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“What kind of trouble do you think she’ll get herself into?”
“If it exists, she’ll flirt with it. She’ll probably see Clay’s place as some kind of playland.”
“Has she ever been to a club or done fetish play?”
“I don’t think so, but honestly, that’s not really something I can bring up during the course of a normal sisterly conversation without her wondering why I want to know or asking how I know so much about it myself.”
“Hmm.” He slipped out from behind the table and opened the cabinets in search of coffee. He was going to be up and down until he could drop anchor, and already sleep tugged at him and dulled his senses. His ideal next move would be to curl up next to Valerie and explore her naked body until she nodded off, but he was a realist. If he snuggled up next to her warmth, he was going to be out like a light. Dom or not, middle age was a bitch.
“How did you and Clay discover you would both be failures in your sainted mother’s eyes if she were to learn about your hobbies?”
Tim chuckled and brought down a tin of half-caff and a box of filters. “That was an accident. Clay and I happened to bump into each other at a club in Houston. We couldn’t really pretend we didn’t know what was going on.”
She winced. “Awkward.”
“Very,” Tim said. Even more awkward was the fact Heidi had been there, too. They’d traveled down to Galveston for a boat show, and they’d all converged on the club as though it were their mothership.
“We sort of side-stepped each other and didn’t say anything about it for a few days.”
“So, he knows your kinks and you know his?”
“In general terms, I guess. We try not to get into specifics and more than I would about any normal aspect of sexuality. He knows that I’m straight, and I know he’s not, and beyond that, we know enough about each other to just scratch the surface.”
“You’d never let him make a match for you, huh?”
“Hell no, and I know that if he offers to, he’s just fucking with me. I don’t know if I’d trust the sort of woman he’d think was good for me.”
“Yeah?” Her smile waned but she fixed it quickly.
He probably wouldn’t have seen the change if he hadn’t had his gaze locked on her phenomenal lips.
What’s that about?
“Carine said she might let him make her a match, though,” Valerie said before he could ask her what had bothered her.
Still pondering her reaction, Tim chose not to respond for the moment. He got the coffeemaker going and returned to the table to fetch his empty bowl. Valerie’s, too. He rinsed them and left them in the sink to deal with later.
“I’m not exactly sure what she’s looking for,” she said, “but I guess it’s like with you and Clay. I’m curious, but I’m not sure I want to know that much about her.”
“How much does she know aboutyou?”
Valerie raised one shoulder in a lazy shrug. “I’d guess at this juncture, she’d know quite a bit about what I like and what I don’t.”
“Care to share?”
“Why bother? You’ll figure it out, I’m sure.” She slipped out from behind the table and handily found herself a mug. She set it on the counter beside the brewing coffee pot and pointed to it. “Fill that, will you? I’m going to go outside and soak up a few more ultraviolet rays before the sun totally disappears.”
She headed toward the front of the galley, and he said quietly, “If you’re done with your meal, pretty girl, you could lose the dress. No need to be so formal when we’re not dining.”
It took her a moment, but she got moving again, saying nothing.
He’d made an order, not a request, even if he hadn’t raised his voice or put any heat behind the words. He preferred guiding his submissives that way, and a few of them were able to pick up the nuances. Obviously, he didn’t keep the ones who couldn’t, and of the few who did, he hadn’t wanted to keep long-term.
He was about to find out how good an architect—someone who was good with solid lines and things that were clearly black-and-white—was with nuances.
And Lord help me. If she’s too perfect, I don’t know what I’ll do with her.
