punishing herself because her mother had died and she’d lived. She’d been in shock, and only her stepmom had been strong enough to risk everything to drag her out of it.
She didn’t want to be clingy ever again.
“I don’t think he was being clingy,” she said quietly. “I think we made a nice connection. I think the sex was good.” That was an understatement. It had been the best sex of her life, and she wasn’t sure why she’d been cool this morning. Perhaps because she’d woken up and wanted nothing more than to walk right out and coax him back into bed.
She’d wanted to cling to him. Yes, that was why she’d put a bit of distance between them. She’d dreamed of him, and it was all happening way too fast. He was already important to her, and she didn’t think that was such a good idea.
“Oh, he was clinging hard, but I think you managed to detach him.” Kyle made it through the light this time. “He was thinking you’d settled something the night before. You hadn’t. You set him straight, and now you can both move on.”
She didn’t want to move on. She barely had time to understand there was a place to move on from. “I only wanted to go to the class. I wasn’t trying to break things off with him.”
Kyle chuckled. “But he understands the class, and that’s why he’s all jealous and shit.”
“I’m not walking in and immediately having sex with my training Dom,” she said with a huff. She’d thought about it, but she hadn’t even met the man yet, and if she was exploring a relationship with Hutch, she certainly wouldn’t cheat on him.
“Most people do by the end because it’s an intimate experience,” Kyle pointed out. “And that’s what you want. At least that’s what I heard when you talked about it. You want the experience, and Hutch knows what that means.”
She did want the experience. She wanted what her aunt had found at the club—a network of friends who were also counted as family. If she let Hutch train her, she would always be Hutch’s sub. She wouldn’t simply be Noelle. She wouldn’t find her own friends, and she couldn’t count on the man forever. The most likely scenario was that they’d had an odd bonding experience when she’d been attacked the day before, and it had led them to an intimacy that wouldn’t hold up in the real world. They would sleep together during this crisis, and then it would fall apart when they went back to their own spaces.
And she would be devastated because Kyle was right about the fact that she usually felt something for the men she’d slept with. She felt so much for Hutch. If she let herself, she could fall in love with the man.
She’d hated that look in his eyes, like she’d killed some light there.
“He’ll get over it,” Kyle said as he finally turned down the road that led to Genedyne. “And hey, who knows, maybe when you’re done with training you’ll want to play with him. If he ever goes back to the club.”
“MaeBe told me he was a member there.”
“Yeah, but from what I understand, he hasn’t been going regularly.” Kyle pulled into the parking garage, and the monitor overhead picked up the sticker on her windshield and let them in. “He’s been…I don’t know…looking for something lately, according to his friends. But don’t worry about it. He’s a good guy. He’ll find it someday. He was moving way too fast with you.”
She’d felt it, too. “We made a connection.”
Kyle seemed to think about that for a moment. “What you have is insane chemistry. It happens sometimes, and it feels like the best thing in the world. It’s incredible and addictive, and it doesn’t mean you’re in love. It means some people fuck together better than they do with others. Sex isn’t love. It’s a biological function we’re taught to pretty up so we forget we’re animals at the core.”
Well that had gone dark fast. “You don’t believe humans can love each other?”
“Of course I do. I don’t think that sexual chemistry equals love, even though it can feel like it,” Kyle insisted. “I think love is more than passion. Love is about the quiet times, being comfortable. It’s about friendship every bit as much as it is about sex. You can have the best sex in your life and if the person you’re having it with isn’t good