Mastering Lexie (Stronghold Book 4) (21 page)

It could have
been a totally normal dinner between them, except for the fact that he could
see her nipples, and she wasn't feeding herself.  Which was what made it
so freaking surreal.  On the other hand, she was kind of enjoying it
too.  At first she'd hated that Patrick was cutting up her meat for her,
it made her feel like a child, but he didn't talk to her like she was
one.  And he sure didn't look at her like she was one.  The man could
barely glance at her without his gaze dropping to her breasts for at least a
moment.  There was something nice about being fed, about the care he took
to make sure she could sip her wine without spilling.  He was just so
focused on her, it was impossible not to enjoy it to some extent.  

Once they were
finished eating, Patrick picked up their plates.  "You may put your
vest back on and return your arms to normal."

Disappointment
zinged through her, but she stifled it.  Especially when she caught a
glimpse of his face and knew that he'd seen it.  Plus it felt good to move
her arms again.  She rolled her shoulders, stretching them out a little
bit, and enjoying the way his attention went straight to her breasts before he
turned away.  Ha, take that.  

Sighing
internally, she put her vest back on.  The fabric pressed against her
nipples, making her want to moan a little bit.  She was turned on. 
Not so much from being fed as just from being in Patrick's presence, knowing
that he was looking at her as a woman and a submissive.  Even though he
tried to hide it, she'd seen the occasional heat in his eyes when he'd looked
at her.  She was getting to him.

Baby steps
, she reminded
herself.  Sometimes it sucked being patient, but it was better than
ruining everything by pushing.  Especially with something like starting a
relationship between the two of them, she knew that Patrick was going to feel the
need to be in control more than ever.  If she couldn't give up that
control, then she wasn't the right woman for him anyway.

"I'm glad
you came over tonight," Patrick said, coming back into the room.  He
sat back down at his previous seat, his dark eyes studying her. 

Lexie smiled.
 "Me too.  Thanks for inviting me."

He inclined
his head, still looking at her as if trying to puzzle something out.  She
just waited, knowing it was better to let him figure out exactly what he wanted
to say.  Trying to hurry him just made him grouchy.  

"What did
you think about the way we ate dinner tonight?"  His tone was
questioning and not at all sexual.  The way he might ask someone if they
preferred salty or sweet.  Still trying to keep their relationship in
'training' mode, she supposed. 

She hesitated
on answering, because she didn't want to disappoint him, but she also thought
she should tell the truth.  In the long run, they'd both be a lot more
disappointed if she lied.  One of the things her friends had hammered into
her about the scene was being honest.  Brutally honest, if need be,
because anything else was just asking for trouble.  Besides, she and
Patrick had been tip-toeing around each other for so long, and she didn't want
to play games.

"I'm not
sure it was my thing," she said, watching his expression just as carefully
as he watched hers.  If this was a deal breaker, she wanted a heads up.
 "I wouldn't mind eating that way some of the time, but not all of
the time.  I liked that it felt intimate and I felt very cherished and
cared for while you fed me, and I liked being the center of your focus, but I
think I'd get annoyed if I had to eat like that every night."  The
expression on his face didn't change.  She hesitated again and then added,
"I suppose I could try and see if I got used to it, if it was something
that was important... um, to my dominant."

Yeah, that got
a little flicker of something that looked a lot like jealousy when she said 'my
dominant.'  Patrick didn't want to think about someone else being her
dominant.  It was the little moments like that which gave her hope for
them.

To her relief,
he relaxed and smiled at her.  "Thank you for being honest."

Okay,
seriously?  That's all he was going to say about that?  What about
him?

"Is that
something you would want?  Every night?" she asked.  Yeah, maybe
she shouldn't be pushing, but she needed to know dammit.  Had she just
ruined her chances with him?  Even though she knew that his past
girlfriends hadn't been able to meet his needs, that some of them had called
him a control freak before they went running, she never knew the specific
incidents that set them off.  Patrick never talked about them, as far as
she knew.  She'd always taken it for granted that she knew Patrick, but
right now, she was realizing that there were some facets to him that she didn't
know at all. 

While she had
an idea in her head about what it meant to him to be totally in charge of the
relationship, to have a full-time submissive, maybe she was wrong about
that.  Maybe he wanted to feed his submissive every night, or even every
meal.  There were a lot of ways to live the lifestyle, and just because
she thought she knew him and could guess at his preferences, that didn't mean
she would guess right.

The silence
between them stretched, and she wondered if he was even going to answer, when
he finally gave a little nod.  

"Probably
not every night.  I do like to provide for... my submissive."
 This time it was Lexie's turn to feel a little flash of jealousy, and by
the gleam in his eye, she knew she hadn't entirely hidden it.
 "Which, sometimes, to me means cooking her a meal and feeding it to
her.  It's something which I would enjoy on a regular basis, but not
necessarily every night."

"How
often is a regular basis?"  That was Maria's advice.  Be
specific.  Don't assume anything.  Good advice from Maria,
considering some of the things she'd assumed about Rick when she first met
him.  Mostly that he was a womanizer and that he'd never be into her, and
then she'd assumed a lot about BDSM.  Although, it was also partly Rick's
fault for not talking to her about a lot of stuff, and she hadn't asked because
she hadn't known the right questions.  Lexie knew the right questions.

"A couple
times a week."

She could live
with that.  It was hard to keep her mouth shut and remind herself that she
and Patrick weren't negotiating a contract or a relationship.  They were
just talking.  But she also knew that he would be taking note of
everything she said, of every small reaction she had, and analyzing it. 
The big guy practically seemed psychic sometimes with how well he could read
facial cues and body language.  Lexie could sometimes hide things from
him, but right now she wasn't trying.  This was too important for hiding.

"Do you
ever expect your submissives to cook for you?"  She asked the
question, even though she was pretty sure she knew what the answer was. 
It was why she'd been practicing cooking with Justin for the past few months.

"Sometimes."
 Patrick's teeth flashed in his dark face, gleaming white in a predator's
smile.  "Preferably wearing nothing but an apron."

His face
suddenly changed, going blank, and Lexie had to stop herself from crowing with
delight.  Yeah, he definitely hadn't meant to say that.  This time,
the silence was fraught with tension, both sexual and not, as they stared at
each other across the table.  Were both of them picturing her, in nothing
but an apron, cooking for him?  She hoped so.  She really, really
did.  

Patrick broke
their staring contest first, glancing down at his watch.  "It's
getting late, you should probably head home."

She could see
the clock in his kitchen from where she was sitting.  They'd been sitting,
eating and talking for almost two hours.  If she wanted time to wind down
at home before getting into bed, then he was right.  He knew that she
liked to go to bed early on the nights she wasn't manning the front desk of
Stronghold.  It made up for the late nights the rest of the week. 

Part of her
wanted to say she was fine, that she should stay, but she decided a tactical
retreat was better at this point.  Let Patrick keep stewing.  It
seemed to be working.

******

Cleaning up
his kitchen, Patrick's mind wandered, as it always did when he was doing
mundane chores.  He liked cooking for his subs, and having them cook for
him, but he would have been happy to give up doing dishes any day.  Maybe
he should have mentioned that to Lexie and see if she would have stayed to do
them.

Smirking, he
rinsed the soap off of the pot he was currently washing and put it on the
drying rack.

He'd ended
tonight feeling reassured about her.  Lexie was a submissive, and she had
a crush on him, but she wasn't a pushover either.  When he'd first asked
her how he felt about the dinner, he already knew.  He'd been paying
attention to every nuance of her reactions throughout the evening.  What
he'd wanted to know was if she would tell the truth about it.  Because
even though he made it his business to be able to read people, he wasn't
infallible.  Also, he wanted to know how far she'd be willing to go.

That she
wasn't willing to lie made him feel better.  She'd spoken honestly and
sincerely and had been up front about her needs.  A relationship with him
couldn't work any other way.  As much as he needed his sub to be... well,
submissive, he also needed to know that he was fulfilling her as well, and that
she wasn't feeling resentful or smothered, but that she appreciated him and his
dominance over her.

Although he
could tell that Lexie hadn't loved the way they'd eaten dinner tonight, she could
enjoy it to some extent, and she'd be willing to do it more often than her
preference as long as it wasn't all the time.  No couple was perfect, the
key was finding compromises so that they could both be happy.  Feeding her was
something he was willing to compromise on as well.  The important thing
was knowing that they could communicate honestly about it.  

He really had
enjoyed feeding her though.  Tormenting himself as he'd placed each bite
of food between her lips.  Trying to keep his gaze from falling to the
silver gleam of her nipple piercings too often.  Having her under his
control, with her acceptance and encouragement.  He wasn't like Liam, who
rarely engaged in anything other than honor bondage, but Patrick did like to
see a woman who was willing to hold herself the way he wanted her to without
restraints or ropes.  Doing it for his pleasure and nothing else.

Having Lexie
under his command was a rush like nothing he'd felt before.  At the same
time, it had also felt settled.  Domestic.  Comforting. 
Everything he'd always wanted his home life to be.  

Fuck he was
getting in deep.

Rinsing off
the last pot, Patrick decided to go take a shower.  Maybe it was pathetic
to be jerking off to nothing more than the memory of her eating from his hand,
but that's exactly what he was going to be doing in five minutes.

******

Cradling her
phone between her ear and her shoulder, Lexie poured her cooked noodles from
the pot into the colander to drain away the water.  It wasn't the most
comfortable position, but she didn't want to put Leigh on speakerphone either,
it was too hard to hear that way.  The other woman had called to
chat.  Lexie got the feeling that Leigh had a bunch of free time that she
didn't quite know what to do with, and that she was feeling lonely in her
apartment now that Michael had moved most of his things out.

"I just
don't know what to do with myself sometimes," Leigh admitted, sounding
forlorn.  "It's easier on the weekends when I can hang out with
people, but on the weeknights not everyone's available.  I can only hang
out with Angel so much."

"Adam's
not giving you any trouble, is he?" Lexie asked, surprised.  Adam's
protective side usually encompassed every one he cared about, and she'd always
thought he liked Leigh.  Picking up the colander, she poured the spaghetti
noodles back into the pan so that she could mix in some sauce.

Leigh laughed,
reassuring her.  "No, he's been awesome.  I think he'd be
totally fine if I was over there every night, but you know.  It's
hard.  I feel like I'm imposing and taking away the time that they're
supposed to have together.  Plus, I don't want them to feel like they have
to tone down their affection for each other in front of me or anything. 
But it does hurt sometimes to watch them.  It makes me remember the way
Michael used to be.  And then it makes me remember how he stopped being
that way."

"Yeah, I
can get that," Lexie said sympathetically.  She knew the
'third-wheel' feeling all too well.  Fortunately, Patrick's presence
usually meant that she wasn't totally out on her own, but it wasn't like they
were together.  Watching the other Stronghold couples made her
yearn.  They didn't even realize how stinking cute they all were
together.  Even Andrew, the most die-hard bachelor of the group, was starting
to look a little envious sometimes.  "Kind of sickening aren't
they?"

She and Leigh
both giggled, because it was the truth.  But there wasn't any bitterness
to their envy, both of them were happy for their friends.  It was just
hard not to wish for happiness of their own.  Yeah.  Lexie totally
got that.