“This collar is a symbol of my love. It is a training collar and I want you to understand that going into this phase of our relationship.” He studied her face, searching for any hint of what she might be thinking. She only seemed more mesmerized as he spoke to her, as he explained the meaning of the collar he wanted to place around her neck. “To put it in layman’s terms, this particular collar would be comparable to an engagement ring in the vanilla world.”
“But we’ve been living a vanilla life, like you said.” She looked slightly confused.
“Yes, but you knew early on that’s not who I am.”
“Have I disappointed you in some way, made you feel like I wasn’t open to your life and the things you enjoy?”
“God, no,” he said, almost too quickly. “You’re perfect. Everything between us has been perfect so far.”
Her smile warmed his heart and gave him more courage than ever before. He knew how she felt about him. Their feelings for one another mirrored the other.
“I want you to accept this gift and wear it all the time, not just in private, but in public, too. I want everyone to know you belong to me, that our relationship is one geared toward a long-term commitment. By accepting, you agree we’re devoted to one another. I want to educate you about the lifestyle but as we move into what will be a training stage, there are ground rules to set and things to discuss.
“For example, you are in every way imaginable a reflection on me. When you’re in public, how you act and how others perceive you shows the world what kind of training you’ve received from me. I want our relationship to be honest and open at all times, but in saying that, I want you to trust that I’ll always keep your best interest in mind. I have no desire to pursue other submissives and I won’t. Those days ended the first time I saw you.”
“For me, too.”
He hesitated. Had he misinterpreted how she’d responded to Hales and Dallas? Had he introduced them too late or would she willingly accept them at his request? After a brief silence, he said, “There’s something I want you to consider for me. It isn’t a condition of wearing this collar, but something I want you to think about when we begin setting soft and hard limits.”
“What are those?”
“It’s a way we determine whether or not you’ll be open and receptive to certain activities within our relationship.”
“You want me to play with other Doms.”
“I…” His first instinct was to immediately say that’s not what he had wanted to discuss first, but she’d obviously picked up on his need to bring in another play partner for her. “It’s something to consider, yes. We don’t have to discuss it right now.”
“Can we discuss who?”
“You already have someone in mind?” Now this wasn’t going according to his plan. He didn’t want their special moment to be overshadowed by the discussion of playtime with others, unless of course, she was ready to tell him she’d willingly accept his brothers.
“I’m sorry,” she said, cupping his cheek. “I just thought that…”
“Go on. We have to be open and honest with one another, Drina. You need to trust me completely if you accept and wear my collar. Yes, we have a lot of boundaries to set, soft and hard limits to discuss, punishments and rewards, even your safe word. Everything we do for the next few weeks will be with your training in mind.”
“You’re die-hard about this, aren’t you?”
“Where you’re concerned, yes.” And it scared him to death. He’d played with submissives in the past, given them those cheapo disposable collars during dungeon parties in larger cities, but he hadn’t taken things this far. He’d never wanted to go this far with anyone else. He’d never considered ownership but now he was all in and he wanted her to realize it from the start. “Eventually I want to own you.”
“You want to own me? You mean my heart?”
“I mean you,” he said, unhooking the collar from the jewelry box. “The center infinity symbol is there for a reason. It means limitless, endlessness, impossible to measure or calculate—that’s what I feel for you, Drina. My love is endless. I want to spend my life with you so I had the collar designed by a jeweler in town in hopes that later we can go back to him and add an ownership tag on the back of the piece. Then you’ll know—everyone will know—you’re mine. You are owned completely and irrevocably only by me.”
“But you want to share me.”
She was still stuck on that? Well, fuck. Apparently, he needed to go ahead and put it out there and maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing. He had to consider her sisters and their relationships. She wasn’t exactly green in the lifestyle arena.
“Do you find Dallas and-or Hales attractive?”
“You’re asking me this now?”
“You seemed interested to know what I had in mind for you, and I want to answer every question you have so you’ll feel good about the start of our training period and understand our relationship better.”
“Hales looks so much like you…of course I find him attractive.”
“He and I are very different.” And not in a good way, but he wouldn’t elaborate on that. “What about Dallas?”
“Have you already talked about me to Dallas?”