Page 127 of The Sadist and the Brat

“Give me a damn minute, for God’s sake,” she said on a wheeze, and dropped her head to hang between her knees. “You love me?”

“It seems I do.”

“Don’t be cryptic,” she said, irritated, and sat back up to glare at him. Her heart was still beating like a scared rabbit’s, but she didn’t feel like puking anymore. “Okay. What does that mean?”

“What the hell kind of question is that?” he demanded, in full resting-dick-face mode.

“A valid one,” she shouted back and leapt to her feet. “You said you love me, but I don’t know what that means. Do you want to date? Move in together?I don’t know what you want from me.”

“You want to know what I want?” He stalked toward her, moving so fast she barely had time to squeak before he was gripping her upper arms, all but lifting her off her feet. She could see his eyes now, and they were blazing. “I want us to be together. I want you to be my submissive and wear my collar. I want you to love me back, dammit!”

“I do love you back, dammit!”

He blinked. “You do?”

“Yes!”

His grip on her arms tightened, shock replacing the anger in his expression.

“I know,” she said, answering the question in his eyes. “It surprised the hell out of me, too.”

“You love me,” he repeated.

“I just said so, didn’t I?” she demanded, then she didn’t say anything at all because he was kissing the hell out of her. When he broke free, it was to swoop her up in a hard hug that all but squeezed the breath out of her.

She squeezed him right back.

“I’m sorry I was trying so hard not to spook you that I made you think you didn’t matter,” he murmured into her neck.

“I’m sorry I left the party without telling you and poured anise extract into your liquor bottles,” she replied.

He hugged her all the harder. “You’re going to pay for that one, you know.”

“Don’t I get points for leaving the really expensive one alone?”

“Half a point,” he allowed, and pressed a gentle kiss to her neck before easing back to look her in the eye. “And you can thank Sam for telling me about that, because I was ready to dump it down the sink with the rest of them.”

Sadie made a mental note to send Sam a thank-you gift. “So, what do we do now?”

“We have some talking to do,” he said. “And I think we need some new rules.”

She blinked. That wasn’t what she’d expected to hear. “Rules?”

He nodded. “If we’d been communicating well, this misunderstanding never would have happened.”

She winced. “I know.”

“Not all your fault,” he reminded her, and gave her ponytail a gentle tug. “Turns out, I’ve got some insecurities that need addressing, too.”

“Oh.”

“We’ll work out the rules together, all right?”

There was a squiggle in her belly, but she decided she liked it. “Okay. Together.”

“But first,” he said, and holding her hands, stepped back.

“What?” she asked, confused when he sat down on the couch. Her eyes widened in surprise when he grabbed the waistband of her leggings, dragged them to her knees, then yanked her forward so she sprawled ass-up over his lap.

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