Kimberley did not sleep well that night.
Dreams intruded into her mind; dreams of softly spoken words, kindly or seductive or cruel depending on his mood. Of chains and bindings, cuffs and whips; other things, sweet and dark and she'd never contemplated before. She woke halfway through the night with the dreams clinging to her mind like seductive phantoms; she tried for an hour to drive them away before giving up and letting them in, masturbating furiously to visions of control and degradation.
She woke and showered and ate and did not, at any point, open her app or even touch her phone.
Kimberly was...
She was scared.
Last night had been
intense
. So intense that in the cold light of morning, her pussy aching with the treatment she'd given it last night, she felt something like dread steal over her.
He'd been nice. But James had been nice, hadn't he? Sensitive and sweet and a little broken. And so she'd lowered her barriers to him, given herself up completely to help him, to fix him...
How quickly sensitive turned into angry, sweet into selfish, broken into violent. She'd lost a year- more than a year- nearly bombed out of university, nearly lost herself to him.
Lost herself to him...
How easy would it be to lose herself in Josh? How quickly until he simply owned her-
(Another pulse of arousal and she remembered the fantasies from last night.)
...she probably should just forget it. Don't expose herself to the risk, don't let another potential
James
back into her life. Last night was a thing of fantasies, not reality- at least not the reality for Kimberly, frumpy little single girl who struggled to get dates.
...she was late for the office, wasn't she? Shit.
***
She arrived fifteen minutes late. Ignoring Greg's look- a sort of strange mixture of smug triumph and open contempt- she sat down and booted up her computer.
"You alright?" Blonde and perfect Sam smiled at her.
"Just fine," she murmured as her screen flickered to life. "Sorry."
"You look tired."
"Busy night." Her brain caught up with her mouth a half-second later and she felt the traitorous prickle of an angry blush spread across her face. "Uh."
Sam's face was a beacon of smugness. "Ohhhh..."
"It was just coffee!"
"Just?"
"Ah." For a moment she wanted to add I mean
I did hand him my panties at the end
but one again that little, quiet voice inside of her leapt up to strangle it in her throat. "Just. Coffee."
"You like him, though?"
She paused, remembering the pleasant conversation, the way he'd seemed genuinely interested in her. "Yes." The waves of pleasure as he ordered her, the drumbeat of her heart as she handed her sopping wet panties over to him. The medley of dark thoughts the night after. "Yes."
"Seeing him again?"
There was an awkward pause. "Um."
"Um?"
"Well..."
"Well?"
"I- I don't know if I should."
"Why?"
She pondered her answer but didn't have any time before her emails came up on screen and she suddenly found herself busy fixing an emergency. By the time she'd started putting the situation right, the moment had passed.
The morning passed as well, slow and tedious, with Sam and her having brief chats here and there. Greg passed by several times, to stand uncomfortably close, stare down their tops and give the occasional new set of orders; Kimberly did her best to give off the same aura of busy, impersonal obedience that Samantha seemed to have perfected.
It wasn't until lunch- a ham and cheese bagel for her, yet another impressively healthy salad for Smantha- that she remembered the question.
"He's...it feels all a bit...intense, you know? I went on one coffee date and things just got...a bit wild."
"Wild how?"
"He, uh." How the hell to put this? "He asked me to do something and..."
"What?"
"It- it doesn't matter. What's important is that it felt really, really...good."
"Okay..."
"Like, wayyy too good. Like...addictive good."
"Okay."
"And I'm just worried, you know, if he can do that, what if I can't trust him...?"
Samantha sat back. "So. Let me see if I understand."
"Sure."
"You met this guy for coffee."
"Yeah."
"You really like him."
"Yeah."
"And you have crazy chemistry with him, right?"
"Well...yes."
"What part of any of this is bad, exactly?"
"I don't want him to be like- well-" She gestured into the air helplessly but Sam just nodded.
"Hey...listen. I don't know what sort of losers you dated in the past, but you can't let bad experiences get in the way, okay? I say if you click with this guy, give him another chance."
"It's- a lot."
"A lot of women would kill to feel that sort of intensity, you know! Shit, I can't remember how long it's been since I felt something like that for a guy- not since I was a teenager."
"Seriously? You?" Samantha's love life was a story delivered in snippets and hints, crumpled clothes from the day before and half-glimpsed flirty texts. "I would have thought..."
"Honey...I've had plenty of fun with plenty of guys. Even some love. But that sort of shit that you're talking about...no. Not since high school." Samantha sighed and closed her eyes. "Are you going to call him back?"
"Probably."
"Hey, and don't stress so much. If he suggests anything dodgy you can always say no, right?"
"Of- of course."
***