Page 34 of Volatile

“You do?”

He did. He unequivocally agreed. Until the next second when he didn’t.

“Are you surprised?” he asked.

“No, but....”

For someone who had no problem getting out her words, in any manner and tone she wished, she was sure struggling to find them all of a sudden.

“I’ll let you get back to sleep now, Ms. Swanson. You sound like you need it after the day you’ve had. I’ll see you on Tuesday.”

“Oh... okay. Um, thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Jon tossed the phone on the couch and continued trekking around the room. The space wasn’t big enough; he needed to get out for a nighttime run and clear his head.

He scrubbed his hands over his face. This whole plan was far from ideal at best. A royal clusterfuck at worst. Maybe he shouldn’t have let her go so easily after the sex. He should’ve kept her there to make the future expectations clear. That was his mistake. She wasn’t a sub of his; they hadn’t mapped out the boundaries beforehand. Just because he was well-familiar and comfortable with one-time encounters, didn’t mean she was as well.

He’d screwed up, but she’d been so eager to get out of there. The awkwardness covered her like a shadow, and he’d wanted to give her that reprieve. To walk away with her pride intact because she’d looked embarrassed as hell. Sexual freedom was not something she was accustomed to. She wasn’t from his world. Not even close.

Jon went to his bedroom to change. He needed that run badly. Maybe he could pound the memory of Ivy submitting to him into the pavement and leave it there to wash away with the rain.

He kicked the pants from his body and pulled on a pair of shorts. She hadn’t really submitted to him, not in the truest sense, but she’d submitted to the experience. In her aroused state, she’d surrendered to him, and that had made him harder than a freaking boulder.

He’d wanted her, and after she had asked for it, there’d been no turning back. There was no way it could have ended that didn’t involve him fucking her. He’d wanted her, not to prove a point or to pretend that he had the same life back as all those months before, but because his dick was going to explode if it didn’t get to be inside her.

Her.

Ivy.

Not Julia.

And that scared the ever-living shit out of him.

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