The Commitment(9)

"Just kidding," he said, laughing. He grabbed my hand back and threaded his fingers through mine. "No, seriously. Men fall in love more easily than women. When I finally met you, before our meeting with Lara, I wanted to ask you out, even thought I knew it would probably only be vanilla. I'd already plotted out a way to seduce you and initiate you into my depraved ways and so learning you were the sub I was supposed to initiate into the secret world of D/s..."

"You really were going to try to seduce me, you bad man," I said, still amused that he and Lara were conspiring about me. "I told Lara that the relationship would be purely research."

"Lara thought you needed a bit of encouragement. You know," he said, sounding guilty, a half-smile cracking his lips. "Find your 'inner sub'. I was more than willing to try because I'd already thought of it. I do love a challenge. I just had to find out how to push your buttons, so to speak."

"That sounds so…" I struggled for the right word. "Machiavellian."

"Oh, it's completely Machiavellian. I can't lie. I wanted to conquer you, Ms. Bennet." He shook his head, smiling to himself. "I thought I'd have you totally under my control in no time flat. How wrong I was…"

"What do you mean?"

He just smiled, pleased with himself that he'd successfully won me over, despite my initial refusal.

"You look like the Cheshire Cat," I said, noting his amused expression, his lips curving up in a smile. "The Cheshire Cat who swallowed the canary, to mix metaphors."

"Oh, I ate the lovely little canary. " He glanced over at me, grinning from ear to ear. "I had her for breakfast and lunch and dinner."

"Don't get too smug." I took my hand back, my arms folded across my chest, unable to keep a grin off my own face. "You're the one who came to me in the end, professing your love. Not wanting to be parted from me ever again."

His grin faded and he reached over and took my hand once again. "You don't have to remind me about that. I thought I'd lost you for good. I was serious when I said I don't want us to be parted again."

"And yet, you were going to leave me, leave Manhattan and go to Kenya without even a goodbye?"

"Kate, remember what happened to me the last time a close relationship ended." He said nothing for a moment and I thought about how his marriage broke up and that he'd been given a temporary restraining order. Finally, he sighed. "After you said it was over, I tried not to feel anything. I shut down emotionally so I wouldn't over-react. I went through the motions of my life, hoping that going to Nairobi would distract me enough to keep the emotions locked away. Luckily, Elaine called me to tell me you'd fallen in love with me and were miserable, or right now, I'd probably be in some bar in Nairobi with a colleague, drowning my sorrows in a bottle of cheap vodka."

"You'd probably be looking for a new submissive. Lara would be busy sorting through her list of hopefuls."

"No. I'd have been overly invested in my work and my music. After you?" He shook his head and turned to me, his expression intense. "A relationship with just a sub would feel hollow."

I smiled, butterflies in my stomach. We drove in silence for a few moments and I mulled over the prospect of not having him. What if Elaine hadn't phoned him? He might have already been in Kenya and out of my life for good.

"I'm so glad she did call." I had to clear my throat because it was choked up. "I haven't thanked her enough."

He kissed my knuckles again. "We had a lot of people behind the scenes trying to get us together."

"And one determined to pull us apart."

We cruised to a halt at a streetlight. "She can't hurt us now," he said and glanced at me, his gaze moving over my face.

I sighed. As happy as I was with Drake, I was still uncertain about our relationship. We weren't going to be a Total Power Exchange Master/slave couple. TPE scared me. I had to be equal to Drake outside of the bedroom – as equal as we two could get, given our personalities. Our power exchange was only in the bedroom, and even then, it wasn't total. We were very vanilla.

I watched his profile in the darkened car. It was perfect, his forehead high, sharp cheekbones, full lips, square jaw covered by the right amount of scruff. Long dark lashes over blue blue eyes. Tousled black hair.

"Does anything ever faze you?"

"Does anything ever faze me?" he said and frowned. "Does anything ever faze me. Let's see…" He turned his attention back to the road, chewing his bottom lip for a moment. "You." He glanced at me briefly.

"Me?" I said, totally surprised. "You control me so well. How could I faze you?"