His Pretty Toy by Shanna Handel

Chapter 2

Trent

The dark closes in on me like a fog. Only the air isn’t wispy and dense. It grows stronger, surrounding me, tightening around my lungs and my throat until I can no longer breathe. I can’t move my arms. I can’t move my legs.

That’s when the screaming starts.

I bolt upright, gasping for breath.

Damn.

Another dream. To be so powerful, to control so many, and yet, to be powerless when it comes to my own mind.

It’s maddening.

Sleep is unachievable at this point. I check the clock. Three a.m. My alarm would be going off in an hour anyway, so it’s no great loss.

I stand, stretching toward the ceiling, pain shooting through my body. The scar running from my hipbone to my chest throbs. I deepen the stretch, wanting the pain. It burns like fire.

I do the exercises I’ve been commanded to do by my over-eager physical therapist—a boy too young to even grow a proper beard, the patchy hair on his chin pissing me off every time he lifted my arm over my shoulder for the past year. When I’m done with that, I move on to my own daily workout, strength-training exercises using my body weight to keep strong, followed by a five-mile run on my estate.

The air is cool, the sun nowhere to be found as I make my way through the orchards, along the wall of the garden, past the stables. I think of her and I run faster, until my lungs are burning and legs feel like jelly.

She’s due to arrive at eight o’clock sharp.

Why did I do it?

I have no need to pay for sex. When you’re as rich as me, women throw themselves at you. And I have no desire for a relationship. ‘Fuck ‘em and forget ‘em’ is my motto. No need to complicate this already complex life with attachments.

I slow to a jog, winding my way back toward the house. I don’t know what came over me yesterday when I saw her.

I needed a break, a moment amongst real people. I left my downtown office building to fetch my own coffee. It’s always brought to me. Brewed fresh from beans roasted on my family farm in France. Two creams, two sugars, piping hot. But I needed a change.

Poppy, my young, scatterbrained yet incredibly organized secretary, insisted I stay put and that she would order the coffee for me, nervously pushing the pink plastic frames of her glasses further up her freckled nose as she reminded me that I get cranky when I go out there.

I cut my gaze at her, reminding her, “I’ll do as I please.”

When I stepped out of my pristine lobby onto the stink of the muggy, packed streets, I remembered why I don’t do this, but I couldn’t turn back. Poppy would get no end of satisfaction knowing she was right—well, no, she’s as humble as they come, I’d be the one having to live with the knowledge that I was wrong—so I press on. I’ve heard my interns speak of Café Leche, the best coffee shop in town according to them.

What do they know of real coffee?

I try not to judge, reminding myself not everyone has access to their own French roastery. Coffee roasting is a complex process. The heat must be carefully applied to green coffee in an effort to transform the magical elements contained within each seed—sugars, proteins, acids—into delightful aromas of roasted nuts, malts, chocolate, fruit, and more.

I oversee the process, traveling several times a year to ensure the quality of the bean. These kids who work for me have no idea what real coffee is. And I’ll not share mine with them. They wouldn’t appreciate it.

I pulled directions up on my phone, making my way through the mass of people. Green and white striped awnings hung over big square windows, the name Café Lechecarefully painted across the glass in gold letters. I stared inside, debating whether to go in, or just go back to work and tell Poppy she was right, when I saw her.

But even now, I can’t shake that strange bolt of electricity that tore through my heart at the sight of her. My heart actually skipped a beat and despite my daily vigorous workouts, I thought I might be having a heart attack.

I don’t know what it was about her that took my breath away, but she did.

Average height. Average proportions. Brown hair that curled at her shoulders. Pretty brown eyes. Nothing spectacular.

Then she smiled.

And the whole world lit up.

She handed a customer their cup of coffee and in that moment, I knew I had to have her. If only to keep that heavy, foggy cloud at bay for one night, I wanted her.

I never even went inside the shop.

I was in a mood the rest of the afternoon, snapping at Poppy so badly she was nearly in tears by the end of the day. I blamed it on lack of caffeine. But the real reason I was so terrible was that unsettling burning of desire set deep in my bones, putting me on edge.

Swallowing my pride, I apologized to Poppy, sending her home early with a hundred-dollar credit to one of those dinner delivery services. I took the peace and quiet to play on my computer, turning over every stone, found every fact I could about the girl.

Ashley Barnes, goes by Ashe but I prefer Ashley. Address 321 Turner Street, Apartment 309. She’s twenty-one, of Italian descent, and has a deep love of pasta. Had a pretty decent GPA, majoring in creative arts, minoring in interior design at the arts college she attended until about a year ago, when she dropped out, taking a full-time assistant manager job at the coffee shop she had been working part-time at. She moved from a dorm room to her current hovel of an apartment.

No idea why she dropped out. Surely a career in design would be more lucrative than steaming milk for lattes. Living relatives, two: a mother and a sister. Her mother lives outside of town in a matchbox of a house.

I know trivial facts as well. She won the art contest at her high school four years running. She volunteered every Saturday at a local homeless shelter, teaching a painting class to anyone who wanted to attend. At the age of eighteen she had a high school boyfriend turn into stalker when she broke up with him to attend college.

The restraining order still stands.

She has an incredible amount of debt attached to her name; no wonder she signed my contract so quickly. Nothing frivolous on her credit card statement like other girls her age. The purchases are mostly grocery store and discount store charges, and medical bills.

Lots of those.

She loves chocolate and flowers, art and coffee. She doesn’t have much free time to enjoy them since anytime a shift opens up, she takes it. She’s working sixty-hour weeks.

Every week.

Just like me, only I’m making millions. She’s making pennies. Other than her debt, with such a shit apartment and an old rattling death trap of a car, I can’t help but wonder what she’s spending her meager salary on. It’s certainly not her clothing—her uniform is jeans and a tee shirt.

She wears it well.

I want to do bad, bad things to that sweet, innocent girl.

Gretchen figured out the rest.

I want to see her wearing nothing but the mark of my cum between her thighs. My heart races, that damn pang running through me. I tell myself it’s from the run, not from thinking of her.

Now I glance at my watch as I enter the back kitchen door of the estate.

Only twelve hours to go.