This morning I woke to him sitting at my small dining room table on his phone.
“What are you looking at?” I asked as I poured myself a cup.
The big man looked up and grinned. “Tank.”
“Who’s Tank?”
“My dog.”
“Really?”
A crease lined Zeke’s forehead. “Do you doubt everything people tell you?”
“No. I … uh…” I didn’t know what to say to that. “Okay, yes. It’s a bad habit.”
“Well, break it.”
Did I mention the man was extremely bossy? I hadn’t spent a lot of time talking to him, choosing to pretend to be otherwise occupied with the television. Rather than engage in conversation, Zeke had found other ways to entertain himself, again, mostly on his phone.
I glanced over at Zeke to see him watching the screen.
“Where is he?” I nodded toward the phone. “Tank.”
“Back in Chicago. Doggy daycare,” he said. “They’ve got cameras so I can check in on him anytime I want.”
Okay, now I’d heard a lot of people treated their dogs like children, but I’d never known anyone who sent their pet to doggy daycare. And to be honest, Zeke was probably the last person on earth I would’ve expected to do that.
“Do you like animals, Miss Tinsley?”
“Sure.” I took a sip of my coffee as I leaned against the counter. “Who doesn’t?”
“Oh, you’d be surprised.”
“Does he go to daycare a lot?”
“Only if I can’t take him with me.”
“Why didn’t you bring him?”
“Because I’m on assignment,” he said, as though that was obvious.
I smiled with my lips close to the rim of my cup. “I happen to like dogs. So, if you’re gonna be stuck with me for a while, I wouldn’t mind if you brought him with you.”
He didn’t say anything, but I noticed an unusual light in his eyes. The man was obviously really attached to his dog.
“So,” I prompted as I moved to the chair opposite him. “How do you know Trent?”
He smiled and turned his attention to me, setting his phone on the table. “Me and the boss man go way back.”
“So you work for him?”
“No. Not in an official capacity, at least.”
“What do you do?”
“A little of this, a little of that.”
I wasn’t sure if he was being obnoxious on purpose or if it was his default setting. “So a jack of all trades?”
“Master of none.”
I stared at him. Surely that wasn’t what his resume said.
“Fine. I’m in security.”
“So you’re a bodyguard by trade?”
He shook his head. “Actually, girl, I do this for fun. I’m in cybersecurity.”
I never would’ve guessed that. However, I had caught on to the fact that he continued to call me girl. That was a common way of addressing female submissives in D/s. It wasn’t meant as derogatory, so I took no offense to it, but it led to my next question. “Are you a member of Dichotomy?”
“I am,” he said.
“Are you a Dom?” I knew he wasn’t a submissive, but I asked anyway.
“Sadist,” he corrected.
“Oh.” I fought the surprised reaction, but not before he saw it.
The smirk he shot me was devious and it was then that I realized the man was as wicked as they came. And more than a little scary.
Despite the fact Zeke Lautner was absurdly attractive in an aggressively dangerous, not-quite-handsome sort of way, there was something in his coal-black eyes that softened him. Outward appearances would likely have people giving him a wide berth from his enormous size alone, but when the man looked at his dog, it was clear he had a soft side hidden underneath.
Not that I would tell him that. I wasn’t an idiot.
“Don’t worry, girl. You’re not my type.”
I grinned. “Because I’m not a masochist?”
“Because you’re not a man,” he stated firmly.
I chuckled. “Got it.”
*
That evening, I was doing everything I possibly could to keep my mind off the conversation I’d had with Trent yesterday at lunch. I was trying to psych myself up for a trip to Illinois—which I had learned from a lengthy email from Trent’s assistant would be taking place bright and early Wednesday morning.
I’d been surprised by the level of depth Troy had gone into, informing me about the weather in Chicago, as well as what could be expected once I arrived at the airport. It was refreshing considering I hadn’t gotten much out of Trent, only that he would be tagging along.
For some reason, I hadn’t been able to tell Troy I couldn’t make it. It had me wondering whether or not Trent had known that, hence the reason he’d left it to his assistant to handle. While being in Trent’s presence made me absurdly nervous, I figured I had nothing to lose by entertaining a potential client, so what the hell.
But now, even with the multitude of boxes I was managing to pack—with Zeke’s help—I couldn’t keep my thoughts from drifting to Trent.
All day, my mind had been rehashing every detail of yesterday’s erotic lunch meeting. The way he’d so easily played my body in a public place. Even thinking about it had a foreign sense of anticipation filling me. I was eager to see Trent again, although it was against my better judgment. I had too much to do to even entertain the notion of seeing Trent Ramsey in any capacity that wasn’t business. He was way out of my league. Not to mention, now was not the right time in my life to get wrapped up in someone who could easily become a distraction I couldn’t afford.
