Page 83 of Violent Cravings

"I mean that your view of everything is very black and white. All you see is the trouble that comes with what you call your obsession. Yes, it got out of hand before, and maybe it did again with me. But from where I'm standing, you never really lost your mind with me. Yes, you locked me in my room with no intention of letting me go, and you wanted to keep me all to yourself – granted. Not an okay thing to do."

He interrupts my musings with a laugh, shaking his head as he trembles under my touch.

"And you neglected your duties," I continue. "You pissed off a lot of guys it seems, most of all your assistant... what was his name? Lemon."

"It's more than that, doll," he insists. "I didn't just piss them off. I endangered the biggest acquisition my company has ever been involved in. If I don't get my shit together soon, we'll lose millions of dollars and the trust of a lot of very important people."

"Oh, well," I say, brushing his words off.

"Oh, well?" he repeats. "Do you even know what an acquisition is?"

I shake my head. "Not exactly, and it doesn't matter to me right now."

He lets out an exasperated sigh.

"What matters to me is that all of this is still fixable. You haven't lost anything so far. You haven't done any damage that can't be dealt with."

He looks at me, his mind working as he processes my words.

"You're making this sound so easy," he says, sounding defeated. "But it never really is."

"I didn't say it was easy," I protest. "But I stick to my words: I think you should focus on the positive aspects of all of this, instead of highlighting only the bad things, and remembering the terrible things that have happened to you and that Sandria girl."

"The good aspects? What could you possibly mean by that?"

"Well," I say, gently rubbing across his persisting hardness. "What you call obsession, I call dedication, or commitment. I like that you want me this much. I like that you came all the way to California to see me, and I like that you brought me back here and claimed me all to yourself."

He looks at me incredulously. "My crazy little doll."

"I didn't like that you refused to speak to me," I continue. "And I didn't like that you were hiding things from me. And I didn't like that you wanted to keep me here against my will, or at least thought that's what you were doing."

He tenses up. "What do you mean by that?"

I tilt my head to look up at him and meet the curious depth of his blue eyes.

"As sad as it may be, master, I really have nowhere else to be," I say. "I don't want to be anywhere else but here with you. Maybe that's what's making it so easy for me to forgive you."

I pause, lowering my eyes back down to his lap.

"The only thing I'm afraid of is that you'll push me away again," I add in a low voice. "That you'll get scared because of what happened, and that you prefer to go back to your 'system', as you call it, instead of giving me a chance. Giving us a chance."

Awkward silence stretches between us when I pause to give him a chance to reply, but he takes his sweet time coming up with a good response to my honest words.

"You're living in California now," he says eventually. "You said you needed a fresh start. I don't want to keep you from going through with that."

Now I'm the one huffing in disdain.

"To be completely honest with you, I don't even know what I was doing in California," I say. "I wasn't doing anything, really. All that talk about a fresh start didn't really live up to anything. I slacked and moped around most of the time, trying to forget you and trying to come up with something to do."

I pause, swallowing my pride before I continue to speak.

"Looking back now, California feels more like an escape," I conclude. "I thought if I just moved far enough away, I'd come up with something to do with my life, find myself, change things. But really, I was just running away from making a decision. The geographic change didn't do anything to make my life any better."

I hesitate, unsure whether I should add the last few words that have been dancing through my head.

"Unlike that move, you did bring some change into my life, and for the better," I finally dare to say. "And I don't just mean your money. I mean you."

We look at each other, the air between us oscillating with significance. He moves a finger along the side of my face, tracing the outline of my jaw and regarding me with a placid expression.

"My doll," he says. "I can say the same about you."

I bite my lower lip, trying to find the right words for what I want to tell him.

"I may not have it all figured out yet," I say. "But I can finally see a place in life for me. Right next to you, Ryan."

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