Domination (Explicitly Yours 2)

“Promise me.”

She looked up at his tone. In his face was a shadow of how worried he’d been. “He didn’t,” she said. “Promise.”

He ran a hand up and down her back. “I’m sorry, babe. It was a lot to ask of you.”

She returned her cheek to his chest and nodded. “It’s done, though. Over.” She almost told him it was okay to feel angry. Selfishly, that would make it easier for her to be angry. But she felt very much like a house of cards that couldn’t take any more weight without collapsing. Later would be a better time for them to get angry.

“Thank you,” she said.

“For what?”

“Not being afraid to touch me.”

“How could I be? You’re my girl.” He kissed the top of her head. “I love you.”

She almost rose up to kiss him but was afraid he’d pull away. “Please go make coffee,” she said, separating from him.

He left the shower. She didn’t cry again. She soaped her breasts, behind her ears, under her feet. All the parts Beau had touched. Everywhere. She was owned, just like he’d promised. She rubbed between her legs a little longer than necessary—one second comforting that unfulfilled ache, the next trying to make it stop. Only an hour earlier, Beau had been inside her. She couldn’t come, not so in between Beau and Johnny. Her mind and body had been there with Beau, but her heart knew Johnny was minutes away. She wished she’d just been able to fucking come, because now Beau’s ache might never go away. She turned off the water.

Johnny returned to wrap her in a towel. He dried her off and patted her hair. “There’s coffee in the living room.”

She kept the towel around her, and they went to the couch. Johnny sat at one end while she curled her knees to her chest at the other. He was patient while she sipped from the mug.

“I think maybe it’s best I don’t go into details,” she said.

“That bad?” he asked.

“It’s just, I?

??ve heard some couples do that. After affairs or whatever. Seems stupid to me. Like asking for trouble.”

He nodded, looking into his coffee, thinking. “All right. Last thing I want is to make things harder on either of us.” He looked up. “But you were safe? Were you scared?”

“In the beginning a little. He took me to Rodeo Drive—”

“Seriously?”

“Only because I couldn’t go in jeans. To the fundraiser, I mean—the event I texted you about. But being around all those people actually made things better. It didn’t feel like such a dirty secret.”

He coughed. “About that last text. I’m sorry. It was selfish of me. I’d already had a drink—”

She glanced up from her coffee. “Text?”

“You didn’t read my response?”

She shook her head. “He took my phone away.”

“What do you mean he took it away?”

“He had a very particular way of doing things. He didn’t like me mentioning your name. When he found out I’d texted you, he took my phone.”

“So basically he’s a complete dick.”

She looked at her handbag. Johnny’s last request the night before had been that she not kiss Beau. Had the text been about that? Or had it been something even bigger—maybe an apology that they’d decided to go through with this at all?

“What’d it say?” she asked.

“Nothing. Just continue. Where’d you go after the event?”

His face was red, as if he were embarrassed by the text. She hesitated, but decided not to pursue it. She would read it later. “After? We went for a nightcap. There’s this insane, secret speakeasy on Sunset—”

“Heard of it,” he said. “Don’t know anyone who’s been, though.”

“It wasn’t anything,” she said, shrugging too hard in an attempt to seem convincing.

“Right. After that?”

“I think we should stop there.”

“Oh.” He bobbed his head slowly. “All right. If that’s what you want.”

Lola did want to tell him, because only he would understand why their next stop had been so strange. That Beau had taken her to a strip club at all was unusual—but that it’d been the same one she’d worked at? If she mentioned it, Johnny would ask why they went there. He’d want to know if she’d danced for him. Cat Shoppe was a sore topic for Johnny, who’d risked their relationship to get her out of there.

“It’s what I want,” she said, returning her time with Beau into the vault where it belonged.

He looked around the room. She drank more coffee.

“I checked while you were in the shower. The other half of the money still isn’t deposited.”

“It’s the weekend,” she said.