The intimacy between them was staggering. No longer capable of keeping her hands to herself, she settled her hand on his knee, feeling slightly giddy when she heard his slight gasp. “I think you can do whatever you want to do. Give it a little time. The world will forget and move on to the next scandal.”
He turned his face toward hers, his lips so close she could practically taste them. “If you really believe that, why did you change your name and hide who you were?”
She flinched, uncomfortable that she had become the topic of conversation. But she refused to run away this time. “It was different for me. No one forgets in a small town.”
His eyes narrowed. “Bullshit. If that were the case, you wouldn’t have changed your name after you moved to Detroit. You wouldn’t need pills to deal with your anxiety over Rachel Dawson saying your real name. Why should my situation be any different?”
The truth in his words flayed her. “Because you’re not like me. You don’t give a fuck what people think of you. You’re brave.”
His nostrils flared like a bull’s before it charged. “And you’re not? How could you think that? You went undercover to help me prove my innocence and refused to back down when you started receiving threats. With no thought to your safety, you went alone to Joseph’s office to search for the evidence that would link him to Alyssa’s death.”
“If I’m so brave, why did I freeze?” Flooded by shame, she dropped her gaze to her lap. “I had the gun in my hands. It was him or me, and in the end, I couldn’t kill him. If Nick hadn’t shown up when he had, I wouldn’t be here. Going to Joseph’s office wasn’t an act of bravery. I did it because . . .” She swallowed back thick tears. “. . . I had to prove to myself I wasn’t wrong about you. I knew when I walked out of your bedroom it was a mistake, but I was so angry you’d lied about your alibi, I questioned my instincts. That’s why I went to Joseph’s office.”
Jaxon gently tipped up her chin with the soft pads of his fingers. “I shouldn’t have kept Bethany Gold a secret from you. You deserved the truth not only as part of my legal team but as my submissive.” He glanced at her collar. “I don’t want what happened between me and Bethany to diminish what you and I shared. Bethany was physical, a way for me to move on from my broken marriage, but when it came time to fuck, I couldn’t do it. All I felt was guilt and remorse for breaking my marriage vows. It hadn’t mattered that she had been unfaithful. That’s why I left the hotel room. Why I left Chicago. But as I got closer to Detroit, I didn’t want to go home either. I realized in that moment that I didn’t really have a home anymore. Only a house where I hung my clothes and rested my head at night. This house, my career, it was never mine. I loved Alyssa, but my marriage was over. I knew a vanilla relationship would never satisfy me, but neither would a relationship with a woman who pushed me past my boundaries. And then you came into my life, and for the first time, I thought I might have found what I’d dreamed about.”
She hadn’t missed that he spoke about their relationship in the past tense. But if she was going to start being brave, she had ask for one more chance to make things right between them.
Leaning closer to him, she grazed her lips on his, enough to pick up his flavor. “I don’t want to lose you. I know we both made mistakes. Trust is the foundation of a D/s relationship, and it blew up in our faces like dynamite. But at the other end is forgiveness. Before recently, I didn’t believe in it. If someone hurt me, I’d cut them from my life and never look back. You’re the one who told me to forgive Hannah. Don’t you think you and I deserve it as well?”
He exhaled a shuddering breath and his tongue licked across the seam of his lips. “You deserve a lot of things.”
“And so do you. I messed up. As my Dom, isn’t it your responsibility to correct my behavior? Otherwise, how will I learn?” She bit his lip playfully.
He pushed her back with a hand to her sternum, his penetrating brown eyes glazed. “I told you before, you had every right to walk out on me after you learned about Bethany. You don’t need my forgiveness for that, but if it makes you feel better, I will. But when it comes to your safety, it would be my job as your Dom to correct behaviors that put your life at risk. You’re a masochist, and so I’m not sure a spanking would suffice. I’ll have to get creative. Are you sure you want me to punish you? Do you know what you’re asking?”
She didn’t hesitate. “Yes.”