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  “Come again?” He frowned.

  She glanced to the fire with a deep breath through her nose. “Exactly what I said, I don’t believe you.”

  His thoughts stuttered. While he had opened the door to talk, he hadn’t expected her to take this direction. Perhaps foolishly, he’d thought she’d ask about his favorite movie or a random question, not something so personal.

  He leaned back on his arms, stretching out his legs. The heat from the crackling fire warmed his shins. “Well then, do tell, what do you think I’m doing?”

  “Coasting.” Her gaze cut to him and her eyes widened with her smile. “Oh my God, I’m analyzing, aren’t I?” She gave a dismissive wave of her hand and shifted against the blanket. “It’s a bad habit from the job. Ignore me.”

  Her blushing couldn’t sway him. He remained stuck, infatuated with her statement. “It’s all right. I told you we could talk. This is what you want to talk about. Please continue.”

  A long sigh fell from her mouth, and she turned to the fire. “To me, it sort of seems like you coast through life; doing the right thing, saying the right thing, and being the right man in every situation. But you don’t do it for yourself or because it makes you happy.” She peered at him through her thick lashes and gave a halfhearted shrug. “Today, out here …” She tilted her head back, glancing to the starry sky. “You were different. More comfortable. Free, almost.”

  “Because of that you don’t think I’m happy?” he asked.

  “I think you coast on the edge of totally letting go, because if you stop coasting, you’ll crash.” She peeked at him a moment, then quickly looked away. “I understand why you do it. It’s safer to live and do for others. It’s scary to face what would truly make you happy and the chance it might be taken away.”

  Aidan watched Cora, his mouth dropping open. He found himself unable to form the words to respond; she had him pegged all wrong. Christ, no wonder a barrier remained between them. His stomach knotted with the knowledge of her impression of him.

  The fire crackled, sending an ember near Aidan’s leg as she added, “I see you, you know.” His gaze remained locked on her when she turned to him with a soft smile. “I see every flaw and every imperfection.”

  He snorted, lowering his head and looked to the ember sizzling out. “That’s a pretty picture.”

  His heart banged in his chest as she scooted a little closer and said, “It makes me lucky.”

  Lucky? “Please enlighten me,” he grumbled, glancing to her glowing cheeks. “How does any of that make you lucky?”

  She reached out to stroke his forearm, and a soft expression crossed her face. “I see what no one else does.”

  How to take that? The thought that she knew him so well warmed him. He wanted her to know and trust him. However, the weakness that her statements portrayed shattered him. He both loved and hated the words that came from her mouth. “You don’t think I see you?”

  She dropped her hand, as if his flesh burned her. “No, you don’t.”

  Sweat beaded along his flesh, like frost over grass. The world spun, seeming to slow down. “Cora …”

  “Don’t be offended.” She gave a sad smile. “I’m paid to look deep into people and read what they’re saying without really saying it.”

  Fuck that. As a Dom, it was his job to read into a submissive. “Believe me, none of this is okay.” The situation was far worse than he’d imagined.

  Cora groaned and said, “Great, I’ve ruined the mood. Please forget about it.” She leaned away with a stiff posture and a sullen expression. “Tell me, how often do you go camping?”

  With fuzzy thoughts, he thinned his lips. “What don’t I know about you?”

  She rolled her eyes and avoided his gaze, glancing to the fire. “See, you shouldn’t have let me ramble. It never ends well. About the camping—”

  Part of him wanted to run, not interested to know the answer. The other part of him held, determined to break down the barrier. “You cannot say something like that and change the subject.” He searched internally, desperate to find meaning in her admission. Christ, he thought he was closer to her than any woman. How did she not know that? “Does Porter see you?”

  She continued to stare at the fire with an unnatural stillness. When she spoke, her voice was strained. “Yeah, he does—he always did.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Hours flew by like minutes, and the conversation hadn’t dulled. In fact, considering how strained things had been at the beginning, Cora could’ve listened to Aidan talk about his childhood to college to his job all night.

  At some point, the clouds settled in, darkening the sky. She stared at the fire burning brightly, sending orange flicks into the air. As a comfortable silence fell between them, Cora turned to the small beige-colored tent. Her heart fluttered and her palms grew sweaty. Really, a tent shouldn’t make anyone so nervous, but there was more to that tent that troubled her.

  One tent. One giant sleeping bag for two. Daunting.

  Cora’s heart tripped at the idea of sleeping next to Aidan. She felt as if she was sixteen years old and at the summer camp, the place she experienced her first kiss with a boy. She hadn’t slept in the same bed with a man since Porter; dungeon play didn’t involve sleepovers.

  Is this really happening …

  It seemed both exciting and incredibly dangerous for her.

  “Was Porter your only boyfriend?”

  She gulped, turning to Aidan. “My first Dom boyfriend, not my first boyfriend.”

  “Tell me about the others.” Aidan smiled.

  His shadowy gaze made her hyperaware of his every move. The warmth in the depths of his eyes lightened her chest. You look good when you’re not lost within yourself. But she couldn’t allow herself to get too hopeful—she’d been let down too many times.

  Whatever his intent tonight, she had to keep believing his actions came from being her Dom and wanting to help her, not to get to know her better. And certainly not to let their love grow. She couldn’t handle being wrong again. “Just young-love type stuff, boyfriends through high school and college. Nothing too serious.”

  He hesitated, regarding her with a tilt to his head. “When did you discover you were submissive?”

  “It was a fluke.” The fire crackled, drawing Cora’s attention to the hot embers. “For an assignment in college, we needed to analyze a person and explain reasons for their actions.”

  “You researched a submissive?”

  His soft voice filled with interest, and a tone she’d never heard before kept her attention on the fire. “Nope, a sexual sadist.” She scrunched her nose. “In fact, he was a serial killer.”

  “Please tell me how researching that led you to living the lifestyle.”

  She glanced to him with a smile. “I know how morbid it sounds. A person researching that should run away, not willingly enter into it.”

  A wrinkle marred his forehead. “My thoughts exactly.”

  “Well …” She ran her hands over the soft blanket beneath her. “I went to Chains for research. I thought if I learned how it all worked, then it would be easier for me to understand the mind of a sexual sadist.”

  One eyebrow arched. “Did it?”

  She recalled that eye-opening experience. Lord, what she’d learned through that assignment had both changed her life and made her aware of her limits. “Yeah, and what I saw I didn’t like.”

  “You’re not a masochist,” Aidan agreed.

  “Yep, I figured that out pretty quick.” She remembered the iciness in her veins when she watched knife play. While she understood why some people enjoyed it, and she respected their right to do it, edge play never interested her. “From my experience at Chains and through all the research, I learned the difference between safe, sane, and consensual and abuse.” At his unfamiliar stillness to observe her, she looked to the fire. “By the time I finished the report, an interest grew to experience the safe, sane, and consensual.”

  “
You liked the kink?”

  Chuckling, she turned to him, gazing over the shadows on the contours of his face. “I loved the kink.”

  His body tilted toward her, and he paused to examine her. “How did wanting to experience kink move into realizing that you were submissive?”

  Cora became trapped under his stare. He’d never been so attentive. She couldn’t restrain her smile. Who knew Aidan enjoyed learning about her life? She mulled over his question, recalling the moment she made the choice to accept a power exchange, instead of playing with kink in the bedroom. To give up her choices and fall into a Dom’s command had been a progression. “It happened with Porter.”

  “What happened?”

  “When I first got into the lifestyle it all unnerved me,” Cora admitted, glancing down to her hands resting loosely in her lap. “I guess I looked a little like Presley did when she first joined the club, wide-eyed and scared shitless.”

  He chuckled. “I would’ve liked to have seen you that way.”

  She laughed with him. “Oh, I’m sure it was amusing for all.” Her smile faded and she shrugged. “But with Porter, he built this level of trust between us that I never knew possible. He made me feel …”

  “Safe?” Aidan offered.

  “Exactly.” Lord, she had never known trust like that, where she depended on a man who held her like glass, always careful not to let her break. “He never asked me to give up control. At first we played in scenes in a fun way, staying comfortable within the limits I set out, which, let me tell you, were a lot.”

  “Pretty normal for a newbie.”

  She agreed with a nod. “I started watching other scenes in the club, and saw where Doms were taking their subs. Where I could see them mentally screaming to stop, but because they allowed someone else the control, they stayed quiet.” Her heart swelled with the happy memories. “And I saw where that took them. How they looked after the scene, with that glow of satisfaction.”

  “You wanted that?”

  She raised her brows. “Who wouldn’t want that?”

  He chuckled.

  She smiled, too, and added, “The relationship I built with Porter allowed me to let my guard down. And that helped me realize that giving someone that kind of control didn’t mean I lost myself; rather, it meant I found something more, something deeper emotionally.”

  Aidan gave her a grin that encouraged her to go on. “What did you find?”

  She focused on his mouth and his honest smile. “It fulfilled me in a way I didn’t expect.” The response on his face made her hesitate, and then she looked to the fire. She loved when he looked at her that way. “I’ve always been driven, and it gave me peace to have someone else take care of me. That whenever I stepped foot into the club, I could let it all go.”

  He brushed a finger over her hand, bringing her attention to him. She continued, “Most of all, I loved how my gift of submission meant more than a sexual act. The feeling of being appreciated … it made things better for me.”

  “You know you deserve that, Cora,” he said with an emotion-rich voice. “You deserve to feel all those things.”

  “I know.” That had never been a question in her mind. How could any woman not feel incredible while with a man who paid attention to her every move? She glanced down to his hand over hers and she flipped her hand over, giving his fingers a squeeze. “Even if I don’t love Porter that way, I’ll be forever grateful to him. I wouldn’t be the submissive I am today without the trust he built in me.”

  “Look at me, Cora.” Her gaze cut to him when his fingers tightened around hers, and he added, “Porter allowed you to be who you are and opened your life to new possibilities. But you became that person by choice and should own that. Don’t forget about the strong woman you really are.”

  Her eyes became teary, and she yanked her hand from his. Stop that, Cora! With a harsh breath, she controlled the flare of heady emotion. “Don’t worry, I’m still the same person.” She winked, forcing a smirk. “Maybe just a little wiser.”

  He nodded and looked forward into the fire, and she studied Aidan as he stared at the flames, his dark hair falling over his brow. She clenched her hands against the sudden urge to trace her fingers over such perfection. The tingle of her lips to press them against his was not appropriate right now. “How about you? Did you always know you liked kink and sexual domination?”

  Nodding, he leaned back on his hands. “Always knew I liked kink. After my first taste of bondage, I discovered I needed more than vanilla sex to find fulfillment.”

  Cora’s mouth went dry at the images of an inexperienced Aidan. All the same, picturing Aidan as a newbie Dom was near impossible. She pushed past the burn in her loins. “Then what happened?”

  “I heard whispers of Chains in college.” With a slow arch to his mouth, he added in a low voice, “Once I went there, I never looked back.”

  I’m damn glad! “Did you have a mentor?”

  He shook his head. “Not a mentor necessarily, but I learned from watching and practicing. Much like you did. In those early years, I attended a lot of play parties, which tended to be where I learned the most.” He winked with a mischievous smile. “And I had patient submissives who let me make mistakes and learn from them.”

  To hear him talk so openly about his past experiences tightened her chest. This conversation should’ve happened a long time ago. “Yes, but how did you learn to dominate a submissive?”

  His brows drew together in concentration before he said, “I think anyone can grow as a Dominant, but I also believe it’s a born trait, as it is with submissiveness. I’m good at it, because it’s naturally who I am.” He exhaled slowly, bending his legs and resting his arms on his knees. “If it wasn’t, I think it would look forced.”

  “Yeah, I agree.” In fact, she believed all the Club Sin Masters were naturally dominant men. Most had important jobs in which they needed to be controlling. It wasn’t much of a surprise that they’d seek that same type of control in their sex lives, too.

  Whatever Aidan’s reasons for the shift in his demeanor, she wouldn’t miss the chance to learn more about him. “So, you asked me; now it’s your turn—how many girlfriends have you had?”

  He turned to the fire with a clenched jaw. “I’ve had a few vanilla relationships, but only one D/s relationship.”

  Lily.

  A woman Cora had never met, but one she’d thought of often, especially considering she knew that Lily’s death had destroyed Aidan. Club Sin Master Kyler had told her about the car accident when Cora asked him why Aidan seemed so sad. The man she’d met when she first joined Club Sin wasn’t the happier man sitting with her now. From what she heard from Kyler, Aidan was even more depressed in the year he played without Lily in Chains. Cora didn’t know how he stayed there that long. Facing the club without her must’ve been horrible.

  When Cora had met Aidan, he’d been broken, a shell of a once-strong man that had no life in his eyes. In the first two months he had trained her, she’d never seen him smile. While Cora recognized that pain remained, she’d also witnessed him experience the stages of grief. He hadn’t completely moved on, but he’d improved.

  They were just friends when they first started to play and she’d helped him through a dark time in his life. She always felt that he saw that and appreciated her for it. She stared at him for an overlong moment before she looked away to the dark forest beside her.

  Cora shut her eyes, listening to the thundering of her heart. She’d never felt right bringing up his past, since he’d never really given her the opportunity. With a tight voice, she turned to him and managed, “Do you miss Lily?”

  Aidan heaved a sigh filled with longing. “I do miss her, incredibly so.”

  Cora’s eyelids became gummy at his tearful voice. She immediately wished she could take her question back. Why remind him of such a painful time? And why hurt herself in the process, hearing him talk about another woman? “I’m sorry you lost her, Aidan.”

&nbs
p; “It’s all right.” His arms hung slack at his sides; his expression slack. “Life doesn’t always work out how we plan.”

  With an ache in her stomach, she couldn’t deny that statement. She’d learned that hard lesson, too. If it did, Cora would have what Lily had—this unguarded Aidan. “That’s true—it doesn’t.”

  Staring into his shielded gaze, her shoulders slumped as she realized the distance she’d placed between them. A comfortable place for him she imagined that helped him ignore his pain. With nothing less than feeling a desire to flee, she stretched her arms. “All this fresh air has me beat. I’m calling it a night.” She avoided his gaze as she pushed off the blanket, and every step she took toward the tent weighed her down.

  “No, Cora.”

  She froze and shut her eyes, as she battled the fuzziness of her mind. Regardless, her head was murky, his low murmur sent heat roaring within. This was dangerous for her to play with him tonight. She felt too attached. This was too personal. Yet his voice, layered with rich sexual promise, dropped her into his command.

  Her breath hitched and loins burned as he added, “Stay right where you are.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  I need to touch you.

  I have to feel your warmth.

  I want you close.

  Aidan stared at Cora, who was stiff as a board. “Take off your clothes.” He regarded the trembling of her hands as she removed each item of clothing, one by one. She shivered at the cool air in the mountains, which was still unseasonably warmer than in summers past.

  All day Cora had teased him with her lustful looks. Which had been why he’d taken her not into the busy part of the campground but to a remote spot he’d been to before. He wanted her all to himself without watchful gazes.

  Tonight, she belonged to him.

  While he had expected her to react so intensely to him in Club Sin, he hadn’t counted on it out of the dungeon. What she showed him was so glaringly obvious he wondered how he missed it.

  It wasn’t that he was a Dom; it was him that aroused her. The power within that knowledge made a low growl escape his chest. In every sense of the word, she submitted to him. He hadn’t realized how deep that bond ran … until this moment.