Nah, I found it funny. Unless he was sure that Alexi was being facetious, Joseph would probably be terrified that he had overstepped his bounds and beg for forgiveness. I'm no where near that submissive. :-P

Yay! A reply! 

And I just finished the most well-written book I've read in a long time... the last 1/5th of it had me sobbing.