Page 52 of Crushing Clover

“Stay, kitten.” The whisper in my ear made my brain feel like it was melting. “We’ll take the collar with the bell, and the locking metal one, but we’ll pass on the posture collar for today. It’s beautiful work, but I think it’s too much, too fast for her right now.”

“Can I help you find anything else? Body harness? Nipple clamps? Insertables?”

Insertables?

Oh, Denny, please stop giving him ideas.

“That’s all for today.”

I exhaled in relief.

Denny rang up Rush’s purchases as I stood very still. He’d told me to stay, but how literal had he meant it? Could I move a little? What would happen if I didn’t listen?

I brought my hand up to investigate the collar around my neck. The leather was already warm against my skin. Intimate. The bell on the collar chimed quietly, and I took the metal sphere between my fingers to silence it.

“Nice to meet you, Kate,” Denny called to me.

“Nice to meet you, too.”

Rush snapped his fingers as he walked past me, as if he were summoning a dog. I followed, even though I was tempted to be a bad dog and bite him instead.

When we reached the truck, he opened my door and lifted me up onto the seat. He buckled my seatbelt, as though I were incompetent, then put the hand-stamped boutique shopping bag on my lap.

He got in and brushed a kiss along my cheek.

“You look very pretty in that collar.”

“Thank you.” It was probably best to be polite, even though I didn’t like wearing it.

He gave me the kind of self-satisfied smile a Viking might give a monastery he’d set on fire. When he reached for me, I made myself sit still. He flicked my collar’s little bell, and the sound it made was clear and sweet.

What would the bell sound like if he was fucking me hard?

My pussy twitched, and I blinked at him, feeling strange.

His gaze turned into a smolder that made the cab of the truck overly warm.

“Nice.”

Umm…what was nice?

Too chicken to ask, I turned my gaze out the windshield and watched the scenery as he pulled into traffic.

Chapter 12

“Why are we here?”

“I thought it would be nice to stop for a while. You haven’t been to the beach here yet, have you?”

“I haven’t been to the beach since I was a kid.” I laughed, thinking about the trips we’d taken to the beach on Lake Erie, not far from the group home where I’d met Noah. We’d only been able to go occasionally because they were so short-staffed, but it was fun when we did. The last time, Noah and I had gotten in trouble for sneaking off, which was fair, considering we’d been making out. I smiled wistfully at the memory. I’d been so in love with him at one point. Now I’d probably never see him again.

I rolled my eyes at myself.

The boy I’d fallen in love with was as gone as the girl who’d done the falling. He’d cheated on me and planned to hide it. For years, I’d been his sugar mama, housekeeper, and itch scratcher. What he’d given me wasn’t love, no matter what I’d wanted to believe.

And now? He’d let me be sold to save his own skin.

That was the last time I’d let myself get nostalgic about that self-centered traitor.

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