Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 91635 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91635 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 458(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 305(@300wpm)
“You’re…not going to tie me up?”
“Not this time.” Amani’s eyes crinkled at the corners with his warm smile, and he reached up to brush Vic’s hair back from his brow, threading his fingers into it. “Not for your first time. You need to be able to end this without remembering a safe word, without any other conditions, if it feels wrong for you. When you feel safe enough, we’ll progress to cuffs or other forms of bondage. Besides…”
Amani sank down enough that his body almost touched Vic’s, the loose caftan falling down to tease and lick along his chest and stomach, feather against his cock in shuddering washes, the faint lamplight and starlight turning the fabric just translucent enough to offer a tempting glimpse between those slim, spread thighs. As close as he was…when Amani spoke again he shaped the words against Vic’s lips, pressing their meaning into his mouth in sweet-slick caresses.
“If you want to stay bound,” Amani whispered, “you’ll stay bound. That’s the test, pet. If you can be obedient enough to stay bound without being tied. If you want this enough for that.”
He sucked in a breath, his entire body tensing. He had to stay like this…only by his own willpower? He swallowed roughly, then deflected with a smirk. “You really think I’m that afraid of being cuffed?”
But Amani answered that smile with a lingering look, a fingertip pressed to his lips, as he drew back. “Stop. That wasn’t a challenge to your ego, so let your ego go. It’s not the cuffs.”
He sank back, thighs shifting to spread and brace his knees to the bed, straddling Vic’s waist; as Amani’s warmth settled against him, the heat of flesh through fabric and the naked skin of his inner thighs sleek against Vic’s sides, Vic bit down hard on his lower lip, struggling not to move, not to buck upward into that slight weight that wasn’t a fraction of enough to pin him down—and yet the weight of Amani’s expectations, his command, were enough to hold him in place more than anything, trembling and clenching his fists and pressing his wrists harder together.
“It’s that moment,” Amani said, “when you realize complete submission. It can be terrifying. For some, too terrifying.”
“I’m not afraid,” Vic whispered, but he was.
But that fear tasted delicious, a wild thing of liquid adrenaline and burning anticipation on the tip of his tongue, in the back of his throat, spreading through his entire body until he was flesh alight, ready to combust.
“Is that so?” Amani braced his hands against Victor’s stomach, arching over him. “Then may I touch you, Victor?”
“I thought I was supposed to be the one asking.”
“That’s not what submission is about.” Warm, knowing hands stroked up over his stomach, his ribs, with such assurance, as if marking his body with every touch, outlining the parts Amani would claim as his, melting the heat of Amani’s body into Victor’s skin until he shifted his hips restlessly and then tensed, trying to lock down, trying to be still. “It’s not about what I try to take. It’s about what you choose to give. So…” Those stroking hands stopped just at the base of Vic’s throat, lightly encircling, and yet capturing Vic with such powerful, subtly understated dominance that his breaths stilled in his chest. “How much are you willing to give?”
“Everything,” he rasped, looking raptly up at the delicate vision Amani made above him, evening light shining off the dark gloss of his hair to make a halo of soft shimmer, night casting his eyes in liquid amber. “As much as you want.”
That catlike, cunningly sweet smile played across Amani’s lips. “You’re not ready for that yet…but we’ll play a little.”
Vic didn’t understand play—until Amani’s slim fingers stroked along the underside of his cock, tracing from root to tip, while that other hand remained at his throat. Suddenly the lightest touch against his cock was an exercise of dominance, showing him his place, rendering him this subverted thing laid naked and exposed with no defenses, that hand on his throat a warning, a threat…a silken and seductive promise. All he had to do to end it was lower his arms. Push those slender hands away. Grasp that delicate body, and lift it away from him.
And he only closed his eyes, arching his neck to that touch to his throat, gripping at the bar of the headboard, lifting his hips into that touch—and then again, again, as Amani encircled him in warmth and stroked faster, faster, pressing down harder and harder on his throat until he was gasping, breath struggling, a touch of instinctive animal panic telling him to fight, to struggle, but every jolt of pleasure seared that way until the fear was just an aphrodisiac and his head was light, his body liquid, his hips writhing and bucking into the sheath of Amani’s palm.