The Collar (The Submissive 6)

The doctors hadn’t been able to find exactly what had happened. They even said there was nothing in the way of them trying to conceive again in a few months. He wasn’t sure either one of them would be ready then, if ever.

Well-meaning friends came by the cabin to pay their respects, tell them how sorry they felt, how it was for the best, and to bring casseroles. He was caught between laughing over the number of casseroles in their freezer, crying over the outpouring of sympathy, or yelling in anger, demanding to know how it could ever be for the best.

Dena barely spoke, choosing to answer most questions in as few words as possible. He didn’t know how to reach her, and how could he pull her from her abyss when he couldn’t find a way out of his own? Day after day, he felt her slip further and further away.

When she suggested she move out for a while, just to get her bearings, he agreed. She’d been living with him for years. Maybe she needed to be away for a bit. He thought if they each could grieve alone and without worrying about the other, maybe they would heal faster. They could find their own peace and come together stronger.

But looking back, he could see his agreement for what it was: the worst decision he’d ever made. Without her, the cabin echoed with loneliness and despair met him at every corner. Days after she left, he shut the door to the nursery, telling himself he’d wait until she came back so they could deal with the room together.

She never came back. With time, they had each grown stronger, but they had also grown further apart.

“I don’t get it,” he told Daniel three weeks after she moved out. “Whenever we’re together, it’s like we’re walking on eggshells. Almost like we’re scared of each other.”

“I wish I knew what to say. I just don’t. Has she mentioned moving back?”

They were at Daniel’s house, having a few beers and pretending to watch the football game.

“Nothing,” Jeff said. “Maybe I’ll stop by and see her after work tomorrow.”

“She still staying with Kelly?”

Mistress K was a Domme in their group. Since she worked for the Wilmington Police Department, their paths crossed often in both the vanilla and the kink worlds.

“Yes, but you know how Kelly can be.”

“Bossy, demanding, and hard to get along with?”

“Exactly,” Jeff said. “Just like someone I used to know.”

Daniel put his beer down and leaned forward. “I can’t say I know how you guys are feeling. I don’t. But the loss you’ve experienced is a major one. It’ll take time to come to terms with it.”

“I wish I’d never agreed to let her move out.”

“You can’t keep her against her will.”

“Maybe not, but I could have fought her on it instead of just agreeing.” He thought back to the day she’d suggested moving out. “Do you think it’s the house? Maybe it has too many memories?”

“I think it’s a combination of things, but I know you have to accept the fact that you can’t fix them for her.”

Jeff knew Daniel was right. There were some things that were out of his control. He couldn’t change what had happened; nor could he control Dena’s feelings about it. She would have to work it out for herself, the same way he did. The only thing he could do was to try to be there for her while she did so.

He pulled up to Kelly’s house later that evening and wondered if he should have called first. Dena’s car was in the driveway, but Kelly’s wasn’t. With a heavy sigh, he parked his truck and made his way to the door.

Dena opened it at his knock, a look of surprise on her face. Her hand automatically went to her collar. “Jeff. I wasn’t expecting you.”

She moved aside to let him in.

“I wanted to stop by and see how you’re doing,” he said, once inside.

“You could have called for that.”

“I wanted to see how you were doing. You talk to me on the phone but avoid actually being in the same room with me.” By his calculations, it’d been almost two weeks since he’d seen her.

She led him into the living room, where they sat on opposite sides of the couch.

“I’m doing about as well as can be expected.” She studied him. “How about you? How are you doing? You look tired.”

“I’m not sleeping well,” he said. It’s lonely without you, he wanted to add, but didn’t. For some reason, the words didn’t make it from his head to his mouth.

She sighed. “Me either.”

They sat, for what felt like eternity, without speaking. She picked at a thread on her jeans. He stared at the ceiling. It was like they were strangers.

“When are you coming home?” he asked.

She jumped when he spoke, almost as if she’d forgotten he was in the room. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t think I’m ready.”

“Ready for what?” he asked. “It’s our home. It’s where you belong.”

“It’s not the house.”

She went back to paying attention to the thread on her jeans. It’s you, were her unspoken words. It’s you I’m not ready for.

“I see,” he said. And he did. It was his fault, after all. When they’d first confirmed she was pregnant, he’d thought about proposing. He’d been waiting for a sign she wanted him to. Now he knew why he never found one. He stood up. “I should be going. I just wanted to see how you were doing.”

She didn’t show him to the door.

They next saw each other a week later at a group social. He went because he thought it might be good for him to be around people. He’d missed the companionship of his peers, but he was surprised to see Dena there.

She still looked lost. She had always been thin, but she looked gaunt and her eyes were sad. She was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved tee. While she typically didn’t wear her corset and heels to group socials, she usually didn’t wear street clothes either. When she saw him arrive, he knew she was just as surprised to see him as he had been to see her.

No one came up to him. Most people simply stared at him and quickly looked away.

“How’s it going?” Daniel asked, giving Jeff a slap on the back.

“Better now that I’m not being treated like I have the plague or something. Hell, it was a miscarriage; it’s not contagious.” He knew he sounded bitter, but he couldn’t help it.

Across the room, no one was talking to Dena, either. As he watched, Kelly came and stood by her side. A feeling of gratitude swept over him.

He was at the buffet table, getting something more to drink, when Dena came up to him.

“I didn’t know you were going to be here,” she said.

He shrugged. “I didn’t know it was my place to let you know my every move.”

She shifted her weight. Her fingers drifted up to her throat and grazed his collar. “By that you really mean it’s my place to let you know my every move.”

“That is my collar you’re wearing, isn’t it?” Any other time, he would have insisted on knowing she’d be attending a group function ahead of time. Since the miscarriage, however, everything was a mess.

She looked past him to something over his shoulder. “Sorry, Sir. I thought it would be a good idea for me to come tonight. To see our friends in a neutral environment.”

Yet she hadn’t expected him to be there. He didn’t want to examine that too closely, but he knew he would have to eventually. On the surface, her actions seemed to indicate she was moving on, but moving on without him. He closed his eyes in an effort to head off the pain of the realization that he’d moved on, too.

In that moment came the knowledge that this was what their future looked like. They would occasionally run into each other, and when they talked, there would be hidden meaning in their words. Their relationship had always held a certain measure of fire. It was what made her surren

der to him in the playroom so intense—the fact that she was so unyielding outside those walls.

Even now, with her jeans hanging loose on her too-thin frame and her glorious hair pulled back into a ponytail, her spine held its undeniable strength. He had the unwelcome thought that she was turning that strength against him. Perhaps it was only by living separately from him that she had found the sense of self-preservation to move on from the loss of their daughter.

“We have to talk,” he said, decided. “Come by the house tomorrow evening.”