Chapter Eleven
The next daydawned far too early. Serena closed her eyes and buried her face in Hunter’s warm chest.
She thought he might be asleep, but after a beat, he tightened his arm around her.
“Waking up with you is the best thing ever. I don’t like that I gave you pause to think I wanted anything else,” he said roughly, his voice raw.
“We went to bed together.” She kissed his chest. “That’s all that matters.”
“I think it’s possible I know just as little about relationship stuff as I do about being a Dom.”
She laughed. “Oh, baby, you think too hard about this.”
“I want to be what you need.” He said it so seriously, so stoically, that she stopped laughing immediately.
“You are. Stop thinking about this being about sex and think about it like dishes. Imagine that I’m someone who needs the dishes cleared from the table right away, and stacked just so in the dishwasher. If you don’t do either of those things, that’s not going to be deal breaker. But I appreciate your efforts to try harder.”
“I’ve been thinking about what you said last night.”
“Yeah?”
He didn’t continue right away, just stroked his hand up and down her spine. Then he huffed a nervous laugh. “That’s it. Just thinking.”
“Okay.”
“Are you hungry?”
Yeah, she was. They hit the buffet for breakfast, then lost fifty bucks in the casino before Serena declared that gambling wasn’t for her. When she dragged Hunter to the mall instead, he rolled his eyes, not seeing the difference—until she bought new lingerie.
Then they retired to the hotel room and explored just exactly what the emerald green set looked like on, and had spectacular vanilla sex, of the loud and dirty variety.
It was perfect.
Dinner ended up being fast food on their way to a last minute show they got tickets for—a pop singer who was way better than either of them expected. She did a devastating version of Silent Night for her encore, and it brought down the house.
As they spilled out onto the sidewalk again, Hunter pulled her into his arms and kissed her more deeply, more thoroughly than he had all day. He poured a lot she didn’t quite get into that kiss. It tasted like adventure and resolve, like he’d spent all day thinking, secretly, and now he had a plan.
When he turned her around and pointed to a limo, with Quinn leaning against it, she realized that’s exactly what he had.
A crazy, crazy plan.
“I want a redo, beautiful,” he rumbled in her ear. “You trust me?”
Did he trust himself?That’s what really mattered. “To the moon and back.”
Hunter had textedQuinn during intermission, and his friend had been totally cool about both the apology, which was twenty hours too late, and the evening’s new plans.
He’d just said to meet them at the theater. The limo…that was a fancy touch.
But he liked it. Another chance at doing this right.
Because for all of Serena’s confident chatter about kink being like doing the dishes, Hunter knew in his soul that it wasn’t the same thing. Now that he’d had a taste, he knew that sharing these private fantasies, that exploring them together, bonded him and Serena in a way that orderly household chores never could.
He guided Serena to the limo, his left hand possessively resting on her hip. With his right, he reached out and shook Quinn’s hand. “Thanks, man.”
Quinn snorted. “My pleasure.”
“That’s the plan.”
Serena squeaked. He stroked his hand lower, covering the sweetest, softest part of her ass. “Yours, too.”
“Oh, goodie,” she whispered, glancing up at Quinn from beneath her lashes. A look passed between them, two people who knew more about this than he did, and Quinn nodded at Serena.
His friend cleared his throat and opened the door, chagrining the driver.
Whatever. Tonight was all about breaking the rules. Shattering them to pieces, really.
Hunter ignored the default flight or fight response that wanted to take hold inside him.
He wasn’t afraid of anything, not when it came to Serena.
