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After a few minutes, she pulled back, shivering. They were still outside in the cold, but Colin wasn’t complaining, just giving her what she needed. She took a deep breath.
“Thank you,” she whispered, feeling him wipe her tears away. He helped her bundle into the car and dropped another kiss on her mouth before closing her door and getting into the other side.
“Colin?” Olivia said softly, as he was putting his phone on the car’s docking station. He grunted in acknowledgment, putting the restaurant’s address in the GPS.
“Can I pay for our dinner tonight?” she whispered, not looking at him.
He furrowed his brow as he turned to look at her, turning his whole body in the seat to face her. They regarded each other for a second. His stare always seeing too much.
“First, I need you to answer what it’s going to matter if you swipe your card, or I swipe mine?” he asked, an eyebrow arching. She furrowed her own back at him.
“What?” she asked, confused.
“Our money is combined, what’s mine is yours and all of that. You have access to everything baby, you haven’t looked at your account in a while?” Colin asked.
Olivia frowned, digging into her purse and pulling out her debit card. It looked the same. Then took out her phone and logged into her banking app, seeing too many numbers and dollar signs that betrayed that he had in fact merged their finances, without asking her. And she didn’t know because she thought she’d been paying for her school lunches and other things with the money he’d given her for the blueprints, not having a need to look at her accounts like she used to.
Olivia felt stripped of her last vestiges of independence. She felt her blood boil as she snapped mentally.
“Olivia-“
“SHUT THE FUCK UUUPPP,” she screamed at him so loud she felt like she burst a blood vessel.
She turned her back on him in the seat, facing the window and curling in on herself. Colin wisely kept quiet and took a deep breath, determined to make it through the evening. He knew that a break was coming and had been mentally preparing himself for it. He put the car into drive, and drove off slowly in the direction of the restaurant, attempting to get a handle on what was happening between them.
They sat at a secluded booth at a restaurant he’d chosen, and Colin pissed her off by ordering the most expensive bottle of wine they had on the menu. So, Olivia waited until they drank half of it before she knocked it off the table by ‘accident’, then promptly helped the waitress clean it up. She settled back in the seat and calmly ate the rest of her soup, feeling minutely better.
He waited until they were in the car before he locked the doors and turned to look at her.
She recoiled at the fury in his eyes.
“You’re going to get what you’re begging for, but we’re going to get through this therapy appointment first. I don’t know what the fuck is going on with you right now, but I have been an exceedingly patient man. You need to watch yourself before you bite off more than you can chew, little girl.”
Olivia slapped him across the face before she even knew she did it, hearing his groan as his head cracked to the side. He stayed there, his eyes closed and breathing deep. She gasped; eyes wide before she slowly turned to look out the front of the window. She began trembling, her breaths coming out panicked.
“There’s no need to shake. I would never retaliate by putting my hands on you back in anger,” he said, his tone clipped as he turned back to face the front.
“I’m s-s-sorry, Colin,” she whispered, barely able to hear her own voice through the blood rushing in her head.
Colin threw the car into drive and peeled off down the road. The car ride was uncomfortable, he didn’t even turn music on to break the tension, not saying a word to her. Soon they were at the therapist’s building. It was an indiscreet glass building with no identifiable markings other than a number for the address.
Colin rounded the car and opened her door, she didn’t even know if he looked at her as she was studiously not staring at him, too afraid to meet his eyes. He closed the car door with a slam that made her jump and she winced as he placed his hand on her lower back to escort her up the stairs.
Colin had already schooled his face into an impassive yet pleasant expression as he introduced her to Dr. Tyson.
Dr. Tyson was a short, yet intimidating African American male who had the kindest eyes she’d ever seen. She went to sit on the couch next to Colin, carefully perching herself stiffly, taking a peek around the room to relieve herself of the sudden rush of testosterone that took up the space.
Olivia saw a movement out the corner of her eye and saw that Colin had placed his hand palm up on the sofa between them.
She chanced a glance at him and noticed he still wasn’t looking at her. She tentatively placed her small hand in his and she felt tears prick the back of her eyes when he closed his hand over hers and squeezed softly, rubbing his thumb along her knuckles. She squeezed his back, leaning more into the seat and crossing her legs.
Dr. Tyson explained that he wanted to keep this session light, just an introduction. He spent time explaining his modality to Olivia, how long he’d been a therapist and wanted to know if she’d ever been to therapy, and what she expected to get out of therapy, individually and as a couple. He also spent some time going over their relationship, so he could get a better feel for their dynamic.
He was not shocked or gave any indication of judgment when Colin explained how they got married, and how quickly they got married… and that they were compatible in that way. The fact he liked to give pain and she liked to receive. The doctor wrote some notes on that, and Colin squeezed her hand again when she was unconsciously trying to lean forward to see his notes.
Olivia relaxed back into the seat. She got really embarrassed when the doctor brought up their age gap, not at the age gap itself but at Colin’s obvious pleasure behind it. It was the same pleasure she found that he took in when he spent a lot of money, or really did anything that meant he had power.
But she quickly realized that he didn’t abuse that power.
