If you’ll remember, chapter nine concluded with some sex, as usually happens in this book. “Quality vs. quantity?” I think we know where this lands.

Chapter ten opens with them in “post-coital bliss.” And if you’re wondering, no, I might not ever let that go. There is some “you so hot! No, you so hot!” chatter, then they have to get ready to head back to the marina.

When Ana gets back up on deck, Christian is on the phone in one of his “I sound super important but I never say shit worth repeating” moments. I wish he had dropped his Blackberry into the ocean, but sadly it was not meant to be.

And this, this paragraph terrifies me:

Would I leave him again now that he’s admitted he loves me? I gaze up into his clear gray eyes. Could I ever leave him again—no matter what he did to me? Could I betray him like that? No. I don’t think I could.

“NO MATTER WHAT HE DID TO ME.”

She would see it as a betrayal to him if she were to leave him, NO MATTER WHAT HE DID.

This is one of those reasons this book is so scary to me. Yes, it’s a work of fiction, etc and so on and so forth. But this book that is supposedly “revolutionizing” the sex lives of women is explicitly saying that if your man tells you he loves you, you can’t ever leave him because it would be a betrayal to do so, regardless of what he does that could warrant leaving. This is a problem.

Moving along, Christian gets pouty because Ana is fond of the man whose job is basically to keep Christian alive. This goes in line with the fact that he doesn’t like her having any relationships aside from with him. Later on in the chapter, he also scolds Ana for “flirting” with Taylor.

I was Mrs. Taylor yesterday.” I grin at Taylor, who flushes.
“That has a nice ring to it, Miss Steele,” Taylor says matter-of-factly.
“I thought so, too.

That was it, that was the entire exchange, and it was in reference to the fact that Christian and Ana stayed at a hotel as “Mr. and Mrs. Taylor” for security reasons. But he gets all butt-hurt about it.

 

Anyways, back to the task at hand, which is saying goodbye to Mac.

I shake his hand shyly. He must know what Christian and I were up to on the boat while he went ashore.

After they disembark, it’s time for more private conversations in an Italian restaurant!

Also there’s this—
Christian: “I will shy away from anything that could make you leave me again. I was devastated when you left.”
Edward: “My entire being shies away from any course that could inspire that kind of pain again.” (eclipse, ch 21)

Basically the gist of the conversation is that Ana wants to delve deeper into the world of kink because she’s worried that things as they are won’t be enough to satisfy Christian. In a rare appropriate response, Christian is hitting the brakes on her idea because of how freaked out she was last time. (Spoiler, this “appropriate response” won’t last.)

Later, Ana reflects on the long day she’s had:

I have had a mind-blowing day. Dr. Greene, our shower, Christian’s admission, making love at the hotel and on the boat, buying the car.

That is a lot of shit to pack into one day. Like, a lot…

Part of me wants to try to timeline it to see if it can even fit into one day (because it’s still early evening when she’s thinking this). But most of me says, “fuck it.”

After they get back to Christian’s apartment, Ana decides to get her stuff ready for work the next day and Christian is NOT HAVING IT. There’s this whole back and forth about how she doesn’t have to work, it’s not safe, and the final compromise is that she’ll have one of the security guys accompany her to work.

Wait… You know what? You know what?! I just realized I’m giving this another plagiarism point, because this is the same “werewolves are dangerous” bullshit that Edward used in eclipse to keep Bella from going to La Push at first.
“But Leila—she’s out there.” [aka: Victoria]
“It’s not safe.”
“Either he comes with you, or I will be really irrational and keep you here.” [aka: I’ll have my sister kidnap you for a few days]

It’s no wonder this section pissed me off so much when I was going back through it; it’s just the same shit in a different packaging. Much like the rest of this book.

But there was also this gem:

Do you think I am going to stay here twiddling my thumbs while you’re off being Master of the Universe?

*THEY SAID THE THING*

(In case you don’t know what I’m talking about, click here.)

Also, Ana thinks to herself, “What does he mean? He’s going to support me? Oh, this is beyond ridiculous—I’ve known him for what—five weeks?” (Ahem… see the “power and control” wheel above.)

Yes, think about this, and GIRL RUN!

Christian distracts Ana by offering to give her another tour of the apartment. How much apartment is there? So of course she calls him mercurial again.

This tour ends at the library, where she tries to sucker Christian into a game of pool.

I don’t think I’ve ever played pool on such a large table before.

Snerk.

I have several issues with this game. Supposedly José taught her how to play and she acts like she’s an old hand at this, but she calls the balls by their color rather than number, even calling the cue ball “the white” and the eight ball “the black.”

On one turn, she uses a shot to knock a ball into better position (with no mention of a sink, even though every other sink is detailed), then immediately gets to take another shot. What?

She calls the pocket “top left-hand” instead of “far left corner.”

If your heroine is supposed to be some kind of hustler, and is giving us a play-by-play of the game with her inner monologue, can you…? Oh, fuck it. Just fuck it!

Anywho, my biggest issue with the pool game at the end of the chapter is the fact that the chapter cliffhanger is literally, “does he sink the eight?”

OH MY GOD YOU GUYS, DOES HE? I CAN BARELY CONTAIN MYSELF.

 

Chapter 10 Plagiarism points: 4.

Just a note: at first I wasn’t counting each instance of characterization thievery as a separate plagiarism point, but the book has gotten so ham-handed at describing Ana as Bella and Christian as Edward, that I have decided to count it each time.

All book quotes are from Fifty Shades Darker by EL James unless otherwise noted.