Elena #2
The request is quiet. I still tighten at the memory of those words in my bedroom.
Dominic sees the change in my breathing. His eyes drop briefly to the pulse at the base of my throat, then return to my face. He stays where he is.
“This isn’t punishment.” His voice is quiet but firm. “I need the truth.”
“I wanted to have sex with you.”
“Even though you knew there was almost no chance of conceiving?”
“I wanted it even though I wasn’t ovulating. I wanted you inside me because it was you, and I used the arrangement so I wouldn’t have to deal with what that meant.”
He exhales and uncurls his hands.
His shoulders relax, just slightly. “Thank you.”
I hate how exposed his gratitude makes me feel. The vulnerability is a raw nerve, and I immediately reach for armor. “The sex was effective stress relief, too.”
For a second, he only stares at me.
“So close.”
“It’s still true.”
“I’m sure it is.” He closes another foot of space, and the air between us thickens, charged with the memory of his hands on my skin. “Do you need a research citation before you admit you want me again?”
“I haven’t said I want you again.”
“No?”
The low question pulls heat through me. He is close enough now that I can smell his cologne and see the faint crease his tie left at the base of his throat. His hands remain at his sides.
I could reach for him. He would let me choose, the way he did in my condo. Standing in my office adds another layer of wrong to how badly I want to put my hands on him.
“We still have the clinic this afternoon,” I say.
Dominic steps back.
The loss of his warmth irritates me even though I’m the one who brought up the appointment.
“Yes,” he says. “We need to decide what we’re doing about it.”
I return to my chair and reopen the confirmation email. The appointment button is green, and the cancellation link waits beneath it in smaller type.
My gaze fixes on the confirmation email. “We can keep it. There’s no reason we can’t proceed as planned.”
“If that’s what you want.”
“We could keep the appointment and also try naturally during the next window.”
“We could.”
I look up. “You’re being very agreeable.”
“I don’t want to use what happened to influence you. You chose that medical option for a reason.”
I stop reaching for counterarguments. Dominic wants natural conception.
He has never hidden that. He could make an argument based on cost, timing, stress, or the fact that the clinic attempt failed.
Instead, he removes his preference from the decision, so I can make it without feeling indebted for the night in my bed.
I meet his eyes. “What do you want?”
“I want you to choose the method you’re comfortable with.”
“That is infuriatingly careful.”
“It needs to be.”
I click into the clinic portal and look at the appointment details. The sterile room. The paperwork. Dominic providing a sample alone while I wait down the hall. All the distance I built into the process is available.
I don’t want it today.
My hand is steady on the mouse. I look at him, the decision settling into something solid and certain. “I want to cancel.”
He doesn’t smile or move closer. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. I want us to try naturally.”
“Only during confirmed ovulation?”
I start to answer, then stop. If I make the new method another schedule, I can keep pretending sex is just part of the procedure, like medication and monitoring.
“No.” The word comes out quieter than I expect. “I don’t want ovulation to be the only time we can touch each other.”
The corner of his mouth lifts. “All right.” I immediately want to qualify the decision.
“That doesn’t mean the purpose of the arrangement has changed.”
He lets out a quiet, frustrated sigh. “There it is.”
“Dominic.”
“I agreed to the method. I didn’t agree that wanting each other outside a fertility window is meaningless.”
I turn back to the screen. “We need rules.”
“We do.”
“Every time requires a current yes. One encounter doesn’t create an expectation for the next.”
“Agreed.”
“Either of us can stop at any point, including after we’ve started.”
“Always.”
“No false reasons. If I’m ovulating, I’ll tell you. If I want sex, I’ll tell you that too.”
He almost smiles. “I’d like that in writing.”
“Don’t push it.”
“I’m not the one who invented a medical test.”
I wince. “I deserved that.”
“A little.” His voice turns serious. “Don’t do it again.”
“I won’t.”
“And no outside partners. That rule stays.”
“Yes.”
“No sex at work?” he asks.
The question carries just enough doubt to make me look at the desk between us.
“Absolutely no sex at work.”
“You hesitated.”
“I was deciding how concerned I should be that you needed to ask.”
“Very.”
I ignore the heat in his voice. “Sleepovers?”
He doesn’t offer one. “Do you want a rule?”
I think about how easy it was to lie beside him after the urgency passed. “We’ll decide when it happens.”
“And what do we expect from each other outside sex?”
That question is harder. We already expect more than the contract requires. He checks on my test results. I know when his meetings run late. He came to my birthday drinks because I wanted him there, and he stayed in my bed because neither of us wanted the night to end at an orgasm.
The only answer I have is, “We’ll decide that as it happens too.”
Dominic nods once and doesn’t ask whether “as it happens” means I already expect it to happen. I’m grateful and annoyed in equal measure.
I click the cancellation link.
The clinic asks for a reason. I select change in treatment plan, confirm I understand that rescheduling might create a delay, and submit the form.
The page refreshes.
Appointment canceled.
I take my hand from the mouse. “Done.”
Dominic comes around the desk. He stops beside my chair and holds out his hand.
“What?”
“We made a new agreement.”
I pull my hand back. “This isn’t legally binding.”
“Neither was your positive test.”
I put my hand in his. “You’re going to hold that over me forever, aren’t you?”
“Only until you stop trying to explain desire as a measurable health benefit.”
His fingers close around mine, firm and warm. We don’t shake. He holds my hand for a beat longer than a handshake, then releases it and heads for the door.
“Dominic.”
He looks back.
“I did want you that night.”
His smile disappears. “I know.”
He opens the door and returns to his office.
For the rest of the afternoon, I work through meetings, revise a financing model, and answer two dozen emails without making a single mistake. Nothing about the executive floor looks different. Maya moves between our offices. Phones ring. By late afternoon, the light outside has gone gray.
When I lift my head from the final page of the model, Dominic is standing across the hall near his office windows.
He’s looking at me.
The next time we try to conceive, one of us has to ask. There will be no appointment or clinic procedure to hide behind. I chose that method, and Dominic knows how hard it is for me to say I want him.
Dominic doesn’t look away.
Neither do I.