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Suncoast Society

Things to Do in Denver

Tony Daniels has a high-stress job running the data center for Asher Insurance. When he’s sent to Denver to supervise building their new facility, it completely takes over his life, including stealing valuable time and attention from wife and slave, Shayla.

Shayla doesn’t like having to spend time apart from her husband, but she’s a big girl with a job of her own. Still, it would be nice to actually spend their wedding anniversary together. And that gives her an idea…

But then Tony receives an unexpected phone call, and his past moves to darkly intrude on and overshadow his already thinly stretched present. Sadist doesn’t mean soulless. Except now it also means asking something of his wife she has every right to refuse. Will this new weight draw them closer, or will their already dangerously stressed dynamic split apart at the seams?

Genres: BDSM, Contemporary

Length: 31,308

THINGS TO DO IN DENVER

Suncoast Society

Tymber Dalton

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Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

Things to Do in Denver

Copyright © 2018 by Tymber Dalton

ISBN: 978-1-64243-335-7

First Publication: July 2018

Cover design by Harris Channing

All art and logo copyright © 2018 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

If you find a Siren-BookStrand e-book or print book being sold or shared illegally, please let us know at legal@sirenbookstrand.com

Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

DEDICATION

To Sir. He knows why.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tymber Dalton is the wild-child alter-ego of author Lesli Richardson. She lives in the Tampa Bay region of Florida with her husband (aka “The World’s Best Husband™”) and too many pets. Active in the BDSM lifestyle, the two-time EPIC award winner and part-time Viking shield-maiden loves to shoot skeet and play D&D with her friends. She’s also the bestselling author of over one hundred and forty books and counting, including The Reluctant Dom, The Denim Dom, Cardinal’s Rule, the Suncoast Society series, the Love Slave for Two series, the Triple Trouble series, the Coffeeshop Coven series, the Good Will Ghost Hunting series, the Drunk Monkeys series, and many more.

She loves to hear from readers! Please feel free to drop by her website and sign up for her newsletter to keep abreast of the latest news, snarkage, and releases. You can also find all of her Siren-BookStrand releases under all four of her pen names on her author page on the BookStrand site.

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Author’s Note

This book’s timeline overlaps with A Spanktacular Fourth and A Crafty Ever After and should be read after those two titles. You’ll see another side of certain events.

Tony and Shayla’s feature books are The Denim Dom and Click, with another small feature for Tony in Open Doors, although they appear in other books in the series as secondary characters, including Domme by Default, The Reluctant Dom, and others.

Some of the characters in this book appear in or are featured in previous books in the Suncoast Society series. While most of the books in the Suncoast Society series are standalone works which may be read independently of each other, the recommended reading order to avoid spoilers and to not miss any backstory information is as follows:

1. Safe Harbor

2. Domme by Default

3. Cardinal’s Rule

4. The Reluctant Dom

5. The Denim Dom

6. Pinch Me

7. Broken Toy

8. A Clean Sweep

9. A Roll of the Dice

10. His Canvas

11. A Lovely Shade of Ouch

12. Crafty Bastards

13. A Merry Little Kinkmas

14. Sapiosexual

15. A Very Kinky Valentine’s Day

16. Things Made Right

17. Click

18. Spank or Treat

19. A Turn of the Screwed

20. Chains

21. Kinko de Mayo

22. Broken Arrow

23. Out of the Spotlight

24. Friends Like These

25. Vicious Carousel

26. Hot Sauce

27. Open Doors

28. One Ring

29. Vulnerable

30. The Strength of the Pack

31. Initiative

32. Impact

33. Liability

34. Switchy

35. Rhymes With Orange

36. Beware Falling Ice

37. Beware Falling Rocks

38. Dangerous Curves Ahead

39. Two Against Nature

40. Home at Last

41. A Kinkmas Carol

42. Ask DNA

43. Time Out of Mind

44. Happy Valenkink’s Day

45. Splendid Isolation

46. Similar to Rain

47. Happy Spank Patrick’s Day

48. Fire in the Hole

49. Pretzel Logic

50. This Moody Bastard

51. Walk Between the Raindrops

52. Rub Me Raw

53. Any World That I’m Welcome To

54. Heartache Spoken Here

55. Roll With the Punches

56. See You Sometime

57. Borderline

58. A Case of You

59. Reconsider Me

60. Never Too Late for Love

61. Blues Beach

62. Happy Spanksgiving

63. Our Gravity

64. Friends in Common

65. Almost Gothic

66. Empty-Handed Heart

67. Steady Rain

68. Indifference of Heaven

69. Like the Seasons

70. I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead

71. Through With Love

72. Judgment of the Moon and Stars

73. For the Roses

74. A Spanktacular Fourth

75. Blue Motel Room

76. A Crafty Ever After

77. Come In From the Cold

78. Things to Do in Denver

TABLE OF CONTENTS

THINGS TO DO IN DENVER

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

THINGS TO DO IN DENVER

Suncoast Society

TYMBER DALTON

Copyright © 2018

Chapter One

June 1

Well, that’s not happening.

Tony Daniels leaned against the concrete block wall of the data center, taking advantage of the small bit of shade available on that side of the building. Currently open on his personal cell phone was the e-mail thread for the Suncoast Society Fourth of July private party invite, which had been sent out yesterday. Someone else had just RSVP’d as coming to the party.

Ross was also looped into that e-mail account, a Gmail account they’d created to only handle the private party invites. That way, he could respond to the RSVPs and related questions, since Tony was currently stuck in Denver, and probably would be for the foreseeable future.

Tony marked the message as unread so Ross would see it and respond next time he logged in.

Fuck.

Max, Sean, and Cali had once again volunteered to host a private holiday party. Which he felt kind of guilty about, since he was one of the main private party organizers for the Suncoast Society munch group.

It’d been a while since he and Shayla had hosted one. But like hell would he ask Shay to take one on if he wasn’t even sure he was going to be home for it.

Right now, it was looking like he wouldn’t even be home to attend the party, much less be around to host one of the damn things.

He was going to be lucky if he made it home in time for their wedding anniversary.

Fuck.

He hated Denver, but Asher Insurance was constructing a new campus because they’d outgrown their existing facility. Meaning he had to help oversee this part of the new data center’s equipment installation and configuration. They’d rapidly outgrown the off-site colocation server site he’d been in charge of putting together just a couple of years ago.

The new campus would be a full secondary facility to the main one down in Florida, complete with an expanded call center three times the capacity and staffing they had now, as well as an on-site data center. As opposed to the small call center and administrative offices they’d had in Denver up until now. That site couldn’t house a full data center, either.

Hence the colo.

Which was ironic, because that first colo build-out had happened right when he and Shay were early in their relationship, at the expiration of their initial “contract” for him to train her as his submissive as research for a series of articles she’d been writing.

The two weeks he’d spent out of town then had nearly fucked them as a couple. All because he’d been too stupid to outright tell her he wanted more with her, and she’d been too scared of admitting to him that she wanted more, too, out of fear he’d think she was “clingy.”

For this trip, he brought one of his guys, Jim Coughy, out there with him. But, honestly? Now he was truly regretting picking Jim for this job. Tony would have been better off grabbing nearly anyone else with a pulse and training them on the spot.

Not to mention, he and this dude were going to have a serious meeting with an HR rep when they returned to Florida about his behavior, attitude, and work habits.

And a drug test, because he suspected the guy was taking full advantage of Colorado’s marijuana laws and buying himself a ton of edibles. That was despite Asher Insurance having a zero-tolerance drug policy.

Except, right now, Tony needed a warm body with a valid NDA on file in HR’s hot little hands, someone reasonably familiar with their systems. It wasn’t simply a matter of moving equipment into place, bolting frames together, and racking boxes. It was the wiring, the hook-up, the UPS, the datacom end of it—the whole system infrastructure.

And, once they got the new data center up and running, they had to take the old system down out of the colo and relocate those racks to the new building as well, and get them all back online.

Yes, he’d have to hire a dedicated IT team for this site, but HR was fucking around and hadn’t posted the job listings yet.

Which pissed him off.

They couldn’t seem to get it through their damn heads it wasn’t like hiring a one-off DBA here and there, or hiring in people for a call center. You needed to interview people, check their references, and make sure they weren’t bullshitting you on their skills before turning them loose with confidential customer data a couple of thousand miles away from where you were actually located. Fortunately, until this data center was up and running with a full crew, it would literally be used only as a secondary, like the colo was currently being used. He could monitor it from Florida and call in third-party vendors to come in from the colo facility if there was a hardware issue to address—at a premium price, sure, but the company would have to pay it.

Because he’d already flat-out told them he wasn’t moving to Denver.

Been there, done that, wasn’t doing it again. Although that hadn’t been a permanent move, just a short stint supervising the upgrades at a smaller insurance company Asher had bought and which needed serious IT overhauls to bring them into compliance with federal laws.

Especially not now that he was married to Shay, and they had a life together in Florida.

Worse, he’d budgeted for a trained and compliance-certified IT vendor to come in with a team and help him do this, which would have cut down the total project time to maybe three weeks, max, including padding in time for fuckups.

Then some Asher Insurance VP he’d never even heard of higher up in the company, who’d only been there three months at that point, struck it from the project budget and didn’t bother to tell anyone that until after everything was approved and signed off on by legal and accounting.

And then corporate wouldn’t budge on adding it back into the project budget.

Tony suspected it was no mere coincidence that the same amount of money the asshole had sliced from his budget had later been paid out to a lobbying “consultant” in DC.

Fuckers.

Since he was a salaried employee who didn’t get overtime, he was expected to bend over without lube and take it like a man. Cannibalizing his existing staff from Florida wasn’t an option right now. Two of his staff had transferred over from the data center to the Windows group, he had two vacancies he was already trying to hire for in addition to them, and his existing staff was stretched as thinly as he dared without compromising service.

They are not paying me enough money for this bullshit.

Getting this facility up and running…they were averaging sixteen-hour days, it’d been over three weeks since he’d been home, and he missed Shay like crazy.

Aaannnd he couldn’t even call her right now, because he knew she was covering a county commission meeting for work. Not usually her bailiwick, but it was a zoning issue with a massive environmental impact for a local neighborhood, and the magazine she wrote for was covering it as part of a series on other ecology and environmental stories.

Fuck.

Even his boss, Darren, who he usually hated with a passion privately and barely tolerated at work, was just about licking Tony’s taint trying to keep him happy. If Tony up and quit on them right now, they’d be up shit creek without so much as a kayak, much less an oar to paddle it with.

It wouldn’t help him get a glowing recommendation from Asher when he applied to other companies if he left under those circumstances, but it would damn well give him a modicum of personal satisfaction to fuck them over.

Except…sadist or not, he was the better person. He was a professional.

And it wasn’t just him anymore. He had a wife, responsibilities. They had a life together.

His house was, fortunately, paid off, so that was one pressure off his mind. But he was too damn young to afford to retire and keep that house, either.

Tony pulled up his ongoing text message with Shay.

I know you’re working right now and can’t text Me, pet, but I wanted to come outside and text you that I love you and miss you. Thank you for your patience with this. I’ll talk to you later.

He stood there for another moment, his personal cell in his left hand, hoping she’d reply while he scrolled through e-mail and messages on his work cell in his right hand. He didn’t get service on his personal cell inside the building, but his work cell was tapped into the Wi-Fi already installed.

After a few minutes, resigned, he tucked his personal cell into his back pocket and his work cell into his shirt pocket and returned to the building.

Fuck.

Chapter Two

Shayla haaaated this. Covering county government was probably one of her least-favorite tasks. She hadn’t been fond of covering the government beat when she’d still been a reporter up in Cleveland for the Plain Dealer, either, but at least she’d had a more familiar foundation of local knowledge to call upon.

Not to mention, she’d had fellow reporters whose brains she could pick for background info on topics.

She was flying mostly blind right now, and Florida environmental topics were tricky to cover, anyway. This one in particular. There was a convoluted patchwork of federal, state, county, and even city agencies with their fingers in this particular pie—and that was before a couple of non-profit orgs like the Sierra Club tossed their lawsuits into the mix.

And complicating matters was the county’s 2050 comp plan, which she was still trying to decipher.

But this whole series of articles were her babies, and she’d see it through to the end. Being an investigative reporter had been her dream, even if her career had taken a slight dogleg on her when she’d left Ohio and moved to Florida a few years earlier to start working for Sunshine Attitude magazine.

She wouldn’t complain about the personal benefits.

Although she currently didn’t have much of a personal life. As much as she missed Tony, it was almost better he was out of town right now. That way, she didn’t feel guilty sitting up late into the night reading and researching, trying to absorb dry scientific facts and even more arid government-speak as she untangled everything for her articles.

This sucks.

In the back of her mind, she tried not to think about their upcoming wedding anniversary. He’d told her he’d do his best to either wrap up the project before then, or take three days off and fly home so they could spend it together.

Except this was his job. He got paid damn good money for what he did, and if he quit, it wasn’t very likely he could find another job locally that would pay as well.

Like hell did Shayla want to move.

At least I have Bagel and Cream.

The two cats were their babies, and she smiled to herself as she thought about the adorable scene just a couple of days before Tony had flown out, him dozing on their sofa that afternoon with both cats curled up and asleep on him. She’d snapped a picture of it with her phone to look at when she felt lonely.

The cats had curled up in bed with her every night since Tony had flown out to Denver, which was unusual, since they normally preferred to sleep out on the couch.

Focus!

She forced her attention back onto the meeting. A mixture of near-fatal boredom and terror of missing anything vital filled her. Adding to that, she felt like she was way over her head in literally alligator-infested waters.

But she would do it. The first couple of articles in the series had not only done well on the magazine’s website, but had been tracked directly to a discernible uptick in website subscribers, as well as a slight increase in print subscribers.

It was a point of professional pride to her that she tough this out.

* * * *

Another thing Shayla detested about Tony being in Denver was the two-hour time difference, something hammered home when the meeting finally adjourned a little after five that afternoon and she checked her personal cell on her way out to her car.

She nearly started crying at his sweet text, but also over the fact that it was three p.m. in Denver, and he’d be hard at work for several more hours, at least.

She didn’t call or text his work cell unless it was an emergency.

Her being lonely and feeling sorry for herself was not, in her opinion, an emergency.

Once she was in her car and the AC was running, she stared at the message again before composing a reply.

I love and miss You, too, Sir. Meeting just adjourned and heading home.

She’d been at work earlier that day and they knew she’d leave this meeting and head straight home. There was no reason for her to go back to the office. She had her work cell with her, as well as her laptop. She’d be working on the story tonight anyway.

In fact her boss, Bill Melling, was harping on her to schedule vacation time she hadn’t taken yet.

She’d been hoping she could take it with Tony for their anniversary.

Hmm.

There was a thought. Maybe she could take a long weekend and surprise him in Denver. She could take her laptop and write while out there while he was working. Not much of a fun trip, but spending a few days sleeping by her husband and Master’s side would go a long way to soothing her loneliness.

By the time she made it through the afternoon traffic and pulled into their driveway, she was ready for an adult beverage. She grabbed their mail first, sorting through it on her way back up the driveway. After schlepping her stuff inside from the car and dumping it on the couch, she scooped the cat pan and fed Bagel and Cream—who’d met her at the front door with loud meows of disapproval—and then cracked the top on a bottle of craft beer she’d picked up the other day.

She was going to pull her laptop out and get started when her eyes widened.

Fuck.

She turned and stared at the small bookcase in the foyer, where her leather collar and cuffs sat, waiting.

Forgotten.

Shit!

She burst into tears.

* * * *

Five minutes later, she’d calmed herself, stripped, and donned her cuffs and collar. It wasn’t like her to forget this part of her daily ritual, either. Even with Tony out of town, it was a true comfort to come home and just…be.

Follow her routine.

Except today, she’d blown it.

And yes, she would own up to it. She’d feel like shit until she told him. Their relationship was built upon trust. Tony had worked damned hard to earn her trust.

Like hell would she hide what she’d done, even though she damn well knew she’d earn punishment strokes for it.

She picked up her phone.

I’m home, Sir. I’m sorry, I forgot to strip and put on my cuffs and collar first thing. I have done it now. Took me about twenty minutes to remember.

She set her phone aside, the craft beer not tasting a fraction as good as it had before she realized her error.

It was the principle of the matter. She willingly became not just Tony’s wife, but his slave. She wanted this. Asked for it.

She knew she’d beat herself up a helluva lot worse over this than any punishment Tony would come up with for her.

It was nearly nine o’clock when her phone finally rang, and she answered it without looking because it was Tony’s ringtone.

“Hello, Sir.”

“Hello, pet. It’s okay. I’ll give that one to you as a freebie.”

She felt tears pricking at her eyes. “No, I earned punishment.”

He sighed. “Sweetheart, I know this isn’t easy on you. Considering I still don’t know how long this is going to take, I don’t feel right doing that. But if it’ll make you feel better, we’ll start the list at five. Okay?”

“Thank you, Sir.” She closed her eyes and envisioned his face. “How’s it going.”

He grumbled. “Not good,” he said, his voice low. “I’m pretty sure Jim is buying edibles.”

“Oh, no.”

“Yeah. I’m really regretting picking him to bring with me.”

“Are you back at your room now?” She kind of hoped he was, that maybe they could have phone sex.

“No. I’m still here at the job site. I stepped outside. Waiting on the pizza I ordered to be delivered. Going to be yet another late night.”

“It’s what, seven there?”

“Yeah.” He sounded exhausted. “If we’re out of here before midnight, I’ll be shocked.”

More guilt filled her. “Sorry, Sir.” She had no room to bitch when he was the one working his ass off. At least she was home.

He gentled his voice. “Sweetheart, please, don’t apologize. I love you, and I miss you, and I don’t want you heaping guilt on yourself that’s not yours to carry. All right?”

“Yes, Sir.” He knew her damned well.

“Let me get off here. I see the pizza guy coming. Love you. Have a good night. Text me before you go to sleep.”

“Yes, Sir. Love you, too.”

“That’s my good girl. Good night.”

“Good night, Sir.”

She stared at the phone, the tears finally coming.

I will not stress him out by being clingy.

Will. Not.

She finished the last two swallows of her beer and carried the empty out to the recycling bin in the garage. She had no reason to bitch when, hell, the spouses of active military sometimes didn’t see them for years at a time, and here she was kvetching about weeks?

Then she pulled a fresh beer out of the fridge and popped the top on that.

It’s going to be another long, lonely night.

Chapter Three

Fuck this shit.

While Tony had been in Denver for over five weeks now, his body was still firmly adamant about staying on Florida time.

Meaning he was lying in bed, wide awake at five a.m. local time on a Tuesday morning, already able to tell he had absolutely no hope of going back to sleep this morning despite not needing to be up for two hours.

The thought of rubbing one out came to mind, almost immediately followed by the memory of Shayla sounding close to tears when he’d talked to her last night. It was the third time she’d forgotten to put on her collar and cuffs since he’d left, and he didn’t have the heart to remove that as a rule, even though he knew he’d have to give her the punishment she believed she’d earned.

If he didn’t, she’d feel even worse. He’d given up trying to talk her out of feeling like that. And if he removed the rule, she’d feel like she’d failed him, even though she’d done anything but.

No, he wouldn’t rub one out. If his pet was stuck alone, he’d suck it up, too. He’d given her permission to masturbate if she wanted to as long as she told him about it later, but so far, she’d only done it during their phone sex sessions.

Then again, that’s the only time he’d felt like doing it, too.

He finally sat up, groaning at the various aches and pains he felt from several weeks of non-stop physical work. It wasn’t so much that it was hard—although it was for parts of it because the damn server rack systems were freaking heavy—but it was also repetitive, getting down on his knees under the raised floor to run wires, climbing step-ladders—just…a grind.

And they weren’t even done yet. Still had to finish the new data center install, then get everything up and running. Troubleshooting. Once that was all on-line, he could begin the process of shutting down, moving, and reinstalling the colo’s servers.

More troubleshooting.

And Jim Coughy’s performance was deteriorating by the day. Tony didn’t know how much pot the guy was consuming, but this was fucking ridiculous.

Fuck my life.

He dragged himself to his feet and grabbed his work and personal phones as he headed for the bathroom, opting to sit and scroll instead of trying to aim.

He had a good-morning text from Shayla, but he couldn’t call her yet. She’d be scrambling to get ready for work, and if he called and interrupted her, she’d stop and that’d make her late.

He’d wait thirty minutes, which would put her in the middle of her morning drive to work and able to talk.

Okay, so that was a good reason to not go back to sleep.

He then scrolled through his work e-mail and quickly dumped a lot of what he didn’t need to worry about, forwarded a few, answered a couple more.

That handled, he opted to take a shower and stand there, letting the hot water beat on his body. Then he made himself a cup of coffee from the room’s crappy-ass coffeemaker and climbed onto the bed to sit up with the TV tuned to an early morning local newscast.

Note to self, stop and buy a fucking coffeemaker.

This bullshit was ridiculous. He could buy himself a cheap-ass one and at least have decent coffee.

Yes, he was spoiled, he’d admit it. One of Shayla’s jobs was making coffee every morning and having his ready for him, bringing it into the bathroom with her on weekday mornings, where they showered together.

Bringing it to him in bed on weekends.

He went through his personal e-mail on his phone and paused at one that had been sent late the night before by someone he hadn’t even thought about in over a decade.

His ex-brother-in-law, Dennis.

Short, direct, and ominous in its brevity.

Tony, I know this is out of the blue, but I need you to please call me as soon as you read this, no matter what time it is. 941-555-8192. It’s urgent.

He still had a few minutes before he could call Shayla. While he hadn’t had any contact with his ex’s family in over ten years, he hadn’t left on bad terms with them. While his ex had driven him crazy, especially toward the end, he really didn’t even harbor much in the way of ill-will for her, especially this far out from the event. She’d wanted kids, he did not. He’d made it clear from the start, and she’d decided to ignore that and try to talk him into it anyway.

Plus, she’d been vanilla and he’d found himself holding back who he really was, increasingly unhappy and knowing there had to be more to life than he was living.

Tony punched the phone number into his contacts and then called it.

It rang twice before he heard a man’s nearly desperate-sounding voice answer. “Hello?”

“Dennis, it’s Tony Daniels. I just read your e-mail.”

“Oh, thank you. Look, I’m sorry to contact you like this, but have you heard from Christine?”

“Your sister?”

“Yeah.” He sounded choked up. “I mean, I know it’s a long-shot, but I was hoping.”

A wave of gooseflesh swept over him. “No, I haven’t talked to her since the divorce. What’s wrong?”

It took Dennis a long moment to answer, and no matter who it was, Tony wouldn’t have wished the desperation or near panic he heard in that man’s voice on anyone’s family. “We think she’s…” He sobbed. “We think she’s going to kill herself.”

* * * *

Shayla managed to oversleep because she apparently shut her alarm off instead of hitting snooze. It wasn’t a problem when Tony was home, because he didn’t hit snooze, and she had his coffee to make.

Without him home, just how much of her own daily routine revolved around her husband had become painfully obvious.

This was the fifth time she’d done this in the five weeks since he’d left.

After tapping out a quick good-morning text to Tony, she ran into the kitchen and punched the power button for the coffeemaker before dashing back to the bathroom, both cats loudly following in her wake and demanding their usual morning greeting—and treats—that she gave them in the kitchen while she waited for the coffee to brew.

“Not today, guys, sorry!” She threw herself into the shower, managed to nick herself on the knee while shaving her legs, and didn’t even bother drying her hair. She towel-dried it and pulled it back with an elastic band.

Fuck it.

No make-up, that could go on once she was at work. Wasn’t like she wore a lot anyway.

By the time she jumped into her Civic, she managed to shave the time deficit down to running only five minutes late, meaning she’d still get to work on time because she always tried to be there at least fifteen minutes early.

Whew.

Part of her hoped Tony called her on the way in. He had a few times, when he’d awakened early and couldn’t go back to sleep, but she wouldn’t call him in case he was asleep.

She’d been in such a hurry she hadn’t had time to hook up her Bluetooth receiver for her phone, either, opting for the local Sarasota rock station. Tony had tried to talk her into buying a new car, but the little Civic was still in great shape and—the best part—paid for. So what if it didn’t have the newest sound system? The ten-dollar receiver he’d hooked up for her meant she could play her phone through the radio.

She was at a stoplight when one of the station’s morning news breaks came on, and it caught her ear.

“The Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office is asking for the public’s help in locating a local woman who has been reported as missing and endangered. Christine Marcus Daniels is forty-six, blonde, blue eyes, and was last seen leaving her job at Carter-Reynolds Financing in Sarasota late yesterday afternoon. She drives a red Chevy—”

She punched the radio’s power button to shut it off when her phone rang, Tony’s custom tone.

Her day infinitely improved. She answered, thumbing it into speaker mode. “Good morning, Sir.”

“Good morning, pet.” But he sounded…weird.

“Are you all right, Sir?”

“Woke up early and couldn’t go back to sleep. How are you doing?”

“I was running late and caught up, fortunately.”

His voice started sounding a little more normal. “Ah. Overslept again?”

“Yes, Sir. This sucks. And I know,” she quickly added, “it’s not your fault. Sorry. Didn’t mean it to sound like that.”

“I knew what you meant, pet. You’re right that this sucks.” He sighed. “I’ll try to get us out of there at a decent hour tonight so I can call you before bed. I won’t promise, but I’ll try. I’ll know better later today and will text you if it looks like I can. If we’re at a natural stopping point, it’s easier to resume things the next day.”

Her heart raced. “Thank you, Sir. I appreciate that.” This day was looking up. Even if they couldn’t talk for long later, the fact that she knew he was trying meant the world to her.

“I know, sweetheart.” He sighed.

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Yeah. Not looking forward to today. I need to call work and talk to my boss and see if I can get someone else flown out here.”

“That bad, huh?”

“Yeah. Fucking Colorado. Why’d our secondary facility have to be in Colorado? It seems like there’s a damn edibles store on every fricking block.”

“I’m sorry, Sir.”

“Not your fault, pet. I should have asked Mike Kennedy to come with me from the start. Technically not his area of expertise, but I know his work ethic, and he would have been helping me kick ass.”

“Then you’d be able to talk to me around him,” she teased, belatedly hoping he understood she was joking.

He laughed, much to her relief. “There is that. Him being a friend in common would be nice.”

She wished she could delay getting to work so she could talk to him longer. “I’m almost to work, Sir.”

“Okay, pet. Have a good day. I love you.”

“I love you, too, Sir. You have a good day, too.”

“Yeah, well, I won’t have any of those until I’m home with you, sweetheart. Talk to you later.”

He ended the call before she pulled into a parking space, and she was glad she hadn’t had time to put on make-up that morning.

Otherwise, she’d have raccoon eyes from taking a minute to sit there and cry and feel sorry for herself.

Chapter Four

After Tony finished his call with Shayla, he tried to bury himself in work, firing up his laptop and logging into Asher’s system to deal with e-mails and other issues.

To try not to think about the first phone call of his morning.

He literally had not set eyeballs on Christine since the day of their final divorce hearing. At that time, he’d already separated all their finances and was living on his own when the judge signed the final order severing what few ties were left between them. He’d moved out months earlier, before the end of the year, and knowing they were having problems long before then had been filing separate tax returns.

One less thing to deal with. Especially with her increasing hostility toward him, which would flip in an instant to weepy and apologetic, keeping him off-balance. The whole dynamic that had started his allergy to drama in the first place.

After their final hearing, he’d wished her well and left after shaking her hand, not wanting to be a douche. He just wanted to…leave. She’d driven him crazy in bad ways, especially toward the end before he’d made the decision to file for divorce. In retrospect, he never should have married her.

But he’d never wished her ill-will.

He was a person of his word. If he said something, he meant it. If he was wrong, he admitted it. He’d been upfront with Christine from the very beginning, when they were first dating, that he did not want kids.

Period.

Full-stop.

At the time, he couldn’t afford to simply drop money on a vasectomy, but he used condoms religiously until they were living together and she got fitted with an IUD and it took effect.

For her part, she’d insisted she was okay with that, said she didn’t want kids, either. Which was why he’d been willing to marry her after dating for a while and living together for a couple of years.

But it was like once the ring was on her finger, she changed, thought she’d change his mind.

Got mad at him when she switched from using an IUD back to the pill, and he insisted on using condoms again.

He wasn’t falling for that. No way did he want to have an “oopsie” baby. The only reason he’d stopped using condoms with her with the IUD was because her doctor had assured him that while nothing was perfect, those were pretty darn close.

He knew some of Christine’s desperation to have kids was “teasing” from Christine’s mother and aunts, wanting to know when they’d start having kids. Because at every fucking family function they went to, even though Tony always answered their nosy and repeated inquiries about when they’d “start a family” with the same answer—we aren’t—her relatives were always pushing her to think about her biological clock.

Like she was less of a woman if she didn’t have kids.

Like there was an imperative for her to have kids, or she was a failure.

He was not the man for that role. He had nothing against kids, nothing against his friends’ kids. He loved kids.

He just did not have any desire to be a parent, and never had.

He also hadn’t been raised in a family that apparently tied self-worth to how many grandkids you could produce for the family name.

He honestly hadn’t thought about Christine in a couple of years before today.

Dennis told him that she’d had another marriage, which had also ended in divorce. The guy’d told her he did want kids. Then he’d flipped after they got married, and had finally admitted he’d had a vasectomy years earlier, after she started talking about going to see a fertility specialist when she didn’t get pregnant their first year together and he realized his secret would come out anyway.

After that, she went through a string of boyfriends, long- and short-term, and had recently been fighting severe depression.

But no one had realized how severe until now.

It was one of her co-workers who’d contacted Dennis yesterday. She’d sat through a teary lunch with Christine. Christine had also given the co-worker her house key and asked her to please take care of her cat for her for a few days, but didn’t say why. When the coworker went over that evening, she found no sign of Christine, but she discovered several sealed envelopes on the kitchen counter, including one addressed to Dennis, and it included his cell number on the outside.

With a sticky note asking Dennis be called first once they were found.

There was also one addressed to Tony.

The detectives hadn’t released those other notes to the family yet, and Dennis hadn’t opened them before calling the cops. When the co-worker had called Dennis, he’d rushed over to Christine’s apartment and ripped the envelope open addressed to him, then immediately called 911.

Tony had also given Dennis his work cell number to pass to the detectives if they had more questions for him.

Christine had turned off her cell phone before leaving work. Police had already tried pinging it after obtaining an emergency court order. Her car was an older model with no on-board electronic systems that would allow it to be tracked or located.

No activity on her debit or credit cards.

No activity on her social media feeds.

Nothing.

All they could do was pray she hadn’t hurt herself. Normally, they couldn’t file a missing person report that quickly, but the presence of the notes and their obvious meaning indicated she fell under the endangered designation, and law enforcement had sent out BOLOs all over the region to various law enforcement agencies. They’d also put out a Silver Alert for her car on highway signs, even though she was younger than the usual criteria.

No one had known she was seeing a counsellor for her depression, and that she was on several medications for it, until she’d told her co-worker about it at lunch and left her doctor’s contact info in the note she’d written to Dennis.

More alarming was that she’d purchased a handgun three weeks earlier and hadn’t told anyone about it. Her brother discovered the empty box for it, with the receipt inside, sitting on her bed.

She’d never owned one before and did not have a concealed carry permit.

Tony still had an hour before he was supposed to meet with Jim Coughy downstairs for breakfast before heading to the job site when his personal cell rang from a Sarasota number he didn’t recognize.

Gut clenching, he answered. “Tony Daniels.”

“Tony, hey, it’s Ethan Neri.”

Tony sat back and pulled his glasses off. Ethan was a friend in common from the Suncoast Society.

He was also a Sarasota County Sheriff’s detective.

“Hey, Ethan. I think I know why you’re calling me.”

“Yeah. Wish it was better circumstances. Sorry I didn’t call you last night, but wasn’t sure if it was you or not, until I saw your number. This is my work phone.”

“I figured. Did you find her?”

“No. But I need to follow all leads. Her brother told me he called you…”

Ten minutes later, Tony had logged into his personal e-mail account and was hitting refresh every few seconds, waiting for the scan Ethan was going to send him of the note. Tony had given him permission to open the letter to view its contents and send him copies.

It finally hit his inbox, and he put his glasses back on before he clicked on the e-mail to open it. The e-mail was just a quick line from Ethan, sent from his work email.

Mr. Daniels, attached please find a copy of the letter we discussed. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at…

Tony clicked on the attachment. The letter had been handwritten on sheets from a lined yellow notepad in Christine’s familiar rolling script, and was dated yesterday.

Dear Tony,

I’m sorry I didn’t get in touch with you personally about this, but I know you. You’re a good man, even if I didn’t appreciate how good you were at the time. And I know you’d be talking me out of this, or trying to tell someone, and…well, that kind of defeats the whole purpose.

There are things I want to say to you, though. I don’t want to leave them unsaid.

I wasn’t very fair to you during our years together, and I’m sorry for that. Looking back, I can see how immature I acted, and how unfair I was to you. You were always honest with me, always open, and never tried to change me.

But I did try to change you, change who you were. For that, I’m truly sorry.

I know I made life hard for you, especially toward the end. I guess I couldn’t fathom a future where you didn’t finally give in, because you loved me enough to change for me.

It was never that you didn’t love me enough, it was that I placed unrealistic expectations on you.

You deserved better.

I know there were other issues between us besides the issue of children, and you were honest and open about them as well. I could never fully appreciate that until later. I wanted to hold on to my self-righteous fury and insist you were wrong, when the truth was, you weren’t.

You were right. About everything.

I know I should have placed my focus on US, and what we had together, instead of what I wished I could have.

You were the best thing to ever happen to me, and I was an idiot to let you get away. I should have been happy to have a man who was faithful and honest and forthright, a hard-working guy who always had my back, even when I didn’t deserve it.

I heard you remarried a couple of years ago. I never found the nerve to contact you then and wish you well, because I wasn’t sure how to do it without making it sound like I was jealous or being snarky.

The truth is, I am jealous. She’s married a wonderful man, and I truly wish you two a lifetime of happiness. Hopefully she’s not stupid enough to waste her chance the way I did. I guess that’s why I never went through the trouble of changing my last name, even after I remarried—and divorced—because part of me always knew I screwed up.

I never found a guy who could live up to the high bar you set. I don’t say that to make you feel guilty. In fact, nothing in this letter is designed to make you feel…guilty. Seriously. It’s not. Please don’t feel that way, and please don’t feel there was something you could have done, because there’s not.

I wanted to tell you that what I’m doing now is for ME, because life is hard, and I’m out of strength to keep trying. Maybe that makes me a coward or something, but it’s my choice, and it’s a choice I’ve spent the past decade struggling NOT to make, no matter how put-together everyone thought I was.

I’m tired.

And as I sit here writing not only this letter, but a few others, I admit that maybe it’s for the best I never had kids. Because even though I desperately wanted them—and yes, I know I could have adopted—I realized it’s not children that I needed.

I needed to learn how to fill the void inside me.

But it’s an endless, gaping void. It has only grown larger over the years, and no amount of children or antidepressants or psychotherapy or anything else is going to change that fact or stop its growth.

I’m empty.

The closest I ever came to feeling like I belonged, and like I wasn’t empty, and like I was loved, was when I was with you.

And I’m sorry. I’m truly sorry for not recognizing what we had before, for not fully appreciating that it was enough had I only LET it be enough.

You did NOTHING wrong.

You ARE a good man, and you were a good man then, too.

You were a good husband.

You were an even better friend, and I desperately wish I hadn’t screwed that up, too, because I miss your friendship and those times we shared together as much as other times between us. I miss our sunsets. I miss our talks. I miss you making me laugh.

I loved you then, and the sad truth is, I still love you and tried to find someone else I could love as much as I loved you, or who would love me as well as you loved me.

And I can’t.

I won’t.

And even if I did, the void is so much bigger inside me now than it had been, and like I said, I’m tired.

Really, truly tired.

Too tired.

It’s time for me to lay down and sleep and I hope you don’t hate me, because I only wish the two of you happiness.

I also hope she appreciates how lucky she is, and hope she doesn’t try to change you, because you shouldn’t change. Not for someone else.

Thank you for having been in my life.

All my love,

Christine

Tony read and re-read the note and knew.

They wouldn’t find her alive.

She’d likely driven somewhere yesterday she knew would be quiet, peaceful, and most likely desolate.

Quite easy to find in that neck of the woods. Drive twenty minutes east, and you could be in the middle of nowhere.

She’d always loved sunsets. She probably did it close to sunset, he’d guess.

He called Ethan back.

“Detective Neri.”

Tony rubbed at his forehead. “Search parks, beaches, anywhere like that. You’ll find her facing west, wherever it is. Good chance it’s an inland park somewhere.”

“Hold on.” It sounded like he stepped away from whatever group of people he’d been near. “Say that again?”

“She’s already gone.” Tony’s voice choked. “She did it close to or just after sunset. She sat somewhere and watched the sun go down and did it.”

“Did she have any place in particular you can think of?”

“I don’t know. But she loved sunset. Loved watching them. We used to do that a lot, stop and watch the sunset, wherever we were. Check public parking lots on the beaches, St. Pete to Punta Gorda. Anywhere she could have driven to between when she left work and sunset. That’s your timeframe, your search area. But we used to go hiking a lot, like at Myakka River State Park, places like that, so she might have gone to an inland park. Or she could be on Boca Grande, or Manasota Key, up at the Skyway rest areas, Ft. De Soto—it might not be at the actual beach, either. But wherever it is, she could see the sunset, and she’ll be facing west.”

“Thanks. I’ll use that as a starting point.” He paused. “Are you okay?”

He let out a weighty sigh. “I…don’t know. I know this is your job, but can you please do me a favor?”

“Sure.”

“Are you lead on this?”

“Yeah?”

“Call me as soon as you find her, please? On my work cell, because I’ll get calls on that. I don’t get reception inside the data center on my personal cell.”

“I will.”

“Please don’t tell her brother I think she’s already dead. That’s between you and me. And please don’t say anything to Shayla about this. Or our other…friends. The focus needs to be on her family right now, not on me. I’ll tell Shayla later.”

“No problem.”

“Thanks.”

Tony ended the call and tipped his head back, eyes closed. He wasn’t a praying man, but he needed a moment.

I’m sorry, Chris. I’m really, really sorry.

Chapter Five

Tony had been downstairs over twenty minutes, and had nearly finished his breakfast from the hotel’s breakfast buffet, when Jim finally staggered into the restaurant and dropped into a seat at the table.

Tony glared at him. “About time.”

“Chill out, man.” His eyes looked red, bloodshot, and he smelled like alcohol.

“You’re drunk.”

“No, I’m hungover,” he snapped, “and you’re not helping.”

Tony took a deep breath and dropped his voice. “This is your only warning. You stop this, or I’ll report you to HR. No more drinking, no more pot, no more edibles. I’ll have your ass hauled in for a drug test, then you’ll be out of a job.”

Jim snorted and leaned in. “Good luck putting that fucker together without me then. You might want to rethink that. Yeah, I fucked up last night. I shouldn’t have had the drinks. I met a cutie at the bar across the street and stayed out too late. The pot’s nothing. We haven’t had a fucking day off in weeks, so unless you want to be doing this by yourself, get off my back, huh?” He shoved back his chair and headed for the breakfast buffet.

Tony leaned back in his chair, pulled out his work phone, and called up a blank e-mail to his boss, Darren.

Need HR procedures for immediate termination. ASAP. Can’t talk right now. Just issued Jim Coughy a verbal warning for alcohol and pot consumption. Told him it’s his only warning. Also, FYI, will be needing to dip into discretionary to hire temps soon. Be prepared.

Send.

He tucked his phone into his front shirt pocket.

Why should I be the only one having a crap day?

He had a small discretionary budget for emergencies for his department. He could dip into that and hire one or two guys from the colo facility to come in and help him finish the hardware portion of the build, but he’d need one of his own guys from Bradenton to fly out for the troubleshooting portion of it. And he’d need Darren to go to bat for him to force the reallocation of funds.

Which, since Darren was starting to feel heat from his superiors, he’d likely hand-walk it through to the VP above him and suck whatever dicks he’d have to and ensure it went through.

Fucker.

He didn’t speak to Jim Coughy again until they had driven to the job site and were preparing to return to work on the row of servers they’d been wiring in. By that point, Tony had nearly chewed off his own tongue to keep from firing the guy, but in that way, Jim was right.

Tony needed an extra set of hands.

At least until he hired the temps.

On top of his thoughts returning time and again to Christine’s letter, and the deep sorrow filling Dennis’ voice…it made for a shitty-ass day in beautiful Denver.

At lunch, Tony had already planned to drive over to the colo to talk to their rep there about arrangements for moving their servers, so he didn’t need to make any excuses to Jim.

But while there, Tony arranged for two temps to start working with him Monday morning, made sure they already had current Asher NDAs on file for working with their servers, and got their personal information so he could prep site IDs for them for the new campus. They would add it onto Asher’s bill, and Tony assured them Darren would send them a signed PO for the manpower by the end of the day.

With that handled, Tony shot Darren—who was legit close to freaking out now, based on the tone and tenor of texts he’d sent Tony—an e-mail that he’d arranged that, the info of who and where to send the PO to, and to be prepared to have their travel department issue a return plane ticket for Jim for Friday morning. Meanwhile, Darren, after spending half of a rambling e-mail begging Tony to try to work with the guy, had also included their HR procedures in an attachment, and CC’d the HR rep in charge of his department.

Several balls rolling—check.

Before he headed back into the new data center, he checked his personal cell, found a text from Ethan’s personal cell that they hadn’t found Christine yet, and a text from Shay.

Love You and miss You, Sir. Heading into meeting.

That had been sent only twenty minutes earlier, while he was talking to the colo people.

Dammit.

Otherwise, he might have been able to talk to her for a few minutes.

Miss you, too, pet. You’re My good girl. Love you very much.

After responding to the text from Ethan, Tony headed inside.

Motherfucker.

* * * *

Tony did manage to get them out of the data center and back to the hotel by seven local time.

Ethan had texted him again an hour earlier that there was still no word about Christine. Tony asked him to please call him as soon as he knew, even if it was in the middle of the night, and Ethan assured him he would.

Meanwhile, Tony picked up dinner from a deli just down the block from the hotel and took it back to his room to call Shayla. He didn’t want to eat with Jim, and if Jim wanted to go out, he’d have to call an Uber or rent a car himself. Asher had rented the car in Tony’s name, and they only needed the one. Good thing, too.

Last thing they needed was Jim getting in an accident while drunk or high.

Tony settled in front of his personal laptop and called up a video chat screen through Skype.

Shayla answered quickly, a smile on her face. “Hi, Sir.”

“Hey, sweetheart.” He pulled the lid off his container of pasta e fagioli. “Sorry, just got back. Haven’t even had a shower yet.”

“Sorry, Sir.”

“No, this is fine. I can eat dinner and talk to my beautiful pet.”

She gave him another smile. And, yes, she was naked, and wearing her cuffs and collar.

Except…he wasn’t even remotely in the mood for sex, video chat or real. Not after the day he’d had, and as exhausted as he felt.

“Miss you, Sir.”

“Miss you, too, baby. Damn, it’s been a long day. I can’t convince my body to follow Denver time. Sorry I’m not in a very sexy mood.”

“It’s okay, Sir. I understand. I’m just happy I get to talk to you.”

“How’s the babies…”

And like that, he spent forty-five minutes chatting with Shay while he ate. By the time he finished eating and ended the video chat to go take a shower, he felt ready to collapse.

Except as he lay there in bed and stared at the ceiling, he couldn’t stop thinking about Christine’s letter. He would tell Shay about all of this when there was something to tell her. It wasn’t managing her, it was him not having the energy to keep track of juggling more balls in the air than he could handle.

Who knows? They might find her safe.

Then again, pigs could fly and the Tooth Fairy might be real, too.

* * * *

Tony’s Wednesday morning didn’t start much better than Tuesday had, except his body let him sleep until six local time.

A text from Ethan—no updates.

A good-morning text from Shayla—she was heading straight to a meeting up in St. Pete, state officials holding some committee meeting that covered part of what she was writing about.

That meant while he could call her, he didn’t want to distract her from trying to find her way around St. Pete when she’d never been to that particular building before.

Tony opted to call Darren, who was already at work, based on e-mails he was seeing fly about a sev2 incident that had hit overnight.

“Good morning from the Mile-High City.”

“Did you fire him yet?”

“I will tomorrow night. Please have his ticket set up for Friday morning. I’ll take him to the airport and then go back to work. We’ll be at a point where I can work by myself until I get the extra help Monday.”

“You sure he’s using?”

“Yep. The attitude he gave me yesterday morning was the last straw.” Tony detailed all the issues he’d been having with the guy.

“Dammit.” Darren sighed. “Yeah, you’re right. It’s a violation. HR said you’re covered. If he wants to protest, he can march himself to a lab Friday afternoon after he returns to Tampa, go with one of our Loss Prevention guys and get drug tested.”

“Yeah, he won’t do that. He’s been buying since about our third day here. There’s an edibles place literally down the street from the hotel. Five-minute walk.”

“Dammit.”

“Yeah. So, hey. Make sure when HR posts our IT jobs for Denver that they emphasize in the postings it’s a zero-tolerance workplace, or good luck getting anyone to pass a drug test.”

“I will. How are the…”

The next twenty minutes were spent catching Darren up, all info that Darren was happy to hear, because he was heading into a meeting shortly where he knew he’d be asked for a status report.

And he swore he’d go to bat for Tony.

And, yes, Darren assured him he sent out the PO for the not two, but three temps. And he would have the colo manager forward Tony the info for the extra person.

Okay, so he’s not a total asshole.

At least by the time Tony made it down to breakfast, he wasn’t feeling quite so…murdery.

I need to give someone a good beating.

Hell, it’d been at least a week—no, two, come to think of it, before he’d flown out to Denver that he and Shay had played.

So. Going on the better part of two months.

That was unheard of, for them.

Sigh.

Even if they didn’t do heavy, full-on scenes every week, he’d pull her over his lap for a Saturday morning foreplay spanking, or a quick bare-handed spanking at night before making love and going to sleep. Something.

Jim was only ten minutes late this morning, but his eyes looked red and bloodshot.

Tony opted to keep his mouth shut and get through until tomorrow night.

Meanwhile, he’d try not to think about the sound of Dennis choking back sobs, or of the words contained in the images of Christine’s letter to him that he’d saved in the photos section of his phone.

Chapter Six

Thursday had been tense, Jim apparently sensing something was coming down the pike. When Tony drove them back to the hotel Thursday evening, he dropped the bomb.

And Jim had…well, gone off.

To the point that when Tony handed him the confirmation number and flight information for his ticket back to Tampa, and told him he’d drive him to the airport in the morning, Jim said not to bother before storming off into the hotel.

Okay, then.

Fine with him, because it meant he could sleep in late.

He stopped by the front desk to tell them they’d be dropping Jim’s room as of tomorrow, but to keep his.

At least he slept damn good.

Until Friday morning, when Tony was startled awake by his personal phone ringing a little after five-thirty Denver time.

Not Shayla’s ringtone.

He reached for it, didn’t even bother looking at the screen, and answered, his voice still thick with sleep. “Daniels.”

He knew what this would be about.

“Hey, it’s Ethan,” he softly said, like he was trying to keep from being overheard. “We just found her.”

“Where?”

“Myakka City, Manatee County. In the Chance Reserve, Coker Prairie Tract. State-contracted nuisance pig hunter found her and called it in. I just got here. Detective who caught it’s a friend of mine and called me.” He sighed. “Haven’t called her family yet. We’re still officially confirming it’s her…”

“But it’s her.”

“Yeah. ID on her. Haven’t found her car yet. They have deputies circling the property. Just like you said. She was sitting against a tree, facing west across a marshland. She’d walked off a trail and picked a spot. Hunter’s dogs found her. If it hadn’t been for that, she might have sat here for…a while. I’m waiting for their ME to get here, but they’re busy and short-handed, so it’ll be a while.”

Tony sighed. “Shot herself?”

“Yeah. Same make and model handgun she had the box for.” He paused. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, me, too. Please text me after you make contact with Dennis. I want to talk to him.”

“Okay. Will do.”

Ethan ended the call and Tony stared at his phone.

Fuck.

He got up and used the bathroom, then climbed back into bed. Less than thirty minutes later, Ethan texted him.

By the time Tony was ready to get up an hour later, his personal cell rang again.

Dennis.

Taking a deep breath, he answered. “Hey.”

The man choked back heartbreaking sobs. “They found her this morning.” He started sobbing his way through details Tony already knew, but he didn’t stop him, didn’t interrupt.

“I’m so sorry,” Tony said when Dennis finished.

“We…we’re going to have her funeral Sunday afternoon. I already talked to the pastor. We’d like you to come, if you can. I mean, I know you weren’t—”

“What time, and where?” he gently asked. Tony jotted the info down on the room’s hotel stationery notepad. “Okay. May I bring my wife, or would you rather—”

“Yeah. Please. I’m sorry. I mean, if it’s too weird for you to—”

“No, I’ll be there. How’s your parents?”

“They’re…devastated. I think Mom was in denial. Dad’s…Dad.”

Tony softly snorted. “Yeah. I’m really sorry, Dennis. I’d hoped they’d find her okay.”

“Me, too. We’ll see you Sunday.”

“Yeah.” He ended the call and sat there for a moment before he called Darren.

“How’d it go last night?”

“Shitty. I need a plane ticket home to Tampa. Today.”

“What?”

Tony sighed. “I’ve had a death in the family.”

* * * *

Tony waited until he’d made it through security and was sitting at his gate to text Shayla.

Can you talk, pet?

She called him seconds later. “Hello, Sir. Lunch break?”

“No, unfortunately.” There wasn’t any easy way through it except through it. He quickly outlined the events from Dennis e-mailing him until that morning. “Dennis asked if we can go to the funeral on Sunday. I’m sorry I didn’t say anything to you about this sooner, pet, but I really didn’t have anything to tell you until now.”

She went quiet for a moment. “Oh.”

“Will you go with me?”

“Yes, Sir. Of course I will.”

“Thank you, pet. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing?”

“Because I know that’s not exactly the homecoming you were hoping for.” Stick…and carrot. “But I’m not flying back out until late Tuesday afternoon.”

“Really?”

“Really. I was thinking we could go to Venture Saturday night, if you’d like to.”

“I can take Monday and Tuesday off! I don’t have a meeting to cover until Wednesday.”

He closed his eyes. “That would be amazing, pet. Thank you.”

Now her tone sounded more animated, enough that the headache trying to start behind his eyes eased just a hair.

My pet is happy.

He listened to her talk for a moment until she finally took a break. “Can you pick me up from the airport tonight?”

“Tonight? Oh!” Now she really sounded happy, and, yes, he might have done that deliberately. “What time?”

“My flight arrives at almost six Tampa time. I’ll text you the info.”

“I might be a little late.”

“That’s okay. I haven’t eaten yet today. I didn’t have time. I had to rearrange my vendor crew and everything. We can eat there at the airport.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can, Sir.”

“Looking forward to it.” They called for boarding for his flight. “And, pet?”

“Yes, Sir?”

“I love you so much, sweetheart. I can’t wait to see you.”

“I can’t wait to see you, either, Sir!”

He ended the call and hauled himself to his feet to queue to board. At least he could do his laundry at home that weekend, instead of having to do them in the hotel’s machine or taking them to a cleaner. He’d checked out of the hotel and brought everything with him, but had already reserved a new room for himself for Tuesday on.

I can’t wait to get home.

* * * *

Shayla hoped it didn’t make her a horrible person that she totally let the news that Tony was coming home and would stay until Tuesday eclipse the fact that they were going to a funeral.

Yay!

She bounced up out of her chair and to her boss’ office to let him know she was going to need two days off.

Not a problem, fortunately. Sunshine Attitudes magazine was just one part of the business, which also included a graphic arts house and other related services. It wasn’t like the Plain Dealer, where she’d have to get someone to cover a regular beat for her.

The series she was working on would last another couple of months, at least, but she was enjoying it despite the grueling research and coma-inducing boredom of some of the meetings. It was gratifying to receive e-mails from lawmakers who’d been following what she was doing and commending her for distilling complex subject matter, accurately, into plain English that people could understand.

And we can go to the club tomorrow! Yay!

She’d had lunch a couple of times with Jenny, Leah, and Loren, and had dinner a few times with some other friends, but Tilly was usually out of town lately.

Plus she hadn’t felt like going to the club or the munches without Tony, even though she had his permission to go, and she knew she was perfectly safe going alone.

The point was, she didn’t want to go without him.

Adulting sucks.

It was kind of tempting to stay home tomorrow night and just nest with him, except he probably wanted to go himself. If he hadn’t, he would have flat-out said so.

Even better, she was able to wrap things up early enough she could skate out the door in time to beat the worst of rush-hour traffic and park in a space in the short-term terminal parking garage at TIA minutes before his plane was due to land. She left her purse and laptop locked in the trunk of her car and hurried over to the elevators that would take her to the main terminal.

While she waited, she fought the urge to bounce on her feet.

He’s coming home!

She resisted the urge to also reach over and repeatedly punch the down button.

Finally, an elevator arrived and she unabashedly ran over to duck in so she didn’t have to wait for another one. The main terminal was busy as heck, but she quickly found an arrivals board, found out his plane was on the ground at the gate, and made her way over to where the airside shuttle monorail would pull in.

She fingered the heart-shaped locket on her necklace, her day collar.

That was one thing she never forgot to wear.

And she might have let out an audible squee when, three monorail arrivals later, he finally stepped out of the car, his laptop case over his shoulder and pulling a carryon bag.

He looked up, his green gaze immediately locking with hers. She realized she was sniffling back tears as she ran over to him as soon as he stepped out of the exit chute and out of the way so they could hug. It took every ounce of will she had not to drop to her knees in front of him and give him their greeting.

He held her tightly. “It’s okay, baby. I’m home. I’m sorry it’s been so long.”

“I love you so much, Sir.”

“I love you, too, pet.” He kissed her, one hand reaching up to firmly cup the back of her neck and melting her, the other splayed against her lower back.

Closing her eyes, she held on tightly, savoring this, him, melting totally against his body.

Finally, he ended their kiss only to hold her again. “Give me just a minute, baby,” he whispered. “I needed this. I needed you.”

“I needed you, too, Sir.”

She couldn’t imagine a time where she would never not need him. Yes, she was an independent person, had lived on her own.

But ever since being married to Tony, she hadn’t wanted to be alone, had never known how good it could be with another person.

When he finally let out a deep breath and looked down into her eyes, she spotted how weary he seemed, the dark circles under his eyes. “Luggage, Sir?”

“Yeah. Baggage claim. Let’s dump it in the car and come back for food. I’m working on a headache. Do you have anything with you?”

“Yes, Sir. In my purse in the car.”

“Okay. Good.” He leaned in for one more quick kiss, followed by a tired smile. “Love you, pet.”

“Love you, too, Sir.”

Chapter Seven

Twenty minutes later, they’d retrieved Tony’s bags, had stowed them in the trunk of Shayla’s car, and were seated in a booth in a restaurant in the terminal. He’d also taken three ibuprofen and looked even more exhausted than he had when he’d stepped into her arms right off the monorail.

“We don’t need to go to Venture tomorrow night, Sir,” she softly said to keep from being overheard. “I don’t mind staying home.”

He reached across the table and held her hand. “Let’s play it by ear. I need a break and would really like to go.”

She wanted this discussion done and out of the way before they drove home. Once they left the airport, she wanted nothing more than to be her Sir’s pet. “You said she left a note for you?”

He nodded and pulled out his personal cell. He unlocked it, swiped to something, and then handed it to her. “That’s the first page. Swipe through to see the others.”

Shayla swallowed hard as she read it, unsure how she was supposed to feel about…this. Tony hardly ever talked about his ex-wife. He’d had a couple of discussions with Shayla about her early on in their relationship, and they were all couched in terms of what he didn’t want from their relationship. The good example of a bad example, in other words.

Never had Shayla ever received the impression that he’d still harbored feelings for the woman, so the vague discomfort flowing through her wasn’t triggered by anything her husband had done.

When she finished reading the note, she returned the phone to him.

“I’m sorry I didn’t say anything to you about it sooner, pet. Between the stress of dealing with and firing Jim, and the install, this was just too much on my plate to parse until it was…resolved.”

She reached for his hand again. “Hey, I’m not upset, Sir. You’re my husband, and that’s my ring on your hand, and that’s all I care about.” She squeezed his hand. “Seriously, Tony, I’m good. This doesn’t upset me. I mean, I’m upset that you’re upset, but I’m not upset at you.”

He removed his glasses with his free hand and rubbed at his eyes. “Thank you for being okay with Sunday.”

“Like Tilly always says, it’s better to give thanks for good fortune and live well than dwell in the past. I would rather be the better person. Especially since her family’s in so much pain right now. It won’t hurt me to be magnanimous.”

He tightly squeezed her hand and let out a sharp breath that almost sounded like he was trying not to cry as his weary green gaze focused on her. “And that’s one of the reasons why you are the center of my universe, pet,” he quietly said.

* * * *

Shayla tried not to pester Tony to talk, didn’t want to stress him out or make him have to think during dinner. She could see the exhaustion lining his face and had, quite honestly, figured he’d likely fall asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow when they returned home. She volunteered to drive them home, and he even dozed off in the passenger seat, the seat tipped back and his left hand resting on her thigh.

But he was home. At least for a few days.

Not that she was a praying kind of person, but she prayed he was able to at least rest while he was home because, now having him before her, she could tell how desperately wrung out he was.

What she wasn’t counting on was after they returned home and she brought his carryons inside for him, while he wrangled his luggage, he set everything down in the foyer, fisted her hair, and kissed her in a way that totally melted every thought right out of her brain. Before she could even strip and don her cuffs and collar.

“Greeting, pet,” he whispered.

She folded, down to her knees, formal bow, and kissed the top of his left sneaker, the right. The back of his left hand, the right.

When she nuzzled the front of his jeans, she felt a very rigid, solid bulge awaiting her there.

He stroked the top of her head. “Good girl,” he whispered. “Up. Naked, cuffs, collar, bedroom. Now.”

She jumped up to do it while he paused in the living room and petted Bagel and Cream, who were loudly meowing at him from where they’d jumped up on the sofa.

He’s home!

He’s home!

* * * *

Tony wasn’t sure how much energy he’d have in him tonight, on top of the headache that still wasn’t going away. He stopped by the kitchen after petting the babies and drank a glass of water.

Probably dehydrated. And stress.

He hoped. Because if it turned into a migraine, it would make the next day or so absolutely fucking miserable.

Then he detoured through the playroom to grab a light, stingy paddle. He just wanted a little assist tonight, and his hands were aching and covered in countless scratches from running wires and assembling racks. He’d save striping her ass for tomorrow night.

Then he headed down the hallway, toward their bedroom.

She was already kneeling on the bedroom floor, at the end of their bed, waiting for him.

“My beautiful pet,” he softly said. “Such a good girl for me. You’ve been so brave and so sweet, and I know how hard this time away’s been for you, because it’s been miserable for me, too.” He tossed the paddle onto the bed and then walked over to her. Part of him wished he’d taken his boots with him to Denver, and he would have worn them home today.

Except he couldn’t work in them, they didn’t have arch supports, and would have been miserable to wear all day. He’d kept his packing down to a minimum, knowing he’d have enough shit to keep track of as it was.

Stopping by the closet door, he toed off his Asics sneakers, leaving them tied, and yanked his socks off to drop them on top of them. Then he walked over to her, standing in front of her.

He tapped his left foot once. She practically levitated, her entire body nearly vibrating as she struggled not to wiggle in glee over the fact that he was home while she once again pressed her lips to the top of his left foot.

Tony took a deep breath and smiled. Maybe he had a headache, but dammit, he was going to love up on his wife tonight. She’d damned well earned it.

He tapped his right foot and she repeated it.

“Up,” he quietly said, raising his arms to the side.

She immediately tugged his shirt out of his jeans and started unbuttoning it, smiling up at him, her sweet hazel eyes looking more brown in the dim light. He never broke eye contact with her as she unbuttoned his short-sleeved shirt and pulled it off him.

When she started to fold it, he made a noise. “Just drop it,” he hoarsely said. It’d been the better part of two weeks since he’d rubbed one out during phone sex with her. Now that he was home, his cock had decided, headache or not, the little head was getting some action tonight.

She dropped it and tugged his undershirt free, lifting it over his head and dropping it. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her, warm, bare flesh pressing together and peace filling his soul.

Saying she was the center of his universe was no exaggeration—she was. He’d lived over ten years alone and lonely, and while he had no problem being an independent person, life was undeniably sweeter with her beautiful soul twined around his.

He kissed her, catching her right hand and pressing it against his belt. She took the hint and didn’t break their kiss as she unfastened his belt, his fly, eased the zipper down, and he bent with her as she started pushing them down his hips.

He wiggled and kicked them free, stepping out of them as she reached for the waistband of his briefs and practically yanked them down his legs.

Now freed, his cock tightened in the cool air and he had to catch her by the arms when she tried to sink to her knees to go down on him.

“Not yet,” he hoarsely said, backing her toward the bed. “I think I only have one in me tonight, and I want it inside you.” He turned them and sat on the end of the bed.

Shayla needed no prompting to get into position, stretched out over his lap, head to his left.

He reached behind him to grab the paddle with his right hand as he stroked her back with his left.

“This is going to be hard and fast, baby,” he warned. “No counting tonight. But this also counts as your punishment spanking, okay?”

She squirmed on his lap. “Yes, Sir.” From the fuzzy sound of her voice, he could tell she was already sinking into subspace for him.

“Once we finish this, the board’s reset and my good girl starts at zero. Understand?”

More happy squirming. “Yes, Sir!”

Okay, so that was two birds, one stone. Usually punishment was something completely separate, not part of play, and done only when he was clear-headed and calm.

Except he hadn’t wanted to punish her for forgetting her cuffs and collar. She expected it, though. And with her so happy to have him unexpectedly home, she was apparently happy to not have it be a cane.

Win-win.

Clamping his left hand around the back of her neck, he didn’t bother with a warm-up. He started off light for the first four strokes and then laid into her ass and the backs of her thighs. Hard, lightning-fast, alternating impact points with every smack, so that a few minutes later she was squirming in that almost too much kind of way and her moans had turned into whines that meant she was trying to decide if he was close to giving her a break or if she needed to yellow.

Except, usually, he took safewords off the table for punishment, conducted them very ritualistically, with her voluntarily holding still for them and taking them, never restrained.

He tossed the paddle aside, his cock throbbing from her flesh rubbing against his. “Good girl,” he said. “Sir’s pet is all better. Get your ass up on that bed.”

He fought the urge to laugh as she scrambled up and off him, on her back in the center of the bed, hands expectantly held over her head, thighs spread wide.

“My beautiful pet,” he whispered. And he meant it. He knew she wished she wasn’t as rounded in the ass and hips as she was, but he loved her curves. She hovered between a size 14-16 and she was absolutely perfect, in his eyes.

Grabbing her at the knees, he shoved her legs farther apart and shouldered in there, no hesitation. He dove for her pussy and tried not to hump himself against the sheets as he eagerly ate her out. Her sweetly salty taste filled his mouth, making him unleash a growl of pleasure into her cunt and drawing a moan of response from her.

His tongue traced the shape of her shaved pussy—yes, his excellent pet to keep herself the way he loved, even though he wasn’t home and she hadn’t been expecting him home when she showered that morning—every curve and fold, avoiding her clit until she was begging him.

With the tip of his tongue, he teased the pearl under the hood, her moans changing to needy whines. Every flick of his tongue made her shudder in his hands, under his mouth.

This. Her.

How could any straight man not enjoy this with his woman?

Kept from her body for too damn long, he couldn’t drag it out. He wrapped his lips around her clit and lightly sucked, triggering her first orgasm. As she undulated beneath him, he hooked his arms under and around her thighs to clamp her securely in place.

No, his headache could just wait a little while to dig in and torture him. Her sweet sounds were the balm his soul needed and had longed for. Hearing her come over a phone, or watching her on a computer screen during a Skype call, was not the same as her juices coating his face and running down into his goatee, his lungs filled with the scent of her.

His.

All his.

Of all the hell this experience had been, his heaven lay right here before him, right now.

The only thing that kept him going and fighting the urge to say fuck it all and quit for something less stressful.

Her.

If you did things right, Sirs lived to keep their pets happy every bit as much as pets lived to satisfy their Sirs.

And if anyone thought he was “Mastering wrong,” they could go fuck themselves right the fuck off on a rusty pitchfork.

Repeatedly.

Chapter Eight

The sweet, droning hum of subspace filled Shayla’s soul. Once Tony pulled the first orgasm out of her, he kept her hovering, right there, perched perfectly on that rolling edge of please don’t stop and oh god that’s too much.

His tongue and lips, warm, wet suction and heat and sweet, slick friction against her clit turned one orgasm into a nonstop train of them that had no intention of derailing until he was ready to let her stop.

Her back arched and she couldn’t keep her hands over her head any longer. She hadn’t been ordered to, so she risked reaching down and grabbing handfuls of hair and grinding against his face. His goatee and mustache rubbed against her sensitive flesh, the stubble on his cheeks scratchy along her inner thighs in all the good ways.

He growled, one of pleasure, and started alternating tongue-fucking her with swiping it up her clit, circling, down again to repeat the motion.

“Yes!”

Then he twisted his arms, grabbing her forearms and pinning her down. Another, stronger wave of orgasms swelled, crested, broke free and crashed into her.

She didn’t bother trying to stay quiet. He loved and owned her noises. If he wanted to quiet her, he’d have gagged her.

Time disappeared. She had no clue how long he kept her there, wringing wave after wave of pleasure from her body. There was no “too much” to this—she wouldn’t safeword, no matter how intense, unless it was the bad kind of pain. That wasn’t an order so much as it was a matter of pride, at this point.

Finally, he released her arms and climbed her body. She was already reaching for him, wrapping her legs around his waist as he notched the thick, ready head of his cock at her pussy and shoved home.

Both of them moaned, and Shayla shuddered as one more orgasm rippled through her.

“My gorgeous, perfect pet,” he growled before slanting his mouth over hers and capturing it in a kiss.

As he fucked her she kissed him, holding his head in place, fingers buried in his hair again. She tasted herself on him and licked, along his lips, around his chin, through his mustache and goatee, everywhere.

As hard as he was fucking her, she suspected he wouldn’t last long, and he didn’t. Just long enough to grind one more out of her before he completely caged her body with his and drove his cock into her, hard, deep, repeatedly, finally falling still as that sweet and long-absent groan of satisfaction rolled from his lungs and refilled her soul.

They both let out twin satisfied sighs, which made them both chuckle.

Tony nuzzled her nose with his. “Love you so fucking much, baby.”

“Love you, too, Sir.”

He rolled to his side and she suspected he was sound asleep before he even finished repositioning himself. She lay there for several minutes, still, listening to the sound of him breathing, before gently easing herself out of his arms and out of bed.

She quietly scooped up his dirty clothes from the bedroom floor, then padded out to the entry. Dragging his suitcases through the utility room and into the playroom, she closed the door behind her, turned on the light, and sorted the dirty clothes from the clean ones. He had a system, dirties inside out, except for jeans, which he tightly rolled and shoved inside dirty shirts.

After sorting everything and carrying it back through to the utility room, she started the first load of laundry, preset the coffeemaker for in the morning, and realized her soul was singing at having Him back so her routine could, for a brief time, return to normal.

Yes!

She spotted his cell phones sitting on the bookshelf in the foyer, next to the bowl where he always dumped his wallet, keys, and spare change from his pockets. Unzipping his carryon, she found the pouch he carried all his chargers in when traveling and located the ones for his phones.

Taking them into the living room, she plugged them in, then thought about it for a moment and unlocked his cell phone to look at the images of the note again.

No, jealousy wasn’t her first reaction. She felt sad when she recalled Tony telling her about how Christine’s brother had sounded on the phone.

Something pinged at her memory…

Oh, shit.

She’d heard about that missing person case. It’d only triggered a blip on her mental screens because of the woman’s last name being the same as hers.

And Tony.

Fuck.

How much long-term pain did a person have to be in to finally take that path?

What if it was James?

Despite her residual anger at her ex and what he’d put her through…putting her through it had resulted in her moving to Florida and meeting Tony.

Tony’s divorce years before he met Shayla allowed him to meet her.

This was not a pain or a burden she wished visited upon anyone or their families.

I hope you’re finally at peace and sorry you felt this was your only option. Yes, I know how lucky I am, and yes, I love him.

She closed his phone and set it on the side table. She didn’t need to look at anything else on his phone, and she’d be honest with him later that she’d read it again.

He didn’t mind her looking, as long as she wasn’t sneaky about it. At any time, she could ask him to hand over his phone, just the way he could ask her to hand over hers.

But they didn’t need to do that with each other, because they trusted each other.

That was something she could never have again with James, the way Tony never could with Christine, albeit for drastically different reasons.

Shayla returned to bed and cozied up to him, snuggled tightly against him. In sleep, he rolled toward her, his arm draping over her and one leg hooking around hers.

Finally.

Now she could actually sleep and, hopefully, wake up rested.

* * * *

It was disorienting to wake up in his own bed for a change, and at the right time.

How fucking sad is that?

Other than his head was fucking pounding. But he smelled coffee and it was actually fucking daylight outside. He could tell because of the light seeping in around the blinds over the windows.

When he turned his head, he spotted Shayla’s smile. “Good morning, Sir.”

“Coffee, pet?”

She tipped her head toward the other side of the bed, and, sure enough, there sat a steaming mug.

Along with a glass of water and a bottle of ibuprofen.

“Oh, my god, pet, you are a goddess.”

“I thought you might need it this morning.”

He sat up and swallowed three tablets, forcing himself to drink the entire glass of water before he set it down and picked up the mug to take a sip of coffee.

“I need to get laundry done today.”

“Already halfway done, Sir.”

He glanced over at her and spotted her pleased smile.

“I wasn’t going to make you do all that.”

She pouted. “It’s my job.”

“Yeah, but I hate making you do a whole bunch like that when I’m the one who was out of town.”

“Even more reason for me to do it, Sir. I want you to do as little as possible while you’re home.” Her smile faded. “Please?”

It slammed back into his brain why, exactly, he’d flown home. A ragged breath escaped him. “Okay. Thank you, pet.”

That sealed it. Tonight they were definitely hitting Venture. He needed the break, she needed the beating—hell, he needed to give her the beating—and they both needed the time with friends.

“Stay. I’ll be right back.” He climbed out of bed and used the bathroom, then went to retrieve his work and personal phones from the living room where she’d put them on their chargers for him last night.

He returned to the bedroom. “Thank you for thinking about my phones last night.”

She snuggled tightly against him. “You’re welcome, Sir. I…read the message again last night. The letter she left for you.”

He nodded. “Are you all right? I won’t make you go with me to the funeral, if you don’t want to.”

“I want to go. And yes, I’m all right. I feel sad for her and for her family. I wish she could have found someone for her like I found for me.”

He nuzzled her temple, inhaling, not realizing how much he’d missed the scent of her hair. “Me, too, pet. I no longer loved her, but once the divorce was final, I didn’t wish ill-will on her.”

She stared up at him. “Headache not any better?”

“It’ll be fine,” he said, even though, yeah, it was still throbbing like a motherfucker. Not quite migraine status yet. He’d have to keep ahead of it if he wanted to be able to function tonight.

At least I don’t need to volunteer tonight.

He set his phones aside and pulled Shay into his arms to snuggle. While part of him wanted to make love to her right now, he also knew if he did too much he wouldn’t have any energy left for later.

That wouldn’t be fair to her.

When her hand started trailing down his abs and definitely making its way toward his semi-stiff cock, he chuckled and captured her, bringing her hand to his mouth and feathering his lips along her knuckles.

“Stay, pet.” He tucked it against his chest, over his heart. “I don’t blame you for trying, but your Sir is not a young dog and is feeling his age right now.”

She kissed his shoulder. “Sorry, Sir. I mean it about tonight. If you want to stay home—”

“Then I’ll say so, yes. Please don’t wear me out and bring this up all day, pet.”

“Yes, Sir. Sorry.”

“No apology needed, but you’ve made your position clear.” He tucked a stray hair behind her ear. “I’d like to go. I’ll make the call later. I do want to eat dinner here. I don’t feel like going out to Sigalo’s.”

“Thank you, Sir.”

“You feel like making breakfast?”

She smiled. “Scrambled eggs and sausage?”

“That sounds amazing, baby.” He kissed her. “Let’s eat, then take a shower, then we’ll cuddle and I’ll make up for some lost time with you.”

Adorable confusion furrowed her brow. “I thought you wanted to save your energy?”

He waggled his eyebrows. “Didn’t say I wouldn’t break out a stunt cock.”

Confusion turned to a grin. “Oh, boy.” She giggled. “Scrambled eggs and sausage, coming up.” She bounced out of bed and he watched her gorgeous ass disappear through their bedroom door.

Not a single mark on her flesh this morning.

Good.

This time tomorrow morning, however…

His cock twitched with interest.

“Wait your turn,” he mumbled at his member as he reached for his cup of coffee.

Chapter Nine

“Holy shit,” Shay muttered when they pulled into the parking lot in front of the building that housed Venture. “I didn’t see this many people RSVP’d on Fet when I marked us as going earlier.”

The parking lot looked much fuller than usual, at least thirty cars there.

Tony let out a sigh. So much for scening early and getting the hell out of there. “Grab our badges for us when we sign in. Just in case,” he added when he spotted the dark shadow that crossed her face.

No, he wouldn’t scold her for being irritated about it, but he couldn’t in good conscience leave their volunteer crew swinging in the breeze just because he’d had a bad…

Couple of months.

Fuck.

It really had been that long since they’d been there.

Fortunately, it seemed that while there were a lot of people in attendance Tony had never seen at Venture before, there were still plenty of play stations available. Just before ten, he decided to get started and staked out a bench on the new side, where he put Shayla down on the floor on a fleece throw, in a formal bow.

He was still fighting the headache, but he’d managed to quell it to something he could ignore if he had something else to focus on.

Like Shayla.

He opened his toybag and was going to start setting out implements when he realized he hadn’t grabbed them any water for after.

Domfail.

He didn’t want to make her do it, because she was barefoot already, and he’d started dropping her into subspace. Walking around the bench to Shay, he reached out and stroked her head.

“Stay right there, pet. I need to get us some water. Be my good girl.”

He didn’t know if she even realized she’d wiggled her ass in pleasure or not. “Yes, Sir.” She was still wearing the black sundress he’d asked her to wear this evening, which was a good thing, because he wouldn’t leave her alone if she was naked.

Standing, he walked through to the old side where Sean was DMing with Axel. A suspension scene had just wrapped up, and he stopped to chat with Sean.

“Long time, no see, stranger,” Sean teased with a smile.

“Yeah, work’s been fucking…crazy.” He watched as Axel, another volunteer, was crossing the social area to go check the kitchen supplies.

That’s when Tony spotted a woman snapping her fingers at Axel.

“Who the fuck’s that,” Tony asked Sean.

“New-new member. Max gave her the newbie talk a little bit ago. First time here.”

Axel pulled up short, and Tony didn’t hear what the woman said to him because both he and Sean started moving toward them at the same time.

“Excuse me?” Tony heard Axel ask.

“I said, get me a bottle of water.”

“Whoa, lady,” Sean said. “He’s one of our volunteers. See the name badge?”

Her head swiveled around and reptilian-cold eyes took them in. With her hard, angular face and unflattering makeup, her bleached blonde hair and overdrawn eyebrows didn’t do her any favors.

In fact, Tony uncomfortably realized she reminded him way too damn much of Christine. Could have been her sister, and in fact it took him a moment to realize no, it wasn’t her sister.

The woman sneered. “So?”

An unexpected wave of rage washed through Tony.

Sean started to say something but Tony put out a staying hand and grabbed the volunteer name badge and lanyard from his back pocket, stringing it around his neck.

Tony kept his voice low and it was only the fact that he didn’t want to cause a scene that allowed him to rein in his anger. “Let me tell you something, lady. I don’t know how you do things elsewhere, but our volunteers aren’t here as subs or slaves to anyone but their partners. You are all kinds of out-of-line right now, and I suggest you apologize to him.”

“I was told this is a full-service club. I paid to get in here tonight. I expect good service.”

It took every last ounce of willpower he had to not grab her by the arm, yank her out of the chair, and bodily drag her out of the fucking club. “I don’t know who told you that included fetching you beverages, but I know it wasn’t anyone who gave you the newbie speech. And I know, because I wrote the damn thing. Everyone pays to get in here and yet you’re the only one acting like your shit don’t stink. No one else tries to order our volunteers around. Apologize.”

He shoved away the mental image he’d had of Dennis sobbing as he’d told Tony they were looking for Christine.

And tried to ignore how much this woman looked like her.

“I don’t owe anyone an apology.” She looked him up and down with a haughty glare. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”

He sucked in a deep breath.

Assault is illegal.

His stance changed, feet shoulder-width, hands on his hips. His voice dropped to an even more dangerous tone. “I think I’m the guy about to throw your ass out of this dungeon for being a bitch to our volunteers if you don’t apologize right now. Try me.”

He sensed Sean tensing next to him, and realized Axel looked like he was torn between throwing the woman out or maybe pulling Tony back and away from the woman.

Her gaze didn’t cut from Tony. It took her a couple of breaths to finally glance away first. “Sor-ree.” Sarcasm dripped from her tone. “You can bet I’m going to write about this on FetLife. Asshole,” she muttered.

“Go right ahead, honey,” Tony told her. “You’ll be jumped on by everyone else who’s been coming here for years and who will tell you you were out of fucking line. Everyone working here running the club is a volunteer. We don’t get paid. We do this because we’re members and we want to help keep it open.”

“I pay to get in, I expect a little service.”

At least she didn’t sound like Christine, so there was that.

Didn’t help reduce his anger, though.

“You’re not understanding me, lady. This is a kinky community center. Everything we make keeps the lights on and the doors open. No one on our staff tonight has agreed to be your bitch for the evening, or is being paid to be your bitch, so how about you drop the bitch ’tude and chill.”

Tony patted Axel on the shoulder. Axel continued on to the kitchen area while Tony and Sean stepped away and returned to where Sean had been watching the earlier suspension scene.

Another guy was now preparing to do a suspension on the large A-frame. He couldn’t remember the guy’s name but he’d seen him at the rope events before. If he recalled correctly, the guy knew his stuff.

Still, Tony stood there, legs apart, arms crossed over his chest, and glowered at the woman, who still looked enraged.

He returned it to her ten-fold.

You ain’t got nothin’ on me right now, lady, so knuckle under.

She finally turned away. But he suspected they were far from done having trouble with their new entitlement-minded problem child.

Feeling like shit, and knowing he should chill a little—okay, a fucking lot—before scening with Shay, Tony leaned in toward Sean. “Can you do me a favor?”

“Yeah?”

“Please walk over to the other side and tell Shay I asked her to come here.” He sighed. “Fuck, she’s gonna be pissed. I was about ready to start scening with her. I came over to get a couple of waters.”

“It’s okay. I’ve got this. Go play.”

Tony studied the way the man about to do his suspension tied his ring to the frame, noting the wraps, how he made his tie, how many turns he took from ring to frame.

Looks fine.

Then he realized he was stalling. He glanced over at the woman again. She now sat turned away from him and Sean, but with her head tipped down, like she was looking at something in her lap.

He spotted the telltale glow of a screen suddenly lighting her face in the darkened space.

White-hot rage exploded in his brain, even shoving his throbbing headache to the background for a moment. “Oh, hell, no,” Tony muttered as he turned and stormed toward her, Sean on his heels.

She had her phone out and was typing something on it, the unmistakable black background and white text of FetLife. Before she could put it away, Tony snatched it from her hands and jerked his thumb toward the office door.

“You. Office. Now.” He didn’t wait for a reply and turned on his heel, heading that way.

He hoped she followed, because if she didn’t, he was looking waaaay too forward to the possibility of putting hands on her and physically throwing her out of the building.

He stiff-armed the office door, belatedly hoping no one was standing behind it as he shoved it open ahead of him. Ignoring everyone else in the office, he shoved the front door open, then turned to watch if she followed.

If she didn’t, things were going to get reeeeally interesting.

By interesting, he knew it meant him possibly going to jail, or at the very least receiving a phone call from Derrick tomorrow asking him not to volunteer for a while.

Fortunately, the woman appeared. He turned and exited the office, fighting the urge to hurl the phone to the sidewalk and stomp on it, crush the screen, grind it under his boot heel.

Fuck.

He had the sense of mind to walk a few yards down the sidewalk before turning, hands on his hips and leaning in.

Shayla appeared outside, looking pissed, and that was the final straw. Cali emerged behind her from the office.

This cunt standing in front of him—the spitting image of his fucking ex-wife—was interfering with time he’d promised to his beautiful, patient pet.

Game on, motherfucker.

He gave up trying to rein in his anger, which had flashed over from white-hot to blue-cold and even frightened him a little.

Christine…Jim…weeks away from Shayla because some fucking asshole in corporate threw his lobbyist buddy money that should have had the fucking Denver job done by now and—

As long as I don’t hit her.

He unloaded. “I don’t know what the hell you think you were doing, lady, but the rules posted all over the place, including the rules you were told and agreed to when you came here tonight, specifically said no cell phone usage in the dungeon.”

“Well, I—”

He held up a hand and pinched his thumb and fingers together in a universal gesture for her to shut her pie hole. “You were going to get on FetLife and bitch to someone, yeah. I saw the screen when I walked up. What’s your name?”

“I—”

“I asked you for your fucking name!”

Out of the corner of his eye he spotted that even Shayla and Cali both flinched, and the woman he was unloading on leaned back and away from Tony and the force of his scream.

The woman’s rage wilted. “Carol Fallowes.”

“Spell your last name.”

She did.

He looked at Cali. “She’s banned. DNA list. Immediately.” He returned the woman’s phone and ticked points off on his fingers as he silently congratulated himself for not heaving it out into the parking lot or lobbing it up onto the building’s roof. “First strike was being a bitch and trying to order Axel to get you water. Second strike was you gave me attitude when I ordered you to apologize. Third strike was you took your phone out in the dungeon.”

“You have no right to do that!”

“Fourth strike,” he said, voice rising, “is that you came in here with attitude like this, disrespecting our volunteers and thinking that rules and common courtesy don’t apply to you. Your fifth strike is that tonight of all nights is not the night to piss me off, lady.”

He leaned in closer. “Name’s Tony.” He pointed at his name badge. “Feel free to tell everyone I’m the big, bad asshole Dom who threw you out of here tonight, and make sure to tell them what you did to earn the eviction, because then you’ll really eat yourself a shit sandwich for those efforts.”

He stepped around her, heading toward the office door.

“But my stuff’s still in there! And my ride! I came with friends!”

“I suggest Uber or Lyft. Or you’re waiting out here until they leave. Cali will get your stuff and bring it out. You set foot in this building again, I’m calling the sheriff’s office and having a trespass warning issued against you.”

“You wouldn’t dare!”

He turned and stalked toward her, causing her to scurry backward a couple of steps in a way that satisfied him way too much. “Try me, lady!” He focused on Shayla. “Pet, go set up the implement stand for me. Now.”

“Yes, Sir.” She raced back inside.

He turned to Cali. “I’ll wait in the office until you get her shit for her. Might want to bring a pair of scissors to cut her wristband off her so she doesn’t try to sneak back in.”

He headed inside, not bothering to look to see if Cali followed.

He couldn’t answer Skye, June, and Eliza’s silent questions with an office full of people, either. Which…he was belatedly realizing there was.

Fuck. I hope none of them heard me going off.

Actually, on second thought, fuck that. I hope they did hear. He wasn’t the one in the wrong.

Cali quickly scooted inside, straight to the dungeon, hopefully to get the woman’s shit.

Had he done it, he’d be heaving it out the front door.

He rounded the counter and snatched a pair of scissors off the desk, walking over to hand them to Cali when she emerged a moment later.

He did have the sense to hand them to her handle-first. Cali hadn’t pissed him off. Hell, she was his friend.

Then he walked behind the counter again, scooting past Skye and Eliza, to stand next to June in front of the computer. He was well aware of how Eliza was eyeing him, silently arching an eyebrow at him, but he shook his head.

June leaned in. “You all right?” she whispered.

He shook his head. “Save your spot,” he muttered. He might be enraged, but he would still protect member confidentiality.

Even banned members. That’s how they did things around here.

Another, secondary wave of rage rolled through him, that events and that fucking cunt had made him lose his shit in a way he was not fucking proud of, on a night that was supposed to be about him focusing on Shayla.

June saved the spreadsheet, then called up a find box, her fingers paused over the keyboard.

He grabbed a pen and sticky note and spelled the woman’s name, and there it was, one of the entries into their spreadsheet from that evening.

He wrote DNA on the sticky note, and she highlighted the row in red, adding the DNA—Do Not Admit—tag next to her member number, then tabbing the cursor over to the Notes box.

Tony stepped in and typed the day’s date, followed by his initials, and the reason.

PERMANENT FULL BAN. Rude to volunteers, tried to order them around, rude to Tony when he confronted her, disobeyed direct DM commands, pulled her phone out in the dungeon after reprimand, evicted.

He scanned it for typos, then hit CTRL+S to save the spreadsheet.

Meanwhile, Cali had returned to the office, but he ignored her while he finished all that.

Then he grabbed the sticky note, shredded it, and tossed it in the garbage can under the counter. He pulled off his badge and handed it to Cali, as well as Shayla’s, which was also tucked in his back pocket.

“I think you need to hold on to those for me. I…” He couldn’t even finish and headed inside.

Chapter Ten

Tony had a rule—actually, more like an inviolate law:

He did not play when upset or angry.

Period.

Except…tonight.

His rage wasn’t directed at Shayla.

In fact, he was amazed that in that short amount of time, she’d somehow managed to set up the implement stand exactly the way she knew he liked it and had returned to her kneeling position on the fleece throw.

He pulled up short in the doorway to the new side and took a deep breath as he watched her from there.

My beautiful pet.

He turned on his heel and strode over to the kitchen area to grab not just bottles of water, but a couple of chocolate chip cookies for her for after. Then he returned to the bench and set it all on his bag, out of the way.

Breathe.

The headache was back with a fury.

He walked around the bench to stand directly in front of Shayla. When he tapped his left boot once, she immediately kissed the top of it, nuzzling her cheek against the leather.

When he tapped the right, she moved to it and kissed it.

Breathe.

He finally knelt and caught her chin, gently tipping her head up. “I am not upset or mad at you, pet,” he forced himself to whisper.

She smiled. “I know, Sir.”

“This will probably hurt. A lot. If you want to call it now, I wouldn’t blame you at all. I’ll put everything back and we’ll go cuddle. Your choice.”

Hurt flashed across her face, but she quickly schooled it. “I want to scene, Sir, but it’s your choice, not mine. I trust you.”

Brushing his thumb over her lower lip, he met her gaze for a long time, studying her.

Her trust in him.

“I love you so much, baby,” he whispered. “Thank you for setting the stand up perfectly.”

She smiled, flicking her tongue against the tip of his thumb. “You’re welcome, Sir.” She sucked on it.

Breathe.

“I mean it, that this will likely hurt a lot.”

Her smile widened around his thumb. “I hope so, Sir.”

In his jeans, his cock made its presence known, hardening and surging, uncomfortably straining against his zipper despite his headache.

His control snapped, and for the first time in…ever, he allowed lizard brain to control the show.

“Naked. Bench. Now.”

Her smile flashed over to a grin he’d murder thousands for without hesitation. She jumped to her feet, yanked the sundress off, and nearly levitated onto the bench.

Standing, he grabbed snap clips to attach her wrist and ankle cuffs to the bench, then picked up her favorite bit gag and blindfold from where she’d hung them on the end of the implement stand.

“Color,” he whispered.

“Green, Sir.”

He leaned in, eye-to-eye. “That’s the last time I will ask you for a color tonight, pet,” he whispered. “You get black, or nothing. Understand?”

His cock throbbed again at the challenge accepted gleam in her eyes. “Yes, Sir. Thank you.”

Breathe.

Lizard brain still had a conscience. “Last chance, pet. No penalty, no punishment. Green, or we can stop.”

She stretched forward to kiss him. “Green, motherfucker,” she whispered before her lips curled into a smile.

Oh, no, she didn’t.

Sometimes at home when they scened, or even in bed, she would get…not even bratty, because it wasn’t.

Playfully challenging.

She knew exactly what phrases and what tone of voice would trigger him into that mode, too, and she took great pleasure in engaging it when she was in the mood to receive a harder than usual beating or rougher than usual sex. She called it his “predator” mode.

Were they at home when she did this, or maybe at one of the private parties, he’d already be stripping so he could fuck her brains out as part of the scene.

He reached down and adjusted himself in his jeans. “Challenge accepted, pet. May god have mercy on your ass, because I won’t.” He fisted her hair, yanking her head up and back to claim her mouth in a crushing, bruising kiss that left her whimpering and gasping.

He buckled the bit gag around her head, tightly instead of set to the usual hole where she could spit it out of she needed to. Followed by the blindfold.

Rooting around in his bag, he found one of the tennis balls he used with her for puppy play. He put that in her right hand and closed her fingers around it.

That was her safeword, and she recognized it. If she dropped it, scene over, period.

She clutched it like she held the most expensive diamond in the world.

He stood, his gaze sweeping over the implements.

Breathe.

Instead of a light flogger or a slapper, he grabbed one of the thin, whippy riding crops that he knew stung like a motherfucker.

He stood to her left side and trailed his left hand slowly down her spine, pausing at her lower back where he splayed his fingers over her bare flesh.

His cock jumped again as she flinched when he touched the crop to her ass, holding it.

Tonight would not be a subtle dance between them, gradual crescendos and tender valleys.

Tonight would be full-throttle sadism, a hard horse race, right out of the gate.

He started with the riding crop, not hitting her with it as hard as he could, but making her squirm and squeal, all those little noises that completely bypassed every other nerve in his body and gathered right in his cock.

He switched to a paddle, back to a cane, another strap that was stingy as fuck, a different riding crop.

And not once did his gorgeous pet falter. She moaned and cried and took every stroke, every mark, every bit of it, his headache still there but fading a little as he breathed and hit, breathed and struck, breathed and lost himself in his perfect slave’s body, her pain, her sounds of agony, every little moan and squeak, and the way she desperately clutched the ball to make sure he didn’t stop.

He decided to mix in a little pleasure with the pain and took a pause, grabbing the battery-powered wand vibrator from his bag. When he pressed it against her pussy without turning it on, she knew what was coming and eagerly whined, arching her back, trying to stick her ass out and make it easier for him to get it in there.

Just as he was about to switch the vibrator on, there was a loud boom that shook the building, and the power went off, shutting down the lights and the music.

Oh, motherfucker!

* * * *

Tony couldn’t scare her. She trusted him and knew he would never go too far, no matter how upset he was.

If anything, she knew how much he desperately needed her right now to let loose some of his pent-up anger, grief, guilt—everything he’d been dealing with.

It was her job to let him take it out on her. She loved him, she belonged to him, and as far as she was concerned, it was a win-win. He’d playfully warned way back at the very beginning of their initial dynamic that the brain was ridiculously easy to rewire to crave pain with pleasure.

He’d delivered on that warning, and then some.

With every impact, her clit throbbed, her pussy grew even wetter, and she was glad she had a towel under her or she’d likely have a puddle there instead.

Then he paused and as she sucked in a shaky breath, she felt the cool, unmistakable head of the wand vibrator pressing against her cunt.

Yay!

She’d started to breathe, to suck in a long, slow breath to hold it in anticipation of the vibrator springing to life when she felt and heard the loud boom, followed by the music shutting off.

“Nnnoooooo!” she nearly howled around the bit gag as the vibrator disappeared.

She suspected the lights had gone off, too, based on the sudden groans and mixed chatter around her. Then she heard Max’s voice rise above the din.

“Everyone stay where you are, please,” he called out. “That sounded like a transformer. We’ll get some flashlights.”

“I’ll get the LED candles,” Sean called out from what sounded like the other side.

Shayla groaned in frustration. It was like the world was conspiring against her and her husband.

You gotta be shitting me!

Tony’s hand stroked her back and he muttered something she couldn’t hear over everyone else, but she lay there, trying not to grumble and complain.

She heard June’s voice. “Everyone okay?”

“What the hell was that?” Scrye asked, sounding like he’d walked over toward where her voice had come from.

“Cali went outside to look and call FPL,” June said. “We think maybe a transformer blew.”

“Motherfucker,” Shayla muttered against her bit gag, and she fought the urge to bang her forehead against the bench in frustration. It took everything in her to not throw the damn ball that was in her hand.

Not that she could have thrown it far, but she was pissed.

And every last bit of her subspace was fucking gone.

The sound of sirens approaching filtered in from outside.

“I have a Bluetooth speaker in my car,” Axel called from the other side. “We can hook it in to Pandora on my phone.”

“Go get it,” Max called back.

“Do we have to leave?” someone asked.

“No, not if y’all want to keep playing,” Max said. “Just please be careful and try not to walk around too much until we get more lights up.”

She was aware of Tony moving, and his hand disappeared from her back. “I’m not stopping. Hang on, pet.”

After a minute, she heard Three Days Grace start up nearby, and realized he must have taken his phone out and called up one of his scene playlists.

His hand returned to her back, as did the feel of a riding crop or cane against her ass instead of the vibrator. “Ready?”

“Yes,” she grumbled around the bit gag, her mood totally shot to hell now.

* * * *

Under any other circumstance, Tony would have been laughing at Shayla’s frustration.

Except, yet again, life interfered with their fun. She probably wouldn’t be able to come right now even if he tried it. He needed to get her back into subspace first.

Shit.

Knowing he was going to owe her big later, he swapped out the vibrator for a riding crop and wondered if she’d even be able to sink back down into subspace, or if he’d have to call the scene and just take her home and make love to her to make up for the subspaceus interruptus.

After a few swats he watched how she was trying to shift around on the bench, but she hadn’t dropped the ball yet.

Pausing to help Axel connect the Bluetooth speaker to his phone, Tony then walked to Shayla’s head, fisted her hair, and yanked her head back again. He trailed his tongue around her lips, where the bit gag held them apart.

“Hope you’re ready to take your Sir’s load up your ass when we get home, baby,” he whispered. “Because before I have to leave on Tuesday, I’m going to make sure I leave several loads in every one of your sweet holes.”

She whimpered, rocking against the bench a little.

Good.

She didn’t sound quite needy enough, but it meant the night hadn’t been totally borked.

Yet.

“Does my good pet want to beg to take a load up her ass?”

“Yes, Sir,” she mumbled around the gag.

He pressed his lips to her ear. “Going to hogtie my pet in bed tomorrow morning. I’ll start my day by putting the first load down that sweet mouth of yours. Then I’m going to bury one in your pussy. The third will go in your ass while I’ve got a vibrator humming away in your sweet cunt. In fact, I think after I fuck your ass tonight, you’re going to wear a vibrating butt plug to sleep.”

That whine was much closer to the frequency he was trying to dial in.

Excellent.

He licked her cheek and released her head, beginning some bare-handed pummeling along her back, shoulders, upper arms, and down to her ass and thighs. He’d tried to keep the bare-handed impact play to a minimum tonight, because his hands were sore enough as it was.

But it worked. When he buried two fingers in her dripping pussy, she rocked against him, whining, groaning, desperate.

Then he grabbed the vibrator, switched it on, and pressed it against her clit.

He stood there watching her as she came beautifully unglued for him. She strained against her bonds, a long, low moan rumbling from her as the vibrator did its work.

It also allowed him a moment to breathe, to reach down with his other hand and adjust himself—again—and regroup.

The rage had dissipated at some point, he didn’t know when. Running his hand over her ass and thighs, feeling the hot welts there—yeah, she was done. He wasn’t sure how long they’d been playing total, but it was time to end this scene on a happy note.

Switching hands with the vibrator—because she was grinding against it now and probably on orgasm three or four—he reached up and took the ball from her, tossing it into his bag. She wouldn’t need that now.

She didn’t get a safeword for this part. If she was in the bad kind of pain, she’d start waving her hands at him or something.

After another ten minutes of that, he finally switched off the vibrator and set it aside.

Shayla’s body trembled before she went limp on the bench, a fine sheen of sweat covering her.

As he came back to himself, he realized more than a fine sheen of sweat covered him, too. It was getting damned hot in there without A/C.

Shit.

He unclipped her wrist and ankle cuffs from the bench but left her lying there as he quickly tossed everything into his bag. He could organize it at home, and would likely be using it there before he left on Tuesday, anyway.

Once that was ready, he wrapped her in another fleece throw and scooped her into his arms, carrying her over to one of the couches. “Wait right here, pet.”

He hurried back to the bench, moved the towel and wiped the bench with one of the antibacterial wipes, then dragged his stuff over to the couch to clear the bench. That included juggling his phone and the Bluetooth speaker, but Max came over to help him before leaving to answer someone’s question. Cali had put stickers over the front and rear cameras on his phone for him to reassure others of their privacy.

After settling on the couch with Shay, now that he was paying attention, he realized some people had left, but not many. He tipped his head at Rusty, who was DMing on that side, to motion him over.

“Why isn’t anyone leaving?” he whispered.

“Can’t. Power lines are down. Unless you have a vehicle tall enough to drive over the back curb and swale. Gilo’s bringing a genny and fans.”

“Ah, okay.”

Shay shifted in his arms. “Sir?”

“Shhh, baby. It’s all right. You surf your zen.” He kissed the top of her head, closed his eyes, and just…breathed.

Although, yeah, it was growing uncomfortably warm in there now.

With his eyes still closed, he tried to visualize the parking area and understood exactly what Rusty meant. That side of the complex, you had to drive around the back side of the building and around another to exit through the main entrance. It was why this location was perfect, because Venture’s unit didn’t face the main road the complex sat on. Their unit faced west, and was shielded from view from the road by a fence and landscaping put in place by Kel.

But that section of the parking lot, the swales were bordered by concrete curbs. He thought he could make it over them, though, but wouldn’t know for sure until he could go out and take a look at them and compare it to his SUV.

Fuck.

Chapter Eleven

Once Shayla had recovered, Tony helped her get dressed, made sure she’d had plenty of water, and left her at a table in the social area with another friend while he took their bags outside and went to scope the situation.

Gilo had brought the generator and fans, but it was already cooler outside than it was inside despite the warm June night.

Rusty walked over with a flashlight to shine on the swale. There were some tire tracks through the grass where others had risked it, and where Gilo had come and gone with his truck. “Well?”

Tony rubbed at his chin. At least he’d been able to take his time getting ready today, a good shave for the first time in over a week, able to trim his mustache and goatee and shave everything else. While in Denver, he’d been letting stubble sprout and only shaving on Sunday mornings, when he’d let them sleep in a little while longer than the other days.

“What do you think?” Tony asked him.

Rusty laughed. “Nooo. You’re not fooling me. I’m not making that call and then you rip your oil pan off.”

Tony turned to look at his SUV. It wasn’t meant to be an off-road vehicle, just a comfortable driver, but he thought he could make it. “I’m going to risk it. I need to get her home and collapse.”

“You doing okay?”

“Yeah, just…yeah. I’ll be fine. Shitty time at work right now. I have to fly back out to Denver on Tuesday.”

He said their good-byes and bundled Shay into the passenger seat. Rusty walked back out with them and stood at the swale with a flashlight held trained on the curb and keeping an eye on it. As Tony let the front wheels bump against the curb, he goosed it, and felt the SUV bump over them.

Rusty looked, nodded, and gave him a thumbs-up.

Relieved, Tony waved at him and eased through the grass over to the neighboring complex. They didn’t have curbs there, the grass transitioning to cracked and chipped asphalt.

This worked out better anyway, traffic-wise. Tony wove their way through slightly unfamiliar streets until they were once again pointed toward home.

In the passenger seat, where Shayla had tilted it back and already dozed off, she let out an adorable snore.

No, he wouldn’t fuck her ass tonight. That was too much prep and not enough energy. If she wasn’t in the mood to do anything by the time they got home, he’d hold her cuddled next to him and either finish himself off, or go to sleep and wait until morning.

If his cock would let him.

But when he pulled into the driveway she’d already tilted her seat forward again and was awake.

He leaned in to kiss her. “How about a trade, pet?”

“A trade, Sir?”

He smiled. “Blow job tonight, ass fucking in the morning?”

She smiled. “You’re going to make me wear a butt plug tonight, aren’t you?”

“How about a non-vibrating one?”

“Deal.”

* * * *

If Tony was passing up an opportunity to fuck her ass, she knew he was worn out. So she let him have fun inserting the average-sized butt-plug into her and didn’t mind at all when he fingered her clit as he did, getting her over unexpectedly.

And when he sat up against the headboard and spread his legs…

Yeeeeah!

She was on him like fur on a cat, devouring his cock and loving every soft groan she pulled from him.

His hands cupped her head, fisting her hair, and she needed no coaxing to deep-throat his cock. Pre-cum already slid over her tongue, and she knew it wouldn’t take him long to fill her throat.

There was no denying she loved going down on her husband. She’d spent countless hours on her knees or on her stomach, like this, with his cock deep in her throat. She loved knowing she was the only person who got to do this to him, the only person in his life like this, the same way he enjoyed knowing she belonged only to him. No one-way street for her Master—he was perfectly happy to hold himself to the same standard he held her. He didn’t even play with others, although she didn’t mind if he did demos for people as part of classes he taught.

That wasn’t “play.”

It damn sure wasn’t this sweet and sexy connection, the delicious feel of his hot cock pressing and throbbing against her tongue.

She didn’t drag it out tonight, either, knowing he’d been hard the entire time they’d played. Nothing tonight had been his fault, that was for sure, and she loved him even more for trusting himself with her body the way he had.

To trust she knew him well enough to say yes to beating his anger out of her flesh.

He finally erupted, ropes of cum filling her mouth as she swallowed, swallowed, licked, sucked, until he finally chuckled and pulled her off him, easing down the bed so he could cuddle her against his side.

“Good girl,” he whispered, kissing her. “Such a good girl.”

She let him recover for a couple of minutes before asking him about it. “So what the actual fuck happened tonight? Who was that woman?”

He sighed and quickly detailed the events.

“I nearly came off that bench when you didn’t use the vibrator on me the first time.”

He laughed. “I’m honestly surprised you didn’t, too. I’m so proud of you for toughing it out. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get you back into subspace.”

She nuzzled against him. “You were amazing, Sir.”

“Not too much?”

“No, Sir. Never too much.”

“I owe you an apology.”

“For what?”

He tipped her head to face him. “I promised you I’d never play upset.”

“But you weren’t upset at me.”

“Doesn’t matter. Let me apologize, please?”

“Apology accepted, even though it’s unnecessary. Tony, seriously, you were fantastic. I love you so much for doing it.”

He kissed her again. “Love you, too, pet.”

As they settled in to sleep, his voice broke the darkness. “She reminded me a lot of Christine,” he softly admitted. “I think that’s why I snapped.”

She pulled his arm more tightly around her. “It’s okay, Sir.”

“I expect better of myself.”

“No one’s perfect, but you’re far and beyond better than the average person. Considering I was the lucky beneficiary of your rage, I’m good with it. Angry scening, check.”

“It’s not funny, pet,” he quietly said.

She rolled to face him and in the darkness she found his face and laid her palm against his cheek. “Who are you married to?”

“You.”

“Who’s your slave?”

“You are.”

“Whose ass did you beat tonight?”

“Yours.”

“Then shouldn’t my opinion be the one that matters? I wanted predator mode tonight. Had we stayed home, I would have goaded you into a takedown and consensual non-consent scene. Tony, I needed this tonight every bit as badly as you did.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.” She kissed him again. “I am perfectly capable of standing up to you and telling you no when I need to. Haven’t I always?”

He sighed. “Yes.”

“Then trust me the way I trust you. I’m your slave, yes, but as you yourself drummed into me, you want a slave, not a doormat. I will never be a doormat for you. Although I damn near threw that ball when the power went out.”

He snorted in the dark, a sound that lifted her heart. “I thought you were going to.”

“We good, Sir?”

He kissed her, long and sweetly, then sighed. “We’re good, pet.”

Finally, she snuggled against him and sensed him drift to sleep.

Which left her thinking about the funeral ahead of them in less than twenty-four hours.

I will be the bigger person. It’s the right thing to do.

Except knowing it was his ex’s doppelgänger that had triggered her husband, she wondered if maybe neither of them should be attending.

Chapter Twelve

Sunday afternoon, Shayla sat in the church pew and fought the urge to uncomfortably shift to one side, lean against Tony.

The butt plug he’d put in her before they’d left the house wasn’t exactly something she could ignore. That was after he’d spent the better part of an hour tying her up and slowly plowing her ass as he’d sipped his morning coffee, using a vibrator on her to make her come all over his cock as he did.

He kept hold of her hand, more for his comfort than her own, she suspected, from the way he kept a tight grip on her. He’d dressed in a suit and tie and wore a somber expression she wasn’t used to seeing on his face.

They sat midway back in the chapel, behind the bulk of the fifty or so people there for the funeral. Her brother had greeted them when they’d arrived, offering Tony a hug that he’d accepted, and Tony giving her a subtle nod that she could hug him, too, if she wanted.

The man looked like he was two breaths away from crying again, so of course she offered the poor guy a hug.

Yeah, this had been the right thing to do.

Tony had led her down to meet Christine’s parents and sister, where they sat in the front row, murmuring her condolences and accepting hugs from all of them before Tony led her back to where they now sat.

He seemed to know a few people there, some stopping and saying hi, shaking his hand when they recognized him, but other than that, Tony didn’t speak.

He did, however, rub his thumb back and forth over her thumb, she noticed. A self-soothing gesture.

Ethan and his wife, Brita, arrived. Ethan paused when he realized it was Tony and Shayla, and left Brita sitting with them while he walked up front to give his condolences to the family.

Brita leaned in, looking grim. “I’m really sorry.”

Tony shrugged. “I’m here for her family. I feel badly for them.”

Brita offered a sad smile and nodded. “I never enjoyed these, that’s for sure, but always went for the families, when I could. Help with their closure.” Shayla remembered Brita was a former detective, too, Ethan’s partner before her injury in the line of duty forced her retirement.

She was also Ethan’s slave, and another friend in common.

Ethan returned to sit with them and, thankfully, didn’t try to strike up useless conversation with them. He wore a suit, too, but she’d spotted his badge clipped to his belt.

When the service started, an older minister took the pulpit to begin. There was a rather plain black casket—closed, thank goodness—sitting at the front of the church, and a picture of the woman smiling in better days sat on top of it. It looked like it’d been part of a larger image, cropped and enlarged for the smile she gave the camera.

It was only after Shayla stared at it for a few minutes that she realized she knew that picture.

Knew it damn well.

Because in one of the photo albums in their house was a copy of it. And the barely visible brown hair to Christine’s left in the picture belonged to her husband.

Fuck.

* * * *

There wasn’t a single other damn photo they could have picked to use besides that one? Why the fuck didn’t they just use our wedding photo, then?

It wasn’t bad enough he felt vaguely guilty after reading the note she’d left for him, but they couldn’t have found a better picture of her that wasn’t directly connected to…him?

Breathe.

His headache had returned with a vengeance, but he sat there, forcing himself not to react, not to be emotional.

This day was absolutely not about him.

The only reason he was here at all was Dennis asked him personally. If it wasn’t for that, he would have mailed the card that was tucked into Shayla’s purse instead of bringing it.

Tony wondered if any of the other people here were Christine’s other ex-husband, or ex-boyfriends.

Why didn’t you reach out?

Why didn’t you talk to someone?

Why are you putting your family through this?

They were questions maybe they’d never know the answers to despite the notes she’d left.

He distracted himself from the service by rubbing his thumb over Shayla’s, anchoring himself here and now, to her.

At one time, he’d been ready to spend the rest of his life with Christine. When he’d finally come to realize she had changed the rules of the game and had every intention of trying to get pregnant with him despite what they’d discussed and agreed upon, it’d literally flipped a switch inside him, from trust to distrust.

It wasn’t that he fell out of love with her immediately, but if he didn’t have trust, he couldn’t have that kind of love.

Despite trying to talk with her, wanting to regain that trust, the gulf had quickly and irrevocably widened, becoming insurmountable.

Thus he’d left.

Logically he understood none of this was his fault.

It still didn’t lessen the impact of hearing her mother sob, or watching her father’s shoulders silently shake.

Christine hadn’t been religious. This was her parents’ church, and some of the attendees were their friends. They’d also prepared a small wake in the church’s social hall, where they all gathered after the service.

He didn’t want to be rude and just boogey out of there. So he stood with Shayla, Brita, and Ethan, clutched together in a tight group in one corner and trying to stay both out of the way and yet available if any of the family wanted to talk to them.

“Did they find her car?” Tony softly asked.

Ethan nodded. “Had been towed the day before. Reported by a nearby resident, which is why that ball got dropped. The towing company wasn’t on rotation with the county and didn’t get the BOLO alert. They saw the news report about her suicide at the park, realized that’s where they’d towed the car from, matched the registration to her name, and called it in.”

“Anything? Any…answer?”

Ethan shook his head. “It just…is. It’s sad, and sucks for the families, but it just…is. She wasn’t terminally ill or anything. She didn’t express suicidal ideations to her therapist. She didn’t tell anyone she was doing it. The only thing there was is that she did get diagnosed as being in menopause a few weeks ago.”

“Fuck,” Tony whispered, lowering his head, closing his eyes.

“What?” Ethan asked.

“That’s it.” He couldn’t look up and face anyone for a moment. “I guarantee you that’s it. She wanted to actually have a baby, and that avenue was…closed.” He finally opened his eyes.

“Why didn’t she just do IVF?” Brita asked.

Ethan shook his head. “She wasn’t well off financially. I mean, she wasn’t struggling, but she wasn’t able to afford several grand to do that.” Ethan looked around and leaned in. “You realize the only reason I’m telling you all this is because of how I know you, and that you’re her ex, right?”

Tony nodded. “Yeah. I appreciate it. I won’t say anything.”

“I hate to say it,” Ethan said, “but you were right about where we’d find her, and you’re probably right about this. It’s sad to say I think you honestly knew her better than anyone else.”

That did not fill Tony with good feelings.

* * * *

They stayed home that night. Shayla made Tony’s favorites and they snuggled on the couch before going to bed. The next morning, it was again a sweet treat to be able to sleep in and make his coffee for him. Like a few days of perfection, of life being on an even keel.

Until his personal cell rang with a call from Marcia. Shayla sat there on the couch, next to Tony, and watched as horror, followed immediately by a mask she literally watched him pull into place, filled his features.

“Yeah. Okay. Thanks.”

She didn’t speak, waited him out.

It took him the better part of five minutes to finally meet her gaze.

“The power outage Saturday night, at the club.”

“Yeah?”

“Car hit a pedestrian, and then the power pole.”

“Yeah?” She wasn’t sure where he was going with this, but from the look on his face and how long it took him to say the next line, she knew it couldn’t be good.

“The woman I threw out Saturday night.”

“Yeah?”

A heavy sigh escaped him. “She was the pedestrian who died.”

Horror washed through her as Tony stood. She scrambled to follow, but he held out a hand without turning. “I need a few minutes, pet. Please.” His voice didn’t sound right. “I’ll be right back.”

He headed down the hall and she heard their bedroom door shut behind him. Every instinct in her screamed for her to safeword and follow him, comfort him, talk to him.

But he’d asked for time alone. That was the same thing as her safewording, and she knew it.

He was not a man to withdraw like this.

Except these were not normal times for him, not normal events for him to process.

Nothing right now was normal.

She knelt there on the couch, naked except for her cuffs and collar, staring down the hall, trying to listen for him.

Fuck!

This was supposed to be their goddamned time together!

She was about ready to put a moratorium on personal cell phones until he flew out on Tuesday.

He finally returned about fifteen minutes later. She didn’t speak, and neither did he. He climbed onto the couch with her, rested his head in her lap, and closed his eyes.

Shayla sighed, stroking his head, snuggling with him.

My poor Sir.

He was always strong for her.

Always.

No way in hell when he needed her to be strong was she going to let him down. This was enough to make anyone drink, much less upset.

That he was so calm almost worried her.

She shouldn’t have been, though, because it was Marcia’s next call a few hours later, just as they were getting ready to go out to eat, that fixed that.

They were standing in the foyer and he rested one hand against the front door as he stared at the floor, his other hand holding the phone to his ear.

“Yeah,” he quietly said. “Yeah. … Uh-huh. Okay. We’re on our way.”

Then he hung up and handed her the phone. “Stay, pet. Do not move. I’ll be right back.”

Without another word, he walked through the kitchen, and she watched him exit through the utility room. A moment later, she heard the door to the garage open, then close.

Followed shortly after by the sound of a crash, or a thud of some sort, and a long, loud scream that made her cringe.

But he’d given her a direct order, and considering his current mindset, she didn’t want to safeword and investigate.

He returned a moment later, shaking and flexing his right hand, and then she realized he must have punched…something.

He held out his left hand for his phone. “Thank you, pet,” he hoarsely said as she handed it to him. “We need to…delay dinner.”

“What’s wrong?”

He sighed. “Cali’s in Proctor-Collins in the ICU. Infected cat bite. She had a reaction to the antibiotics. They had to intubate her.”

“Motherfucker,” she muttered. “Is she going to be okay?”

“She’s stable. Sean and Max are there. Essie’s a wreck.”

“Essie?”

“She was there with her when it happened. Sean and Max were at work and Cali was hiding how bad her hand was, so Essie took her.”

And Essie was pregnant.

Jesusfuck.

“You can beat me tonight if you want to, Sir,” she offered as he locked the door behind them.

“No, pet.” He shook his head. “I just want the world to settle the fuck down for thirty seconds so I feel like I can take a goddamned breath.”

Later that night, after making love and him falling asleep in her arms, she studied his right hand, the fresh scrapes on his knuckles and fingers. She still hadn’t looked to see what he’d punched, but at least he was asleep.

Although she’d hated the haunted fear in Sean and Max’s expressions tonight, there wasn’t anything they could actually do for them. They’d stayed for a while, but then Eliza had shooed them out when she realized Tony was leaving again Tuesday.

And now…

She closed her eyes and inhaled his scent, trying to imprint it on her heart. He’d be leaving again for several more weeks, and while she hadn’t mentioned it, he’d likely be missing their wedding anniversary.

Like hell would she say anything to him about it and stress him out. He knew when the date was. The last thing he needed right now was more stress on him from her. He couldn’t help it, and she knew it wasn’t what he wanted. No way would she blame him for it.

She was an adult and knew he’d make it up to her when he came home.

She only wished there was something she could do to take his mental and emotional burden off his shoulders for a little while.

I love you, Sir. I hope you know I’m here for you no matter what.

Chapter Thirteen

Friday morning, Shayla had no problems getting out of bed on time. Fortunately, she didn’t need to be at the airport until at least nine, so she had plenty of time. Plus she’d packed the night before.

All she had to do was grab a shower and get ready. Their neighbor was all set to take care of the babies for them until she returned Sunday evening. And since Tony hadn’t said anything about the plane tickets, she suspected he wasn’t checking her credit cards. Then again, he had no reason to. The card she’d used was in her name, even though he had one for that account, too, and she received the e-mail updates about charges.

Sneaky, sneaky pet.

It’d been three weeks since Tony flew back to Denver, and this weekend was their wedding anniversary.

She giggled.

Hell, if she hadn’t seen the promo e-mail yesterday morning she would have totally missed the opportunity. And okay, it was costing a couple hundred bucks, but she’d take it out of her fun money for the next month or two, if Tony decided she needed to.

They could afford a little splurge like this every once in a while. It wasn’t like she was buying a car.

Shayla knew she’d earn herself a spanking for lying to Tony about her meetings, but hopefully it’d be damn well worth it when she knocked on his hotel room door.

I can’t wait to see the look on his face!

She’d packed a few of his favorite implements in a very light suitcase that she’d checked because she knew she couldn’t put them in her carryon.

She’d also included a few other goodies.

Like lube, condoms, butt plugs…

As she stood in the gate area and waited for her flight to board, she texted him.

Meetings today, Sir. I’m turning my phone off. Love You.

She was settled in her window seat by the time he replied.

No worries, pet. Text Me when you can. Love you, too.

She smiled, glad that they were going to get to have the perfect wedding anniversary after all.

Because she was going to ask they turn off their damn personal cell phones until she flew home on Sunday. That way, only if he had a work emergency, or couldn’t take time off from working on the data center, would he have to think about anything except them.

I can’t wait to see him!

* * * *

Tony sat in his seat and waited for Shayla’s reply, hoping it came before some damned flight attendant made him turn off his phone.

Love you, too, Sir.

He smiled, then shut his phone off and tucked it in his shirt pocket.

Fuck Asher Insurance.

This was his goddamned wedding anniversary. They could shove their timeline up their asses for a couple of days. Had they hired the crew he budgeted for in the first place, they’d be done by now.

Too bad he’d already turned off his work phone or he’d check to see if the e-mail he’d forwarded—with copies of everything he’d done thus far and how the VP who’d axed the vendor crew in the first place was the reason they were behind—had made its rounds through the various other VPs yet. Darren had signed off on him sending it, was CC’d on it, and Tony had included the e-mail from Darren last week agreeing that Tony could take these couple of days off and that the delays were not Tony’s fault. Also commending him on how fast he’d started catching up with the temps helping out. Also also including the fact that Tony was taking Mike Kennedy back to Denver with him on Sunday for the next stage, Mike was being promoted and getting a pay raise, and the implied tone that no one better complain about it if they didn’t want to lose Tony. That if they wanted to complain about missing the project deadline, they could talk to Sam Eppenson, the VP who’d red-lined the budgeted crew.

And, oh, FYI, hope that money being sent to a DC lobbyist was worth all of this.

Tony would have loved to be a fly on the wall of that morning’s VP meeting, watching Eppenson explain himself.

He’d have to settle for Darren’s report on it, since he was going and promised to go to bat for Tony.

While he’d gained a lot of ground and decreased their deadline deficit, Tony missing his wedding anniversary was not going to put them totally back on track. Especially when they couldn’t shuffle the Bradenton schedule around to cover for Mike’s absence until Monday anyway, and he was going to need the man’s help with the troubleshooting portion of things and getting the colo moved over.

At least this way he could take a couple nights off, spend them in bed with Shayla making her happy, soothe his own soul a little, and be ready to kick ass next week with Mike flying out with him late Sunday morning to help.

He’d already warned Mike it’d be a grind and hard work, and his friend and coworker was more than ready for the challenge.

He’d also asked Mike to give his wife and slave, Jenny—Shayla’s friend and fellow book club member—orders not to say anything to Shayla about this.

He didn’t want Shayla putting together that he would be home this weekend.

This was a surprise.

He actually managed to doze off on the flight, miracle of miracles, and booked an Uber at TIA.

Fuck it, he could expense it back to Asher, and he knew damn well Darren would approve it, based on the circumstances.

Once he was sitting in the Uber, he texted Shayla.

Text Me when you can, pet.

He didn’t have a responding text from her by the time the driver pulled into their driveway, though.

And her car wasn’t in the driveway, although it was nearly six by the time he arrived.

With relief, he unlocked the front door, and Bagel and Cream ran to greet him. He knelt to take a few minutes with them, a wave of melancholy sweeping through him.

“When’s Mommy coming home, huh?” It was Friday night, and she should be home by then, usually.

He’d already changed into shorts and had opened a beer when Shayla finally texted him.

What room are You in, Sir?

He stared at his phone and opted to call her. “That’s a silly question, pet.” He smiled, trying not to give the surprise away as he walked over to the front windows and peeked out the blinds.

“No, it’s not, Sir,” she coyly said.

“Are you on your way home?”

“I asked you first. And are you in your room right now?”

He chuckled. “I’m staring at a gorgeous view.” He took a sip of his beer. “And hoping for an even better one soon, a full moon.” He fought the urge to giggle.

“Did you get done early today?” She sounded…really excited.

“You could say that. You didn’t answer my question, pet. Are you on your way home?”

“Not exactly, Sir.”

He turned from the window. “What do you mean, not exactly? You didn’t mention going anywhere after work today.” Damn.

“You tell me what room you’re in first, Sir.” She giggled.

His Dom senses were tingling in an uncomfortable way. “Pet. When are you coming home?”

She didn’t answer at first. “Coming home?”

“Coming home, yes, pet. When are you coming home.”

“Wait.” The playfulness disappeared from her tone. “Where are you?”

“I’m going to pull Dom rank and ask where are you?”

She went guiltily quiet for a long, uncomfortable moment. “Umm…” She sighed. “I’m parked outside your hotel—”

He groaned. “Oh, no! Pet, please tell me you’re kidding?”

“No!” Her tone flipped, understandably angry. “Why? What’s wrong with me being outside your hotel?”

“I…” He literally face-palmed himself, scrubbing at his lower face with his hand. “I’m home, pet. Our home. I flew home today to surprise you. I had an Uber drive me from TIA.”

She didn’t respond at first. “Oh,” she quietly said.

He didn’t cry much. The last time he’d openly wept was at Kaden’s funeral.

He was damn close to repeating that performance right now.

“I told my boss I would not miss spending my wedding anniversary with my wife. I’m flying back to Denver on Sunday, with Mike. He’s going to help me out there and hopefully we’ll get finished sooner.”

Another long silence, except for the heartbreaking sound of sniffles. “Oh.”

“Pet, I…” He walked over to the couch and collapsed on it, taking his glasses off and laying them on the coffee table. “Sweetie, I’m so sorry,” he gently said, realizing she was crying already and desperately trying not to let him hear her. “I never dreamed you’d fly out or I would have told you. I wanted to surprise you and be here for tomorrow.”

“I…” He suspected she hit the mute button because the call didn’t drop but all sound disappeared for a moment from her end before she returned, and her voice sounded choked when she did. “I’m sorry, Sir,” she whispered. “I’ll take whatever punishment you want to give me for lying about my meetings.”

It clicked. “You had to turn your phone off for the airplane.”

“Yes, Sir.”

He flopped over on his side, wishing he had the power of teleportation right fucking now. “Baby, I’m so sorry. You’re actually at the hotel right now?”

Another sniffle. “Out in the parking lot,” she whispered.

Oh, she was desperately trying not to let him hear her cry, and his heart broke for her. “Let me get my laptop up and I’ll look up flights, baby. Maybe we can get you home tonight.” He sat up and walked over to his bag as he heard her mute the phone again.

Dammit.

He knew she was sitting there in a strange city, in a rental car, trying not to let him hear her cry.

“Unmute the phone, pet,” he gently said. She did, and he caught the tail end of a sniffle. “Sweetheart, don’t try to hide that you’re crying. It’s okay, I’m not upset with you.”

“But I…I…” Her heartbroken sobs broke his heart.

“Shh, pet,” he whispered, hoping she’d be able to quiet down to listen to him. “Pet, my sweet, beautiful pet, I’m not upset, baby. I’m not.”

He opened his laptop and set it on the coffee table, punching the power button and wishing it’d hurry up. “Worst-case, we’ll get you home tomorrow and still have tomorrow night together.” He grabbed his glasses and put them back on.

“I…I got one of those…those travel company e-mails yesterday…there were $99 last-minute weekend trip one-way flight specials…before I thought it through I had it booked. I got like the last seats out and back at those rates. I fly home Sunday.”

His heart sank but he tried to think positively. There were other airlines, and fuck it, if he had to max out a credit card to get his wife home, he would.

Or, if he had to, he’d fly himself back out to Denver tomorrow morning and still have a night with her.

“Who’s supposed to take care of the babies?”

“Mitch next door. He already did it this afternoon, he texted me.”

“Okay. I’ll text him.” He drummed the fingers of his other hand as he waited for the Wi-Fi to connect to his home network and the browser to open.

More sounds of her crying.

“Let me start looking, hold on, pet.”

But…his heart sank as he started searching for a flight and only found seats—on any airline—to return to Tampa late Sunday. Even trying a couple of other hub cities to route her through wouldn’t work.

And there was absolutely nothing flying out of Tampa for Denver until Sunday morning. Again, anything to Denver through hubs wouldn’t get him there until sometime Sunday, or so late Saturday night that it wasn’t even worth the thousands of dollars it’d cost.

Fuck.

She sniffled. “No seats, huh?”

He pulled off his glasses again and set them on the coffee table. “No. I’m sorry, pet.”

“There’s some sort of big trade convention starting this weekend and running all next week through next weekend. There were all sorts of banners and stuff at the airport welcoming them.”

“Oh, fuck.” Yeah, there had been, but in his eagerness to get home, he hadn’t paid any attention to them. He had a thought. “Hey, stay until Tuesday or Wednesday.” He started to search flights home from Denver. “I’ll book you a new one-way, and—”

“I can’t, Sir. I have meetings on Monday and Tuesday for my environmental articles. County meetings, I mean. I have to be there to cover them. They’re off-site and won’t be televised.”

His heart sank. “Oh.”

“I hope I can find a hotel room,” she quietly said.

Now the warning a desk clerk had given him that morning, that he might want to keep his room instead of checking out, made perfect sense. “Go inside to the front desk,” he said. “I didn’t check out. I kept my room because they warned me if I cancelled the original reservation, I might be screwed. Now I know why. I was going to let Mike share a room with me, if he had to, because I’m in a double. Tell me who the desk clerk is. I’ve come to know a couple of them by name.”

“Yes, Sir.” Sniffle. “Hold on.” He heard her get out and the chirrup of a strange car horn as she locked it. A moment later, she was talking to someone. “Her name’s Susan, Sir.”

“Hand the phone over, pet, and get your ID out to show her.” There was the sound of the phone being passed.

“Hello?”

Tony pulled on his professional voice despite his heart wanting to break. “Hey, Susan. This is Tony Daniels, from Asher Insurance, staying in room 428. You’ve been seeing a lot of me over the past couple of months.”

“Yes, Mr. Daniels, how can I help you?”

“Well, funny story…”

Five minutes later, Shayla had her phone back, a key to his room, and was walking out to her rental car to get her things.

“I’m sorry, Sir.” Now alone again, she sounded even more sniffly, teary.

“Pet, I need you to get your things and go up to the room and call me back once you’re up there and settled. The Do Not Disturb card is out, but that’s my room. All right, sweetheart?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

He ended the call and collapsed back onto the couch again.

Fuuuuuck.

Chapter Fourteen

Shay called him back fifteen minutes later. “Your pillow smells like you, Sir.” She sounded close to tears again.

He knew she’d figured out which bed he’d been using, the one by the window. Not difficult, because it looked slept in. “Well, at least there’s that.” He sighed. “Sorry I didn’t leave you any dirty clothes to sniff. I brought everything dirty home thinking I’d wash it while I’m here. There’s some clean stuff in the dresser.” He walked back to their bedroom, where the bed was neatly made.

Of course she made it when he wasn’t home. She was a beautiful, perfect, well-behaved pet. He pulled her pillow out from under the quilt over their bed and buried his face in it, sniffing.

“I’m sorry, Sir. I wanted to surprise you.” She sniffled. “Surprise.”

He managed a laugh. “Well, you accomplished that, sweetheart, that’s for sure. I am…surprised.”

Another sniffle. “Maybe I can overnight myself home via FedEx.”

“I don’t think they’ll allow that,” he gently said. “If they did, I’d already be en route to Denver.”

“What about in a really large dog carrier? I could stay curled up for a while.”

He chuckled. “Sorry, pet. I won’t allow that, even if they did. Which they won’t.”

“It was worth a shot,” she muttered.

“Why don’t you pull on one of my shirts and wear it for me, sweetheart. It’ll smell like you when I get there Sunday.”

“Yes, Sir. Hold on.” He heard her set the phone down, pull open a drawer, and then she was back. “Okay, Sir. At least I remembered my cuffs and collar this time. And yes, they’re on.”

“My perfect pet.” He sat on the edge of the bed. “Have you had dinner yet?”

“No, Sir.”

He had an idea. “Are you hungry?”

“I was,” she muttered.

“Button up the shirt and put on pants, pet. You’re going to have a delivery of food in a little while.”

“What?”

“Trust me?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Good girl. Did you bring your laptop?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Get Skype up and running. I’ll call you back in a few minutes.”

He ended the call and then pulled up the number for the family-owned deli a block down from the hotel. They had great food and were open until eight local time. He’d probably eaten there over a dozen times since he first arrived in Denver, and ordered take-out from them even more often.

And they delivered.

After placing the order, including a little extra item they promised to grab for him after he explained what happened, and then prepping a couple of things on his end, Tony called Shay back. “You’ll have to sign the credit card slip, pet. Make sure to give them a $20 tip for me, please. I had them add something special for you.”

She sniffled. “Yes, Sir.”

He walked back out to the living room, woke up his laptop, and fired up Skype, then gave her the hotel’s Wi-Fi access code. When she answered the video chat call, his heart nearly broke from how red her eyes looked, her puffy nose.

“Hello, Sir.”

“Hello, pet. I’m going to hang up the phone.”

“Yes, Sir.”

He did, looking at her on the computer. “Oh, take off the collar and cuffs. Sorry. You can put them back on after the food arrives. No scaring the vanillas.”

“Yes, Sir.” She removed them, but he could tell she didn’t want to. Then she pulled the pillow into her lap and hugged it. “I’m sorry, Sir,” she whispered.

“Sweetie, please don’t cry, because I’ll start crying. You don’t want to see a grown Dom cry, do you?”

That earned him a smiling, shnurffly laugh. “No, Sir.”

“Okay. This’ll be all right, sweetheart. Just a bump in the road.”

“I guess I’ll get to work on my latest article this weekend after all. I figured I’d be half-assing it and pulling all-nighters Monday and Tuesday.”

“I don’t want you half-assing things, baby.”

They chatted for nearly thirty minutes when there was a knock on the door. “I’ll be right back, Sir.”

He listened as she answered the door, then the sound of her nearly crying. “Oooohhh!”

Tony smiled to himself and was still smiling when she returned, her food in hand and smelling the bouquet of five red roses he’d asked them to grab from the grocery store just down the street.

Well, he’d asked for any kind of flower, or some sort of little gift, if they’d tack an extra $20 onto his bill to cover it.

Which was why he wanted her to tip them $20, for the effort.

“Thank you, Sir.”

“Happy Anniversary, pet.”

She offered him a sad smile. “Happy Anniversary, Sir.”

“Eat.” He pulled his laptop into his lap and settled back on the sofa, his second beer of the night in hand, an idea forming in his head. “Tomorrow night, we’re going out to dinner.”

She squinted at the screen. “How many of those have you had already, Sir?”

“Trust me?”

She took a bite of her pasta e fagioli. “Yes, Sir.”

“Okay. Make sure you keep your laptop and phone charged tomorrow. And do you have earbuds with you?”

“Yes, Sir?”

“You’ll need those. What kind of clothes did you bring?”

“I have something I can wear out, but nothing fancy. Jeans and a blouse.”

“That’s perfect. We’ll go at three your time, so we don’t have to rush, and there won’t be a lot of people around.”

“You keep saying ‘we’ like you’ll be here.”

“I sort of will.”

“Okay, I’ll play along. Where are we going?”

“I’ll text you the address. Be in your car tomorrow about two forty-five.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Meanwhile…” He took a sip of his beer. “Did you bring toys with you?”

She actually blushed. “Yes,” she muttered.

“What’d you bring?”

He actually made her pick up the laptop and show him.

“Ooohh. Get the red paddle out. And the vibrator.”

She did. “What am I doing with these?”

“Finish eating your dinner and I’ll show you. Is your laptop plugged in?”

“Hold on.” She disappeared for a moment, then the laptop jiggled, and she returned. “It is now.”

“You’re on my bed, right?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Okay, good. I’d feel weird if you did it on the bed I’m going to let Mike use.”

“You’d feel weird?”

“What was that, pet?”

“I mean, yes, Sir.”

He smirked. “Good girl. How’s the food.”

“It’s really good.”

“I’ve eaten there a bunch of times now, and ordered take-out. I love that.”

“The pastrami is really tender.” She took another bite of her sandwich.

“I’d offer to take you sightseeing tomorrow, except I haven’t even been. I know a few restaurants nearby, and the data center, and the colo. If you want to take a drive tomorrow, I can let you see where they are. Can’t take you on a tour of the campus, though. I’d have to physically be with you for that, sorry.”

“It’s okay, Sir. I’ll have plenty to keep me busy.” She smiled. “Or I could take you sightseeing.”

“You’ve been to Denver?”

“No, but I can look up places to go and bring you on my phone. FaceTime.”

“Ahh. Smarty pet. We’ll see if you feel like that tomorrow. Maybe I’ll spend all morning in bed with you, hmm?”

“That’ll be…interesting.”

Once she finished eating, he had her get naked again, cuffs and collar only, and lie on the bed on her stomach, facing the laptop and propped up on her elbows and his pillow.

“Now what?”

“Take the paddle and smack yourself with it.”

“Seriously?”

He leaned forward, dropping his voice. “Do it or safeword, pet.”

He’d even excuse the eyeroll. She shifted position a little and reached behind her.

Smack.

“Harder than that, pet. And look at me when you do it. You know how hard I hit you.”

She grimaced and did it, but that time, he thought it was harder. “Good girl. Again. Such a good girl for me, baby.”

It took him about ten minutes, but he thought he had her not exactly in subspace, but in that beautiful, mentally mellow headspace where she frequently spent time when they were making love.

He shoved his shorts down and adjusted the camera angle. “Now then.” He fisted his cock and slowly stroked himself. “Good girls earn rewards. Get the vibrator and slide it inside your pussy and turn it on, but don’t you dare come until I give you permission. And I want your eyes right here the whole time. If I have to stroke my own cock, then you’re going to watch me do it and beg me for permission to come. If I don’t think you’re begging enough, I’ll make you turn the vibrator off.”

She whimpered, but she did it. He nearly giggled at her pitiful moans, which drowned out the sound of the vibrator.

He grabbed the bottle of lube he’d brought out from the bedroom and drizzled a little in his left fist. He did it slowly, deliberately, drawing it out, enjoying the way she watched him. She always thought it was fascinating that he was a righty but beat off southpaw.

“That’s right, pet. Give Sir a good reason to let you come. Making me do all this work by myself.”

“I’m sorry, Sir. I’ll make it up to you. Please let me come.”

“You don’t get to come—if I decide to let you come—until after I have. I want to watch all that sweet, pitiful need in your face while you watch me stroke my lonely cock.”

It was lonely, too, but at least he could watch her gorgeous face and pretend it was her lips around his cock instead of his own hand.

“I should have made my dirty little pet put in her butt plug,” he teased, not wanting to wait for her to do that. Besides, his stamina was waning. He’d be good for this one and then he’d likely fall over and go to sleep.

He honestly didn’t feel like being in bed, even his own bed.

Not without Shay.

Not like this.

He slowed his strokes, her groans firing his need. This wasn’t the first time they’d had phone or video sex, but it certainly was the most poignant and he wanted to drag it out.

At least for a little while.

He reached down between his legs with his right hand and gently tugged on his balls. “How’s that clit doing, baby. You’d better not be close. You’d better keep yourself right on the edge. Because if I do give you permission to come, if you don’t come soon enough, I’ll withdraw permission.”

Another moan, sending a pulse of need straight to his balls. Yeah, he loved having her helpless and needy and squirming.

Usually, he preferred it to not be so…long-distance, though.

He kept her dangling for a while, got her into a sweetly begging mindset, then finally decided to stop torturing himself and her. He sped up his strokes, a twist at the head, back down again to the root. Before he almost realized it he was there, pleasure slamming into him and adding extra urgency to his strokes as cum erupted from his cock, all over his hand and his stomach.

“Come, pet!”

A familiar, low groan rolled from her. If he hadn’t been so damned tired he might have been able to keep himself hard and stroke through a second one.

Except…he was that damned tired.

And now feeling come-drunk and spent, he reached for the towel he’d brought out to clean himself with. “Good girl,” he said. “You can turn it off.”

She did, eyes closed.

Looking gorgeous.

“Better?”

“A little,” she muttered. “Not the same.”

“I know, pet. I’m sorry.”

Her eyes popped open. “Please don’t apologize, Sir. It’s my fault. You can fuck up next year’s anniversary.” She smiled.

That finally got a laugh out of him. “My practical pet. I’m going to clean up and go to sleep, okay?”

“Yes, Sir. I’m not exactly sleepy. I’ll probably work for a while.”

“Okay, baby. Text me when you wake up. Love you.”

“Love you, too, Sir.”

And like that, he was alone.

Fuck.

He got up and took a shower, then returned to the living room with his pillow from the bed, as well as Shayla’s to curl up with. There, he stretched out on the sofa and turned on the TV. Bagel and Cream jumped up there with him, and as he settled in for the night, he tried not to think about Christine, alone.

About her last sunset.

About…everything.

Fuck.

Chapter Fifteen

Tony started out his Saturday morning calling Patrick, a friend of his he knew was a manager at the Cattlemen’s Country Steakhouse in Sarasota.

A friend in common.

After the guy finished laughing—and apologizing for laughing at Tony’s situation—Patrick wrote down what Tony wanted and said he’d make the arrangements for him and call Tony back.

They had a Cattlemen’s Country Steakhouse in Denver.

Ten minutes from the hotel.

An hour later, his friend called him back and assured him everything was arranged, that he’d talked to the manager who’d be on duty that afternoon, and they would make it happen.

All Tony had to do was call them with a credit card, which he did.

By the time Shayla was awake and had called him on Skype, he’d already done chores around the house, finished his laundry, and had answered several work e-mails. At least they had a lawn service, so that was one chore he didn’t have to do or slough off onto her shoulders.

“Good morning, Sir.”

“Good morning, pet. Happy Anniversary.”

She sighed, looking glum. “Happy Anniversary.”

“Aww, I think someone needs a good-morning spanking.”

“I should call a hard limit to spanking myself.”

“Are you?”

She stared at him for a long moment before sighing. “No. I’m just mad at myself. I thought this was going to be a great anniversary and I fucking ruined it.”

Uh oh. “Sweetheart, please, stop. I’m not upset. And I already have our date night set up.”

“You do?”

Okay, that perked her up a little.

“I do. You’re going to have fun.”

* * * *

She had no idea what was up her husband’s sleeve, but she’d put on a happy face for him.

Even if all she wanted to do was curl up in a ball and cry.

She wasn’t even in the mood for orgasms, to be honest.

He must have sensed she wasn’t really in a frisky mood, because they spent the morning talking. He ordered her breakfast from the deli and had it delivered for her, so there was that.

“I could have gone downstairs to their buffet.”

“But this is private.” He smiled. “Let me pamper you, sweetheart.”

She sipped at the cappuccino he’d ordered for her. “This is good.”

They talked until nearly noon her time. “Well, I’m going to let you get some work done, sweetheart,” he said. “Take your shower, and text me on your phone when you’re in the car. Two forty-five.”

“No hints, huh?”

“Nope. Make sure you have your laptop, phone, chargers, and earbuds.”

“For dinner?”

“For dinner.”

“Yes, Sir.”

Okay, so she could guess that they were going to “eat” together like they had last night.

“I love you, Sir.”

“I love you, too, pet. See you soon.”

Once she’d ended the video call, she sat back on the bed and had a long, hard cry before getting up to take her shower like a good pet.

* * * *

Tony made sure he had everything ready to go before he jumped in the shower. Showered, shaved, and even put on a suit and tie for her.

Hell, it was their wedding anniversary.

He’d make the best of it and it’d be a story to tell their friends later. Fuck, Tilly and her men spent weeks apart at a time.

Except in their case, they could split off into twos and still have someone.

He arrived twenty minutes early, and Patrick indeed had everything ready on his end. They’d saved him a table in a far corner booth, where he’d have privacy. Once Shayla texted him she was ready, he sent her the name and address of the steakhouse.

Ask for Lisa, tell them you’re Mrs. Daniels, and they’ll show you to our table. Then get your laptop out and Skype Me once you’re seated. I’ll be ordering for you.

He awaited her reply.

Yes, Sir.

He flagged down his waitress—to whom he’d already slipped a couple of twenties for her patience—to let her know they were on the clock now and he’d be ready shortly.

He arranged the bouquet he’d bought for Shayla on his way to dinner—that he’d leave locked in the utility room for her when he left tomorrow so the cats didn’t eat it—where it was visible in the frame.

Fifteen minutes later, his Skype connection was ringing.

“Hello, sweetheart. You must have not hit any traffic.”

She was crying. “Oh, my god, Sir, thank you.”

“Let me see it.”

She turned the laptop so the camera would show the bouquet.

“Make sure to take pictures of it in case they won’t let you take it on the plane with you. Oh…duh.” He smiled. “Just leave it in the room for me.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“This one”—he pointed to the one on his table—“will be waiting for you in the utility room.”

She laughed. “Yeah, it wouldn’t survive the babies, otherwise.”

“No, it wouldn’t. Is your waitress there?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Turn the laptop around for me, please.”

The waitress waved. “Hi, I’m Carmen. I’ll be your waitress tonight.”

Tony turned his to face his server. “Carmen, meet Ellen.” The women laughed and waved. “Carmen, Shayla will have water with lemon, an unsweetened iced tea, and for an appetizer, one of your Cheddar Onionz.”

She noted it on her pad. “I’ll get that going.”

He turned to his server. “Ditto the Onionz for me.”

She smiled. “Yes, sir. I’ll be right back with that.” He already had his beverages.

They turned their laptops to face each other again. “I can’t eat a whole one, Sir,” Shayla said.

“I know. Stick it in the fridge, and I’ll have it tomorrow night.”

“Ah.”

He smiled. “Right?” The room had a fridge and a small microwave.

She laughed. “Okay, so I’ll have the rest of yours tomorrow?”

“Exactly. Don’t know how good it’ll be, but there you go.”

Once the servers returned it was time to order their entrees, and Tony again did the honors. “Shayla will have your petite filet, rare, with the garlic butter topping. Baked potato, salad with bleu cheese. I’ll have the porterhouse, rare, garlic butter topping, baked potato, and broccoli.”

Both servers noted what they needed to and left them alone again.

“You can use the earbuds now.” He put his in, too. That gave them a little bit of privacy.

“Thank you for this.” She leaned over and smelled the flowers. “They’re beautiful.” He took a screencap of her smiling and saved it.

“I can’t take credit for picking those out, but I can these. I’ll make sure I tip them damn well. And FYI, you aren’t paying for tonight.”

“How’d you arrange this?”

“I called Patrick. He runs the one here in Sarasota.”

“Sneaky Sir.” She smiled and at least it didn’t look like she was going to cry now. “This is nice. I appreciate you going through this trouble.”

“Well, honestly, I was going to give you a card and flowers, and take you out to dinner, sooo…” He shrugged. “Although I had planned for us to be in the same restaurant when we did.” He smiled. “I was also going to do a little something else, but that will have to wait. They’re not that liberal in this restaurant chain.”

She smiled for him, and that time it looked a little more solid. “Probably not.”

“I was going to talk to you about what I wanted to get you for our anniversary, though. I want you to go car window shopping.”

“Sir?”

“I’m done screwing around. If you insist on keeping the Civic, fine. But it’s got over a hundred thousand miles on it, and it’s tiny. I want you in an SUV.”

“I don’t want a new car.”

“Then we’ll get a good used one, although I’d prefer new for the warranty. Start looking around, see what you like. Needs to be at least as big as mine.”

“There’s a joke there.”

“I’m serious, Shay. You need a new car. I hate the thought of you driving around in that tiny thing, and I’ve been pretty damn good about not putting my foot down about it before now.”

“It was the first car I ever bought for myself.”

“That’s why I said we can keep it. We can store it in the garage. Keep it as a backup or something.” He leaned in. “When I get back, once this all settles down at work, I’m taking two weeks’ vacation. We’re going to drive. Wherever you want, but we’re driving. So think in terms of the new SUV is what we’re driving on vacation.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really. No more arguing.” He arched an eyebrow at her. “Understood, pet?”

She smiled. “Yes, Sir. I thought you just hated it because of the radio.”

“I do hate it because of the radio, but that’s not the only reason I hate it.”

They had a good dinner together, and both of them had leftovers to take with them.

The final surprise was the dessert, a huge slice of chocolate cake that, again, they could each only eat half of.

The rest to be boxed up and taken home.

Once he was at home and she was at the hotel, and after he’d confirmed what time Mike and Jenny were picking him up tomorrow to head to the airport, Tony and Shay reconnected on Skype.

“I think I’m stuffed, Sir.” She opened the fridge and showed him the containers. “But you have dinner tomorrow. Mostly. Well, an onion and cake.” The flowers were sitting on the dresser.

“Mmm, cake. So do you, sweetheart.” He started to say something, but he let out a big yawn. “Oh, wow.”

“You need to go to bed, Sir. You have to get up early tomorrow for your flight.”

He sighed. “Did you get any work done today?”

“Yes, and I’ll be doing more after you go to bed.”

He reached out and touched the screen. “Miss you, pet.”

She reached out to touch her laptop, too. “Miss you, too, Sir.”

“If you have a flight delay or something, keep me posted. Maybe we can wave to each other on the tarmac or something.”

She smiled. “Tell Mike I asked him to give you a hug for me.”

“I’m not hugging that guy.” He smiled.

“He’s your friend in common.”

“Yeah, but we’re not that close. Besides, I’m his boss. Might be taken as sexual harassment,” he joked. At least she was trying to tease him, which was an improvement. “Love you, pet. Snuggle on my pillow for me. Let me smell you.”

“Want me to leave my shampoo and body wash for you, Sir?”

“Mmm. If you want to.”

“Yes, Sir. I’ll leave your card on your pillow.”

He sighed. “Ditto.”

Later, as he tried to go to sleep that night, he closed his eyes and deeply inhaled her scent from her pillow.

Please don’t let me ever let her down.

* * * *

Tony unlocked the hotel room door and smiled at the flowers on the dresser.

“Oh, hey, those are nice,” Mike said.

“Better be. I paid for them.” He dropped his luggage, walked over, and sniffed them as he remembered Shayla’s smile.

A lavender card envelope lay propped on his pillow.

Tony smiled and walked over, picking it up, immediately opening it.

On the outside, in dark blue metallic foil letters, it said, You are the love of my life, my husband, my soulmate…

Inside was printed, You fill my heart with love and my life with joy. Every year with you is another year better, stronger. Happy Anniversary.

She’d also included a handwritten note.

I have never for a second regretted asking You to be my Master, or asking to be Your slave. My only regret is that I didn’t speak up sooner so we didn’t have those two miserable weeks apart. You are my heart and soul. Please never doubt how much I love You, respect You, and how fiercely I will stand beside You and fight for what we have, with You, through the good times and the trying times. I won’t say “bad” times, because there are no bad times with You.

YOUR pet, always.

He sniffled, blinking back tears. Sometimes, he didn’t feel like he deserved her.

I am a lucky bastard.

She texted him once she was on the ground, and then called him later, once she was home.

She was crying. “Thank you for the card, Sir. I love you, too.”

“Now, don’t make me cry again.”

She laughed. “Again?”

“I might have wiped a tear away after reading what you left for me.”

“And the flowers are beautiful, Sir.”

“You’re welcome, pet. Always.”

* * * *

Shayla sat on their bed, and blinked back tears. “I guess I need to let you go and get ready for bed. I need to be up early tomorrow.”

“Okay, pet. Be safe. Love you, always. You’re my good girl.”

“Thank you, Sir. Love you always, too. Good night.”

“Good night, pet.”

She dropped her phone onto the bed and blinked back more tears as she reread the card.

On the front, in red script, it said, My wife, My love, My heart…

Inside, it said, With every year and every trial, we are stronger and better. Every day with you is a testament to how beautiful our love is. Every year to come will be better—and we have perfection now.

He’d also added a handwritten note.

My sweet, beautiful, perfect pet. My good girl.

Mine.

I’ve never regretted marrying you, claiming you, owning you.

You remind Me every day that I want to be a better man because of your love.

You remind Me every day how lucky I am to own you and love you.

Thank you, from the bottom of My soul for trusting and loving Me.

Sir.

She set the card on the dresser and went into the bathroom to get ready for bed.

No forgetting tonight. She’d stripped once in the front door—cuffs and collar in place.

She’d gone from her previous mindset of moving to Florida with no trust and thinking she’d never be able to trust anyone again in a relationship, and now was married to a man who had not only earned her trust, he kept building new levels she’d never dreamed possible.

As she lay there in their bed, trying to fall asleep, she knew she’d start looking for an SUV as soon as she could.

Because he’d asked her to. And, yeah, she’d trade in her car. It was silly not to.

But looking forward to their vacation…

She sighed.

There were so many options, so many places she’d like to go, sights she’d love to see.

Even better, she’d be seeing them with Tony.

She’d need to start making a list so she could narrow it down, decide what she wanted to do.

Not leave it until the last minute, because she wanted Tony to make the final decision about where they’d go and needed to give him options so they could plan.

There was one thing for certain, however.

We’re damn sure not driving to fucking Denver.

THE END

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Table of Contents

THINGS TO DO IN DENVER

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen