“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m going. Whatever you decide…I’m sorry.”

Picking up his keys, he left her there, standing in the middle of her living room.

* * * * *

He had plenty to keep him busy. He steered clear of “the tower” for a while, what they called the executive offices. Janet cooperated, choosing to update the scheduling grid online and send text alerts to the affected drivers, including himself. When something needed to be couriered, she delivered it through one of the interns, or he delegated another driver to pick it up from her. He was the boss, after all.

Besides that, he had a lot to do outside of work. His visits with Amanda, some time spent with guys at the VA. He helped Dale out at Eddie’s place and with building the swing set. While he was doing that, he didn’t talk about Janet and Dale didn’t push, especially when he realized Max wanted to think the problem through without help.

She’d told him he was different, because he’d been to her home, engaged her in an environment different from the club. In turn, he’d pulled a Pretty Woman moment, insisting that was just “geography”. Fuck, he really needed to stay away from late night television.

On the day she’d killed Jorge, it had taken her a trip to the border and then twenty miles after that to feel everything that she’d done to escape. She’d planned and committed cold-blooded murder. Then, on top of that, she’d butchered the body. Most people couldn’t countenance either act, let alone execute them. He knew up close and personal the difference between taking out a man through the sights of a rifle, and holding him against your body as you cut his throat. Feeling how hard he struggled against his fate, the way the soul slipped away when he lost.

Janet had shared the terrible story with him, a story he assumed no one but Matt Kensington knew. That had been her additional offering to show him he was different.

Yet, in the end, she’d shut him down just like she’d shut down one of her subs. That might be true, but he had no doubt he was the asshole here. He’d basically proven what she’d said. He’d rushed the boundaries, taken advantage of those shields being down. It was an unforgivable breach, he was sure. He’d fucked it up at every level, because he’d wanted it too much. He’d stirred the shark-infested waters, but it was his own demons that had made him crash and burn.

So that was clear enough. But was it the finish line? Was their pleasurable interlude a short-term thing, now over, just as she’d predicted from the first?

If she felt that way, he had no doubt she would have made a move toward closure within twenty-four hours. But five days passed, and that didn’t happen. And his feelings toward her didn’t dim in the slightest. If anything, they became even more excruciating.

The simple truth was he wasn’t done with it, and apparently she wasn’t either.

We both feel it’s worth it, because neither of us has backed off yet.

The problem was, he had no course of action. No matter from which angle he considered it, he came up with nothing. It suggested the ball was in her court, and he needed to wait her out. She’d said that as well, hadn’t she?

He was forced to face the fact he had to do something utterly foreign to his nature. Nothing. He had to wait for her.

At the end of that first week, he sent her a text. I’m here, Mistress. I’ll wait. And then he hunkered down into his daily schedule, dedicating his energy to not going out of his fucking mind while he waited.

* * * * *

Janet stood on the nature trail, gazing up through the leaves. She should have worn gloves, because her hands were cold, but if she decided to use the park’s fitness area, she’d get warm. For now she watched the leaves play with one another in pretty patterns above her head, listened to the birds chirping to one another. She kept her mind still. She really was in unfamiliar waters here. It would have made her laugh, but too much was weighing down her heart, churning in her stomach. She wondered if, when Max went into dangerous situations, it was anything like this. Every detail planned, yet if one small piece went awry, all of it could fall apart, such that he had to be ready for any contingency, adapt as the circumstances changed.

He came down the trail at an impressive clip, given that she knew at this point he’d already run five miles that took him through the marsh, by the river. Though he was in that mental workout zone, she was wearing a red fleece pullover and black exercise leggings. The red caught his attention, as planned. His gaze touched on her, probably expecting she was another insanely early jogger taking a break, then he locked on, recognizing her.

She’d only seen him at a distance for four weeks, and not that often. They’d both managed it that way, and she’d been impressed by his understanding of the nature of their détente. I’m here, Mistress. I’ll wait. A pause in their chess game, but possibly not an end to it. Game sounded too frivolous, especially given that the word had launched their argument, but battle was too much the other way.

She watched him slow to a walk. His hair was damp on his neck, and he wore T-shirt and sweats on the body she knew intimately. With his gray eyes fixed on her, the plans she had unraveled. And not just because she couldn’t hold it together in the face of how much she felt, being alone with him again at last.

Initially, she’d been angry with him, with his typical male, overinflated testosterone reaction to her wanting him to back off. But then, as she was able to settle the waters of her past to a deceptive placid surface again, she’d thought a lot more about the scenario, things they’d both said and felt. And she’d known there was some truth to his words, but beyond that, there’d been an elusive and unexpected weight in her chest, a sense of regret and guilt she couldn’t define.

The moment his gaze met hers, she couldn’t have said what it was in his expression that helped her find that meaning, but she did. She finally pinpointed what he’d been seeking from her that night. He hadn’t been able to properly express it either, and, as often happened in an argument when emotions were so raw, things had gotten blown out of proportion, truth lost in anger and hurt.

She’d given him the story, yes, which seemed a huge concession, but if she’d been asked to report it to a police precinct, she would have delivered it the same way. And then she’d asked him to leave. In her world, the men who attracted her were managed, enjoyed, but never truly trusted. While it might have been unreasonable for him to demand that much from her so soon, she realized he hadn’t been looking for all or nothing, just a step in that direction. Something spontaneous, unplanned.

From his expression, she thought he might be pleased to see her, but he was wary as well. Maybe he thought she was going to call an end to it here. Was that what he wanted as well? She quelled the despised insecurity. He hadn’t made that move in four weeks. Why would he want it now?

He stopped, two feet between them, and didn’t say anything. She looked up at him, the rise and fall of his chest as he adjusted to the change in exertion, the dark-blond hair rumpled and spiked. He’d likely rolled out of bed and gone straight into his workout.

“It’s a little early for a woman to be hanging out in the park alone,” he said at last. “Ma’am.”

It was the ma’am that did it. As she let out the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, he gave her a faint smile, though his eyes remained serious.

“I have it on good authority this is where a Navy SEAL does his morning workout,” she managed. “I wasn’t worried.” Reaching out, not sure what she was doing, she curled her fingers into the fabric of his T-shirt. Then she’d latched on with the other hand as well. As she stepped closer, his hand rose, rested on her hip, drawing her in. She pressed her face to his chest, inhaling his scent. In a heartbeat, she was overcome with a sense of well-being so strong she shuddered with it. She’d missed him. Really, really missed him. And she had no words to convey that. Touch seemed inadequate, or at least she thought it might be, but when his other hand cupped her skull, she reconsidered.

“I’m sweaty and nasty,” he said.

“Yeah, you are. I tend to like my men that way.”

He offered a tight chuckle, then his grip around her grew stronger. “You’re not here to end things, are you? Because that would be a shitty way to start my day.”

“Well, I was, but since it doesn’t fit your schedule, I guess I’ll do it another time.” The band in her chest loosened further at that mild comment, which drove away any worry she’d had that he wanted to go that direction. “Max…”

“I’m sorry. Fuck, I’m sorry in so many ways. I pushed too hard, too fast. You got deep inside me, quicker than I expected, and I reacted like a kid having his fucking ice cream cone taken away.”

She shook her head against him. “No. You don’t need to say you’re sorry. You followed your gut, and your gut wasn’t wrong.” She took a deep breath, tilted her face up to meet his eyes. “Sharing that was very difficult for me, but I lock things down when my emotions are involved. I let you in, but I shut you out at the same time.”

“It’s an impressive skill. Very effective. Like being thrown on a bed of railroad spikes and being told you can leave as soon as you can get up.” He sighed, stopping her response to that. “Look, when bad shit happens, and it often does, I’ve learned not to get stuck in that moment; I use it to do better going forward. From what I see of your life, how you live it, you would have made a hell of a SEAL. If you weren’t a girl.”

She made a face at him but then sobered. “I haven’t been a girl in a long time.”

He touched her cheek then, stroking her hair. “The girl in that picture is still there. I know, because sometimes she makes me feel like I’m seventeen again.”

He’d said she’d gotten deep inside him, but he had no idea how words like that could drive him into her soul, far deeper than she’d ever allowed anyone, even when she was naïve and innocent. Of course, the soul tended to lie at the bottom of a well, its depth determined by experiences, loss and regret, things that happened over the course of a lifetime.