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He gave her a minute, but she didn’t say anything.
“Maybe I’ll be kind and let you pick what I call you.” He pinched one nipple, twisting until she hunched her shoulders, instinctively trying to break his hold.
“No,” he snapped, releasing the nipple only to slap her breast.
She flinched and whimpered, and the dark place inside him that needed this—needed to cause pain—crowed in delight.
He was a monster in an elegant suit. But he was a monster who was also very self-aware, and totally in control.
“I hate those words, Daniel.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, and she’d turned her face away.
“Are they hard limits?” He didn’t remember seeing them on her checklist.
“No. I just…If I hear a Dom using any of those words, I put him in the ‘never scene with him list.’”
“You avoided the issue, rather than formally put them on your hard limit list, or discuss them in scene negotiation.”
“Yes.”
When he touched her cheek, she looked at him. Tears gathered on her lashes.
This was the critical moment, where he had to show her that nothing would change how he saw her. Would make her any less.
Maybe he needed her to understand that, believe that, because he needed a reassurance that he wasn’t really a monster. In his case it would be false comfort.
She looked at him with such vulnerability that he knew the next thing he said would be critical. That if he misspoke he could trigger an emotional landmine.
Daniel winked. It wasn’t a sensual wink, but a comedic, overblown thing where he scrunched up half of his face.
Autumn sputtered out a surprised laugh.
“You know what they say, sticks and stones may break your bones.” He cupped her waist, squeezing gently. “But words will cause deep psychological trauma and create weird sexual kinks.”
Autumn dissolved into laughter, whooping with amusement. He laced his hands together behind her back to brace her and stop her from tumbling off the chair.
And through it all, she kept her hands behind her head, arms raised with her elbows out.
That was telling.
More specifically it was telling him that the laughter hadn’t drawn her all the way out of the scene. Hopefully it had been a brief emotional release, enough of one that she would be able to handle what he had planned.
And if she wasn’t ready, they’d keep circling around it. He could be patient when needed, and Autumn deserved that.
He waited for her laughter to fade down to a smile before he spoke again.
“You might not like those words, at least in the abstract,” he said lightly. “But you’ll like them when I use them.”
She swallowed, but didn’t look away.
“I didn’t like it when you called me a slut before,” she whispered.
“Was it my words or my tone?”
“Both. Mostly your tone.”
“Then I see no reason not to refer to you as my pretty little pet.”
He used the cultured, formal voice that had, through a lot of hard work, become his normal speaking voice. She didn’t react, so he kept going.
