Tangled Truth Delphine Dryden Truth & Lies, Book Four
Drew likes Eva. But he also likes to tie girls up for fun. Eva likes Drew. But she keeps insisting ropes aren’t her thing. When a friend’s fluke accident lands them in a bondage-themed photo shoot, however, Drew soon discovers why the lady doth protest too much. And Eva overcomes personal demons to discover a whole new world of freedom within the loving constraint of a well-tied rope.
Ellora’s Cave Publishing
www.ellorascave.com
Tangled Truth ISBN 9781419934483 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Tangled Truth Copyright © 2011 Delphine Dryden Edited by Kelli Collins Cover art by Syneca Electronic book publication June 2011 The terms Romantica® and Quickies® are registered trademarks of Ellora’s Cave Publishing. With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.® 1056 Home Avenue, Akron OH 44310-3502. Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000. (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/). Please purchase only authorized electronic or print editions and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted material. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.
TANGLED TRUTH Delphine Dryden
Trademarks Acknowledgement The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction: Boy Scouts: Boy Scouts of America Corporation Converse: Converse Inc. Currier & Ives: Currier & Ives Foundation Eagle Scouts: Boy Scouts of America Corporation Fortune 500: Time Inc. Le Corbusier: Foundation Le Corbusier Monopoly: Hasbro, Inc. Scrunchie: L&N Sales and Marketing, Inc. Starbucks: Starbucks Corporation
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Chapter One Drew narrowed his eyes, barely resisting the urge to lick his lips. “Come on. I dare you.” “To go out with you? That really doesn’t bode well, Mr. Brantley.” God, he loved it when Eva called him Mr. Brantley. Over the past few weeks, spending far too much time hanging around the Swift Gallery, he had learned the best way to encourage it. “It’s Drew, remember? Come on, I can’t stop calling you Miss Godfrey until you start calling me Drew.” “Mr. Brantley.” Eva smirked as she said it, and Drew counted that a minor victory. She was willing to flirt just that much. “I’m working. Can’t you find anybody else to bother? There’s quite a crowd this evening. Take your time, look around. I’m sure there is at least one willing, unattached woman here who would love to give you the time of day.” It was true, the gallery was packed. And for once, Drew actually had a somewhat legitimate reason for attending an exhibit, other than to hit on the lovely gallery manager; one of the featured artists was his brother’s girlfriend’s cousin. It was a slim connection, but he wasn’t too proud to exploit it. He had no interest in any of the other unattached women in the crowd, willing or otherwise. Ever since he’d met Eva Godfrey through some mutual friends the previous month, he had been a man on a mission. “Your lips say no-no, Miss Godfrey, but your clipboard says yes-yes. Actually, what does your clipboard say? Is there really anything on there?” Eva clutched the long, well-worn clipboard closer to her chest. Drew knew the board was mostly a prop, a piece of armor. He’d sneaked a peek at a previous gallery event and found only a heavily annotated list of caterers and business contacts. Was it
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habit that made her carry it around all the time, he wondered, or was she really that much on her guard? But at least she hadn’t simply walked away. “The dare itself isn’t to go on a date,” Drew went on. “It’s to take a bet. Just answer a trivia question. About art. If you get it wrong or I stump you, then you go out with me.” Her skepticism was apparent. “A question about art? You’re really expecting to win that? What if I get it right, what do I win?” “If you get it right, I will walk away brokenhearted, never to trouble you again,” Drew assured her. He placed a hand over his heart, confident enough to risk a little drama. He knew she couldn’t resist this hook. In the brief time he’d known her, he’d seen that her knowledge of art was as deep and broad as her love for it. She didn’t talk much, but when she did, it was about art. But he also knew she would get this one wrong. It wasn’t exactly a question about art, although close enough that she couldn’t accuse him of cheating. He hoped. With a sigh, Eva nodded. “Okay, it’s a bet. Let’s hear it. Quickly, because I really do need to get back to work.” Restraining a whoop of joy, Drew stepped closer. Just inside the boundary of polite conversation, so he could pitch his voice a little lower. His heart leapt when she stood her ground, and he had to swallow before posing his stumper. “Okay, in the late eighties the punk band Wire released a song called Madman’s Honey. One of the lyrics to that song was a quote from a caption on a painting by a famous fifteenth century painter. Who was the painter?” He had to bite his lip to keep from grinning at the look of disbelief that transformed Eva’s face. “That’s not…oh, you are evil.” “Is it a date?”
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“Wait, wait.” She mulled it over, tapping her pen against the clipboard as she considered. She looked slightly panicky. “Tell me the quote.” “Oh, that might give it away. ‘Master cut the stone out, my name is Lubbert Das’.” “Das. Fifteenth century? It sounds German, maybe. Or Dutch? Albrecht Durer.” “Wrong.” He couldn’t quite believe it. When she’d said “Dutch,” he was sure the next name out of her mouth would be— “Wait, no. Lucas Cranach the Elder.” “Still wrong.” He was astonished, but he didn’t want to give her any more time to throw names at him. “You’re guessing now. That’s it. I win!” He had no idea how she could have guessed wrong twice. How many fifteenth century Dutch painters were there, anyway? “No, but—” “Do you want to know the answer?” After a pause, during which Drew feared the clipboard might be crushed to bits in Eva’s delicate white-knuckled hands, she let her shoulders drop and conceded defeat. “Oh fine. Who was it, then? I can’t believe this!” “I’ll tell you over dinner. Tomorrow night at eight.”
***** The first time he saw Eva, he thought she was his friend Sheila. From the back they were nearly identical, with the same impossibly pale skin and blonde hair so fair it was almost silvery. But then she’d turned, and Drew’s eyebrows had shot up. Far from sharing Sheila’s adorably oversized features, this girl had a face like a marble angel. Beautiful, classic, and at that moment so cold even the heat of August couldn’t soften its lines. Stunning. The girl who wasn’t Sheila had been standing in front of one of the photos, holding a plastic glass of white wine and looking as though she would rather be just about
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anywhere else. Drew wondered what she was doing at the photography show, but then Sheila and her husband Danny walked over to greet her and it became obvious she was a friend of theirs. Danny gestured Drew over, and as he approached he saw the girl wasn’t nearly as tall as Sheila, either. Similar build and coloring, similar proportions, but smaller all over. A delicate porcelain doll of a girl. When he got closer, he realized she barely came up to his shoulder. “Eva Godfrey, Drew Brantley, you meet at last,” Danny said dramatically, with a bow and flourish. “Pleasure,” Drew said, offering a hand that Eva took in a forceful, brief handshake. All business. Her fingers were as cool as her smile. Drew felt the urge to keep her hand in his, warm her up a bit. “Mr. Brantley. Danny’s said very nice things about you.” “Oh, it’s Drew, please. And the same to you. You run the Swift Gallery, right? Nice place.” Not that he spent much time in art galleries, but he had certainly looked in the window once or twice, and it seemed nice enough. He might be tempted to do more than just look in the window now. “A bit too highbrow for the likes of us low art folks, I’m sure,” Danny quipped, obviously not too concerned. Eva rolled her eyes at him. Drew noticed that when her gaze happened to fall on one of Danny’s photos, she quickly looked away. The photographs could be startling to the uninitiated. On every wall of the large loft space, pictures depicted soft skin restrained by ropes in complex knots and woven patterns. Close-ups, for the most part, with only one or two shots in which the model’s face could be seen. But of course, everybody there already knew the model was Sheila. “You’re not a fan?” Drew was surprised. The crowd at the small, private showing that night consisted primarily of friends and family, and it wasn’t as though Danny and Sheila’s friends tended to be closed-minded. In fact, the room felt not unlike the neutral 9
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conversation area at a BDSM gathering…though these participants were, in general, more heavily clothed. “Evie doesn’t play,” Sheila said with a shrug. “Though she knows she has a standing invitation.” “I appreciate your artistry,” the petite blonde said with a hint of wry humor. “And I’m here, being supportive.” “Yes, you are, my love,” Danny said firmly, “and we appreciate your support. Sheila’s too big for her britches tonight and she’s got her brat hat on.” As if to prove him correct, Sheila stuck her tongue out at her partner then grinned unapologetically. “You’ll take care of that later, I’m sure.” Drew smiled, watching the easy banter between his friends with enjoyment. Theirs was a rare partnership, balancing equality and expertise in business with domination and submission in the bedroom, and a stunning juggling act of all those dynamics in their daily life together. Danny might have the upper hand when it came to bondage and sex, but he had no trouble deferring to Sheila’s business acumen or writing talent. They were a formidable team, but mostly Drew liked the way they approached life with such obvious relish and gleeful flouting of convention. Drew’s own tastes were a fraction more conservative, but only a fraction. Domination and submission didn’t interest him much. His participation in the BDSM scene fell squarely into the category of bondage, and his expertise with ropes and knots made him Danny’s favorite assistant for some of the more complex suspension and predicament bondage the photographer liked to experiment with. Drew’s clean-cut, vanilla manner had earned him the affectionate nickname “Bondage Boy Scout” among Danny and Sheila’s generally edgy group of friends and fans. Few knew that the label was accurate; Drew and Danny had actually both been Eagle Scouts. There were no badges in the type of knots they were into now, however. Drew knew Eva had a nickname, too, although it was not quite as affectionate. Predictably, she was “Ice Princess”. Drew watched her surreptitiously throughout the 10
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evening, wondering how apt the title actually was. Eva looked chilly enough. Her already cool, Grace Kelly looks were rendered even icier by her simple white shift dress and silver thong sandals. The only hint of warmer color about her was the long, thin watermelon-colored scarf draped loosely around her elegant neck. Just a sheer hint of silk, bringing out the color in her lips and cheeks a tiny bit. Or perhaps, he corrected himself, the blush on her face had more to do with the subject matter of the oversized photographs surrounding them. More than once, Drew caught a glimpse of Eva when it was clear she thought nobody was watching, and on each occasion she was staring at the artwork with something very like longing. In those moments, she looked far from icy. She looked hot, and Drew found himself picturing her in the poses he’d helped tie Sheila into for the photo series. He couldn’t help imagining Eva’s soft, smooth white skin crisscrossed with black or maybe red ropes, the tender flesh plumping out on either side of the snug restraints. He didn’t imagine, however, that before the evening was out he would get the chance to see even a hint of such a thing in person. “Drew! Buddy!” called a tipsy Danny from across the room. Drew looked away from Eva to see his friend waving a camera at him. Intrigued, he approached and saw that Danny had tied a mutual friend of theirs to the cowhide-covered Le Corbusier chaise that occupied one corner of the loft. Brandon, the friend, was a study in blue and gold, his light denim jeans and chambray button-down forming a neutral and strikingly conservative background for the intricate web of black ropes securing him to his ultramodern chair. His shock of blond hair and fashionably tanned skin almost glowed in the cool setting. “It’s his present for hosting this shindig,” Danny explained, fiddling with his camera lens and stalking around the chair as an audience formed. “I promised him a souvenir photo. But Sheila went on a drinks run, so I need you to find me a substitute for her. I want some hands around his shoulders or something like that, tied in something bright. This place needs color desperately.”
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“Black and white are the new black and white, Daniel,” Brandon said, obviously unconcerned. He was an award-winning designer, and he had no serious doubts about his decor choices. The black-and-white loft was also a perfect impromptu gallery space, as the evening’s festivities proved. “But if there must be more color, let’s have something warm. Evie’s scarf, maybe. I can wear it as a cravat.” “Let’s leave my scarf out of this, please,” Eva said with a sniff. “I don’t know where your neck has been.” The line got a laugh, loudest from those who suspected they knew where Brandon’s neck had been. “If you’re trying to find a Sheila replacement,” Drew speculated, “it seems like Eva’s the logical choice, anyway. Same skin tones, and she’s already wearing sleeveless.” “It’s my understanding that our Eva doesn’t care to be tied,” Brandon said with a snarky smile. “Or whipped, or dressed up like a gimp, or anything else like that. She doesn’t sully herself with our sort of low fun.” Drew heard a murmur of “bitch” from somewhere in the crowd behind him, and he was fairly certain the remark was aimed at Brandon, not Eva. He had to agree with the sentiment. He looked for Eva, angry on her behalf, and was somewhat startled to see that her crisp demeanor hadn’t changed in the slightest. “I stand by my anti-gimp position, but you can use me and my scarf for the picture if you really must,” she said, startling him further. Drew had to admire the slight swagger with which she approached him and offered her scarf and her crossed wrists in turn. To a light smattering of applause and laughter, Drew helped Danny ready the shot, holding the light meter and waiting patiently for the photographer to decide how he wanted things. Then, twisting the scarf carefully to form something like a rope, Drew pulled Eva’s slender wrists together and began cinching them. Just a simple tie, as the “rope” was not quite six feet long. A few loops, a twist of the ends in opposite 12
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directions, and then he finished things off with a bow that earned a few more chuckles from the crowd. Then, to his vast dismay, he had to let go of Eva’s hands so she could place them according to Danny’s instructions. Drew itched to pull her back toward him, to trace each margin of silk against skin, to bare her further and wrap more of her up in tidy rows of loops and knots. He was close enough to Eva as he worked to see that she enjoyed the process as well, despite her protests. A great deal, Drew suspected. Her crystal-gray eyes were slightly dilated, and the rosy flush on her cheeks was matched by the reddened imprint on her lower lip where she’d worried it with her teeth. She was breathing a bit too fast, especially considering how innocuous a bind he’d put on her wrists. It wasn’t fear he was seeing, though. It was arousal, and he wondered if she even realized how obvious it was. “Comfortable?” he asked out of habit. “Nothing hurts, you can feel all your fingers?” “I’m fine,” she responded, too quickly. “Fine.” “Drew, you’re in the frame, dude,” Danny complained. Drew backed up and watched as his friend took shot after shot, moving Eva’s hands and arms slightly from time to time in order to shift the focus provided by the vividly colored tie. Days later, Danny emailed Drew a copy of the finished photo, cropped to focus on Brandon’s throat and chest, with Eva’s arms encircling his neck. Her bound hands and wrists looked almost childlike in their vulnerability. No faces were visible. The scarf formed a vivid note of pinkish red against her fair skin and the pale blue of Brandon’s shirt. But what Drew remembered about the moment itself was not captured in the photo. He could recall only Eva’s face, turned slightly into the cowhide upholstery above Brandon’s shoulder, and the much subtler pink that had flushed her carved marble cheek.
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Chapter Two It had taken him over a month to think up his ploy and implement it, and that had only come after about eight weeks of what probably bordered on stalking. When he’d started, it had been unseasonably hot even for August, and Eva had cooled the room in sleeveless white. Now it was cold enough outside that when she answered the doorbell for their date, she was already shrugging her way into a creamcolored overcoat. Cashmere, Drew thought as he automatically reached out to help her find the sleeve. Her hair caught in the collar when she settled the coat on her shoulders, and he had to resist the temptation to work the silky strands free when she turned to lock her door. It was all chilly cordiality at first. But then she threw him a dark look when he took his seat after handing her gallantly into his car. “Hieronymus Bosch. I can’t believe I didn’t think of Hieronymus fucking Bosch. It was so obvious.” Drew thought she must be really pissed off if she was dropping the F-bomb. He’d never heard her curse before. On the whole, he didn’t mind it one bit. “Well, you know. Everybody has their areas of expertise. Nobody can know everything.” The glare she shot him was venomous but heavily laced with amusement. “It wasn’t even a question about art, it was a question about punk music. I never claimed to know a thing about punk music.” “I don’t really know much about either one,” Drew admitted with a shrug. “But I had this roommate in college who loved that band, and he had a poster of the painting on the wall over his bed. The Extraction of the Stone of Madness. The guy was kind of an asshole, actually.” “He left you with an appreciation for art, at least. Or maybe just punk?” 14
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Drew smiled. “Not exactly. I mean the band was okay, but the painting creeped me out. I mainly remembered it because there was a guy in it with a funnel on his head, kinda looked like the Tin Woodman.” “You don’t know anything about art.” It was a statement, not a question. She didn’t sound that surprised. Drew was glad to hear she didn’t sound particularly upset about it, either. “I know some. I know about photography. And hey, I knew enough to get you to go out with me, right?” Eva’s silvery laugh was unexpected. It curled around Drew, a slender ribbon of temptation, almost making him miss his turn. “A sucker bet. Your one piece of art trivia, and you caught me. Now I’ll know to be on my guard.” The topic of their mutual friends didn’t arise until later, when the meal was almost over. “I thought the Boy Scout thing was a joke,” Eva said with surprise when Drew revealed how far back he and Danny went. “Nope. And yes, before you ask, I did get a merit badge for knots.” “I didn’t need to ask.” She lifted her glass to him and took a sip before continuing. “You do beautiful work.” Drew shrugged. “Aw, shucks, ma’am. Glad you think my knots are purdy.” “You don’t seem like a lot of the…the people Danny and Sheila know.” “Well, they hang out with a lot of artists. I’m not really in that business.” She frowned. “True, but I wasn’t really talking about the art crowd.” Leaning forward, Drew murmured dramatically, “You mean the evil, bad, kinky sex crowd?” His corny wink made her smile, even as she blushed at his words. “Of course there’s quite a bit of crossover,” she acknowledged.
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“With their friends, at least, yeah. That’s also partly due to the subject matter of their art. It does tend to draw a certain demographic. The evil, bad, kinky sex crowd demographic.” “Are you in that demographic?” Drew was startled by that. By the direct question, by the suddenly dispassionate gaze she leveled at him with those very pale blue-gray eyes. “That’s a deal-breaker for you,” he said, feeling a hint of anxiety as the knowledge broke. After a moment of hesitation, she nodded. “Yes.” Drew couldn’t help thinking she looked sad. Recalling her obvious—at least obvious to him—reaction to being tied up, he wondered what her history was. He was distracted from pursuing it, however, when the waiter returned with his credit card. It wasn’t until they were safely in the car again, pulling away from the curb, that he returned to the subject. “So I have a question for you. About your deal-breaker.” “All right.” The wariness in her voice warned him to tread lightly. “You never answered my question, actually.” “I know. When we were at that party, when I tied you up, I heard the comments about how you weren’t into that. But I was right next to you. I could feel your pulse under my fingers. I could see your reaction. And it was not the reaction of a girl who wasn’t into it.” “Oh?” From wary to frosty in nothing flat. “I’m just curious. It didn’t add up.” Eva had turned so cold he was tempted to crank the car heater. Drew figured he had nothing more to lose at that point. Might as well go for broke. “You say you’re not into it, but you surround yourself with it. You run a private art gallery in a small town. You could hardly find a more vanilla setting, but you invite a fair number of artists you know are involved in BDSM whether it’s
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reflected in their art or not. As far as I can tell, you’re good friends or at least close acquaintances with practically everybody in the local kink community. You agreed to let yourself be tied up for that photo, and it was glaringly obvious you enjoyed it. In that way. So what’s up, Miss Godfrey? What’s your deal?” A few seconds of pained silence later, he chanced a glance over at Eva. She was still staring at him in shock, eyes wide as saucers. Her lips parted slightly, and Drew had to drag his eyes back to the road before he could become distracted. He’d had a sudden, almost overwhelming urge to kiss the look right off her face. To warm her up, lips first. Crap. I should apologize. “Um. Look, I—” “Did it ever occur to you,” she said in a tiny, strained voice, “that I might have had a bad experience?” He didn’t even look this time, just started glancing toward the shoulder, searching for a place to pull over. Eva didn’t comment. She sat and stared as he eased over to the side of the road and brought the car to a halt. “I am so, so sorry,” he started, but she cut him off with a sharp gesture of her hand. “Don’t!” He caught her hand and held it in both of his, taking his seat belt off and turning to face her. Then things got confusing for a while. Drew remembered the sensation coming over him again, of needing to kiss her, of wanting to fold her into his arms. He remembered the shine of tears, and then the thing that was his undoing, the tiniest tremble of her lower lip. It was pink. It looked soft. It tasted like wine and apple pie a la mode. Which, Drew decided, was the exact taste of heaven. When he laced his fingers through her hair, he was surprised at how warm she was. Surprised, too, when she tugged at his shirt, pulling him closer, angling her head back and making a sweet offering of her mouth. He took it, curling his tongue
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between her lips, nibbling and sucking until he fell into a happy delirium of frustration and delight. When they finally broke apart, he noticed her lip was no longer trembling, although his hands seemed to be. They were framing her face. When had that happened? Eva’s hands were entwined in the fabric of his dress shirt. She wasn’t crying anymore. His cock was straining to get closer to the source of the happiness, and Eva looked so flushed and breathless and mussed all of a sudden. It was mind-blowingly hot. His lips moved faster than his conscience. “I’m not in that demographic.” It was more than half a lie, and he was old enough to know he was stupid to say it. She stared at him for a few seconds then her gaze flicked away to the window. “I need some fresh air. Do you mind?” “What? Oh. Not at all.” He nearly ran around the car in his haste to open her door, as eager as a teenager on his first date. And suddenly feeling about as unlikely to get past first base, judging by the wave of shyness that appeared to sweep over Eva when he offered his arm. It had started to snow, a light fall of powdery white. The night was crisp, and very cold. They had parked near one of the university’s two large fountains, and the soft splash of water was a strange contrast with the silent snow. “I know, I know,” Eva said as she brushed the fine, powdery stuff from the creamy cashmere of her overcoat. “Now I look like a real, live ice princess.” “Not even close to what I was thinking.” Drew reached over and carefully scooped a dusting of snow from the edge of her scarf before it could melt against the skin of her neck. “Then what were you thinking?” she demanded. She tilted her head—whether to avoid his fingers or give him better access, he wasn’t sure. He thought maybe she wasn’t sure, either.
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“I was thinking you looked like a real, live snow angel.” He smiled and then kissed her before she could formulate a protest, grabbing her upper arms and pulling her closer to put her off balance. He could feel her breath, as rapid and shallow as it had been that night he tied her wrists around Brandon’s neck. She was turned-on. She wanted this. She wanted him. And God knew he wanted her. Had walked around for nearly three months semihard and hurting for her, despite her obvious reticence. Just kissing her, and a fairly innocent kiss at that, was enough to make his pants uncomfortably snug. Cautiously, he shifted his hands, one sliding around Eva’s slim waist to draw her closer still, the other cupping the back of her neck lightly as he deepened the kiss. Tasting her, all softness and heat and unexpected willingness. Her tongue was soft as velvet against his. When she finally, hesitantly, began to kiss him back, Drew had to restrain himself from moaning. With all the control he could muster, he let Eva set the pace for a time. She explored his mouth with excruciating patience, learning each curve and slide of his lips and tongue against hers. Her hands, still balled in clenched fists against his chest, never moved. Almost as though she was holding back too. The suspense, the tension, became almost an end in itself. Drew realized they were torturing themselves and each other but also feared what might happen if he raised the stakes. It felt almost like a magic spell, this equilibrium between them, something that could be broken all too easily by one wrong move. Except that the next move was Eva’s. She shifted her hands without warning, tugging Drew closer by the neck, suddenly plunging her tongue into his mouth and pressing herself against him with an enthusiastic whimper. Then, as abruptly, she pushed him away and stumbled back a few steps, wiping a shaky hand across her mouth. “Eva, I—” “That was—” “Sorry, go ahead.” 19
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“No, you go.” Drew couldn’t remember what he had started to say. Now, seeing her flushed cheeks and kiss-reddened lips, so bright against the paleness of her skin and the snowy backdrop, he was dumbstruck. She was too beautiful, too breathtaking to talk to. A snow angel, as he’d said. “I really didn’t want you to stop then,” he finally blurted, honesty bubbling to the top under pressure. “Or, you know…ever.” “It was a bad idea,” Eva said, as though he hadn’t spoken. “Really. I don’t know what got into me.” My tongue? Drew thought, but was smart enough not to say. “I thought it was a really good idea. Whatever got into you had exactly the right idea, and you should let it back in there.” “Let what back in there,” she asked with an arch look, “your tongue?” At least I wasn’t the one to say it. “For starters.” He stared her down, willing her to stop reassembling the chilly shell she seemed determined to draw around herself. Her protective covering. For a minute there, she hadn’t acted like a girl who wanted or needed protection. “Then what? You take me home, we throw caution to the wind?” “You say that like it’s unheard of. People have been known to do that sort of thing.” The wind was picking up, and a flurry of snow skittered across the lawn and around their legs. “I don’t do that sort of thing,” Eva said firmly. “How about after the third date? Would you do it then?” “I beg your pardon?” “The night is still young, Miss Godfrey. I just took you on our first date, and it’s barely nine o’clock. So now, after a brief stop at your place so you can put on some warmer clothes, I am going to take you on our second date.” 20
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Eva’s upper lip curved as though she was trying to keep from smiling. “Isn’t that an extended version of the first date?” “No,” Drew said with much more confidence than he felt, “not if I take you home and you change outfits in between.” “Okay. Assuming I accept that, what makes you think I’ll agree to a second date with you, just like that? Much less a third. I only went out with you in the first place because I lost a bet.” “And it still stings, doesn’t it? But the dinner was pretty good, I think. And besides, you’ll come with me this time because you’re curious now.” She regarded him for a moment, her expression unreadable. Drew found he was holding his breath. “All right,” she said at last. “Impress me.”
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Chapter Three “Are you out of your damn mind?” Eva asked, not for the first time since they had started the climb. “How is this legal? This cannot be legal!” She gripped the iron rungs firmly, and Drew noticed she was actually having no trouble with the ascent up the spare, metal scaffold. “Wanna bet?” he called up to her over the singing wind. “Not particularly,” she retorted. “Not now that I know you only make loaded bets.” “I’m more risk-averse than I let on,” Drew corrected her. “I only like to bet on a sure thing.” “Death and taxes, Mr. Brantley,” Eva reminded him. “The only two sure things.” “You sure are good with the light banter,” he said, slightly winded with the effort to keep up with her. “Jesus, how fit are you? You’re not even out of breath. Here, take that ladder to the right, next.” From the narrow catwalk they crossed to the next ladder, the last leg of their climb. Drew’s hands were chilled to the bone despite his insulated ski gloves, and he could only imagine Eva had to be even colder, slender as she was. He admired her for not complaining. Almost as much as he admired her for the extremely fine rear view she presented as she climbed nimbly up the ladder above him. Her parka only came down to mid-hip, and the jeans she had changed into were strategically faded. God, he loved it when jeans were strategically faded. Not that the ass in question needed any highlighting to look stunning. “Almost there,” he reassured her with a shout. Then they were there, Eva hitting the top platform with a visible sigh of relief and Drew crowding up the ladder behind her.
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“Okay, now don’t turn around yet. And close your eyes.” “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she grumbled, but gripped the back rail on the narrow ledge they were standing on, squeezing her eyes shut. Carefully, Drew turned her around by the shoulders and then slid his hands down her arms to help her find the front rail. He pulled his hands back only as far as her waist, telling himself it was to help steady her, and that the two or three inches of down padding in her parka covered everything really interesting anyway. “Okay. Tilt your head back a tiny bit and open your eyes.” He tried to see it as Eva would be seeing it, for the first time. The panoramic view of the surrounding farmland, silver in the light of the sinking half-moon, and then the infinity of stars overhead. The cold front had passed, leaving only fresh snow on the ground and a bit of ice in the newly clear air. They were just far enough away from any severe light pollution that the lights of the night sky could be seen in all their sparkling glory. “Oh…” she whispered, and then let her head drop back against his shoulder as she took in the astonishing view. Each star, crisp and clear as if seen in a textbook, something one couldn’t see in Indianapolis or even in the middle of a small suburban town. After a few minutes of silence, which Drew hated to break, he bent close to Eva’s ear—the bottom half, with a delicate pearl earring she’d been wearing since the beginning of the evening peeking from beneath her black, fleecy ski cap. “Let me know when you get too cold,” he murmured. “I was already too cold when we started,” she admitted. “But it was worth it. This is beautiful.” “Did I impress you?” Eva laughed. “Yes, you impressed me.” “You want to see something else impressive?”
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“Please tell me that isn’t a double entendre. Okay, what?” “This way.” He pulled her by one hand down to the opposite end of the platform, to a door Eva hadn’t seen before, apparently leading into the dome-like structure they had climbed. “I thought this was a water tower or something,” she said with an embarrassed smile. “In the dark, you know.” “Nope. Observatory. We didn’t exactly come in by the front gate.” He opened the door to reveal a round room occupied by two bespectacled astronomers and the biggest telescope Eva had ever seen. The sliding roof was open a wedge, but a space heater warmed the desk area somewhat. “Brantley! Where you been, man?” The younger of the two men greeted Drew warmly with a handclasp and a slap on the shoulder. “And who have we here? Good evening,” he said, dropping his voice and shifting gears instantly when he got a good look at Eva. “Welcome to the Brantley-DeWitt Observatory Facility. I’m Dr. Davis, and if there is anything I can do to assist you while you’re here, anything at all, please don’t hesitate—” “Yeah, yeah, she’s got it, Ed,” snarked the older scientist. He nodded at Eva from his seat at the view screen for the giant scope. “Ma’am.” “Guys, this is Eva Godfrey. Eva, this is Ed and Fred.” Drew gestured to the two scientists in turn. Ed gave a gracious demi-bow, while Fred had already returned his eyes to his task. “So what’s happening tonight?” “On tonight’s agenda, we are once again looking for supernovae,” Ed reported. “And mainly, Fred’s doing something technical with the calibration on the spectroscope.” “Exciting times.” “The fun never stops, man. You want to use the small scope? Hayden’s not here tonight, nobody’s up there.”
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“Nah, we mostly came in to warm up and take the shortcut back to the car. We were doing naked-eye observations tonight.” Ed winked broadly at Eva. “Naked eye is still my favorite way to look at the stars too.” “That’ll do, Ed.” Drew offered Eva his arm and bid the astronomers good night as he led her to a door across the long control room. From there, a featureless beige hallway led to a stairwell, and down a few flights of stairs they came to the front entry of the building. Exiting, Eva noticed the tidy brass sign by the entrance, reminding her of Ed’s welcome. “Okay,” Eva said as they started following a walkway by the narrow road, aided by a flashlight Drew procured from his coat pocket. “So why is your name on this thing?” “My grandfather’s name, actually,” Drew admitted. “He was an amateur astronomer, and after he retired he threw all his attention and a lot of his money into funding this place for the university. Hank DeWitt was another alum who worked on getting the big telescope built.” “Your grandfather was a scientist? So I guess you didn’t follow in those footsteps?” “Turn down that gravel path, it’s a shortcut,” Drew said, using the flashlight to point out the way. “No, he wasn’t actually a scientist, except as a hobby. He was a lawyer, and then later a law professor. My dad’s a lawyer too. My brother and I are the black sheep.” She laughed. “I just realized, Drew, I have no idea what you actually do for a living. I mean I knew you didn’t only help Danny tie girls up, but I never thought about what you were doing the rest of the time.” Drew took her hand, ostensibly helping her pick her way down the rough path. “I’m an enterprise architecture consultant.” “Oh. I see.”
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“We’re almost to the car. Watch your step. You still have no idea what I do for a living, right?” “No idea, that’s true.” “Say a company wants to find out what kind of technology they might need to implement their business plan. I go in and help define their goals and then help figure out what hardware and software they’d need for that. Work out sourcing options and all that. Mostly my minions go in now, though. I mainly supervise. And spend as much time as possible out of the office playing computer games and tying up pretty women.” The path ended at the edge of the rough gravel parking lot where they’d left Drew’s car. The huge observatory dome was nearly invisible from this vantage point, showing only as a faint silhouette against the starry sky. In the darkness, Drew’s car and the handful of others would have been easy to miss without the flashlight. “That sounds nice. The part about having minions, I mean. I could use some of those. What does the other black sheep do? Your brother?” “Economics professor. Here at the university.” He opened the car door and held it for her, smirking. “Your poor parents must be so ashamed,” she said coolly as she slid into the seat. “We’re a source of constant disappointment,” he agreed, then shut the door and jogged to the driver’s side to get in and start the car. “So can I interest you in stopping somewhere for some fancy decaf latte or hot chocolate or something before I take you home?” “God, yes,” Eva said, rubbing her hands together and then placing them in front of the quickly warming vents with a relieved sigh. “Awesome.” “That’s still on this same date, though.” Drew sighed, resigned. “Gotcha.”
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***** They had just sat down with their coffee when Drew got the call from Sheila. The reception was spotty, and he had to ask her to repeat herself to make sure he’d heard correctly. “Hang on,” Sheila said, and Drew heard rustling and a lot of noise he couldn’t identify, before the signal cleared. “Is that better? I had to get near a window.” “Yeah, it’s better. Where are you?” He held one finger up at Eva, who was mouthing an inquiry about who was on the phone. “Is everything okay?” “At the hospital,” Sheila said. She sounded exhausted. “Danny’s hurt. He’s going to be okay,” she reassured Drew, “but his left hand and wrist are broken in about three places.” “Holy shit! How did that happen?” “He fell off his bike,” she said, with a faint note of incredulity. “Lost his balance right at the corner while he was waiting for the light to turn. You know how he likes to balance and see how long he can stay up before he has to put a foot down? Well, he didn’t know his shoelace was caught on the pedal. When he realized he was tipping too far, he couldn’t get his foot free. Fell straight over and caught himself on his hand.” Drew winced, picturing the accident all too clearly. “Jesus. What do you need me to do?” “Well, we still have a ton of work to do on the new book, and Danny can’t operate the camera properly or do much tying with only one hand. And not even his good hand. You know he’s left-handed, so I’m going to have to be the photographer for the rest of the shooting,” Sheila said. “Which means I won’t also be able to model.” Drew could hear the hesitation in her voice, the hedging around. “And…” he prompted. “And I need you to help me talk Eva into modeling in my place.”
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Drew looked over at Eva, wondering if she could hear any of Sheila’s part of the conversation. But the coffee shop was crowded despite the lateness of the hour, and the steady clamor was enough to afford him at least that much privacy. “Uh, hang on, Sheila.” He tipped the phone away from his mouth and addressed Eva, who was still looking at him with growing concern. “Danny fell off his bike and broke his hand. Sheila’s calling from the hospital. I think he’s okay other than that.” “Is she there?” Sheila asked. Drew returned his attention to the call. “Yeah. We’re at Benito’s, having coffee,” he said casually, as though such a thing were an everyday occurrence. “We went out to the observatory and it was a little cold, so we’re just warming up.” He realized he was using “we” an awful lot and wondered how Eva felt about that. Her face, still full of concern for Danny, gave nothing else away. Sheila chuckled. “Listen to you, being all smooth. Well, maybe this will be easier than I thought, if you guys are a thing now. How long has this been going on under my nose without my knowledge?” With Eva still eyeing him curiously, Drew decided against a direct answer. “If you weren’t aware of it, why did you think I’d have any particular success in doing you this favor?” “I can’t tell you.” Sheila made a snorting noise that sounded suspiciously like a stifled snicker. “It would violate the sisterhood code. But I thought if anybody could talk her into letting herself get tied up all pretty and photographed, it would be you. And it has to be Evie, is the thing. She’s the only one I know with the exact same coloring, even the same body type as mine. If we don’t show her face, people won’t be able to tell it’s not me in the pictures. We really wanted a consistent look for the book and we don’t have time to reshoot the whole thing with a different model. Not to mention we can’t afford to hire a different model. Oh, hey, I have to go. Danny’s talking to the doctor again. I’ll call you tomorrow. Work on her, okay?” “Okay. Good luck. Tell Dan he’s a bonehead.” 28
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“Already done.” Sheila hung up, and Drew put his phone away with a thoughtful gaze in Eva’s direction. She was sipping her cappuccino cautiously and had a very faint mustache from the froth on top. Drew wanted to lick it off but suspected he wasn’t quite on solid enough footing yet to try it. “You have a little…” He gestured to his own lip, and Eva took the hint and dabbed at her mouth with a napkin. “So what happened?” “He fell off his bike. Sheila said his hand is broken in three places, or maybe it was his hand and wrist. Anyway, he can’t work a camera. Which is a problem, obviously.” Eva knew the couple well enough to know what a problem it was. “Their book! How are they ever going to make their deadline?” Although the question was rhetorical, Drew saw an opportunity to provide an actual answer. “Sheila is going to take over all the actual camera work, of course.” “Of course. You can do the rope work alone, I suppose. But then…” She fell silent for a moment, and Drew almost filled in the silence with Sheila’s request. But something told him it might be better to let Eva come to that conclusion on her own, and about five seconds later she did just that. “I should offer to fill in for Sheila,” she said after another sip of her hot drink. She sounded more resigned than enthusiastic, but Drew would take it. The little rim of foam had resumed its place on her upper lip, making her look deliciously lickable once more. “She’s been trying to get me to pose for them for years, anyway. Do you think I could get her to leave my face out of the pictures, if I did that?” Drew hid his grin behind his own huge coffee cup. His mind was already offering up vivid images of Eva, delightfully tied by him in a variety of ways. He tried to ignore the tightening of his cock in his pants and keep his voice casual as he answered. “Sure, I think she’d probably be open to negotiation.”
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Chapter Four “The braid rocks.” Danny was circling Eva, fussing with the light meter and calling out ideas to Sheila as Drew finished the final step of the tie he was working on for the first series of photos. “We need to get some shots with this hairdo when you’re in one of the full-body binds. No, Evie, your face won’t have to show. We’ll take it from the back. It’ll be very tasteful.” “It’s an illustrated book about bondage,” Eva pointed out, grimacing as Drew started cinching in the ropes that bound her forearms together from elbow to wrist. “I gave up on tasteful when I agreed to do this.” “Too much?” Drew murmured, tracking his fingers back along the ropes, testing for slack. Eva shook her head and looked away from his hands as he carefully worked the ropes tighter. “Just because it’s about bondage,” Danny insisted, “doesn’t mean it can’t be tasteful. You can make anything tasteful. Think Mapplethorpe.” “Think Man Ray,” Drew suggested, remembering her fondness for surrealist art. “Or maybe not,” she retorted. “He was a fan of the Marquis de Sade’s work, you know.” Drew smiled and tugged on the final knot before pulling Eva’s arms closer so he could stage-whisper in her ear. “Yes, I know.” “That’s about as far from tasteful as it gets,” muttered Eva, but she shivered at the brush of Drew’s lips against her earlobe. He thought she would be tense by now, ready to be freed, but instead she had softened with each new twist of the rope as if she’d been bound from head to toe already and given up the fight. It was a delightful notion. “Miss Godfrey, you’re a vision,” Drew said with an appreciative smile as he examined his work on Eva’s arms. She was perched on a simple black wooden stool in 30
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front of a draped dark canvas, and her forearms were held down in front of her body, clearly displaying the complex series of knots that bound them. In a skin-toned body stocking, she looked as close to nude as she could without actually being nude. Her simple hairstyle, a French braid that ended a few inches past her shoulders, was elegant and made her neck look even longer. “You should let me do some beauty shots, Evie,” Sheila said. “Just head and shoulders. After we get the ones for the book, I mean.” Drew watched Eva’s face, surprised at how expressive it could be given that she usually looked so reserved. She was bemused now, and her lips curved up at the corners in an incredulous little smile. “You said no faces. I’m not even wearing any makeup.” “I know. And yet you look all fresh and pretty. It’s sick.” Sheila took a final slurp of coffee from the insulated mug she’d been nursing all evening, then jumped up behind the tripod-mounted camera. “Okay, honey, let’s make some more magic.” It only took a few minutes to complete the last series of photos that would illustrate the technique Drew had used. After that, Sheila took the camera off the tripod and goofed around, taking candid shots of the group as Drew untied Eva’s arms and Danny attempted to help using only his hopelessly uncoordinated right hand. “How long will these marks last?” Eva asked, frowning at the crosshatched red imprint of rope decorating both arms from elbow to wrist. “Not long,” Danny assured her. “There wasn’t any chafing, right? They should fade in a few minutes, maybe half an hour.” “It depends,” Sheila added. “They’re beautiful, though.” Eva frowned down at the marks, but Drew privately agreed with Sheila. He had been able to contain himself throughout the shoot, but something about the marks on Eva’s fair skin made him long to see her entire body marked that way, flushed and damp, with post-coital bliss written all over her face.
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“Are we getting dinner now, or what?” Sheila tossed the question over her shoulder as she carefully stowed a long lens in its section of the camera bag. Eva’s gaze flicked to Drew’s in a silent message he couldn’t quite read. A plea? If so, for what? “I’m heading home, actually,” she said as she disappeared into the cramped bathroom with her street clothes in hand. She left the door cracked enough to allow for conversation, but Drew couldn’t see anything interesting through the small opening. “I have some work to do. Maybe tomorrow, though.” “Me too,” Drew said, hoping he was making the right choice. “I’m pretty wiped out, gonna make it an early night.” Sheila’s head came up like a herd animal on alert. She opened her mouth then closed it again when Danny cleared his throat at her. He smiled blandly at Drew, who rolled his eyes at the whole thing and tried not to let his hopes rise too high when, a few minutes later, Eva asked him to walk her to her car. They made it as far as the curb when she turned, and a startled Drew nearly knocked her over. The movement brought them short, with Eva’s back to her car, Drew bracing himself with one hand on either side of her shoulders. He could feel icy metal under his gloved fingers, the steam of her breath, the stirring below his waistband that always happened when he got this close to her. When she didn’t move away or protest, he eased closer, letting her feel his stiff heat against her belly. Drew brought one hand to Eva’s cheek, holding her face, not wanting to let her look away from him. From his need for her. “Just tell me what you want,” he whispered, his words visible as puffs of white that vanished into the chill. He pressed closer still, a brief pulse against her body, and gasped when she pushed back with a moan. “I want you,” she replied, her own breath coming as rapidly as Drew’s. Her eyes looked huge, almost unearthly, in the sodium glare of the streetlight. “I want you. But not—not all that other stuff.” 32
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“No ropes,” Drew hastened to reassure her. Nothing up my sleeve, he thought. Cross my heart. “I told you, I don’t need all that stuff.” And for her, he would even try to mean it. For her, he almost wanted it to be the truth.
***** If Drew had said, “I like vanilla sex sometimes too,” or perhaps, “I’m not in the lifestyle, it’s just one of my favorite hobbies,” he would have been on firmer ethical ground. But then he would probably not have been in Eva’s apartment ten minutes later, pulling her sweater over her head, if he’d said either of those things. On the whole, he thought he’d made the right choice at the time. They were trying to share the important, topical information in a hurry, between heated kisses. It was a conversation that might have been awkward if their motivation had been less immediate. “Do I need condoms?” He was on his knees, kissing his way down her stomach and working her jeans down her hips. Her response was prefaced by a loud gasp as his mouth found a particularly keen spot. “Yeah. Have you been tested?” “Oh my God, what do you even call these things?” “Tanga panties.” The panties were pale blue and lacy and wonderfully revealing, and Drew wondered if it might be possible for her to somehow keep wearing them while he fucked her from behind. “Tested a few months ago. I haven’t slept with anybody since before that. I’m clean as a whistle. I have a condom in my wallet. What about you?” “Ooooh.” He had pressed his mouth at the bottom of the soft patch of hair beneath the lace, working his lips there and then breathing out slowly. Eva melted a fraction more. 33
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“Evie?” “Mm. Yeah. Um, clean too. I haven’t had sex in almost two years. Oh God, do that again.” He did it again, and she slid her fingers into his hair and held him there, arching her hips into the heat and pressure. Drew decided the panties, awesome though they might be, needed to go. Soon. He needed to have better landmarks to work with, and he wanted to see her. He wanted to see her wrapped in a network of ropes, barely able to move a finger as he had his way with every exposed inch of her delicate skin. “Fuck.” “Drew?” She tugged gently on his hair. Pushing the vision firmly down the basement stairs of his mind, closing and padlocking the door, Drew inhaled and let the sweet, tangy scent of Eva’s arousal spur him forward. He stood up and kissed her. Hard, unequivocal. His teeth grazed her lips and he tried to pull himself back, pace himself. But she groaned and leaned in for more. Drew traced his hands down her slender back, taking a moment to marvel at her silky texture before finding and unhooking the clasp to her bra. It was blue, it matched the interesting panties, it was on the floor with the rest of her clothes and his shirt. “Two years, really?” He skimmed his hands over her rib cage, brushing his thumbs along the edges of her small breasts and enjoying the tickle of her firmly pebbled nipples across his chest. When he was standing and Eva was barefoot, he was just tall enough that she couldn’t kiss him unless he bent down. She tried, much to Drew’s delight, stretching up on her toes. He bypassed her mouth and went for her neck instead, and as he worried at the muscle below her ear, he finally gave into temptation and curled one hand over her breast. Her nipple hardened against his palm, and Drew reveled in the sigh that followed his fingers over the sensitive pink and white contours.
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He still had jeans on, and they felt increasingly restrictive. Drew’s fingers met Eva’s over the zipper and they shared an awkward laugh. She looked chagrined, like a kid caught reaching for a forbidden cookie. Drew had to remind himself to keep his hands moving, to get the offending pants off. Only after he slid them down did he consider he might have kept his boxers on. Too late, though, and they were both completely naked, which reduced his brain to little more than a placeholder in his skull. “We should get under the covers, it’s freezing,” Eva said before he could reach for her. Drew followed her down the narrow hallway, delighted by the view. Her bedroom was furnished in a cozy, traditional style with a four-poster bed and a quilt that looked antique. It surprised him. He’d expected sleek and modern, minimalist, like an art gallery. This, while not fussy, was decidedly old-fashioned, though the dark taupe paint and the few knickknacks scattered about made the room look more eclectic and artsy than it might have. She was turning the covers down as neatly as she might for sleep, and Drew recognized the tension that had returned to her shoulders. Her narrow back was straight and stiff and turned directly his way. “Two years is a long time. You nervous?” He stepped behind her and slipped his arms around her waist. So tempting to let his hands roam. He resisted as much as possible and was rewarded by the simple trust evident in Eva’s touch when she wrapped her hands over his forearms and pressed him closer. “A little. I think I’m making decisions because I’m horny. Those are not usually the best decisions.” Drew laughed and squeezed tighter, feeling every millimeter of contact between his skin and hers as a delicious, warm promise of things to come. “I’ll do my best to keep you from regretting it.” His approach was more measured now than it had been in the living room. He wanted her anxiety gone, her senses engaged. He wanted to make her smile. So he 35
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mapped out a course with his hands, tracking every dip and rise he planned to cover later with his mouth. His fingers circled the spots his tongue would linger in the longest. When Eva arched into the gentle exploration, lifting her hands behind her to rest at his neck, Drew felt a sense of achievement he knew he really hadn’t earned yet. But it was still so sweet, such a triumph, having this particular girl in his arms after all that unprecedented effort. And if he wanted her in more than his arms, wanted her knotted in place in his home with a rope she could never hope to untangle, he was aroused enough to ignore that desire in favor of something a little more conventional. Eva turned, smiling, and pulled him onto the bed with her in a giggling heap. Giddy, out of his head with want, Drew rolled her under him in one smooth motion and held her hands as he pressed his hips down. His cock, rock hard and eager, caught against Eva’s pelvis and then snapped down to ride against her pussy. They both cried out at the hot friction, and it was all Drew could do not to push forward just that tiny bit, angle his thrust and enter her right then. Condom be damned, babies be damned. He took her mouth instead, fucking it with his tongue until they were both breathless. Eva writhed against him, heels on his ass for leverage, groaning. When Drew realized she was pleasuring herself against his length, he almost came on the spot. “Get the—” “Condom.” They spoke over each other, and laughed again as Drew reached for his jeans to retrieve the rubber from his wallet. Only one, which he replaced every few months if needed. He suddenly wondered why he didn’t carry more, a whole pack of emergency condoms, in case he found and desperately wanted to spend a whole weekend in bed with the hot girl of his dreams. But they only had one, so they would have to make the most of it. Protection in place, Drew crawled back to his spot and tucked his hands under Eva’s shoulders, cradling her. She worked a hand between them, finding his cock and stroking it firmly. 36
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“You don’t seem rusty at all,” he choked out. Her hand felt so much smaller than his own, so foreign. She pulled him at just the right speed, just the right intensity, and he saw stars when he closed his eyes. When he opened them, she was guiding him to her pussy, rubbing his tip inside her. “Some skills you never lose,” she said with a shaky grin. She was flushed, trembling, and he wasn’t sure if it was nerves or arousal, but it was far too late to turn back. At the last second, remembering it had been a while for her, he considered lube— but then it was evident they didn’t need any. Eva was so wet, so slick and hot and soft, that when she arched her back to meet his first thrust, Drew knew he wouldn’t last long. He didn’t need to, though. Eva came after only a few delectable moments, eyes shut as she strained against him, mouth open and panting. Drew drove deeper, and then let his body take over as Eva’s trembling began to ease. He pushed his cock deep into her warmth again and again, and the divine tension he’d suffered for weeks finally built and broke and shattered him beyond repair.
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Chapter Five Drew wished he were less distracted. He wanted to lose himself in what he was doing with the ropes, and the way Eva’s skin looked exactly as he’d imagined it would when he restrained her. It was Sunday afternoon, a long shoot, and the mood as the four of them worked was relaxed and congenial. He had worried that things might be awkward, that Eva might feel awkward, if they revealed their budding relationship to Danny and Sheila. But their subtle shows of affection passed unremarked, and soon they were caught up in the work anyway. The day had the potential to be perfect. Instead, all he could think about as he relaxed between posing sessions was his brother Seth’s revelation, shared over a late pancake breakfast that morning after he’d gone home from Eva’s to shower and change. The simple, classic diamond solitaire Seth had showed him so proudly. Seth’s plan to ask his girlfriend Allison to marry him, while the family was in town over the Christmas holidays. They had been dating only a few months, but Seth said he knew she was The One. Allison was a great girl, and Drew liked her a lot. He was thrilled for his brother, but it was still disconcerting to think of Seth getting married. It marked the end of an era. “Okay, folks,” Danny said, startling Drew from his train of thought. “Break’s over. Let’s move on to the next one, see what we can get done before lunch.” “What’s next, again?” Drew was already bending over the duffel bag of neatly wrapped rope bundles, looking for the lengths he might need. “Shinju,” Danny replied. “You sure you’re okay with this, Evie?” The tie would bind her breasts tightly above and below, squeezing them into prominence. It was the first binding they would photograph that was overtly sexual.
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She looked a little nervous but nodded. Drew realized she was still wearing the deep red Chinese silk robe she had taken to throwing on over the bodysuit, and he wondered why. Then his thoughts abandoned him as Eva sat on the floor in front of the backdrop and let the robe slip from her shoulders to puddle around her waist. She was topless. Right there in front of everybody, in the middle of the afternoon. He had no idea why it was about a million times hotter to see her breasts this way than it had been the last time he saw them. He nearly whimpered openly as his cock stiffened at the sight. As Danny fussed with the drape of the silk around Eva’s hips, Drew tried to gather his scattered wits and look as though he weren’t about to keel over in shock and lust. “Um, the black rope, right?” He thought back over the conversation of that morning, trying to recall hearing Eva agree to do the shinju binding topless. Nope. He remembered nothing. Either she and Danny had talked about it when he wasn’t there, or he’d been more distracted by Seth’s engagement than he ever would have thought possible. “Yeah. We’re keeping the robe draped over her legs, it’ll go nicely in the shot. Honey, you need help with anything?” The lighting for the next several shots was to be more dramatic, and Sheila was busy shutting out the sunlight and arranging the reflectors. “No, I’m good. Hey. Wow. Evie, you’re going to make me look all kinds of bad when I get back to being the model. My boobs aren’t nearly as pretty as yours,” she quipped, as she fiddled with the equipment. “Oh. Um, thanks?” A deep blush spread over Eva’s face and chest, and Drew could see her start to hunch her shoulders, a marked change from her initial statue-straight posture. He was surprised to feel a surge of protectiveness. He didn’t want her to be stiff and self-conscious; he wanted her to be open and comfortable, and to enjoy this.
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“You don’t have to fish for compliments, Sheila,” he quipped. “Your boobs are every bit as nice as Eva’s. It’s just we’ve all seen yours enough times that the novelty has worn off.” The round of laughter that followed seemed to relax Eva a fraction. Sheila’s comeback relaxed her a bit more, and within a few minutes, the four were back to talking and joking as they had before the unveiling. Drew was glad for the enforced slow pace of the photo shoot, which required him to stop every few minutes while Sheila took pictures of each step during the process. The more artistic shots would come at the end, when the binding was complete; these photos, however, were meant to be instructional. It made the whole thing more impersonal, more clinical, and the friendly mood in the room certainly lent itself to a platonic approach. None of that changed the fact, though, that Drew was wildly turned-on from the moment he looped the first coil of soft black nylon braid around Eva’s slim, taut body. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it weren’t clear from the start that Eva was feeling it too. Her eyes were half closed, her lips parted, while a gentle flush once again warmed her face and chest. Not the embarrassed red of a few minutes earlier, but a soft glow that accompanied the rush of blood to engorged nipples. “Not too tight,” Danny murmured at one point when Drew was close to finishing the binding. “Not during the instructional stuff, anyway. If she’s okay with it, you can make it snugger for the shots we do after that.” Drew realized it was the first thing anyone had said in a while except for brief instructions from Sheila about when to stop so she could take pictures. He had been too wrapped up in wrapping Eva up, too involved in the pressure of the rope and his fingers against her skin. Lost in the way her silken flesh gave under the restraint, and in the wholly enraptured expression she wore. As though she was mesmerized. Which is why Danny spoke to me, not to Eva, Drew thought. She was in no state to converse.
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Eva was in deep subspace, drugged by the rope. Danny and Sheila had noticed it before Drew, obviously. Or rather, Drew had noticed but lacked their objectivity since he was a willing participant. Perhaps even the culprit. “Evie?” he asked as Sheila angled for another set of shots once the binding was complete. “You doing okay, sweetheart?” She blinked slowly, pupils wide, and nodded. A sleepy smile crossed her lips, and Drew suddenly wanted to kiss her more than anything he had ever wanted in his life. He sneaked a finger up to her lips instead, his breath catching when she closed her eyes and opened her mouth a fraction to flick her tongue against his fingertip. “Hey, hey, enough of that!” Sheila smacked Drew’s hand away. “You can do that on your own time, Casanova. This is business right now. Evie, c’mon. Sit up straight. Pull your arms away from your sides just a little. Drew, get out of the shot.” Her abrupt, no-nonsense tone helped Drew snap out of it, and pulled Eva mostly back into the land of the living. He went to the little fridge where Sheila kept water and sodas, pulled out a can of cola and brought it back to hand to Eva once Sheila finished. Then he took himself off to the bathroom, where a few seconds with his head under a briskly cold faucet helped restore him to his senses enough to brave returning to the room. Eva was holding the cold can of soda to the back of her neck, and she shot him a mortified look when he walked back in and threw himself on the couch. Shelia was busy untying the ropes, which made Drew vaguely jealous. Not only because he wanted to spend more time touching Eva, but because he was proprietary about his handiwork. He had to admit, though, it was probably wisest for them all to take a break. “So…” He grinned at the group, all friendly innocence. “Who’s buying lunch?”
***** The afternoon was worse, in many respects. 41
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For one thing, the binding was more time-consuming, a very complex and decorative weaving that secured Eva’s arms behind her back. She had the body stocking back on, which helped some from Drew’s perspective. Unfortunately, now she was on her guard and couldn’t relax. The ropes chafed, the knots hit uncomfortable pressure points, her stance was stiff and awkward. Drew was close enough to realize she was also still turned-on. She was obviously trying to deny it, though, trying to keep from letting herself go. The situation was making her anxious and irritable. Drew knew some people responded strongly and instantly to bondage, particularly ropes, in the way that most people only reacted to intense foreplay. He’d seen something like it in clubs a few times, but only in people he knew were experienced submissives. Eva’s response, though, was as surprising as it was remarkable. “She’s a total rope slut,” was Sheila’s pithy assessment. “Yeah, it’s pretty extreme,” Danny agreed, clearly not minding the development in the slightest. “But it makes sense. I always thought she protested too much.” “I’m right here, you know. I can hear you.” Eva frowned and tried to flex her shoulders. “Oh, honey, don’t try to do that right now. It looks like you’re about to dislocate something.” Eva snorted at Sheila’s show of concern. “It feels like I’m about to dislocate something. And my nose itches.” “Drew, scratch her nose. In fact, you know what? We’re going to take five here. We’ll text you when we’re on the way back. Come on, Danny, let’s go for a walk or something.” On her way out, Sheila gave Drew a piercing look that he struggled to interpret. Was she angry with him? Did she want him to do something?
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Eva was rubbing her itchy nose against his fingertips, clearly not very satisfied with the arrangement. “Can’t you untie me?” “No, not unless it actively hurts or something’s going numb. We’re too far into this. It would take forever to redo it, then they’d have to reset the lighting, and I don’t think Sheila’s in any mood to wait around for that. Is your nose all scratched now?” “It’s better,” she confessed with sigh, “and this doesn’t hurt, exactly.” Drew traced his hands over the knots and then let them trail over her shoulders, where he began to work at the taut muscles as much as Eva’s position would allow. She was sitting on the floor, knees folded neatly to one side, and when Drew sat behind her to get a better angle on the massage, her fingers brushed lightly against the crotch of his jeans. Both of them held their breath for a moment, then released it again as he settled in behind her. They were clearly pretending it hadn’t happened, and Drew was all right with that. Acknowledging it would probably only worsen the situation. Given that he had been walking around half hard all day, he really couldn’t take having things worsened at that point. Their encounter the previous night had, if anything, made his need keener instead of easing the pressure. It was as if, rather than working her out of his system, he had only worked her deeper in. “I can’t untie you,” he said as he worked his fingers more firmly against her, “but I could try to relax you.” She tensed instantly, pulling away, and Drew mentally smacked his forehead for dropping such a stupefyingly obvious line. “I mean really to relax you, not—” “I know what you meant.” “Sorry.” “No. You shouldn’t apologize. I know you’re trying to help.” “Okay. So then let me help.”
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She took a moment too long to answer, and Drew knew he was about to hear less than the truth. “I just want to get this over with.” His response, given without thinking, was more forceful than he meant it to be. “No you don’t.” “Excuse me?” Figuring he might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb, Drew leaned forward and pulled Eva back by the shoulders until her arms pressed against his chest again. He could feel her wild pulse, her quickening breath, and it gave him courage to continue in his reckless course of action. “You don’t want to get this over with. You want to drag it out.” “You don’t know what you’re talking about.” “On the contrary, I know many things about you, Miss Godfrey. Including some things you apparently don’t want me to know.” “Oh? Such as?” Always one for a challenge, Drew held Eva tighter to prevent her escape, leaning over her shoulder and turning her slightly to look at her. “Such as the thing about how turned-on you get when I tie you up.” He kissed her before she could answer, muscling his way in, giving in to the impatience that had plagued him all afternoon. They were both breathing hard when he finally let up and continued talking. “You don’t want to admit it, but it’s true,” he went on. “And I don’t understand what the issue is. You have friends in the lifestyle. Not just hobbyists, either. You know the deal. You don’t seem to have a moral objection to it. You’re even agreeing to be photographed for a book about it. It’s obvious you love this, bad experience or not. I can’t figure out why you’re working so hard to fight it, Evie.” A look of sheer misery crossed her normally implacable face, and Drew’s heart nearly broke at the obvious pain.
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“Is that the only reason you wanted to go out with me? So you could do that?” “The only reason?” Drew shrugged. “No, not the only reason, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think about how you’d look that way. All tied up,” he clarified, as his hands wandered from her shoulders and brushed over her breasts on the way down to her waist. “From your neck to your feet, nice and tight.” “You said you weren’t in the lifestyle,” she whispered. “I’m not. You already know I don’t have to do this to get off. But I sure as hell like it. And I like you. And you seem to like this. So why is it such a problem? Tell me.” She shook her head, refusing to meet his eyes. “I’ve never told anybody about this.” “Well,” he said, using a finger on her chin to gently coax her to face him again, “maybe it’s time you did.” It was a long, tense moment of silence filled with muddy thoughts and doubts. Drew was on the verge of breaking it when Eva finally spoke, her voice coming out in a shaky little whisper as though she feared being overheard. “Tonight. Let’s get through the rest of the shoot, and then I’ll tell you tonight.”
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Chapter Six She looked small and forlorn, sitting in the middle of his bed that evening, wrapped in a blanket and clutching a mug of hot chocolate laced with peppermint schnapps. Ready to tell her tale, but not happy to do so. They had wrapped up the photo shoot earlier than usual, never having hit that magical workflow Danny and Sheila so often achieved. Eva had been withdrawn, thoughtful and compliant but not animated as they finished the day’s tasks. She hadn’t complained when Drew drove her to his apartment instead of hers, or when he settled her in the bed like the fragile invalid she suddenly seemed. Drew perched near the foot of the bed, hoping like hell he had done the right thing in pressuring her to talk about it. She was pale, even more so than usual, and her face was expressionless as she started to speak. “It’s not what you’re probably thinking. I wasn’t abused or anything. In fact, the more I think about it, the dumber it seems that it’s even an issue.” “Why don’t you just tell me? And then if it seems dumb, we’ll take it from there.” She sighed. “Okay. It started in high school. Or the summer after high school. I had been dating the same boy for almost two years. Andy,” she said, and a ghost of a smile whispered across her lips. “I think we both already knew we would go our separate ways once we got to college, but we were friends, we trusted each other. We had fun, and we were trying a lot of new things that summer, going a little crazy. “So this particular time, he’d decided to try tying me to the bedposts. I was laughing at first, just going along with it. But once he had me all tied up and started to touch me, I realized I really couldn’t get away. And everything changed.” A shiver passed through her, but it didn’t look like one of cold. Her eyes drifted shut as her story grew more intense. 46
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“Andy realized something was different too. I was so turned-on, and he barely had to touch me before I came. And even after that I was asking for more. Begging. We sixty-nined and I came again, which had never happened before. Andy started putting a condom on, but he was still kneeling up over my head. I still had my mouth on his— I was still sort of returning the favor…” Surprised that she’d stopped her story in the middle of the action, Drew gave her a second before prompting her. “And then?” With a deep breath, Eva whispered, “And then my mother walked in.” “Oh fuck.” The picture was all too sharp in Drew’s mind. The girl, naked and flushed from her recent debauchery, tied in an X. The boy, his skinny haunches straddling her head, his freshly sheathed cock straining upward while she nuzzled his balls from beneath. There would be no possible way to explain that away. No way to claim it wasn’t exactly what it looked like. “Yeah. ‘Oh fuck’ is right. She freaked out. Not only in the way you might think,” Eva explained, the memory of her mortification still marring her features. “I mean, she started screaming and hitting us both. Andy was trying to untie me and still protect me from her, and then she said…” Eva sniffled, and although she looked like she might cry at any moment, no tears fell. She looked too cold for tears; they would surely turn to ice before reaching her cheeks. “Then she said I was a sick pervert just like my father, and that’s why she’d kicked him out, and now I could get out too. And we were all going straight to hell.” “Wow.” He thought he should probably say more but couldn’t think of anything appropriate to counter what he’d heard. “Wow.” “Yeah, I always thought he’d had a drinking problem or something, and that’s why they’d split up. That’s what I’d been led to believe up to that point, anyway. Turns out, not so much.” Eva looked ill, but determined to finish. “I was coming here to college anyway, so Mom packed me off early. Actually, she had me on a plane the next day.
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She sent all my stuff after me later. I mean all my stuff, everything she had of mine. Baby clothes, pictures. Everything. That was it, as far as she was concerned.” “Sweetie, I am so sorry. That’s so… I don’t know what to say.” Drew’s own parents were still together after decades, and happily so. They were pretty easygoing and pragmatic, on the whole. He suspected if they knew about his bedroom predilections they might be more concerned about potential liability issues than his immortal soul. He couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for Eva. “A few years ago, she called me up to tell me she forgave me. She was going through some counseling program. You notice I didn’t say she apologized or asked me to forgive her for anything. It’s obvious she still thinks I’m a deviant. Like my dad, the famous pervert. Someday I may get up the nerve to ask him what she was talking about.” “He never explained? Doesn’t he know why she kicked you out?” She shrugged, plucking idly at the comforter, folding the fabric in small pleats between her fingers. “I think she told him she’d caught me doing something nasty with a boy. I gather from some comments he’s made that she’d always had some issues with sex, but I’ve never asked him to elaborate on that. We’re closer than we were when I was growing up, but not quite that close. I mean, who talks about bondage with their dad? He’s remarried, and I like my stepmother. They don’t seem like freaks.” “What, no secret sex dungeon in the basement?” “Not unless there’s a trick door hidden behind the washing machine.” “I think it’s probably behind that treadmill they never use,” Drew suggested. “You’ve been in my dad’s basement?” “No. But all parents’ basements are pretty much the same.” Eva chuckled, a welcome sound. “It’s stupid, I know. I’m letting her control me more now than she did when I lived in her house.”
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“Do you think it’s deviant? In the bad way, I mean? Do you think there’s something wrong with liking bondage?” She thought a moment before answering. “In theory, no. I don’t think it’s a ticket to hell, either. My mom got religious in a big way after my dad left, but I was already thirteen by then, so I guess it was too late for her to pull me into all that. Though she certainly tried. Mostly, I don’t think it’s anybody else’s business what two consenting adults do in private.” “And you know plenty of people who would be thrilled to tie you up.” “It’s true,” she admitted. “I admit that I’m drawn to people who are in the lifestyle. I think it’s because that way I can get close to it, see it, without risking myself. It’s the vicarious experience.” Drew was surprised she was so candid, and so self-aware. “So why not just do it?” Eva met his eyes bravely. She seemed more relaxed, more open than she had since he’d met her. “Because every time I’ve tried, it takes me right back to that moment. There’s nothing less sexy than the memory of your mother screaming, slapping you, and telling you that you’re a pervert who’s going to hell. All while you’re naked, can’t move, and your boyfriend’s penis is smacking you in the face.” It was all Drew could do not to laugh. The image was so awful but at the same time, so absurd. “Says you. I bet there are people who pay good money to get exactly that experience. Ow!” She had picked up one of the pillows and whacked him with it. And she was smiling, which Drew took as a good sign. The relief was palpable. “I don’t even know if it’s actually what I want,” she went on, “or if I’ve spent so many years wondering about it, wondering what if, that I’ve psyched myself into believing that.” “Only one way to find out.”
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Drew tossed the pillow back to the head of the bed with an easy overhand lob, then reached to the corner of the bed and pulled back the comforter and sheets to reveal a second fitted sheet and the knotted intersection of two thin ropes. A binding point. A series of similar ropes provided sturdy attachment locations at all four corners. Handy, since he didn’t have a bed with posters suitable for use in tethering a willing partner. Eva looked puzzled for a second before the light dawned. Then she turned a suspicious, but nonetheless curious, glance toward Drew. “But you’re not in that lifestyle, you say.” He shrugged and grinned. “I’m the bondage Boy Scout, remember? It’s important to be prepared.” “Uh huh. I should be angry with you for lying to me.” “Lying? Not exactly. I told you I like it but I don’t require it to get off. Hell, I’ll do you right now, no strings or ropes attached.” “But you prefer it. The ropes.” “Sometimes,” Drew offered. “With some people more than others.” “With me?” He sighed, a deep, shuddering breath. “Oh yeah. I’ve wanted that since the first time I saw you.” She considered that, taking a sip of her hot chocolate. Then she said the three sweetest words Drew could ever remember hearing. “Let’s try it.”
***** Distraction, Drew reasoned, was the key to success in this endeavor. He also reasoned that working up to full restraint slowly was probably the smartest plan, but then lust threw reason out the window. Drew realized he might only get one shot at this and was determined to make the most of it. Besides, he had never been one for half measures. 50
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Unable to choose between the swift efficiency of a simple tie-down and the chance to try something more decorative but time-consuming, Drew decided to do a bit of both. “We’ll start,” he explained, “with the rope cage.” He was already running the chosen rope through his fingers, shaking out the loops. It was plain hemp, nothing fancy. The design of the binding would provide all the visual interest. He also knew he didn’t have enough black rope on hand to do what he had in mind—most of his stuff was in its storage bag at Danny and Sheila’s, awaiting the next photo shoot. “Doesn’t this one have a Japanese name?” “Not the version I’m doing. But it’s an adaptation of a traditional karada, a body bind. Okay, stand right here. And take all your clothes off.” Eva lifted her eyebrows. “That’s…abrupt.” Drew laughed. “Sorry, sorry. But seriously. This is going to take some time. If I start romancing you right now, we’ll get sidetracked and this probably won’t happen at all. Wow, I can see why a lot of guys who do this are Dominants. That probably makes this part a lot easier.” “Easier how?” She was shaking her head, but shucking her jeans off all the same. “If I were a Dom and you were my submissive, I’d tell you to strip and you’d do it.” Despite his intentions, he couldn’t resist helping with the bra, and taking more time with the job than was probably required. But once Eva stood, naked and stunning at the foot of his bed, Drew found himself itching to start the rope work. Around the back of her neck first, the center of the bight marking the perfect bisection of the coarse rope’s length. Then the first knot, a series of intertwined loops that pulled tightly together just below Eva’s sternum. While he worked, he could ignore that Eva’s nipples were responding—either to the cool air or to the situation—but when he took a step back to assess the knot’s symmetry, he couldn’t help leaning right back in
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and suckling one of the tight, rosy buds. Eva sighed and cupped the back of his head, but when she tried to coax him up for a kiss, Drew smiled and resumed his brisk but careful work with the rope. Another knot over the belly, and his fingers brushed the soft skin there in growing anticipation. The contrast between the rough, prickly rope and Eva’s silky texture was enough to bring Drew’s cock to attention. He had to get on his knees to accomplish the next knot, and he groaned as the movement caused even more constriction in his jeans. “Are you all right?” murmured Eva. He looked up to see her smirking at him. Just a tiny bit. Evil as well as beautiful. “I’ll make it. Lift your foot up.” He tapped on the foot in question, and she obligingly raised first that one and then the other so he could slide the rope beneath. He wound her feet together, finishing with a knot at the ankles, then moved to the rear and began the journey back up her body, weaving the rope from front to back and securing it at each intersection. At calf and knees—her startled gasp when he licked the back of one knee afforded Drew a smirk of his own—and then at the waist. When he passed the rope forward to craft the final part of the harness around her breasts, he tweaked one of her nipples and was delighted to realize it was crinkled and taut. Her breathing was different too. Slower, shakier. Her fingers trailed over the rope where it crossed her hips, stroking at the fibers of the hemp over and over. “Eva?” “Mmm?” Drew secured the rope, letting the loose ends fall down her back, and gently pivoted her to face him. Though she swayed a little on her bound feet, she didn’t seem distressed at the hindered mobility. Far from it. “Oh, honey, you’re doing it again.” Drew could hardly restrain his glee. “Are you with me?”
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“Mmm-hmm.” Her eyes held the same sleepy lust Drew recalled from the photo shoot, and her fingers kept up their rhythmic stroking over the ropes. “I should have asked you this before, but what are you going to tell me if you want me to stop? Do you want a safe word, or is ‘stop’ enough?” After a blurry moment, Eva blinked and nodded. “Basket case.” “Not at all. I think you’re really brave to—” “No, no,” she said, with a brief return of the little smirk. “That’s my safe word. Basket case.” “Oh!” “But thank you.” “No, thank you. For doing this. God, you’re beautiful like this.” He took a long pause, just admiring her body, the smooth curves that the rope emphasized so well. More petite than the girls he usually dated, Eva in her clothes looked almost too thin for his taste. Out of them, and with the snug rope plumping her flesh between its diamond panes, she looked lush. Almost voluptuous. She also looked a little worried, though. It was nerves, he realized. The smirk was her nervous smile, and now she was biting her lip, brow furrowing, because he had distracted her out of the blissful trance the rope had drugged her into. He needed to distract her right back into it. Stepping closer, he scooped her slight frame into his arms, startling a squeak out of her. She clasped her arms around his neck and looked toward the bed as he approached it. Drew wanted to follow her down, maintain the maddening contact, feel more of the whiskery ropes and the soft, smooth skin beneath his hands. The almost shy smile on Eva’s lips, the hint of wetness that lingered on his forearm from where it had grazed across the cleft between her upper thighs as he lowered her
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onto the rumpled sheet. Everything about her overwhelmed his senses, going straight to his cock, which ached with the need to be inside her. But there was one more step he needed to take care of. “Give me your hands.” She complied, not even looking puzzled. Just accepting and trusting. Drew realized he was holding his breath. Afraid to breathe, to break the spell. Afraid the perfection would be marred if he did or said the wrong thing. It took him hardly any time to bind Eva’s wrists as he had the night they’d met, and to secure the tether to the rope that spanned one side of the mattress. “Perfect,” he whispered. She was on her side, snugly crisscrossed with rope from shoulders to heels, lashed down at the hands. The pattern of the cage binding left the backs of her thighs and her buttocks exposed, and where they joined Drew could see a glint of wet pink. “Drew,” Eva whispered back. Her eyes were nearly closed, and her dreamy smile was intoxicating all on its own. He rounded the bed so he could stand at the side where her head rested. Soon, so soon, he would feel the heat of her mouth, her pussy, on his loudly complaining dick. “You saw me lock the door to the apartment, right? You know nobody can come in here.” “Yes.” “And you want this?” “Yes. God, so much.” More urgent now. A tiny bit frantic. She writhed, her thighs sliding against each other, and Drew’s patience snapped. He slid his jeans and shorts off and brought his straining erection right up to Eva’s parted lips. He cried out in pleased amazement when she lapped at him, slipping her agile tongue into his slit before using it to circle the swollen head.
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Leaning forward, he let his weight carry him farther between her lips and reveled in the sensation as his fingers sought Eva’s breast and began teasing at her nipple. He used his other hand to cup her head, applying only the lightest pressure, resisting the urge to fuck her mouth. He was pitched too high already. The slick, hot wriggle of her tongue against his erection was enough to make him sweat, but it was the vibration of her mouth over his flesh when she moaned that forced Drew to pull out and reach for the bedside table, desperate for a condom. He nearly dropped it, his hands were so shaky, but he finally coaxed the thing on and rounded the bed to crawl up behind Eva and spoon his body around hers. “Please…” she whispered, arching her back to press her ass against his cock. He gasped and pushed back against the sweet pressure, fingers tugging for leverage on the rope that crossed her hip. But it wasn’t enough. Drew reached between them, cursing softly at having to suffer even that much separation, and followed the seam between Eva’s thighs straight up to the slick heat he longed to bury himself in. Her pussy was drenched, and when he slid two fingers inside her she cried out and tried to fuck them. Her motions were too constrained by the ropes, which allowed her only a slight flexing at the hips. Her ragged cry ripped through the last shred of Drew’s restraint, and he replaced his fingers with his aching cock, driving balls-deep in one rough thrust. Eva’s cries mingled with his own as he worked himself in and out of her, gripping at rope and skin to steady them both against the severity of their responses. Drew felt accosted by pleasure, blindsided, and above all that was the urge to hold this woman even tighter than the ropes that bound her. He wanted to cover her up, tuck her into himself. Spin a web around her that would protect her from the world. And fuck her until neither of them could move. “Drew,” she whispered. She was shaking, and he realized through his heated blur that she was crying even as she gasped with pleasure. But she didn’t say the words that would stop him, and only those words would have. Drew surged into her again and 55
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again, marking the rising pitch of her moans, the whiteness of her knuckles where she gripped the ropes restraining her hands. It dawned on him that he was in over his head, that he was in love. Then Eva came, shuddering in a profound, almost silent ecstasy. It was too much to withstand, the rhythmic tightening of her cunt around him. He went over after her, shouting, startled and unwilling to let it be over. Undone, utterly undone, by what had gripped them both. Trembling. Sticky. Sweat already chilling over still-heated skin. Drew lifted his head weakly to see Eva’s eyes were closed. Evidence of tears was still there in the blurs of mascara darkening her lids. He hadn’t even known she was wearing any makeup. “Sweetheart?” For the first time in several minutes, he was coherent enough to worry that he might have pushed too far, too fast. “Are you okay?” She took a second before nodding. Just that, no words. Perhaps she didn’t have any to fit the occasion, Drew thought. He reached over to his nightstand for a tissue to dab away the ruined makeup but stopped when Eva murmured, “Don’t let go. Not yet.” So he lay back down and held her, even tighter than the ropes.
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Chapter Seven Why did that have to happen on a Sunday night? Drew slurped a bit of foam off his second cup of latte, and the creamy sweetness only reminded him of Eva’s skin. The mahogany of his desktop, cool but rapidly warming under his hand, also reminded him of Eva’s skin. And the sunrise that tinted the sky such a rosy, golden hue was exactly the shade of the gorgeous flush that suffused her face when she was aroused. Drew looked away from his office window and tried to focus on the meeting agenda on the computer screen in front of him. When he started having lyrically lewd thoughts about the color of the red stapler next to the monitor, however, he pushed his keyboard away and swung his chair around to face his door. It was hard sometimes, being the boss. This was his meeting, he couldn’t skip it or show up late. He couldn’t show up unprepared, either. For all his easygoing manner, Drew actually worked hard to make sure his employees were happy. He knew that showing up for a Monday morning meeting to a boss who had slept late and didn’t have a plan would make nobody happy. Least of all him. The only thing that would make him truly happy at the moment, of course, involved Eva Godfrey and several hundred feet of well-conditioned rope. He still felt a lingering glow from the events of the previous night. He wanted to believe it was all about finally getting to tie the girl up and boff her, because that was simple. Drew liked simple. But even beyond that heady thrill was the lingering admiration for Eva’s bravery. Her willingness to try, her wholehearted commitment once she had agreed and the payoff that meant a great deal more than just sexual satisfaction. Although the sexual satisfaction had also been mind-blowing. 57
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“Is that your second cup already? Late night?” Annabelle, his chief operations officer, was standing in the open doorway of his office, looking rumpled and sleepy and extremely casual in snug jeans and a tattoo art tshirt. She held her own cup from Starbucks in one hand, a tablet computer in the other. She didn’t look like a Harvard MBA with a wall full of computer-related credentials, or like a woman who could lead a team of high-powered consultants into a Fortune 500 company and revamp their entire workflow, but Drew knew she was all that and more. She intimidated the hell out of him at times, in fact, when she put her game face on. Yawning hugely, Annabelle slumped into one of his guest chairs and put her Converse-clad feet up on the edge of his desk. Drew lifted an eyebrow but allowed the feet to remain as he accepted the tablet she pushed his way. “A bit of a late night, yeah. What’s this? Budget?” “Yep. I was playing with some numbers to see if we can afford one of these things for everybody in the office without messing with Christmas bonuses. End-of-year bonuses, I mean.” “Whatever. Do you think it would be worth it?” He listened with a fraction of attention to Annabelle’s enthusiastic justification for getting everyone a tablet, one of her new favorite toys, while the greater part of his mind played with his own new favorite toy. He had a particular traditional karada in mind for the next time he and Eva were together. In red rope. Where had he stored the long, red nylon rope? Was it at Dan and Sheila’s place, or still in the small gear bag from the last time he did a demonstration at the club? “And then everybody should also get a pony with a big pink ribbon around its neck. Do you want to hear why?” “What?” “Just checking. Were you listening to anything else, or was I talking into a void?”
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With a self-deprecating smile, Drew chuckled and shook his head. “Sorry, A.B. I’m a little unfocused this morning.” Annabelle cocked her head, her messy brown ponytail flipping off her shoulder with the movement. She went from looking like a precocious teenager to looking like a cutthroat corporate negotiator in about two seconds flat, a change that would have unsettled Drew if he hadn’t seen it before. “You actually are unfocused,” she remarked, her eyes narrowing. “This isn’t just your jovial Peter Pan act. And you were up late. You’ve been spending an awful lot of time… Oh my God! Drew, is this about a girl? A woman, I mean?” When Annabelle got the eagle eye, Drew knew there was no point in attempting to lie to her. And she was one of those happily married people who wanted to see all their friends settled down, so he knew she wouldn’t rest until he was attached. He shrugged and smiled his best charming schoolboy smile, hoping to convey the casual exhaustion of the sated libertine who still had to get up and run a company the next day. But he knew he wouldn’t fool A.B. even that much. She was already on to him. “Drew Brantley. Wow, I never thought I’d see the day. You’re a mess.” “Yeah, I kind of am.” He liked it. He liked admitting he was a hot mess of gooey emotions about Eva. He thought he might even admit it to Eva at some point in the near future, he was that far gone. It felt too good for him to resist. He knew it was too soon to be so foolishly optimistic about his future, but it was that sort of a mood. Annabelle grinned back at him, looking like a teen again. He recognized himself in her, that ability to switch gears and to disarm people with a casual front. “Well, good for you. It’s about time.” “Thanks. We’ll see how it goes.” “For right now, let’s figure out how this meeting is going to go.” They finished the agenda together, and Drew was nominally more focused for the rest of the day. He didn’t mind the mild amount of teasing he got after Annabelle outed his romantic daydreaming to the team. It was afterward that he recognized a shift in 59
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tone. He was different, and people were different toward him. Suddenly he was this guy with a girlfriend. It shouldn’t have mattered that much, but it did somehow. He felt strangely grown up, like his life was heading in a good direction. And he knew that the real change was in how he perceived himself. All I did was tie her up and fuck her, he told himself sternly when he found himself contemplating installing ring bolts in the sides of his bed frame. It’s not like we got engaged. It’s only been a few dates. We’re having fun. Eva texted him a smiley at lunchtime. He texted back a bigger capital-D smiley, the huge dopey grin he had been concealing for hours. Instead of deleting her text as he usually did, Drew hesitated with his finger over the phone screen. He suspected it was a defining moment when he selected Eva’s smiley and hit “archive”.
***** “I really don’t know why. She just says she wants to meet you.” It made no more sense now than it had the first time Eva had told him, a few minutes earlier. “And you’re okay with that?” “I’m so far from okay with it, I can’t even tell you.” “Well, that’s something, I guess. But you still want to do it.” Eva’s mother. Her whackadoo and possibly evil mother. Taking them out to dinner on Christmas Eve, because she would “happen to be in town”. Drew pushed his linguini around on his plate, noting that the clam sauce was starting to congeal. They had both wanted something rich, some cold weather comfort food, but now he regretted his order. The heavy meal had been so much more appetizing ten minutes earlier. “I think ‘want’ is far too strong a word,” Eva objected. “But I do think I probably need to go. She is my mother, and it’s Christmas. I only wish she hadn’t found out I was 60
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seeing somebody. You really don’t have to come though. Have dinner with your family. I can meet your parents another day. They’re staying with Seth until after Christmas, right?” “Right. Would you have told me about it, the thing with your mom, if I hadn’t asked you to spend Christmas Eve with me?” Eva frowned at her minestrone, looking about as thrilled by it as Drew was by his pasta. “I don’t know. Probably, at some point. I mean, you’d have to meet her some time, if we—I don’t mean that I’m expecting a long-term relationship just because of the other night, but if—” “I am.” “I guess it’s…oh. Oh.” Nothing like a declaration of intent to bring a conversation to a roaring halt. “And not just because of the other night,” Drew added after a few moments of torrid silence. “Do we have to go back to talking about my mother now?” The waiter cleared his throat, interrupting their overloud burst of shared laughter, to ask if their meals were satisfactory. When he departed, Drew reached across the table to twine his fingers through Eva’s. “I really did want to bring you to Seth’s for Christmas Eve, but you have to do what you think is right. Obviously you think the right thing is to have dinner with your mom, so I will come with you and protect you if necessary.” His tone was light, but he meant what he said. He felt protective of Eva in general, lately, wanting to keep the rest of the world from spoiling the fresh, childlike wonder that had started to emerge as her brittle shell dissolved. She had been shy about sharing it with him at first, but now she would relate the beauty of a new painting in the gallery, or her joy at a snow-covered field that reminded her of Currier & Ives, and he
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loved it. Like a kid offering up a noodle painting she’s worked on all afternoon, she presented these glimpses into her soul, and Drew cherished each one.
***** Wherever that sense of joy and wonder had come from, he decided later, it hadn’t come from Eva’s mother. Dinner with Carolanne Damron, formerly Godfrey, turned out to be an exercise in forced civility. Drew suspected Eva had just as much difficulty remaining polite; he could swear at one point during the meal he saw a vein throbbing on her forehead, like a visible indication of an impending migraine. Was Eva’s mother evil, Drew wondered, or simply nuts? Or possibly a combination of the two? He kept himself as entertained as possible by debating the question with himself. He had to do something to distract himself from the conversation, that was for sure. “So Mr. Brantley, you’re one of those computer people?” “Yes, ma’am, kind of. I supervise a lot of those computer people, at least.” “Supervise?” The older woman tapped her fork against the edge of her plate, putting Drew in mind of the way a lawyer might twirl a pencil. “I heard—that is I gathered, from what Eva said, that you were an independent consultant. Isn’t that code for being between jobs, these days?” The smirk on her face might have angered Drew if he hadn’t recognized the look. It was Eva’s nervous smile, the same edgy, lopsided twitch of the lips, and it was more than a little eerie to see it on a face that looked so much like he suspected Eva would in thirty years. She was still quite beautiful, the former Mrs. Godfrey, with the figure of a much younger woman and skin that had been jealously guarded from the sun. But Drew hoped Eva would never have the look of suspicion and potential for malice that made her mother look almost ugly despite the good bone structure and fine features. “It may be,” he acknowledged, “but in my case it means I own a company that employs consultants. And they deal with computer systems at other companies. As
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long as they’re doing good work, and as far as I know they are, then we all still have jobs.” Eva, clearly mortified, interjected. “Mom, who did you hear that from? It wasn’t me. Are you talking to Dad again?” “Emailing now and then,” her mother replied with a careless laugh, as though email correspondence was a frivolous game. “I still can’t stand to look at him or talk on the phone unless I absolutely have to, but somehow it’s not so bad through email. It’s like it isn’t really him.” “Like Monopoly money,” Drew volunteered. Eva glanced at him with a quick smile, but it was pretty clear the analogy was lost on her mother. “I know Dad is familiar with Drew’s company, we’ve talked about it. I can’t think why you got the impression he was unemployed.” “Well, it isn’t as though your father is the most trustworthy source of information. I hate to say mean things about him behind his back…” Drew said it in his mind before Eva’s mother actually spoke the word. But… “But you know, I wouldn’t have put it past him to exaggerate, to make the whole thing sound better. More respectable.” It was like an optical illusion, he decided, fascinating by the difference between Ms. Damron’s genteel, almost coy tone and the implied sting of her words. Her quick sidelong glance at Drew however, strongly suggested she wasn’t really talking about the respectability of his employment. She suspected him of something. It was clear from her posture, from the tight set of her lips as she maintained her false smile. She might not know what it was she suspected yet, but she obviously wanted to find out. Drew wondered if what he and Eva had enjoyed over the past few weeks even remotely approached whatever level of depravity Ms. Damron imagined. “Drew is perfectly respectable, Mom. Dad didn’t have to make anything up. I’ve never known him to make things up.”
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“You remind me so much of him sometimes,” her mother said, in a fond tone that almost hid the implied insult. Almost. Drew was leaning toward mean, not merely crazy, as a diagnosis. But he was still undecided. “Thank you,” Eva said, as if she’d been paid a compliment. Gracious. Drew admired her spirit, even as it unnerved him to see her playing this dysfunctional part so very well. “So are you flying home tomorrow, or staying in town for the holiday?” “Flying home tomorrow. My sister Barbara lives here,” she explained to Drew. “In fact she would have been here tonight, but she had to go make sure the nativity scene at her church was still intact. They’ve had a rash of vandals. Should I even ask if you’re planning to attend a late service tonight, Eva?” “Mom, don’t start. Please? Let’s have a nice dinner.” Eva was starting to look stiff again, with all her guards up. Drew hadn’t seen her looking so cold since before their first date. She looked astonishingly like her mother, he realized. “Do you attend church, Mr. Brantley?” “Mom!” “Where exactly did the two of you meet, again? Eva’s father wasn’t clear.” Things were escalating fast, despite Eva’s valiant attempts to keep the conversation light and pleasant. She’d been pretending all evening long that her mother wasn’t being catty. Her mother had been pretending, too, but not quite as well, because she couldn’t really hide the hostility beneath her words. She loved her daughter, Drew thought, and she was possibly genuinely concerned for her soul. But she didn’t like her. She wasn’t proud of her, obviously didn’t respect her. She didn’t seem to see Eva as the beautiful, strong, amazing woman Drew knew her to be, and under such censure Eva was freezing up again. Drew wasn’t sure how to answer. He didn’t want to lie but he didn’t know what Eva would rather he say. He wished they would both stop pretending. It was ridiculous, this hinting around the edges. Better to lay it all out on the table. But that wasn’t his call to make. 64
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“We met at an exhibit of photography by some mutual friends of ours. I help them out on photo shoots sometimes.” “Oh, you’re interested in photography?” And then, for a pleasant if surreal twenty minutes or so, Drew and Eva’s mother discussed photography like any two people might discuss a hobby they had in common. Eva relaxed visibly as she joined the conversation, and Drew felt some of his own strain dissipate. He was surprised by her mother’s knowledge about photography and art in general, and to learn that she was a former professional photographer. For some reason it had never occurred to him that Eva’s artistic predilections came from her mother’s side. He associated artists with open-mindedness, a willingness to accept alternative points of view. Perhaps that willingness was really the important thing Eva had inherited from her father. It wasn’t the kink, it was the mindset that allowed for a world in which variance from the norm was an acceptable option. She’d had to overcome her mother’s influence in order to accept that trait in herself. And she had started to overcome it. Drew had worried about this evening, worried he wouldn’t like watching Eva struggle to gain approval from her mother. He knew enough to know that adults who still seek that sort of approval are never able to find it, and the quest could be soul-destroying. But Eva’s goal, he came to realize as he watched her field her mother’s remarks, was not to fulfill some thwarted childhood need for praise. As far as he could tell, she simply wanted to maintain a connection with this lovely woman who charmed the waiter without even trying, who talked about art and fine wine with such clear enjoyment. This part of her mother, the good part she had kept. He could see that it was worth it to her, that at least for now the cost of dealing with the bad part was high but not impossible. The cordial tone, once established, made it harder for Ms. Damron to revert to her earlier mean-spirited digs. All in all, the remainder of the dinner was much more pleasant—or at least less openly hostile—than Drew could have hoped for.
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Chapter Eight “I almost outed you,” he admitted to Eva later, when they were back in his apartment and snuggling under the heavy duvet on his bed. “When she asked about the photography exhibit. It was on the tip of my tongue to tell her exactly what kind of photography.” “Thank you for restraining yourself. Although I think a part of me wanted you to.” “Seriously? Because I could call her up. You have her cell number, right?” “No, she’s at church with my aunt now, remember? Midnight service.” “Midnight…” Drew looked at the bedside clock, confirming the time. “Merry Christmas, then.” Eva giggled softly, a fluting sound of happiness that seemed to warm the space around them nearly as much as the touch of their bodies. “I’d actually forgotten. Merry Christmas.” “Do you want your present?” “You mean there’s a real present, other than the one that keeps bumping my thigh?” “Yep. And you’re supposed to be pretending to ignore that. Pervert.” She pushed at his chest. “Go get the gift, funny boy.” Drew shivered as he dashed to his computer desk, where the brightly wrapped package sat. He detoured to bump up the thermostat a few degrees. “Yours is at the gallery,” Eva told him when he returned to the bed and reclaimed his spot beside her. “I’ll get it for you tomorrow. Later today. Unless you’re planning to spend all day at Seth’s?”
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“Not all day. Only the morning. They’ll open presents, and everybody will want to see the ring.” “Oh, that’s right, he proposed tonight. How did it go, I wonder?” “Since he didn’t call me asking to go out and get wasted, I assume it went well. Here, open this. It’s not a big thing. I thought about getting a bigger thing.” “I think we’re at that awkward in-between stage where you aren’t sure which way you should go with things like that.” “Exactly,” he agreed. “Although since you just said that and I knew exactly what you meant, I think that officially bumps us into the stage where I should’ve gotten you a bigger present.” “That’s also the stage where I can say, ‘there’s always next year’, right?” “Ooh, that was smooth. I like how you did that.” “Thanks. Is this a CD?” She was working the ribbon off the corners of the flat, square package, and Drew watched her face for her reaction once she finally got the paper off. It took her a second to register the name of the band, and then she flipped the package over and trailed her finger down the list of tracks until she saw Madman’s Honey. Eva bit her lip then broke into a huge grin that heated Drew up from head to toe. He was starting to be more than a little too aware of his arousal, of the proximity of his erection to Eva’s body in the dark, warm space under the covers. Down, boy, he admonished his unruly penis. Then he added a soothing, Soon, soon. “I love it,” she finally declared, and Drew had to stop himself from answering. Because he had been a hairsbreadth away from saying “I love you,” and it was still too soon. It would worry her at first, he thought, and it would possibly require some cajoling and comforting from him before she settled down and said it back. He didn’t want to have that conversation yet. But soon.
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For the moment, he was too busy enjoying the current bumped-up status of their relationship. He nuzzled into Eva’s neck and allowed himself the luxury of rubbing his cock very gently against her leg. Naked, warm, cozy. Nearly perfect. “I’m glad you like it.” “I’m amazed it’s available on CD.” “So. Ropes?” Drew asked hopefully, mumbling as his lips brushed her skin, prompting a shiver from her that he hoped had nothing to do with the cold. “Oh, sure,” she said, as if it had never been an issue. Drew thought it was warm enough to implement his plan. Or at least, by the time he got through they would both be warm enough. To melt glaciers, quite possibly. “Good. Since I don’t have a present to unwrap, I think I’ll wrap one up instead.” She angled her head and met his lips in an enthusiastic kiss, leaving him no doubt about how eager she was. Drew forced himself to pull away, to think about his ultimate goal instead of opting for instant gratification. Because the ropes, he knew, would make everything even better. “Red?” Eva asked, when she saw the lengths of nylon braid emerge from Drew’s big duffel bag. “That’s so festive. I don’t think I’ve seen that long one before.” Drew smiled, passing up the obvious “that’s what she said” opening. “I haven’t used this one on the shoot. I haven’t used this one in quite some time, as a matter of fact, but this is a special occasion. If you have a ponytail holder or something, you may want to put your hair up.” He quickly found the center mark and began shaking the loops loose, snapping them out into long snaking lines of sleek, satiny crimson on the floor as Eva vacated the bed reluctantly and rummaged in her purse for a scrunchie. When she had accomplished a messy ponytail and was preparing to dive back under the covers, Drew stopped her. “It’s easiest if you stand up for this part. This is a traditional karada, by the way.”
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Around Eva’s neck the rope went, Drew’s fingers nimbly weaving the symmetrical lengths back and forth to encase her torso in a series of diamond-shaped frames. He worked quickly, starting to feel nervous about his plan, hoping it would be as good as he envisioned. “It isn’t very tight,” Eva commented. Her eyes were half closed, and her breathing was getting that shaky edge that Drew recognized. He’d been careful to form the lowest knot on her belly higher than usual, to leave her clit exposed, but she was moving her hips gently as though she were rubbing that sensitive spot against the restraints. The rope was working its magic, warming her up, pulling her under its spell. His spell, in a way. “This way I get to keep it on you longer,” he explained, turning her around to secure the rope behind her back. He couldn’t resist pulling her toward him, pressing himself into her, falling a little under the spell of the rope himself. “Yes…” Eva whispered, lifting her hands to twine her fingers in his hair. “Not yet,” he said firmly, as much to himself as to anyone. “There’s more?” “If you’re willing.” “Should I be concerned?” She didn’t sound concerned. She sounded dreamy, and sultry, and he wanted to throw her on the bed and ravish her. Patience. “I don’t think so. Lie down on the bed,” he directed. “On your back.” She did it without question, obviously enjoying the movement of the ropes against her body and between her legs as she moved. The vivid red stood out like a beacon against her fair skin, and Drew had to close his eyes a moment before he could walk back over to his bag. He pulled out the four additional ropes, also red but shorter, and approached the bed with them in his hand. Tossing one at each corner, he let Eva begin to draw her
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own conclusions as he turned to one of her wrists and secured it to the tethering rope with a simple cat’s paw tie. When he looked back up, she was watching him, her lower lip firmly caught between her teeth. “The door’s locked,” she whispered. He wasn’t sure if she was talking to him or reassuring herself, but he nodded. She didn’t protest as he moved down to the foot of the bed and tied one of her ankles, leaving plenty of play in the rope. Then up to the other wrist, which she offered to him without comment. Drew hesitated before securing Eva’s other foot, his confidence nearly faltering when he heard her breathing out heavily through pursed lips. He waited, but she didn’t withdraw or protest, and after a moment he slipped the rope around her ankle in its tidy twists and then turned back to look at the whole of her. She was breathtaking. A study in ivory against the charcoal gray of his sheets, with the bright red rope crisscrossing her body and highlighting all the most delectable bits to perfection. Opened completely to his view, bound in place, unable to hide. “Amazing,” he said, groaning at the ache the vision conjured in his groin. His cock was rearing up, hard and eager, throbbing its own approval of his handiwork. He could see the want, the need in Eva’s eyes, but he also saw the anxiety lurking there. “Try to get away,” he suggested. He moved on to the bed and straddled her hips, letting her test the limits of her bonds. They were secure, and the exercise seemed to settle her somehow. “How does it feel?” “I’m not sure. Drew, please.” “Please what?” She laughed, sounding happy and nervous. “I’m not sure.” “How do you feel when you’re all tied up, Eva? When the ropes are wrapped around you and you can’t get away? Close your eyes and tell me what you feel.”
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She stared at him a few seconds before letting her eyes flutter to a close, her eyelashes forming a lovely fringe against her pale cheek. The little frown mark between her eyes started to fade as she spoke. “I feel the ropes against me. I like the way they pull when I move, like they’re reminding me they’re there. I like feeling them against my ribs when I breathe, and…” “What else? No, keep your eyes closed.” “I feel like I’m safe. Like I can’t fly apart, the ropes will hold me together no matter what. And I also feel like I’m on display.” “And a very nice display it is, too.” Drew traced the outlines of her breasts, the skin just inside the rope diamonds, admiring the way the softness of the flesh was made even more evident by the gentle press of the knots. Eva arched into his touch, her eyes still closed. “I wish I could keep you here all the time, just like this.” Shifting lower, he knelt between her legs to study even more of her at once. “You look so perfect tied to my bed, all spread out and ready for me.” A lovely blush stained Eva’s cheeks, and her breathing sounded something like panic. Seated where he was, Drew could also see the slick, glistening evidence of her arousal coating her delicate pink folds. The ropes were drawn snug on either side of her outer lips, teasing the already blushing flesh. He wanted to run his thumbs along that sweet, inviting seam, tease her open and thrust straight into her, but he knew the scene needed something else for completion. For her to move on, and for him to know that she had. Turning, he brought one leg over Eva’s red-laced torso and straddled her chest as he lowered his face to lick slowly and carefully at the tip of her clit. He was rewarded with a mewl, a strangled gasp of pleasure, and the sensation of Eva’s teeth nipping at one calf. Drew wanted it to last, but his own resistance was fading with each throb of need that pulsed through his balls and made his cock twitch impatiently. Clenching his ass and praying for stamina, he dipped down again and tasted the tang of her, the sour71
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sweet musk that had started to overflow the bounds of her pussy as she tried to squirm against the restraints. She nibbled at him again, more sharply this time. “Drew, come here. I want…I want to do this for you.” “It’s for you,” he corrected, but shifted his weight and bent his body closer to her, angling his cock toward her waiting lips. The first wet, warm embrace of her tongue around his overheated tip nearly made him blow his wad like a teenager. He trembled with the effort to resist thrusting, and tried to distract himself from the unbelievable pleasure by returning to his own task. Licking and sucking, teasing and pushing, and every groan of Eva’s was transmitted directly to his cock from the delicious throat he was practically fucking. When he sensed she was close, he had to pull his hips away before the building counterpoint of their rhythm sent him careening out of control. Eva tensed, trembling under his mouth, a catch in her voice heralding the orgasm that swept through her with a force even Drew could feel. She screamed against his leg, arching up from the bed, and Drew worked her cunt with his tongue and lips until she begged him to stop. “No more. Just need you. Please?” It was almost a whimper, half a whisper, a beautiful shade of sound. Would she come again, he wondered, when he was inside her? Could he survive the pleasure if she did? Drew got up with a groan, only long enough to wrestle a condom from its package and slip back into place between Eva’s parted thighs. He thrust into her sharply, without pause or question, his need to be closer to her so great it shut his brain off for a moment. But only a moment. He reined himself in enough to brace on his elbows, framing her face with gentle hands. “Honey? Eva, open your eyes. Look at me.” She blinked a few times before focusing on him, as if it were too bright despite the dim light in the room. Her smile was fitful, hesitant. “Look at me,” Drew repeated. “See me.” 72
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Her eyes were too bright, full of tears, but her smile broadened at his words and she nodded. “I do see you. It’s okay.” And then, as if she were pleasantly surprised, “I’m okay.” He had to move again and so he did, loving the way the force of each thrust was mirrored back to him in her expression. The hint of tension began to melt into something else as he watched, as her body began to respond again. Within the constraints of the rope, she moved under him and he increased his pace to match hers, until both of them were moaning and panting. Drew lost her gaze at some point as the need took over, the tingling knot in his abdomen and balls tightening almost to the point of pain before he finally exploded inside her with a shout of joy and relief. Seconds later, Eva’s cry mingled with his as her body trembled through another orgasm that seemed even more powerful than the first. Some vestige of sense kept Drew from collapsing on her until he had untied her hands and wrists, but he left the karada in place around her body. He felt the ropes between them as he pulled her close, and he used the added leverage to tug her into the ideal spot. For long minutes they spooned in sated silence, until Drew was nearly asleep and assumed Eva was as well. It didn’t surprise him entirely, however, when she spoke. “Much better when nobody bursts in and starts whaling on me.” “I’d hope so. I mean, that’s setting the bar pretty low. I think I can pretty much always accomplish that.” They chuckled and cuddled closer still. Drew nuzzled Eva’s hair, wondering what it was that made it smell so good. Shampoo? Perfume? Or just her? She sighed, a contented and sleepy sound. “I’ll have to work on raising my standards.”
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Chapter Nine Danny and Sheila had helped with the gift, Eva admitted as Drew was unwrapping it, but the idea had been hers. Drew was too stunned to respond. The mounted canvas he’d revealed was beautiful, breathtaking. It took him a moment to register what Eva was saying. “It’s the wrong one!” she insisted, apparently again, as he gave her a quizzical look. “Sheila did the wrong one. She was barely done with the mounting and so she offered to wrap it to save time, so I never got to see the finished product. But she must have—” “I love it.” “I mean, who gives a picture of themselves? Of course the one I wanted to give you was of me, too, but you couldn’t tell it was me, it was—” “Honey, I love it.” “I didn’t— You do?” “I do. It’s amazing.” “Oh. But it has my face. And I don’t think I photograph very well.” Drew’s laugh echoed in the big, high-ceilinged space of the nearly empty gallery. “You’ve just spent weeks posing for photographs for a book. For an extremely finicky photographer, I might add. And you had hardly a bad frame in the entire shoot. But this one, I think, is my favorite of all.” He turned his attention back to the large photograph, a three-quarters shot of Eva sitting on the ground in front of the dark backdrop, her lower body swathed in the silk robe, her bound wrists held in front of her and obscuring her nipples. It was a candid shot, and she was clearly laughing at something one of them had said. Drew thought he remembered the moment, Sheila cracking a joke and Eva breaking out of her elegant
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pose. Her face was full of joy and friendship, her hands gently curled under her chin. Sheila had done something to it, desaturated some parts and tweaked the color in other parts, to highlight the rosy tones of the robe, and Eva’s lips and cheeks. Despite the bondage, the whole thing looked like a fond memory from a bygone time, dreamy and fleeting. “Well, in that case, I’m glad you like it. I’m going to have to kill Sheila, and for that I apologize in advance. But I’m glad you like it.” “Sheila knew what she was doing. Look, they signed and numbered it. One of one, it’s a unique print.” Eva smiled and skimmed her fingers over the inked signatures in the lower right corner of the picture. “I like the processing. I was planning for it to be black and white. The one I meant to give you, I mean. It’s one that’s also in the book.” “This is better. I guess it’s intended for both of us.” “They’re not being very subtle, are they?” Drew grinned. “Nope.” Eva crumpled the wrapping paper in her hands, forming it into a tightly compressed ball as she seemed to gather her thoughts. “I’m still not sure what I’m doing. What we’re doing. I don’t know if that’s who I want to be.” Drew shrugged, sounding more nonchalant than he felt. “It doesn’t have to be. It’s not like it’s an either-or thing. You can still be you, you’re just you plus a little kinky stuff behind closed doors.” Eva looked skeptical. “Maybe it’s because I know so many people in that lifestyle.” “And that’s one way to do it, but it doesn’t have to be a lifestyle. It never has been for me.” Drew realized he was starting to panic at the idea Eva might be pulling away from him. He was on the verge of promising to give up ropes for good, as he’d once promised he wasn’t into the lifestyle at all. But he couldn’t this time. By now, she meant too much. By now, he knew the ropes weren’t the real issue. “I don’t go to clubs, except
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on very rare occasions to do exhibitions or classes. I don’t do scene parties. For all anybody knows, I’m only in it to help Danny out because I’ve known him since we were kids.” “I know that. But you’re talking about whether or not to be open about doing it. I’m still working on whether I can imagine myself in a relationship that…well, let me show you something.” She pulled him to the back room of the gallery, where Danny and Sheila had started delivering the canvases for their showing at the gallery’s New Year’s Eve party. Flipping through a leaning stack of photographs, Eva found the canvas she sought and gripped the top edge tightly for a moment before turning to Drew. “They want to know if they can include this in the show.” Slowly, she pulled the mounted photo into view and waited with obvious anxiety for Drew’s reaction. His first reaction was that he had to have a copy for himself. The photo was not among the proofs he had reviewed for the book, and he could see why. Eva’s face was recognizable in profile, each delicate feature etched in sharp contrast against the black backdrop. She was quite obviously naked, or at least topless. Her back was completely bare. With her arms pulled back by the elaborate dragonfly tie, and her head and torso turned just slightly, the rounded edge of one breast was visible. He had used, for the highly decorative tie, a wide red ribbon that matched the color of the silk robe swathing Eva’s hips; the bow at her wrists flowed into the fabric, making it look almost as though the robe itself were rising up in ribbons to bind her. Her hair was pulled back in a long braid that Sheila had cleverly worked to echo the pattern of the dragonfly binding. They had shot this series near the end, with promotional material or possibly even the cover in mind. The rope work was beautiful, the simple color scheme of the photo visually arresting. But it was the look on Eva’s face that took Drew’s breath away. She had settled into the binding fully, spacing out to something like a trance state, and in the picture he 76
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could read every detail of bliss on her face as clearly as if he were still standing there admiring his handiwork. She looked as though a soul-deep contentment had overtaken her. One sleek strand of hair had slipped free of the braid, and it described a curve from her temple to her shoulder. The one element out of place might have marred the whole shot, but instead that single imperfect note somehow enhanced the beauty of the rest. “It’s a masterpiece,” Drew said at last. “It would be a crime not to show it.” “I know.” Eva had pulled the picture to the front of the stack, and she stood contemplating it with a closed expression. “I think it’s the best thing they’ve ever done. But.” “But,” he agreed. “I’m not sure I’m ready to be outed, Drew. I don’t even know if I want to label myself that way, much less hear it from other people.” He couldn’t argue with her on that score. A few of their mutual friends knew Eva was standing in for Sheila as a model for the book, but nobody knew which shots were which. Nobody knew how far Eva had gone with it. But anybody who knew the lifestyle, who knew Eva, would know at a glance that her participation in this photo had not been a mere favor to a friend. She had come alive within the binding, and the photograph glowed with her willing and joyful submission to that restraint. If it was part of the New Year’s Eve show, she would indeed be outed. Not only within the BDSM and art communities, but to anybody else who happened to attend what would likely be a fairly large gathering. “You have six days to decide, I guess.” Eva nodded and threw him a brief smile, but Drew’s heart sank as he contemplated the possible outcome of her decision. She knew he couldn’t do without the ropes, and from the sound of things, she might not be as ready as he’d hoped to embrace that side of her nature. He worried that this would not just be a decision about a photograph, but a decision about him.
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***** “No, the food will all need to be set up along the very back wall, by the bar. Besides, cold as it is, stuff’s going to congeal if it’s sitting in this front room.” Drew leaned on the reception counter, watching Eva as she ran briskly through the final arrangements for that evening’s festivities at the gallery. It was chilly indeed in the nearly empty space. But when the crowd arrived, he knew, the temperature would rise pretty quickly to something much more temperate. Not wanting to distract her, he stifled a sigh along with the urge to play with the long curl of hair that had drifted over her shoulder. Still, Eva seemed to catch his impatience. She finished her phone call in short order and slid her cell into the tiny red satin pouch that served as her purse for the evening. “I’m sorry I have to be dealing with all this last-minute stuff. The storm threw things off. You really don’t have to hang around, you can go do something more entertaining for a bit if you’d rather. I know this must be boring, and it’s another thirty minutes at least before people start to show up.” She had pulled her phone out to check the time but slid it firmly back into the bag as if reminding herself to leave it there. That was a concession to him, Drew knew; normally at show time minus half an hour, she’d have the cell glued to her ear and her omnipresent clipboard tacked to her hand as she multitasked her way through the final preparations. “Am I distracting you?” he asked with a grin that was only slightly wicked and suggestive. “Always.” But she didn’t sound particularly upset about that. “Are you nervous?” “Not so much since my dad said he probably wouldn’t be able to make it.” Her smile was rueful. “Don’t tell Danny and Sheila, they’d roll their eyes so hard about this, but I never even worked up the nerve to tell him about my part in the photo shoot. I figured I would find time, but when is the right time to tell your dad you’ve posed for naked bondage pictures?” 78
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She stretched like a cat, the crocheted shawl she wore slipped off her shoulders, and Drew briefly lost his ability to think as he stared at the lean lines of her body, highlighted beautifully by the soft, snug fabric of her dress. The front molded to her skin, so form-fitting it didn’t need a low neckline to be daring. The back was better still, he saw as she bent to pick up the shawl. A simple network of spaghetti straps crisscrossed from neck to waist. They seemed to hold the whole thing together like magic. “Fire engine red,” he said with obvious appreciation. “That has got to be the best dress I have ever seen. I’ve never seen you wear anything like that.” “It’s carnelian,” Eva corrected him, “and thank you. I may have to put my coat back on until it warms up in here though.” “Please don’t.” “I was feeling a little more daring in the store than I am at the moment, actually. I don’t want to look skanky.” With a considering frown, Drew stood and rounded the counter, taking Eva’s hands in his and holding them wide to reveal the dress again. He pondered her as seriously as if he weren’t just taking the opportunity to ogle her again. He thought about the fact that all the other men in the room would also be ogling her, for how could they do otherwise? But on balance, he decided he was all right with that if it meant he got to look at her in the dress all night then take her home and do deliciously naughty things to her with the dress pushed up around her waist. “Not skanky at all. Very tasteful. Classy, but sexy as hell.” She giggled as he stole the predictable kiss. Giggles turned to sighs as he lingered, letting his lips brush against hers, savoring her. “Get a room, you guys,” Danny said from the back of the room. He had come through the service entrance, and now joined them at the desk. He had apparently conned the bartender out of some wine, because he set a plastic glass down next to Eva before sipping at his own. 79
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“We’re in a room. A room with nice, sturdy exposed rafters too. Great for suspensions…” Drew cocked his head, scanning the high ceiling as though scouting for the best location to mount a pulley. “Enough!” Eva was laughing with the guys, but with a nervous edge. “I’m anxious enough about the picture. Stop talking about that stuff, you’ll make it worse.” She swigged some wine and tried to look stern, which Drew found adorable. “Actually,” Danny said, “I came over here to say a toast to your bravery. I really can’t thank you enough, Evie. That photo will be the making of the show.” He raised his glass and she tapped hers against it, just as the caterers arrived. Drew sneaked in one last hug for reassurance before Eva started up her usual whirlwind of organizing, greeting and mingling. He gave her an unmistakably possessive boyfriend kiss, and was unable to resist slipping one hand under the shawl to stroke the expanse of exposed skin at her waist. “You’ll be fine.” And she was. Right up until her cell phone rang again an hour later, and her eyes found Drew’s over a tight knot of revelers who were all exclaiming over the very picture in question. She had to mouth it twice before he could make out the words. “My dad is coming.”
***** Bob Godfrey was of average height and average build, with thinning hair of pure white that was obviously once as blond as Eva’s, a slight gut, and a dark suit with a red paisley tie. In short, he looked wholly unremarkable. But when he walked across the room to greet his daughter, Drew could feel her react as though all the air had been sucked from the room. Her slender hand froze on his upper arm, gripping almost hard enough to hurt, and her tension telegraphed itself so clearly that he had an urge to step between her and the encroaching danger.
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But there was no monster, no horror, only a middle-aged man with a genial handshake. He greeted Drew with the careful civility of any man who knows he’s meeting the guy his grown daughter is most likely having sex with. The slightly too firm, lingering grip with its implicit promise to crush Drew like a bug if his little girl came to any harm. Nothing out of the ordinary. Close up, Drew could see the man Mr. Godfrey must have been in his prime. Trim, blond, with ice-chip blue eyes and features so sharp they looked etched. Age had softened his lines, but he looked every bit the type of man one would expect to see alongside a woman like Eva’s mother. How very beautiful their family must have been, like the picture that came with the frame. But so very wrong behind the façade. “She seems happy,” he said to Drew when Eva darted across the room to greet an influential critic. “Not just tonight, I mean.” He stopped short of saying she seemed happy with Drew in particular, but Drew still felt a flare of relief and joy at the implication. “I think she’s enjoying her work. Tonight especially. I know she’s always happy to give friends an opportunity to show.” Godfrey nodded, his gaze flicking to the closest blown-up photo and then back to the plastic cup of white wine he held. “Interesting subject matter tonight. I understand some of this is your work?” Sheepish, Drew shrugged. “Not the photography part. I just help with the setup.” “Uh-huh.” There was a wealth of meaning in those two syllables, none of which Drew wanted to address with the father of the girl he was sleeping with and, as it happened, tying up. He thought it was probably safest to focus on the photography exhibit as art, and treat it as an educational opportunity. “Would you like a walk-through? There’s sort of a method to the way the exhibit is laid out.”
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They began with the perimeter of the smaller room at the front of the gallery, which was filled primarily with what Danny and Sheila called “technical” shots. These were the detailed pictures that would accompany specific techniques in the book, showing ties in varying stages of completion. Many of them were of Sheila, from the first few shoots, and several showed her face. After the third or fourth one, recognition began to dawn on Bob Godfrey’s face. “Isn’t that…” he said, scanning around the room for Sheila, who was nowhere to be seen. “Sheila, yes. She was the model for a lot of these. I think she and Danny are in the next room where the bigger photos are.” “I had no idea she was that…flexible.” Drew couldn’t stop a snicker from erupting, and he had to admire Godfrey’s iron control because he could tell the man was fighting mightily to keep a straight face. “You’re a good sport, Mr. Godfrey.” “Bob. Call me Bob. What’s this one called again?” He pointed to the picture, the final in a set of half a dozen shots depicting a body-stockinged Sheila becoming a ropebound human pretzel. “Ebi. The shrimp tie,” Drew translated. “The book’s main focus is on traditional Japanese techniques, then there’s a section at the end that discusses extensions and variations. Safety concerns and basic principles to follow if you’re going to try to create new ties.” “Safety?” “That’s probably the most important consideration.” A flicker of amusement crossed the older man’s face, and he leaned in to study the photo more closely. “Good thing, too. You kids today, with your complicated shenanigans. Holy mother of God, did I already mention she’s flexible?”
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Clearing his throat, Drew gestured to the wide, open archway leading to the main room of the gallery. “In here we have the real heart of the exhibit. The art shots, basically. They’re window dressing for the book, but of course for the photographers this is the real fun.” Eva returned to Drew’s side as he and her father rounded the corner and saw the first of the larger photos. She steered them pointedly to the left, knowing that a clockwise tour of the room would mean the maximum amount of time before her father saw the photo with her face. The room’s large central display panel would provide cover until he was at that last, all-important wall. “These are really something, peanut. You have some talented friends.” “They really are. I know it’s a bit…well, you know. But they really are such beautiful photos. I was so glad you could make it, Dad. Has Drew been explaining about the rope work?” If not for the slightly high pitch to her voice, Drew wouldn’t have known Eva was strung taut as a bowstring. She must have also gotten her ability to keep a straight face from her father, he decided. Certainly her mother was no good at hiding what she was thinking. The more he tried to picture the easygoing, straightforward Bob Godfrey with the woman he’d struggled to charm at dinner so recently, the more Drew marveled that they had ever been a couple. Visually, they were a perfect match. But emotionally, they must have driven each other to sheer insanity. “Yeah, I’ve been trying not to bore him by getting my shibari geek on, though. Like I promised.” He stopped their little group of three in front of the centerpiece of the exhibit, a photo from the same series as the one Eva was so worried about. For a moment they all simply looked, drinking in the piece, absorbing the clean lines and subtle curves, the intricacy of the rope work in the dragonfly weave contrasting with the porcelainsmooth skin of the model’s back. This one was taken straight from the back, and was nearly symmetrical with not a hair out of place. The only variance was at the hands; one 83
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of the model’s pinkies was extended slightly, as though she were just about to move her hand or resist the restraint. Drew had to breathe out slowly and force himself to think about baseball scores until the heat left his groin and he was steady on his feet again. This picture always hit him that way, because he knew she had been reaching for him with that delicate gesture. Not wanting him to leave her side, even for the few minutes it took to take the series of photos. She had given a frustrated little whimper right at that second, and he could hear it again every time he looked at the photo. But it wasn’t only the sexuality, it was the artistry in it too, the sheer beauty of the thing that caught him every time. The way it captured the moment and spoke of all that had come before it, all that might follow. The tension inherent in every line. It was heart-stopping. “Mr. Godfrey!” Sheila’s chipper greeting broke the trio’s reverie, as she rushed to give Eva’s father an impetuous hug. She was sparkling and giddy from champagne and success. “You made it! I’m so glad. Have you seen it yet?” This, despite Eva’s frantic attempts to catch Sheila’s eye and her not-too-subtle gestures suggesting throat-cutting. “Seen what, honey? Have your parents seen these photos yet, young lady?” “Oh, Mr. Godfrey. These are nothing compared to the last book we worked on. Besides, I think they’re pretty hardened to it by now. God, Evie,” she asked in an almost conspiratorial tone, “have you been hearing this buzz? I’m getting the word ‘visceral’ a lot. I think it’s going to be so good. The guy from the Post is already waxing lyrical.” She was practically jumping up and down with glee. “It does seem to be going well,” Eva allowed. “Don’t you have people to schmooze?” “I do! So many. Most of them want to know who you are, so get back to mingling, okay?”
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She darted off again with a perky wave, leaving Eva with a smile frozen across her face and Mr. Godfrey looking puzzled. Drew pondered whether to stay or give her some privacy with her dad, but Eva’s fingers clenched his arm with all the strength of a vise clamp. “So?” her father asked after a pause that included lots of significant glances between all concerned. Eva blew out a breath then straightened herself, squaring her shoulders. “Okay. I guess at this point there’s nothing else for it. Come this way.” They bypassed the rest of the photos, weaving around the various clumps of assembled revelers to arrive behind a small crowd gathered in front of the last picture along the long wall. There were faces they knew, faces they didn’t, but all the faces turned to Eva in recognition as she worked her way to the front of the group with Drew and her father in tow on either side of her. Even the strangers in the crowd picked up on the fact that the three newcomers were having a Significant Moment. Without a word, they drifted away to a respectful distance, leaving the little group in relative privacy before the picture of a naked, bound Eva with a face that spoke of hypnotic sensual bliss. Drew would have backed off with them if Eva weren’t still clutching his arm like a shipwreck victim clutches a life preserver. He risked a glance over her head to her father’s face, which was a study in conflicting emotions. It was a long time before Mr. Godfrey spoke, and when he did he sounded more sure of himself than Drew had expected. It was as though he had made a decision about how to react and was determined to follow through. “That’s beautiful,” he stated firmly. “I’ve never seen you look that…happy.” Turning away from the picture, he studied Eva’s face with a similar concentration. “I can’t pretend I’m comfortable looking at it, but it’s worth it to know you’ve found something you can feel that strongly about.”
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Eva’s smile was watery, and Drew reached out to grab a cocktail napkin from a passing caterer’s tray in case tears followed. She held it together though. “Is this why she threw you out?” Godfrey suddenly asked before Eva could speak. “Jesus, honey. No wonder. I’m surprised she didn’t have a stroke on the spot.” “Something like this,” Eva admitted. “And you? She always implied you had a drinking problem, but it was this, wasn’t it? Looking back on some of the things she said—” The older man coughed and sputtered in a way that would have been comical if not for the situation. “This? You’re giving your old man way too much credit for ingenuity, honey. Hell, I only wanted her to…” Realizing his audience, he shook his head and bit his lip as he considered how to phrase himself. “I asked her to do something I think most married people would not think twice about. Nothing like this, just something…people sometimes do for each other. She never would. She’d told me once very early on never to ask again. When I did break down and ask again, finally, after fifteen years of marriage, she told me I was damned to burn in hell as a Sodomite.” “Um.” “No, no. I wasn’t asking her to—” “It’s okay, really, I’d rather not—” “Not that kind of sodomy. Her definition was…different.” “Oh, wow.” “Honey, do you want some more wine or anything?” Drew was loyal up to a point, but at that moment he would gladly have chewed his own hand off to escape the conversation, and he was fairly sure both Eva and her father felt the same way but were trapped by a web of mismanaged communication. She glared up at him and tightened her grip on his arm until he was in pain. “It wasn’t this,” Mr. Godfrey said, making a cutting gesture with his hands that took in the picture, himself, the two of them. His eyes were squeezed shut, a grimace
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locked onto his face. “And it was nothing bad. She’s just crazy. I’m sorry, sweetheart, I know she’s your mother and I shouldn’t say that, but—” “It’s okay, Daddy, I know she’s crazy.” “Can I start over?” “Oh God, please do.” He took a deep breath first and slowly opened his eyes. “This is beautiful, and if it makes you happy, I’m happy for you. And I’m proud of you for being your own person. I hated having to leave you with her, peanut. I really did, but the court was never going to give you to me and I didn’t want to make you have to get up there and testify, choose between us like that. Knowing that you can come out of that and still have the strength to do something like this and let people see it…that amazes me. You amaze me. And you,” he said, a scowl instantly transforming his face as he pointed at Drew, “that doesn’t mean I’m not pissed as hell at you for doing this to my little girl. I really do want to kick your ass all over this room right now, pal.” The words rang around the three of them. Then Drew nodded, slowly, and held out his free hand, thankful it was the right one. Mr. Godfrey glared at it before taking it and giving it another power-shake that came very close to breaking bones. “Understood, sir,” Drew responded, struggling not to grin as he shook the cramp from his abused hand. “I don’t have to be consistent when it comes to stuff like this,” Mr. Godfrey explained. “Because she’s my daughter. But I’ll hold off on the ass-kicking. For now.” “Thanks, Dad,” Eva muttered. She was blushing, the high red color topping each cheek in a vivid dash that played beautifully off the color in her dress. “I think we could probably all use some more wine right now.”
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Chapter Ten “Head. I’m pretty sure he was talking about head. So that means that the whole time they were married, she never once—” “Drew, oh my God, please stop. Please, please stop now and never speak of this again. Please?” “But fifteen years, honey. Fifteen years.” “It might not have even been the rope thing,” she marveled, securing another plastic wineglass in her hand and throwing it in the trash can Drew was wheeling along behind her. “This whole time I thought it was because I was tied up, but maybe that part didn’t even matter as much as the fact that I was giving Andy head? I’ve given plenty of guys head since then, I never even had an issue with doing that.” “I thought you never wanted to speak of it again?” He detoured to pick up a litter of flyers and napkins from the corner of the gallery’s larger room, pitching them neatly into the trash can from a distance of eight or ten feet. “The part about my parents, yeah. I think that’s everything. The cleaning service can get anything else when they mop up.” She put the last cup in the nearly full can then ambled over to sit on the table the caterers had been using. With a sigh of relief, she eased her high, peep-toe pumps from her feet and let them clump to the ground. “So do you think the evening was a success?” Drew strolled over to stand in front of her, nudging her knees with one hip. “I do. Despite the stuff I can’t unhear.” She wrapped a stockinged foot around his leg and pulled him close enough that she could hook her fingers around his belt. “Happy New Year.”
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“Happy New Year to you, too. I have a great idea for a New Year’s tradition. I’ve been waiting all night to show you.” He lifted an eyebrow suggestively, and Eva gave him a coy look in return. “I could probably be talked into whatever it is,” she allowed. “Then stand up and turn around.” He had sneaked out to his car moments before the gallery closed, and now he procured a length of rope from his pocket. He’d been keeping his back to her for half an hour or so, hiding it, pretty astonished that she hadn’t caught on. Now he ran the soft line through his fingers, letting it unwind and fall under its own weight to hang between them, waiting to be used. Eva stood and offered her hands behind her back as if she knew what he had in mind. She hadn’t even paused, and that alone was enough to get Drew going. It was black this time, the rope he tied her hands with. Not as long as he would have liked, not long enough to recreate the complete dragonfly weave. But he accomplished a slightly more complex version of the very first tie he’d ever bound her with. Then he leaned into her, running his hands boldly down from her collarbones to cup her breasts through the fine knit of the carnelian dress. Drew gasped as Eva cupped him in a more meaningful way, sliding her bound hands over his cock and bringing him from half-mast to full-staff within seconds. Stopping her was its own kind of torture, but he had something specific in mind and had enough will power to stick to his plan. It was, after all, a combination of things he’d been dreaming about, developing and honing for months. “Bend over, honey. On the table.” He pushed gently, and Eva gave a groaning laugh as she braced her legs and bent gracefully at the hips, then let herself flop the last inch or so to rest her cheek, shoulders and belly on the tabletop. “I forgot to tell you some things about my outfit tonight,” she whispered conspiratorially, already half lost in the happy place the ropes led her to.
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“Things? Like what, am I going to need special tools to get you out of it or something?” He ran his fingers between her flexed shoulder blades, over the woven knots that joined her hands over the small of her back, and then down into the red-clad cleft between her buttocks. Then he ran his fingers over that spot again, then his entire hand, with a dawning grin. “Oh, holy fuck, have you been dressed like this all night and I never even realized?” With a lot less ceremony than he had originally intended, Drew jerked the soft folds of her skirt up around her waist and made a gurgling, incoherent noise of pleasure at what he found. A black garter belt, clipped to a wide band of lace atop each slim thigh, topping the sheerest black stockings ever. And above that, perfectly outlining each deliciously curved hip and cheek, a lacy black pair of the fabulous tanga panties. Only a thin strip passed between her legs, and that was easily pushed to one side. He tucked it carefully down next to her pussy and then just stood, admiring for a long moment. He ran his hands over every place that lace met skin, avoiding only the one place Eva obviously wanted his hands to be, until she was begging and writhing toward him. “No, honey,” he said sweetly, soothingly, pressing a hand carefully over her helpless wrists. “Be still, let me touch you.” “I can’t be still,” she whimpered. Her voice sounded as disheveled and sexy as the rest of her, and it was nearly as effective as a tongue running over Drew’s cock. “I need you.” He bit his lip and ran a possessive hand over the curve of her ass again, finally letting one thumb trace along the shining wet opening that beckoned him. Then an index finger, and then two fingers, tracing down to circle her clit as slowly as he could force himself to go. When she bucked into his palm, he gave up on patience and freed his cock within a few seconds flat, barely getting the condom rolled over the tip before working himself 90
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into her welcoming heat. She shuddered, and he scrolled the band of latex higher on his length and stroked a little deeper, astonished by the pang of need that stabbed at him. “Drew, please! Now, please now!” Need, and something more, as the condom finally sheathed him and he finally sheathed himself fully in Eva’s body. It was horrible and wonderful and absolute, a kind of madness. It felt like he could never get enough, but he couldn’t help trying. One hand on her hip, the other on the rope around her delicate wrists, he lunged into her as deeply as he could, startling a sharp breath from her. “Deep,” she moaned, but didn’t tell him to stop. He did it again, wishing it could be more, wishing he could somehow merge the two of them, and experiencing something like pain at the knowledge that it was impossible. Another thrust and Eva came, pressing a scream into the table beneath her. Her hands grabbed at the air, then found his sleeve and clung tight, as her pussy clung tight around him, and Drew lost his mind to the pounding that swept him into his climax long before he was ready. And then it was over, but it wasn’t. He was still inside her, still holding her, and she was still coming down from her orgasm in a series of clenching tremors that made Drew’s balls pull up tight in an almost painful spasm of remembered arousal. He leaned over, resting on his elbows, covering her and pressing kisses to her shoulders as her trembling eased. He was in a room full of pictures of her, tied up and all but naked, but none of those images stood up for even a second against the real thing. The pictures were sexy, but Eva was…everything. “I approve of this outfit,” he finally said, his lips against the vertebra at the very base of her neck. Her laugh made her move under him, reminding him to keep his weight off her arms. He stood up reluctantly, expecting her to stand as well, but to his surprise Eva didn’t move. She shifted her cheek against the table, turning her head just enough to look at him. “Drew?” 91
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“Yes?” “I’d definitely say the evening was a success.”
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About the Author After earning two graduate degrees, practicing law awhile and then working for the public school system for over ten years, Delphine finally got a clue. She tossed all that aside and started doing what she should have been doing all along, writing novels! In hindsight she could see the decision was a no-brainer. Because which sounds like more fun? Being a lawyer/special educator/reading specialist/educational diagnostician…or writing spicy romances? When not writing or doing “mommy stuff”, Delphine reads voraciously, watches home improvement shows, noodles around with html and css coding, and plays computer games with her darling (and very romantic) husband. She is fortunate enough to have two absurdly precocious children and two rotten but endearing rescued mutts. Delphine and her family are all Texas natives, and reside in unapologetic suburban bliss near Houston.
Delphine welcomes comments from readers. You can find her website and email address on her author bio page at www.ellorascave.com.
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Also by Delphine Dryden 1-800-DOM-help: Roses and Chains Snow Job Truth & Lies 1: How to Tell a Lie Truth & Lies 2: Art of the Lie Truth & Lies 3: Naked Truth When in Rio Xmas Spark
Print books by Delphine Dryden Snow Job
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