Free Unrestrained by Joey W. Hill Page B

surrender. He had a need for it like a beer at the end of a hard workday. A more intense ritual than that, but still related.” She offered a faint smile, and his lips curved in answer. “But he always understood I did this because he asked me to do it. Not because I had a driving desire to be a Mistress. I enjoyed the pleasure he took in my efforts, that others took in watching.”
    “Because that’s what a true service sub does,” Dale responded. “She takes pleasure in pleasing others. Her Master, all those in her life. A Master takes pleasure in holding power, a sub in surrendering to it. The way she surrenders may be mistaken for the flip side of the coin because of what you just described. You weren’t a Domme to him. You were a Domme for him.”
    He was so straightforward, stating ideas she struggled to articulate because she couldn’t see their shape from outside herself. She nodded, quietly amazed by the relief of claiming it as truth.
    He leaned forward. “Put your hand on the table. Spread your fingers apart.”
    Curious, she did. He began to trace the outline of her hand with his forefinger. Because of the spread of her fingers and the size of his, he made contact with her skin, a light tease as he followed outside to inside, outside to inside. Then he stopped, his forefinger resting on top of one of her nails, a subtle gesture indicating she should leave the hand where it was. All her nerves were tingling, from that point of contact all the way up the inside of her arm.
    “You have a pretty substantial Internet biography,” he said casually. “You raised over a million dollars for Louisiana charities last year. Matched that from your own holdings. And you run the board of Summers Industries.” He glanced around the grounds. “From what I saw of your staff, you also run an efficient household. You take care of your people. They look happy to have you as an employer, and they’re protective. They all gave me the once-over, like if they were required to ID me to the police, they’d be ready. And willing. If they didn’t take me out first.”
    It was an unexpected change of topic, but he left his fingertip on hers, holding her in that magnetic field he was projecting. She had to clear her throat first to respond.
    “Lynn, my head housekeeper and cook, has been with us for more than ten years. Same with Hector, my groundskeeper. Lynn’s assistant, Beth, has been here for five years, and most of the men who work with Hector are long-term employees or his family members. We’ve been through a lot of holidays, birthdays, family crises. It’s perhaps made us a little more closely knit than most employer-employee relationships.”
    Lynn had helped her prepare Roy’s body before the funeral home came to pick him up. She’d told the hospice nurse she’d do it, but she needed help to move him. Lynn had volunteered, but Roy was such a big man, the housekeeper called her son, Delray, who was also part of Hector’s maintenance crew. They did it together, the three of them, putting Roy in one of his golf outfits, khaki slacks and a butter yellow placket shirt. On the left chest, there was an embroidered logo from one of his favored golf courses, an alligator with a golf ball sitting on his nose while a golfer put his foot on his snout to take a swing. It had always made her smile, the crocodile’s aggravated expression, the golfer’s intent concentration.
    After she’d tied his loafers, she sat down in a chair. Delray sat on one side of her, Lynn the other, and then they held hands and cried together for a little bit.
    “Are you ready for this, Athena?” Dale spoke in a low voice. Not interrupting her memories as much as stepping into the room and taking her hand. Prepared to lead her out of it, back to the present. “Or are you still grieving?”
    “I don’t think you ever stop grieving someone you loved for so many years,” she said. “You learn how to make his memories part of your life, how