Page 5 of Becoming His Pet

“I need to put in an order.” His voice. Fuck, his voice, deep and rough. She could really lose herself in that voice.

“Uh—” Nora looked behind her. The door remained closed, and he was a customer. Her job was to make the shop money. “Sure.” She opened the door and gestured for him to come inside. After taking a quick look down the street to make sure no one else was headed their way, she shut and locked the door.

When she turned around she found herself eyes to chest with him. Craning her neck, she found his face. His eyebrows were wrinkled.

“Are you really not open?” he asked, pointing at the door.

“Oh. Yeah, we’re open. Just notopenopen right now. It’s fine. I can take your order.” She stepped around him, finding his curious stare unsettling.

Once safely tucked back behind the counter, she pulled out the order pad and grabbed a pen from the Mason jar. Silk flowers were wrapped around each pen, a DIY craft she’d found on Pinterest.

“You’re notopenopen?” he asked with light amusement. “What does that mean exactly?” His forearms leaned against the counter, and she got a good look at all the tattoos running up his arms. It was already hard for her to keep her heartbeat at a normal pace with his rugged features, his navy-blue T-shirt stretched across his muscular chest, but now he had to go and show her all the ink on his arms.

“Right. So, what can I order for you?” She poised the pen over the pad but was still scanning the pictures embedded in his skin. She stopped when she noticed the name peeking out from under the sleeve of his left arm.

Bella

She blew out a hard breath. Of course he had someone. Look at him, for shit’s sake! And Bella was probably some six-foot blonde bombshell. Unlike Nora’s five foot four, her dark shoulder-length hair that frizzed with the humidity of the city.

His hand appeared in front of her face. “You okay?” His fingers wiggled before her eyes.

Well, fuck.

She cleared her throat and gave herself a mental shake.

“So, flowers. What can I get you? A bouquet?” She fixated her eyes on his chin.

“No. Actually I need like a bundle of flowers or something.” He pulled out a scrap of paper from the back pocket of his jeans. Flattening it on the counter, he turned it to her, so she could read the script.

His girlfriend even had beautiful handwriting. Of course.

“You need carnations. Okay, easy enough.” She scribbled on her pad, noting her chicken scratch didn’t compare to the script on the note. “It doesn’t say a color here. We currently have them in white, peach, pink, and yellow but we can spray the ends of the white petals if you’d like something different.”

When he didn’t answer, she raised her eyes to meet his. But he wasn’t looking at her; his focus was trained on the back office door.

Voices were raised back there, but she’d been so caught up in her own mind she hadn’t noticed.

Putting her pen down, she took a step in the direction of the office. Antonio was yelling. Rambling in Italian, but she understood most of it. Her throat clenched.

No!

She ran to the door, flinging it open just as Teo raised a gun in Antonio’s direction.

Even with the silencer screwed on the weapon she heard the pop of the gun, muffled, but it rang in her ears. Two shots. Antonio dropped to the floor. Blood spilled from his chest, soaking his neatly pressed shirt.

A strong hand clamped down on her arm, and she realized she’d screamed.

“Fuck.” Anthony shook her.

Teo sighed and shook his head. “I told you to stay up front.”

“I-I...” She couldn’t tear her eyes away from Antonio, at the vacant stare in his eyes.

“Let her go.” That deep voice rattled her.

“Who the fuck are you?” Teo demanded.

“Let her go, or you’ll be joining your friend there,” the guy from the shop promised. Pure confidence threaded through his tone.

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