Page 95 of Ward Willing
I pull away after a few seconds. “Thank you for telling me.”
“I’m sorry,” he says quickly. “That won’t happen again. If you really want to do this, if you want me to be your Dom, I need to be better about reading your cues. Forgive me?”
Brows scrunched, I pull my lower lip between my teeth. Even in this aspect of his life, he’s considerate.
“I forgive you.”
“We should probably outline our limits before we do anything else. I didn’t ask you if that was okay.”
“You have my consent. We can either use my safe word, or the traffic light system. Green, yellow, red.”
“Yeah, I read about that,” he murmurs.
“You did?”
His hands come to my hips. “Yes. I did a lot of research, in fact.” He tilts his head slightly, smirking as his eyes study me with glittering rhapsody. “But I still have a lot to learn. Maybe you should teach me,” he says, his voice a low purr.
I swallow as his right hand comes up to my face, and he slowly drags his thumb across my lower lip. “You’re doing just fine on your own,” I offer.
“Still,” he growls. “We shouldbothoutline our limits. Even if unofficially until we’re both more settled emotionally.”
He moves me off him and sets me back in the passenger seat. I’m about to protest when he starts the ignition.
“What about my other punishment?” I ask, thinking back to his earlier promise for punishing me for lying.
He lets out a low chuckle. “We’ll see. I need to think about it, but I don’t think we should go any further tonight. I’ll be upset about the lying for a while, but I don’t want to hold my forgiveness over you,” he says slowly, pulling back onto the road. “That’s not fair to you, and it’s not fair to me. I just… feel a bit out of control, but that’s on me.”
“I know. I’m sorry,” I whisper—all my fight vanishing.
“Fuck,” he mutters, grimacing. “You lost your virginity up against a wall with no foreplay. And if I could do it over, I’d spend the entire night making sure you’d never want to leave my bed again.”
“Maybe you’ll get the chance to make it up to me,” I offer.
“Or maybe you’ll get the chance to make it up tome,” he retorts.
I’m quiet the rest of the drive home, and as Liam pulls into his driveway, he shuts the engine off and sighs.
“I had some CDs for you. I forgot them at the castle.”
“What are CDs?” I ask, turning to face him with heavy eyes. Just as his mouth drops open, I laugh. “Kidding.”
“Zoe…” He looks away as his arms rest on the steering wheel. My heart stutters, and for a second I think he’s going to reject me again. “Come on. Let’s go inside and get you to bed.”
“But—”
“Let me take care of you. Show me what you like when it comes to aftercare.”
Oh.
I smile as he reaches over and unlocks my door.
CHAPTERFIFTEEN
THE RUIN
Liam
Once we’re inside the house, I close and lock the door. When I turn around, Zoe is watching me as she leans back against the entryway table. I walk up next to her, my eyes boring into her as I drop my keys into the bowl with a loud clang. Captain nuzzles up against her legs, and she absentmindedly pets the top of his head. It’s domestic and it almost heals the hole in my heart, but thinking about her in this capacity is dangerous.
