Page 49 of The Dragon’s Good Girl

He said it while he was still inside me, and I've replayed it often enough since that I should probably be embarrassed. It hadn't sounded deliberate. If anything, Soren had seemed as caught off guard by the word as I was, and that's the part my brain keeps returning to whenever I try to convince myself it meant nothing.

The sensible explanation is that it did mean nothing. He's a Dom. I'm his client. He is exceptionally good at making me feel safe, wanted and cared for because those are things I am literally paying him to provide. Developing feelings for him because he does his job too well would be humiliating enough without deciding every pet name and possessive word is evidence that he's secretly developing feelings for me too.

None of which stops me from booking Thursday.

The confirmation lands in my inbox a few seconds later, and I stare at it with the uncomfortable awareness that I have just paid money because I couldn't wait an extra two days to see a man.

I tell Tess about it after work, mostly because keeping it to myself somehow feels worse.

"You booked an extra session because you missed him?" she asks.

We're sitting in the café near her office, and she has the decency to wait until after I've taken a drink before attacking me.

"I booked an extra session because I wanted one."

"Of course. Completely unrelated to missing him. Girl, what the fuck am I going to do with you."

"I regret telling you things."

"No, you don't. Who else would tell you when you're being insane?"

I give her a look over my coffee. "I'm not insane."

"No. You're sleeping eight hours a night, buying yourself things and having excellent sex with a dragon. Frankly, this is the most functional breakdown I've ever seen you have."

I laugh despite myself, which is annoying because it only encourages her.

Tess watches me for a moment before her expression changes. "You really like him, don't you?"

There's no teasing in it this time.

I look down at my coffee. "I think I'm falling for a man I pay by the hour."

"That is bleak even for you."

I glance up.

Tess leans back in her chair. "I'm not saying you should start picking out curtains together, Margot. I'm wondering whether you actually think everything happening between you is part of the service."

That's exactly the question I don't want her asking.

"I don't know." I run my thumb along the edge of the cup. "He called me Angel the second time I saw him, and the first time he said it, I swear he looked shocked. Just for a second, before he covered it. Then he kept calling me that anyway."

Tess's eyebrows lift, but she lets me continue.

"And last time he cooked me dinner. There were flowers because he remembered something I'd told him about my grandmother, and he walked me all the way to my car afterward. Then there was…" I hesitate, because saying this part aloud makes it real in a way I'm not entirely prepared for. "He said mine."

"During the session?"

"Yes, while he was inside me. It just came out."

"And what do you think that means?"

"That I have no idea what it means." I sit back with a sigh. "That's the problem. I can explain all of it if I want to. He remembers things because he's attentive. He takes care of me because that's what I booked him for. Maybe the flowers and dinner are things he does for everyone, and Angel is just a pet name I've decided is special because I like hearing him say it."

"But you don't think that."

I'm quiet for a moment. "I don't know what I think. I know what I want to think, and that makes me a terrible judge of whether any of it is actually real."