Chapter 4
Chicken thighs, lemon, a skillet he doesn’t measure anything into. I offer to help. He hands me a knife and a cutting board and says, “Parsley, as fine as you can manage.”
I chop parsley, and it’s the calmest I’ve been all week.
Dinner is good. We talk about his old working-dog apprenticeship, my vendor who slipped a deadline then apologized to me until I apologized back. He laughs at that one, an actual laugh, head tipped.
“You apologized to him.”
“I apologize to appliances.” I shrug
We’re on the couch after. I don’t remember how we get to discipline methods except that everything with us routes through dogs eventually.
“For the record,” I say, “I’ve never once spanked Biscuit.”
“Good. Dogs aren’t smart enough to learn the right lesson from that.”
“What’s the right lesson?”
He sets his glass down. “That it’s fun to let go.”
I don’t look away. Neither does he.
I’m wet. Have been, if I’m honest, since the parsley.
“So, is this a date?” I ask. “Because I don’t feel like I’ve learned anything about dog handling.”
“It can be both.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
He smiles, and I feel it in my stomach, which is not where smiles usually go.
“Dogs love being told what to do. They love to please. Truth is, people are like that, too.”
“Oh really.” My voice comes out lower than I planned.
“Really. Want a demonstration?”
My heart is going. My thighs are pressed together on his couch, and I don’t remember doing that.
I laugh. “Of course.”
“Stand up,” he says.
The words land somewhere below my stomach. I stand.
“Good,” he says.
He stays seated, one arm along the back of the couch like we have all night. Maybe we do.
“Now come stand in front of me.”
I step around the coffee table. Two steps, maybe three, and I’m standing between his knees. At this height, his head is level with my chest. He keeps his eyes on mine the whole way up.
“Good,” he says.
The word does something to the backs of my knees. In class, he says it to dogs, and I have never once been jealous of them. Now it’s what I want.
“Kneel down a little. Bring me your face.”
I have to admit, I like the shape of this. He’s telling me what to do, but there’s a gap between the telling and the doing, and the gap is mine. He leaves it open on purpose. I could sit back down. I could make a joke and reach for my wine. Nobody’s holding anything but eye contact.
It doesn’t hurt that everything he says sounds like a good idea. That’s probably my people-pleasing nature. But some people, I want to please.
I bend at the waist instead of kneeling all the way, which is a choice, because I know what this shirt does from that angle, and I want him to have the full view. His eyes flick down for exactly one second, then come back up.
His hand comes to my face. Not grabbing, just his palm along my jaw, thumb at my cheekbone, tilting me the last inch. Then he kisses me.
It starts slow, his mouth warm and sure, no rush in it. I make some small sound against him that I’d deny in court.
His thumb presses my jaw open a fraction, and his tongue touches mine, unhurried, tasting like the wine. I lean into his hand harder than I mean to. My fingers find his shoulder for balance.
He kisses like he cooks, like he trains, nothing wasted, every second of it deliberate. When he finally pulls back, my lips follow him for half an inch before I catch myself.
He looks at me. His thumb strokes once along my cheek.
“Good.”
A moment passes.
He shrugs. “See what I mean? Some people like to be told what to do.”
I bite my lip and return to my full height, looking down at him. “Don’t you dare tell me you were going to get me riled up like that and just quit.”
“Quit what?” He leans back. “Telling you what to do?”
He’s playing a little game, and I don’t know where it will end, but I will find out.
Hands on hips, looking like I’m in control, I say, “You should keep telling me what to do.”
“Okay.” That stupid smile of his. “If that’s what you want.”
A pause.
“Turn around slowly.”
I turn. My hands slide down the sides of my jeans, smoothing them over my thighs. I take my time about it because slowly was the instruction and I’m apparently obedient tonight.
Halfway through the turn, his hands find my hips. First real touch, palms warm through the denim, and they slide back and over my ass. He squeezes. Not shy about it either, a full-handed squeeze that makes me exhale through my nose.
“Keep turning,” he says.
I do. His hands trail off me as I go, fingertips last. I complete the circle and face him again. He’s still seated, still relaxed, like he squeezes women’s asses on this couch as a standard part of his evening. Maybe he does. I don’t care right now.
“Now kneel down here.” He taps the floor between his feet.
The rug is soft under my knees. I settle onto them, and we’re eye level, closer than we’ve been all night, except the kiss. He leans forward, elbows on his knees, and one hand comes up and teases through my hair, fingers working in near my temple, slow. My scalp lights up under it.
“You tell me stop and we stop. Okay?”
I squint at him. “Okay.”
“You don’t want to do something, you don’t do it. Okay?”
I nod. “Okay.”
He watches me a second longer, like he’s checking the nod against my eyes.
Whatever he finds there passes inspection, because he leans in and kisses me again, deeper this time.
His hand tightens in my hair just enough that I feel the pull at the roots, and I open for him without deciding to. My hands land on his knees.
His mouth works against mine, slow and thorough. When he breaks it, I’m breathing through my mouth like I’ve been jogging.
Then he reaches into his pocket.
What comes out is a black leather collar. Standard buckle, simple, the kind of thing that would look completely unremarkable in the barn hanging next to the leashes. He holds it up between us, letting it hang from two fingers.
“Really?” I say.
He nods. No sales pitch. Just holds it there and waits, comfortable in the pause the way he’s comfortable in every pause. I understand this is the gap again, the one he leaves open. I could laugh. I could stand up and pour more wine. We could pretend this was a bit.
My pulse is loud in my ears. My knees are on his rug, and the leather is six inches from my face, and I have never wanted anything this specific in my life.
“Okay,” I say.
I reach up and gather my hair, pulling it off my neck, holding it up out of the way.
He leans forward and brings the collar around my throat.
The leather is cool for about two seconds, and then it’s warm from my skin.
His fingers work the buckle at my nape, unhurried, no fumbling, and I feel each small adjustment as the strap draws through, snugs, settles.
He sits back and looks at his work. Then two fingers come to my throat, and he slides one between the collar and my skin, running it along the inside, checking the fit the way I’ve watched him check a dog’s collar at the start of class, professional, exact.
His knuckle drags along my pulse point, and my breath catches on it.
The finger withdraws. The collar stays. I can feel it when I swallow.
He pulls a black leather leash from his pocket and clips it to the ring at my throat. A small click. It goes through me the way “good” went through me in the barn, except lower, and it doesn’t stop. I was wet before. I’m past that now.
“Stand.”
I’m up before the word finishes. Knees unsteady. The leash hangs light between my shoulder blades, and every breath moves the collar against my throat. Every time it moves, I know it’s there, which is apparently something my body has opinions about.
“Turn.”
I turn. He’s behind me now, looking. I can’t see at what. My nipples are tight against my bra.
“Hands behind your back.”
I lace my fingers at the small of my back before I’ve processed the sentence. The position pulls my shoulders back and pushes my chest out. Presents me. He did that with three words, and we both know it. My face goes hot.
I’m collared and leashed in a living room with a basketball hoop rusting across the street. I have never in my life been this ready for whatever comes next.
He stands. Winds the leash around his fist, one wrap, two, shortening it until I have to step in close. My toes touch his shoes. I can feel the heat coming off him. He is in no hurry at all, and I am nothing but hurry, standing still.
He kisses me.
Not gentle this time. His free hand takes my jaw and tilts my head where he wants it. His mouth is slow and thorough, completely in charge. The leash moves with every small turn of his wrist, not pulling, just there, just news from my own throat about who’s holding it.
I moan into his mouth. A needy, embarrassing sound. I’d apologize for it if my mouth were available. My hips roll forward on their own, looking for him. He keeps exactly one inch of distance, and the inch is the meanest thing anyone has ever done to me.
When he breaks the kiss, I follow before the leash reminds me. I’m breathing hard. My hands are still locked behind my back. Nobody told them to stay, and they’re staying.
I’m throbbing. Actually throbbing. I can feel slickness reaching the inside of my thighs, and he’s just looking at me, leash wrapped around his fist.
Every part of me is asking for something. Hands, mouth, anything, more. He hasn’t offered any of it yet.
“Take off your shirt,” he says. “Slow. I want to watch.”
I don’t reach for the hem right away. I look at him. He’s standing close, one hand on the leash, the other relaxed at his side. His face is calm. Waiting.
I hook my fingers into the neckline of the black top, pull it down over my shoulders. One sleeve, then the other. I let it hang loose at my elbows before sliding it the rest of the way off. I fold it, stalling, and lay it over the arm of the couch.
“Good,” he says. Just the word, timed, like in class. It lands in my stomach.
“Now the bra. Same way.”