It’s a deal!

“Alright fine, I’ll agree with that” she replied with a smile, holding out her hand for you to shake on it which you gladly accepted as well.

The both of you thought you were getting the better end of the deal and now it was up to you to try and nudge the odds a bit further into your favour when you went to see Mom. Enough time had probably passed by now that Grace was unlikely to still be downstairs so with your deal now concluded, it seemed as good a time as any to get up and go and check.

“Oh and although I’m not officially adding this to the deal, I hope that if I win, you’ll be more open to letting stuff go on around the house. I already have to be wary of Lucy so if all goes well I’d appreciate you trying to see this as the new normal” you added, stopping before you reached the door to her room.

“I can try but that’s only if you actually manage to win. You better get ready for whatever I have planned as well” Sarah said with a smirk, still thinking she had a chance of winning.

“If you make the new rule good for the both of us then I’m not gonna say no if you lose just to spite you. I’m trying to make this place my ideal fantasy but that doesn’t mean I’m willing to make concessions. But if you do think of something I wouldn’t like… at least don’t make it easy for Lucy to exploit” you added, the smirk not vanishing from Sarah’s face.

Well you’ll just have to wait and see” she replied, not giving you any chance to ask any further about what she might have in mind.

You were 99% certain that Mom would already be on board with your idea but keeping at least one sister on your good side would hopefully net you something positive. Or at least less negative in this case. Lucy seemed to be the one you needed to look out for the most at the moment and although you didn’t mean to piss her off as much as you did, she always seemed to know how to get on your nerves just the right amount where you felt the need to retaliate.

Anyway, for now you put Lucy out of your mind and said goodnight to Sarah before heading out of her room and into the hallway. You closed her door behind you before she could get the chance to complain and saw that the hallway was as empty as you left it.

You kept your footsteps light as you headed towards the top of the stairs once again but the sounds of the previous conversation could no longer be heard. Mom’s door was shut tight and you couldn’t see any light leaking from under the door so you hoped she would still be awake and was just still downstairs. Checking the time on your phone also showed that it was still too early for her to be asleep, with it only being a few minutes past nine and Mom usually staying up later than that by at least another hour.

Slowly making your way downstairs, you cautiously made sure that nobody else could possibly be down here other than Mom before finding her in the living room reading. She lowered the book when she saw you enter the room and you sat down on the sofa next to her after a quick greeting, letting her finish whatever book she was reading. You couldn’t really tell based on the cover but the title suggested it was of the romance genre, a topic Mom wouldn’t usually read on her own accord. She looked to be only a few chapters in so it was probably the case that it was something she had picked up recently or it was something she had had in the backlog for a while she was now just getting around to trying.

It didn’t take long for her to finish whatever chapter she was reading or maybe she just got to a good endpoint as she added her bookmark to her page and set it down, giving you a smile knowing you had waited for her to finish.

“Any good?” you asked, gesturing over to the book she had just put down.

“Well… It’s something Grace gave me a while ago that I never ended up picking up. I thought I’d give it another go and it’s growing on me” she replied, making your guess about it being in the backlog correct.

“How was Grace anyway? Stressed out with work or did she look okay?” you questioned, hoping to find out if she was acting any different after the photos she had sent.

“She seemed a little flushed. I told her to get some rest but she kept insisting she was fine” Mom replied, looking a little annoyed that Grace was ignoring her advice before she continued.

“I swear she spends all this time exercising and getting healthy, and then just ignores her body whenever it comes to work. You should have come down and seen her. Why didn’t you by the way? Emma managed to dart off pretty quickly but you should have at least seen her out” Mom asked back.

“Ah, Emma told me and Sarah to stay upstairs, she didn’t want us to make a massive fuss sending her off so we just said our goodbyes while we were upstairs” you answered, getting a nod from Mom as she saw that you hadn’t just completely ignored your girlfriend.

Thinking back you probably should have walked her home if she was to head out before Grace but you still felt your earlier hesitance was justified and you were pretty sure that Emma understood that. Still, you didn’t want Mom to push the topic any further in case she started asking about what you were doing upstairs so you circled back to Grace while you had the chance.

“By the way, with you saying Grace has been stressed at work, have you reconsidered joining so you can keep a closer eye on her? I know I’ll be working there now so you can come along with me on the days of my shifts?” you asked her, seeing her look unsure as you successfully avoided any unnecessary topic.

“I’ll think about it. You know how long Grace has been pushing me to go and I’m just unsure about it” Mom replied, still looking unsure.

You didn’t know exactly why she had never taken Grace up on the offer to join but you could tell it was mainly about her self confidence. How your father had treated her over the years had led her to never come out of her shell and apart from the trips to the store and the weekly trip to church, she didn’t really get out of the house. You knew this wasn’t helped by her overly submissive attitude but your hope was that you could change her for the better now that you have the KDK.

Her submissiveness was still going to be there but focusing it solely onto you so that you could then change her to be more outgoing and confident in herself, sounded like a good place to start. That didn’t mean your motives were 100% pure either but rewarding yourself with her devotion to you was a perk you couldn’t help but go after.

Mom still seemed to be thinking about the gym proposition with a complex look on her face so you decided that this would be a good test to see how far you could get her to go with what the KDK will allow so far and then maybe test again tomorrow after she went to level 3.

Author's Note: Apologies for the delay today. Had something come up that meant I wasn't able to publish at the usual time. Chapters should be back to the usual time after this :)