JOHARI GOES KINKY
Louisa Trent
Trent Publishing
www.louisatrent.com
Copyrighted Material
JOHARI GOES KINKY
Louisa Trent
Copyright © Louisa Trent 2011
Published by Trent Publishing at Smashwords
Chapter One
“Yikes!” JJ called to the soaked customer who had just entered her cyber café. “Didn’t your mama ever tell you to carry an umbrella on cloudy days? Looks like one of those crazy intermittent showers the weatherman predicted hit you on the way in the door. You’re wetter than a puddle.”
The customer completely ignored the big friendly grin plastered on her face, her cheery if admittedly dumb greeting too. He approached the take-out counter, his features expressionless, his shoe’s rubber soles squeaking.
Ugh. Her poor ears. That noise. A cross between a wet smooch and a toilet bowl plunger, his shoes literally sucked. Comical as all hell. She shouldn’t laugh, though. Nope, she shouldn’t go there. Cracking up would so un-nice.
Girl, a mischievous voice inside her urged, kick nice to the curb. Nice gets you exactly nothing in life. Didn’t the landlady hike your rent even after you told her nice as pie you couldn’t afford to pay another increase?
A teeny-tiny giggle escaped. Only one. Before she clamped down on her inappropriate hilarity and reined herself in. “Sorry.”
Stony silence met her apology. The customer didn’t acknowledge her existence in any way, shape, or form. In fact, he looked everywhere but directly at her.
Lame how the guy completely avoided her eyes. And, go figure, she stood right there in front of him, right there behind the counter measuring dry ingredients for the next day’s blueberry muffins into her favorite and only slightly chipped mixing bowl. What was wrong with him, anyway?
Maybe nothing. Maybe, like her, he was having a bad day. Hey, it happened. Or maybe, unlike her, he was incredibly shy.
To get his attention, she gestured wildly with her wooden spoon, flour dust flying everywhere. “Are you aware your wet shoes make these weird eek noises when you walk? Well they do. And I think someone should tell you. I’m electing myself. After all, I’d want to know if I was having one of life’s embarrassing moments. For instance, if spinach somehow managed to get itself trapped between my two front teeth. Or -- or -- say a low-flying seagull used the back of my jacket for target practice. You know, something blush-worthy like that.”
She took a deep breath. “Anyhow -- I shouldn’t have laughed at your expense, which is why I said I was sorry. And I am. Sorry, that is.”
No response.
Not every customer had to necessarily like her. Or even “get” her. No argument, at times, her sense of humor could get a bit whacky. Off-the-charts irreverent too, especially if her butt was dragging -- tiredness only increased her sense of the absurd. Evidently, this customer found her personality irritating instead of friendly. And that was okay. A high popularity rating among coffee shop owners didn’t necessarily translate into brisk blueberry muffin sales.
But it sure as heck couldn’t hurt.
So she’d take one more shot at connecting with this somber guy on a personal level, just one, and then she’d dial back her Miss Congeniality routine. “You know, you really are sopping.”
“It’s raining.”
Well, yeah, it was raining. Duh. As in buckets. Was he for real?
She sighed. At least he said something. She should be grateful. For a minute there, he had her worried. As it turned out, though, the customer was simply a master of understatement and a man of few words. She could live with that. Diversity kept things interesting. Just because she talked way too much and overstated everything didn’t mean everybody else on the planet had to. It wasn’t always about her. When would she learn to shut it?
Probably the same time she learned moderation in all things.
God. Even in her head, she just went on-and-on. Gab. Gab. Gab.
She smiled. “Right. It’s raining. Falmouth’s thirty percent chance of precipitation turned out to be more than drizzle, didn’t it?”
He shrugged.
Whoosh. No moderation whatsoever, her gaze rushed straight to his shoulders.
Killer shoulders. Broad, but not steroid bulky. She liked. So much so, she inspected his ring finger.
All clear.
Whoa. Now she was psyched. Kink on! But with the usual precautions.
First rule in voyeurism: Do not get burned while peeping.
Easy-peasy. Going stealth would ensure she didn’t get caught.
Second rule in voyeurism: Never do a sister dirt.
Problematic. Not all married men wore wedding bands. Others took them off for reasons -- ahem, cough, cough -- unknown. Fantasizing about someone already taken was poor sportsmanship and conduct unbecoming to a lady. Plus, it was totally tasteless.
Third rule in voyeurism: When in doubt about the second rule, find out for sure before proceeding.
Rule number three didn’t apply here. In a great example of transparency in advertising, the customer’s soaked windbreaker clung to his upper torso like plastic wrap. She could see straight through his jacket to the hard male beneath. If he was selling any of those muscle groups, she was buying. Where was the blame in looking at merchandize flaunted right in front of her nose?
No blame.
And besides, the blame game was getting old fast. She’d quit smoking cold turkey -- no patches, no hypnotism, no E-Ciggies -- and censoring her thoughts was going the same way, banished to the hinterlands, wherever they were. A brand-new her was breaking out, a bold woman who saw what she wanted, went after it and scored.
At least in her fantasies.
In the interest of supplying those fantasies with raw material, she copped the customer a south-of-the-border look.
And blew out a frustrated breath.
What a waste of a perfectly convincing pep talk. Not to mention a peep. The customer’s conservative dark pants -- creased and casually loose -- gave nothing away.
Except her need to get some. How long ago was it that she had?
Long enough ago to dull her sharp disappointment in the activity but too soon to have rectified the sad, sad, situation.
Things were looking up there. Coincidentally, up was also the direction the tips of her nipples were pointing beneath her camisole top.
Damn, she was horny. No romance about it, she was nailing him. In her naughty imagination. And why?
This was it. A defining moment of epic proportions. No more editing herself according to the Nice Girl Handbook. Look out world. Her inner bad girl was saying it like it was.
I’m nailing him because customer dude tickles my puss-- my puss -- my puss --
No matter how hard she tried to force it out, the word remained stuck in her thoughts. Too skanky?
Too bad. Time to own it.
“Pussy!”
Sweet baby Jesus. Gaping at the customer, she blinked like mad. Had she screamed that aloud?
“Here pussy, pussy,” she called to cover her Tourette’s syndrome-like outburst. “Did you see my cat, sir? She was here just a minute ago…”
“Cat?” His features displaying the same deadpan set as before, he shook his head. “Afraid not.”
She didn’t really own a cat. Their fur made her sneeze. But her dorky save worked. Oblivious to her faux pas, the customer returned to pondering the blackboard menu on the wall behind her while she returned to pondering the truly excellent playing field in front of her.
Rivers of “inclement weather” streamed down the customer’s rugged cheeks. Clean-shaven rugged cheeks. No fashionably nonchalant, yet oh-so-calculated, three-day stubble for him.
Goody. Independent thinkers played a huge role in her mental lusting. Pack mentality left her cold.
She wasn’t cold now. Far from it. Fantasizing about him had made her hot-hot-hot. Shamefully hot.
Her lips twisted. Wait. Delete that shameful word forever from her vocabulary. There was no shame in fantasizing, no shame in having sticky-up nipples, just from ogling the angular set of the customer’s jaw, the strong column of his throat…
His eyes. Brown and soulful. Solemn. As if he had seen too much along the way and those sights had saddened but not defeated him. His mouth, on the other hand, was a straight edge, with a marked reluctance to lift at the corners. And she knew this why?
Because so far she hadn’t dragged so much as a polite grin out of him.
JJ harrumphed to herself. So be like that. See if I care.
Only she did. She cared very much. Now that she was single again, she wanted to meet someone. And if she were obvious about it, she couldn’t help it. She was lonely. But optimistic. And willing to try on another boyfriend despite the number the last boyfriend -- the first and only boyfriend -- had done on her.
It was complicated. But experience had taught her to lower her expectations about possible lovers. The next man in her life needn’t dissolve in hysterics at her corny jokes. Or make her LOL, either. He didn’t have to be handsome or tall or have perfectly aligned ultra-bright teeth. She needed something other than flash from a man. Something she’d never had before.
No, not love. She was an optimist, not a fool.
What she needed was dirty sex. Gosh, she was desperate for dirty sex. Filthy sex that had her clawing the tangled sheets. Hardcore sex that strung her up and out, and ripped her thighs apart. Practically illegal sex she’d never be able to tell anyone about, not even to make her girlfriends insanely jealous. BDSM sex involving fetishes, like leather and whips, and high-pitched raw screams she couldn’t suppress. Dominant sex that demanded not asked. Forceful sex that -- well -- forced. Wild sex that left her writhing but never wanting. She’d want for nothing with her next partner…
Okay. A party pack of condoms would be very much appreciated, any brand would do. His technique would blow her processed hair back, not the variety of rubber he used. And if that also sounded too obvious, how about this?
Hey you there with the solemn dark eyes and clean-shaven jaw. Yeah, you, I’m talking to you. In my mind. Bend me over this counter and screw me senseless. Now. Can’t you see, I’m doing a luve tango here?
What she wouldn’t give to touch herself.
Now JJ bit her lip. Why not just do it? The counter she stood behind came up to her waist. If she leaned forward, only a little, she could surreptitiously rub her clit against the protruding shelf.
This was it. She was going for it.
On the way down, the long-handled wooden spoon fell from her grip and bounced on the counter. The clatter had her nearly jumping out her skin. For sure, it had her straightening back up again.
Her nerves-of-steel customer never flinched. Not even a twitch. A second later, maybe in a case of delayed reflexes, he did shake his head -- raindrops spinning from his thick shaggy mane like water from a lettuce crisper -- before launching into a recital of her company’s business motto located at the bottom of the blackboard menu.
“There are no free lunches in life,” he quoted. “But WiFi is always complimentary with your coffee at All Day Breakfast.”
He could read! See that? She had some standards in fantasy men.
After patting herself on the back, she watched, drooling, as he scanned her café’s half-dozen neatly set tables, his survey taking in the genuine faux granite laptop bar that ran the entire length of the front window. No trendy cyber cafe in the city had one finer. And hers came with a quaint Cape Cod vibe. There! Take that Boston.
His inspection completed, the customer spared her a glance, his blank look not easily interpreted.
Until he opened his thoroughly kissable mouth.
“Hard to believe, a smalltime operation like this offers free internet access.”
He might just as well have bitch slapped her.
Smalltime! Who was he calling smalltime?
Chapter Two
At the customer’s major putdown, JJ clenched her fists at her sides.
She wouldn’t freak. Would. Not. Freak. She would not leap over the counter and dump the floury contents of her favorite and only slightly chipped mixing bowl over the customer’s head.
Why?
Because that was fantasy, this was reality, and she knew how to differentiate between the two. She was psyched, not psycho. True, he had totally mocked her cyber café. Not to mention dissing then dismissing her -- through the process of extrapolation -- but she would remain professional, only concluding to herself that she had been mistaken about his character. The customer wasn’t shy. Wasn’t a master of understatement. Wasn’t a man of few words.
The customer was an obnoxious jerk.
Be that as it may, business was business, so she’d pull on her big girl panties and keep her temper.
Maybe.
What he’d said -- them were fighting words. And they hurt. He’d gotten personal. And not in a good way. All Day Breakfast wasn’t just a nine-to-five job to her, wasn’t only a much needed paycheck. This business was her life. What was more, the place was her passion. How could she let him get away with insulting her life and crushing her passion?
She couldn’t.
Royally miffed, she stared him down. But she didn’t give him a well deserved piece of her mind. Why even bother telling him off? A waste of energy getting defensive.
Naturally, she turned right around and did.
“I’ll have you know, this ‘smalltime operation’ is in step with the new minimalism. Furthermore, despite its compact size, my cyber café’s website ranks right up there with our stiffest competition.”
He hooted. “Where? In The People’s Republic of tea-drinking China?”
How dare he?
Low blow bringing tea drinkers, the scourge of coffee shop owners everywhere, into this.
Like a boxer in the ring, she came out swinging. “A lot you know about gamers or computer geeks, the under-thirty demographic who skip tanning on the beach in favor of caffeine and the thrill of going wireless.”
“With 3G and 4G and Air Cards that thrill won’t last much longer. Quicker than you can hang a Going-Out-Of-Business sign, WiFi will be everywhere.”
“Are you saying cyber cafés will soon be obsolete?”
“I’m saying using WiFi as a promotional gimmick teeters on the edge of extinction. The repair shop that rotates my tires has WiFi. You can surf the web anywhere.”
Cold disdain iced her tongue. “Seriously?”
Seriously, some guys should be seen and not heard. This fantasy had been going so much better before her lust object decided to get chatty.