Whatever he’d discovered about her past had driven him crazy. She took that to mean he knew pretty much everything, or at least whatever the local gossips back home provided through public record. Depending on who was asked, there was plenty out there to raise eyebrows.
Still, she couldn’t believe she agreed to answer his questions. Then again, the rewards offered promised fair and prompt compensation after she suffered through their interrogation. She still held tightly to the option of outright ignoring inquiries that made her uneasy, and she would exercise her rights whenever she felt uncomfortable.
“Have you ever thought about having children?”
“Me?” She laughed. “No. I told you. I don’t want to mess up my body.” There were other issues involved as well. For starters, she didn’t think she’d be a very good mother. She wasn’t much of a role model for young men and women. How could she raise a son or daughter? It just wasn’t possible. “Next question.”
Kit frowned, made a note and continued. “Before meeting us, were you ever in a serious relationship with anyone else?”
“Yes.”
Kit paused. He glanced at Kemper and then looked at her dead-on. The expression on his face was marked with pain, true disappointment. Finally, he reluctantly asked the question she expected. “He was a Dom, wasn’t he?”
“Yes.”
He stilled. He and Kemper shared a silent glance before he began his pointless scribbling all over again. “What was his name?”
She thinned her lips.
“A first name is fine,” Kemper said.
“Paul,” she said, shuddering when she thought of him.
“Her nipples spiked when she said his name,” Kit said, shaking the pen toward her breasts. He wrote something down again.
“That’s normal,” Kemper reminded him. “A Dom will teach his submissive to respond subliminally to various hot buttons.”
“Are you saying his name was a ‘hot’ button?” she asked, choking on the idea.
“Your nipples got hard when I asked about him. What would you call your response?”
“A bad habit?” she suggested, somewhat pleased Kit didn’t go the hell off when he spoke of her former Dom. As much as she hated admitting she’d made a bad decision, she was certain her resolve to avoid the lifestyle when she first arrived in Blountville had been a costly error.
In some ways, she felt as though her silence placed a wall between herself and Kit. He was hurt because she hadn’t disclosed her former interest in Domination and submission. Perhaps he felt betrayed a little, too.
After all this time, he discovered she not only had knowledge of Domination and submission, but she’d also lived within the lifestyle on some level. The knowledge would’ve certainly been hard for a true Dom to accept, particularly one who wanted to teach her everything about the world he intended to introduce.
“Let’s hope he’s a bad habit and that’s all,” Kit said, moving on to the next question. “Why didn’t you tell us you once were another man’s submissive?”
And there was the question that should’ve restrained the sub.
Instead, she blurted out, “It was a trust issue. I needed to feel confident in my relationship with you. I needed to trust you.” Her eyes met Kit’s and then Kemper’s. “I needed to be sure you were both trustworthy.”
She was so surprised by her confession, she gasped. Her hand flew to her mouth.
Kit stopped pacing. “Is that the truth?”
Indeed it was. The truth had a way of setting people free, and in that moment, Holly was a believer.
It was as if she subconsciously hid her reasons and just avoided discussing the topic altogether. Then, when she least expected to understand why or what drove her away from Domination and submission, she found her answer. She’d been in one very bad Dom-sub relationship. If she entered another, she wanted to do things differently. She needed to believe she could trust her Doms and count on them.
She didn’t want another great disappointment.
“What is your favorite form of punishment?” Kit asked, moving on perhaps a little faster than Holly might have liked.
Swallowing once or twice, she processed the next question and finally gave her reply. “Spankings, with a crop or a paddle.”
Kit drew a line straight across the page and shook his head like he was disappointed to discover her fondness for a paddling. “Favorite rewards?”