Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
R ev leaned against the wall across from the club’s restrooms and changing areas. While benches were spaced along the corridor, he’d preferred to stand, with his arms crossed, head down.
He was dealing with a lot inside. She’d told him that was normal, but she’d also kept close watch on him, mentally and physically. He needed to find his footing and reassure her that he was all right. But first he had to make sure that was true.
He thought it was. He was just caught up in a state of curiosity and wonder. His main challenge was managing a raging need…for something. For her, for certain. To have her, be with her, hold her, feel her bare flesh against his, be inside her, moving strong like an ocean current that would take them places far beyond what he’d even thought was possible in his earthly existence.
He wanted to kneel to her. He wanted to care for her. Help her take off her clothes for bed, kneel by her shower while she bathed, and be there with a towel to press against her skin. He wanted to see that look in her eyes she’d had when she’d gripped him at the table, right there in front of everyone.
It had made him even harder, and she’d understood that, too. He wouldn’t have thought that about himself, that he could let a woman do such a thing in front of other people, but it was as she said. Here, it was allowed. She’d used his own words to help him understand this place. This village found such things acceptable. And it opened up a whole new world of things for him to want from his Mistress.
Others passed him, coming and going from the restrooms. He’d almost gotten used to being evaluated in the way expected here. He nodded courteously to each, because even if their faces showed a brief flash of disappointment, they all accepted what his bracelets meant.
Villages tended to accept best what they shared in common, and this environment was no different.
Tisha and Witford had called it a deviant lifestyle.
He still hadn’t put that one to bed inside him, the vile things they’d said to Veracity. There were things a man couldn’t share with his family, that arguably were not their business, but still…their judgment had come from an ugly place, and that ugliness could grow into a monster in his heart, because he didn’t know how to fix it.
Because it wasn’t his job to fix it. Not until the Lord showed him how. But sometimes believing that didn’t make the heart as easy as one could hope. Especially when someone he loved had created the wound and the infection that lingered in it.
“Doing okay?”
He glanced up to see Lawrence coming toward him. The Hispanic male wasn’t tall, but he was built solid, his body compact and arms muscular. Veracity had said he was a former SEAL.
“Yeah. I’m all right. You all sure are good about keeping an eye on each other.”
“It’s the job. And one worth doing.” Lawrence didn’t smile, but his expression was friendly. “I won’t assume I know everything that’s going through your head, but just remember, there’s being a beginner and being an idiot. Best way to think about it is, ‘Is this something I can get better at? Do I want to get better at it?’ If the answer is yes, you’re in beginner territory.”
“What’s idiot territory?”
Lawrence pursed his lips. “‘I wasn’t able to be and do everything she wanted here, so that means I’m wrong for her, or I’ll never be good enough for her.’ Most of us have been there. Especially if the woman in question matters, and unless we have more cockiness than good sense. These women are good at cutting cockiness down to size, quite literally, if it calls for it.”
“I seen that, no question.” Rev managed a smile.
“This group of Mistresses, they know their own strengths and weaknesses, and if the weaknesses bother them, they fix them. They don’t ask for validation. And they pay attention.”
Lawrence leaned against the wall next to him, hooking a finger in his jeans pocket. “They want to notice everything about you, want to know how they can bring things out in you that they’ll enjoy the hell out of, but there’s a generosity to it. They want you to find your feet in your submission to them, a strength and steadiness that can carry you in the world. Sometimes, when you’ve dealt with a lot of shit in your life, or your other relationships, you think that kind of level ground is a damn unicorn you’re never going to find.”
Rev studied the man. “You had a woman like that.”
Lawrence nodded, his gaze straight ahead. “It was tough. Her alcoholism only made it worse, and I let myself become part of the whole tangled mess, which, worst of all, didn’t help her. Rosalinda helped me figure it out.”
His jaw flexed. “A big step in finding that level ground is realizing what happens here is a two-way street. The Mistresses come for what they need, for healing and steadying, as much as the subs do. It works, man. It just works, in ways hard to explain.”
He tilted his head toward Rev. “And there’s no need to feel uncertain or worried about any of it. In a world where that’s all we do sometimes, this is an oasis. If you’re lucky, you find the Mistress who’ll want to keep you as much as you want to keep her, and you’ll have that oasis out in the world, not just here.”
Lawrence didn’t look like the type of man who indulged in poetic musings, but Rev thought the former SEAL wouldn’t see what he’d just said that way. He’d just stated the truth he had inside him.
“Thanks,” Rev said. “That helps.”
Lawrence nodded. “If you want, I can give you my digits, so if something comes up on the sub side of thing you’d like to talk about with another male sub, one that’s part of their circle, you can.”
“I don’t carry a phone, but if you okay telling me where to find you, a place where it not a problem looking you up, that’d be good.”
“Sure thing.” Lawrence reached into his back pocket to pull out his wallet and remove a card from it. “I work at this youth rec center, as a coach and anything else they need. You can find me there most days. Leave me a message if I’m not there, and let me know how I can find you.”
Rev told Lawrence about the school and the church. “Those are the places I’m at most times.”
“Got it.”
“How am I doing with Ros and the rest?”
“Not what you need to be concerned about.” Lawrence’s green and gold eyes met his. “If you take care of her, that part takes care of itself. Understand?”
“I do. I wouldn’t hurt her for anything in the world.”
“Good.”
Rev pressed his lips together. “I don’t want to pry into things she hasn’t decided are my business, but her family…her born family…they hurt her bad, didn’t they?”
“Enough that she rarely talks about them to anyone.” Lawrence’s expression tightened. He paused, maybe thinking through what he could say while respecting Vera’s privacy. Rev stayed silent, wanting whatever Lawrence could offer.
“The first couple of years Rosalinda knew her, Vera left on vacations at Christmas and Easter. The assumption was she went to see family, but she was doing destination holiday vacations on her own. If that helped her, Rosalinda would have left her to it. Maybe even made up an excuse to join her, because though she loves her, Rosalinda’s mom drives her crazy.”
Lawrence’s lips tipped up. “But when Vera came back to work, she always seemed down in the dumps, which isn’t her usual gear. So after Rosalinda learned the truth, she told Vera her ass was expected at their holiday celebrations—hers, Skye’s or Cyn’s. Abby doesn’t have any other family, either, so coming to those events with her helped Vera feel more okay about it. And when everyone got paired up, the options only expanded.” Lawrence half smiled. “My mother and sisters had us all down at their place last Thanksgiving. That was an experience.”
Lawrence’s gaze moved back toward the restrooms. “For more, you’ll have to ask Vera. But tread with care. It’s a wound that still bleeds.”
Veracity had emerged. She’d retrieved that little pillbox hat with a net over her eyes from the coat check before she went to freshen up. As she adjusted it, Rev noticed she’d left the black gloves off, so he could still see the mesh gloves that left the black tipped nails unencumbered. He remembered the bite of them on his skin, the promise of pain. More, if he wanted it. If she decided he wanted it.
“See you later, man.” As Lawrence moved away from Rev, he stopped to speak to Vera. She smiled and nudged him with her hip, an intimate familiarity, before he moved on.
It got Rev to thinking. When he and Vera came together in the middle of the hallway, her gaze was coursing over him with appreciation. He’d donned the shirt after the flogging, but she’d had him leave it open, the tie folded in his pocket.
“You look like you want to ask me something, Rev.”
“Is Lawrence one of the subs you been with here? Before Ros and he got together? If it’s okay to ask that, Mistress.”
He added the courtesy, but the words held an edge he needed to get rid of fast. He had no hold on her. No hold on anyone. What God gave, God could take away.
The thought conjured Teena Joy and his mother, but he wouldn’t let this be about that. This was about the things he needed to learn about this world, to decide if he could handle them.
“No.” The touch of kindness in her tone told him she understood what he was feeling. “Lawrence was hired to provide protection when Ros was under threat from a local gang. He wasn’t part of this world,” she gestured around her at the club, “though he was in the lifestyle. We could tell when Ros decided he was hers, even before she acknowledged it herself, so he was off limits. Except under her supervision.”
“You’ve…shared him?” His brows rose.
“Once. It was an acceptance ritual. When each of them chose the man she wanted to keep forever, we celebrated and confirmed it among our circle. It differed from man to man, and Lawrence’s ritual was the most hands-on.”
She said it so matter-of-factly, but it sent his mind spinning again. Dismay, arousal, uncertainty, need. Each time he thought he had a handle on it, the emotions kept surging up, like when rough weather was stirring up the Mississippi, so cat’s paws slapped the bulkheads and sent explosions of foam and river water up onto the land. That ambush meeting in her office, the reaction of his family he still wasn’t sure how to handle, was part of the boiling mixture. It made all of it even more of a struggle to get hold of.
As long as he was sure of the ground under his feet, he could handle a storm. What was making him feel unstable wasn’t something he was sure he should tell her. But she didn’t leave him any choice.
She laid a hand on his arm. “Tell me.”
He tipped his head, cracking his neck, and closed his eyes, thinking it through before he spoke. “When I was little, and first understood what death was, I was afraid. Then Teena Joy say to me, ‘Imagine you standing in front of the door to a new place, and there’s a welcome sign and pots of flowers around it, like our porch. Now imagine you wearing your favorite outfit, the one you most like to wear, that’s the most comfortable. So comfortable you’ve worn it out.’”
That’s your body, honey. It’s taken such good care of you, and it’s ready to lie down and let you go. You step out of it and through that door, and God’s there. There’s nothing to be afraid of, letting go when love is there to catch you. And if you believe it is, it is.
“What you did with me the other night…it gave me that feeling. That if I let go, you’re there. Tonight I don’t know if that feeling was right. Or if it’s like football. You feel good about learning how to catch the ball and run with it, but that don’t mean the NFL is looking for you.”
So much was pushing and pulling inside him. The singing had helped, but the aftermath, and even the conversation with Lawrence, reassuring as it was, tangled up his mind and gut again. He was like one of the kids, messed up over a crush, all wild and excited one moment, and afraid and tense the next. He wasn’t sure he liked the feeling.
“You have a lot to think about.” She laced her fingers with his. “How does this feel?”
“Good. But I’m doubting it means the same thing to both of us.”
“Is that necessary?” Her gaze remained steady, expression neutral.
That didn’t help, but he thought of her guidance earlier. “I don’t know. You said that’s an okay thing to say.”
“Always, as long as it’s honest.”
“I not sure if that’s what I’m being. I not sure of anything in my head.”
“What do you usually do when you’re confused or uncertain?”
“I pray,” he said simply. “I ask God to show me the right way. Then I let it go until that happens. But I feel…I don’t want to mess things up with you. I’ve never wanted like this. Wanted a woman like this.”
Her eyes softened and she stroked his jaw. “Do you want to learn to drive?”
He blinked. “What?”
“You said you don’t drive. Would you like to learn? We could get together sometime soon, and I can give you some driving lessons. Then you can teach me something I don’t know how to do.” Her eyes laughed up at him. “Maybe how to sing. We’ll learn from one another.”
He'd been worried he’d hurt or offended her with his uncertainty. He hadn’t. And with the simple offer, she’d told him her knowledge wasn’t a way to hold power over him, but a gift she was offering, while asking for the same from him. She was teaching him, and willing to be taught. He gripped her hands. “Okay.”
When she took his arm, he looked into her large, silver eyes that offered so many things to him. “I’m here for you, Mistress,” he said. “Whatever you need.”
A quiver ran through her, a line to a deeper place that seemed to twine itself around his fingers as she slid her hand up to overlap his wrist and knuckles. “Thank you, Rev.” A pause, then again. “Thank you.”
Her eyes glistened, as if what he’d said had inspired tears. His brow furrowed, and he opened his mouth to ask what was going on.
“Mistress Vera, hold up.”
Trey and Sy were coming down the hall toward them, so the moment to ask about that reaction was gone. Rev would roll with it, but he wouldn’t forget.
“Mistress.” Sy nodded to her respectfully. “We wanted to ask Rev something, if we’re not interrupting.”
“You are, but go ahead and ask.” Her tone was reproving, but her smile was indulgent.
“We’ll make it quick.” He turned to Rev. “Our lead singer took off with his current girlfriend to California, and we don’t know when he’ll be back, so we’ve been looking for fill-ins for the bookings we had before he got lovesick. Me and Trey and the rest of his roommates who make up the band can do backup vocals, but we’re musicians. None of us have the punch to be lead. Would you be interested? We have a gig coming up at The Blue Lizard.”
Rev blinked. “I sing hymns and songs like I did tonight, ones that we borrow because they fit with worship. I not sure I can sing the way you need.”
“Singing is singing,” Sy said with a touch of impatience. “What I heard tonight, you can do it.”
“Chill, man.” Trey elbowed him, then directed his next words to Rev. “We can get together to go over sets between now and then at a time that works for all of us. See if you’re comfortable with it. If not, nothing lost, and we can have a good jam session. Sy just freaks out over this stuff.”
“Because I like to be paid and not get yelled at by pissed-off club managers who think we didn’t deliver what we promised.” Sy glanced at Rev. “Seriously, I have no worries. If you do as well as I think you will, Chris can stay in Cali with that fucking groupie until they fall into the ocean.”
“Sy,” Trey said.
Sy shot Vera an apologetic look but added, “He left us hanging. That shit about musicians being unreliable and flaking out because it’s part of their ‘art’ doesn’t wash with me. Bite off your ear and mail it to your girlfriend if that’s your kink, but slap on a band-aid and show the hell up when a commitment’s been made.”
“Some say his friend Paul cut it off when they got into a sword fight,” Rev said. “Van Gogh didn’t want his friend to get into trouble, so he said he did it himself.”
He offered a faint smile for their bemused expressions. “Savita, a student at my school, she did a report on him and told me that.”
“Rev works at a middle school,” Vera told them.
“Oh. All the better,” Sy pressed on. “So you don’t have to work on weekends.”
Trey punched his shoulder. “One track mind. What do you say, Rev? Are you interested? I’m serious about that jam session. You’re not locked into anything.”
“Okay,” Rev said. “I’ll do it.”
When he agreed, he had that thoughtful, internal look. As Vera let the men work out the details of when and where they’d be getting together, she noticed Ros at the end of the hall, waiting to talk to her.
Vera put a hand on Rev’s arm. “I’ll be back in a moment. Don’t go away.”
“You’re my ride,” he said, making her smile.
Vera pinched Sy’s tribal tattoo covered biceps, hard enough to leave a mark. Which grabbed his attention, for multiple reasons. She pointed a chiding finger at him.
“Keep being this wound up, and I’ll turn you over to Cyn. Mick is okay with her doing sessions in his absence, as long as no sex is involved. She’ll torment you with orgasm denial. She can make two hours feel like ten days.”
“Yeah, that’ll help calm me down,” he noted dryly, but he dipped his head, a formal apology. “Got it, Mistress. Chris just pissed me off. I need to let it go. Lead singers can be diva dicks. No offense,” he added to Rev.
“I never thought of myself as a lead singer,” he said. “But I expect if I acted like that, God would cut me down to size. Hopefully using her.” He nodded toward Vera.
The two men chuckled in appreciation—and understanding. “Amen to that,” Sy said.
Vera shook her head at them and moved to join Ros. As she did, another Domme passed her, Lace M. Tight. Laci had her single tail out and was practicing some flourishes as she moved. It swept around her like a serpent, wrapped her hips and thighs loosely before falling away and coiling at her feet like a semi-tame pet.
“Do you sleep with that thing?” Vera asked
Laci winked at her. “Only the cane comes to bed with me. If a man going down on me isn’t doing it right, a couple pops gets his tongue working properly.” She glanced toward Rev. “He doesn’t look like he needs that kind of help.”
“Not so far. But rewards for expertise can look a lot like punishment sometimes.”
Laci chuckled and continued on her way, letting Vera do the same.
“I wanted to touch base before you head out,” Ros said when Vera reached her. “Everything good?”
“He’s spun up, but his head space is getting back where it needs to be. I’ll keep in contact with him over the next couple of days just to be sure of it.”
Ros lifted a hand to study her manicure. She liked wearing her nails longer, just as Vera did, even though Skye rolled her eyes at the extra key strikes or wonky touch screens that happened because of the dual contact between fingertip and fingernail.
“You make things harder on yourselves than needed,” she’d told them, using her digital disapproving teacher voice. But she hadn’t argued with Ros’s response.
“Trim my nails so I can do texts and email? Or keep them long so that when I have Lawrence tied to my bed, I can leave deeper marks on his gorgeous back, ass and thighs. Let me think about that for half a second…”
Ros examining her nails now was calculated, her way of saying she was waiting for Vera to answer the question she’d actually asked. Sometimes having Dommes for friends could be a pain in the ass.
“He’s digging into some old wounds, I won’t deny it. It’s not intentional,” she said, when Ros’s mouth tightened. “He’s just pure raw submissive. This is all new to him, but he’s been immersed in the need so long it pulls him in over his head without much effort. It’s a pleasure to watch.”
“But it requires you to be more on your toes than you have to be with the experienced ones.”
“Yes. He’s worth the effort, though.” Vera looked over her shoulder. The moment she did, Rev’s gaze moved to her to see what she needed. She gave him an “I’m fine” nod.
“Clearly.” Ros’s cerulean eyes sparked. “We’re headed out. Morning meeting tomorrow with K&A’s marketing people. If you want to spend more time here tonight, you can come in late.”
“No. This is his first time in a club. Best to call it an early night, and you’ll need Skye and Cyn with you, so I’ll hold the fort at the office.”
“You might change your mind about that, even if the decision isn’t made here.” Ros gave her a significant look, prompting Vera to turn around.
The other men had departed. Rev was back to waiting for Vera.
On his knees.
He'd knelt in the center of the open area. Hands on his thighs, head bowed.
“You know where we are if you need anything,” Ros said.
Her words followed Vera, because her desires already had her in motion, headed back toward him.
When she reached Rev, he lifted his head. His look took her breath. “What are you doing?” she asked.
“Waiting for you. Working on what’s in my head. Here, in this place, if someone kneeling like this, for a Master or Mistress, no one say anything to him. They cut around him, give him peace and quiet. I needed that.”
“You were impersonating a sub to be left alone.” She felt gentle amusement. “Except you’re not impersonating. You’re being yourself. Let me drop you off at home, Rev.”
“I’ll take the bus. There’s a stop close. I like riding at night. Staying on it a couple rounds give me time to clear my head.”
“Are you telling me that’s what you want to do?”
“Yeah. But I’m also asking if it okay with you, Mistress.”
She studied his eyes, his manner, how he held himself. Letting a sub be on his own when his head wasn’t entirely right was a judgment call, deciding if he needed the space, and had the steadiness to be okay. In this case, that care also warred with a personal desire. She didn’t want to let him go.
It could skew the judgment of a Domme, feeling this much. “One condition. There’s a drugstore nearby. I want to buy you a cell phone. You’ll text me periodically tonight and tomorrow. I want to make sure you’re all right.”
“It not the first time in my life my head been messed up, Mistress.” He pointed upward, the corner of his mouth tilting. “I got a direct line to Someone to help me get it straight. Don’t need no minutes or call plan. But if you want that, I don’t want you worrying. I’ll pay for it, though.
“And I like the idea of learning to drive,” he added. “If we took a trip somewhere, I could help. I want you to know I can do that, serve you how you need me to.”
His earnestness affected her, but she covered it with an arch look. “Zodiac has driven for a race team. There’s no vehicle he doesn’t know how to handle. That’s how he earned the right to drive my car from the front door to valet parking. You’ll be learning on a car I borrow. And before you start talking about camels, my Aston Martin will be cremated with me, just like Tiger’s motorcycles. I’ll use a straw to suck the ashes through that needle’s eye.”
She liked seeing him laugh. They collected their jackets and left the club, walking companionably to the drugstore. After getting the phone, he intended to walk her back to the club, but the bus stop was along the way, and by the time they’d reached it, she’d changed her mind.
“I’m going to ride with you. When you decide to get off at home, I’ll take it back here.”
“I won’t let you ride the bus alone this time of night.”
She enjoyed the tingle his intriguing alpha protector side sent through her. “You said you like to ride it a couple times around to get your thoughts together. So we’ll do that, and I’ll get off here on one of the passes.”
“What about your car?”
“Club’s open another five hours. Zodiac will have it ready when I get back.” She nodded toward the road. “Here comes a bus now. Should we grab it?”
This time of night, the bus was mostly for working folks getting on or off shift, or running after-work errands. Both of them were overdressed for riding, but they knew under the suit, Rev was one of them.
His Mistress was a different matter, and got a second look from everyone. He’d guided her toward a middle seat rather than further toward the back, where trouble sometimes slouched. He also gave her the inside seat. He didn’t want to be presumptuous, but he slid an arm across the back, making it clear the role he’d take for her if anyone let the devil guide them.
She sat with elegance, crossing her ankles and adjusting so she was partly turned toward him, leaning against his side. With her hair curling around her face, he wanted to touch. At a slight nod, a flicker of her eyes, she gave him that right. He curled a lock over one finger, brushed his others over her smooth cheek, the firm bone.
She put her hand on his thigh and whispered in his ear. “No talking unless I ask you a question. Or you have something that can’t wait.”
It didn’t take long to realize that order was for him. He didn’t have to come up with things to say. He could swim in the high tide waters of everything about tonight, deal with the chop and sudden swells of feeling that lifted him above his comfort zone, but was still a lifting up.
There were a few valleys he couldn’t really explain, a raw feeling in his gut. When those happened, her hand, which had found his when he lowered it, would tighten, her fingers stroking his palm. It told him how closely she was tracking his mood shifts.
With a little sigh, she put her head down on his shoulder, a surprising move. Resting his jaw against her hair, he closed his eyes. Letting out his own sigh, he settled into an easier place. Hands linked with his Mistress, together and traveling through the New Orleans night.
“Thank you, Rev,” she said at length. “For everything you gave me tonight. You were honest and generous with your feelings. You were everything I need you to be.”
Need. It was an unexpected choice of words. Want and desire, those things she’d been very clear about. The word need reminded him of his desire to stand in her darker, deeper places. Be there for her.
Maybe it was more of a need than a desire, too.
That day at the mailbox, she’d talked about how people didn’t need to get all wrapped up in finding someone, that that would take care of itself. That they needed to focus on how others needed them.
But it was hard not to get wrapped up in it, especially when right now he was contemplating this miracle, not only of finding her, but hearing that she might need him, too. If it was leaning that way, for them to need each other, he couldn’t ask for more.
She tensed, and he opened his eyes. She was staring through the window at a run-down shoebox of a house. A crooked For Sale sign was in the front yard.
“Mistress?”
A single word question, which he assumed didn’t break the rules. “Thomas Rose Associates supports a domestic abuse shelter,” she said. “Laurel Grove. Ros and Abby founded it, in honor of a friend they lost to an abusive husband.”
“I’m sorry. Was her name Laurel? If it’s okay to ask.”
“Yes.”
He squeezed her hand and bowed his head. He said a short prayer for Laurel on her current journey, and for the healing and redemption of the broken spirit who’d taken her life. Then he lifted his head. “Why does the house make you sad?”
She’d been watching him, and took an extra beat answering. “A family lived there. We were trying to convince the woman to come to us, and bring her two boys. We didn’t convince her in time. Her drug dealing boyfriend killed her and shot her oldest boy when he tried to stop him. The youngest is with a good foster family, but he has a lot of problems. Probably because the night before it happened, a buddy of the boyfriend’s shot him up with heroin as a joke. That was what made the mother unleash on him. He got pissed off and…”
She stopped, probably because the hardness in his expression, the regret and anger, told her he’d recognized the story. “The older boy went to our school,” he explained. “I remember him. The kids made a memorial wreath and took it to his funeral. I glad his younger brother is with people who want to help him. Even if they can’t…it better than being with those who don’t care. Nothing harder to see than that. Lot of the teachers, they know those kinds of kids.
“We all try to show them they do have people that care,” he added, “if they just can turn to us when they need to. Some of them kids, they got so much on ‘em.”
“Yeah.” She sat back against the curve of his arm. As she did, he started to hum, something soothing and soft. She put her head on his shoulder again. “You make it really difficult to let you go, Rev. To behave as I should.”
“How should you behave?”
“As you get introduced to all this, I have to be careful. I can’t get lost in my own head and needs.”
He touched her cheek, so she would look up at him. “I a student on what you showed me tonight,” he told her. “But that’s where it stops, Veracity. I not going to school. I’m spending time with you, as interested in you as any of the rest of it. It’s about you and me.”
“I’m not meaning it in an offensive way.”
“I just want you to understand my feeling on it. I’m not a child, and you holding back on me, because you think you have to protect me like one…that won’t work.”
“It’s not like that.” Her tone cooled. “I told you exploring this can break open things you don’t expect. Me looking out for you on that is no different from you riding the bus back to the club with me. To make sure I’m all right.”
He gazed at her a long moment. When he spoke, he didn’t address the last comment, because he knew that wasn’t the important one. “Teachers protect their students, holding back on them, because they know, at the end of the day, the week, the year… they have to let them go.”
He could tell he’d found the nail and hit it square. When she responded, it sounded like she didn’t much care for the words herself. “Rev, it’s very likely after you explore this, you’ll want different things. To expand your reach, to grow in this lifestyle. That may require moving on to different Dommes. It’s the difference between a childhood crush and your first real relationship.
“I’m not saying that’s what this is. But while we’re on the topic of teachers, why don’t you take Mavis up on her offer to get you into some adult classes? I know you don’t believe God doesn’t want you to get an education.”
Rev’s expression went to stone, the one Vera had seen in the office with Witford. She was off her game if she’d made such an idiotic mistake. Normally she was the one Ros called into a meeting to be diplomatic, to smooth things out. She’d gotten defensive. Rev wasn’t the only one who’d needed space.
“I done told you why, and it was honest. And it hasn’t changed.” He leaned in, their eyes close. “When you been hurt bad, you avoid being cut again. Just natural, going that way, and I hate that you been hurt like that. But courage don’t exist without fear, do it? I think you’re a courageous woman, Veracity Morgan. I sure hope you can spare some of it toward me, because I ain’t no crush. You teaching me things, but I also know things.”
He pulled the cord, and she saw they were back at the club. He rose and offered her a hand. Silently, she gave it to him, and he took her down the bus steps. The stop was a rock’s throw from the club’s well-lit parking lot, and there was security circling, so he kept his hand on the door and foot on the step, letting the driver know he wasn’t leaving.
Rev leaned forward and brushed his mouth over hers. His big hand gripped the lapel of her jacket, and then he got back on the bus.
As the doors closed and the bus rolled away, he’d found their seat again, and was watching her through the glass. She didn’t raise a hand and neither did he.
She’d pissed him off, and he’d pissed her off. But was he wrong, in what he’d said about her? She had to consider it, even as she needed to make it clear she damn well would look out for his headspace and physical well-being when he was under her command.
She wondered what she would text him when she checked on him later tonight.
It took a couple hours to work it out, and even then she found herself hesitating. But in the end, she sent it.
I want you, Rev. In ways that aren’t smooth and familiar to me, so I took a wrong turn tonight. I’m sorry. If the road gets bumpy…well, I want to say I’ll make sure you’re wearing a seatbelt and get us through. Not because I think you’re a child who can’t protect himself. But because I want you to take that ride with me and make it a journey worth sharing. Respond to me tonight, so I’ll know you’re all right.
The answer, when it came, made her smile and feel the sting of tears.
I wanted to take a drive with you the first time I saw you, Mistress. You check on my seat belt and I’ll check on yours. Think we both gonna need it.