Page 46 of Bound and Branded

Chapter Ten

Avery

I drift off for an hour or so in the extremely soft bed and then I wake up, fully accepting that I’m going to have to go home for a little bit. Not just because I need to see my dad, but because I need some space. Because I need a chance to get my head on straight.

I have to take more of his soft clothes, because he destroyed the ones I was wearing yesterday.

It’s dark outside when I go downstairs. He’s sitting there in the living room, staring out the window.

“I’m going to go home,” I say.

“Are you all right?”

I nod. But I’m not sure that I feel all right. “I just need a minute.”

“Of course.”

He doesn’t kiss me or anything like that. Because that would be like a real relationship, and not this Dominant/submissive training.

I hope he doesn’t think I’m upset. About what he did. I recognize that what he did was part of the lesson I needed to learn. If I’m ever going to have another Dom, especially if it’s one that isn’t as experienced as him, I need to be confident in setting my own limits. In my own power. That’s the piece that I’ve been missing. The power that the submissive has. It’s a violation of trust to not use the safe word when it needs to be used, and I fully understand that now.

In fact I feel that I probably owe him an apology. For putting him in a position where he did hurt me, this man who is so controlled, who I know that I can trust to press a knife against my breastbone and not draw any blood.

He is the definition of power under extreme control. It is remarkable.

Maybe part of the reason I’m so fascinated by it is that no one with any authority in my life has ever behaved with control.

What a funny thought. I’ve never considered that before.

My dad has no control over his vices and my mom has no control over herself.

I’ve had to compensate by having all this control, and surrendering it to him, I know why I like that. But I think I also marvel at his strength, at the way he measures that, because I have never seen someone choose to harness themselves the way that he does.

It’s incredible, truly. And so is he.

When I pull up to the ranch house, my chest gets tight. I feel the old, familiar stress rising up inside of me. Because this place just sucks all the life out of me.

When I walked through the front door, my dad is sitting there in the living room. “Where have you been?”

“Caleb Flynn’s.”

My dad looks like he doesn’t know what to say.

“Since yesterday?”

“Yes,” I say. I make sure not to invite questions. My statement is definitive.

“Well… There’s chores to be done here.”

“I know,” I say. “And I’ll be here for most of the day tomorrow, and I’ll make sure that they get done. But then we’re going to have to make some changes with how we structure things around here. Because I can’t work this place all the time.” I nearly cry as those words come out of my mouth. I didn’t know that I was going to say them. But I need to use my safe word here. As cheesy and stupid as that sounds. I have been letting myself get crushed beneath the weight of what my dad expects of me, and I have got to draw a line. Because I love this place. I really do, but it’s not the sum total of my dreams.

“I want get back to barrel racing.”

“Well, that’s not going to do anyone any good,” my dad says.

“It’s not going to make any money, not really. But I love it. So it’s going to do me some good. It’s going to do me some good to be able to do something that I really care about.”

“We’re up to our eyeballs in debt.”

---