Fifty Shades Darker

He releases my hand, leaving it in place over his heart. I flex my fingers slightly, feeling the warmth of his skin beneath the thin fabric of his shirt. He’s holding his breath. I can’t bear it. I make to move my hand.

“No,” he says quickly and places his hand once more over mine, pressing my fingers against him. “Don’t.”

Emboldened by these two words, I shuffle closer so our knees are touching and tentatively raise my other hand so that he knows exactly what I intend to do. His eyes grow wider but he doesn’t stop me.

Gently I start to undo the buttons on his shirt. It’s tricky with one hand. I flex my fingers beneath his hand and he lets go, allowing me to use both hands to undo his shirt. My eyes don’t leave his as I pull his shirt open, revealing his chest.

He swallows, and his lips part as his breathing increases, and I sense his rising panic, but he doesn’t pull away. Is he still in sub mode? I have no idea.

Should I do this? I don’t want to hurt him, physically or mentally. The sight of him like this, offering himself to me, has been a wake-up call.

I reach up, and my hand hovers over his chest, and I stare at him… asking his permission. Very subtly he tilts his head to one side, steeling himself in anticipation of my touch, and the tension radiates from him, but this time it’s not in anger-it’s in fear.

I hesitate. Can I really do this to him?

“Yes,” he breathes-again with the weird ability to answer my unspoken questions.

I extend my fingertips into his chest hair and lightly brush them down his sternum. He closes his eyes, and his face creases as if he’s experiencing intolerable pain. It’s unbearable to witness, so I lift my fingers immediately, but he quickly grabs my hand and replaces it firmly, flat on his bare chest so that the hair tickles my palm.

“No,” he says, his voice strained. “I need to.”

His eyes are screwed up so tightly. This must be agony. It’s truly tormenting to watch. Carefully I let my fingers stroke across his chest to his heart, marveling at the feel of him, terrified that this is a step too far.

He opens his eyes, and they are gray fire, blazing at me.

Holy cow. His look is blistering, feral, beyond intense, and his breathing is rapid. It stirs my blood. I squirm under his gaze.

He hasn’t stopped me, so I run my fingertips across his chest again, and his mouth goes slack. He’s panting, and I don’t know if it’s from fear, or something else.

I’ve wanted to kiss him there for so long that I lean up on my knees and hold his gaze for a moment, making my intention perfectly clear. Then I bend and gently plant a soft kiss above his heart, feeling his warm, sweet- smelling skin beneath my lips.

His strangled groan moves me so much that I sit back on my heels, fearful of what I’ll see on his face. His eyes are screwed tightly shut, but he hasn’t moved.

“Again,” he whispers, and I lean into his chest once more, this time to kiss one of his scars. He gasps, and I kiss another and another. He groans loudly, and suddenly his arms are around me, and his hand is in my hair, pulling my head up painfully so that my lips meet his insistent mouth. And we’re kissing, my fingers knotting into his hair.

“Oh, Ana,” he breathes, and he twists and pulls me down on to the floor so that I am underneath him. I bring my hands up to cup his beautiful face, and in that moment, I feel his tears.

He’s crying… no. No!

“Christian, please, don’t cry. I meant it when I said I’d never leave you. I did. If I gave you any other impression, I’m so sorry… please, please forgive me. I love you. I will always love you.”

He looms over me, gazing down into my face, and his expression is so pained.

“What is it?”

His eyes grow larger.

“What is this secret that makes you think I’ll run for the hills? That makes you so determined to believe I’ll go?” I plead, my voice tremulous. “Tell me, Christian, please…”

He sits up, though this time he crosses his legs and I follow suit, my legs outstretched. Vaguely I wonder if we can get off the floor? But I don’t want to interrupt his train of thought. He’s finally going to confide in me.

He gazes down at me, and he looks utterly desolate. Oh shit-it’s bad.

“Ana…” He pauses, searching for the words, his expression pained… Oh? Where the hell is this going?

He takes a deep breath and swallows. “I’m a sadist, Ana. I like to whip little brown-haired girls like you because you all look like the crack whore-my birth mother. I’m sure you can guess why.” He says it in a rush as if he’s had the sentence in his head for days and days and is desperate to be rid of it.

My world stops. Oh no.

This is not what I expected. This is bad. Really bad. I gaze at him, trying to understand the implication of what he’s just said. It does explain why we all look the same.

My immediate thought is that Leila was right-“Master is dark.”

I recall the first conversation I had with him about his tendencies when we were in the Red Room of Pain.

“You said you weren’t a sadist,” I whisper, desperately trying to understand… make some excuse for him.

“No, I said I was a Dominant. If I lied to you, it was a lie of omission. I’m sorry.” He looks briefly down at his manicured fingernails.

I think he’s mortified. Mortified about lying to me? Or about what he is?

“When you asked me that question, I had envisioned a very different relationship between us,” he murmurs. I can tell by his gaze that he’s terrified.

Then it hits me like a wrecking ball. If he’s a sadist, he reallyneedsall that whipping and caning shit. Oh fuck. I put my head in my hands.

“So it’s true,” I whisper, glancing up at him. “I can’t give you what you need.” This is it-this really does mean we are incompatible.

The world starts falling away at my feet, collapsing around me as panic grips my throat. This is it. We can’t do this.

He frowns. “No, No, No. Ana. No. You can. You do give me what I need.” He clenches his fists. “Please believe me,” he murmurs, his words an impassioned plea.

“I don’t know what to believe, Christian. This is so fucked-up,” I whisper, my throat hoarse and aching as it closes in, choking me with unshed tears.

His eyes are wide and luminous when he looks at me again.

“Ana, believe me. After I punished you and you left me, my worldview changed. I wasn’t joking when I said I would avoid ever feeling like that again.” He gazes at me with pained entreaty. “When you said you loved me, it was a revelation. No one’s ever said it to me before, and it was as if I’d laid something to rest-or maybe you’d laid it to rest, I don’t know. Dr. Flynn and I are still in deep discussion about it.”

Oh. Hope flares briefly in my heart. Perhaps we’ll be okay. I want us to be okay. Don’t I? “What does that all mean?” I whisper.

“It means I don’t need it. Not now.”

What? “How do you know? How can you be so sure?”

“I just know. The thought of hurting you… in any real way… it’s abhorrent to me.”

“I don’t understand. What about rulers and spanking and all that kinky fuckery?”

He runs a hand through his hair and almost smiles but instead sighs ruefully. “I’m talking about the heavy shit, Anastasia. You should see what I can do with a cane or a cat.”

My mouth drops open, stunned. “I’d rather not.”

“I know. If you wanted to do that, then fine… but you don’t and I get it. I can’t do all that shit with you if you don’t want to. I told you once before, you have all the power. And now, since you came back, I don’t feel that compulsion, at all.”

I gape at him for a moment trying to take this all in. “When we met, that’s what you wanted, though?”

“Yes, undoubtedly.”

“How can your compulsion just go, Christian? Like I’m some kind of panacea, and you’re-for want of a better word-cured? I don’t get it.”

He sighs once more. “I wouldn’t say cured… You don’t believe me?”

“I just find it-unbelievable. Which is different.”

“If you’d never left me, then I probably wouldn’t feel this way. You walking out on me was the best thing you