Total pages in book: 101
Estimated words: 103102 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103102 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
“Sure, I had a crush on your sister,” he says. “I’m still a man.”
He had a crush. Not has a crush. Since when?
“A man,” I muse. “That means you’re moved by boobs?”
“That means I know an appealing woman when I see one,” he counters.
“As long as you want a Domme.”
“And you want someone who’s willing to take control.” It’s a statement, not a question.
He sees that. He sees what I want. How I want. “Sometimes.”
“Boss in the boardroom, sub in the bedroom?”
“Not always. Only sometimes.”
“Have you asked anyone?”
“What?” My throat is dry. I need water. All the water. But my glass is empty.
“Have you asked a guy if he’s interested?” River asks. “Put it in your profile? Tested out a competing app? Gone back to Depressed Mode in a sub collar?”
“Once,” I admit. “Not the collar or that bar, but the rest of it.”
“What happened?”
“I didn’t trust him enough.” There was something sexy about it, but the danger felt too real. “I couldn’t relax into it.”
“Do you want to try it?”
“Are you offering?” The words fill the air. The city. The state. The planet.
“Are you asking?”
Yes. Let’s go to my place—assuming Lexi is out—and we can use one of your ties. Do you have ties? Fuck it. I have ties. And rope. And those black leather handcuffs with fuzzy insides, so they’re comfortable without looking over-the-top.
River doesn’t push forward or fall back. He looks me over slowly, noting my bare lips, my long neck, the sheer black fabric covering my chest and torso. “Is that why you tested sex in the app?”
“Huh?”
“To use logic and science to see if you attracted a certain kind of guy?”
“Yes.” My chest flames. My stomach and cheeks, too. I’m obvious. Too obvious.
“I’m sure you do,” he says. “You radiate power and competence. People who want that everywhere see it in you.”
“Are you going to say it’s destiny?”
“No. Other people will see it and want to claim it. To control the most powerful woman in the world. Anyone who enjoys control would get a thrill out of that.”
“Would you?” I bite my tongue, but it’s too late. The words are out there. I’m asking him, again. There’s no denying that.
He doesn’t answer. “I’m going to use the bathroom.”
“Then we should go home.”
“Sure.”
I refill my water. I chug the glass. I use our phone-finding app to check Lexi’s location. Perfect. She’s at the Pilates studio her friend owns.
And there’s a picture of them on her Instagram. She tags the studio and mentions tea and dinner plans for after.
Really, she should be more careful with her social media. Anyone could find her. Stalkers, ex-boyfriends, current boyfriends, crushes, sisters.
I use the bathroom, too.
When I’m done, River is standing outside the restaurant, out of place in the Orange County strip mall. He doesn’t belong here. It’s not the tattoos or the European swimsuit. It’s something about him. Something I feel, too. Something I want.
He experimented with his girlfriend.
He knows how to do this.
I want to do this with him.
But I don’t say anything about it. I follow him to the car, I climb in, I babble about the artist on the stereo. Anything and everything I know about music, which isn’t much. The principles, the mathematical parts, the progressions. The emotion, the lyrics, the magic?
None of it means anything to me.
And I feel everything. Even with the cheesy pop song. Even though its inane lyrics describe a teenager’s idea of sex.
I feel it everywhere.
We park in front of his house. He opens the door for me and walks me along the sidewalk. The street is booming with backyard barbecues and front yard games. All quiet parties and kids laughing and dad jokes and wine moms.
We listen to the sounds of the neighborhood all the way to my house, around the side yard, to the front door of the apartment.
I unlock the door.
He stands behind me. “Did he kiss you?”
“What?”
“The guy who tied you up. Or was it something else?”
“He held me down.” My cheeks flush at the memory. Then the vision shifts, and River is the guy on top of me and I’m on fire. “Yes. I think so. I don’t remember.”
“Have you ever felt a kiss everywhere? In your bones?”
“I don’t know. How does that feel?” I push the door open.
He places his hand on the knob. “Should we talk inside?”
I open it wider and walk in.
He follows and presses the door closed.
And then we’re alone in my apartment. In the apartment I share with my sister, in the big, beautiful living room.
“Do you trust me?” River moves closer, but he stays behind me.
I should say no. I should stop whatever this is. But I can’t. I won’t. “Yes.”
“Do you want to feel it? The magic you don’t believe exists?”
“Desire isn’t magic.”
“You don’t think a kiss is romantic?”
“It’s sexual, too.”