Tangled Love

Chapter Twelve

Jack stilled, everything inside him froze. Shock, relief, jubilation, and something like warm, sweet honey spreading through his chest all tumbled over one another in a rush of emotion he wasn't accustomed to. Despite all that, he paused.

Morgan's eyes misted with tears. Her chin trembled. Sighing, Jack restrained himself from snatching her into his arms and darting down the hall to lock her behind his playroom door. But not without great effort. He wasn't naïve enough to believe that one mediocre vanilla fuck had convinced Morgan she was a born submissive. She had layers and layers of guilt about something he didn't understand. And she wouldn't reach her full potential or full happiness until she got through it.

Since he planned to make her his—and would happily kill Brandon or any other son of a bitch who thought she belonged to them—Jack figured he'd better get to the bottom of Morgan's issues now. He hoped, right now, so she could begin to acknowledge him as her master, her lover, the man she could depend on to care for her in all ways.

Jack leaned in and kissed her forehead. "Why?"

She didn't answer for a long time. Instead, she sat up, drew her legs up to her naked chest, and set her head on her knees. He didn't prod, didn't touch, just waited.

Finally, she lifted her misty gaze to him again, proving she'd been shedding silent tears. "You said I wasn't wired for vanilla sex. I–I didn't want to believe it, but I think that just proved your point."

Damn. She'd just made two admissions he had to deal with—and he had to tread carefully. Easy first, with a slide into the more difficult.

"How did I prove my point?"

Those arched ginger brows of hers snapped together to form a scowl, which questioned his sanity. "Did our sex just blow your socks off?"

He smiled, doing his best to keep the mood light while he could. "I'm not wearing any."

Morgan wasn't amused. "So you think this is funny now?"

"No, cher," he soothed. "It did not blow my socks off, but I didn't expect it to. I accepted long ago that I don't like vanilla anything, even ice cream. Tell me what it was like for you."

A subtle command. Morgan hesitated, grappled. Then she capitulated.

"What we did...it was nice. Pleasant, like a picnic. I liked just being close to you more than I liked the actual sex." Tears pooled in her eyes, and her blue eyes reflected turmoil. "I didn't expect that. I kept wishing for...more. For a word or command— some indication of what you wanted, how you felt. Something that connected us. Something more intense."

The relief and jubilation rushed back over Jack. When he'd agreed to sex without domination, he'd hoped this would be Morgan's response...but he hadn't known for sure. She was turning out to be everything he'd believed, wanted to find for years. Still, he had to tread carefully.

"Your past vanilla experiences, were they satisfying?"

She cast him a vaguely guilty expression. "No. I...no."

Ah. There was a wealth of meaning there. He could have chastised her for imagining that she could enjoy simple sex, but she had to experience the difference for herself. One of the qualities he adored about her was that she had a strong mind and will, and she wanted to use them. Even if it made waiting for her to catch on to this discovery frustrating.

"Why did you think it would be different with me?"

Morgan lifted one shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. "You affect me more than anyone else. I just thought...it was you. That it would be different with you. Before, I rarely reached orgasm. If I hadn't been with you, you know, in the other way, I would have been elated by what just happened. But since I know how explosive we can be when..."