Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
Tessica lay in bed, but sleep was the furthest thing from her mind. She kept replaying bits and pieces of her evening with Connor. He wanted to date her. He wanted to see her Little side. He wanted to see her Mommy side. He wanted to sleep with her.
She cringed at the thought of him seeing her naked. Her body wasn’t what it used to be at thirty-four, which was the last time she had been naked with a man. She didn’t look bad for her age, but she’d never had plastic surgery, so she did look her age. And from what he’d shared, Connor was used to sleeping with women a lot younger.
She checked the digital alarm clock and sighed. It was almost midnight, and she had a seven-thirty appointment tomorrow morning. But after such a rich and filling dinner, there was no way she could have gone to bed any earlier than eleven without feeling ill. After their salad course, they’d shared a small tray of cheeses. Then crème brülèe for dessert, followed by a coffee.
After the cheese tray arrived, Connor made an offhanded comment about his granddaughter hating cheese, and the rest of their evening had been spent discussing their kids and grandkids. Intentional or not, the discussion had never returned to kink.
They parted ways when the Uber driver dropped Tessica off at her house before taking Connor back to his hotel. Connor had promised to email his flight schedule for the following week once he had it finalized. He said he’d try to get Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday off. Tessica frowned and wished for the hundredth time that Connor lived in Oregon.
She checked the clock one more time and shook her head. Tessica knew of only one thing that sometimes helped put her to sleep when her mind wouldn’t settle. And she’d been surprisingly horny after Connor suggested co-topping a Little with her. Normally she wouldn’t think twice about sticking her hand into her panties and bringing herself to climax, but it seemed weird to do it while thinking about Connor . Especially when she doubted he’d approve, considering his reaction to finding out she’d been doing herself for so many years. But he hadn’t told her not to, and he’d probably want her to get a few hours of sleep.
Decision made, she reached down and slid her panties all the way off. She dropped them on the floor beside the bed, and then shimmied her nightie up to her waist so that her entire lower half was naked. When she spread her legs wide, her clit pulsed in anticipation. She put both hands on her breasts and used her fingers to tweak her nipples. As the jolts of pleasure started, she imagined Connor being her Daddy and making her dinner while she colored.
She tried to make it last, but the thought of Connor taking care of her made it impossible not to touch her clit. As soon as her finger hit the sensitive nub, the jolts of pleasure tripled. A few short minutes later, her entire body tensed as wave after wave of ecstasy coursed through her. She lay there breathing hard for a few moments, and marveled at how quick and easy it had been to come before she finally slipped into sleep.
The following week Tessica had some downtime at the shelter and set up her laptop at the front counter to do some accounting work.
An older man came in holding a crate. She caught a glimpse of a toy poodle before he set the crate on the floor.
“Welcome to Fur-ever Friends. How can I help you?” she asked.
“I saw online that you take unwanted animals?”
“We do.”
“My brother passed away last week, and I’m the only family he had.”
“I’m so sorry,” Tessica said.
The man nodded and continued. “This is his dog, but my apartment doesn’t allow animals. And even if they did, I’m gone for weeks at a time.” The man pulled some papers out of his jacket. “I have some of Toby’s vet records. He’s fixed, he’s got all his shots, and he’s real friendly. But I can’t take care of him.”
Tessica could tell the man was genuinely upset. “Well, you’ve brought him to the right place. I’m sure we’ll find Toby the perfect home.” She pulled an intake form out from under the counter and slid it over to him along with a pen. “Just fill out this form, leave the vet records with me, and I’ll take care of everything else.”
An hour later, Tessica had Toby settled in a kennel when Gwen arrived for her usual Wednesday afternoon veterinary check in.
“Hey,” Gwen greeted her with a cheerful smile.
“You seem chipper today.”
“I’m feeling chipper. How are you?”
“Busy.” Tessica gestured to her laptop. “I’m trying to close the fiscal month for one of my clients before tomorrow morning, but there’s a four-thousand-dollar error somewhere, and I can’t find it. On top of that, a new dog was brought in today. And Connor’s supposed to be here this evening to check on the shelter.”
She didn’t mention that she and Connor were supposed to go on a date after work. She wasn’t sure she was ready for that bit of info to be public.
“Well, I can’t help with the accounting, but I’ll check out the new doggo. Which kennel is he in?”
Tessica waved her toward the back and kept her eyes on the numbers in front of her. “Kennel two.”
When Gwen didn’t move, Tessica glanced up from her screen.
“How much sleep did you get last night?” Gwen asked, eyes narrowed.
Tessica gave Gwen a somewhat patronizing smile. “I got plenty of sleep, thank you.”
“Yeah, sure you did,” Gwen scoffed. “Tell you what. I’m going to check out the dog, and do a quick looky-loo at all the other inmates. Then I’ll watch the front desk while you go upstairs and focus on your accounting. I can stay until closing.”
“Don’t you have to go back to the clinic after lunch?” Tessica asked.
Gwen shook her head. “I switched with one of the other vets who needed the weekend off. I have today and tomorrow off, and I’m working Saturday and Sunday.”
“You didn’t have to come in today if you have the day off. You should?—”
“Tessica.” Gwen walked over and put an arm around the older woman’s waist. “I’m here because I want to be here. I want to help you. Please let me.”
Tessica sighed, patted Gwen’s shoulder, and nodded. “Okay. Thank you.”
Four hours later, Tessica closed her laptop. She had figured out where the missing money was for her client, and she’d closed their fiscal month. One less thing to do meant she could focus on her date with Connor without worrying about work.
She walked downstairs to the sound of voices, and saw Connor and Gwen talking at the front counter.
“Connor.” Tessica checked the clock as she went to join them. “I didn’t realize it had gotten so late. Sorry about that.”
Connor shrugged. “It’s okay.”
Gwen asked, “Did you find the four thousand?”
“I did. Thanks again for keeping an eye on things down here so I could concentrate.”
“No problem. I can come by tomorrow afternoon if you want.”
“No.” Tessica shook her head. “That’s your only day off. You should do something fun or relaxing.”
Gwen frowned. “When’s the last time you had a day off?”
“That’s irrelevant.”
Gwen turned to Connor. “It’s not irrelevant. She’s working a lot . Like?—”
“Gwen!” Tessica scolded.
Connor focused on Tessica. “How much is a lot?”
“It’s not that much,” Tessica assured him.
Connor turned to Gwen. “Is that true?”
Gwen shook her head.
Connor turned to Tessica. “Last week at the club, Paul also mentioned that you’d been working too many hours. I was planning to talk to you about it last week on our date, but I forgot.”
“Date?” Gwen’s eyes shot wide open.
Tessica pursed her lips, irritated that the cat was out of the bag, and refused to comment. Instead, she focused on Connor. “I don’t see how that’s any of Paul’s business.” She was definitely going to have a talk with the club owner the next time she saw him.
“Do you have some blank paper?” Connor asked.
The question threw Tessica off for a moment, but soon enough she nodded and pulled a couple of pages out from under the counter. She held them out to Connor.
Instead of taking them, he said, “Please write down your schedule for the past week.”
“What?”
“All the hours for both your accounting work and the shelter work. Including any extra work you did at night on your laptop.”
“But...”
“But what?” He asked.
“Why?”
He leaned forward. “Because I told you to.”
Gwen gasped.
Tessica purposely ignored her and scowled at Connor. “You’re going to have to do better than that.”
He sighed. “Because I doubt you realize how many hours you’re actually putting in. Seeing it written out might help you to be more objective about it.” He raised his eyebrows and leaned in. “And because I told you to.”
Tessica felt her face heat up. It was difficult to argue with his logic. Reluctantly, she began writing, and tried not to think about how she was going to explain this to Gwen later.
Gwen said, “I uh, I should probably get going.”
“I have a question for you before you go,” Connor said.
“Okay.”
“Would you be open to doing a private playdate with me and Tessica?”
Tessica looked up from her paper to glare at Connor for being so presumptuous, but he was focused on Gwen.
He continued, “We discussed the possibility of topping a Little together, and I thought you might be a good candidate.”
“Really?” Gwen asked. “I mean, sure. Yes. I’d like that.” She grinned. “I’m off tomorrow!”
Connor chuckled. “I’m not sure about tomorrow, but if you give me your phone number or email, I can let you know.”
“Okay.” Gwen pulled one of her business cards out of her vet bag and wrote an email address on the back. “This is my personal email and my phone number.”
“Thank you.” Connor pulled his phone out of his pocket and texted his name and email to the number she’d given him. “There you go. Now you have my email and number, too.”
“Thanks.”
“I’ll text you tonight once Tessica and I have had a chance to talk it over.”
“Okay, great.”
Tessica continued to glare at Connor. She wasn’t sure why he thought it was okay to make plans and decisions without her input, but she didn’t like it. And she was going to give him a piece of her mind, but not in front of Gwen.
Gwen seemed to pick up on the tension in the room before Connor did and grabbed her jacket. “Well, I’m off.”
“Thanks again for helping today,” Tessica said.
“You’re welcome.” Gwen put her jacket on, picked up her vet bag, and walked out.
Once they were alone, Tessica spoke up. “That was not okay.”
“What wasn’t okay?” Connor asked.
“You can’t make plans that involve me without checking with me first.”
He blinked a couple of times and eventually nodded. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m so used to making decisions for the Littles and submissives that I play with, that I didn’t think twice about it.”
Tessica nodded. “Apology accepted. I can understand why that would be your automatic response, but if we’re going to date, we’re going to be equals ninety percent of the time. And that means consulting me before making plans.”
He nodded. “Point taken. I’ll work on it. How’s your list coming?”
“That’s another thing. You can’t order me around in front of the Littles that I Mommy.”
Connor shook his head. “I don’t agree. Littles understand hierarchy. You won’t lose their respect just because you answer to me.”
“Littles also understand a united front. If they know I have to answer to you, which I have issues with by the way, then when I say no to something, they’ll automatically go ask you to see if they can get you to overrule me.”
“Hmm.” Connor paused a moment. “Okay, I see your point. As long as it’s not something involving your health or well-being, I’ll do my best not to undermine your authority.”
“Thank you.”
“But you working yourself into the ground does involve your health and well-being, so finish the list.” He raised an eyebrow in challenge.
Tessica frowned, but got back to the task at hand. The more she wrote, the worse it looked. Unfortunately, the Mommy in her wouldn’t let her lie about it, no matter how bad it was. She dutifully wrote it all down. By the time she was finished, she was appalled by the numbers. She winced and glanced up to face Connor’s condemnation, but he wasn’t there. She turned and saw him near the back, petting Butch.
“All done?”
She nodded. “Maybe we should go over the shelter news first.”
“I don’t think so.” He locked Butch back in his cage and went to stand next to her. He held out his hand.
With a sigh, she handed over the list of hours she’d worked. “I’ll feed the animals,” she muttered, not wanting to see his expression when he read it.
She focused on the task at hand, and fifteen minutes later, all the animals had been fed. She couldn’t think of any other tasks to use as procrastination techniques, so she went and stood beside him near the counter.
He set the pages down, crossed his arms, and said sternly, “This is completely unacceptable. I thought you told me Gwen fed the animals in the morning.”
“She did for the first couple of weeks, but then I told her I had it covered, because she was doing it for free as a favor. I pay her to come in twice a week to do vet checks on the animals, not to feed them.”
“When do you sleep?”
“I sleep,” she said.
“Five or six hours a night?”
“Sometimes.”
He shook his head. “For the next seven days, you’re only allowed to put in eight hours per day.”
“Eight hours? There’s no way I can get everything done in eight hours.”
“I don’t care.”
Tessica put her hands on her hips. “Well, it’s not really your call, is it?”
Connor raised his eyebrows. “We’re talking about dating. It may not be one hundred percent official yet, but I care about you. When I see you doing something this unhealthy, it doesn’t matter if you’re a Little, a submissive, or an equal partner. I wouldn’t be okay with this schedule. If one of your Littles had this schedule, what would you do?”
She bit her lip. “I’d make them stop.”
“Exactly.”
“Look, I agree it’s too much. I realize I need to cut back, but eight hours isn’t enough. How about ten?”
“No.”
“But—"
“No. Eight hours a day and if you go over, I’ll spank you.”
Tessica scowled at him as anger bubbled up in her chest. “What? You can’t threaten to spank me out of the blue. You need to speak to me like an equal when we’re not in a scene, or I’ll spank you!”
Connor scoffed. “You and what army?”
Tessica crossed her arms and shook her head. “You’re a sad excuse for a Dominant if you think BDSM is all about being physically bigger than your submissive.”