Two Loves for Alex (17 page)

But in those novels Alex could control the scene. She could drop the scales from the hero’s eyes at last, allowing him to realize how much he loved and needed the heroine. Too bad she couldn’t write the script for Daniel and Liam.

Too bad she couldn’t make them suddenly realize that, while they still loved each other, there had been a huge hole in their hearts, one only she could fill. They would beg her to take her rightful place as not only their slave girl but their lover and partner.

Instead they were sending her away. She was no longer an extension of their lovemaking but a hindrance. A source of friction. She punched the pillow as hard as she could. God damn it, it wasn’t
fair
. She’d accepted everything—all the limits. She’d slept alone each night in her bed instead of in their arms. She’d tried as hard as she could be a true submissive.

But it wasn’t enough. She guessed it would never be enough. Because this wasn’t about her. It was about them. About their relationship and stuff they had to work through. She couldn’t influence it. Shit, she wasn’t even privy to it. Their important talks didn’t include her. She was just some girl. Some sex toy they’d brought in for their amusement. And now that the amusement had become complicated by real feelings they were just going to toss her away liked a used tissue they’d jerked off into.

Well,
fuck them
. She smacked the pillow again so hard a seam opened and several feathers floated out. She dropped her head against the pillow and gripped it hard.

What the hell was wrong with her anyway? She’d known going into this that love wasn’t on the menu. In fact she’d told herself that was a plus. Love was messy. Love fucked everything up. Better, far better, to be a sex slave and nothing more. And she’d almost convinced herself but now they were the ones pulling the rug out from under her. They wanted her to leave.

She sat up and pushed her hair resolutely from her face. Fine. If they wanted her to leave she was so out of there it wasn’t even funny. Alexandra Helena Stewart did not stay where she was not wanted.

Alexandra… The image of the dark, handsome Anthony floated into her mind. He had called her that, giving the “r” a slight roll of his tongue, making it sound exotic and special.
Alexahndrrra…

She’d been Alex since she was a little girl—a tomboy running wild with the boys, never interested in makeup or dolls. Her father had wanted a boy—maybe that’s why she acted so tough as a kid. She didn’t feel tough now. She felt vulnerable and miserable. She felt rejected. Shit, she
was
rejected.

She stood and moved toward the armoire, jerking open the doors. Grabbing her clothing, she threw it onto the bed. She opened the bureau and pulled out the rest, stuffing it all willy-nilly into the suitcase she’d stored beneath the bed.

She went into the bathroom, grabbed her toiletries and dumped them into the cosmetic case she’d brought them in. She returned to the bedroom and crammed the cosmetic case in with her clothes.

What had he said?
If you were mine… You would be mine alone. You would know your worth because I would shower you with love and attention.
What it would be like to belong to a man like Anthony?

She sensed he would be a harsher taskmaster than Daniel and Liam. More of a Master, less of a lover. Her loins tingled at the thought. Was that what she wanted? Someone who would really take her in hand? Who would completely dominate her world?

At least with Anthony she wouldn’t be relegated to the background, sent away when he was done with her. He had even said it—
you will never sleep alone
. Somehow he’d seemed to understand and pinpoint her loneliness.

He was very handsome, no question of that. Sexy as hell. But was he too Dom? Something in his bearing, in the way he looked at her, like a wolf eyeing a lamb—it had been disconcerting. But also…sexy.

Alex shook her head. What was she thinking? Was she planning to leap from the frying pan right into the fire? She didn’t need another Dom. No. She needed time to think. To regroup. To be more honest this time about what she really wanted.

Love.

Yes. She wanted a submissive relationship but she also wanted love. She wanted the kind of love she’d witnessed between Daniel and Liam. That kind of shining, all-encompassing adoration that lit them both from within with a secret special fire.

Would she ever find that kind of love? Could Anthony offer her that kind of love?

She sank to the floor and dropped her head into her hands, the weight of her misery bowing her low. “I don’t want his love. I want Daniel and Liam. I want them both. I want them to want me. To love me. Damn it. Love me. Love
me
.”

She snapped her mouth shut, embarrassed to realize she’d been talking out loud. She rose, remaining motionless for several seconds. All was quiet. She grabbed her suitcase and her laptop and left the room that had been hers for only two weeks.

Two weeks that meant more to her than a lifetime. Two weeks she would never forget.

Daniel returned to the bedroom a moment later. “I think she must have overheard at least part of our conversation. I should go talk to her.”

Liam frowned. Things were getting increasingly complicated. “Let’s figure out what we’re going to do before we go get her. I agree she needs to be involved too but only after we’re clear in our own minds what we want.”

Daniel paced the room. Liam resisted his urge to direct Daniel on this. He wasn’t entirely sure if he wanted Alex to stay or go. On the one hand he loved having her around. She was sexy and fun and Daniel had blossomed as her Dom. On the other hand they kept butting their heads against the ugly green wall of jealousy. It really was hard to insert a third person into a committed relationship, even a D/s relationship. If she was to stay they needed to be on the same page or it would never work.

Gently he said, “So we don’t have to decide for sure now. I’m totally with you on this, Daniel. My main concern is us—you and me. Do you want her to stay? Do you think we can work through this and keep our lines of communication more open?”

“Yeah. I want her to stay. At least I think I do. Let’s give it more time before we make any final decisions. Let me talk to her. Would that be okay? I think she’d feel more at ease if I was the one to explain we’re just working through some stuff as a couple but didn’t want to leave her out of the loop.”

“Okay. Sounds good. I’m here if you need me.” Liam wanted to go to Alex himself or at least accompany Daniel. But he respected Daniel’s desire to go alone. He needed to step back a little, he realized. After all he’d claimed from the beginning Alex was to be Daniel’s sub, yet he’d begun to be involved more and more directly with Alex. It was time to step back a while and let things sort themselves out.

Daniel stumbled into the room, breathless, his face a mask of shock. “She’s gone. I can’t find her. Her stuff is gone. I checked and her car is gone. She just…left us.” He shook his head in disbelief.

“Are you sure?” Liam jumped up and followed Daniel down the hall to Alex’s room. The bed was rumpled, the drawers of the bureau pulled open and empty. “Call her. Call her cell.”

Daniel reached into his pocket and withdrew his phone. He retrieved Alex’s number and pressed the call button. After five rings he got her voicemail.

“Alex. It’s Daniel. Where did you go? You have us worried to death. Please call back right away.” He turned to Liam with a defeated look. “Voicemail.”

“Yeah.” Liam held out his arms and Daniel moved into them. “Don’t worry. If she did overhear the conversation she’s bound to be hurt and confused. She probably heard us questioning if she should go or stay. You know, she’s so young. Maybe it was just a matter of time…”

“No. Don’t say that. Don’t blame her,” Daniel snapped. He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I just feel awful. Poor Alex.”

~*~

Alex lay on the bed in her garage apartment. Good thing she’d kept the lease on the place, she thought bitterly. Jesus, she’d lasted a whole fucking week as permanent slave girl in residence.

She heard a buzzing sound and realized it must be her cell phone, which was in her purse and set on vibrate. She’d barely used the phone in the week she’d been back with Daniel and Liam, calling her mother once to say hello and Cheryl once to assure her she was still alive and not being held against her will by crazed homosexual sadists.

She flipped open the phone. Missed call. She retrieved the message. Daniel. Daniel was worried.
Sweet Daniel.
But Liam wanted her gone. He was threatened by her relationship with Daniel. Even as she thought this she knew it wasn’t fair. And she knew it wasn’t just Liam. Both of them were conflicted about her and her role in their lives. Hell,
she
was conflicted.

She’d done the right thing to leave. This was better. A time out. A chance to think things through. But it wasn’t right to run out on them like she did. It was immature. She pushed the call back button and waited.

“Hello? Alex?”

“Hi, Daniel.”

“Where are you?”

“Back in Danbury. At my place.”

“Why? Why did you go? You just ran out. Took all your stuff.” There was reproach and pain in his voice. Alex steeled herself against it.

“Yeah. Look. I heard what you guys were saying. I was coming between you. Liam wanted me gone. I heard him say it so please don’t deny it. I’m putting a wedge in your relationship. It’s the last thing I wanted to do.”

“No. No, that’s not true, Alex. Yes, we’re working some stuff out but we never intended you to get that message. We were talking it through. We were asking each other how we should handle things. Listen, it’s because you matter to us, don’t you see? If we didn’t care we’d just let you go. Chalk it up to experience and move on.”

Hope rose with batting wings against the walls of her heart, though she tried desperately to quash it. She couldn’t resist forcing the issue. “So you know definitively that you want me in your life? You and Liam want me to live there and belong to you 24/7? You can say this with certainty?”

There was a pause, during which Alex nearly hung up. She was gripping the phone so tight her hand started to shake. “I guess we can’t say anything with certainty. Yet. We need time. The two of us. To work things through.” Daniel’s voice sounded defeated and the hope that had risen a moment before fluttered to its death.

Alex took a deep breath, refusing to let him hear the pain. “Yeah. I need some time too. And some space. I’m not sure it’s working for me either. I thought I could handle just being your submissive without anything more but I’m not sure anymore. I…I need to get my own priorities straight.”

Another long silence, during which Alex began to cry. She held the phone away, determined not to let him hear her. Damn it, what was she doing? Throwing away the best thing to ever happen to her? But her pride backed her into a corner. She didn’t want to be with them on sufferance while they figured out if they wanted her or not.

“I understand,” Daniel finally said. “Please, please call us when you’re ready. Give us another chance. Please.”

“Bye, Daniel.”

Alex closed the phone, dropped her head into her arms and cried until there were no tears left.

~*~

Alex worked furiously on her novel. She woke up at dawn and typed until her fingers cramped. She stopped only to use the bathroom and get a new cup of coffee, which was often cold by the time she remembered to sip it.

The book had started out chronicling the sexual adventures of Amy and her two Masters—art imitating life. But where her real life had derailed, Amy went on to find true love and happiness in the arms and hearts of her Doms. Hurrah for fiction.

She finished the rough draft at the end of her third day back in Danbury. Exhausted but triumphant, she sent it off to her editor a full two weeks ahead of schedule.

Daniel had called again on her second day home to ask how she was. “We miss you,” he said. She missed them too, both of them. She missed being the object of their sexy, sensual D/s training. She missed the intensity of experience and the serenity of submission. She missed the rare times they let her linger in their bed, as if she were their real lover instead of just their sub girl.

She missed the easy companionship around the dinner table. She even missed her chores, though not enough to clean up her dump of an apartment. Better to just get a bunch of trash bags and fill them. Empty the place and start fresh.

Though she ached for what she’d lost, she wasn’t ready to return to them. She was no longer willing to settle for sleeping alone, their sub but not their lover. And she knew that wasn’t fair. It wasn’t what they had offered and she had claimed it wasn’t what she wanted.

But now she knew different. She was ready, for the first time in her life, to stop running. Cheryl had accused her of being afraid to commit, of heading for the hills whenever the L word came up. She realized now this was because she had never seen love. Not the deep, abiding love she’d observed between Daniel and Liam. A love she wanted for herself—if not with them with someone she could trust and connect with. Someone who understood her need to submit as a part of that love.

Over the next few days, with her novel done and not quite ready to start the next project, she took long walks early in the morning, musing on her life and what her next step should be. She kept thinking about Anthony Campos, the sexy, slightly dangerous whip maker who’d basically crashed their party.

She remembered he lived in Wilton, not far from Westport. He’d made a point of saying his address but she no longer recalled it. She did recall he’d said he was listed. On a whim she pulled up a telephone directory on the internet and typed in his name and town. An address and phone number appeared like magic.

What had he said? She closed her eyes, trying to remember his exact words. Suddenly she could almost hear his voice, that deep, sexy voice with the rounded pure tones of his slight Spanish accent.

If you ever want to connect with a real Master, someone who could take you where you’ve always dreamed of going, call me. I’ll be waiting, Alexandra.