Page 104 of Sleep for Me

“Okay.” If this was her next step, then so be it. Trembling just a little, she held out her hand to Beryl, masking her flinch as their palms connected. “I guess I’ve got a job.”

“Oh, we are going to have so much fun!”

At least someone was excited, Caera mused, delicately extracting her hand. Right now, she really didn’t know how to feel about it.

“Good girl,” Saul praised quietly. “Looks like I need to uphold my end of the deal now.”

That she knew exactly how she should feel about, and already a trickle of excitement thrummed through her.

Suddenly, she couldn’t wait until Friday.

Chapter Thirteen

“Is this a wise decision, Saul?”

“We made a deal, Thane, and Caera fulfilled her side of the bargain with more grace than I expected.” Saul glanced toward the bar where his eager bunny was attempting—badly, if the sympathetic look on Liam’s face meant anything—to order their drinks. “Last time was a fucking shitshow, I think we can all agree on that, but it was her idea to come again. She’s finding her place, and if she believes that Avalon and submission are where she belongs, then I won’t argue.”

“She seems happier,” Connie said thoughtfully.

“You can see it too? Good, I thought I was pinning my hopes on a wish instead of reality.” He ran his thumb over his mouth as he watched Caera using her hands to help her voice. “We’re on a strict meal schedule now, both of us. Breakfast, lunch, afternoon snack, dinner. She can sleep for a few hours at a time without nightmares waking her, but they still drain her energy. I’m using naps as a reward system.”

“Did the flashback affect your sex life?”

“Jesus, Connie.” Jasper rolled his eyes. “I’m just getting used to having a baby sister, I don’t need to hear all about what she gets up to with this reprobate.”

“So cover your ears,” she suggested hotly.

Jasper’s lip curled. “Not happening. If he’s put a finger in the wrong place, I’m bound by brotherly duty to break it.”

Saul grunted. “Like you’d stop at just breaking a finger, J. I imagine I’d be able to fit in a drawer by the time you got through smashing me into pieces—but just for the record,” he added hurriedly when the sadist’s eyes lit with intent, “there have been no fingers in any places that she didn’t want them to be. Things have been…tamer since that night, but it’s only frustrating her.”

“Submitting is hard at first, but once you’ve bitten that apple, you want to shake the whole tree.” Archie told him soberly. “Caera’s had a taste, and now she’s ready to chow down. The incident with the whip might have scared her, but you both know it’s a trigger now.”

Saul cocked his head, lifting a finger when Jasper ran his hand over his kitten’s hair to silence her. “If you don’t mind, Jasper, let her speak. The advice you guys give is solid, from my point of view, but I’d like to see how it looks from a submissive’s vantage.”

Anarchy blinked at him. “Um…”

“It’s fine, kitten. Give him a clue.”

“Honestly? I’d carry on like nothing happened. The bigger you make the issue, the harder it is to minimize when you need it to not matter. If our roles were reversed and I was in Caera’s shoes, I’d want Jasper to be himself. The trigger is going to get pulled at some point, right? It’s inevitable. But she survived it once, and she will the next time, and the time after that, until it doesn’t bother her.”

“Huh. So drop the kid gloves?”

“Put on the brass knuckles,” she agreed.

“Thanks, Archie,” he murmured, then grimaced when Caera turned away from the bar, a glass in each hand, and bumped into an older Dom. She almost dropped both drinks as the guy reached out to steady her. “Before she gets back, I wanted to ask you if anything had moved forward with your parents, Jasper.”

Blue eyes turned stony with barely concerned anger. “No. The team lost the trail in Hong Kong, so our guys are heading home to regroup. There are a few people who’ve ended up dead over the past weeks, and things are getting pretty hot. I’ve spoken to Atticus, and he wants us to wait until he gets back before we change tactics.”

“Tactics?”

“He knows about Caera, about her connections to the family.”

“You told him.”

“I did. It was satisfying to relay information he wasn’t already aware of, but he came up with a few ideas that were similar to ours. Primarily, he’d like to get the word out in Dominic’s circles that the girl he lusted after as a child is still alive. It might take a few weeks, maybe even months, for it to reach the pervert, but Att thinks she’s enough to drag his sorry ass out of hiding.”

Saul shook his head, switching his attention fully onto his friend. “We’ve talked about this, Jasper. There are risks in exposing her that way, no matter how well guarded she is. Dominic is resourceful, and he usually gets what he wants. Nobody takes that step until Caera understands what it will mean for her, and agrees to it.”

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