Things Made Right by Tymber Dalton Page A

just doing what you say?”
    He leaned in, his hand gently cupping the nape of her neck, his forehead touching hers. “No, sweetheart,” he said. “It’s about me being able to take care of you. Protecting you. Not about restricting you. It’s about me kil—” He closed his mouth on what she suspected he was about to say.
    About me killing for you.
    “About me caring for you,” he said. “Dying for you, if that’s what it takes. Giving you all of me. In return, I expect you to give me all of you.”
    “I want to work,” she said. “I want to get my degree.”
    “I know. And I want you to have that.”
    “That doesn’t sound so bad.”
    He let out another of those sad sounding sighs. “If I told you to assume a position and hold it for me as long as I told you to, would you do it?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “If I put you on your knees on the floor, and told you to stay. An hour, maybe two. Would you do it?”
    “I…I don’t know if I could. I’d try.”
    “Failure means punishment. There might be times I set you up to push your limits, to see how far you can go before you fail.”
    “Why would you want me to fail?”
    He gently kissed her. “So I can catch you when you do and show you that, no matter what, I’ll always love you. That nothing you could ever do would ever make me stop loving you. And then we try all over again.”
    He pulled away, staring into her eyes, the corners crinkled. “And because I’m a sadist. Sometimes, I want to see you fail so I can punish you. And you’ll know it, too. It’s a cat and mouse game. And for training. Because punishment is always followed by a reward.”
    “Reward?”
    His brown eyes looked deep, warm, inviting. An eyebrow deliciously arched. “Orgasms,” he said. “Every punishment followed by an orgasm. Until your body gets to the point it craves pain to get the reward. Until the two are so mixed up together in here”—he gently touched the center of her forehead with his right index finger—“that one equates to the other.”
    Sadness filled her. “I can’t let myself be beaten.”
    “No,” he sternly said. “ Never beaten. Not like what you think.” He looked like he was trying to figure out how to word it. “I guess it is hard to process if you don’t understand what I mean.”
    “Show me.”
    He studied her carefully, watchfully. “You say that, but you don’t understand.”
    “Then show me. Let me decide if it’s too much. Show me what it might be like, and let me make up my mind about it.”
    “After what you’ve been through—”
    “If I ask you to stop, will you? If you show me, and it’s too much for me, and I ask you to stop, will you stop?”
    “Yes.”
    “Then show me.”
    “It’s not like that all the time, though. You won’t be able to safeword your way out of a spanking if it’s what I’ve decided you’ll have for punishment for breaking a rule.”
    “Okay. Then show me your worst.”
    His expression clouded. “I never want to show you that. Ever.”
    “Then show me what I need to see to make up my mind.”
    “But—”
    “They didn’t stop. They didn’t ask me what I wanted. I’m telling you what I want. If nothing else, I want a good memory in my brain. I want a memory of your hands on me, of your lips on me. I want that memory to carry with me, always, even if I decide I can’t do this.”
    “You’re sounding like you’re pretty sure this is what you want,” he said.
    “Yeah,” she quietly said. “Because you’re already sounding pretty sure I’m who you want.”
    “I do want you. More than you know. But I also know—”
    “ Show me.”
    After contemplation, he finally stood and held his hands out to her, helping her stand.
    “For tonight,” he said, “if you need me to stop, you say red . If I ask how you’re doing, you say green , yellow , or red . Just like a stop light.”
    “Okay.”
    “Yes, Sir ,” he corrected.
    She swallowed. “Yes, Sir,” she whispered.
    He