Chapter Five

By the time Seth got home, I had cooked Jess dinner and thoroughly rotted her brain with reality TV. Honestly, it had been a great time. She wasn't my Little, but taking care of her had been nice. I had settled her in her highchair for dinner and fed her cut up bites of spaghetti and meatballs. We didn't use the chair's restraints - I didn't feel it was really my place to use Seth's toys that way - but caring for her, making her feel Little... was soothing.

After the sun set, after she had binged the entire season of her silly cooking show, I changed her diaper and put her into pink unicorn pajamas, a silly summer kigurumi with a horned hood. She giggled as I tickled her and told her that she was a very pretty unicorn but truth be told, it made me a bit sad. I kissed her once on the forehead before I raised the bars to her crib.

"Goodnight, cupcake," I said softly as I turned on her Fluttershy nightlight.

"Nighty night night, Nessa," she yawned, looking tiny and vulnerable in her crib. "Thank you for the lovely day - you're a great mommy. You're going to make some Little very, very happy."

"Thanks," my smile said, 'You are the sweetest, you make me happy' but it was a lie. I felt worn and sad inside. To have been so close to my desires and to know that Jess wasn't mine - I didn't want her, I didn't want Seth's Little, I would never, ever try to insert myself into their relationship... but I wanted a Little of my own. Someone to care for. My speech to Jess had been true; I had a need, a desire, that I could only share with someone like her - a submissive.

I pulled her door closed so she wouldn't wake when Seth got home and settled back onto his couch, flipping on Twitch and pulling up one of my favorite streamers.

When Seth finally stumbled through the door, it was late and he looked awful.

"Did the servers take you out back and beat you?" I teased him as I muted the TV. "There's some spaghetti left in the pot, Jess is already in bed."

"I ate," he groaned, flopping down on the couch next to me and kicking his shoes off. "Thanks for hanging with Jess. She's kind of fragile on the weekends, she's very much a creature of habit."

"Rough day?"

"Literal surgery," Seth replied, laying an arm over his eyes. "The dumb fucks bought their drives in a lot, which means that they all reached mean-time-to-failure at once... and they didn't call me until the second parity drive failed - the microcontroller literally burned out. I had to take a live drive from another array and cannibalize it for the board. Of course, they couldn't show me the problem, all they could do was mumble that it wasn't working."

I gave him a smile, a 'You poor soul', as I wrapped my arm around his shoulder.

"So what are you buying with the emergency fee you're dropping on that invoice?" I smirked. I knew him - he already had the money spent in his mind, probably on...

"A pink straitjacket," he grinned, sitting up. "The straps go around the thighs instead of between the legs for easy diaper changes."

Yep. Seth was still Seth, even though his usually calculated demeanor was shattered with exhaustion.

"I suppose there's just the matter of the babysitting bill," I deadpanned, sitting up as well. "Getting someone to watch your adult baby isn't cheap, after all."

"No joke, a pro sitter is like $300 an hour these days..." he winked, leaning into me until our shoulders touched, "but it was money well spent last time, my spanking technique is much improved." It was good to be close to him, we had been very close friends before Jess came into the picture... but lately it was getting hard to be around the both of them, especially after Lauren... "There's a treat waiting for you in your Blizzard account."

"You didn't have to, I was teasing," I smiled a wry smile - there was no point in trying to fake it with him, he could see through all of it.

"I hope Jess wasn't too bad," he was actually nervous... he needed reassuring.

"She was fine. We actually had a really good day, it was really nice to have someone to care for. I'm going to be perfectly blunt," I turned my body to face him, and he followed suit, turning his palms up as he rested his hands on his knees - it was a way that we signalled we were emotionally open to hard truths, it was easier to be vulnerable with your palms up. "I'm worried about her - when was the last time she saw her friends? When was the last time she went out without you?"

"I know," Seth sagged. "Believe it or not, I've been trying to get her to go... I messed up. I tried to make her wear a diaper under an outfit that wouldn't hide it well enough last time she was going out and... well, it didn't go well. She panicked and decided not to go instead... and I've been having trouble getting her to try again. She's afraid to go out unpadded, afraid to upset me, and she's not listening to me when I say it's okay. I'm not sure what to do."

"I'm in Redwood all week, what if I took her out one evening?" I was relieved - Seth wasn't trying to stop her, not honestly, it was Jess' insecurity that seemed to be the problem. A girls' night out might do her some good.

"Are you going to be up for it? This is a hatchet job, isn't it?" he asked. I winced, I never liked that term... but he was right, these jobs were emotionally draining. "Sorry. I know they're hard for you." Seeing him this way, open and vulnerable, disheveled and a little shaky, brought a small smile to my face. He hadn't shown this side to me in a while, and it was nice to connect with him when his Dom mask was down.

"I'll be fine, it's important. We'll go out for dinner and drinks and we'll just talk. She needs some adult time. Plus, I'll already be much closer than usual, no sweat."

"I agree," he laid back, sighing. "I've been worried about her too."

"Why didn't you say anything?" I laid a hand on his knee, telling him I was there for him.

"You've got enough on your plate, Vanessa. And irons in the fire. How's that going, by the way?" He looked over at me, making eye contact, his face concerned.

"I misread something," I admitted with a small shrug. "We're getting coffee on Wednesday morning... downgraded from dinner."

"Ouch," he winced, "what's the core?"

"Not sure yet. Texting," I shrugged. He, of course, had the same problem.

"I'm sorry it's rough," he consoled, "I know you'll find the right girl. You're a catch, and there are lots of subs out there just waiting to have their Little side unlocked."

"That's what I keep telling myself," the advice from him stung a little bit - it was the same advice I had given him when I was with Kailee and he was single... and it had worked for him, after all. It was actually hard to imagine him without Jess at this point.

* * *

"Don't worry," I assured the nervous manager, Benjamin, offering a smile that said 'All is right with the world, everything is going to be fine', "I'm here to help." He was twitchy in his aeron chair, sitting next to his modern art installation. It was a lie, of course, his entire team was on the chopping block.

"I know," he smiled weakly. From the movement of his body, I could tell his left leg was jittering under the table. He was lying as well, he was terrified. "Thank you for your help, we just need to figure out how we can right the ship. My team can really move the needle, I'm sure of it."

Ugh. Managers and their buzzword bullshit. Don't get me wrong - management is a valuable skill, a good one was worth their weight in gold, but this guy wasn't a good one. He was a passive aggressive bullshitter and he had blamed three members of his team already and I'd barely started. He was one of those "talk out of both sides of his mouth" weasels... which was only part of the problem. His entire team was warm bodies, subpar code monkeys who were hired to fill chairs so their growth numbers looked good to investors.

It backfired, the way it often did. Companies like A-Tech, which was a disgustingly generic name for a SAAS provider, were always better investing in a few rockstars rather than padding out a team with morons. They all knew why I was here, they all knew my reputation. I heard the whispers when I walked through the door... the Terminator is here.

I hated the name. I was an Systems Analyst, I found weaknesses in organizations and systems and I helped streamline them... it just so happened that the weaknesses I was best at finding were human.

The day was stressful, interview after interview, combing over code commits and roadmaps. The core service was valuable, but the management layer across the entire company was garbage.

"Hey," my blood froze as the voice came to my ears. I was hunched over a terminal, fingers flying across the keys... but I stopped dead at the syllable. I would know that voice anywhere even though I hadn't heard it in years.

"Aubrey," I greeted her coldly, not even bothering to turn around.

"Terminator," she responded derisively, stepping closer. She set a cup of coffee down gently on the desk beside the mouse and leaned on the back of my chair, her chin by my ear, elbows on either side of my head. "Funny seeing you here."

"I don't find it particularly amusing," I said evenly, though my heart was pounding. I didn't know she worked here. "What can I do for you?"

"You can do me a favor," she said softly. "Make sure Benny makes the cut." I brought up the org chart... Benjamin Harris, manager. Aubrey Brown, assistant. That weasel had his own assistant, and of all the people in the world, it had to be Aubrey.

"I can't discuss my analysis before it's complete," I said flatly.

"Oh I know," I could hear the smile on her lips, I knew what was coming next. "Kailee has some nice pictures of you though, the two of you doing some pretty... interesting things. I'm sure Jeff would love to see them." Jeffery was my contact here, the COO - and I knew what pictures she was talking about. They weren't particularly flattering. "I really like my job here, Nessa. I barely have to do anything at all, and Benny is a great lay. Don't fuck it up for me."

Shit.

"Blackmail is unbecoming," my voice was confident, but we both knew my position was weak.

"And yet it doesn't seem to bother me at all," she replied. "It's easy, just recommend that Benny gets moved to another department, we both know you're going to cut the brain trust that works under him."

"I make no promises."

"Oh I know," she stood, resting her hands on the back of the aeron. "You don't keep them anyway, Vanessa. Actually... I need two favors. The second will give me a nice signal that you're going to follow through with the first."

No.

"I would like very much," she began. My heart pounded. No. "If you gave Kailee a call." She finished the words I knew were coming in a whisper. "She misses her mommy."