Consent
Triumph
His knees felt weak, and he heard a tremor in his hope-filled voice as he asked, “Are you sure?”
Her gaze into his eyes never wavered. “I’m sure.”
He paused for only a moment before sliding his palms from beneath hers, then curling one around the nape of her neck and guiding her to the elevator.
Neither said a word as they waited for the carriage to arrive, nor as they rode the four floors up. It wasn’t until they were inside the apartment and he put the Do Not Disturb light on the elevator that he spoke.
Mouth dry with anticipation, he asked, “Do I have consent?”
“Yes.” Her words were strong and sure, and her eyes never left his.
“Safe word.”
“Red.”
“Limits.”
The first hint of uncertainty flashed across her face. “I thought I didn’t get them anymore.”
“Only if that’s what you’re consenting to. You set the rules. I play within them.”
Certainty returned. “No limits. Don’t hold back with me. I want whatever you want to give me, Triumph.”
Since the attack, he hadn’t touched her except to hold her or give light kisses.
Direction had to come from her, and she showed no signs of residual trauma from the night in the village or the attack in Elysium once Guillermo and Cesar had been removed as a threat.
However, he needed her to come to her own conclusions about how to proceed with her life and with him.
“Be damn sure, Glennon. Is that what you want? No limits?”
“Yes.”
He’d give her what she wanted, but tonight he would go easier than normal. Not because she couldn’t handle him at full force, but because he wanted her to see… No, he needed her to know she could trust him to always put her first, even if their relationship seemed like it was based on his needs.
He fisted the strands at her hairline and used his hips to press her to the door. His free hand collared her throat with just enough pressure to show he had control.
Her hands scrabbled against his bare chest as she tried to graze her fingernails along each ridge of muscle. They raked down from his pecs to the start of his abs, forcing him to grab her hands and put them against the door above her head.
“That’s not how this works, little spy. Who’s in charge? Who did you give control to?”
She whimpered. “You.”
“That is correct. If you hand everything over to me, you take what I give you, when I give it to you.”
“Yes.”
What he was about to do could trigger her memories of that last attack. However, he had to trust that she knew he was nothing like Guillermo. He would show her the difference between surrendering and submitting.
He spun her around so that her front pressed against the door, her cheek to the side, and now her hands were in one of his at the small of her back. His other hand swooped around to collar her, holding her head up so it didn’t get cramped at an odd angle. He gave her the chance to safe-word.
“One last time. Are. You. Sure?”
Without pause, she submitted. “Yes.”
“Fuck, Glennon.” He ground his pelvis into her ass and laid his face cheek to cheek with hers, his lips against her skin as he spoke.
“You feel how hard that made me? You giving me total consent? That’s you telling me you trust me to know what you want.
You trust that I’ll never hurt you. The woman who trusts no one trusts me.
Me! That’s the sexiest fucking thing you could ever do. ”
He clamped his teeth onto her shoulder. Not hard. Just enough to leave indentations in the soft flesh. He admired his work, using one finger to swipe across the divots. “Very nice.”
He pulled her miniskirt up above her waist, exposing a nude-colored thong. Turning her to face him once more, his hands reached around to cup her bare ass cheeks, and he hoisted her up his body to carry her to their room.
Once inside the bedroom, he slid her down his front and placed her at the foot of the bed.
“Take off all your clothes and put them on the dresser.”
As she complied, he also stripped, purposefully making a pile of his clothes next to hers and setting his boots beside her shoes. When they were both completely naked and facing each other again, he kept his hands at his sides.
What he did was to ensure understanding. She was making a choice on her own, with no coercion from him. In that moment, it wasn’t sexual. No secrets between them.
Most Dominants would impress this message by having her strip and leaving themselves clothed, stressing that the submissive was baring themself physically, emotionally, and psychologically.
No secrets kept. No emotions hidden. No thoughts suppressed.
It also emphasized the power dynamic, solidifying the roles both individuals took on.
But while he would certainly dominate Glennon in their bedroom play, he did not want her to see herself only as a submissive.
By being unclothed with her, he sent the message that what was true for her with him, he also vowed to return.
He would not hide himself from her, either physically, emotionally, or psychologically.
They were in this relationship together, true partners, one hundred percent. Whatever she experienced, he would support her, and vice versa.
His hand returned to the back of her neck.
“Before we go any further, we need to review the rules. Most important—traffic light system. ‘Green’ means you’re good. Keep going. ‘Yellow’ means slow down—you need a break, or we need to talk something through. Maybe you don’t want to stop, but you need to adjust.
“Even more important is using your safe word. ‘Red’ means we stop immediately. If I’m hurting you, if you become panicked, or if you change your mind, and something becomes a hard limit when you didn’t think it would be.
“I mean it, Glennon. I will read your responses the best I can. But use your safe word if you need to. I will stop. Immediately. No questions asked. I will not be angry. I’ll be furious, though, if you need to use it and don’t. I need a verbal answer to show you understand and agree.”
“Yes.”
“I know that right now you think you have no limits, but trust me. You do have some; you just don’t know what they are yet.
Even if we do something once and, after the fact, you decide it’s not for you, you can change your mind.
When you find those things, you tell me.
I don’t care what we’re doing at the time—together in private, out in public, in the middle of having sex.
Doesn’t matter. I want to know immediately.
Waiting to have conversations about things like this can cause anxiety and make mountains out of flat surfaces.
That also means no hinting, no holding out, no lying.
It sometimes feels awkward to be that blunt, but it’s the only way this works.
“I can tell you right now, there will be no urination, scat, or blood play. Those are my hard limits. However, we will never discuss trying something for the first time during a scene. We talk about it when we’re out of the headspace. Verbal answer—do you agree with everything I’ve said so far?”
“Yes.”
“Excellent. You do not need to use an honorific with me. I hate that shit. When we’re in a scene, you call me Mason or Mase. No one has called me that since I started high school. That name is now between you and me only. Hearing you use my given name will please me more than a title.”
In the soft glow of the room’s only lit lamp, he watched her pupils expand. She liked the idea of having something that was just between them.
“Is there anything you want to say, Glennon? Speak now because you’ll have very little opportunity to talk in a few minutes.”
“No.”
“Remember: You set the terms. I live within them. Always.”
She was so fucking beautiful. So perfect.
For her entire life, people had recognized the need she had inside to please others and used it to her detriment.
When she was young, it had been her parents.
She loved them. She loved her brother. She wanted them to be happy.
It made her happy to sacrifice some of her joy so they could experience happiness.
The problem came when her parents perverted that need in her and twisted it to appease their own guilt—a guilt that shouldn’t have existed because no one was at fault for her mother getting sick.
Glennon wanted them to be happy? They might fuck something up, then let Glennon sacrifice everything because she was happy to do so.
And then, when something went wrong, it wasn’t their fault—it was hers.
Then Joey learned to use her desire to his advantage, keeping him from being held responsible for his mistakes. He’d been taught that was how things were done.
Enter the CIA. Like her parents, they saw that her nature was to never leave someone in need.
Dangling the innocent victims of the Colonel Cartel in front of her and setting up her brother as her talisman, they saw the perfect opportunity to not only get what they wanted but to use her nature against herself rather than against those to whom it belonged.
Triumph knew that if he wasn’t careful, he had the power to destroy her. His impulse was to put her on a pedestal. To protect her and keep others, including himself, from asking anything of her ever again.
However, stopping her from giving herself to others was the wrong thing to do. Helping others was her whole purpose in life, but it should never be at the expense of who she was.
She needed to see that other people could recognize their needs while still respecting hers. Being second in line wasn’t the problem. She preferred to be second. She just didn’t want to be forgotten.
So what he was about to do might seem, on the surface, like a dick move or, at best, selfish. But he was going to let her give him what she thought he wanted, and then he was going to give her and himself what they both needed.
Everything.