CHAPTER 10
The grand opening went off without a hitch and the store had a constant stream of visitors all weekend long, which made the long days of preparation worth it. They probably gave away more treats than they sold, but that was fine. It was never about the money for either of them, and making a splash was important for a new business.
Even with a couple of employees, hired from the Ranch Littles, it was a hectic time, and Heaven Leigh hadn’t had the chance, or energy, to visit the Littles’ Wing all week, but as soon as things settled down and were running smoothly, Angel put his foot down.
“ Chiquita , you’re getting stressed and grumpy. And I keep seeing your Little side peek out, and then vanish. You need to take your big girl panties off . Put your Monday panties on and go to school.” The reference to her cutesy day-of-the-week panties, was his way of saying she needed some serious Little time.
And he wasn’t wrong. She needed it; there was just so much to do. But he wasn’t having that. “You’re not replacing one need with another, nina . That’s not a choice you need to make. I’m your Daddy and I say you get both.”
So, in the interests of being sure that Heaven Leigh had enough Little time, he’d decided on a loose schedule of three days a week at the Ranch, minimum.
It didn’t have to be the full day. She’d gotten used to dividing her days, and it seemed less stressful that way. So, sometimes she’d spend the mornings at the Ranch and sometimes it would be afternoons there, but one way or the other she would be there at least three days—more if she felt like she needed it.
Her first day back she felt an immediate sense of relief when she set foot on the stark white tiles that marked the entrance to the Littles’ Wing. She’d missed it… a lot. Adjusting to the new schedule took a bit, but she was finally starting to feel comfortable with it.
Angel’s Heavenly Bakery and Chocolate Shoppe was closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, which made them the ideal days for her to be at the Ranch. And this Monday, Heaven was walking herself over to class. Angel had offered to walk her over, but she shook her head.
“I’m okay, Daddy. Do you want to meet me for lunch though? Then we can go over to the shop and work in the afternoon.”
“Lunch sounds great, chiquita . I might go and get started on my own though. Would that bother you?”
She thought about it for a minute and then shook her head. “Naw. It’s okay. I’m getting plenty of working time in.”
“True. Well, I’ll probably do some prep work this morning then. I also need to pick up another list of Littles who would like to work at the shop. We’re going to need more people if we stay as busy as we have been. There are apparently a couple of submissives who are interested too. Derek vetted them and feels they’ll all be reliable, but we can go over it later.”
“Sounds good, I better go though. I don’t want to get in trouble.” She grabbed her backpack and headed for the door. She wasn’t really worried about being late, but she had things to show her friends, and she was worried that her Daddy would somehow realize she was up to something.
“Heaven.”
She froze with one hand on the doorknob. Icy fingers of dread crept down her spine as she turned back. “Yes, Daddy?”
“I love you. Have a great day and be good.” He gave her such a sweet smile that all the ice melted away, mostly because it was clear he didn’t suspect anything, but also because his love always made her feel wonderful.
“Love you too, Daddy!” She practically skipped out the door and it turned into a quick trot as she hurried to get to the main building, and the Littles’ Wing. Today she was going to unveil her big secret, and she was so excited.
She’d been hinting that she had a surprise coming for a couple of weeks now, but she had refused to give the other Littles any real information until she was ready. It all involved her new prank line of treats. They didn’t know anything about them yet, and she knew there would be lots of shrieking excitement.
Her Daddy was fully aware of the special foods, of course. It wasn’t like she could have kept it secret entirely, since some would be right there in the front cases. The cute fake vegetables and fruits were just too darling not to sell in the store. But she’d been careful to keep a couple of the items from him. Something told her he wasn’t going to approve.
Heaven was fully aware that the extra items were going to lead to trouble on her end, eventually. She had grown to appreciate a well-planned prank though, and was willing to take the penalty when it arrived. It would hopefully just be later, rather than sooner.
She strolled into the Littles’ Wing all smiles, but there wasn’t enough time before class started to tell her secret, so she had to wait until recess. Even though she normally enjoyed class, it was still a long wait, and she had trouble keeping her mind present. She was scolded several times for not paying attention, which was unusual.
As soon as they were dismissed for recess, she grabbed her backpack and headed for the playground. “Guess what!” she said, waving her friends over. She didn’t actually give them a chance to guess, instead pulling out a handful of papers from the zippered pocket of her bag.
She began passing them around, with a grin so broad it nearly split her face in two. “I’m doing a takeout menu.” Her voice was bubbling with excitement, but she tried to keep it low, so none of the Bigs would hear and get curious.
“Wait… a takeout menu?” Megan grabbed a sheet and read it, eyes widening. “You’re going to deliver chocolate to us? That’s amazing!”
Heaven nodded vigorously. “Yep! You can fill out the order sheet, and I can bring the boxes when I come to class.”
There was an even mix of small chocolate treats and baked goods on the sheets. Nothing incredibly fancy, of course, these would come from their regular menu, so that they’d always be available. Brownies, cupcakes, turtles, maybe twenty choices in all. If they wanted more options, they’d have to visit the store in person.
“Are… are you sure you’re allowed to do that?” Callie asked.
“Don’t see why not. Since our store is over in Rawhide Ridge, it would be hard for you guys to come shop in person.” She shrugged. “My Daddy helped with the forms, and anyone from the Ranch can order treats. Even the guests. We can deliver them to the front desk and then they can be sent to their rooms.”
She hesitated for a second, and then added, “But maybeeeee, don’t make a big show of gobbling up lots of sweets? They might um… you know, find some rules about it.”
Despite the conversation being about business, Heaven was deep in Little space now. Her professional self had left the building, which was obvious by the way her style of talking had changed.
Heaven didn’t use Little-speak as much as some of her friends, but when she was in a giggle, her style of talking tended to get younger and more informal. Her voice changed too, and it wasn’t a planned thing. It just happened when her mindset switched.
“I heard they were setting up shuttles to the Ridge, and maybe we’ll be allowed to go over for shopping sometimes. Like fieldtrips,” Blake put in. “I heard my Mommy talking about it. I know Lori is all excited.”
Heaven Leigh nodded. “Master Derek said something about that too when we were talking about the store. Cause, you know, we wanted everyone to be able to come over, but still, it’s not like you’ll be able to get over every day. This way, you can still have sweets.”
Everyone agreed that it was fair and an awesome idea. And then Heaven pulled out the other order forms. The ones she was really excited about. “This part is super pinky-swear secret, okay? This is my special line, just for Littles.”
The first set had been professionally typed and printed. They had thousands of them at the store, and Angel had delivered a stack of them to Master Derek as well. But these forms had been hand written, by her, in different color crayons, so each one was a little different.
It had taken her hours to make them, and she’d decided that next time she was just going to make one, scan it, and print it out, because her hand hurt even more than when she had to write lines. But it seemed fitting to make this particular order form in such a Little way. This was where the business lady and the Little girl merged.
She waited for the reactions, and they came quickly.
“Oh, em, gee!” Mary’s voice exploded in the circle and Heaven quickly hushed her and shot a quick look around to make sure no one had noticed. Luckily Littles were always getting excited and shrieking, so it hadn’t drawn any attention from the Bigs, but other Littles were crowding around to see.
Mary covered her mouth, but a second later was whisper shouting, “Sorry, sorry, but guys, did you see the pranks?”
Of course they had since everything on the secret order form was basically a prank. The responses were flying at her from all sides, and she couldn’t keep up with who was saying what.
“Wowwww, Heaven. These are amazing. I love those little vegetable cakes you do. I’ve been wanting more forever. My Mommy was totally fooled last time you passed them out!”
“She’s doing broccoli! I bet we could switch them at dinner!”
“Realistic chocolate soap! And she has it in the different brand names. That’s going to be a lifesaver. I swear, Daddy washes my mouth out like once a week these days.”
She broke through the babble to address that last comment. “The soap looks like real bars too. And”—she drew out the suspense for two beats—“I added an outside coating of fizzy candy, so when it hits your tongue, it’s going to foam up like real soap too.”
Everyone gasped, looks of wonder spread across their faces and Heaven flashed them a smug grin. She was super proud of that one, and it was one her Daddy didn’t know about. He probably would have thought it was naughty or something.
“Just make sure you act like it tastes awful or they’ll figure it out,” she advised. Heads nodded in agreement all around her.
She knew immediately when they’d all gotten to the bottom of the list, from the shocked silence. The last couple of items were going to cause trouble. There were a few that were going to annoy more than just her Daddy. She knew they were likely to be limited edition items—as in, she’d be forced to remove them pretty fast, but she hadn’t been able to resist.
“Why would anyone want chocolate-covered soap?” Billy asked, sounding confused.
Heaven Leigh would have explained it, but someone else got there first. “Duh, it’s to trick the Bigs. They’ll bite into it thinking it’s a chocolate and there’s soap inside,” one of the girls said.
“I figured if you ever wanted to get revenge for having your mouth washed out,” Heaven added. She’d originally had the idea to do a full bar of soap on a stick, disguised to look like an ice cream bar, but having to keep the chocolate shell frozen would make it complicated, so she’d downsized to chocolate bars.
She saw some eyes light up at the thought of getting their own back with their Caregivers, which inspired her to throw out a warning. “Just remember, you order these at your own risk. I’m not responsible if you get spanked for any of this.”
Chastity snorted. “Heaven, they’re going to know it’s you. No one else could make this stuff.”
She’d already thought of that. “Well, the vegetables and the chocolate soap honestly aren’t going to be too bad. I don’t care if people figure out I made them. Actually, we’re selling the veggies in the shop anyway. But I’m not known for chocolates, so they might suspect, but unless someone tells…” She shrugged.
Someone would probably tell eventually, and there was no getting around that, but hopefully not right away. She pulled a handful of crayons from her bag. “Sooooo, who wants to place an order?”
It turned out… lots of Littles did. Not just the ones in class, or the ones in the Dorms, but Littles from all over the Ranch were approaching her to place orders.
Heaven shortly had a thriving side business going. From the prank list, the vegetables and fruits were the most popular. Some Littles probably did swap them out for healthy food, or tried, but most, she thought, just liked eating them. The bars of “soap” were also going out as fast as she could make them. Hopefully the Littles who bought them were at least pretending to be miserable during the mouth washing, or the jig would be up super quick.
A few Littles did buy the naughtier pranks, but for days she didn’t hear anything about them being used. She was starting to wonder if anyone would be brave enough, but of course, who could buy such a glorious prank and resist using it for long.
Heaven sometimes used real chocolate bars and various other candies as accents for her cakes, so the bakery had a bin full of them. It was a simple matter to open a regular candy bar and slip one of the tricks inside and then seal it up. She hadn’t made a big effort to make her pranks look like any specific kind of candy bar, but they were the right size, shape, and chocolate to pass unless someone looked closely.
Littles took to leaving what looked like brand new, unopened candy bars around. On teachers’ desks, on cafeteria tables, in coat pockets of the nearest Bigs. Wherever they might be found.
One day no one seemed to be doing anything with the pranks… and the next day, Heaven was hearing about it everywhere. It didn’t seem like a coordinated event, but more like bad luck, that so many of the Dominants got tricked in one day.
She knew she was caught when Angel showed up during class. He rapped at the door and poked his head in. “I’m sorry to interrupt. I’m afraid I need to take Heaven early today,” he told the teacher in a genial tone of voice. But the look he sent Heaven was anything but pleased.
She carefully gathered her things, stuffed them in her bag and followed him out the door. There was a sinking feeling in her stomach. “Daddy? Is something wrong?”
He stopped and turned around but didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to. When he pulled a crumpled order form out of his pocket and handed it to her, it all became clear. It was one of the ones she’d done in crayon, and she winced.
“Oh.”
Angel let one eyebrow slowly rise and he folded his arms across his chest. “I had an interesting phone call from Master Derek today. Want to guess what it was about?”
“Um, just catching up? Is he missing you?” She put as much innocence into her tone as she could manage.
“Yes, that’s exactly it,” he agreed, nodding. “He was missing me so much he needed to call me to catch up. Oh, and he also wanted to let me know that my Little girl was running a prank delivery service that had caused him to end up with a mouthful of soap. And not just him either…”
This was the worst-case scenario she’d tried not to think about. “He… he did?”
“He did. You know, for someone who used to think pranks were dumb, you certainly have managed to get yourself in deep.”
“Technically, I didn’t prank anyone, Daddy. I just made fun stuff. I told them that it was at their own risk if they pranked people. Stores aren’t really responsible for how people use the stuff they buy.” She didn’t really think that excuse was going to work, but she had to try.
“You know that’s…” He stopped and shook his head. “I think we both know that isn’t going to save your tail, Heaven Leigh. Now, I suggest you move your little butt straight home. I have something to do first, but when I get there, I want to find you waiting in the corner with a bare backside. Am I clear, young lady?”
He was using his upset Daddy voice, which was a rare thing. Angel was so even-tempered that he hardly ever got mad at her, but she thought he might be now. She was in big trouble, and this wasn’t going to be good. Still… it had been fun while it lasted.
She sighed. “Yes, sir.”