Inked Adonis: Chapter 1

This is not a drill.

I repeat: this is not a drill.

My dog is humping the leg of the hottest man I’ve ever seen.

He isn’t my dog, technically speaking—he’s the newest client in my dog-walking roster. But for all intents and purposes, he’s my responsibility for the duration of our loop around Lincoln Park. Given the single-minded focus with which Rufus is currently hip-thrusting the shit out of this poor man’s leg, this little pit stop might only add a couple minutes to the walk.

Rufus has yet to listen to one single order I’ve given him all day—too busy bounding after squirrels and almost taking me out with his baseball bat of a tail—so this display of unbroken concentration is honestly kinda admirable.

And me?

Savvy new businesswoman that I am—what am I doing about it?

Not a damn thing.

I’m frozen on the spot, watching in horror as Rufus goes to town on a suit that looks like it cost more than my entire college tuition.

In my defense, I’m also trying to hold onto the three other clients who have a better grasp of consent or a worse ability to wriggle off their leashes, or both. Patsy, Snide, and Blue are nipping around my legs, jazzed up by their latest comrade’s escape.

Which is why I turn to my best friend and business partner in the hopes that her take-charge personality will make up for my sensational lack of alpha female energy here.

“Hope?” I squeak.

But Hope is standing apart from the group of barking dogs, gawking at the nightmarish scene unfolding before us with open admiration.

“Holy shit—he’s gorgeous!”

Not the problem-solving partner-in-crime I was hoping for.

But I get it. This is overwhelming. Not just Rufus’s horny little stunt, but the victim, too.

Say what you will about Rufus, but the dog has excellent taste. The man he’s assaulting is broad-shouldered and dark-haired, with steamy silver eyes and a jawline that Michaelangelo would be jealous of. He’s wearing his dark navy suit in a way that every man wants to, but few men truly can.

Even with my attention understandably scattered, the one thought that keeps repeating in my head is, I don’t blame the dog.

Hell, I kinda wish I was Rufus right now.

“What do we do?” I hiss.

Hope snaps out of her daze and hisses right back, “Handle it!”

My first instinct is to say, I can’t, and flee the park with the dogs not currently grinding it out against a stranger. But Hope is more than just my best friend in this instance; she’s also my new business partner. If I want her to merge her personal assistant company with my fledgling dog-walking venture, I need to prove to her that I’m trustworthy.

So I shove the three remaining leashes into Hope’s hands and stumble forward, ready to pretend I have any idea how to regain control of a randy Rufus.

But Rufus’s victim chooses this exact moment to stand.

Holy hell.

The man was imposing sitting down, but there is tall and then there’s tall. He towers over me and Rufus, a veritable Great Dane in his own right.

“You seem to have lost control of your dog.”

I avoid his stunning silver eyes and focus my attention on the canine instead. “Rufus!” My voice aims for commanding but lands somewhere between squeaky toy and panic attack. “Stop it this instant.”

Rufus must be into voyeurism, because he humps the man even harder.

I chance a quick glance at the human Great Dane to see if he’s as unimpressed with my faltering control as I am.

Spoiler: He is not, in fact, impressed.

His face might as well be carved from marble—eyebrows arched, jaw clenched tight. Cold, beautiful, and utterly unimpressed. I study the hard corners—for science, of course—trying to decide if he’s finding this amusing or if he’s just mentally drafting the lawsuit that will put Hope’s Helpers out of business.

Then the man snaps his fingers.

“Rufus,” he growls, his voice a dark promise that makes my thighs clench. “Sit.”

Rufus freezes mid-hump. His adorably soulful eyes turn up towards his human counterpart. With a little apologetic whine, he detaches himself from the man’s leg and parks his sizable ass on the ground.

I stare at the dog in disbelief.

He listened.

He actually listened.

I don’t actually know why I’m shocked. If that man gave me an order, I’d be obeying, too. Sit. Stay. Speak. Undress.

I’d park it wherever he told me to.

Rufus whines, probably resentful that the man’s attention is fixed on me.

Those firebrand silver eyes are truly something. They make it hard to focus. What am I doing here again?

Oh, right.

Emphatic groveling.

“I’m so, so, so sorry. This is mortifying. This is my first day walking him, and I—” I make the mistake of looking him in the eye.

Christ on a cracker. The man is literally two heads taller than me. I’d have to get a stepladder just to reach those lips of his. Although, why I would need to reach his lips is beyond me.

That’s a lie.

It’s not beyond me.

There’s only one reason I’d want to reach those lips. And that reason is about as innocent as Rufus’s overtures a moment ago.

“—I underestimated just how strong he is.” I glance down at the right leg of his suit pants. The once immaculate fabric is now crumpled and dusted with slobber and dog hair. “Oh, God. He really did a number on you, didn’t he?”

All I can think is that if this had happened to Chicago PD Sergeant Tom Pierce, the man would be screaming in my face as he “took care” of Rufus. My father is not what you would call “understanding.” Or “lenient.” Or “nice.” He has no tolerance for animals.

For that matter, he doesn’t have much tolerance for people, either. Hell, if he could kick humans across the rainbow bridge and call it a “mercy killing,” he would do it in a heartbeat.

Just the kind of person you want the CPD to strap with a service weapon and send out into the community, right?

I bury that childhood trauma down deep and try to focus on the Greek god in front of me. But between the horror of the situation, his criminally good looks, and the way he’s staying eerily silent as he regards me, I’m breaking out in stress hives. I can feel itchy heat spreading across my chest and up my neck.

“I’m more than happy to have those pants dry cleaned for you. In fact, I insist.” I hold out a hand, finally taking charge.

He gazes down at my outstretched hand and lofts one thick eyebrow. “You want me to take my pants off?”

Maybe a mercy killing isn’t such a bad idea, after all.

“No! I’d never— Of course not. That is not at all what I⁠—”

And then he does the last thing I expect.

He smiles.

His chiseled face cracks in a perfect grin—pearly-white teeth amid a thick black beard and a dimple in his right cheek, like a little kiss from the gods that obviously handcrafted him.

I literally have to grab the back of the bench to keep myself upright.

Apparently, Rufus agrees, because he rears back on his hind paws and attempts to summit the man like Mount Everest.

“Rufus! No, stop⁠—”

“Sit.” That voice again. Pure dark velvet wrapped around steel. It leaves no room for misinterpretation.

One word and Rufus is back to being grudgingly obedient.

“You have to show me how you do that sometime,” I mutter, glaring at Rufus, who still only has eyes for his new favorite human.

“It’s all about showing him who’s boss. You have to be the alpha.”

“Rufus has at least sixty pounds on me,” I point out dryly. “I think we both know who the alpha is.”

He clicks his tongue, the sound dripping with disapproval that shouldn’t turn me on but absolutely does. “It’s not about physical size. It’s about strength of character.”

I shift my measuring hand from my head to somewhere in his stratosphere. “I think it’s at least a little bit about size…”

He chuckles and my heart does an acrobatic routine that I haven’t experienced since Miles Hertz chose me as his Juliet in tenth grade.

I thought I’d outgrown that particular brand of teenage stupidity.

Apparently not.

“Again, I really am sorry,” I press on, hoping to get out of this interaction with at least some of my dignity intact. “But, on the bright side, Rufus doesn’t warm to people easily.”

“Are you telling me I should be flattered?” His large hand drops to Rufus’s head, and I try not to imagine those fingers elsewhere. “Well, I appreciate your enthusiasm, Rufus, but I don’t usually go for public sex on a first date.”

“You shouldn’t ask me out then.”

The moment the words are out of my mouth, I freeze.

Did I actually just say that?

Out loud?

To this walking wet dream?

The man’s silver eyes glimmer with a terrifying mixture of surprise and amusement that has me praying for the pavement to open up and swallow me whole. “Is that so?”

I sweep a hand over my face in an attempt to hide my raging blush. “No! I didn’t mean that like that. It came out wrong… It was just a joke!”

“I’m sure it was,” he purrs, his tone suggesting he doesn’t believe a single syllable.

I bite my tongue to keep from shouting, I’ve never had sex in a public park before! With the way things are going now, he’d probably misinterpret it as an invitation.

I map out the breadth of his shoulder and the catcher’s mitts he calls hands, and I don’t know… maybe it is an invitation…

But no. Definitely not. Bad idea. The worst idea. The kind of idea that ends with my mug shot on the evening news.

He pats Rufus again, scratching him behind the ear until his leg starts thumping the ground. “Next time you take this ogre out for a walk, a studded leather collar might give you more control.”

“Studded leather?” I repeat, trying to beat away images of handcuffs and bondage rope and a tall, broad figure stalking closer and closer… “Oh, I won’t need to resort to that. Rufus is a good boy. I save the whips and chains for the bad ones.”

“In that case, do you have a collar in my size?”

Warning sirens blare in my head. Flirting detected. Abort mission.

It makes zero sense. Men who look like him don’t flirt with women who look like me. I run the calculations, searching for any other way to interpret his words combined with that devastating dimple. I come up empty.

I swallow past my thundering heart lodged in my throat. “If you’re asking for private training, I’ll have to check my calendar. But you seem well-mannered from where I’m standing.”

“Clearly, you don’t know me very well.” He reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a sleek black business card. “Here. Just in case you find some room in your calendar.”

I take the card, staring at the slanting gold words embossed into the thick paper.

SAMUIL LITVINOV: CEO, Litvinov Group

“Do you want me to walk your dog?” I blurt out. “Or you?”

I expect him to snatch the card back, to realize he’s made a terrible mistake in wasting perfectly good cardstock on a woman who can’t control one horny Great Dane. Instead, he gives me a laugh that slides down my spine like warm honey. “I guess you’ll have to call me to find out, Ms…?”

“Nova. Nova Pierce.”

“Nova,” he murmurs, and fuck me if my name hasn’t ever sounded like that before—like dark chocolate and broken promises. “It was an unexpected pleasure meeting you today.”

He takes a step back. Rufus lets out a pathetic whimper.

Relatable. I have to bite back a whimper of my own.

“Be a good boy, Rufus. But maybe not too good.” Those Arctic eyes catch mine one last time, burning with something that makes my toes curl in my ratty sneakers. “Bad dogs have all the fun.”