I pop another one before the elevator opens. My stomach lining is doomed anyway.
I text Ian saying I’m here, and he says the door has been left unlocked while he finishes something up in his library. When I enter, locking the door behind me, I find the place as I left it. Ian definitely lives in a bachelor pad, but it’s homey. I don’t doubt he gets the place professionally cleaned once or twice a week, but he isn’t a slob either. There’s one dish in the sink and few spots on the carpet around the TV. The most clutter comes from books on the coffee table and cat toys strewn across the living room.
A cat. The man has a freakin’ cat. With an almost impossible to pronounce Irish name, because deep inside, he’s a pretentions fuck.
When he comes out of the library, dressed in business casual and offering me a drink, I clench my thighs shut. It ain’t happening tonight.
Business talk over bourbon. Sitting across from each other in the living room. No sweet talk. No covert touches. It really is business.
Important business.
Ian wants me to join him on his remodel project. Apparently he cleared it with our fathers so I could be properly paid for my services. All I need to do is bring Anita to help me and, you know, pay her as I always do.
This whole time I’ve barely drunk any of the bourbon, but now I guzzle it. Should’ve done that earlier, because it’s doing wonders to numb my cramps.
“Didn’t have any other plans, did you?” he asks, half-empty glass in his hand as he dangles his arm over the back of his couch. “I assumed that your schedule was empty right now.”
“You assumed right.” My plans were the museum. Now that it’s put on hold, I have to figure something else to do with my time. Take some classes. Find a new cause I can champion. Go on vacation in Europe, where the subs are plenty and uncircumcised.
Ugh. Domination.
I don’t know if it’s my period or my mental health right now, but I have been so turned off ever since I left this place on Sunday morning. My mind is in constant turmoil over it. Do I need to purge my system and dominate a guy? Or do I need something else?
Until I came here tonight, I thought it was the former more than the latter. Now that I’m here…
I can’t stop staring at him. How handsome he is in slick trousers and that light pink shirt with the top three buttons undone. Stubble on his chin, his cheek, but contained. I can smell his nice cologne over here, and it makes me feel… comforted.
No way can I forget what happened this weekend. I went too far with him… yet he proved to be a better man than I ever thought in how he handled it after the fact.
All this time I’ve thought Ian Mathers was a stuck-up rich boy who indiscriminately used women because, well, that’s what men in these circles do. So many enter BDSM as Doms because they wanna spank and choke women who line up to have it happen to them. Sure, lots of them have great relationships, but as a woman, let alone a Domme, I’m always wary of a Dom’s true intentions.
Maybe Ian isn’t any of those things. He’s a decent guy. Maybe a great one.
I want a relationship with him.
Now hear me out. I’ve thought a lot about this. I’m not… in love with the guy. Not like that. Besides, let’s be honest. He and I are so same that we’re too different for each other. I don’t want to be a sub fulltime. I barely want to do more exploration into that side of myself.
This is why it won’t work out between him and me. Not on a serious relationship front.
He knows that too. That’s probably why he hasn’t made a move on me since I got here.
“I’ll do it,” I say. “What do you need? Administrative work?”
“Somewhat. I need help keeping the contracts in line and making sure everything goes according to plan. It would be nice having one person I can trust instead of a few I barely know from Adam.”
“You trust me?”
He looks at me as if he should be the one asking me that. “You have a vested interest in the quick completion and success of this project. So, yes. That said, we start in a week. The sale will take about a month to complete, but until then we can start making the arrangements. I’ll also need you to write some copy for the press. You’re way more experienced at that than I am.”
Yup.
“Sounds good.” I can barely look at him right now. The more I do, the more I think about going to the couch and making a fool of myself.
Kissing him. Holding him. Feeling his hands on me as I do whatever the fuck I want to him. Ugh!
I’d destroy him.
He’d destroy me.
This wouldn’t be a volatile relationship at all.
“Ian,” I say after a few moments of silence. “We need to talk. About the other thing.”
He pours himself another drink. “Sure.”
“I’ve been thinking a lot since I left here Sunday.” I don’t know how I should approach this. Physically or verbally. On one hand I want to hold his hand and confess everything I feel. On the other? I want to hold myself to this chair and never look him in the eye. There is still a lot I’m coming to grips with in my heart and mind.
My body, meanwhile, knows damn well what it wants.
“Let’s face it, Ian, we’re in a thick forest here with few breadcrumbs to get out. Especially if we’re going to work together.”
He smiles at my analogy. I melt a little inside. Even this cold Domme has ways of unwinding. Fuck, I’m thinking like him.
“What’s going on here, exactly?”
The smile fades. That’s right, buddy, I’m gonna make you talk now.
“I figured this is casual. If it ever happens again.” He drinks. “Vanilla sex, that is.”
Only people like us would have to specify that it’s vanilla. “So, hooking up like we did those first couple of times.”
“Preferably with a bed here and there, yes.” That smile is back.
“All right.” Casual sex. I think I can handle that. “So we’re not a… thing.”
“It wouldn’t work out, Katie.”
Every time he says my name like that, I want to shiver. This time, I go for it, letting my whole body display what he does to me. “After this weekend, that is very clear.”
“It’s nobody’s fault, Just how we are.”
“That’s the thing.” I can’t believe I’m saying this. I can’t even believe I’ve been constantly thinking about this for days. Every time I close my eyes, I see him towering over me, whispering filth into my ear as he gets ready to smack me, hold me down, come inside me. I’m disgusted and turned on all at once. “What if it’s not how I am?”
He’s intrigued, but listening.
“What if I am a switch?”
“Katie…”
“I’m serious. What we did Saturday night was fucking hot. No, I wasn’t ready for a lot of it… but I think I could do it again in the future.”
“Katie.”
“No, listen to me. I couldn’t be your fulltime sub, Ian, that’s true, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to keep exploring…” Does he want to say something? I don’t let him. “There’s a lot we could offer each other in that department.”
“You’re talking about trying to submit some more?”
“Yes. I could only do it with you.”
Ian leans forward, those sharp eyes of his coming dangerously close even though he’s still an easy five feet away. “Why?”
I feel vulnerable. More vulnerable than when I was handcuffed to his bed getting ready to be fucked bareback for the first time. “I trust you,” I try to say with conviction. However, my voice trembles. Only a little.
“You’re asking a lot of me.” There’s a growl in his throat. Not one trying to overpower me, but a side of his true self. “This weekend was emotional for me as well. You put me through a lot of ups and downs. I would be at the whims of your emotions and what you can handle on any given day.”
“I don’t mean all the time, Ian. Maybe just… once in a while. In between the casual hookups.”