Darcy couldn't help but think she'd done something to displease him. Mild outrage replaced any guilt she might have felt over failing to please him. She couldn't find it in her heart to apologize for resisting his attempt to exercise dominance. They hadn't talked about having a bondage scene this evening.
He lifted two glasses filled with water and set them on the table next to plates he'd already piled with food. “Come on and eat. Tell me how you hooked them and reeled them into your web.”
Sinking into her seat, she eyed him warily. “You're mixing your metaphors.”
“Yep.”
She reached across the small table and closed her hand over his. “Theo, what's wrong?”
Several thoughts and emotions flickered through his deep brown eyes. His jaw set. “I finished the Web site addition. Your documents are uploaded and your forms are finished. I can show it to you if you want to come in tomorrow. It's not live, so we can't access it from anywhere but there. I can have it up for remote viewing by Monday.”
Heat spread up her neck as she realized he must have worked extra hard to finish, and he'd only done it because she had freaked out about it. “Thank you, Theo. I'm sorry about the way I snapped at you this afternoon. I didn't mean to nag you.”
He laughed. “I had most of it ready to go, sweetheart. It was a matter of finishing a few protocols. Also Victor invited us to dinner next Thursday.”
The way he threw that caveat in there completely tore Darcy's attention away from the other issues. She'd been to dinner parties at Victor's house before. They always started late and ended late, and guests spent the entire time kowtowing to Victor's ego.
Echoes of the warning she'd issued earlier grew louder in her brain. Withdrawing her hands, she folded them in her lap. She dropped her gaze to stare at the mounds of food on her plate, vaguely noting there was enough there to feed three people.
“I have late meetings on Thursday.”
She chanced a peek at his face, though she felt like a complete coward for the way her body language clearly indicated her reticence, to see how Theo took her negative answer. A genuine smile had returned to his face, the first she'd seen since she arrived home. Pride manifested in the crinkles at the corners of his eyes.
“Perhaps another time, then. I know how important making the world a better place is to you.”
That he voiced his reaction without any irony further buoyed her spirits. Strain left the room, and she regaled him with the highlights of her presentation and what it meant for her career.
They cleaned up the dishes and put away the leftovers, and she noticed tension had returned to his shoulders.
She slipped her hands around his waist from behind and leaned her head against his back. “Theo, I wish you would tell me what's bothering you.”
He didn't turn or face her, but his body grew tenser. He inhaled and exhaled. “I've been thinking about us.”
Now it was her turn to tense. She withdrew her arms and braced her heart for the worst. Though she had only been in two previous long-term relationships, she had been dumped before by men she'd considered casual dates. It always started like this, and it was never pleasant.
He had to have sensed her trepidation, but he didn't turn to face her or offer comfort. “I keep thinking you're holding back from me, and then I wonder if maybe I'm expecting too much from you. You aren't a twenty-four/seven kind of woman, and that's fine with me. But I get the sense you're hiding a huge portion of yourself from me.”
Stunned, she couldn't think of a reply. Silence fell with all the comfort of a building collapsing around her head.
Theo finally turned around, and she remembered how to breathe. He didn't look angry or like he wanted out. Frustration seemed to be his primary emotion, and once he looked at her, took in a face that was no doubt pale and scared, that frustration grew.
“This relationship isn't going to work if you don't trust me.”
She nodded. “I trust you.”
His lips pressed together. It wasn't the response she had expected.
“Really, I do trust you, Theo. You wouldn't be here if I didn't.”
“You think I'm ending things when I'm trying to have a discussion about the fact that you have yet to truly submit to me.”
That explained the roller coaster of moods he had displayed since she had come home. This was karma paying her back for giving in to PMS earlier. She folded her hands over her heart. “You maybe want to lead with that one next time, Theo. This happy-unhappy thing you've been doing isn't a fun ride.”
Leaning back against the edge of the counter, he crossed his arms. “You admit you haven't submitted to me.”
She nodded and crossed her arms too. Where his pose betrayed a little defensiveness and a lot of aggressiveness, hers was meant to provide comfort and security. The topic he posed could leave her very vulnerable. “I've been submissive. I've played the game, but no, I haven't actually submitted to you.”
“Is it because you're not over Scott?”
Ever since Amy had thrown that brick in his face, she'd known it was going to come back to haunt her. To be fair, Scott was part of the problem. Whether or not she wanted to admit it, his presence hovered over them both.
“It's really hard to move on when I don't even know if he's dead. Nobody ever found his body. If the fucking police had focused on something besides me, maybe I would at least have some closure. In my heart, I know he's dead. But then doubt creeps in and says, what if he's not? What if he's being held in some dank basement somewhere, being tortured while I move on with my life? What does that say about me, Theo? Do you honestly want to be with someone like me?”
He reached out and brushed his thumb under her eye, and she realized she was crying. She hated crying.
“Yes, Darcy, I do. If you were able to completely dismiss someone who meant so much to you, you wouldn't be the woman I've already fallen in love with.” He shook his head and moved away, crossing the room and sinking down at the table. “I keep telling myself I won't ask for too much too soon. The sane part of my brain knows you need time. A lot of time. It knows I could lose you if I force you to accept me before you're ready.”
He muttered something else, but she didn't catch what he said. She wanted to offer comfort, but she didn't want to force him to back down. Her heart thumped painfully, and she wished there was a manual out there with cheat codes for getting through emotionally draining moments.
His words penetrated, and she realized he had admitted to having fallen in love with her. She couldn't honestly say the words back to him, not with the way she held pieces of her heart away from him.
She didn't want to lose him, but it wasn't fair to keep him hanging on when she might never be able to give him what she had given to Scott. Flashes of images and threads of thought bombarded her brain. Opening to the possibilities, she let them coalesce into a complete idea. It was time to move forward. She had to be honest with Theo if she expected him to stick around.
Taking one step, she reached out her hand, but she was still too far away to make contact. “I'm not promising it'll be smooth sailing to be with me. I have a lot of baggage.”
His dry, mirthless chuckle scraped against the nerves in the back of her neck. “Everyone has baggage. I'm not going to lie to you, though. I wish you would talk about him more. I have such a vague image of him in my head, and it's really hard to go up against a guy who is so perfect in your eyes.”
Darcy rolled her eyes before she realized it was a wasted gesture. He wasn't looking at her. “Scott wasn't perfect. But I accepted his faults the same way I accept your faults.”
He turned and impaled her with a glare. His strong hand gripped the back of the chair next to him. “I haven't shown you my faults.”
She wiggled her finger in the air, circling the general area of his body. “This pouty thing is a fault. If you want to have a discussion with me, at least have the balls to face me while you do it. You can be arrogant, and you haven't pushed me wh
en it comes to bondage. Probably because you know if you go full-out, I get to do whatever I want to do with your ass. Those are definite faults.”
Maybe her summation wasn't fair, but she couldn't seem to stop herself. Part of her still didn't want to tell him what she wanted because she wanted him to figure it out by himself.
Both of his brows shot up. “Is that all?” His tone dripped sarcasm. It oozed all over the floor. If she wasn't careful, she would slip on it.
This time he got to see it when she rolled her eyes. “Don't get snippy. You have a lot of great qualities that I really like. They definitely outweigh your faults. Actually, your faults don't bother me all that much. I find your arrogance attractive, and I'm sure you'll get over your sexual issues in time.”
His jaw worked. She watched him struggle with his inner Dom. She could almost hear the mini Theo on his shoulder telling him to throw her over his shoulder, tie her down, and spank her until her bottom glowed. That Theo would war with the sensible side of him questing for answers and solutions, the one that urged a slow breaking down of her soft limits.
Finally he rose to his feet. “What exactly are you trying to accomplish by insulting me? Are you upset I brought up Scott? He's here with us, Darcy. He's a question, a variable, an unknown that's keeping you from submitting to me. You can't expect me to never breathe his name. I don't expect you to keep it all inside, either.”
Was it right to talk about this with Theo? How could she justify laying all of this at his feet? It was one thing to mention a few things in passing. She already felt bad about the few things she'd revealed to him so far. Perhaps that also contributed to the frustrated feelings swirling through her chest. She'd kept the turmoil inside for so long she didn't know how to let it out. Perhaps that was part of her problem. If she couldn't let her feelings out, it was difficult to let new feelings in. Frustrated, she rubbed her eyes.
“Scott isn't keeping me from submitting to you. It's all the crap that happened after he disappeared. My life was hell, Theo. I had days where I didn't get out of bed. I had weeks where I didn't get dressed. You happened to meet me when I decided it was time to get my life back together. I presented a pretty front to you. It's false advertising, and I'm sorry you got caught up in it.”
She took three steps, closing the space between them. Tilting her head back, she stared up at him. “I'm glad you did, though. You can't possibly know how much you've helped me heal. But I've reached a plateau. If you want more from me, you can't ask for it. You have to take it.”
His impassive expression only served to make her bolder. She ran her hands over his flat stomach and untucked his shirt from his pants. He wrapped his hands around her wrists, halting her caress.
“For some reason, I can't submit to you. You want to tie me up and fuck me, but you let me call the shots. I can't be submissive if you let me call the shots, Theo. It doesn't work that way. If you leave options, I'm manipulative enough to use them.”
The hands imprisoning her wrists became iron bands. “If I call the shots, I will run over your soft limits because I don't like them. You noted I was demanding and exacting on our first date. Though I haven't been yet, I am demanding and exacting in the bedroom. I take what I want, when I want, and how I want. You won't get a say in anything. I'll ask for more than you think you can give, and I won't stop until you give it to me. I have a dark side, Darcy. It doesn't have to come out.”
She didn't quite know what to say because even though she was afraid, the pulsing in her pussy rejoiced that he seemed to finally understand what she wanted without her having to ask for it. And he had too been demanding and exacting in the bedroom. Though he had her wrists in his iron prison, he hadn't moved them from his stomach. Her fingers twitched against his midsection.
“It doesn't stop in the bedroom, sweetheart. When I told you bondage was important to me, I meant it. You've spent some time with your wrists tied while we're relaxing because I wanted you to get used to the feel of it against your skin. If I get my way, there will almost never be a time when you're not wearing ropes.”
Reflexively she jerked her wrists free. He didn't stop her.
“It's not too late to change your mind. I see your fear. A little fear is healthy, but I don't want you living in fear of me. I would never actually hurt you, and I will always respect your safe word. You think my approach is half-assed. I've only shown you my tender side. I have one of those too. It's not a fault, and no matter what you decide tonight, you have earned a punishment for saying that.”
Excited and hoping he'd follow, she backed away. “Now, see, from my perspective, calling you out on that opened up a whole area of communication we neglected. I should be rewarded for pointing that out.”
He took a menacing step forward, and the temperature in her pussy shot up five degrees. “You're saying you want me to tie you up the way I want to tie you up. You're asking me to forget your limits, ignore that panicked look you get when I bind both your hands, and do whatever I want to you?”
Wordlessly she nodded.
Those brown eyes blazed across the room and seared her. “I want your submission. You can't give it to me, but you're willing to let me take it.”
She inhaled sharply, recognizing that he couldn't take her submission. Despite what they said and what it looked like, she would have to give it.
He leaned back against her counter and crossed his arms. This time the gesture was ominous. “You have ten seconds to change your mind.”
“Okay.” She held up a hand to buy a few more seconds. “But in the spirit of fair play, I should warn you that I fight back. I kick and punch. If you want my submission, you will have to fight for it. If my soft limits are on the table, so are yours.”
“Fine. In a scene, you are allowed to fight back however you want. But touch my ass and I'll whip you with my belt.”
Her knees weakened, and the likelihood she would do exactly that the second he let down his guard shot to 100 percent. “That's not much of a disincentive.”
A low, evil chuckle rasped from his throat. She'd never heard him make a sound like that before. It set every nerve ending in her body on edge. Pivoting, she ran. The open front door registered as a bad idea, so she veered left to grab the heavy wood and give it a hefty push.
As she spun to head up the stairs, Theo caught her around the waist. Darcy gave over to her first instinct and jabbed her elbow as close to his solar plexus as she could get it. He absorbed the hit as if it was nothing and thrust them both into the door.
He twisted the deadbolt. She took advantage of his occupied hand to wiggle down and jab his stomach, reasoning it was softer than the ribs she'd ended up getting with her last attempt. She was wrong.
Still, being smaller, she used his weight against him and continued the wiggling. She slid down and out under his arm, but he tackled her again, pinning her to the floor with his body. It was a good thing she had been bent over, otherwise the fall would have been jarring.
She stilled for a moment, planning her next move. Theo's breath tickled against her neck. “Good call. I closed the kitchen window too. Having the cops show up because of all your screaming would ruin the moment, and then you'd have to make it up to me wearing a gag.”
His hands rested on her upper arms, and his erection pressed against her ass. A sigh of relief escaped at the blatant evidence he found this as arousing as she did.
He lifted one hand off her arm and let it travel down her body. He squeezed her ass so hard she yelped. He continued on, shifting his weight to pull her skirt out of the way. Since he had removed the rope panties, no barrier existed to keep him from his goal.
Darcy didn't dwell on that. Bucking sharply, she threw him off and broke free. She scrambled for the stairs. The bathroom door had a lock, and she wasn't above using it. Perhaps that wasn't fair. He'd either have to pick the lock or break down the door. The image of wood splintering under the force of his kick and the subsequent menacing expression on his face fueled the fantas
y.
Oh, but she was enjoying this. Even as part of her wondered whether wanting to be overpowered by a man and forced to do whatever he wanted was sick and wrong, she thoroughly enjoyed this chase.
He caught her before she made it halfway up the steps. He had grabbed her by the hair, and the sharp tug brought tears to her eyes and tingles to her pussy. As he forced her to turn to face him, she realized he hadn't advised her to stop one time. She kicked and found her ankle caught.
Standing precariously halfway up the staircase with her ankle and hair in his possession, she used all her strength to pull away from him. She didn't move an inch until he yanked her ankle and knocked her on her ass. She bounced hard on a step.
He used her leg as leverage. Pushing it up, he forced her to lie back against the steps. The hand in her hair moved to the front of her neck. Darcy gasped. Never in her life had a lover put a hand on her neck. In other circumstances, she would be petrified.
However she knew Theo wouldn't really harm her. The bruises she would sustain from her falls were mostly her fault.
His grip slid up her leg to stop at the back of her knee. He pressed her knee to her chest. The hem of her skirt dug into her leg stubbornly before giving in and rolling up. She thought about bringing her free leg up to nail him in the balls. He must have read her expression because he shifted his knee to press against her inner thigh. The position rendered her immobile.
Reaching through the railing to the cherry table, he grabbed the smooth nylon rope that she'd spent the afternoon wearing as panties.
Moving quickly and with more grace than she would have thought possible given their awkward position, he straddled her stomach. The way he had positioned her on the stairs meant her legs were useless for fighting. Her upper body strength presented no real obstacle.
Relieved at his fighting skill, a sense of security at the way he engulfed her body flooded her senses. Though she felt drugged, she wasn't willing to give up. She tugged at the hand on her neck.
He released her, but not because she had any effect on him. She took a swing at him, and he caught her fist in his palm. Wordlessly he looped one end of the rope around her wrist and through the banister railing. She did her best to use her free hand to stop him, but he merely tied that one to the spires on the other side that gave the living room a little bit of delineation from the stairs and hall.
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