Domme By Default

Chapter 1 Her

What can I say about our marriage? It was the second try for both of us. We each had a child with our exes, and while he was over a decade older than me it wasn't an issue.

He was my guardian angel, I was his prom queen.

I felt rescued in many ways after a decade of an emotionally abusive marriage. He felt loved and desired after a decade and a half of a frigid ice queen who blamed him for everything from her PMS to global warming.

When we'd first met on the downside of our divorces, we'd spent hours IMing back and forth some nights as we worked.

And I'll never forget how tickled I was.

I feel like the prom queen likes me! he'd said one night.

No one had ever talked to me like that before, made me feel like that.

Cherished. Loved.

When we finally got together and moved in, the sex was phenomenal as far as I was concerned. I'd had a few decent partners before my ex—who was crappy in that department.

My new husband had a total of three partners—including me—and had never had a blow job before I gave him one.

He'd also never gone down on a woman.

I had a lot of fun teaching him that. He proved to be a natural and eager student.

The kids fledged and we were on our own and I felt everything was great. We never fought. We could disagree and go to bed and kiss each other good night. Perfectly matched temperaments. Mine on the heated side, his a little cooler. A great give and take that worked well for us.

Open and honest, as our individual emotional scars from our previous woundings healed we found an easy middle ground we called our own and enjoyed our time there.

I never felt anything lacking, except that I wished he'd be a little more...

Dominant.

I trusted my husband in a way I never trusted my ex. Or any other man, for that matter. I wanted to give him that control over me. I wanted to submit to him. Now that I knew I could fully trust someone in that way, I craved it. While we'd play on occasion, he never took what was freely offered.

Over the years we opened up somewhat in the bedroom, the dynamic slipping back and forth in play. I resigned myself to the fact that while our marriage wasn't textbook material, it worked for us and I wouldn't trade him for anything. So what if our traditional roles were anything but?

I called my dad one afternoon, my cell phone wedged between my shoulder and cheek, as I studied the wires in the ceiling fan I was changing out.

"Why isn't your husband doing this?" he snarked.

I bit back a less than daughterly reply. "Because he's at work. I'm perfectly capable of doing this, Dad."

I got the impression my father looked down his nose at my husband for some things. Not that he didn't like my husband, because my parents adored him, especially after I spent years with a real jerk.

But he always seemed to think my husband should do it all.

"You can't wait to do this until he gets home?"

I didn't want to admit my husband was clueless about home electrical systems. I would sooner lick a porcupine than let my husband touch wiring. "Dad, please, just answer my question."

His tone turned gruff. "Listen to me, young lady—"

Only my parents could get away with calling a nearly forty year-old woman that. "Dad, you are the one who taught me how to change my own oil and tires, right? Why the heck can't you help me do this, too? My husband works very hard at a good job that pays pretty damn well and allows me to work from home and do what I love. I'd think you'd be happy for me."

Low blow, and I knew it, but it worked. I could almost hear him backtracking.

He sighed the big, put-upon I know she's right but I'm still her father sigh. "How many wires did you say you have?"

I finished an hour later. I turned on the breaker for the living room circuit and watched as my new ceiling fan lazily spun to life.

When my husband returned home later that evening, he wrapped his arms around my waist and kissed the back of my neck. "It looks great, sweetheart. Why didn't you wait for me?

I would have helped you."

I shrugged as I leaned against him, feeling calm and settled with him home. "No big deal. I don't mind." That was the irony. I didn't mind, per se. It was nice knowing I wasn't one of those weakling, wussie women who couldn't even use a pair of jumper cables properly. I felt a little pride—okay, a lot of pride—that I had done it by myself. Well, with my Dad's advice, but mostly by myself.

No matter what kind of pretzel I'd contorted myself into, my ex had rarely paid me complements about my accomplishments. Usually he found fault and picked my doings apart, all under the guise of constructive criticism.

Not my husband.

He kissed the top of my head. "You're so good at this stuff.

I'm so proud of you."

I hugged his arms tighter around me, wrapping me in a cocoon of strength and security. No, I wouldn't trade a thousand handymen for my husband. Not on your life.

Men are no more born with a fix-it chromosome than women are born with a shopping gene. My husband and I were two living proof examples of that. How perfect that we'd found each other.

And yet ... there were still traditional roles that we filled.

When he had to have his gall bladder out I sat alone in the waiting room, near panic, feeling stupid that I was crying and looking like a moron. One of the hospital chaplains saw me and must have thought my husband was dying until I admitted he was only in for a routine gall bladder removal.

Hell, he was supposed to go home with me that afternoon as long as there were no complications.

by Tymber Dalton

I'll never forget how the chaplain sat back and looked at me like I'd grown a third eyeball.

He's my angel, my husband is. How do you explain to someone? Who cares if I can rebuild a car engine, the thought of ever losing my husband terrifies the crap out of me. When he leaves the house every day, a piece of me leaves with him, worry always in the back of my mind until I see his sweet face walk through the door again that night.

I had never felt more relief than I did when the nurse called me back to recovery and I could hold his hand and reassure myself that he was okay.

He came back to me.

He always came back to me.

Thank God!

Later that night, after I'd got him settled in our bed and his pain medicine had taken him securely off to dreamland, I curled next to him with my ear pressed against his chest and listened to his strong and steady heartbeat.

I needed him. I'd spent so many years in a mental and emotional wasteland before him that to lose him, I knew, would be a pain I could never bear. I would do anything for him. With the exception of my child, I'd never loved anyone as much as I loved my husband.

He always made me feel safe and secure. Cherished.

Loved. I knew he would die for me to protect me if ever put into the position.

I couldn't say the same about my ex, that's for damn sure.

So what if he couldn't remember which was the master cylinder and which was the power steering pump when checking the fluids? Who the fuck cared?

He loved me.

And I loved him.