Cruz (Dark and Dirty Sinners' MC #5) - Serena Akeroyd Page 0,84

a helluva lot more interesting than her assistant's sightless eyes staring up at me.

Peering into the refrigerator, I saw she had the makings of a pot roast in there, which came as a surprise because as far as I knew, she didn't really cook.

Still, seeing carrots, onions, a bag of string beans, the chicken itself, and then upon further inspection, finding some potatoes, I decided that was what we'd be having for dinner.

Which fit with the timeline.

Though it was a deceptively simple position, it couldn't be maintained for long. But, because it was deceptive, in her mind, she'd be thinking I could leave her like that for hours on end.

I wouldn't do that, even if I was tempted. Which, today, I wasn't. Maybe in the future she'd piss me off enough to tie her up with the intent of leaving her there for hours, but today wasn't that day.

Today, she'd been traumatized, in more ways than one, and I was just grounding her.

Reminding her that she wasn't the kid who'd been abused by someone she should have been able to trust.

Today, she was a woman. A woman who'd helped a girl that could've ended up as twisted up inside as Indy.

Here, now, she was more than just Indy. She was a woman. A living, breathing sculpture who needed to remember that, to me, she was more than the sum of her past.

Every day was a fresh one when you had a submissive. You couldn't take bitterness over into tomorrow, otherwise you'd spank too hard, whip deep enough to bleed.

Doms were only human, and filled with foibles, but when you had a sub, one who allowed you to enact all those kinks that made you different, one whose trust enabled you to be free, you had to tread lightly. You had to forgive.

They trusted you.

You had to live up to that trust.

So, I cooked. While she watched.

I scrubbed the potatoes, peeled the carrots, chopped up the onion, and tossed them together in a little oil I placed in a baking tray. When I found some rosemary on the windowsill where she had some fresh herbs, I tossed that in too, before I placed the chicken atop the veggies, covered it with foil, then set it in the oven.

Prepping the string beans, I placed them in a pan of cold water, ready to boil them later when the chicken was done.

All that set, I saw it had taken me thirty minutes from the time on the stove, and I washed up, before I padded over to her.

She hadn't moved, and her gaze tracked me as I headed for the bed.

When I stripped off my cut and Henley, leaving my jeans on, interest lit those bronze eyes, and I climbed onto the bed, before I arranged her how I wanted her.

On her side.

It was awkward, but I was a fan of awkward.

Nothing worth doing was ever simple.

So, to the 'C' shape she made, I curved myself around her, letting my front cup her back, and my hand moved over to her front.

She was wet with drool, and I started to swirl my fingers in it. Not to soothe, just to ground.

Nothing was dirty here.

Not drool, not pussy juices, not my cum.

I wasn't into piss or scat play, but if I was, that wouldn't be dirty either.

What we had transcended the regular bounds of a relationship.

I didn't want to see her at her best.

I wanted to see her at her fucking worst, because that was trust.

That was freedom.

"Last sub I had, I was only twenty-three," I murmured, hushing her when she tensed.

It might not have seemed wise to talk about another woman when I was in her bed, but there was shit I needed to share, shit she needed to hear. I didn't need feedback, just for her to grasp the reality of the situation we found ourselves in.

"Not many subs will trust a Dom as young as that, but I found them. Usually they were older than me. A lot. I didn't mind. I kinda liked it because they settled on me for the age difference. Bored housewives with aging husbands who had pouches over their belt buckles—why wouldn't they like a trim guy who reminded them of what they could have had when they were my age? When they were too scared to play how they wanted to?

"The reason subs don't trust young Doms isn't just because of a lack of experience, it's the lack of wisdom. It took me a long