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While it felt good to be protected and safe, I needed to be trusted to know my own limits too. IwantedLuke to trust me, and I was afraid that after our last scene, he didn’t anymore. I didn’t want to be treated with kid gloves—not physically, not emotionally. At least Luke didn’t try to “help me” or fix things the way Daniel did. I needed Luke to believe in my ability to cope, to take pain, to deal with it.
And I wanted him to get off on that too.
I wanted my pain to feed his pleasure and his pleasure to feed into my pain. I didn’t want Luke to only hurt me and get nothing back. I wanted that feedback loop, the call and response of something more…
“You’re a million miles away,” Sensei Kato said, clapping his hands in front of my face. “I asked what brought you here, but I see from your sweat-stained pits “—he gestured at my t-shirt—“that you were getting some aggression out with Joey.”
Joey was Sensei Junior, but only his father called him by his real name.
“I kicked his ass,” Sensei Junior said, punching at the computer with just his index fingers, scowling like it was currently kicking his. “He’s gotten weak.”
I shrugged. “I didn’t come here to win. I just came to fight.”
Sensei grunted. “You were gifted in Aikido. You transferred kinetic energy so well. You could easily topple men twice your size. But now you’re all about the violence. Where did I go wrong with you and Joey?”
“It’s the testosterone, Dad,” Sensei Junior said. “Minty and I have too much of it.”
“That fairy? Too much testosterone?” The whisper reached us from the clot of parents still helping their kids into their shoes and coats.
Sensei turned.
All the parents went quiet, and their darted glances let us all know just which man had made the nasty remark.
“That’s not acceptable here. I never want to hear anything like it again,” Sensei barked. Then he turned back to me, put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed. “Ignore that piss ant.”
“Ignore him?” I asked loudly, putting my hand over my heart. “After he called me afairy?What a compliment! He must think I’m beautiful.” I batted my lashes at the dad in question.
Gritting his teeth, the man rushed out with his embarrassed son following at his heels.
I laughed.
It felt good to laugh. I hadn’t done enough of it lately. Here with the fluorescent dojo lights and Sensei protecting my honor and Sensei Junior about to toss the computer in the trash can, I felt a glimmer of what my post-rape-but-pre-diagnosis life had been. This evening at the dojo hadn’t been as mind-silencing as one spent in Luke’s basement, but it had been enticingly, seductively normal.
Could Ihavenormal again? Was I allowed?
And what about the symbiotic relationship I wanted with Luke? The give and take of lust and pain… but also something more than that. Something personal and real. Was that something I could have before I died? Would Luke want to give it?
Probably not. After my confession, I’d be lucky to get one more scene in the basement before Luke called it quits. I’d seen the discomfort in his eyes. He’d tried to hide it, but it was all over him like perfume.
My gut twisted. Renewed anxiety snaked in. The old temptation to go to Kyle’s dorm wormed into my mind…
No.
I shook my head, determined to stick to the conditions of my contract until Luke gave up on me. Which would undoubtedly be sooner rather than later.
Hell, it’d probably be tomorrow.
Chapter Eleven
‡
Luke
“Have a seat,”I said, pointing to the sofa in my living room. “Before we go downstairs, I want to talk.”
“But wearegoing downstairs?” Minty asked, his expression growing tight and wary. I thought he might walk right back out the door if I said no.
“Of course. We agreed to a scene today.”
