Nobody's Perfect

by Kallypso Masters

  "Do you know if you're having a boy or girl?"

  Karla shook her head. "We want to be surprised. Neither of us is much into traditional baby colors, so that won't make a difference as far as clothes or the nursery. Don't you just love that room you're staying in? I think the colors are so relaxing. It was a wonderfully healing place when I came here after…" Karla looked down at the teacup in her lap. "…after my brother was killed."

  "Oh, Karla, I'm so sorry!" Savi hadn't heard that she'd lost her brother.

  Karla took a sip, then held the shaking cup in her lap. Her protruding belly pressed against the teacup's rim. "It's still hard to think about him being gone forever."

  "I can't imagine."

  But she could, in a way. While Savi didn't have any siblings, her Maman had walked out of her life, never to return. Only Maman had left intentionally. The details of that night nineteen years ago were sketchy, at best. She and Maman had spent a perfect day at their beach cave, the same one Damián had taken her to, ironically. Savannah remembered their picnic and watching the sun set before Maman took her back to the house.

  The next day, Maman was gone. Her life had never been the same.

  Time to change the subject from loss to life. "How far along are you?"

  "I'm due the 25th of July. Seems like an eternity."

  Savi laughed. "You'd better pace yourself. You do have a ways to go."

  Karla bit her lowered lip, then focused on Savi's face. "Adam says we can't have sex anymore until the doctor gives the all-clear after the baby is born."

  Savi didn't know anything about sex during pregnancy, but had only heard of it being a problem for someone on bedrest. "Are you having difficulty with your pregnancy?"

  "Far from it. Everything's going perfectly." She smiled and rubbed her belly and smiled enigmatically for a moment. "We couldn't have asked for more, but he blames himself for somehow causing his son to be stillborn because he likes it a little rough." Karla blushed and grinned. "Sorry. Too much information. But no amount of logic and scientific evidence will get through that stubborn man's head."

  Oh dear lord, Savi did not want to continue this conversation, either. So out of her league.

  Karla grew serious. "But I'm not going to wait that long." She grinned. "I have a plan to batter down his defenses yet again. I'll drive him crazy, until he reaches his monumentally high breaking point. Then, I'll bring that man to his knees, he'll want me so badly."

  The sheer determination in her voice made Savi worry for Adam. He didn't stand a chance.

  "Sex wasn't an issue I had to worry about during my pregnancy." Thank God. If Savi had been with Damián or any man during her pregnancy, she probably would have welcomed a reprieve from having to have sex. As she'd grown stronger away from Father, she'd wanted to close off that part of her nature forever.

  Karla's eyes opened wide. "Oh, no, I'm the one who's sorry! I totally wasn't thinking. All of my brain cells must be going straight to the baby lately."

  Karla must have thought she'd wanted Damián in her life back then. "No, don't apologize. It is what it is—and everything worked out just fine." Until Lyle and her father found her and Mari.

  "You're stronger than I am, Savi. I don't think I could have faced becoming a mother without Adam by my side, even if I do want to wring his neck at least once a day." She smiled and placed her hand over the baby cocooned in her belly. "The man can't communicate worth a darn, but at other times, well, let's just say I'll always know where I stand with him. He shoots from the hip, just like the ancestor he keeps telling me stories about. That's him on the far right in those photos on the dresser."

  Savi looked over at a line of framed portraits of six men in uniform. The one Karla referred to looked like a 19th-century photo—probably Civil War era or soon after. The man inside the picture looked young and handsome in his uniform. "Adam's mom gave him those photos for Christmas. They're duplicates of the ones she has of his relatives who served in the Marines."

  Savi's eyes stung. Karla's baby would have a whole ancestry and lots of love from both sides of the family. Savi hadn't been able to share the details of Mari's heritage with her daughter. Not only had she known nothing about Damián's background, but her own family's mementos were lost to her, too. Of course, Savi could care less about her father's side, but being able to share Maman's French heritage would have been…

  Karla's hand squeezed Savi's. "You okay?"

  Savi forced a smile to her lips and raised her hand to rub her eye. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just got something in my eye."

  "Listen, why don't you come down to the club tonight?"

  The abrupt change of topic caught her off guard. "No, I don't think…"

  "It's pretty laid-back on Wednesdays—more social than anything. You'll meet a lot of great people. We run a really nice club. You can have a couple drinks, listen to my show, meet some of Damián's friends."

  "No, I need to stay with Mari."

  "Grant and I can take turns watching her. Adam only lets me do two sets a night now when the club's open, so I'll just start the first one later on when things start hopping. One of the other members can tend bar for Grant tonight."

  "No, I don't want anyone to go to any troub…"

  "No trouble at all! If I'd known Marc would be on another overnight expedition, I'd have asked Adam to bring Angie back to the club." Karla rolled her eyes. "Adam's fit to be tied that Marc's let Angie move back to Aspen Corners. They're so perfect for each other. Wish I knew what happened, but neither of them is talking." Karla glanced down at her cup, lost in thought, then she gave herself a mental shake, then looked up and smiled. "Sorry. Anyway, Grammy Karla would love to spend some time with Marisol—and Auntie Grant would, too. We love that little girl like crazy. And I'd love for you to see our club."

  Savi decided to put an end to this notion immediately. "Thanks for the offer, but I'm really not interested in…that kind of thing."

  Karla leaned toward her. "If you're like me, you probably have a lot of preconceived notions about this BDSM stuff. Believe me, most of my notions were far from reality. If you met most of our members at their jobs or on the street, you'd never guess what they do in private."

  Damián had said the same thing.

  "And if you stay in the great room, there really isn't anything too kinky that goes on there—not most of the time, anyway. We don't have any demos planned for tonight, either, as far as I know."

  "Really, Karla. I appreciate the invite, but I'd feel too uncomfortable there."

  "Uncomfortable where?"

  Savi turned to watch Adam walk in and suddenly the walls of the room closed in on her. The man's size and presence seemed to suck all the energy from the room.

  "Adam! I didn't expect you back so soon." Karla stood and walked over to him, giving him a hug.

  She turned her face toward him, clearly wanting a kiss on the lips, but he kissed her on the cheek instead. Karla didn't hide her disappointment.

  Adam smiled and patted her growing belly. "Turned out everything's okay."

  Karla's face and body relaxed visibly, but Adam didn't elaborate about what or whom he'd been checking on.

  "Adam, I was just trying to talk Savi into coming to the club tonight."

  "Excellent idea. What's the problem?"

  "She won't say yes."

  Savi wished they'd quit talking about her as if she weren't here—and that they'd quit trying to get her to go to their damned club. The last place she was going to be found in was a sex club.

  Adam turned to her, his expression stern, as usual. "What are you afraid of?"

  Savi pulled herself up in the chair. "I'm not afraid of anything." He grinned and might as well have called her a liar. When he smiled, his entire face changed. He should do that more often. Of course, he usually smiled for Karla, and sometimes Damián.

  "I need to stay with Mari."

  "I told her Grant and I could alternate babysitting for a couple hours."

  "Problem s
olved. I don't expect a big crowd tonight, just the regulars."

  How could she get out of this? "I don't have any…of those kinds of clothes."

  She thought she saw a twinkle of laughter in his eyes. "What kinds of clothes would that be, hon?"

  Her face flushed. "I don't know. High heels, latex, fetishwear."

  He grinned. "Why don't you just wear a pretty blouse and a pair of jeans?" He looked down at her athletic shoes. "The shoes you have on now are perfect. Bare feet are fine, too. Everyone chooses their own style of dress and comfort. You'll fit right in."

  Really?

  "But I don't know how to act…kinky."

  Adam laughed heartily now. She was glad her discomfort provided him so much entertainment. "Hon, you leave kinky to the rest of us. Just be yourself."

  Why was it so hard to argue with the man? Because he wouldn't take "no" for an answer. Like Damián. She shivered.

  Adam kissed Karla on the cheek again. "I have some paperwork to draw up."

  Good. Maybe he would leave this ridiculous idea alone. Then he turned to Savi. "Come down to my office when you finish here and we can go over the guest contract. No one gets into the club without reading and signing it."

  But I don't want in your damned club!

  Without waiting for her response, he turned and left the bedroom. Damián had mentioned a contract. What would she have to agree to do—or not to do? And why did her curiosity about this part of Damián's life pull at her so strongly?

  * * *

  Savi had no clue why she was doing this, but she signed her name and pushed the contract across Adam's desk again. She pulled her hands into her lap and clasped them to control the shaking. What had she done?

  Adam pored over the two pages of the contract and nodded. He set it aside and looked at her. "Damián has talked with me about the security concerns for you and Marisol."

  Savi had been so focused on the club's contract and what might happen tonight that she hadn't prepared herself for this line of conversation. She wondered how much he knew. "Did he tell you who we're running from?"

  "I'd rather hear that from you."

  Savi swallowed, then took a deep breath. "My father's business partner found me in December. He's the one who beat me. He was supposed to take me back to…" She shuddered. "Father thinks he owns me. He won't stop until he finds me, but I'm more afraid of what he'd do to Mari."

  Adam's mouth drew tighter. She had to remind herself that his anger wasn't aimed at her, but still she retreated against the back of the seat, wanting to place a little more distance between them.

  "I just want you to know I have you covered, just as Damián did. Nothing is going to happen to either of you under my watch."

  Savi looked down at her hands and saw that she was picking at the skin around her fingernail. She clasped one hand over the other to hide what she'd been doing. She needed to stop that nervous habit. She looked up at Adam, wondering why she'd confided in him. Something told her he could be trusted to keep a confidence. The contract she'd just signed talked about the importance of confidentiality. Would he honor that outside the club, as well? Wasn't that in the contract she'd just sign, an agreement not to "out" anyone she might meet in the club if she knew or saw them outside this world?

  But, more likely, it was Adam's eyes that had instilled that level of trust.

  She took a deep breath. "My father is an abusive, controlling man."

  "We can't choose our parents. Lord knows I'd have chosen a different father if I'd been given the chance."

  Savi relaxed a bit. Perhaps he understood. "I escaped from his house when I was nineteen, soon after I met Damián. But how do I put him behind me and move on?" She thought she'd done that, but all of the flashbacks and memories that had come flooding back recently told her she'd only hidden that pain away. She hadn't dealt with it, not at all.

  "I'm not the best example of someone putting bad memories behind them, hon. I basically blocked out my own past, until recently. Now I'm trying to come to terms with where I came from."

  "I can relate to blocking things out. The memories keep bubbling up when I least expect them. I don't know how to process them."

  "As I'm sure you know in your line of work, our brain is a pretty amazing thing. When it senses we're ready to deal with things, it gives us the flash of memory or reveals some part of our life we couldn't handle mentally or emotionally before. In my case, I think my subconscious knew I had Karla there to help me deal with the past. Maybe your mind is trying to tell you Damián can be there for you, making it safe to reveal those things to you now."

  The flashbacks had started after she'd returned to Damián. Did he have that kind of effect on her? Did her subconscious mind trust him, even though her body and conscious mind still couldn't?

  "But more important than the past is where you go in your life from here, the choices you do make about your present and future.

  Savi's eyes burned at his words, but she blinked away the discomfort. "I've made lots of mistakes…"

  "We all do, especially when we aren't taught any better or we're fighting for survival. If we have sins to atone for, and I've certainly had my share, then we do that. We try to make life better than the way we found it for those we love and those who need us. From what I can tell, you've done that in spades. You've raised a daughter who is smart, respectful, and who loves you, and now her daddy, very much." He smiled. "Seeing them together does this beat-up old heart a lot of good. Don't you apologize about what you've done. You're a survivor and you've raised a strong daughter who will be even better equipped than you were to face whatever life throws her way."

  Savi squirmed in her seat, not comfortable with his words of praise. "I had lots of help in those early days from a friend and the priest at a local church. Otherwise, I'd have been clueless and would have messed up every…"

  He leaned forward. "You were smart enough to seek help. That's not the easiest thing for a lot of us survivors to do. We sometimes think we have to do it all ourselves, all the time. Believe me, I know." He sat back in his chair.

  Why did he keep trying to convince her she was so good? That she'd done the right things? Why didn't he see what she really was? She cast her gaze into her lap. I'm not good enough for your son.

  "Define good enough."

  Oh dear lord. Savi looked up at him again. Had she spoken the words out loud? Her face grew hot. She'd rather that the floor would open up and swallow her than to have to respond to Adam's directive. She looked down at her hands and saw blood pooling at the base of her middle fingernail. She'd picked the skin until it bled. Embarrassed, wanting to hide the evidence of her distress before he noticed, she fisted her hand.

  "Let's just say I'm not the wholesome person you and Damián think I am."

  "Somehow I doubt you're as bad as all that. But Damián's no saint, either. This doesn't mean you can't commit to a relationship with each other that'll bring out the best in both of you."

  Savi shook her head. "There can never be anything more. I'd only hurt him."

  "Maybe if the two of you would stop hurting yourselves," he glanced at her hands then back at her, "you'd see you're perfect for each other."

  Savi squeezed her hands even tighter, embarrassed that he'd noticed she was mutilating herself. But what was he saying about Damián hurting himself, too? She'd seen no evidence of that.

  "Would you trust Damián enough to let him help you redirect some of the negative messages that are messing with your head?"

  Savi shook her head. "No. I don't think I could trust anyone that much. I'm sorry."

  "Hon, you don't have anything to apologize for. But if you're still worried Damián might do something to hurt you, well, you can put those thoughts to rest. He's one of the most controlled Doms here at the club. He never takes a sub further than she's ready and willing to go. He never scenes in anger. I've gotten no complaints from anyone, and the Dungeon Monitors have never—"

  Savi looked up. "Dungeon Mon
itors? Damián told me there were monitors, but he didn't say anything about a dungeon."

  Adam grinned. "You don't have to worry about the dungeon, little one. Most members never venture down there, and those who do go with full knowledge of what they'll be doing and seeing. There's actually a waiting list for that area of the club most nights. But Damián wouldn't take you there unless you were ready—and, believe me, you aren't. In the broader kink community, some people refer to entire clubs as a dungeon, though. Dungeon Monitors is just the term the community came up with for those members who have been trained to monitor scenes at clubs to make sure everything is safe, sane, and consensual."

  Savi grinned. "This world needs a glossary or cheat sheet for newbies to be able to make sense of it all."

  Adam laughed out loud. "I have some books in my room, if you're interested in exploring it further. But you'll learn more by just going to the club tonight, talking with others, and observing what goes on in some of the play scenes and interactions."

  "Will Damián be there?"

  "Might be."

  Oh, lord. Could she face him again after what had happened last week in his apartment?

  Adam leaned forward. "If it helps, Damián also knows I'll kick his ass if he ever did anything to hurt you or anyone else. I have a responsibility, especially to the subs in this club."

  Subs? But she wasn't a sub.

  "Hon, you have my word that no harm will come to you here."

  Savi glanced at the contract she'd just signed. She had no idea what tonight would bring, but curiosity got the better of her. Adam and Damián weren't monsters. They didn't seem to let their emotions and…male appetites…rule them. There were also Dungeon Monitors to keep an eye on things. What did she have to worry about?

  Chapter Ten

  Damián thanked Grant and carried the drinks back to the table where Savi waited for him. He had no clue what Adam had said to get her in here, but he wasn't about to complain. He knew from his experience with some of the other abused subs in the club that parts of this lifestyle could help her deal with some of her past trauma and abuse, but he didn't want to be the one to inflict that pain on her. Yet, there wasn't anyone here who could give her what she'd probably respond best to. The thought of watching any other Dom work with her just twisted his gut.