I considered that answer with caution. He’s a man who doesn’t like any game he doesn’t create, though he certainly excels, at those. And he wouldn’t be asking me this question, staring at me right now, and waiting for a reply, if he didn’t suspect trouble. In a matter of seconds, I decided that that If I were to tell him what Mary had done, he’d fire her.
“We’re co-workers,” I’d said.
“You mean competitors.”
“Because you pitted us against each other,” I’d reminded him. “She wanted to work with Riptide.”
He’d stared at me with those hard gray eyes, several intense beats before he’d said, “Yes. She did. But I don’t trust her.”
“And you do me?” I’d asked, taking the bait he’d lead me to, and waiting for what I was certain would be an answer I did not expect.
“You get trust when you give it,” was his reply, and he’d watched me, expectation in the air again.
He’d wanted me to say that I trust him and I was, am, stunned by the fact that I don’t want to give him the power that would offer him. I realize now that I don’t want to play his games. I don’t want to play games at all. I’m changing personally and professionally.
My silence had told him this. I’d seen it in the darkening of his gaze, the hard set of his jaw. Something had flickered in his eyes. I didn’t like that. His lips had twitched, and I’d known in that instant I’d displeased him when I’d spent a year trying to please him. Too often, I did not.
He’d turned and left without a word. He does this often. It’s his way of making you wonder what he is thinking. And as you do, he has control, but remarkably, I find, it also makes me self reflect to the point, I know me better. Maybe that is why I work well with that man. His games, even when I do not, want to play them, make me grow. And this time was no different. I sat there after his departure, my fingers on the ring where it hangs at my neck, and I’d asked myself why I couldn’t give him my offer of trust. This is work. This is my career. And then, I’d realized many things, but one quite large thing I think. When I’d come to the gallery, to Mark Compton, I’d been an innocent girl, eager to earn this job. I’d come to him a young girl who had an open heart and I had trusted easily. I’m not that girl anymore, if I were the ring would be back on my finger.
Wednesday, six pm
I cannot write everything there is to write. Not now. I’m still at work. But this day has been crazy. I was at Ava’s coffee shop grabbing coffee to get me through what will be a late night, and I found her and Mary huddled in a corner. It made me uncomfortable. I don’t know why but I felt that it was about me. That is very self-centered, I know. I’m not that girl. I don’t think everything is about me but it just felt off in some way. I’d left before they’d seen me and that’s when I’d come face to face with him. I’d stepped outside and was halfway back to the gallery when he’d stepped in my path. Have I ever mentioned he smells like a wonderful spice? I don’t know what kind of spice. Just spice. Really, yummy, delicious spice. Nutmeg and honey? No. No. That is a strange comparison. Just warm and wonderful. And he’d been so close I could reach out and touch him, but of course, you never touch a master without behind told to touch him.
Which is why I touched him.
I put my hand on his chest, and I swear he sucked in a breath. And I was holding mine. To my surprise, his hand had covered mine, and he’d held me to him. “Rebecca,” he’d breathed out, and this new way he says my name, like I’m the reason he has a voice, set my heart to racing.
“Hello,” I’d said, which was silly. Hello? I should have said his name. Why can’t I ever say it? Why is he still Master to me?
“Did you get my gift?”
“Yes I-” My free hand goes to the ring on the chain. “I’m wearing it.”
He’d gone still. So very still.
And I have to go back to work.
More soon…
Wednesday, eleven pm
Somehow, I made it through an evening at the gallery that included an open house with a wine tasting. Normally, having artists in the house like the famous, Chris Merit–a local that is famous worldwide–would enthrall me. Tonight, I couldn’t stop thinking about that encounter on the street with my former Master. Former. There is the key word that we defined tonight. I think he really didn’t believe I would stick to my word. I think he really believed I’d become his submissive again. I know he did. From the very instant his heavy stare had landed on the ring where it hung on a chain at my neck, I could feel the dark energy radiating off him. I could feel the iron will of that man, telling me without words, I’d broken the rules. I knew then that sending me that package, with my ring in it again, had been his way of reclaiming me.
In all of sixty seconds, he’d taken my hands and led me to an alcove in front of an antique shop, the concrete wall hiding us from the public eye. I’d ended up against the wall, that big body of his, caging mine, against the stone at my back. But not touching me. See, that is what he does. He makes me feel him, even when he’s not touching me. He makes me want him, when I swear, I’ll never want him again. He smells good and it makes me remember how good he tastes and feels.
“This is how it is?” he’d demanded.
“What does that even mean?” I’d whispered, and God, my throat had been so dry. And my heart had been racing. It’s racing now just typing this.
“You know who and what I am,” he’d said, without directly answering my question.
“What I know,” I’d said, “is who and what I am. And it’s not your submissive. I am, however, the woman who loves you. I’m also the woman who says that to you, and never gets a reply. That’s not enough anymore.”
He gray eyes had sharpened, and he’s stared at me for so many seconds, it had felt like a year. “You know you’re special to me.”
“I know every submissive you’ve ever had was special to you.”
“You aren’t them.”
“I know,” I’d said. “I’m not. And I will never pretend to be again.”
His hand had come down on my hip, a branding that had scorched me from the inside out. “You belong to me.”
When he says those things to me, I get wet, and hot, and want in so many ways. There is just something about that man saying you belong to him, that makes me want to be owned. In bed. That’s the thing. I like how he owns me in bed. I don’t, however, want to be owned the rest of the time. And damn it, I want to own him, too. I want him to belong to me, too.
“I belong to me,” I’d replied, and I’d let the defiance I’d felt lace my words.