She found herself drumming her feet on the mattress within an embarrassingly few swats, begging for him to stop – to no avail, of course. “I don’t think so, Beth. It’s not at all too early in this relationship for you to learn that I mean what I say. When I ask you to do something, I expect you to do it as quickly as possible, and without any backtalk or mumbling under your breath about having to do it. Do you understand?” She couldn’t get past the “in this relationship” part of his little speech to concentrate on the rest of it, and she said as much before she could stifle it, parroting the phrase back to him. Vidar was surprised at her questioning tone, and was horrified to realize that she might think that this was some sort of fluke for him, or worse, a one night stand. He had hoped that confessing his love for her would have conveyed that, but apparently not. “Yes, a relationship. Surely you didn’t think that I was going to make love to you, and then add a notch on my belt as I drove out of town! Do you really think of me as being that heartless?”
