Chapter Six

Kiara was out of the warehouse inside fifteen minutes. Once she’d started putting on street clothes she’d looked at her phone and realized it was still early—only two pm. She’d raced out the door, hoping to beat at least some of the traffic, since North Hollywood to Torrance was a grueling commute that meant passing by downtown LA and the accompanying traffic.

It took her only an hour and a half to get home. Her anger had cooled by the time she got in the car, and she cried for the first part of the drive. They weren’t tears of sadness. Or at least not only sadness—there was some lingering rage, some relief, some frustration.

Despite the orgasms, her body throbbed with need. Her body would have preferred she stay with Reis, that she submit to him so he would give her more of that sweet pleasure and pain.

When she was in college, she and her roommates called it waking the dragon. Once you had sex, the dragon was awake, and wanted more—more sex, more orgasms. If you didn’t feed the dragon it would go to sleep and you could handle celibacy.

As a fetish model, Kiara found herself in various sexy positions on a weekly basis, but those were work. People didn’t realize how uncomfortable modeling could be. Not that the people who topped her for the shoots weren’t careful with the ropes and bondage, but twisting and turning to make sure all the angles presented the best possible picture meant stretching and twisting in awkward ways. Add bondage on top of that and the fetish shoots she did usually didn’t wake her dragon.

The dragon was awake now. Awake and wondering why Kiara had walked away from the man who had so skillfully fed it.

“Reis is bad news,” she told her reflection in the rearview mirror. “Also, you’re talking to your libido, which makes you seem nuts.”

She flipped from the radio to her audiobook. It was the latest in a sci-fi series she loved. After listening for ten minutes, one of the series’ rare sex scenes started and she turned it off in disgust.

“What do you want?”

“You.”

Why had he said that? What had he meant by that?

The words seemed so straightforward, but they weren’t. He could have meant that he wanted to have sex. After all, Reis’s cock had been hard; she’d felt it several times. But sex wasn’t part of their contract, hence taking her off the stage.

Maybe he meant he wanted to top her for the weekend. She’d had a few modeling partner Doms, especially those who were in town for a shoot, ask if she’d sub for them at a club or munch.

Maybe he’d wanted sweep her off her feet, marry her, and take her to live in his palace.

Kiara pulled into her parking place on the ground floor of her apartment building. She stretched as she climbed out of the car—the scene had left her a little achy, but the feeling would be gone in a few hours.

There wouldn’t be any marks on her body either. No physical reminder of what he’d done to her.

She trudged up the steps to her small one bedroom. It was nice inside—mostly because she’d painted the beige walls, covered the cheap carpet in lovely throw rugs, and refinished the kitchen cabinets herself. She hadn’t expected to be back this early, so she stood for a moment, not sure what to do. Her stomach registered a protest, and she felt itchy from sweating in the car. She turned on the shower, letting the water heat up, then ate cottage cheese directly out of the tub.

A half hour later she was sitting on her bed in a robe with her hair in a towel. The doorbell rang.

She tapped to open the app on her phone that connected to her video doorbell. She’d watched one too many scary movies where the heroine got it when they went to the door and she’d ended up impulse purchasing the fancy doorbell late one night.

The image showed a mid-forties woman holding a box. She was wearing a ball cap with a picture of a cupcake on it.

Kiara considered getting dressed, but her curiosity got the better of her. She left the chain on and opened the door.

“Kiara Portner?” The woman smiled distractedly.

“Yes?”

“You have a delivery of fresh baked cookies from Cookies and Cream.”

Kiara closed the door, undid the chain, and opened it. The warm scent of fresh cookies wafted in from the hall and Kiara’s mouth started to water. The woman passed in the box, then picked up a small bag Kiara hadn’t seen.

“And here’s your milk.”

“Cookies and milk?”

“Yes, ma’am. It’s your lucky day.”

“I guess it is. Do you need anything from me?”

“Nope. I hope you enjoy.”

The woman smiled and hustled off.

Flattered and curious, Kiara brought the milk and cookies to the kitchen. There was no note or card. She would call the store and find out who’d sent them, but first priority was eating one of the still-warm chocolate chip cookies. She was on her third cookie, washing each gooey bite down with a sip of whole milk—which tasted sinfully good—when the doorbell rang again.

This time she called out, “just a minute!” and ran into the bedroom to throw on leggings and a loose tunic top rather than continuing to wear her robe. When she checked the doorbell app, all she could see were flowers. Cookies and now flowers?

She opened the door, accepted the large bouquet of out-of-season-and-therefore-expensive dahlias, and brought it into the kitchen. She hunted among the blooms for a card while starting on her fourth cookie. No note, but a card from the florist shop. She’d have to call them, after she called the cookie place.

The doorbell rang.

Over the next two hours she opened the door for a gift basket with a bottle of red wine and assorted savory snacks, a cellophane wrapped fall wreath of amber, gold and umber leaves and gourds, a bouquet of cream balloons filled with gold glitter, an orchid, and finally a simple brown cardboard box.

Kiara sat on the floor of her living room. The orchid was on the coffee table. She’d unwrapped the wreath and hung it on the wall above the couch. The balloons were taking up most of the space above the small dining table. Her always cheerful apartment was full to bursting with beautiful gifts and delicious smells.

Inside the final item, the cardboard shipping box, was a smaller box wrapped in plain blue paper. There was an envelope taped on top. Kiara carefully removed the envelope, making sure the tape didn’t damage the wrapping paper.

The envelope was lined with gold brocade, the card inside made of heavy cream paper.

Kiara,

Would you like to go out to dinner with me?

Reis

She stared at the simple words, shocked. Not shocked that he’d been the one to send all these things. After all, who else could it possibly be? No, she was surprised that at the end of all this, what he wanted was to take her to dinner.

She eyed the blue-wrapped box, her smile fading. She knew how Doms thought. Inside might be lingerie she would have to wear to dinner. Maybe some sort of wearable toy—a plug perhaps. The box was slightly larger than a shoe box, so it could be practically anything.

He didn’t want to take her to dinner. He wanted her to sub for him while they ate. They were very different things.

Kiara jerked the present out of the shipping box and started tearing at the paper, her throat tight with emotion.

She tore the lid off, expecting to see jewelry-like cuffs, leather panties, or a lightweight plug. She tossed tissue out of the box, until she uncovered the contents.

A set of wooden bookends, carved to look like people sitting on the ground, leaning against the upright support of the bookend, each reading a book. They were beautiful, the wood smooth and glossy, the carvings so detailed that she could see the individual pages of the book each figure held. One was a man, the other a woman. The man sat cross-legged, the book on his lap. The woman had both knees bent, book atop them, heels planted on the ground and skirt spilled around her.

Kiara lifted them out of the box, setting them on the table so the figures were back to back. When pushed together it looked like they were sitting on opposite sides of a wall.

A perfect pair, doomed to never meet, divided as they were.

There was one other thing in the box. A small gold envelope. She opened it and pulled out a gift card

For a bookstore.

That weekend they’d spend together he’d asked her if she preferred gold or jewels as a present. She’d smiled at him and told her that books were the perfect gift.

He’d remembered.

Kiara tapped her nails against the gift card. “What game are you playing, Reis?”

There was no answer. She grabbed the greeting card, and read the message again. He’d written his phone number in the bottom right corner.

Picking up her own phone, she didn’t call, but texted. “Thank you for the gifts.”

The response was immediate. I’m glad you like them. Did you get everything?

I assume so. How many was I supposed to get?!

Right, how would you know? Send me a picture.

Kiara pushed up off the floor and cuddled onto the couch.

Pic of what?

What are you willing to send me a picture of?

Flirting was a very bad idea. She snapped a photo of the balloons and the orchid and sent them.

I’m not sending a picture of the cookies, because I don’t want you to know how many I already ate.

Too many cookies?

No such thing.

How about dinner, and more cookies after?

Kiara bit her lip, looking down at her phone. A minute ticked by, then two.

She decided to play it safe with her response. “That might not be a good idea.”

Might?

I have to work tomorrow. She smiled, imagining his expression when he read that.

I won’t keep you up late.

“Liar,” she said aloud as she typed out her one-word reply. Liar

He didn’t respond to that. Kiara leaned her head against the back of the couch, staring at the ceiling.

Her phone rang.

She knew who it would be, even without looking at the number.

“Hello, Reis,” she answered.

“I’ve never lied to you.”

“Let’s not do this.”

“You’re right. This is a conversation we should have in person.”

“That’s not what I was saying.”

“If you don’t want to have dinner with me, I understand.”

Kiara opened her mouth, but the words wouldn’t come. She should tell him she didn’t want to have dinner. She should politely decline. That was the smart thing to do. She would have been able to say no yesterday, but tonight, after a day spent submitting to him, she didn’t want to say no. She wanted to say yes and damn the consequences.

“I shouldn’t,” she muttered.

“I’d rather not beg, but I will.”

“You would beg?” she asked incredulous.

“For you. Yes.”

“Reis, what are you doing? Why me?”

“I’ll tell you, over dinner.”

She blew out a long breath, but since the moment she’d seen the gift card she’d known she was going to say yes.

“Okay. When and where?”

“I’ll pick you up—”

“No, I’ll meet you.”

There was a moment of tense silence before he said, “Since you’re local, is there a place you’d recommend?”

That surprised her. “Do you like tacos?”

“Of course.”

“There’s this great place, but it’s in L.A. Where are you right now?”

“I’m staying in Hollywood.”

“Then let’s meet at Los Anayas. It’s sort of halfway between Hollywood and Torrance.”

“Can you spell that for me?”

“I’ll text you the address. Meet you there in an hour?”

“An hour. It’s a date.”

Kiara couldn’t stop the nervous little chuckle. “A date. Right.”

“Yes, Kiara. A date. I’ll see you in an hour.”

Kiara ended the call, then texted him the address. Rising from the couch, she looked around her apartment. There was a subset of the BDSM culture that specialized in this sort of cute care-taking and gift giving, but Reis had never shown signs of interest in being a Daddy Dom.

She had more questions than answers, but there was a way to get answers. All she had to do was go to dinner.

Kiara looked down at her outfit, then headed into the bedroom to change.