Apologies for the delay - you know how it is :) Anyway, thanks to Ariadne and Wattle
Chapter 26
I tiptoe into his office, and he is engrossed in conversation on the phone. He doesn't look too pleased as he tells the faceless caller that he's going to 'check it out with his people'. That must be Roz, or possibly Andrea. I'm sure he'll tell me if he wants me to know. I hope it's nothing to do with me. Sir is an incredible man, confidence and charisma oozes from him. But life is way too complicated at the minute. I don't know what he sees in me, and I cannot be helping with the chaos.
Saying his brusque goodbyes, he hangs up and rolls the blackberry around in his palm. He stares at me and I drop my gaze, watching my stockinged toes curl against the luxurious pile of the carpet. I left my shoes in the room after I was busted by Dr Green for not eating breakfast. It was my blood pressure that drew her attention, a fact she shared with me after Christian left. I'm a literature major, not an expert on physiology. I had no idea about the blood pressure, and if I'm completely honest with myself I am a little embarrassed that I know so little about the human body. I know that I broke the rule about eating breakfast. I had really been trying, but it's not the first thing I think of in the morning. I'm happy with my coffee normally, and more often than not I'm muddling about, trying to get my untidy self dressed and out the door in a half-presentable manner.
I peek up and notice that he has gone from a scowl to a smile. When he sees that I'm looking at him, his expression returns to stern. "Well, Anastasia. Do you have something you want to tell me?" Where do I start? He drums his fingers on the case of his phone.
"Sir, I am sorry." I really am sorry. I'm sorry I didn't try harder, and I'm sorry I got caught out.
"How many mornings have you eaten breakfast since we met?"
Oh fuck. "I, I think I had a bagel one morning." There was at least one advil breakfast too, and possibly a meal consisting of a half eaten pizza crust and mayonnaise.
"You think? Think harder, Anastasia."
"It's just that I'm running about in the mornings, trying to get out on time." My stupid statement is out before I realise it. I feel like handing him the cane and bending over the desk myself
He puts the phone on the desk and swivels in his chair to face me directly. "That is not an excuse. One, you should get up earlier, which dovetails nicely into two; your inability to rouse yourself at an appropriate hour would imply that you are not getting enough sleep."
"I am going to bed by 11.00 , Sir. I just woke up a couple of times in the night this past few nights."
"Now we are getting somewhere. What is causing you to lose sleep?"
"I - I don't know really. I suppose it's just with the new job and things." I hadn't given it any further thought.
He steeples his fingers. Those fingers. Hummm. Those lips. I'd love permission to touch those lips now. "Anastasia, your journal?"
What? "Oh, Yes? My journal?" I bet this means more homework and I'm not happy about this. I will definitely get up fifteen minutes earlier and have a scrambled egg and soldiers if it means I don't have to go through this again.
"Do you want to keep a food diary?" Omigod, I do not!
"No, Sir."
"Should you keep a food diary?" Uhm. What's the right answer here?
"I – I don't want to do that, Sir."
"This is not about what you want, Anastasia." Prowling the short distance to me, he runs his hands the length of my arms, circling my wrists in an easy grip. " Anastasia, I look after that what is mine. That you eat nutritious food and do not go hungry is very important to me."
"Well, Sir, that's why I came to find you here in your study. Mrs Jones has cooked ham and eggs and I wondered if you would like to share some." Taking my hand, he leads me to the breakfast nook.
"I have eaten already and you need the protein. Sit."
I lever myself up onto a stool. There's no sign of Mrs Jones. I go to lift the knife and fork, but he chides me. "Uh huh. If you can't remember to feed yourself, I shall simply have to feed you." He cuts off a small piece of ham and holds it to my lips.
I protest, albeit meekly. "Sir, I can feed myself."
"Obviously you can't. Open." It's an order. I concede and using my lips, I ease the piece of proffered meat from his fingers. I chew slowly at first; the salty, slightly sweet taste of ham is delicious. I didn't realise how hungry I was.
He cuts another piece of ham. "More?"
I nod. "Yes please, Sir."
"I really ought to have you living here with me. Then I could ensure that you eat breakfast every morning." I almost choke on the forkful of fluffy scrambled egg that he has just given to me.
"Are you joking?" I splutter, bits of half chewed egg falling out of my mouth and one falling onto the lapel of his suit, a saliva covered yellow brooch. I'm mortified. "Oh, sorry sir, please forgive me. I didn't mean to do that." I go to get off the stool to get a napkin, but with a hand on my thigh, he stills me.
He delicately pinches the regurgitated morsel and drops it on the table. "I don't joke Anastasia. It's something that we might consider in the future."
WE? We're only a month into this. I'm 21, I'm not ready to live with a man, especially one that is so out of my league at the minute. When I'm around him I feel like a neophyte, and I'm a terrible submissive, but... I want to do this. I need to do this.
"Two bites of ham and a spoonful of semi regurgitated egg is not enough for a grown woman." He arches a brow. "Is it Anastasia?"
"No Sir, it is not." It is embarrassing having him feed me, but I want to make him happy. When I see his smile and feel him relax, I feel content and sated."
"Come, eat some more and then we can go to work. Next time, you will not have the privilege of a chair." I obediently eat the rest of my breakfast; small morsels of deliciousness. It doesn't take ten minutes. I make a mental note to re-set my alarm. I can do this for him.
Christian leaves with Taylor and I leave with Sawyer. On Christian's instructions, I'm not allowed to drive, so Sawyer gets to act as a very highly paid chauffeur. Poor guy. He's probably a former Navy Seal or Army Ranger, and now he gets to babysit me. That's not going to look great on his resume.
"Sawyer?"
He pauses at the open car door. "Yes, Miss Steele."
"Please, call me Ana." He frowns but says nothing. "Can we please go past my house? I left my – journal there."
"Mr Grey said you were to be taken to GEH."
"I know, and I understand that, it's just that I left something in the apartment this morning during the ... incident." I shudder, thinking of it. I'm no worse for wear, but at the time it was really unnerving. "I need my journal to continue some work that Si- I mean Mr Grey has given me to do." We click our seatbelts in, and Sawyer checks that my buckle has engaged. In Sir's absence, I roll my eyes.
He sighs resignedly. "Very well, but if there is any suspicious activity, you are not to leave the car. Do you understand, Miss Steele?" He pulls smoothly out of the Escala car park and into the rainy Seattle day.
"Ana." I smirk. "Thank you so much Mr Sawyer."
"Just Sawyer. Ana." He returns a lopsided grin. Great, it looks like we might understand each other.
As we pull into my street, it's quiet, apart from a couple of pedestrians. There is no evidence of the earlier melee, apart from some scuffled grass, the mud showing between the bruised green blades. Assuring Sawyer, that I'm just going to nip into the house and straight back again, I get out of the car, unassisted. I let myself into the house, which is actually fairly tidy given how stressed we were this morning. I grab my journal from my bedside cabinet. I grin as I look at my laptop which was underneath my journal. It looks so innocuous there. I pick it up too, and putting both items under my arm I leave and lock the door.
I wave an 'all okay' to Sawyer as I come down the steps of the apartment. Just before I reach the car door, I spot a woman wandering down the street. She looks lost. She's wearing an expensive but grubby trenchcoat, her ponytailed hair is brown with blonde roots and she's clutching her purse. On her finger is a rock so big I wonder how the Titanic missed it, and a wedding band. Our eyes meet, and it is the strangest sensation – I never believed in doppelgangers, but this woman looks a lot like me.
We pause, and it seems like she wants to say something, but looks away and scuttles past me, breaking into a run as Sawyer gets out of the car. I look at her retreating form, the belt of her coat dangling behind her.
"Are you ok ... Ana?" Sawyer enquires. He still doesn't feel comfortable addressing me as such.
"Yeah, I'm fine." I frown. "Didn't you think she looked a little like me?"
Sawyer follows my gaze. "She is certainly the same build as you." He squints. "With her hair re-coloured the resemblance would be striking." He looks at his watch and frowns. "We need to be on our way, Ana. If we take any longer, Mr Grey will think that I have allowed you to be kidnapped. I'm required to give a full report, I will have to include this stop."
"Do you think that girl was report-worthy?" I know I want to put something in my own journal about it. I just can't put my finger on it.
"I am not sure, but I will note it." He doesn't spend long before he's all business again. "Now, I think this has been enough of a detour for one day."
"Okay, thank you, Sawyer. I promise I'm going to try and keep you out of trouble!"
We take off down the road, and I see the woman again, she is getting in to a red audi A3, just like mine. It's so strange, apart from the fact that I've never been blonde, that could be me.
Back in the comfort of my little hobbit hole, I look at my unopened journal. I need to write about meeting Sawyer today, and for some reason, that lost looking girl is in my head. Also, something that Sir said to me earlier has been buzzing in my brain. Why haven't I been sleeping? I thought it was just excitement about work, but that has been tempered by the fact that I have been thinking of that creep Hyde. I have definitely slept better knowing I don't have to look at his sweaty face for a week. Opening the journal to the next blank page, I run my finger along the join, creasing the leaves open. The pen just flows over the paper. I never realised how freeing self-reflection could be. I write about how creepy I find Jack, how scared but protected I felt this morning. I write about the strange woman. In another life that could almost be me. And, I manage to fill two pages on how I feel about being a submissive. It's the most liberating yet constricting feeling. When I do something right, even for a minute or two, I love seeing the quiet appreciation on his face. When I do something wrong, I want to learn how to improve. I want to be a better person. Introspection is making me quietly stronger, more confident in myself.
I hear a throat clearing and I look up to see Barney there. He points at my hand, shiny and black with ink as it passed over the pages. "Are you going old school there, Ana?" He pretends to dig in a cupboard. "I'm sure I've seen a quill around her somewhere too, " he teases
"Shut up, you messer!" I grin "It's my homework."
"Better than getting 500 lines I suppose." Barney got lines? "Oh, and I'm not talking about lines lines." He makes a scribbling motion in the air. Does he mean lines with a cane?
"Anyway, that aside, Ana, I hear you had quite an eventful morning."
"You heard?" I dread to think of all those photos. What are my parents going to think? Well, my mother will probably think it's 'awesome', but my poor Dad. The last thing Ray needs or wants is to be the talking point of Monetsano."
He nods. "We heard, We acted, We neutralised." Chuckling, he continues. "Neutralised. I sound like Taylor."
I share his laugh. "Yeah you do. Did you hear I got a bodyguard? Poor guy is going to be bored out of his mind."
"Ana, the Boss wouldn't have assigned a close protection officer to you unless he felt you needed it. We all take care of each other."
We both jump when Christian walks into the office. "Well said, Mr Sullivan."
Barney winks at me. "Chat to you later Ana."
"And I will chat to you sooner than that Barney." Christian's tone is warm but the words are clipped.
"You know I'll be in my cell, Boss!" With another sly wink, that I don't think Christian spotted, he leaves.
"It's nice to see you here now Anastasia." He settles himself on the edge of my desk. "And it pleases me to see you using your journal. Although, I did hear that you made a detour on the way here."
Ratfart. That Sawyer squealed on me. "I needed my journal." I clutch it protectively. "And it was in my apartment. " I pause. "Will I be allowed to go back there again?"
"Of course you will be allowed. Sawyer will be living in the neighbouring condo." He stretches and crosses his legs at the ankle. "But not until after the weekend, and I do have lots of play and activities planned for my property, Anastasia."
"Sir?" Oh please let it be the playroom. Last time it was mind blowing.
"I expect to see you in the playroom." He stands up and just before he leaves the room he looks over his shoulder, "Six o'clock, sharp, Anastasia."
Checking the time, I see it's only 11am. What am I going to do to keep my mind occupied for the rest of the day?