"We were discussing what you wanted her to buy," she said through gritted teeth.
"Sorry," he said. He'd registered her tone, his own saying he wasn't sorry at all. He gave her an easy, feral smile. "It's just a game we're playing. I thought this kind of store, you'd be used to it."
"Role playing and fantasies are part of what this store is about, yes," Madison said evenly. "Not abuse and malnourishment."
His eyes narrowed. "You better get your hand off my slave."
"You better join the current century and realize she doesn't belong to anyone but herself."
Veronica was shaking. Madison tucked her further behind her. "Get the hell out of my store, before I call the cops."
"She'll be home by supper time."
"That will be her choice. You won't be around to help her make it."
"Sanctimonious bitch. I don't have any problems teaching you both a lesson. You're all by yourself in here." He took a step into the store and Madison took a step back, already thinking about the .38 Alice kept under the counter. Unfortunately, he took it as a fearful retreat, not a calculated one. Light kindled in his eyes.
"How about we teach you a lesson instead?"
She bit back a sigh of relief, glancing over her shoulder to see Logan step out from behind her storeroom curtain, Troy on his heels. The two of them shifted apart, shoulder to shoulder, and she saw nothing submissive about Troy now. His eyes were cool flint. A direct contrast to Logan's, which held hellfire.
"You heard her," he said, taking another step forward. "Get out of her store. Now. And don't come back."
Logan's expression left no doubt what would happen if he didn't listen. Madison remembered how dangerous he'd appeared when making erotic threats to Troy, but the difference between sensual intimidation and genuine menace was dangerously clear. Clear enough to penetrate the thick head of the man in the doorway. With a sneer, he turned and left, giving the door a kick that could have broken the glass, if he hadn't missed and hit the frame.
"I really should go with him," the girl quavered. "He's my Master."
"No, he's not." Logan's tone was everything a Master's should be. Authoritative, assured, decisive. Protective. It drew Veronica's attention to him like a magnet. Madison's, too, for that matter. She wanted to kiss him, right then and there.
"He doesn't know the first thing about being a Dom. We're going to get you a meal, take you to a place that will help you figure things out. If you still want to go to him after that, one of us will take you. But you'll give it twenty-four hours. Understand?"
The question was obviously rhetorical. Logan could dial up that Dominant attitude full force, and it had the desired effect on Veronica, underscored by her next stammered words.
"Y-yes sir."
His jaw eased, but not the fury in his gaze. Still, he touched the girl gently, guiding her to Troy, who exercised his usual calming presence to shepherd her behind the curtain and into their adjoining storeroom. When Logan turned his attention to Madison, she realized she was shaking herself, but it wasn't fear. His touch, hands closing on her upper arms, helped calm her.
"You all right?"
"I'd be better if I could blow up his Lincoln Continental with him in it. You don't have any explosives in your store, do you?"
The spirited response eased some of the fire in his visage. Realizing some of that had been on her behalf, a territorial male's desire to protect her, gave her a flutter.
"It's never supposed to be like that," he said, turning his attention to the street, where the Continental was leaving its parking place, the tires squealing as the owner vented his frustration on his exit. "You do know that, don't you, Madison?"
He wasn't looking at her, but she sensed how significant the question was to him, how vital her answer. When his gaze shifted to her, what she saw there confirmed it.
"Right before Veronica got here, I was thinking about the pain session and being a little afraid," she admitted. She lifted her hands to his face before he could say anything to that. "Now I know I picked the right Dom to show me the ropes, so to speak."
He blinked, covered her hands with his own, a light hold on her wrists. "So you've decided."
"You know I have." She took a breath, looked toward her back room. "Will she go back to him?"
"Maybe. It's not the first time a criminal sadist has used our world to cover his sickness. Most Doms have a sadistic side, but it's one they use for mutual pleasure, for them and their subs. Unfortunately, a woman with low self-esteem like that will fall into the wrong kind of Dom's lap like candy. But we'll do our best to make sure she doesn't end up there again."
"How did you know I had a problem?" she asked.
"The security cameras in my store include the entrances and exits to yours. We watch out for our neighbors, and the situation gave me a wrong feeling. I came through the back so if it wasn't anything, I could leave without interrupting you. Troy insisted on coming, too. He's become quite fond of you." Stroking a wisp of hair from her brow, he tapped the librarian glasses lightly. "That makes two of us."
"Well, that's good, because I was going to trade on your affections to draft you and Troy for a fashion show I'm planning. I need some handsome escorts for the models, and someone to show off the male outfits. You know, pirate outfits, the studded leather harnesses and thongs . . ."
"Uh-huh." He snorted. "Good luck with that. That's my cue to get back to my store, talk to Veronica about where she'll be staying tonight."
"And that will be?"
"There's a shelter in the area. It's run by a woman who's been in the lifestyle. Becky was with an asshole like that for three years too long. She handles not only the standard abuse cases, but those that get outed by the BDSM community. We take care of our own there, too. A guy like that gives us all a bad name."
That fierce light flickered again. While she'd wanted to blow up his car, it was obvious he would have preferred to beat Veronica's Master to a pulp with his fists. Logan was a very hands-on type of male, after all.
"If I can convince Veronica to stay there a night," he continued, "long enough to find out there are better, healthier ways to exercise submissive tendencies--and determine if she actually has them, rather than just being a woman with a bad self-image--things will be more in our favor that she'll stay another day, and another, and get her life back on track."
"Would it be okay if I stopped in and visited her tonight?"
He squeezed her hand. "You've got a good heart. I'll ask Becky. The location of the shelter is secret, for obvious reasons, but I know she won't object to you coming as long as she feels it's the right time. She'll likely want to spend the first few hours just feeding her and doing some one-on-one work. But after that, I expect it would be good for Veronica to talk to as many women as possible who know how it's really supposed to work."
She liked that he included her in that number, and was kind of amazed at her personal pride and ownership of that. I am a submissive. "Whatever Becky and you think is best. Anything I can do to help, just let me know."
He bent forward, dropping an unexpected kiss to her forehead. Then he slid an arm around her, held her closer. "I'm glad you're all right. But next time anyone gives you wrong vibes, you get your pretty ass back behind your counter and have that gun within reach."
"You know about the gun?"
"Yep. Alice would go to the range with me sometimes to stay in practice. I gave her a few tips to improve her aim." He leaned back, gave her a sharp look. "You know how to use one?"
"Yep. Our daddy taught us both when we were kids. I haven't used one in awhile, but he said I was a natural. We'll go to the range sometime and I'll smoke your pretty ass on target rounds."
He grinned at that. Leaning down again, he put his mouth on hers. It was reassuring and promising, all at once. Her toes curled in her shoes as he slid his fingertips into her hair, his other arm banding around her waist to hold her even more securely to him. When he lifted his head, she saw a rare ins
tance of sheepishness in his gaze.
"Sorry. I needed that."
"Anything I can do to help," she repeated, a little breathlessly this time. "You know, I still wonder if that whole 'pain-can-help-heal-and-deal-with-guilt' thing is just an excuse to spank me."
The set of his jaw eased, his lips curving. "I have half a mind to do it right now, purely for my own enjoyment."
"See? I knew it was more than a selfless desire to help me."
He sobered. "Madison, you're joking about it, but I want to say it. Remember what I told you from the beginning. There is absolutely nothing more important to a Dominant than the care of his or her sub. We might use pain for mutual pleasure, and that mutual pleasure may not be how other people define it. But what he's doing to her, manipulating her emotions, taking advantage of her weaknesses, that's so far from what BDSM is supposed to be about, it's like a dirty cop versus a good one. There is no comparison, even if they look the same at times. You understand that, right?"
"You look nothing like him," she said, meeting his gaze. "And I don't mean physically. From the first moment I met you, I knew I could trust you. Even when I've been afraid, that comes from me, not anything you've done. My sister told me I could trust you with anything." She swallowed. "Even my soul. You haven't done a thing yet to make me feel differently."
It was the truth, she knew it. All her fears about Logan came from her own history, her lack of faith in herself, her certainty that fate or her own actions were going to destroy what seemed to be a growing bond between them, because they always did.
Since Logan had been Alice's primary caregiver until three days before her death, Madison had assumed he'd seen Alice's final letter to her, the part where she'd said Madison could trust Logan more than anyone. Yet his reaction now told her otherwise. He wasn't a man to show softer emotions easily, so she reached out, closed her hand over his arm, reinforcing her belief.
"Thank you," he said quietly. He put his hand over hers for another brief squeeze, and then he moved toward the back room. He needed to go, she knew he did. She wasn't sure if Troy could hold Veronica there indefinitely the way Logan could, though Troy was far more resourceful and determined than it had first appeared. She'd jumped to some pretty stereotypical assumptions about a man who wanted to belong fully to a Mistress.
But what about herself? When she'd thought I am a submissive, she'd felt that was true. Yet she was running a business, had just held her own against an asshole who outweighed her and got through life by bullying others. "Submissive" didn't equal "timid" or "doormat." It seemed the more she embraced that side of herself, the better opinion she had of herself.
Even so, she hadn't really explored the other side of things, had she? Logan had assumed from the beginning she would embrace a submissive's role. While so far nothing had said differently--boy howdy--she wondered if that was because Logan was a hetero Dom who naturally drew out submissive cravings in a woman as part of his skills, or because it had never occurred to him to look for anything different from her. Well, she could look for it from herself, couldn't she?
"How did you recognize it . . . in me? That I'd be open to the submission thing?" She asked it abruptly, bringing him to a halt.
"It's a feeling I get. For instance, I'm not so sure Veronica is a sub. She might have a dysfunctional family history that made her prey for the likes of that asshole. Until she gets clear of that, there's too much storm debris to know what her soul really looks like. But you . . ."
He inclined his head. "I'm not sure how good an idea it is to say this, but it shines from you like a beacon. You're not her. You're healthy and strong, you feel and you grieve cleanly. You also want and need with such power, it's irresistible. I don't know about those shit-for-brains men you've been with, Madison, and I wish I could have spared you the pain they caused you, but I won't regret a minute of it if it brought you to me as the person you are."
What would seem like bullshit charm or stalker craziness from anyone else always received an answering tone inside her chest when the words came from him. But she wasn't ready to be boxed into something when she wasn't sure about all the other possible boxes in the room. He'd said he liked her assertive side, right?
"What if I wanted to give it a try? The shoe-on-the-other-foot thing?"
"You want to try being a Domme?" The genuine surprise in his gaze was gratifying, proof that she could do something he didn't expect.
"Yes. I think . . . yes. At least once. But I don't think I could do it with a stranger. It wouldn't be a real test. I'd be too divided between not knowing him and what I was trying to figure out about myself." She gave him a hopeful look. "Care to change sides for one night?"
He chuckled. "As tempting and terrifying as it sounds to be at your mercy, I'm a Dom down to the bone, and it would skew your test results. How about Troy?"
She remembered Troy's body against her, his lips in her hair. The way he'd responded to Logan. "Oh . . . well, yes," she said. Cleared her throat.
He grinned. "I'll try not to let that blush and eager light in your eye aggravate me. Much. Let me talk to his Mistress about it. She'd have to clear anything like that."
"And Troy. I wouldn't want to compromise his friendship in any way."
"Part of their contract is that she can share him if she desires. He trusts her to know him well enough to care for him. She might want to be present, though. No Dominant in their right mind allows their sub to be shared without overseeing his well-being, unless they know the Master or Mistress well enough, like Shale knows me. But even with me supervising, she might still want to be there." He gave her an amused look. "That's as much for her to remind Troy who his Mistress is as to protect him. She doesn't worry about Troy transferring his affections to me. Boy's pretty straight, though he'll take it up the ass for her without a blink."
After that bald statement, and a wink, he disappeared behind her curtain, leaving her whirling over a whole new set of possibilities. Her gaze moved to the wall, where a pair of thigh-high boots and a black corset were displayed against the backdrop of a two-dimensional silhouette of a woman's body. Imagining herself in such an outfit, slapping a paddle against a gloved hand, she blanched. What the hell was she thinking?
*
Though another set of customers kept her busy, she saw Logan pull out of their shared alley in his truck. He had Veronica with him and lifted his hand to Madison as he went by. She assumed he'd left the store in Troy's hands.
He didn't return until late afternoon. When the truck passed by her display window, she caught a glimpse of his face. He looked tired. Perhaps the day's events had left him dispirited. It made sense, given how important a part of his life this was. She expected it was the same thing a social service or humane society worker felt every time they encountered an abuse case, the evil of fellow men sapping their soul.
When she checked her rear security camera, she saw he'd put down the tailgate of his truck and was sitting on it. Not doing anything, really, just staring into space. Maybe he'd prefer his privacy, but it twisted her heart and she couldn't stop herself from wanting to help. Late afternoon was a slow period for her, so she put the clock sign on a thirty-minute return and went out through the back storeroom, taking him out a coffee and her last piece of cake.
He eyed her as she emerged. "Trying to make me fat, woman?"
"I think you can absorb a calorie or two, as busy as you and Troy stay all day long in that store. Want some company? I can just leave the cake and coffee if you don't."
"You're kind," he said quietly. "I can't imagine a moment when your company wouldn't brighten my day." He offered her a hand to help her onto the tailgate.
"Charmer." But she settled next to him, swinging her feet next to his, planted solidly in his work shoes on the ground thanks to his greater height. "How's Veronica?"
"Safe with Becky for the time being. She's pretty docile, all in all, but that can be deceptive. Because it was such a destructive relationship, almost like a drug a
ddiction, later tonight is when she'll start to deal with withdrawal, from being away from him. If she's still there three days from now, her odds of staying will be much higher."
He leaned back, bracing himself with one arm, sipped his coffee. "How did you know I like coffee on a hot day?"
"I've seen you with a steaming cup by the cash register when it was ninety outside. True sign of a caffeine addict, and a purist. You don't do iced coffees, Frappuccinos . . ."
He snorted. "No. But I can do your lemon cake all day long. Yours is a little different from Alice's, but just as good."
"We make it the same way."
"It's the flavor of the hands that make it," he said. "You emphasize the density of it, the weight. Alice focused on making it as light as air. You're the earth, she's the sky."
"Are you a shaman in your spare time?"
He smiled, put his arm around her and slid her closer, so they were hip to hip, then braced his arm again so she could lean inside the triangle of it and his broad shoulder.
She nudged his knee with hers. "What do you do, besides this? Run the store, make BDSM furniture? Train subs and do whip demonstrations. Watch movies with me." Her nose crinkled. "Come to think of it, that's a pretty full schedule, if you add in eating and sleeping."
"It is. But I find time for things. My house is on the outskirts of Matthews. It was a small farm at one time, about thirty acres with a pond, but now I just maintain the property. I have a bigger furniture workshop in the barn. Most of what I have at this location are showroom pieces, though I always keep a couple in process for when I prefer to work here."
"Why'd we watch the movie at my place, instead of there?"
The corner of his mouth tugged up. "I figured you'd be more comfortable in your own surroundings until we got to know each other better. My place is fairly isolated."
She smiled. "Plus, as a bachelor, you'd have to clean the place up with a shovel if I was coming over."
He looked pained. "That makes me sound like a typically lazy male, averse to domestic chores. Which, while wildly true, is stereotyping."
She chuckled. "What do you do out there?"