InstructionbySeduction

Jessica
Shin

You do not open the box. The box
opens you.

When Leah picks up an ornate box at
a flea market she knows it’s special. But she has no idea how her life as a sexually
disappointed college student and grocery store cashier will be transformed.

Through forces unknown, the box summons
Hale—a man who knows Leah inside and out. He uses their no-strings-attached sexual
escapades—which include a hot threesome and light bondage—as lascivious lessons
to teach Leah what she needs to succeed in her job, education and
relationships.

With each sexual encounter growing
more and more extreme, Leah comes away challenged and questioning everything.
But will Leah listen to her new instincts and embrace the life of her dreams or
will she continue to hide in her old and comfortable but self-defeating ways?

An
Exotika®
paranormal erotic romance
from Ellora’s Cave

The Flea Market

The October morning of the flea market was overcast but not
raining. Good thing too because half the tables weren’t under the protection of
the tents. Leah shuffled along the tables huddled under her too-thin jacket,
looking for something interesting. There was always
something
interesting at a flea market.

Old toys, tools and made-in-China trinkets littered the long
lines of tables. Leah paused to inspect a gargoyle statue, saw the price then
moved on.
Maybe someday. When that gargoyle isn’t half my paycheck.

Leah pulled the jacket tightly against her body as a gust of
Kansas wind swept through the market. She shivered.
I should have looked
harder at garage sales for winter coats
, she thought wistfully.

Rounding a corner to move on to the next line of tables,
Leah noticed an elderly Asian man sitting behind his table, eyes closed, almost
looking as though he were meditating. She neared the table, her flea-market-prize-find
sensors going off. The most interesting stuff was always sold by unique people.

Leah’s gaze swept a table filled with teapots, cups and a few
jade pieces, all very nice even though clearly secondhand. She picked up a
small plate and admired the painting of a lotus blossom. Then suddenly a
curious sensation unraveled within her, as if she were somewhere familiar. Leah
looked up and around her expecting to see someone she knew but the few diehards
out this early in the day were none that she were acquainted with.

Looking back at the table, Leah felt purposely led toward
one small object hidden in the interior of the table behind a statue. She
reached around and picked up the box resting there. Immediately the feeling of
familiarity consumed her and she shivered.

Mine
, she thought fiercely before she could even
inspect the box, then chastised herself.
Not yours. Not yet.

The old man opened his eyes and watched Leah as she ran her
finger across the slivers of ivory inlaid in the box that rested comfortably in
the palm of her hand. The intricate carvings in the dark wood were rough but
done with care and purpose. This box meant something.

“You like?” the old man asked.

“Very much,” Leah said softly. “I’ve never seen anything
quite like it.”

“Box very special. I will only sell to the right person.”

Leah smiled. She’d heard that story before.

“I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.” She stared at the
box then looked up to meet the old man’s eyes. To her surprise there was no
sparkle of jest in his eyes or a smirk of humor on his lips. Instead there was
only serious honesty about him.

“Only to the right person,” he repeated. “Box very special.
Box makes dreams come true.”

Leah couldn’t believe the acceptance she felt of his words.
Sure, it was a neat box but magical? Mystical?
Please.

“How much?” she asked.

“Sixty-five.”

Leah winced inwardly. That was every dime she had with her,
including the bus fare for her ride home and some grocery money. Good God. Was
it really that rare, that valuable? Just a little box?

“Does that mean I’m the right person?”

“You are the only person I sell box to.”

Leah pushed up on the crease to open the box but it wouldn’t
budge, almost as if there were no lid but just a square of wood cut to look
like a box. She turned it around and saw the hinges that would allow it to open
then tried it again. But still the lid held fast.

“How do you open it? Ancient Chinese secret?”

“You do not open box. Box opens you. Lid will come up only
when you are ready for what is inside.”

“And what is inside?”

“Truth.”

Leah paused, staring down at the enchanting piece of wood in
her hands that she couldn’t seem to put down.
Truth, huh? This old man is
going to take me for a ride.

“I’ll give you forty-five for it.”

“Price is sixty-five.”

“Fine, fifty. But no more.”

“Sixty-five. No less. Box must be sacrifice.”

“If I give you sixty-five I won’t be able to get home.”

“Must be…sacrifice.”

Leah met the eyes of the old man, his brown ones boring
holes into her green ones. His seriousness struck her. He wasn’t just a
salesman trying to get a better price for his wares. He believed every word of
what he said. Leah couldn’t shake the feeling that he was looking into her, through
her, knowing her with just a look. She wouldn’t be surprised if he’d already
known exactly how much cash she had on her.

“Sorry,” she whispered. “Can’t do it.”

Leah set the box back down on the table feeling like she’d
ripped one of her fingers off to do it. She looked back up at the old man.

“I hold onto box for you. You be back.”

Leah turned away without trying to argue with him. The farther
she walked away from the table the greater the torment raged within her. It
seemed like she’d given something personal away when she left the box, as if it
already belonged to her. Even more than belonging…it was part of her.

The remaining tables were filled with useless junk. All she
could think about was the box. She tried to distract herself with some antique
books, a usual flea market favorite for her, but they were no more interesting
to her than her college statistics book.

An hour later it was midmorning and the rush of market-goers
had arrived. While the usual suspects perused the various tables and jockeyed
for position around the old favorites, all Leah could think of while she dodged
people was the box. How it felt in her hand—like something she’d always had
with her. How it looked like it really could make her dreams come true.

A sudden panic seized Leah.
What if someone else buys it?
What if someone else is there at the old man’s table this very moment,
convincing him it belongs to them? They probably have the sixty-five and more
too.

“Shit,” Leah said, drawing some disapproving glances from
those around her. She put down the ornate candleholder she was pretending to
look at and turned away from the table. She jostled her way through the crowds,
her panic growing so badly she could taste it. She had to get back to the table
and get her hands on the box before anyone else did.

Leah ran into a fiftysomething man who cursed at her. She
jumped over a woman’s dog. Her heartbeat pounded painfully in her throat as
images of someone walking away with her box ran through her head. She slid to a
stop in front of the old man’s table. He was busy taking money from a middle-aged
woman for one of the teapots. Leah scanned the table for the box.
No box. No
!

“Sir,” Leah interrupted, bringing a sour gaze from the
teapot woman, who was chatting it up with the old man. She didn’t care. “The
box? Where is it? I need it!”

The teapot woman shook her head and turned away with her
purchase muttering something about rude kids. Leah held back her usual
I’m-older-than-I-look
as she was holding her breath waiting for the old man to respond.

“I told you you come back.”

“Yes you did and yes I did. The box, please. Tell me you
didn’t sell it to someone else.”

The old man smiled and chuckled, surprising Leah. What could
possibly be so funny? He leaned over and reached under the table. When he
righted himself and she saw the box sitting in his hands, she exhaled a very
heavy sigh of relief.

“I told you I keep it for you.”

“Thank you.”

Without a second thought Leah pulled out her wallet and
handed the old man two twenties, two tens and five ones. Every last bit of
foldable money in her possession. She nearly dropped the cash on the table in
her urgency to feel the box in her hands once more.

As her fingers slid across the rough and smooth edges of the
carvings on the box, she immediately relaxed. She felt whole again. She cupped
the box and closed her eyes.

“Don’t forget what I tell you,” the man said. “It opens only
when you are ready. You cannot open box. Box opens you.”

Leah nodded. She turned away without looking at him again.
She had a long walk home.

Leah made her tired way through the crowded hallway toward
her classroom. She’d had to work late the night before, closing up the
FoodSmart where she worked as a cashier. The two morning classes already under
her belt had drained her and she contemplated skipping her public speaking
class. It was always such a stressful class anyway.

She didn’t know if she could do it again but she found
herself in the room, sitting her chair anyway. Her plans for truancy usually
ended up that way.

As the other students trailed into the room Leah suddenly
felt very old. She looked young enough to fit in but she knew she was at least
several years older than the oldest other student in the class.
Putting off
college for four years will do that to a girl
. Going less than full time
would make her older and older as each year passed but she could only take as
many classes as her measly scholarship and family donations could cover.

“Okay class, let’s get started,” the teacher said. Mrs.
Larson was an amiable, pretty woman and even though she taught one of the most-feared
courses at Wichita State University she was well-liked by the students. She
beamed a good-morning smile that even Leah couldn’t resist returning.

The class covered tactics for sharing personal experiences
in a speech and Leah tried to pay attention. She didn’t see a career in public
speaking in her future but she did want to get a good grade.

As the class period came to an end, Mrs. Larson clapped her
hands and said, “Okay everyone. Time for thinking on your feet.”

The requisite groans ensued as everyone prepared to look
anywhere but at the teacher, thinking that if they didn’t make eye contact they
wouldn’t get called on. Leah was right there with them, busying herself with
some lint on her jeans.

“Tell me about a time when you felt very strongly about
something and acted on that feeling…Leah?”

Leah felt the air drain out of her. She could barely
remember the question as she stood from her seat and looked around at the
class. Something about a strong feeling… Leah racked her brain but all she
could think of was the box.

“Thank you, Mrs. Larson,” Leah heard herself say, speaking
the rote words all students knew to begin with by then. “A time when I had a
strong feeling and acted on it…was when…um…a few months ago…”

“She got laid at a frat party,” some smartass said from
across the room.

“She’s too fat to get laid.”

“Too fat to get frat.”

Snickers ensued.

Leah cut her eyes to the general area but couldn’t be sure
which of the morons had said it. She blinked and swallowed, trying to remember
the question again. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Mrs. Larson pointing
toward the door. One of the students sighed, then got up and left the
classroom.

“Please Leah, continue.”

Continue
?
I haven’t even said anything.
Leah
felt the heat of embarrassment creeping up her collar and was certain her face
was turning as red as her hair.

“Um I was at this flea market a few months ago…”

Leah tried to ignore some more snickers and a comment about
her wardrobe coming from a flea market.

“And there was this old Chinese guy with a box and…and…”

Leah faltered. She couldn’t express how she felt about the
box to herself, much less to this group of hateful snobs. Even if she could
express it, it was ridiculous. It made no sense. They would just ridicule her
all the more.

“So he was a really good salesman.” Leah hated herself. “And
he told me all kind of mystical stories about this box and how it brought rain
to a town in China that was having a drought. So I bought the box.”

Leah sat down and stared at her desktop, feeling the sting
of tears behind her eyes.

“Have you called Jenny yet?” some jerk said.

“Okay, that’s it for the day, class. See you all on
Wednesday.”

The class moved around Leah but she couldn’t lift herself
from the seat. She was afraid that if she moved she would erupt into a Niagara
Falls of tears. When the room was quiet around her, she heard Mrs. Larson say
softly, “Leah, I’m so sorry.”

Words of compassion were not what Leah needed to hold
herself together. The tears sprang from her eyes as she launched herself out of
her seat.

“Leah, please, can you stay for a minute?”

“I have to get to work.” Leah sniffed as she ripped open the
door and ran out into the hall.

The cold Kansas wind froze the tears in Leah’s eyes as she
walked back to her apartment. It steeled her against the cruel comments of her
classmates and got her home in one piece…until she walked inside and closed the
door behind her.

Leah leaned against the closed door and let the tears fall.
She choked on them, not even bothering to wipe them away or cover her face.

* * * * *

“Did you find everything you were looking for?” Leah asked
the customer as he began filling the conveyor belt with his groceries.

“Yes, thank you,” he said.

“Great.” Leah flashed him a smile. He smiled back. It was
forced and Leah knew it but even a fake smile makes you feel better inside.

“Is plastic okay, sir?” Leah’s coworker Kelly asked from the
other side of the register.

“Sure.”

Leah and Kelly took care of the man and sent him on his way.

“Slow day today,” Kelly said, pulling the band out of her
long blonde hair and re-tying it to get all the loose ends.

“Yeah,” Leah said absently.

“What’s up with you today? You seem all distracted and not
nearly as chipper as usual.”

“I got all chippered out at class this morning. I think I’m
going to switch to night classes.”

“Why?”

“More adults in night classes. Fewer stupid juveniles.”

“True but it’ll put a monkey wrench in your schedule here.”

Leah shrugged. “Kelly, do you think I need to call Jenny
Craig?”

“What?” Kelly asked with a laugh. “Why do you say that?”

“Some kid said it in class this morning.”

“Oh Jesus. Okay, I see what you mean. It would be shit to go
through class with rejects like that.”

“Watch your language—Bob’s here.”

“Is he? Thanks. I’ve already been written up once.”

“So do you think so?”

“Think what?”

“Jenny Craig?”

“Oh Leah. You’re not fat. Sure, you’ve got a few extra
pounds—who doesn’t? Just cut out the sweets for a few weeks.”

“I’m more than forty pounds over my ideal body weight.”

“Don’t listen to those assholes. Oops, I mean those jerks.
Don’t measure yourself against someone else’s standards.”

“Easy for you to say.”

“Don’t worry about them, Leah. You’re twice as smart as
they’ll ever be.”

“Is that why I’m working at the FoodSmart?”

“Smartass.”

Leah finished her shift, closed the store and made her way
home on her aging bicycle. She carried it up the two flights of stairs to her
government-subsidized student housing and wheeled it into the living room.

The apartment was a good deal for a student. Small but
functional, reasonably priced and close to the school. Leah had waited a year
for a spot to open up and was overjoyed when she moved in. It was her first
place to live in all on her own even though she was twenty-seven.

Leah dropped her bag on the sofa and walked into the
bathroom. A hot bath was in order after a day like that. As the water filled
the tub, Leah stripped off her clothes in the bedroom. She wanted to jet past
the full-length mirror on the way out but stopped and turned back.

Her eyes moved across every curve of bare skin so intently
she could almost feel a caress. Smooth, fair skin, a few ripples here and there
that she didn’t really care for but she didn’t hate them. She didn’t hate
herself. Why did they?

“She’s too fat to get frat,” she whispered, then shook her
head.

Leah sighed a long exhale as she slid into the hot bath water.
Who needs those losers? The real world isn’t like that. Or at least not that
bad. Just a few more years.

Sitting up, Leah pulled a bunch of bubbles toward her and
rubbed them across her chest. They crackled as she crushed them and circled
them across her shoulders and arms and breasts.

“It ends now,” Leah said aloud. “I’m not going to take their
crap anymore and I’m not letting anyone make me cry. Everything is a choice.
And I choose to love me for me. I don’t give a fuck-all what anyone else
thinks.”

Wet and clean, Leah lifted herself from the bath water
feeling renewed and strangely stronger.
The wonders of a good self-pep talk
.
She wrapped a towel around herself, tucked the corner to keep it on and walked
back into her bedroom.

The box was on her dresser sitting wide open.

Leah stood paralyzed. In the months that had passed since
she bought it she had never been able to open it. She’d tried everything but
still it remained unmoved. And now there it was wide open for the world to see,
all on its own.

You do not open the box
.

Leah took several cautious steps toward her favorite mystery,
afraid to blink and lose the illusion of the openness. But the closer she got
the vision remained the same. The box was open. It was no mirage.

Swallowing hard, Leah reached up to the top of the dresser
and picked up the box. Her heart pounded painfully. What was in it? Had the old
man just smoked too much opium back in the day? Truth? The box was open.
You
do not open the box.

With a shaking hand, Leah lowered the box until she could
see inside it.

It was empty.

Bang, bang, bang.

Leah yelped and dropped the box. The banging on her
apartment door sounded ten times as loud as it really was. She looked down,
panicked that she’d dropped the box. Certainly it was closed now. Certainly it
knew she was unworthy and careless and would be keeping all of its secrets to itself.

But the box remained open, sitting upright on the carpet.
Leah bent over and picked it back up, then impulsively tried to close it. The
lid would not move. Leah laughed, a sound of freakish bewilderment. She pushed
hard but the more she tried to force it the less the lid would budge.

Bang, bang, bang.

“Who’s there?” Leah yelled.

No answer.

Leah put the box back on the dresser and walked into the
living room.

“Who is it?” she called again. Still nothing.

Against her better judgment Leah continued to move toward
the door, covered in nothing but her towel. Then she felt it again—that strange
familiarity she’d experienced at the flea market. Something that belonged to
her was near.

“Who’s there?” This time it was no more than a whisper. It
didn’t matter. She was going to open the door no matter what.

The deadbolt turned under Leah’s fingers. The click that
meant the difference between safety and vulnerability resounded through the
apartment like a shattered dish.

She grasped the door handle and turned it, feeling the scene
move before her in slow motion. When she pulled it open, she didn’t know what
to expect. A ghost? Chinese poltergeist? Her mother?

The man standing there was some kind of dream, perfect in
every way. He looked like he could have hung out with the Rat Pack in Vegas.
His dark-brown hair was cut short and clean, the perfect complement to his
basic black suit and white shirt. His black tie had tiny silver lines across
it. His green eyes had a hint of mischief in them and one corner of his mouth was
turned up into a bad-boy smirk. His hands were stuck casually in his pockets.

“Hey.” With a short nod of his head, he proceeded to push
past Leah into her apartment. As he passed her, Leah shrank in shock at the
feeling that swelled within her. A feeling that had been sadly dormant for many
long months, maybe even years. Desire…passion…even lust. And here she was
feeling it for someone she’d never laid eyes on before.

Leah stood, her mouth agape as this stranger walked into her
kitchen. The late January wind blowing straight into her apartment went
completely unnoticed. The man opened her refrigerator and said, “Do you have
any import beer in here?”

“Top shelf, right-hand side.” Leah said, still reeling. The
stranger reached in and grabbed a Smithwick’s.

“That’s exactly where I would have put it,” he said. “You
going to close that door? It’s colder than a penguin on ice cream out there.”

Leah closed the door and turned the deadbolt out of habit.
She was half expecting the man to be gone when she turned back but instead he
was rummaging through the utensil drawer. He pulled out a bottle opener and
cracked open the beer.

“Okay, what’s going on?” Leah walked toward the kitchen, her
brain beginning to thaw. “Who are you and why are you drinking my beer?”

The man took a long pull on the beer and set it down on the
kitchen counter. He turned back to her, crossed his arms and leaned against the
counter.

“I’m Hale. And I’m drinking your beer because I prefer
imports over domestics.”

“What a coincidence, me too. Now why are you in my
apartment?”

Hale’s eyes met hers in a very knowing but serious look.

“You asked for me. I can make your dreams come true.”

The room spun around Leah.
Box makes dreams come true
.
She thought of the open box in her bedroom. Open, not closed.
You can’t open
the box
. Again desire pulsed through her and she closed her eyes.
Wrong!
No! Go away!

“You’re not going to pass out, are you?” Hale asked. “I hope
not. I prefer people conscious.”

Leah shook her head. The improbability of it all—no, the
impossibility…

“It’s not impossible. Don’t you think that everything is a
choice?”

Leah nodded.

“Then can’t you choose to make something happen?”