving her out of the way so we could see the profile, but the three-inch man was still up on the screen. We all groaned in unison because he was cute and that made his shortcomings even more disappointing.

Angela moved the cursor to Robin Hood, and we inhaled sharply to keep from laughing.

“Is that . . . ?” Angela whispered.

“I think it is,” Kristina choked out.

Pictured in a green Robin Hood period costume, leggings and all, was Jared Park, former president of our senior class.

“I knew he was kinky,” Janeane grumbled so we turned to look at her. Janeane had gone out with Jared four or five times and had said at the time he was a great kisser, but a little bossy. Now we knew why. He was also president of the Thespian Club in high school, which I guess explained why he was in costume.

“What does his profile say?” I asked.

“Gorean male wants a slave girl slash submissive. Will train the trainable.”

“What the hell is a Gorean man? I thought he was Caucasian?” Kasey asked, confused.

Angela opened google and typed in Gorean. Once she found what she was looking for, she began reading.

“People who base their Dominance or Submission on the works of John Norman,” she read out loud.

“Ok, but who the hell is John Norman?” Kasey asked.

“Oh, my God, he wrote the Gor books,” I whispered. “John Norman is an author of nearly thirty novels about Gor, a primitive, male-dominated planet. The Gor books have men enslaving women, and the suggestion is that female slavery is, in some sense, the natural order of society.”

“Ha, I bet the women’s libbers hate this guy,” Angela chuckled.

“Jesus, you’re telling me Jared lives his life according to this man’s work? I knew he was a jerk,” Janeane seethed.

“Ok, we’re getting off-track here. Is there anyone else of interest?” I asked to diffuse Janeane’s anger and keep the group focused.

“Yeah, here’s one,” Janeane announced. “Dark Prince . . . I’m a dominant looking for a submissive slave.”

“What does his message say?” I asked.

“’Taryn, your pictures entice me. The hint of the forbidden, a tantalizing taste of what you could offer me, your Master. I require complete submission from my slaves. I will dress you, feed you, and cage you as I see fit. In the easiest possible terms to explain this lifestyle, so there are no misconceptions as I’ve had with others in the past, I own you. You become my property when you agree to be my slave. I will do with you what I feel is in your best interest and in return for your submission, I will take care of you for the rest of your life—Dark Prince.’”

You could have heard a pin drop when Janeane finished reading and I’d admit that my heart rate increased infinitesimally with the seductive quality of the message.

A slow grin pulled across my lips. I loved it when my characters came into focus early in a project. Before I could give an opinion about Dark Prince, Angela jumped in with a rush of excitement. “I don’t know about you guys, and the whole slavery thing aside, but for research purposes this guy is . . . well, he’s—”

“Perfect,” I finished for Angela.

***

Rounding his desk, Dallas Vaughn still had his mind on a certain heart-shaped ass, and it pissed him off. He should have had better control of his urges at thirty-four, but when he’d seen that ass in the window attached to that girl-next-door face, he’d reacted. His jaw had tightened and his hand had flexed violently when he noticed the pants she wore were practically see-through with the setting sun shining on them. He had sucked in a breath on a half groan at the sight of her rose-colored pussy right before his coffee exploded all over his shirt.