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A third finger poised.
I stopped.
She didn't notice. Probably wouldn't. I still had two fingers buried up to the knuckles inside her.
I stopped. I breathed. Marilyn was no more or less worthy as a human, as a sub, as someone who could say something stupid like No safe word but still had a safe word as any decent human and Dom would acknowledge.
I didn't have it in me to pull her against me, to smooth her tangled hair, to hold her against my chest and let her cry. She had started the whole encounter, and I was ending it. That was the most I could do, other than apologize.
I pulled my fingers free of her and examined her for tears or damage, making her squirm in embarrassment. I didn't correct her. This was no game. But if she got something out of it, good for her. And if she instead was determined only to avoid the living fuck out of ever putting herself in such a situation again, so much the better.
With a pang, I realized I'd miss Marilyn if she stopped coming over. That didn't change how I was going to treat her, either in future encounters or now. More, it made me feel sorry for myself.
I rubbed her ass until her sobbing stopped. She was still across my lap, red and white and sobbing. When she stopped I asked if she could sit up. Sniffling, she did, not meeting my eyes.
That was all right.
What I really wanted to do was offer her money. I'm sorry, here's some money. How much did it take to make someone feel better after something like this?
She wasn't a hooker. I wouldn't treat her like one. And she wasn't a wife in a domestic violence relationship. I wouldn't buy her something nice to "make up for it."
I just wanted her to go.
And I wanted to know that eventually, she'd come back.
I gave her time to clean up. When she opted for a shower, I made sure she had everything she wanted in it.
Except me. I was capable of remorse, it seemed. But not kindness.
When she came out, her long blonde hair wet and tangled into curls, I watched her dress and finally couldn't stand it.
My voice didn't sound remotely like mine as I asked, "Will you come back?"
She turned to look at me, confused. I waved one hand. "I mean, to see me. You'll come back some time?"
The look that crossed her face wasn't anything I could understand. It took me until long after she'd left that evening to identify it.
At that moment, though, she walked across the room and drew me to my feet, another woman acting as if our relationship were normal and we could communicate at the same level. When I was standing, now towering over her, she went up on tiptoe and kissed my mouth, then met my eyes.
"Of course I'm coming back. If you'll have me."
Relief rushed through me. With it, a tiny bit of the normal Cole St. Martin returned. I gave her a half smile and said, "Good."
And swatted her ass as I saw her to the door, laughing when she flinched and hurried out of reach.
It wasn't until much later that night while I was watching a video of what I'd done to her that afternoon that I understood the expression on her face.
Peace.
28
Annie
That night answered most of my questions.
It didn't seem like Chloe was trying to be cruel or play games. More like she didn't understand that there were different types of submission and different house rules, so to speak.
Or maybe St. Martin or Claude had told her not to tell me but to make me scramble to catch up.
