She’s in the Monday afternoon meeting when her phone buzzes with a text. She checks it under the conference table, not recognizing the number. The message grabs her immediate attention.

Can you focus for me, darling?

Her mind and body briefly hum with some unnamed feeling before it disappears.

No, she texts back, then without thought she backs out of the message and swipes it left, hitting delete.

By the time she looks back up, the wrong number text is gone from her phone and her mind.

She’s at the only one left this late at night, having just finished a project and getting ready to pack up and leave, when her phone buzzes with a text. She doesn’t recognize the number, there’s no name attached to it from her contacts, but she opens it to read the message anyway.

Can you focus for me, darling?

There’s a shift in her mind, an anticipation in her body. Yes, she texts back immediately, without thought, without hesitation.

Three dots appear on the screen.

She watches them, the way they shift hue, the changing shades pulling her down, down, into the depths of her mind. Where her conscious mind rests, letting the subconscious take over for a moment. She doesn’t need to think, she needs to sink down, to focus, to wait for the promise the dots hold. Her mind and body focus solely on the screen, waiting on the edge for the next message.

Down. Focus. Wait.

Down. Focus. Wait.

Down. Focus. Wait.

She whispers the words in time with the shift of the dots, unaware she is doing so. Unaware of how much time is passing while she cannot look away from the screen. Distantly, she feels the excitement in her body, breathless anticipation of the message to come.

The dots disappear.

Wait, her mind whispers in the heartbeat between the dots and the message that finally appears.

Blank.

Her phone vibrates with a text message. She looks down, seeing her husband’s name at the top of the list. She frowns as she realizes she’s been zoning out for half an hour, just staring at her phone, instead of packing up to leave. She’s also aching and wet, like her husband has played with her for hours, taking her to the edge and backing off, over and over again. She wonders what she was zoning out on. Must have been something steamy.

The car service should be waiting for you outside, darling.

She grabs her bag, eager to get home. The car is outside at the curb, and she slips into the backseat. The driver says nothing as he smoothly pulls into traffic.

She squirms in her seat as he drives, her aching need building at every red light, only to ease off when the light turns green. She feels sharp bursts of not-quite-enough pleasure in her clit each time the driver activates the turn signal, pulsing with each click that sounds in the cabin. Her fingernails dig into her thighs as she tries not to show him how turned on she is. He signals a turn, then quickly turns it off and signals the other direction, and she has to bite her lip, the two bursts nearly undoing her. But she doesn’t come. She can’t come. Something is blocking her.

She nearly whimpers with relief as the car turns into her driveway. Before she can reach for the handle of the door, eager to get inside for relief, the driver turns around.

“Come twice for yes, once for no,” he says.

She cries out as the barrier falls, orgasm rushing through her, fingers digging into the seat as her hips jerk against the seatbelt. The pleasure tapers off for a heartbeat, then hits her again, her cry a wail of pleasure as she comes, feeling something click in her mind as she grinds against the seat.

Finally, panting, the wave recedes into a pleasant buzz, and she falls back against the seat, smiling. She opens her eyes to see her husband watching her from the front seat of her car. “Fuck,” she says slowly. She looks up and realizes the car is now in the garage, engine off and overhead door closed.

He laughs. “I’m guessing you like that delayed ratification vote.”

She remembers now, at his words. Her husband using the ‘delayed ratification vote’ protocol they had set in her mind years ago, to allow her to experience certain post hypnotic suggestions she was on the fence about. She would temporarily accept them, experience them once, and then 'vote’ with her orgasms on if her mind kept them or not. Not every suggestion was kept, but this one, now that she remembered everything, she see why she had. “God, that was hot, getting that unknown text message and having to respond without thinking. I’m glad you set up a way to turn it down at least. I was in a meeting the first time.”

“I figured you might be. How did it feel the second time?”

“Like the phone was the only thing I could focus on once I’d said yes. The three dots indicating you were typing a message were everything to my poor entranced mind.” She smiles. “Did you program the mantra to them or was that my mind?”

He shakes his head. “I told you that seeing those three moving dots would have you sinking deeper, watching them intently, and waiting for my next message.”

She shakes her head to clear it after those words. “Well, I was repeating 'down, focus, wait’ with the dots.”

“Interesting.” He smiles as he tilts his head, and she knows he is putting that in the back of his mind for later. They don’t do a lot of mantras, but she suspects they will be in the future.

“And once you texted 'blank’, I didn’t remember anything after that, not you winding me up several times, not your orders for what would affect me on the ride home, not even that you were my car service driver. In my own car,” she adds with a smile. “Not until you triggered me to remember. But yes, I want to do that again, have you trigger me at work and not remember it, following your commands with no clue, as long as it’s safe,” she adds.

“Always only when it’s safe. That’s why you can reject the text. And the texts only work from that number, which you automatically delete from the phone. If I sent it from my actual phone number, it wouldn’t work on you.”

She sits back in the seat. “I guess the question is, will I remember this little trigger exists?”

“That is entirely up to you.”

She thinks about it. How hot it was to trance, not knowing why, only seeing that number and the compulsion to respond, to watch. She wants that unknown factor again. “Let’s let me forget for now. We can talk about it next time we do a review of my triggers.” Once a month or so, they review all her active triggers, clearing out those that are no longer needed.

He nods at her now, an anticipatory grin on his face. Clearly, he was hoping she wouldn’t want to remember. “Darling, I move to adjourn your mind.”

“Seconded,” she says automatically, “mind adjourned.” Her eyes close as she gives up her mind to his will, sliding back into welcomed trance.