Once in a while a university student would come in looking to exchange their worn text books for other worn text books or an elderly matron would wander in and sheepishly ask for tawdry romance paperbacks that the store practically sold at fifty cents to the kilo.
Other than those sporadic visits, Nissa only slid off her comfy stool occasionally during her shifts to rearrange stock on the shelves or to turn the “Back in 15 Minutes” sign around in the door window.
Certainly for a post-graduate student on summer break there were more active and engaging places to work at, but she did appreciate the easy, relaxing pace of the small store. Never one for hanging out at those crowded chain coffee shops, nor did she have the chops to sell clothes to fashionistas or A.D.D teenagers at those high-strung boutique stores, the laid back intimacy of the small side-street bookstore suited her.
The bookstore was the current iteration of the three-quarter century old unit located in the mid-town of the city. Once a small grocery, then a cafe, then an art gallery, and so on, it now sold books, used but with still stories to tell. Who knew how many layers of paint were underneath the current rich, forest green veneer?
For current fixtures, two-sided dark-wood shelves were lined up in a row like soldiers from the front all the way to the back of the long but narrow space, each with one of their sides pressed up against the wall opposite to the sales counter creating short, enclosed aisles. Low wattage ceiling lights cast a haunting glow over the books at night. During the day, Nissa preferred the hazy shimmer of white light that filtered through the store from the large storefront window.
The only things that remained untouched, it seemed, was the solid wood floor. Though waxed and refinished throughout the year, it continued to showcase its defiantly elegant natural wood grain. The lazy creaking noises that ebbed from the floorboards as people walked across them or shifted their feet as they read amongst the shelves was a surprisingly comforting sound to Nissa. It added to the serene ambiance of the place. As a student of dance, the floors also reminded her to stay light and graceful on her feet.
The young storekeeper’s attire and style matched the store: simple, relaxed, classical. She preferred a natural, clean look forgoing too much make-up for just a light kiss of blush on her high, cafe au lait cheeks. Her shimmering mocha-hued hair was kept silky straight, its cascading length stretching down to the small curve of her back. A wheat brown skirt dropped over her slender legs to her ankles which were covered by white heel socks and black slipper shoes. She accessorized a simple white T-shirt with a light silk scarf wrapped lightly once around her neck.
Comfortable and rarely intruded upon, Nissa had ample time to indulge in her love of reading — another boon of working in a bookstore. Summer time meant she could ditch the mind-numbing text books for some suspense, some enriching classics, some thought-provoking existentialism, and even some crotch clutching titillation, at least once in a while to keep the body stimulated as well as the mind. Currently it was a four-year-old travel guide to Thailand in her hands. Eventually, after graduation perhaps, she would visit the homeland of her parents for the first time, personal savings allowing, of course.
It was the mid-afternoon. A sultry voiced French crooner sang his brooding songs of regret, temptation, and love through the speakers of the small CD player beneath the counter. Yet, Nissa could hear the ticking of the pendulum clock off to the side over his singing. She flipped through the pages of her book, becoming increasingly detached from the words and pictures, checking the clock with increasing frequency. Her legs crossed, she bounced one over the other, a crinkling vibe of anticipation creeping between her gut and her toes.
The fine line of her thin dark brows pinched together. He should have been here by now.
Almost simultaneous to that thought, the little brass bells above the door tinkled like chattering fairies. For a moment, the sounds of the streets filtered in, only to be dulled as the door fell shut once more. Nissa sat up in her seat, facing away from the door for a moment. She inhaled, relaxed her face then spun her stool seat around.
And there he was, at first a silhouetted figure with the halo of bright summer light sweeping behind him from the outside. As her slender, almond eyes focused, the handsomely symmetric, bold angled, dark figure of a man came into view. An easy, deceptively courteous closed smile slipped onto his full brown lips. The narrowed look in his marine green, crescent eyes was that more inviting.
Nissa smiled and nodded, with a subtle, slow blink of her long lashes. “Good afternoon,” she said politely.
“Ms.Nissa,” the man answered, nodding in turn, “Comment ça va?”
“Bien, merci,” she replied, grinning. That was about all the French she knew but that brief exchange already represented about twenty-five per cent of what their few conversations had encompassed.
His name was Leandro. In the two months since he had first entered the shop, that was one of the few significant bits of information she had gotten from him other than physical and surface characteristics. Oh, but those were attractive characteristics to be sure. That smooth as smoke voice laced with that rich French accent tickled at her ear. The clothes he wore were refined and fashionable; they hugged his running-trim frame as if everything from his jackets to his leather shoes had been personally tailored. Perfect combinations of a rounded, wide nose, full pink lips, high cheekbones, squared off jaw and dimpled chin were all pulled together by those eyes, electric and provocative, that magnetically sucked in anything in its viewing path.
Finally there was his scent which implanted in Nissa’s head the vivid image of ocean waves crashing relentlessly and dying upon jagged rocks. This engaging musk was the enhancing sauce splashed upon his rich, roasted chestnut imbued skin.
This was a creature built for seduction, or so Nissa’s burgeoning imagination had created.
She placed her book on the table and folded her hands on her lap, legs remaining crossed. Quietly she watched as Leandro walked slowly through the store, deliberate tilts and turns of his head up-and-down, side-to-side, always as if it was his first time in Second Glances. There was a certain appreciation in his examinations as he scanned the books, the shelves, the store itself. That appreciation only seemed to intensify when his eyes crossed paths with Nissa. He would never stare though, never burn his glare into her. His looks were purposeful yet were only glances; enough for her to skip a beat or two.
He moved his leather portfolio briefcase from one hand to the other as he stopped in front of a display of books by a shelf in front of the counter and picked up a hardcover. Nissa pushed herself upright in her seat to look over his shoulder, trying to see what he selected. However, Leandro just put it down and proceeded to stroll to the back of the store. He knew what he wanted.
The first time Leandro had entered the store, he had asked where the art and photography books were kept. It was the only time he had ever asked Nissa for help. Instead of simply telling him which aisle to go to, Nissa had felt strangely compelled to come out from behind the counter and walk him to the back shelves. As she walked in front, leading him down the narrow corridor, she wanted to look back and see if he was watching her, appreciating her as he did the store. The books he sought were almost at the very back, an area dimly lit, beyond the reach of the natural light from the windows.
Arriving at the row of shelves, she gestured towards the books. “Are you an artist? A photographer?” she had asked, feeling atypically curious about a customer.
Leandro smiled. “I do have a certain…interest for the material, yes.”
And that was it.
Since then, Leandro always made his way to the back, just as he did now. His scent wafted past the storekeep’s appreciative nose.
Nissa remained in her chair, she wasn’t going to chase after him or bother him. That wasn’t the type of play she felt she wanted to do with this person. She did, however, lean over the counter a little, angling her head towards the back though she knew she wouldn’t be actually able to see him.
Instead, after turning down the CD player slightly, she listened. She heard the quiet creak of the floors as he shifted his weight while looking amongst the shelves. The sounds of books sliding off and on the shelves and pages being crisply turned. It stirred a pleasant vibe within her.
This is how it always was, the two times a week Leandro would visit the store.
Finally, after about fifteen minutes, she heard the click of heels once more as he walked back to the front counter. Nissa turned up the volume of the player once more.
Leandro approached the counter.
“Did you find anything today?” she asked.
He shook his head politely. “No, but there is always something worth looking at in this store, I find.”
Nissa smiled gently, trying to stem a blush she suddenly felt filling her cheeks.
Leandro looked aside for a moment and listened to the music playing in the store. “Mario Pelchat?” he asked.
Nissa grinned and nodded. “Yes…again,” she replied.
As if sensing the apology in her voice, Leandro smiled and shook his head. The artist was actually from Quebec but the Euro-Francophone man didn’t show any sign of haughty disdain for the music. To Nissa’s pleasant surprise, he suddenly closed his eyes and listened. His dimpled, dark-stubbled chin rose up slowly and his whole upper body seemed to expand as he breathed and contemplated the song.
Opening his eyes, he said, “The lyrics are very emotional, very enticing.”
Nissa looked down sheepishly. “I really don’t understand the lyrics. I just like the sound of it,” she admitted, “It sounds very sultry, seductive.”
Leandro tilted his chin downward, his thick, dark brows shadowing his cool green eyes. “If that is how the music makes you feel, then it transcends language,” he remarked confidently. He added, “It is better to feel than to tell, no?”
A warm rush swelled from deep beneath her chest. “Absolutely,” Nissa spoke like the word was butter in her throat. Her look, her speech was unabashedly flirtatious. It was an unusual reaction from her for an unusually intriguing and attractive man.
She mindlessly pushed aside a small pile of books on the counter and looked back up at him, fully expecting him to offer his usual genteel smile and nod before leaving. Today, when their eyes met, he remained unmoving where he stood. No courteous smile. No nod. Simply a long look from his darkened green eyes, a lingering gaze he held upon her. It wasn’t harsh or cold by any means. Nor was it unattractive or unwanted by Nissa. After two months of intrigue and flirtation, to suddenly see a look like this from Leandro erupted a mental storm in her head and a drumming in her heart.
Under the stolid, seemingly intentful watch of Leandro, Nissa felt compelled to move and, just as nonchalantly as she had shifted the stack of books, she swept her long waterfall of hair back to her front over her shoulder, brushing it down gently with her hands and fingers as she looked off to the side, a touch of anxiety in her expression.
“Au revoir, Nissa,” she heard him say. As she looked up, he turned and walked away. The bells above the door announced his exit from the store.
“Good-bye, Leandro,” she said softly, too late. It was a delayed reaction, as if her whole being had to reset after that brief, compelling moment.
Nissa looked ahead blankly and blinked, still absorbing the sensation she felt and the image of that persuasive gaze of his. As if her mind finally accepted that he was gone, Nissa sat upright, realization dawning on her face.
She slipped off her chair and made her way to the back aisles to see what ‘present’ had been left today.
Nearly two month’s ago, after Leandro’s second visit, Nissa had gone to the art and photography section, simply intrigued to know what he might have been reading. She always found a different book set aside at the end of the shelves. Looking at the covers, she recognized immediately that it wasn’t a book that belonged to Second Glances.
The owner of the shop refused to sell erotica.
It had taken her a moment to actually pick up and look at the first book laid out as a tempting offering. It was a pictorial filled with black and white images of nude bodies entwined and connected in shadowy and seductive sexual poses. Elegant, slender bodies melted together with bold, muscular figures. Rigid lengths of shafts of men were captured in photos sinking past the soft, rippling petals of women. Appetizing looks of ecstasy and rapture were prevalent in the rounded lips and the strained and satisfied brows over closed eyes. Nissa could almost hear the ghostly ebb of moans and groans whispering all around her as she stood in the quiet shop. As it was, when she swallowed to stimulate the saliva in her dried throat, it was like the thrum of a waterfall in her head.
Each time Leandro left the store, he left a book like that behind for her to find like some sort of erotic Christmas present. Sometimes paintings, sometimes drawings, sometimes photos. Black and white or colour. Abstract, artistic, or explicitly pornographic. There was always a book left on the shelf and Nissa always pored through each one, enthralled, curious…aroused.
She never asked him about the books. She knew to the bystander it could have been perceived as the equivalent to a dirty phone call, but it didn’t feel that way with Leandro. He was trying to stimulate a reaction from her, that seemed certain. Nothing that she felt made her wary of him, though. So she never approached him about the books, just waited to see what the next phase of the game was if there was one.
She was definitely compiling quite the collection back home.
As she turned into the row, a pleased smile curled onto her lips. He hadn’t disappointed her. It was another photographic pictorial this time entitled “Compulsions”. Arching her brow, she picked it up from the shelf and flipped it open.
“Oh my God,” she breathed.
Leandro remained present in the store and in her thoughts through the images in the book. Nissa’s prior attempts to imagine what the man looked like raw in the raw flesh crashed headlong into the stark reality presented within the pages before her. Uninhibited views of his sleek, muscular black-skinned body curved and strained off the pages. His searing, seductive eyes reached out and seized her by the collar of her shirt and held her fast, preventing her from even thinking of turning her sights away. His nude body was adored and inhaled by the camera lens and the white lights and dark shadows that curled and wended their way along and through his velvety chocolate skin.
To her chagrin, what garnered her attention the most was the bold display of his handsome cock. A shade darker than the rest of his ebony body, and just as attractive as any other part of his sculpted frame, it was impressive in both length and girth. Yet it was how the man wielded it in the pictures that was most striking.
His physical presence in the photos was matched by a curvy, long-legged pale beauty. Hair like an amber sunrise, skin toned to the perfection and delicateness of eggshell, and a dreamy body with ample, rounded breasts, she was a match for Leandro. She had to be, as the stark but captivating images showed her seductive body accepting Leandro’s substantial length deep inside.
The glean of sweat Nissa felt at her fingertips made it easy to turn the glossy pages.
As Nissa continued to gaze at the photos, the woman in the photo, aside from the sensation elicited from the look of delectable satisfaction on her face, soon faded. Only the determined, sexual bravado of Leandro remained in her eyes. His muscular arms and hands gripping and clutching. His legs planted and driving his powerful hips. His long tongue stretching out to sample skin and inner flesh. His beautiful cock manipulated like an irresistible force of desire.
Nissa wet her lips. Her almond-shaped, night sky eyes widened. Her own heavy breaths and frequent gulps were the only sounds her ears heard. Maybe that was why she hadn’t heard the tinkling alert of the store bells, nor the deliberate and approaching footfalls announced on the hardwood floor. Absorbed in an overwhelming torrent of illicit sensations, she thought it was simply a trick of her senses that she suddenly inhaled the scent of musk that was so identified with Leandro.
“Nissa,” a smoky voice called to her from behind.
She didn’t jump. Her heart froze but she didn’t jump. Nor did she turn turn around immediately, instead raising her eyes from the book and catching her breath and holding it. It was as if she was experiencing an energy surge but she refused to succumb to it. She knew he was there behind her, watching her. Somewhere deep inside, she had envisioned something like this happening, to be caught by him, to be alone with him. Her deepest thoughts had anticipated this moment. She had long resolved not to be a nervous, skittish creature when it did.
Finally she turned. Leandro filled her view, blocking the end of the small aisle with his presence. His stoic, handsome face was fixed upon hers. He had the look of confidence and cool, calm desire.
Still holding the book –that provocative smoking gun– in her hands, she gazed long and hard towards him. She could feel the blush seeping into her cheeks and her heart had kick-started to a rapid fire beat. Still she remained steady and calm, at least in her appearance.
The Mario Pelchat CD finally concluded and the store suddenly fell silent.
A knowing look sparkled in Leandro’s riveting eyes. He had sensed her heightened level of desire and stimulation like a predator senses the fear when hunting. The floor creaked as he moved in.
They didn’t exchange words. They hadn’t ever exchanged many to begin with anyway. Their eyes spoke volumes, however, as they locked onto each others like beacons. Leandro took the book from her hands and set it aside on a shelf. With his next deft move, he simply took her face in his hands and raised it towards his. An anxious, tiny gasp slipped from her lips before they came together in a smouldering, hungry, lustful kiss. His lips were large and soft, covering hers with an impressive surge.
His strong hands slid to her smooth waist, wrapping around her back and pulling her in. She reached over his shoulders, clutching her arms around the tight, short black curls of hair on his head. Their kisses were loud and wet, lips circling and mashing together until they pried them open like oyster shells shunting their tongues forward to a quivering slick clash between their mouths.
Nissa groaned into his mouth when she felt his hand slip around her ripe bottom and give it a brazen grope. She felt the heat around her neck and she stripped her thin scarf away, discarding it to the floor. With that, Leandro tangled his hands in her length of silky hair and tugged it down sharply. Nissa gasped, her lips breaking away from his and her chin swiftly tilting towards the ceiling.
Her exposed neck absorbed a rapturous attack of Leandro’s lips and tongue and teeth. As she held on with one hand behind his neck and the other against a shelf of books, he pushed up the bottom of her shirt, past her smooth creamy belly and over her milky, round breasts. His appreciative tongue soon was flicking and swirling around her hazel nipples, hardening them to a strained attention.
The space around them was swirling with wanton lust and Nissa had long given up trying to think straight. Her body, swelling with an unfathomable and unrecognizable need for Leandro, took over. Her legs steadying beneath her, she dove her hand down between them and pressed her palm firmly and brazenly against his crotch. A rigid, imposing shaft protruded from behind his slacks. She slid her hand up and down its length, delighting on how it twitched and pushed back against her touch. She was done imagining it, done looking at it in pictures. She needed to experience it…now.
Leandro tossed aside his coat and quickly unbuttoned his shirt, pulling it from his pants and throwing it open, dispelling a wave of heat from his chest and torso. Nissa had just a moment to cast an appreciative glance at his chiseled dark body, before she was spun around to face a wall of book shelves. Her body still reacting on its own, she quickly angled forward and braced her hands against the shelves.
Leandro grabbed at her skirt, pulling and hiking it up high up her slender and toned legs. He indulgently pushed it over the firm rounds of her ass. With one hand, he held her skirt up, with the other, he tugged her thin panties down to her ankles, pulling them off along with her shoes. Her white socks remained. After a tender and appreciative drag of his hands up her hard calves past her smooth thighs, he dug his fingers once more into her seductive bottom before moving in with his mouth and tongue.
Nissa’s mouth rounded wide and she gasped sharply once she felt him ply apart the moons of her ass with his tongue and nose. She stretched out onto her toes feeling a rough, slow lick between her crack and then a tickling, teasing sensation along and into her anus. He sucked from underneath, his tongue and lips working feverishly at her twinging petals. A stream of wetness ran down her inner leg. Her fingers clutched at the shelf and her eyes squeezed together tightly, her black brows pinching towards one another. She bit down hard on her lower lip, struggling to keep her cries in check. Upon hearing Leandro stand and position himself behind her, followed by the soft whine of his fly, she braced herself for the ultimate test.
Leandro’s slacks were pushed down to his ankles, joined quickly by his briefs.
Nissa turned her head slightly, her eyes pulled to the side trying to see behind her. Instead, she felt Leandro reach around, take one of her hands and pull it behind her. Her soft, gentle hand was guided around a thick, hot shaft of flesh and muscle. It throbbed in her palm and she could feel the pulse of blood surge through its rippling veins. Breathing hard, her eyes rolling into her head, she stroked his cock savouring its length, and rolling her palm over the soft dome, thumbing the tip. It felt so good.
Leandro pressed the dark length of his cock against her glistening cream butt, teasing the head along her dampened crack. Nissa drew her hand back and held onto the shelves once against. She leaned forward more, positioning her legs apart.
Assuming a power stance behind her, Leandro slid a hand around and under her belly, propping her bottom higher. His other hand wielded his cock, nudging the head against her, shifting it, circling it until it parted the sensitive petals, exposing the appetizing pink inner flesh behind.
Nissa gasped and swallowed, wriggling her bottom slowly from side-to-side no longer able to bear the anticipation.
With both hands now entrenched around her trim, slippery waist, Leandro threw his hips forward with a sudden and intense thrust. Nissa tossed her head back, sucking in a sharp gasp of air down her tightened throat. The shelves rattled and so did she from deep within as she felt his cock surge into her with one bold stroke.
“Ahh-ahh!” she shuddered. It was like a fire was stoked in her belly, hot air spilling out from her mouth.
His crotch molded against her buffering ass as she took him in fully. He stayed inside for a long moment, throbbing, swelling against her warmth and dampness, feeling her squeeze against his length. His stomach tightened as he withdrew, his cock already glistening with a wet sheen, before swiftly striking again. He continued to roll his hips in a disciplined yet forceful motion, gliding his cock in-and-out of Nissa. Like the wheels of a train finding traction and pulling forward, he gained momentum and soon the slap, slap, slap sound of his crotch against her tender bottom flowed through the store.
The creak of the floorboards below them was drowned out by the sounds of their illicit encounter. Sharp sighs succumbed to languid groans. The incessant spanking of flesh against flesh grew louder and louder. There was nothing else to focus on except the passion and lust swelling to a fervent pitch between them.
That’s when Nissa heard it. The disruptive jingle of the bells over the door to the entrance.
She gasped and her eyes suddenly opened wide, turning her head towards the sound. Her body froze when she heard heels clicking on the wood floors and she was sure that her heart had stopped the moment she heard voices in the front of the store.
“Oh God,” she whispered, her throat raw and dry.
Leandro stopped momentarily as well when he felt her body tense up against his. He leaned forward, his face looking across her shoulder. She looked at him. Fine strands of her long hair were strewn across her face but he could see the panic in her eyes. That’s when he smiled.
Nissa’s silent message was ignored as he slowly resumed his steady strokes. Even as she gave a swift shake of her head, he slid a hand around to her front. They slid up her flat, trembling belly, lifting her shirt up. With a slip of his fingers, he pulled down the cups of her bra below her breasts then swiftly covered them with his warm palms. He massaged Nissa’s soft, round bosom, and fondled and pinched at her pert nipples.
She frowned, closing her eyes, and breathing deeply through her nose. Her heart was ready to burst against Leandro’s incessant touch.
His thrusts were less pointed for the moment, altered to a more rhythmic, quiet grinding of his hips against her bottom, but that didn’t make the sensuous feeling subside within Nissa.
Pulling her lips inside her mouth, she clamped down tightly, trying to hold back her moans and groans. Her eyes were watery and anxious and she was certain her whole face was glowing like a pink lantern. The voices at the front continued and she desperately focused trying to listen and hear if they were approaching them in the back. Yet they remained at the front of the store.
Leandro continued his unabated strokes, tightening his buttocks with each grinding thrust. He licked at her neck and stretched the collar of her shirt over her round shoulder indulging in the smooth skin he found there with his active lips and tongue.
Nissa felt him swell within her. A rattling groan crept up painfully in her throat. Just as her lips parted, his strong hand came around and covered them, squelching the illicit moan before it escaped into the air. His hand remained at her mouth as the soft cries now slipped unabated, Nissa unable to contain them any longer. The anxious, urgent look in her eyes remained.
The two of them heard the footsteps in the front of the store, listened to them as they walked away. They paused briefly, both of them silent and motionless. The bells sounded. The voices were gone. In unison they gasped only to swiftly draw a strong breath of air and immediately resume their torrid pace in desperation.
“Ahn!” Nissa cried out to the ceiling. Her moaning voice sounded to her as if it came through a booming microphone.
Stiff grunts and stiffer strikes of his cock were offered freely by Leandro. His thrusts were pronounced and long, throwing her forward, upward onto her toes. Once more he wrapped a length of her finely spun raven hair in his fist and pulled, arching Nissa’s back inward to a painfully seductive slope, presenting her glowing bottom to his unimpeded strikes. Both their bodies, dark and light glimmered with beads of perspiration.
Nissa’s eyes stayed open and wide, looking upward at the dim ceiling light. Her body shook and shifted at the command of his relentless, voracious cock. His scent swept around her and suddenly she was there, amongst the crashing waves and the jagged rocks, every sense within her piqued and stimulated to their brightest point.
Leandro’s breath quickened then stopped. With one last passionate and powerful drive of his hips, every well-developed muscle in his body strained tight.
“Huhn!” As he let loose a resoundingly gratifying groan, a load of viscous, rich cum jetted through the length of his cock, shooting forcefully past his tip. He filled Nissa quickly, completely.
The moment she heard him hit his climax, Nissa felt the flow of tantalizing energy move through her like a fire. “Ahh-UHN!” An aggressive and seductive groan of immeasurable pleasure coursed past her gaping mouth. It felt as if every muscle was in full release as she spilled a slippery torrent of pungent sweetness over his swollen cock. As she continued to cum in trembling spurts, he remained throbbing deep inside of her, still spilling into her.
Sighing and gasping softly, her body shook and hitched and she felt the strength suddenly leave her tired legs. She buckled, but Leandro held her up in his strong arms. He helped pull away the hair that had fallen across her eyes and he gingerly applied tender kisses all over her flush face until she finally met his mouth with hers. Still connected, their tongues danced and wrestled, each trying to ease the thirst and dryness of the other.
As they took their time to savour the feeling and to recover their strength and senses, Nissa could only imagine how beautiful they must have looked together judging by how beautiful it had felt.
Several minutes later, she and Leandro walked back towards the front of the store, the wood floors creaking as if to welcome them back down to earth, back to normalcy. Nissa returned to her seat behind the counter, her face showing a bit more colour, her long hair a bit more light and shimmering.
Leandro slipped on his coat. From his portfolio briefcase, he pulled out a card and handed it to her.
“It is the number of the representative of the photographer I work with,” he said, “I believe she would be very much interested in speaking with you about photos.”
Nissa looked at the card then back at him, perking a brow upwards. “With you?” she asked.
Leandro picked up his portfolio from the counter and smiled. For the second time that afternoon he left saying, “Au revoir, Nissa.”
As he made his way to the door, this time Nissa was able to properly say, “Good-bye, Leandro” before he nodded and left. The bells rang out above and he was gone.
After watching the door for a moment, the world outside going about it’s business as usual, Nissa resumed reading her book. After ten minutes of staring at the same page, she glanced at the business card on the counter. Hesitantly, she put down the book and then reached for the card.
There was something cajoling about the ornate and elegant card, like a tickle of temptation from deep in the recess of Nissa’s mind. As if in a trance, she slid off her chair, and walked to the front door of the store. Locking it, she turned the “Closed” sign towards the streets. Taking up “Compulsions” in her arms, she disappeared into the back office of the store.
