AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“But what?” she demanded, her body still slightly turned away from him. For all that she was no longer restrained, she suddenly felt a million times more vulnerable than when she had been. Her ass clenched around the plug in it, making her feel even more unbalanced. It wasn’t like she could take it out right now, and its presence inside her was impossible to ignore, reminding her with every twinge of her body how she’d just handed herself over to him.
The slight remorse she saw in his eyes slid away, and he reverted back into the controlled, arrogant Dom she was far too familiar with. Master Mold. Head Sentinel. Owner of the club and sure he knew what was best for everybody in it. “Your dominant controls the scene. Not you.”
“I wasn’t thinking, I was just reacting. Because I wasn’t getting what I needed.” Slam. A direct hit. He actually winced. Vindictive anger rose up in her. “You’re jerking me around, Patrick. I need more than just a flogging and some toys. It’s not enough. I need to be touched. I need to feel like there’s not a fucking wall between us.”
Growling, Patrick threw his hands up in the air, turning his back and stepping away from her. Lexie slid off the table, standing on wobbly legs. Anger and adrenaline were giving her strength now, but she still kept one hand on the table, just until her head stopped whirling. She wasn’t dizzy, exactly, just unsteady as her body normalized.
When he turned around, she could see his frustration, even though she could tell he was trying to hide it.
“Look, Pixie, maybe we shouldn’t scene again until after Jake gets home and I’ve had a chance to talk with him. It’s just too much-“
“Jake? What the hell does Jake have to do with anything?”
The look she got was absolutely dumbfounded.
“He’s my best friend and your brother,” Patrick said, sounding confused.
Oh for the love of...
“Are you serious?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest, and then wincing when they pressed against her sore nipples. She shifted them to underneath her breasts, her right foot starting to tap. That had always seemed like a cliché, but right now she realized there was a reason behind the cliché. Her arms felt like they were all that was holding in her pent-up emotions, while her tapping foot was leaking some of the energy that needed a place to go before she exploded crazy bitch-rage all over him. “You have to talk to Jake, before you’ll touch me. That’s what you’re saying.”
Now Patrick looked like he was getting kind of pissy too, which just enraged her even more. “Yes, Lex.” Ha. Not ‘Pixie’ anymore apparently. “I have to talk to my best friend before I date his little sister. It’s called-“
“It’s called fuck off,” she snarled, springing into motion. Darting to her dress – as best she could with a plug in her ass - she snatched it up along with her shoes and little purse, pulling it over her head as she stomped towards the door, shoes dangling from her fingers. Fury and misery were clashing inside of her.
She couldn’t even list the number of ways she’d bent over backwards, shunting her pride to the side, turning fucking flips to get Patrick’s attention in the way she wanted it. She’d thought she’d finally gotten it. Thought that he’d finally seen her as more than Jake’s little sister, realized she was her own person who could do what she wanted and be in a relationship with who she wanted. But big, bad Dom Patrick wasn’t going to touch her without someone else’s permission. Who the fuck was he kidding?
If he wanted her - really wanted her - he would never let anything or anyone stop him. He never had. So why the hell wasn’t she important enough for him to go after, the way that she’d gone after him?
The Dungeon was like a smack in the face as she raced out the door. Sex, sweat, screams, cries of pleasure and pain... all the things she’d wanted and craved. All the things she thought she finally had.
“Lex, wait, slow down.” The concern in his voice actually had her slowing, looking over her shoulder. His hand grabbed on to her bicep, fingers wrapping around like a caress. “You’re having sub-drop –“
“Oh fuck you again,” she shouted out in sheer exasperation. Tears filled her eyes, and not the good kind this time. She didn’t even notice half of the noise in the Dungeon came to a halt. “You don’t know everything. How dare you brush off my feelings by saying it’s just sub-drop, like they’re not real, so you don’t have to acknowledge them. I know exactly what I feel. I feel sick and tired of fighting for you while you’re sitting around waiting for permission from my brother. The only person whose approval you should need is mine. Do you think I’ve asked Jake for permission for anything about you? No, because it’s none of his fucking business!”
She burst into tears, wrenching her arm out of his hand, and ran for the stairs. Fuck him. Just fuck him so very much. Behind her she could hear him growling at everyone to go back to what they were doing, because all action in the Dungeon had come to a halt while she’d shouted at him. The only good thing about it was that it gave her a head start to get up the stairs.
Sprinting, she ignored him calling her name. She didn’t have to listen to his orders anymore. The scene was over. That’s all it was for him. Scening with her, putting her off, placating her like a child until her brother got home and he could ask permission.
Dammit, why couldn’t he just love her, the way she loved him? What would he do if Jake got home and said he didn’t want Patrick dating her? It wouldn’t matter to her, she didn’t care what her brother thought about her relationships, but apparently what Jake wanted mattered more to Patrick than what she wanted. She’d put him first, over everything, over everyone, and he’d just kept putting her off over and over again. Because she hadn’t mattered enough for him to fight.
A sob tore through her throat. Tears blinded her as she ran for the women’s locker room. Patrick wasn’t the only one calling her name now, but she ignored them all. She just had to get to safety, and the only safety for a submissive woman in Stronghold with a Dom hot on her heels was the women’s room.
She damn well wasn’t going to let him see her crying. Not while he was invalidating her feelings by saying it was all sub-drop. Let him make himself feel better with that if he wanted, but she knew better. Sub-drop was the downside to the euphoric ecstasy of a scene, the drop of emotions as adrenaline and endorphins dissipated, before the chemicals in a human’s brain normalized again. It happened, Lexie knew that, but this wasn’t it. At least, not all of it.
This was years of her feelings being unacknowledged. Months of hard work, of trailing after him like an eager-to-please puppy dog, being brushed aside. Hours of proving to him that she could be the sub he always wanted. If he couldn’t see that, if he couldn’t appreciate that, then she didn’t want to be with him anyway.
She didn’t want to be with someone who didn’t - or wouldn’t - care about her the same way she cared about him.
There had never been a moment in his life when Patrick wished he didn’t own Stronghold. He loved the club. He loved his work. But having to stop and tell everyone to return to their own scenes, to give them a quick reassurance that everything was fine - when it wasn’t - made him wish he didn’t have the responsibility. It took precious moments, moments in which Lexie managed to get far ahead of him.
Remorse, anger, guilt, a rush of emotions pounded through him and made his breath short. It felt like his rib cage was squeezing his heart out of his chest. He’d thought the memory of her face, wreathed in ecstasy, would haunt him, but the memory of pain filling her eyes completely obscured that.
Guilt that he’d wanted to do more than kiss her, that he’d wanted to give in, lay her back on the table, and fuck her senseless, had crippled him. All his vaunted self-control and he’d nearly lost it completely, just because her skin felt like silk and she tasted like strawberries and sweetness. He’d panicked, and because he’d panicked, his thoughts hadn’t been as ordered as they normally were.
He hadn’t meant to hurt her, but nothing had come out right, and he wasn’t sure if he could explain his conflicting urges in a way that would placate her even if he’d had an hour’s warning. Lexie didn’t want to hear that he had to talk to Jake first, he got it, but he also knew he wasn’t going to change his mind about it.
What was so wrong with wanting to talk to Jake first anyway?
