Page 25 of Vengeance of Childhood Proportions (Till Death Do Us Part #7)

Chapter Fifteen

Mal

“Ooh, looks like someone got laid last night,” a voice cooed as I walked into the bullpen the next morning.

My eyes narrowed on Jessica Rubin, my boss’s secretary.

No one, least of all me, thought that any secretary would be able to hold a candle to Mrs. Atwater, Carr’s previous hire.

The woman was in her late sixties and had run that man’s life with an iron fist. When she retired, there were bets going around to see how long Carr would last before both his personal and his business lives imploded.

He went through four different secretaries, all who quit within a week of starting. Then Jessica came on.

Late twenties, the blonde was heavyset, had glasses, and dressed like she was colorblind.

Additionally, she was all thumbs. Everyone, including myself, was thinking she would last hours , not days.

But nearly two years later and Jessica was still here.

Carr adored her, and if I didn’t know how devoted he was to his wife, I might question if there was something going on between them.

Carr was protective of Jessica and often said that he thought of her like a fourth daughter.

Personally, I thought Jessica was sweet, but she was not someone I’d ever look at with romantic intentions. That had nothing to do with her weight, her hair, or even her lack of fashion sense. It was her bubbly personality. Even if she consented, it would be like kicking a puppy.

Jessica’s one fault was that she was a total gossip. Carr didn’t mind because she kept her lips sealed about his life, and she kept him informed on our lives, but it was common knowledge to watch what you said in front of her.

My glare was not at her words, or even at the fact that she was wrong because I hadn’t fucked my little owl last night, but because she was obviously fishing for information.

“Whether I did or did not has no relevance to what’s in your hands there,” I said pointedly, indicating to the accordion file folder she held to her chest.

Mira was running late this morning, some issue with her ex-husband about custody of her kids, so I’d come into the office rather than picking her up at her house.

We were never going to meet our appointment in Anchorage anyway and I might as well get some work done while waiting for her.

Mira was going to be a bear when she got in.

Not only did the domestic scuffle make her look bad to Carr, but also the Anchorage agents we essentially had stood up.

She would be even more zealous to solve a case and prove her worth now.

The next several weeks of my life were now going to be a bitch because her ex-asshat decided to bring a woman over to his house to fuck on the same night he had his two young children.

I didn’t have kids, didn’t want them, and even I knew to keep it in my pants around them. Fucking moron. And his selfish decision was now going to be affecting my life. Fucking-A.

Jessica held out the file folder. “You’re no fun, Mal. At least tell me her name.”

She wouldn’t believe me if I told her. I did not deny my lifestyle.

If someone walked up to me and asked me if I was a Dom, I had no reason to deny it.

My family knew and it had no bearing on my performance at work.

However, I did not advertise it. My sex life was between me and my partner, no one more and no one less.

The day I started talking about who I was fucking at work was the day I turned in my retirement papers.

I was not quite sure how I felt about having not fucked my little owl the night before.

I’d watched her dance for hours, and fuck, how she danced.

She was grace incarnate. Lost to the world, I could understand how dancing helped her get out of her head.

Even in those fucking boots, she was steady, strong, and so very, very flexible.

I was glad I still had my coat on because I was hard just thinking about it. My little owl had escaped so completely from this plane of existence, I’d had to stop her several times to insist she drink water and take a break. I’d also called down to the kitchen to have some food brought up for her.

The look in her eyes… I knew it well. She wasn’t in subspace, not yet. But she was so very close. It wouldn’t have taken much for me to get her there.

So why hadn’t I? I’d promised to show her pleasure without bondage after all.

The answer was simple: because it wouldn’t have been my victory.

When she soared, and she would, it would be because I had guided her there, I had brought her so far up that she was one with the clouds.

I loved watching her dance, and I planned on having her dance for me often, but I would not steal her passion.

I was selfish enough to want to earn it myself so that she knew the passion only I could give her.

I’d learned several things about my little owl last night simply by observing her, possibly more than she wanted me to know. She could keep her secrets, for now, because I would learn them eventually. I always did.

My little owl might be physically strong, but mentally she needed guidance. She second-guessed herself, almost like a child learning a new skill. It made me wonder just how long she’d been a submissive and who she had trained with.

Master Kade was not her lover. She looked at him almost like a father-figure, as in for guidance and protection, but I didn’t see anything that was so specific.

Maybe an uncle would be a better analogy.

She was not turned on or affected by the fact that he’d fucked another man in the hallway.

She was a little too blasé about it, actually.

That observation had nothing to do with the homosexuality of what had transpired, but at the fact that I personally did not want to know the specifics of what my family did in the privacy of their bedrooms. Yet she’d acted like seeing Kade fuck someone was a normal occurrence.

It pleased me that there was nothing sexual going on between Kade and my little owl.

I was not the jealous sort, but I felt a possessiveness towards my little owl that would lead me to believe I would have been if there was anything obvious going on between them.

However, just because I couldn’t see into the hallway, did not mean I couldn’t hear .

Master Kade was a hard Master, and I did not mean that in reference to his genitals.

I’d known a lot of Doms in my time. There were ones who were teachers and mentors, training subs before letting them loose on the world.

Others were after love, seeking a shared passion with a permanent partner.

Some wanted that intense passion without the commitment of a collar.

And then there were ones like Master Kade.

Ruthless, demanding, and selfish. I was certainly the first two, but I was not the latter.

I might use my submissive, but I repaid them in kind.

Master Kade was after his pleasure and his pleasure only.

There was nothing wrong with that trait.

Many submissives got off on the humiliation and the degradation that someone like Kade could provide for them.

More power to them. It just wasn’t my cup of tea.

Listening to Kade humiliate Noah did nothing for me, and while I knew there had to be consent involved in whatever was happening in the hallway, I wasn’t entirely convinced that Noah wanted to be there.

When my little owl had exhausted herself to the point where she’d fallen asleep with her head on my lap as she knelt next to me, I’d sat there for a long while, just petting her, offering her the comfort of my presence.

I could have removed her mask, could have even made it look like it had slipped off in her sleep, but I didn’t. In fact, when it started to ride up on one side, I readjusted it to cover her again.

I did not want to steal my little owl’s identity. That was her own, and I had to earn the right to be gifted it.

It was nearly two in the morning before Master Kade had come into the room to take my little owl away.

I did not like seeing her being lifted by him or carried away from me.

Her aftercare should have been my responsibility.

Since I had no way to contact her, I’d given Kade one of my business cards and asked him to give it to her.

I had no idea if he actually would, but there was a chance.

On the back, I’d written a note, asking my little owl to meet me at the club tonight again.

Taking the file folder from Jessica, I continued to my office.

Since I was directly under Carr, I was the only other agent on our floor who had an office.

Mira was extremely jealous of that fact, but that was her problem, not mine.

I had not asked to be promoted, though I certainly did not mind the perks that came with it.

I was more of a boots-on-the-ground agent than a paperwork-monger.

Sitting down at my desk, I woke my computer up.

Despite the late hour I’d been at the club, I’d woken up and gotten a ten mile run in before learning that Mira would not be making it to work on time.

I liked coffee, but I was not dependent on it like many of my colleagues.

I’d had a single cup following my run and that satisfied me for the day. I preferred water or iced tea.

Glancing at the case number on the front of the accordion file, I noted that it was for the murders in Atelihai.

It was too soon to have anything inside this folder for the new body we’d looked at yesterday, so it was likely the preliminaries on the John Doe discovered at the high school.

I needed to do more research on Atelihai, the school, and that weasel of a principal.

Unfortunately, other cases had more of a priority and this one had been pushed to the bottom of the pile while waiting for information from the crime scene techs and the coroner.

Pulling out the first manila folder, I noted that John Doe had finally been identified. Christopher Evan Harrow. Based on his California driver’s license, he was thirty-one years old. What was a Californian doing in these parts?

It didn’t take me long to find that answer. Son of a bitch—he was an alumni of Atelihai High and he’d been on the hockey team the first year Atelihai had won the hockey championships. I’d put money on the fact that, when Jane Doe was identified, she’d also be a native of Atelihai Valley.