help with sunscreen, I can reach everything back there,” I said, opening the tube and demonstrating. Only the spots just below my shoulder blades were tough to rub in, but I managed. Even the last few sunbeams of the day were more than capable of frying my skin if I wasn’t slathered with the stuff.
“So what else do I need to explain, Sir?” I asked saucily as I worked, forgetting my caution for just a moment. The others, four other mid-to-upper-management types, had already spread their towels and headed for the water. Kendra was sitting a little too far away to hear us over the noise of the crowded beach, and seemed already lost in the book she’d brought with her. She’d kindly offered to watch everyone else’s stuff while they swam. “Do I need to explain about the Tiger Balm?”
“No. I know what that’s for. It works for the normal kinds of sore muscles too, you know.”
“True, it isn’t just for us perverts,” I said, moving to stretch luxuriously in the sun’s lingering heat and then stopping short with a horrified gasp, realizing what I’d just said and to whom. “Oh my god, Sir, I am so sorry! I didn’t, I can’t believe I just said—”
“Kate.”
“It was totally inappropriate, I must be just…it’s the sun or something, it’s—”
“ Kate . Stop talking.”
“Yes Sir. Oh. I mean—”
“ Shhh . Stop .”
I just nodded this time, too terrified to go on. Flirting was one thing, brief hiking-related handholding was one thing, but this ? Were there any odds I was not about to receive the firing of a lifetime?
“So,” said Jack. “So. Our shy, reserved little Katie not only knows all the signs and symptoms of a lesbian bottom having had her butt thoroughly smacked—it was about the shoes, did I hear that right?—she also has the nerve to sneak her new friend some Tiger Balm, plotting right under the top’s nose, to help her with her boo-boo. What do you think Kendra is going to do to Jane when she finds out, little Katie? She may not see it but you know she’ll smell it, that stuff’s impossible to miss.”
I couldn’t answer right away, because my entire worldview had just been given a forcible quarter turn and I was still trying to regain my footing in this new, strange universe in which Jack asked me questions about the relationship between a Dominant and a submissive, and was expecting me to answer.
And was looking at me as though I’d better answer right.
And, oh my God , I wanted him.
My brain kicked into overdrive and I experienced a moment of deep empathy for what animals must feel like when they’re caught in oncoming headlights. I do not have office romances. Never, never, never. And especially not with the boss. I can’t. Can’t. There could not possibly be a worse idea. Never in history has that ever worked out well for anyone. At least nobody that I can think of right now. But…he’s not just a coworker or a boss, he’s…Jack.
“I didn’t think about that, Sir,” I admitted at last, my mouth dry and my pulse racing as I fell into a form of address that was all too familiar, but not one I thought I’d ever be using deliberately with this man. I was looking down studiously at my towel, at the hotel crest on the corner where sand was already infiltrating the gold embroidery.
So I heard, rather than saw, Jack’s frustrated sigh at my answer, and his next few words which he seemed to be whispering to himself as much as to me.
“I didn’t come here planning to do this,” he said, repeating what he’d said the previous day. “I should have known this was a bad idea, Kate. It’s Rio. I mean, I know that. But I thought I’d be fine with it, even here, and there was no way you hadn’t earned this trip. Nobody else was remotely qualified. I couldn’t rationalize a way not to pick you that didn’t just reek of discrimination. But getting here and finding out that you’re actually… damn . I mean, it’s just too much. I’m only
“So what else do I need to explain, Sir?” I asked saucily as I worked, forgetting my caution for just a moment. The others, four other mid-to-upper-management types, had already spread their towels and headed for the water. Kendra was sitting a little too far away to hear us over the noise of the crowded beach, and seemed already lost in the book she’d brought with her. She’d kindly offered to watch everyone else’s stuff while they swam. “Do I need to explain about the Tiger Balm?”
“No. I know what that’s for. It works for the normal kinds of sore muscles too, you know.”
“True, it isn’t just for us perverts,” I said, moving to stretch luxuriously in the sun’s lingering heat and then stopping short with a horrified gasp, realizing what I’d just said and to whom. “Oh my god, Sir, I am so sorry! I didn’t, I can’t believe I just said—”
“Kate.”
“It was totally inappropriate, I must be just…it’s the sun or something, it’s—”
“ Kate . Stop talking.”
“Yes Sir. Oh. I mean—”
“ Shhh . Stop .”
I just nodded this time, too terrified to go on. Flirting was one thing, brief hiking-related handholding was one thing, but this ? Were there any odds I was not about to receive the firing of a lifetime?
“So,” said Jack. “So. Our shy, reserved little Katie not only knows all the signs and symptoms of a lesbian bottom having had her butt thoroughly smacked—it was about the shoes, did I hear that right?—she also has the nerve to sneak her new friend some Tiger Balm, plotting right under the top’s nose, to help her with her boo-boo. What do you think Kendra is going to do to Jane when she finds out, little Katie? She may not see it but you know she’ll smell it, that stuff’s impossible to miss.”
I couldn’t answer right away, because my entire worldview had just been given a forcible quarter turn and I was still trying to regain my footing in this new, strange universe in which Jack asked me questions about the relationship between a Dominant and a submissive, and was expecting me to answer.
And was looking at me as though I’d better answer right.
And, oh my God , I wanted him.
My brain kicked into overdrive and I experienced a moment of deep empathy for what animals must feel like when they’re caught in oncoming headlights. I do not have office romances. Never, never, never. And especially not with the boss. I can’t. Can’t. There could not possibly be a worse idea. Never in history has that ever worked out well for anyone. At least nobody that I can think of right now. But…he’s not just a coworker or a boss, he’s…Jack.
“I didn’t think about that, Sir,” I admitted at last, my mouth dry and my pulse racing as I fell into a form of address that was all too familiar, but not one I thought I’d ever be using deliberately with this man. I was looking down studiously at my towel, at the hotel crest on the corner where sand was already infiltrating the gold embroidery.
So I heard, rather than saw, Jack’s frustrated sigh at my answer, and his next few words which he seemed to be whispering to himself as much as to me.
“I didn’t come here planning to do this,” he said, repeating what he’d said the previous day. “I should have known this was a bad idea, Kate. It’s Rio. I mean, I know that. But I thought I’d be fine with it, even here, and there was no way you hadn’t earned this trip. Nobody else was remotely qualified. I couldn’t rationalize a way not to pick you that didn’t just reek of discrimination. But getting here and finding out that you’re actually… damn . I mean, it’s just too much. I’m only
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