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“I beg your pardon!” This time, I jumped all the way off his lap and whirled to face him with my hands on my hips. “It is not about the money. You pay me well enough as it is, and yeah, the extra was a nice help, but I’d much rather have the peace of mind and the extra time with you.”
“Okay then, what’s the problem?”
“There’s no real problem. Well, there wasn’t anyway. Now the problem is that you think you can tell me to move in with you instead of asking, and just throw it out there like an afterthought and expect me to jump at the chance.”
Archer closed his eyes and exhaled before opening them again, and apologized. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to come off that way. It’s been a long and emotional evening. Can we just go home?”
Okay, so another subject he was just going to ignore. Great. I tried to push my annoyance out of my head and focus on all the good things that had happened, but the night felt unfinished.
Still, I’d rather be upset in the privacy of my own home, or at least Archer’s. “Yes please. Let’s just go. Can we stop and get food on the way? Fast food. A big fat greasy burger and extra- salty fries?” I hadn’t eaten like that in weeks. Archer ate way too carefully at home and way too fancy when we went out. But I had just had my ass plugged, spanked and fucked in a room full of people, and I wanted a burger, dammit.
Archer raised his brows and shook his head, but he didn’t argue. Instead, he handed me the dress I’d taken off at the start of the night and kissed the top of my head. “We can do whatever you want. If Daddy’s good girl wants a fast-food burger, Daddy’s good girl gets a fast- food burger.”
The praise helped to take some of the sting out of all the things he wasn’t talking about. The burger helped more.
Chapter 18
Archer
She said I love you and I didn’t say anything. Not that night, and not the next day. Or the next, or the next or the one after that, and now a week had passed. I moved her into my apartment though, unofficially because she wouldn’t agree to let me buy out her lease, but she did agree to let me pay the remaining three months’ rent in full.
I understood.
She said I love you and I said nothing, so she needed a back-up plan.
I was working on a back-up plan of my own.
I wasn’t an ‘I love you’ type of guy. I’d never said it, and when I thought about falling in love, I’d always figured I would be the one to say it. My stubborn, control-freak tendencies couldn’t handle the thought that it had gone differently.
I knew the fact that I hadn’t said anything back and the fact that I’d changed the subject every time it had come up since was wearing on her and quickly becoming a matter of discord between us, at least in her brain, but my sadistic side kind of liked that. And I hoped, that by the end of tonight, she would forgive me for all the emotional angst I’d put her through. I planned to make it up to her, bigtime.
Leaning against the doorway of our joint office after court, I watched her for a few minutes before she noticed my presence. Her long blonde hair was woven into a tight bun that accentuated her cheekbones. Or maybe it was the makeup doing that. Either way, she looked magnificent.
I cleared my throat to announce myself and she jerked her head up, searching the room, and smiled when she found me. “Archer! I didn’t notice you. How was court?”
“It was fine. Closing arguments on Monday and then it's up to the jury.” I strode in, and leaned over the desk to brush a kiss across her lips. She blushed just like she did every time I kissed her in the office, which was crazy when you considered all the other stuff we’d done in here, but it was part of her charm.
“Well, you are done for the day, it looks like, but I still have some emails to send and a brief to finish.”
I shook my head, knowing that as usual she was a week ahead of schedule and whatever it was she was working on could easily hold through the weekend. “Close the laptop. Get your things.”
She looked at me with a frown and cocked her head to the side as if thinking. She glanced at her desktop calendar and her eyes flickered. “Oh, it’s okay, you can go on ahead. I can uber back to the apartment when I’m done here. It’s Friday, I know you have plans. You don’t have to wait for me.”
“No.” I closed her laptop myself and placed my hand firmly on top of it to prevent her from opening it back up. “You are done working, you are not ubering, and you are coming to the club with me tonight.”
Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. Instead of looking happy, she looked… dismayed. “Archer, it’s okay. It’s important for you to have some alone time, and now that I know what you’re doing, and I’ve met your friends, it’s really not an issue. We are together all day at the office and every night at home. I don’t have to intrude on your Friday night ritual also. I appreciate it, really, but you don’t have to bring me every time.”
I let her finish her little speech, then took her hand and helped her stand, pulling her body close to mine. My hands looped around her waist then found her ass and squeezed. “I realize that and trust me, I don’t do anything I don’t want to do, and there will be plenty of Friday nights I leave you home alone, because you’re right, we are together all the time, and we do need our space. And we’ll get it. Just not tonight, because tonight, you’re coming with me. Now get your purse, and let’s go.”
She gave me an odd look, but thank god, she easily obeyed. I was too nervous to keep arguing.
Audrey
I had no idea why Archer was so insistent that I join him at the club night just one week after my public punishment. I wasn’t really looking forward to facing all of those people again, but there was no hint of the man he had been that night. The cold, stern, serious Dom that had led me into the club last week was gone and replaced with my Archer. He smiled and waved at people as we made our way hand-in-hand to the owners’ lounge.
The nervous pit in my stomach began to uncoil when we were safe inside and greeted by familiar faces. Even though I didn’t know his friends well yet, I felt oddly comfortable among them. I mean… they had to be pretty great people if they were cheering me on as I got my ass fucked, right? I made myself blush with the memory.
“Hi!” Nyla bopped over, handing Archer a glass with a dark amber liquid in it, before turning to me. “Whatcha drinking?”
