Licorice Whips (10 page)

Her smile slowed his heartbeat. She didn’t take him or this play seriously. Sweet continued dragging the tail up her arm to her chest. Once there, he circled her already hardened nipple.

Leaf moaned. Her body writhed. She chewed on her lower lip again.

Sweet brought the tail up to her face. He brushed the whip over her forehead and traveled down her nose to her screwed-up mouth. He swirled the whip around her mouth until Leaf released her bottom lip and relaxed her face.

Sweet gave the other side of her body the same treatment, brushing the whip down her body until he got to her feet.

“Mmm, nice.” Leaf curled her toes.

“Time for something new.” If Sweet wanted to get back into playing as a Dom, he would have to start now.

Standing at the foot of the platform, Sweet parted her legs. Taking a step back, Sweet swung his arm to get used to the feel of swinging a whip again. He planted himself and stared at her tuft of black pubic hair with sprigs of gray through it.

Sweet flipped his wrist over and landed the tail squarely on her pussy.

“Oh, God!” Leaf gripped the sides of the platform.

Watching Leaf’s face go from relaxed to shock had been the ultimate payoff building up to this moment. Inside he felt nothing. His heart didn’t pump like it used to. He didn’t sweat. The play today felt like a job than a joy.

Sweet continued whipping her, keeping his stare on her face and hoping beyond hope that something clicked. Masaun would have told him that, like baseball, he needed to keep his gaze on his target. Her reaction proved to be too alluring.

Sweet kept up the whipping while keeping his stare on her face. Leaf kept her mouth open, making an “O” with her lips with nothing coming out except for an occasional squeak here and there.

“Breathe,” he instructed.

His first time back playing as a Dom, he really didn’t need his plaything passing out on him.

Leaf exhaled and turned her head.

Sweet let his mind wander thinking about Nikla. Would she like this type of treatment? Why did it even matter? She made it obvious she had no interest in him.

“Ow! Ow! Stop! Please!”

Sweet snapped out of his haze and focused on the woman in front of him who had now propped herself up on her elbows and had removed her eye mask.

“I know it’s supposed to hurt but that was a bit too...” Leaf trailed off and covered her mound with her hand.

Sweet put the whip on the counter. He would have stopped sooner had he given her the safe words. Damn. Sweet could almost hear Masaun saying “I told you so” in his ear. He ran his fingers through his hair. “Session over. You can get dressed.”

“Wait. That’s it? But what about–”

“You have a good night.” Sweet stormed out of the room.

His first time back into playing didn’t go the way he wanted. Maybe he had lost his touch.  He had to stop torturing himself by thinking about doing this to Nikla. If he couldn’t get past doing it to a stranger, someone he didn’t want, how could he do it to someone who had snagged his interests?

Chapter Six

Nikla hoped her night would have been more eventful than her packing up Justin’s shit. Her night could have been interesting had she pressed Sweet to outdo her vibrator. He definitely ticked off all the boxes in her checklist.

She found herself eager to pass out fliers at Decadent Treats just to see him. True to his word, he came out each day to confront her. His type of confrontation consisted of asking a long list of personal questions and ending it with a box of chocolates and candies, which she never accepted. That didn’t mean she didn’t look forward to the offer.

Nikla couldn’t stop thinking about those green eyes. At five-foot-nine, Nikla sometimes found it difficult to find men taller than her. Sweet stood a good half of a foot over her. His broad shoulders looked perfect for gripping during sex.

Sex. She didn’t want or need to think about that now. Nikla’s doorbell chimed. At this time of night, she didn’t have to guess who stood on the other side. Nikla picked up the box she’d just packed and carried it to the door. It took him a few days to come crawling to her since that unfortunate phone call.

Balancing the box on one raised leg, she unlocked and opened her door. Justin, poor, thin, busted Justin, stood on the other side with his head hung low. His jet-black hair swung down over his face. He adjusted his glasses over his slender nose then pulled his brown jacket together to cover his chest.

“Your stuff.” Nikla held up the box for him.

“Nik, let me explain.”

When he didn’t accept the box, Nikla let it crash to his feet.

Justin jumped back. “What the hell! Not mature.”

“I guess finding out your boyfriend is a cheating scumbag from a pocket dial is really mature and smart, right?” Nikla crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head. “I really tried to make us work.”

Justin bent over to pick up his items. “Maybe that’s the problem. We shouldn’t have to work that hard to be together.”

“And the other problem is that you need to like me.” Nikla had to truly concentrate on not screaming at him. She would not appear as a hysterical woman. He didn’t warrant hysteria.

“Sometimes you make it so hard. Hell, you wouldn’t even hold my hand in public. I liked you. I just didn’t–”

Nikla slammed the door in his face before Justin could say what she always suspected. He didn’t love her.

With her hands balled into fists, she stormed over to her kitchen and stood in front of the refrigerator, staring at it. She knew what she had hid in the freezer—her emergency stash, her coping mechanism. The king-size frozen Snickers bar would hit the spot right now and ease her pain.

“No. I’m better than that.” Nikla turned her back on the refrigerator and took a huge step out of the kitchen. “I don’t need food to cope.”

Like on autopilot, she walked into her living room, retrieved her yoga mat from behind the couch, and rolled it out in the center of the floor. Nikla stood at the end of it and did her sun salutations, raising her hands straight into the air, then doing a swan dive, swinging her arms down to her feet and flattening her back and bringing her head up to look out the front window. She did a couple of these motions before she took a powerful step back and assumed the warrior pose.

Fuck Justin. Forget that damn Snickers bar taunting her in the freezer. She lowered her arms and turned toward the kitchen to get rid of that temptation. When she got one foot away from the kitchen, her doorbell rang.

“Oh no, he didn’t.” Nikla turned on the ball of her foot and stomped back to the door.

Knowing Justin, he probably scanned the contents of what she’d packed and wanted to argue with her on some missing item.

Nikla pulled the door open. “Now what?”

Deana held up her hand. “Whoa. Did the Fed Ex guy piss you off or something?”

Nikla exhaled. “No.” She took a step aside and opened the door wider. “Come in.”

Her friend took a tentative step inside, keeping her stare on Nikla the entire time.

“You don’t have to look at me like I’m crazy.” Nikla slammed the door behind her and padded back to her living room. “I’m fine, or I will be fine.”

After they sat on the couch, Nikla shared what happened after their lunch that day, and what she did just five minutes before Deana arrived.

“That son-of-a-bitch!” Deana slammed her hand on the coffee table. “And here I thought he was a nice Filipino boy who would treat you right.” She unzipped her small purse. “I have folks. I can make a call and have him hurt.”

Nikla shook her head. “Not even necessary. Having to hear him cheating on me gave me the permission to wipe my hands clean of him. I was never really one-hundred percent happy in the relationship.” To admit it out loud wrenched her gut.

“If you weren’t really feeling him, why were you with him?”

Nikla promised herself to always be authentic and honest. Letting her relationship with Justin last longer than it should made her feel like a liar.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I just know that I now have time and energy to concentrate on something else now.”

“Dating?”

Nikla shook her head. “Nope. My business.”

Deana winced. “Without Justin’s money–”

Nikla stopped her friend before she could finish her thought. “I don’t need Justin’s money. I don’t need anything from him.” If she ever thought she would need to stoop so low as to ask him for anything, she would jump from a bridge first. “I found a great location for my new place.”

“Awesome. Where?” Deana placed her purse on the coffee table and leaned back on the couch.

“Downtown Virginia Beach.” Nikla smiled, a first in hours. Then she thought about the mysterious stranger who tried staring her down for the spot. Her smile became even broader.

“A penny for your thoughts.” Deana nudged Nikla’s knee.

Nikla shook her head and waved her hand to her like she wanted to erase the memory. “It’s nothing. I had, um, a little incident during my–”

“Protest?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you get arrested?”

Not in the way Deana meant it. Certainly Sweet had arrested her attention. “No. I didn’t feel good. A guy from Decadent Treats helped me and took me home.”

“A guy took you home? And you’re still cheesing like that? What did you do?”

Nikla smiled at the impure thoughts she had about the man after he left. “Nothing happened.” She regretted that. She wanted him to take her body and make it his. “He’s the same guy who tried running me off from in front of Decadent Treats the other day.”

“Really? So? Did you exchange numbers or just bodily fluids?” Deana inched closer to Nikla.

Nikla felt her nose wrinkle after the inquiry. “Are you kidding? I just met the guy. I didn’t even shake his hand.”

Despite that, Sweet had no problem picking her up when she’d fallen. He helped carry her into her apartment and put her to bed. She still remembered how hard his body felt when he pressed her against him.

Her clit throbbed and she had to cross her legs.

“You don’t have to shake his hand. Just let him work your body.” Deana stood up. “You still have that wine in the fridge?”

Nikla nodded.

Deana turned and headed to the kitchen as she slipped off her jacket. “Did you at least get his name so you know who to look out for?”

Nikla heard the refrigerator door opening and closing, then heard her friend going into her cabinet for glasses.

“Yeah, it was a weird name.” Nikla would never forget it.

“Like what? Hannibal Lecter or something?” Deana giggled as she walked out of the kitchen and toward Nikla.

“I wish.”

Deana’s eyebrows shot upward.

“With a name like that, you can see evil coming.”

Deana sat down and opened the wine, pulling out the temporary cork and emitting a popping sound in the process.

“No, this guy’s name was Sweet.”

“What? It was something cutesy like Yogi or Boo Boo?” Deana poured a glass and handed it to Nikla.

Nikla took a needed sip of the fruity, red wine before continuing. “No, his name was actually Sweet. Sweet Hawkes to be exact.”

Without a word, Deana pulled out her phone and started typing into her screen. When something populated in front of her that she liked, her eyes widened. “I knew it! I thought I had heard that name before. He and his brother own that candy shop in Virginia Beach. Decadent Treats.”

“He’s an
owner
?” Nikla shook her head. “I thought he was just an employee, a scout for the owner.” In all the time he’d encountered her, never once did Sweet tell her that he owned the store.

Deana made a grunting sound deep in her throat. “With the way this guy looks, I think I would be eating, licking, and sucking on something Sweet.” She winked at Nikla.

“Let me see.” Nikla snatched the phone from her friend’s hand and looked at the picture. The shot had Sweet standing next to another equally handsome man, but Sweet grabbed her attention. Both men carried the same mesmerizing green eyes, but Sweet’s gaze seemed to bore right through the picture and into her soul.

“Yeah, that’s him.” Nikla handed the phone back to Deana. “As soon as he heard me on the phone with the real estate company, he actually had the nerve to come up to me, while I’m still on the phone, and say that he wants the place.”

“I think I know why.” Deana smiled as she continued to play with her phone. She turned the large screen around to Nikla. “Your boy dabbles on the dark side.”

Nikla squinted as she looked at the tiny news article on the phone. “Does that say something about BDSM?”

Deana nodded. “Looks like he and his brother are into that.”

Nikla carried her glass of wine to her office and fired up her computer. She needed to see this on a much larger screen. She felt Deana’s hand on her shoulder as she did her own Google search on the man.

The first link contained the article about his and his brother’s candy shop. In the brief caption by the link, it looked like the place had been a resounding success. She didn’t need to read the article to know that. Their success, or rather someone else’s failure, forced her to action.

The next couple of links had her interested. She clicked the first article that came from their local newspaper comparing the two brothers to the fictionalized character in that wildly popular book series about a woman’s first foray into the world of BDSM.

“I told you.” Deana patted Nikla’s shoulder. “It’s no wonder the man acted like he already owned the place. That’s his nature.”

Nikla started to tune out Deana as she became engrossed in the article, which mainly focused on Sweet’s brother, Masaun, and Masaun’s assistant commonwealth attorney fiancée, Kindle Langston.

She read every word of the article. The little bit that focused on Sweet, she read over and over again. The one thing she had hoped to have found out in the article the journalist never revealed: Sweet’s true name. The writer continued to call him Sweet or S. Hawkes throughout. Maybe the man had his name legally changed to Sweet.

“That guy brought you back to your apartment?” Deana asked.