For His Taking (For His Pleasure, Book 2) (The Submission of Miss Masters, Domination, BDSM) by Kelly Favor

engagement ring?”
    “You returned it, I assume.”
    “No. Not yet.”
    Her mother stopped kneading the meat and turned to her. “Why not?”
    “I don’t know.” Nicole was chopping veggies for the salad, but her knife was paused momentarily. “I suppose the right opportunity hasn’t presented itself.”
    “There’s no right opportunity to return an engagement ring, Nicole.”
    “True.”
    “You need to send it back to him as soon as you get home. Stick it in the mail and be done with it.”
    Nicole hated to admit it, but her mom had a point. Keeping that ring stuffed away in her shoe was just holding on to the past. A few tears rolled down her cheek now, as she thought about the act of putting her engagement ring in an envelope.
    She was crying as she chopped the veggies, but it was okay. There were enough raw onions to have an excuse.

    ***
    She got back to the city the next afternoon and rushed home, wanting—needing—
    to get the ring out in the mail that day before the last pickup.
    It was still there, stuffed into the toe of her shoe. She dug it out and unwrapped it from the surrounding tissue paper. There it was, glimmering in the sunlight that streamed through her bedroom window. Nicole sat on her bed and stared at it, turning the ring over in her hands.
    Saying goodbye to it was like saying a final goodbye to him. They’d only been together a short time, an inconsequential amount of time, really. Everyone had pointed that out to her, as if the heart cared a whit about time.
    As far as her heart was concerned, Nicole and Red had loved each other for eternity and then some. Yet, intellectually she could explain how false that sensation was. Love required time and patience and attention, it took years to build a real, lasting relationship.
    Then why did this feel like agony? If their short time together had been so meaningless and silly, why did she feel like this was going to kill her spirit?
    Nicole couldn’t explain her emotions away. She was crying again as she wrapped the ring in newspaper until it was indistinguishable from anything else that might end up in an envelope. The last thing she wanted was for some nosey mail carrier to figure out what was in this plain looking envelope being delivered to the fancy house in Connecticut.
    At around four o’clock, Nicole went to the nearest drop box and, without hesitation, pushed her envelope down the dark hole where it joined hundreds if not thousands of other similar pieces of mail.
    Now it was truly done with.

    ***
    A day and a half later, Nicole was at her first Yoga class. She’d decided that she needed to get out of the apartment more. Less watching TV and eating ice cream with Danielle, more motivating and getting the blood flowing again.
    There was a tiny Yoga studio called Nirvana, just down the street from their apartment, and they had classes on Wednesday night at 7pm, which worked perfectly for her.
    The only problem with the class was that she’d been ambitious and signed up for an intermediate session. The main reason she’d chosen this particular class was that it fit her work schedule best. And then she’d assumed that having done a bit of Yoga with friends in college (and considering herself to be young and somewhat fit), she wouldn’t have too much trouble adjusting to the intermediate poses.
    She’d been very, very wrong.
    From the start of the class, Nicole had known she was in for it. The instructor was this tiny little woman with a severe expression on her face and the attitude of a drill sergeant. Her name was Lilly and she yelled a lot for a Yoga teacher.
    “Marianne, straighten your left leg. No straighten it. Okay, I’ll come over and do it for you!”
    This was a typical rejoinder. Lilly would adjust arms and legs and make comments the whole time, usually about how lazy or bad everyone was at doing the positions.
    Nicole was sweating and shaking from the first asana. By the time they’d gotten to downward dog, she