DAY TWENTY-ONE

If I was going to play a game of cat and mouse with Adam, then I had to make sure I was the only mouse worth chasing. He had to see only me through a field of hundreds of beautiful, submissive women who could satisfy his every need.

When I listed my limitations in my journal, I didn’t use the words to become depressed or hurt myself. I didn’t fall into despair. I made a calculation that he would have made. Without doing that first, I’d fail. So I didn’t get my self-worth wrapped up in the reckonings.

I was inexperienced. Unsure. I carried a ton of baggage with his name on it. He might never trust me again. He might always think I was apt to leave him at any moment. I represented an emotional risk.. On paper, I was the least likely candidate for his affections.

Coming back to me would be crazy. The morning after the tryout at the Cellar, I had a come-to-Jesus moment. I knew him well enough to know he’d told himself leaving me was about protecting me. I was sure he believed that, but I didn’t. Without truly understanding what I was saying, I’d told him he was protecting himself. He was legitimately protecting himself from a terrible mistake.

Adam Steinbeck was the jealous type. He still considered me his possession and responsibility, that much was obvious. Best-case scenario, he was telling the truth and wanted to protect me. Worst-case scenario, he wanted me to stay away from the Cellar so he could do/fuck what/whomever he wanted without my eyes on him. Even if that was the case, it proved there a bond between us that hadn’t broken yet.

I felt in my bones that the bond would start to fray at the end of the thirty days we’d promised each other. Any legal action would be legitimized. I’d have nothing to hold over him, and we’d split.

Also, I wanted to finish.

Also, he was mine.

Also, every day that passed without me taking action was a day he drifted further away.

I had to take a risk. I had to do something he didn’t expect. His reaction would save us or end us. What I was going to do could give him ammunition to justify taking another woman to bed before I could bring him closer to me.

But every day that passed brought us closer to the day he’d find someone else.

Every day, we’d be closer to irreconcilable.

Every day that passed brought us closer to the day he’d stop trying to protect me from someone who could hurt or humiliate me.

My thoughts felt calculating, but my heart was getting closer to panic.

The longer I looked at the card marked INSOLENT as it hung from the refrigerator magnet, the more I knew the panic would get both better and worse if I texted that number.

Success or failure, I had to find out who I was. I still had to understand what my submissiveness meant. How deep it went. How it could complement or destroy my life.

He didn’t seem very bossy or Dominant. There was nothing sexual about anything he’d said so far. Was I supposed to be attracted to him? I wanted to want him, but it was hard through text and, to be fair, impossible as long as Adam Steinbeck lived and breathed.

Maybe making a joke wasn’t a good idea. I waited a full minute for a response. Note to self: if the Dom doesn’t have a sense of humor or his standard of humor is too high, walk away. I actually got out my journal, started a new page, and wrote that down.

Seemed as good a time as any to make a checklist of the perfect Dom.

Right. Well, I could push hard for the last one, knowing I might not get it. Or I could just pretend that every future man I ever dated could hold a candle to him. The world was going to run out of candles.

My phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number, and I would have sent it to voicemail if Insolent’s card wasn’t right next to it. The numbers matched.

He was calling me. Why?

Should I answer?

Odds his name was Adam? Slim.

Odds he was the man for me? Also slim.

List of what I had to lose? Again. Slim.

I tapped the green button and put the phone to my ear. “Hello?”

“Let’s talk.”

Not Adam’s voice. Bottom line. He wasn’t Adam. All I heard was an English accent and the one man he wasn’t.

“I can’t promise anything.”

“It’s early for promises. Don’t you think?”

“Yes.”

Too early, and too late.