Page 106 of The Dominator

Ok.

I knocked on the adjoining room’s door. Nino opened it. He eyed me warily. I was surprised neither of them was stationed in here with me after yesterday.

“I’m about to order room service. Do you two want anything?

“No,” he grunted.

“I’m sorry,” I said, looking him in the eye. “I’m sure I put you in a bad position yesterday and I’m sorry about that. I let my, uh, emotions get the better of me. I hope you didn’t catch too much slack.”

His mouth turned up into a smile. “It’s okay, doll. And no, we’re good.” He winked.

I think I garnered some respect by speaking up and apologizing. Then I saw his eyes land on my throat.

“You all right?” His expression darkened.

I nodded and pulled my robe tighter. “I’ll be booking a spa appointment and–” I heard my phone ding, “some visit to a dress shop or something. I’ll let you know about that?”

“I’ve already got the details. Get breakfast. Then let us know when you’re ready to go.”

I nodded.

It was already 11:45 and I wasn’t surprised since I saw the sun rise before I finally fell asleep. I looked at the phone.

Tommy had messaged with a boutique name and address and the name Suzette and wrote that I should call down to the hotel spa, that they had an appointment for me.

I replied with:

Thanks.

He replied back with three x’s.

I headed to the bathroom to examine my throat. It had a purply and fairly distinct handprint on it. There would be no hiding that I’d been choked. Nino hadn’t looked pleased when he saw it. But what would he do about it, right? Nothing, likely, except pity the boss’s poor stupid girlfriend who’d gotten herself in trouble.

I ate some oatmeal and fruit while watching the news on TV and tried to get my mind straight. I pondered things, wondering if I’d kept his dominance cravings at bay after Mexico with the games we’d played at the farm. In the past few days since then there hadn’t been any games but there had been stress. Oodles of stress.

He’d warned me after Mexico that he might take his frustrations out on me in the bedroom. I had no idea what that meant at that time. Did he need me to be stress relief? Maybe if I played the kinds of sex games with him that we’d played at the farm that’d help. That’d give him the thrill of the chase and so forth. Maybe if I made sure I did that, it’d be enough and he’d keep the necklace on. And maybe if he didn’t have the necklace on, I’d know to be extra careful. I’d do my best to make him not want to take it off and if it was off, I’d make sure not to provoke him.

Right now, I wasn’t thinking like a girl happy to be with her fiancé on a trip; I was thinking like someone who had to find a way to survive. I resisted the urge to crawl back into bed and cry some more over the lost love of my life that I now knew was just a mirage and decided that I just needed to get through the rest of this trip and when we got back I’d try to figure out what to do next.

But when we got back home, he wanted me to start planning our wedding. At that thought, it felt like ice pierced my veins. I looked down at the engagement ring on my finger. It was beautiful alright, and right now it felt like it weighed a thousand pounds.

* * *

By 7:00 I was ready for him, as ready as I could possibly be to go on a date and pretend that I was okay with it.

I was in a knee-length sleeveless and fitted short-sleeved gold dress with a high lace neck. I had stammered to the dress shop lady about wanting something with a turtleneck and she laughed asking how I could think of wearing such a thing in the desert in June, but then I pulled my hair back and showed her my throat and she didn’t even flinch, just strolled over to the rack that had this beautiful dress.

I kept on my new diamond earrings and wore a pair of gold strappy heels that had been paired with the dress. Thanks to the spa I had freshly done fingernails and toenails with perfectly shaped brows and I was ready to go. I’d foregone the bikini wax today. My girlie parts had seen enough action in the last twenty-four hours, thank you very much. My trip to the dress shop in a cab with my two bodyguards had been uneventful, but they seemed to be very alert, probably figuring their balls were on the line if I managed to give them the slip.

When I got back to the suite, I was surprised when he came out of the His bathroom ready, dressed, looking dapper, in a tuxedo. Dapper wasn’t an adequate word, actually. He looked like a movie star heading to the red carpet. He was freshly shaven, his hair had been trimmed just a touch, and when he opened the bedroom door he smiled and his whiskey-colored eyes twinkled.

“You’re gorgeous,” he breathed, opening his arms. “Come here, please.”

I went into his arms and said, “Not so bad yourself” but I couldn’t look him in the face.

He inhaled my hair. “Orange blossoms?” he asked.

I shrugged. “I guess?”

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