this a thousand times before with countless people. I knew that. It was a thought that grated on my nerves every time it came up, which was often. “Don’t be nervous.”
“I’m not,” I said a bit too quickly. “It’s just not what I expected, that’s all.”
“What did you expect?”
I paused to think about it, before realizing I hadn’t actually conjured up any specific expectations. Another glance around the room was just as overwhelming, even though the dark red hues gave it a surprisingly cozy feel, aside from all the torture implements. “I guess I didn’t think it would be this...nice.”
He smirked. “I try to make it comfortable.”
“Wait, this is your room?”
“I lease it,” he answered nonchalantly. “I don’t like other people touching my things.”
I swallowed hard, trying to tell my animal brain that didn’t apply to me. I leaned back against what I thought was a solid...chair...thing, but it turned out to be a moving part. Before I could fall and take it with me, Raf grabbed me by the waist and pulled me to him.
“Careful,” he said, looking down at me like a god studying a mouse.
“Right.” My voice was hoarse, betraying just how tense every part of my being was. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine. I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
Damn, he was warm. His voice, his body pressed so close to mine, his gaze… “I thought that was the point of all this.”
His lips quirked. “Sometimes. But I don’t need to make you feel pain to take control.”
“Oh,” I said in a rush of breath, forgetting how to blink. It was a waste of time, anyway. “So...what do you want me to do?”
“First things first, why don’t you have a seat?” He was already leading me by the elbow over to a red velvet sofa with a black wood frame that looked like something out of a Sherlock Holmes movie. One of the old ones where he wasn’t a total douchebag.
Once I was on the sofa, I realized Rafael had no plans of sitting down. He was just standing casually to the side with his arms folded, watching me. I felt like I was a juvenile delinquent in the principal’s office again, as a hot guy in a suit tried to figure out what to do with me.
“There are a few things we could try. It doesn’t have to be formal or anything. We’ll just experiment, and you can tell me what you like and what you don’t, and we’ll go from there.”
“Isn’t this supposed to be about what you want?”
“Is that what you want?” he threw back at me. “You want to be told what to do? To give up control?”
“Yeah,” I answered way too quickly. “That, uh, sounds good. You know what you’re doing, obviously, so I trust you.”
His face went blank, and something in his gaze shifted. It was a look I’d never seen in his eyes before, and I found myself scrambling for what I’d said wrong.
I was still trying to come up with an apology when he finally answered in a husky voice that made a shiver run down my spine, “In that case...how do you feel about wearing a collar?”
Chapter 10
Rafael
“I trust you…”
Three little words I’d heard a thousand times before, in many different contexts, including this one. And yet, hearing them come from his lips unleashed something within me. Something dark and dangerous, a hot-cold knife digging right into my soul.
I’d had him climb up on my table on his hands and knees, a vulnerable position he didn’t seem wild about. I wanted to take him then and there, but that wasn’t what this was about. This wasn’t just about me getting off, which was a guarantee anytime I touched him, but about introducing him to my world. If I didn’t fuck it up, there was a chance he’d want to stay here, but the prospect of that was too intoxicating to think about right now.
He had given me carte blanche, but I still wanted to start slow for his sake. The sight of him in that position was making me question my own definition of slow, though.
I walked around him, thoroughly enjoying the sight of his ass. When I came back around, he was looking up at me anxiously, and quickly averted his gaze. The submission part came naturally to him, but if he was going to be my pup, we were going to work on his bite.
First, though, we would have to negotiate the contract.
“While you can still use