Page 81 of License to Kill

“We’ll ask Mellisa about that when we see her. We went to the bank and merged several accounts and set up several savings accounts. You wanted savings accounts with specific purposes, so we did that. You even gave them weird names in our banking login.”

As that was something I would do, I believed him. “This just establishes I am not in my right mind.”

“That’s what the psychologist is for, and she’ll be here tomorrow. I am concerned you don’t remember a basic like that, though. It took two hours out of our day, and you were about ready to bite my head off over it.”

“Why was I ready to bite your head off?”

“You wanted to go home and explore, I think. Or establish dominance over the tub. And the bed. And everything we own.” He smirked at me. “You were a little territorial. And once I did get you home, you took your frustrations out on me, but as I am who I am, I thoroughly enjoyed it. You were pretty cranky in the bank, though, so maybe you blocked it out because you don’t like losing your temper in public, and you were muttering a lot of curses when the bankers weren’t around.”

Crap. “I took my frustrations out on you?”

“Rather aggressively and with your teeth. I enjoyed it. I’m hoping to enjoy more of that kind of attention tonight, although I will handcuff you if you get too rough with me. I like when you bite. I don’t like when you bite so hard I am at risk of having my throat torn out. When you’re at your best, there is a very fine line between the two. Handcuffs are useful for that, as I get you exactly where I want you, and they keep you there for a while.”

My eyes widened. While we did have a tendency to get rough, which was a two-way street, I hadn’t thought I’d been getting that rough. “Should I grovel for forgiveness now?”

“No. This is where you get rough and bite, and I put you in cuffs should you get too rough. You didn’t do anything wrong. You just get wild when I successfully provoke you, and I like it. The way I see it, I deserve to be bitten repeatedly for my contributions to our problems. As we can’t really get blood everywhere, I’ll probably just cuff you out of the gate and enjoy myself far more than I should. We’re very frustrated people, and we need to become less frustrated through extended displays of affection. Between displays of affection, I figured we’d talk, make certain we’re on the same page so we are both happy in our marriage, and otherwise stop any more problems before they start.”

Time spent in being tossed around the pack and occupying their varying holding cells had helped with some of the frustration issues, although we’d both dodged serious talking in favor of adding to our general counts of property destruction. “I don’t want to destroy such a pretty room, by the way.”

“I will be challenged taming you, but I’m looking forward to it. I’m of the opinion that naughty vixens enjoy dominance battles in bed. So, I figure I’ll try just calmly surrendering to see if you stay as rough. If surrendering doesn’t work, I have my handcuffs, and I’m willing to use them. Of course, now that I’ve told you that, you’ll probably antagonize me into using them because you like it.”

I really did. “I have issues.”

“Your enjoyment of being cuffed is not an issue. It’s a kink, and honestly, it’s fairly tame as far as kinks go. It’s worth noting you trust me with the cuffs, and that’s a big deal to me. I suspect if anyone else cuffed you like that, you’d turn into a terrified psychopath hellbent on escaping.” He smiled at me, grabbed the blanket off one of the chairs, and wrapped it around me. “Now, you sit in that nice chair while I get you some treats and get the fire started. We’ll relax, talk, and then I’ll get on to the taming portion of our evening.”

When Jake said he wanted to talk, he meant it, and he’d chew on it worse than a dog with a bone until he got his way, so I sat, cuddled in the blanket, and prepared for the inevitable disaster our conversation would be.

In his quest to pamper me, he’d arranged for a basket full of fruits, chocolates, and champagne, along with meats and cheeses. If we ate everything in the basket, we wouldn’t have room for anything else. “That’s excessive.”

“My first plan was worse.”

“Give me the strawberries, only enough of the Champagne to sip at it until you can make me some hot chocolate, and if there isn’t hot chocolate in the basket, the basket is a lie.”

“There is hot chocolate, but it’s not in the basket. There’s also coffee and tea.”

“Let’s start with the hot chocolate, and we’ll see about the coffee later.”

Chuckling, Jake grabbed the Champagne bottle, which was a smaller bottle that matched our drinking speed, which was half a glass sipped at over the course of several hours. He popped off the cork, and I marveled he kept a hold on it rather than sending it on a destructive flight across the room.

“Okay, that was impressive. I would have broken half the things in here trying that stunt.”

He poured me half a glass, poured some for himself, and headed deeper into the room. “I’ll return shortly with your hot chocolate. Try not to drink yourself under the table or make yourself sick on the strawberries.”

I grabbed a strawberry and bit the tip off. “I’ll think about it.”

“Try not to get actually sick, but if you get sick, I will nurse you back to health.”

Considering I had a lot of weight to regain, I couldn’t afford to get sick even if I wanted to. As such, I limited myself to five strawberries and savored them while waiting for the hot chocolate, and I only took a few small sips of the Champagne. Jake returned with two steaming mugs a few minutes later, and he set mine on the end table beside my chair before setting his down and lighting the fire.

I wondered if he would have been able to do such a good job of making the wood burn if the hotel hadn’t already set it up so all he had to use was use a long match to ignite the kindling. “Want to bet they would have come and lit that for you if you’d asked?”

“Fool’s bet, mainly because I asked them to prepare the fireplace so I could look all manly for you.”

Well, at least his sense of humor had survived our problems intact. “We’re going to ruin all these nice treats and hot chocolate and Champagne with serious talk, aren’t we?”

“I’m hopeful we can navigate the serious talk without it dissolving into a bickering session, thus being able to enjoy the treats while still talking.”

“That would be quite the improvement.”