thought of that. She was unfailingly generous, always thinking of ways she could help and serve others.
“You sure can. When I tell you it’s okay. Right now, I want to take my time enjoying your body, your reactions. All that arousal that happens between your legs? Eventually I want to taste it. Put my mouth there, make you come that way.”
She stilled. He wanted to ask her what she was thinking about that, but he decided to go another way. “You seemed to like the spanking the other night. It didn’t seem to upset you.”
“No...they didn’t ever…not like that. He—”
“Don’t,” he said sharply. She flinched, and he cursed himself. Tried again, calmer.
“I said ‘don’t,’ because I didn’t want you to go there in your head.” He took a breath. “But is it hard to do that? It’s all right to tell me.”
“No,” she said after a long moment, confirming the truth he was having trouble accepting. “I like my life so much more now, Rory. But then, it was just different. Wrong or right, good or bad…it was just my life.”
She shook her head, “It didn’t happen often, but sometimes, when they praised me or were more kind, it made me feel…”
"Like you mattered."
"Yes. Dr. Taylor says that helped them keep me in a situation where I wouldn’t reach out for help, and I understand that. But she also said it wasn't wrong for me to accept that kindness for what it was worth. Or see my life how I saw it then, the bad and not so bad. If it helped me survive it." She took a breath. “But when you get mad about it, it feels like I’ve said or done something wrong, bringing it up.”
That made total sense. She had to be able to talk about this stuff, without him reacting. How the hell did he do that?
Same way he’d learned how to do plenty of other hard stuff. With practice.
He turned her over toward him, guiding her so she was curled in his arms, her head tucked under his chin. One of her arms crept under his, the other tucked between his chest and her body. Her bare breasts pressed against him. He stroked through her hair again, cradling her jaw and side of her throat. He didn’t want to distress her, but he wasn’t going to make a wrong assumption again, if he could avoid it by asking her the right questions.
“Whenever I touch you, Daralyn, if something doesn’t feel right, or scares you the wrong way, can you tell me to stop? Truthfully.”
She thought about it for a few heartbeats, then she shook her head against his chest. “No. I don’t know if I can. When I think about doing it…”
In a heartbeat, she was a ball of quivering nerves, her breath rasping, a warning of a panic attack. He held her closer.
“Easy,” he said. “You’re fine. We’re fine.”
When she’d said no, they’d punished her.
Her reaction to anger was to draw inward, defuse. How was he going to get past that very male part of him that wanted to rage, tear apart anyone who’d hurt her?
“It’s okay,” he said, saying it to himself as much as her. All while holding her, rocking her. “It’s okay.”
“But I can’t…” Despair drenched her tone. For fifteen years, she’d been told what she wanted wasn’t an option. And they’d done such a good job that it was branded down to the unconscious level.
Telling her she could make choices didn’t liberate her. It shattered her.
Until she could get there—and she would, he knew it—he would have to continue to determine, guess, or deduce her wants and needs, all while watching out for her well-being. And hope like hell the Dom part of him didn’t get so used to it that he missed any attempts she made to start doing it for herself, such that he overrode her at the wrong moment.
It was a lot of responsibility, and he felt the weight of it, the fear of it. But he could handle it.
“I get it,” he said, taking them away from the danger zone. “It’s okay. Don’t tell me what you want. Tell me what feels good.”
A little bit of tension went out of her, though she spoke hesitantly. “I don’t want to tell you what to do.”
“Did I say that?” He made his tone firmer. Decisive. “Tell me what I said, Daralyn.”
“You said to tell you what feels good.”
“Right. It will be my decision, whether I do those things