Shaking her long dark hair and straightening her black cocktail dress down her curvy frame Joanne walked slowly from her car to her apartment stairwell in a daze. She hadn't seen her ex in ages and it always amazed her how much a 'Jesse sighting' affected her. It was almost like his stare across the bar with those brooding blue yes was a physical caress and one that touched her in places that made her whole body tingle.
She had pushed him away over a year ago due to the irrational fears she harbored after coming off of a messy divorce not to long before that. She had sometimes since then wished he hadn't of let her go, fighted harder for her, but most of all that she hadn't been so stupid.
They had an unusual relationship at best. He had made her secret sexual self finally open up and give into her submissive needs. A strong woman who never bowed to anyone found herself on her knees in a classic slave fashion, naked at his feet and finally at peace with herself. It was like finally coming home.
Joanne never had let someone in that far, trusted them that much. It was obvious to her that it had left a permanent mark on her, unlike the way he use to bite her to mark her as 'His', because they always eventually and sadly faded.
Lately there was talk about him fancying himself a player and a manipulator of women. She knew that he was just lashing out. He had been as open with her as she had with him. She knew he respected women way too much to purposely tear them down for his own sexual exploits. Even though she knew the stories to be false and bravado in the fact of rejection part of her wondered if he had been bragging about her being one of his victims.
That is what lead to her sticking out her lounge at him across the bar the last time their eyes had locked in a hot but brief glance. She saw quickly his eyes turned dark as he shook his head and stormed out of the bar. She couldn't tell if it was passion or anger or a heady combination of both reflected back at her in his blue eyes as he passed her on his abrupt departure of the premise.
Her mind confused and her heart heavy she trudged up her stairs to see the most peculiar thing on the landing, Jesse.
Jesse looked at Joanne with the same stormy blue eyes, his golden hair ruffled like his hand had ran through it too many times, which he was apt to do when frustrated. Joanne tried to pick her jaw up off of the ground and say something but just seeing him there in that tight black shirt that molded every muscle and the way he was staring at her like a hungry tiger about to pounce had rendered her completely speechless.
"Let me in kitten." Jesse said in a low threatening voice
Even though she knew better, she still scrambled past him to open the door for him. Her ankle biting attack dogs lunged at both of them in a barrage of fur and yips. Joanne scooped both of them up before they took a taste of Jesse's incredible looking legs.
'Damn, has he been working out?' she asked herself wondering how it was possible for her to be so wet with anticipation without knowing why he was even there.
"Let me put the girls in the kitchen. I'm sure you have something on your mind you feel the need to share and I won't be able to hear you over this racket." Walking away with them and shutting them away behind the kitchen door she turned to see him standing just inside the front door wearing the same expression except a little more pained like he was holding himself back. As she walked up and sat on the arm of her couch across from him she could see the pulse in his neck beat at a mad rate. 'That can't be good.' She thought.
"What's on your mind Jesse? Come to yell at me for leaving you over a year ago, or are you just miffed that I stuck my tongue out at you?" She tried to have the words fall off of her lips as casually as possible even if it was a false front. She lifted her eyes to him defiantly as he purposefully close the gap between them in a few short steps and stood directly in front of her and slapped her, hard.
Joanne's eyes went wide in surprise as her hand leapt to the offended cheek. The welt started to blaze with heat as she thought about the mark that was going to leave.
