Page 79 of Submissive Lies

“Oh my fucking God, Jen!” He shook his head in derision. “Are you seriously going to fucking play that game right now?”

“What game?”

“You are!” He threw up his hands. “Holy shit, you’re going to try and act like you have no idea what I am talking about, aren’t you?”

“I’m not playing a fucking game, Thomas— “

“Bullshit! Bull fucking shit!” Thomas jabbed a finger towards me. “You know exactly what I am talking about right now but you’re going to play this fucking passive aggressive ignorance card like I’m a fucking idiot or something.”

“What do you want, Thomas? What’s your fucking point here?”

“Okay, I guess we’re fucking doing this…” He muttered under his breath. Sighing, he enunciated his next words slowly, as if speaking to a child. “What does that mean? What did you mean by that statement?”

I paused. I looked down at the coffee table. To the empty cup sitting there. I was acting like a child. But I wouldn’t admit it. Because he’d acted like a child too. I chuckled bleakly.

“You know, it’s funny. Now that I think about it, that does pretty much encapsulate everything.” I grinned ruefully, shaking my head. “In all honesty, it’s what this all boils down to.”

“Honesty.” Thomas snorted. “That’s pretty ironic coming out of you right now.”

I turned my face slowly towards his.

Low blow, dickhead. Low fucking blow.

“You know what, asshole? Fuck off.”

“Okay, okay! Fine, I shouldn’t have said it. There. Satisfied?”

I sat, taking in deep breaths. Ten minutes of arguing with Thomas to make him concede he’d acted like a dick had me dancing back from the edge of fight / flight.

“Yes. Thank you.” I blew out an elongated sigh.

There was a moment’s pause and then he rounded on me. “You still haven’t answered the original question, though.”

“What question?”

He rolled his eyes. “What. Does. That. Mean. The statement you made. Statements.” He held up his hand as if to ward off what he assumed I was about to say. “What did you mean with the whole ‘I’m not who you think I am’ and ‘I remade myself’ thing?”

I blinked my eyes.

“Where do I begin?”

“Dominance. And… submission?”

“Yes.” I nodded, my voice gentle for the first time since we’d began. “You understand that term, right?”

He shot me an annoyed glance. “Don’t fucking patronize me, Jen.”

“I’m just asking.” I threw up my hands.

He looked down to his lap and then huffed out a long sigh. “Okay, I do. In a sense. I’ll admit I’m not well-versed, per se, beyond what little I’ve picked up from things. Bits and pieces of Fifty Shades of Grey, that kind of stuff.” He turned his gaze back to me. “I’m guessing it’s a lot more complicated than that, isn’t it?”

I smiled.

“Yeah. You could say that.”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Thomas cut me off, holding up his hand. “I want to make sure I’ve got this straight. This guy Ben was your… Dom?”

“Yes.”

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