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“Abigail.”
Yes.
I recalled the words I’d typed this afternoon in reply to the question the blog reader sent. In this position I will find my soul satisfied. My body slipped deeper into my headspace.
“I wasn’t expecting either the note or to find you waiting like this,” he said.
“To be honest, when you told me I couldn’t wear your collar, I wasn’t planning to either.”
He sighed deeply and walked farther inside the room. “I may as well have stayed at home today. I was completely worthless.”
“I’m sorry, Sir. I didn’t mean to make your day more difficult.”
“You didn’t make it difficult. I thought about a lot of things.” When he spoke again, I heard the smile in his voice. “And had you been there, I wouldn’t have done a lot of thinking.”
“I agree,” I said and I’m sure my smile matched his. “I did a lot of thinking as well.”
“I had a chance to read your blog before I left to come home.”
Earlier in the day, I’d posted the questions I’d answered. Meagan had called shortly after to say the office was getting flooded with questions for me and I would have my pick of what I decided to answer on the show. We had a meeting scheduled for early next week to go over the finer details.
“I hope you enjoyed my posting, Sir.”
“I did.” He chuckled and the sound made me smile. “I especially enjoyed how you turned down the gentleman who came on to you.”
I laughed. “I will never stop being surprised at how people act, Sir.”
“I agree. Humans are entertaining.”
Silence followed his statement and the brief frivolity that had been present left the room. The bed rustled as he stood.
“In Delaware, when it hit me that for even the tiniest of seconds, you thought I might cheat on you, it shook me like I haven’t been shaken in years. That you would think me capable of that.”
“I’m sorry.” His words felt like a punch to my gut.
“I shouldn’t have come into the room that night. I should have never taken you when I was so angry, but I had to prove to myself you were still mine.” He framed my face with his hands and pressed his forehead to mine. His breath was warm against my skin. “It made me feel like an ass and part of me didn’t want to tell you that because I know you and I know hearing me say it will hurt you. And it pains me when you hurt.”
“I’m glad you told me, though.” But he was right: hearing how my words and actions negatively affected him wasn’t easy, but he was right to tell me. I needed to know, just as I had to tell him when he hurt me.
“Your feelings are never wrong. You are entitled to them and I would never tell you otherwise. But you need to know how I feel, too, and when you say and do things that make it sound like you don’t trust me? That hurts me, too.”
“I trust you with Charlene,” I said. “I know you would never do anything to hurt our marriage or compromise your integrity.”
“It’s good to hear you say that, because she accepted the position when I met with her after work.”
I had expected as much, so hearing him say it didn’t surprise me. What surprised me was how it didn’t affect me the way I thought it would. Realizing that my struggle with my submissive nature was normal, and something other submissives experienced too, had helped me realize that just because I felt jealous didn’t mean I didn’t trust Nathaniel. That woman’s question had helped me remember it’s only human to experience contradictory emotions. But I had always trusted Nathaniel and that was the most important thing. Whether Charlene could be trusted or not was another story, but I realized too that it didn’t matter because I could trust him to handle her.
“I know you made the right decision. You’ve run the business for a long time and you’ve been overseeing the nonprofit for just as long. If you didn’t know what you were doing, neither one would be as well-off as they are today.”
“Thank you for saying that, but I do on occasion make a mistake. I’m confident, however, that hiring Charlene isn’t one of them.”
“I no longer doubt it, Sir.”
“Thank you.”
He moved and stood behind me. His fingertips brushed the nape of my neck and I shivered at his touch.
“Another thing.” His fingers tangled in my hair. “I have a question for you, my lovely. Are we going to do this your way, or my way?”
My heart thumped in my throat and my need for him and what he was doing grew. I barely managed to get out, “Your way, Sir.”
The fingers in my hair fisted and he pulled so I met his eyes. “Be sure, Abigail.”
They say the eyes are windows to the soul and in that moment, it was true. In his eyes I found the answers I’d been searching for. “I’ve never been more sure, Sir.”
He didn’t answer immediately, but took his time, appearing to search my expression for verification of my words. Whatever he was looking for, his own features relaxed and he whispered, “Stand for me now.”
He kept his hand in my hair as I stood, pulling me into his arms when I came to my feet. Lowering his head to mine, he murmured against my lips, “I missed you.”
I wrapped my arms around him. It felt so good to be sheltered in his embrace. I sighed, content once more. “Life is lonely without you.”
His lips slowly moved over mine, seeking, looking for answers to questions he couldn’t voice. There was a gentle softness in his kiss that felt like a caress. And when he started a tender nibbling with only his mouth, I groaned in pleasure and tried to deepen the kiss.
He pulled back and whispered against my skin, “My way.”
I ran my nails over the fabric on his back. “I want you.” It was a need, urging me to drive closer and have him.
“My way,” he said again and reinforced his words by taking my hands and bringing them behind my back. “Keep them here.”
I wanted to protest, but his softly spoken, “Abigail,” made me stop.
“I’m not going to take you now,” he said. “But if I were, it wouldn’t be strength that I would claim you with. I would take you with a gentle whisper and control you with the faintest touch. Do you know why?”
“Because you’re a sadist?” I replied and I meant it a little.
“Because I don’t command you by force.”
I knew that, of course. My submission was given to him because he didn’t demand it. I still wanted to whine.
“Submission that is coerced. Obedience given in fear. Supplication offered because it feels it has no other option. These are not things that have a place in our world. They don’t belong in any relationship and I will not have them in ours.”
“You’re afraid I’m going to say I want to extend the time I’m collared because I feel I have to in order to make you happy?” I narrowed my eyes at him. “Don’t you know me better than that?”
“I used to think so.”
That one hurt. Was he implying he felt like he didn’t know me anymore?
He sighed. “The thing is, I need to know that extending our time is something you really want to do.”
“I do, Sir.”
“You’ll have to forgive me if I’m not one hundred percent convinced of that. You’ve said it before, but it’s not how you’ve behaved.”
I started to panic. What if he never wanted to collar me again? How would we live like that? We couldn’t. “What can I do to convince you?”
“I want you to give serious thought to what you want our relationship to look like. Think it through well. We’ll discuss it next Friday night.”
There was hope then if he wanted to discuss on Friday night since that was the night he typically collared me. If everything went well, maybe he’d offer me his collar. I tried not to let it show how impatient I would be to have to wait over a week.
“Thank you, Sir.”
He only nodded. I had my work cut out for me.
* * *
I met him in the library the following F
