Page 407 of Face Off

“You also became remarkably comfortable giving orders.”

“You liked it.”

“My cock is still in my hand, Charm. I’m not constructing a convincing denial from this position.”

Her laugh reaches me, but the serious edge remains when she speaks again. “I liked hearing you lose control.”

“You have heard me come before.”

“I’ve heard you attempt to control it. Tonight, you let me hear everything.”

“You told me not to hide.”

“And you listened.”

The quiet satisfaction in her voice reaches a place the orgasm left unprotected.

“I don’t want you to hide any of it from me again,” she says. “I don’t want the restrained version of you who is constantly watching my face and deciding how much of yourself I can handle.”

“You weren’t complaining when I fucked you in front of that mirror.”

“I wasn’t complaining about anything you did in front of that mirror.”

“Then what! What are you saying?”

“That night was different too.” Her breathing settles before she continues. “You stopped holding back because you needed to break through whatever was happening inside my head. You used your body, your voice, the mirror, and every filthy thing you knew would force me to look. You weren’t taking something for yourself, Ryan. You were dragging me back into the room.”

The truth presses against the resentment I have carried from that night.

“You were disappearing in front of me,” I say. “I wasn’t going to let you.”

“I know. That is what I mean. Even when you stopped controlling what you did to me, you were still focused on what I needed. You held me through it, and when it was over, you asked me to stay because you couldn’t survive being alone, but you never took everything you needed from me.”

“You weren’t capable of giving it.”

“I know that too.”

She doesn’t defend herself or ask me to soften the truth.

“I wish I had understood how often loving me forced you to restrain yourself,” she says. “Even in bed, you were always reading me, reassuring me, and making certain your desire didn’t become one more thing I thought I could fail.”

“I never hid who I was because I was ashamed of it.”

“I know.”

“I wasn’t translating myself into someone you could tolerate.”

“No, but you were careful with me when I should have made it safe for you to be completely free.”

The word catches my attention. “Free?”

“The real you. The arrogant, dominating, possessive Chicano man who reaches for Spanish when English is too fucking small for what he feels. The man who loves with his entire body and doesn’t apologize for wanting something once he decides it belongs to him.” Her voice grows quieter without losing its certainty. “I want all of him. I wish I had shown you that I could handle all of him before everything fell apart.”

“You couldn’t have.”

The answer comes without cruelty, and she receives it without flinching.

“No,” she says. “I couldn’t have then.”