"Yeah, but you often do actually answer when I ask you to elaborate. I figured if it was that you didn't want me to have it you wouldn't."

"But then you keep asking questions I've already answered, over and over, they're the same questions."

"Yeah, usually hoping context change or phrasing will shed light into something I don't understand. You're singularly opaque to me."

"Maybe you're just bad at asking questions."

He grins. "Maybe I am."

"Anyway. I might go back to Brian's house."

"I find this a splendid idea."

Nod.

"Tell me when you decide? ...if you want, of course."

"...why do you want to know in advance?"

"No reason, bad phrasing, I meant mostly when you actually do it. If you do."

"Okay."

"Okay! Good luck!"

This will work and Jackson will have a nice dom and be happy. Yes, and Sadde will win the lottery—which he of course does not play—tomorrow.

It is an uneventful several days and then Jackson shows up to breakfast one morning without his collar on.

...whoa. "May I go have breakfast with Jackson today, ma'am?" she asks Isabella.

Kiss. "You may."

Kiss! Detach leash! "I love you." And she walks up to him after he has grabbed his breakfast.

"Hi."

"Good morning," she says with a raised eyebrow.

"So, uh, yeah."

"Do you wanna tell me how that went?"

"Um. Brian's sister knows how to pick locks."

"So Brian was in fact hitting on you, was he."

"...probably."

She bites her tongue on a request for elaboration—he was pretty clear on his thoughts about how much information he wanted to share.

"Well, I'm happy for you. What about Mason?"