“The look on your face as I revealed them, Meredith, it is a look I have waited all my life to see on another sidhe’s face.”

I reached out, and one of the thickest tentacles wrapped around my hand and wrist. The image may have brought snakes to mind, but these felt almost rubbery, like petting a dolphin, except not wet. I squeezed where the tentacle wrapped around my hand, holding “hands.”

“Now that you have the tattoo you might be able to find another sidhe lover,” I said, gazing down the length of the undulating tentacles, like a bed of exotic sea creatures waving in the current, except this current was his body, his muscles, his thoughts.

“But they would only love me with the tattoo in place hiding my extras.” He ran his hands through both sides of the graceful movements of those other body parts.

My gaze followed his hands down through all that potential until he came to the band of his pants, where he caressed his hands over the only bulge that was still hidden behind cloth. I let out a shuddering sigh, because I knew that the promise of that bulge was everything a woman could want.

“The heat in your eyes never flinches, just sharpens as you see things you like more, but there is nothing on me that you do not enjoy in some way.” He started drawing me closer with the tentacle I was holding “hands” with.

I half crawled and half let him pull me across the bed toward him where he stood beside it. My heart was racing, my body already wet, though right now that was a mixed blessing, a messy mixed blessing.

“I am so sorry that I had any issues at first,” I said.

He smiled and wrapped another tentacle around my other wrist. He wasn’t holding hands this time; he wrapped around my wrist like a rope, or a chain made of muscle and skin. The one I’d been holding twisted in my grip and he suddenly had both my wrists bound. It caught my breath in my throat, sped my pulse even more.

“Just as I need someone who sees all of me as desirable, you need bondage.”

“We can’t be rough yet,” I said, but my voice was already lower, almost choked, just from him holding my arms out to my sides, and feeling the unbelievable strength as he held me. I knew I couldn’t get away if he didn’t want me to, and that was part of the thrill, but I also knew that if I asked he would let me go instantly, and that was one of the reasons I trusted him to do bondage with me. It was all about trust and desire, and understanding yourself and your lover.

“I’ll never be rough compared to Mistral, but you wouldn’t want that rough every night.” He pulled me over the bed, my body sliding helplessly toward him. There was nothing I could do to stop that muscled strength. Luckily I didn’t want to escape; I so wanted to be caught.

He smiled, and it filled his eyes with that darkness that wasn’t fey, or human, but just male. It made me shiver, but not with fear.

“No,” I whispered.

“How long has it been since you had any bondage?” he asked, pulling me close enough that some of the smaller tentacles could trace across my skin in teasing lines.

“You know how long,” I said, my voice a little hoarse.

“Do I? As you said, I don’t live with the rest of you; how do I know what you are doing?” He made it light, teasing, but sometimes when we tease there is a truth to it.

“Do you want to live with us?”

“It is not want, Meredith. I cannot leave my kingdom and move to yours.” He forced my hands straight out to my sides, until it was almost uncomfortable. His tentacles stretched effortlessly outward to hold me, while the smaller ones traced teasing lines, careful not to go inside my bra or panties.

I found my voice and said, “I have no kingdom of my own.”

“Perhaps not, but you have a court of faerie, and more magic gathers to you every day.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing and just gave myself over to the sensation of him touching me, and being held so terribly, wonderfully tight. I began to pull. I knew I couldn’t break his grip by just struggling, but sometimes struggling is the best part, or the best part until the man pins you and makes the struggling impossible.

I closed my eyes and pulled harder.

“You can’t get away,” he said, voice full of that arrogance that big, athletic men can have.

“I know,” I said.

“Then why try?”

I opened my eyes and let him see that my eyes had started to shine, just from this. “Because I like to struggle, and you like to feel me struggle.”

“True,” he said, and it was almost a whisper. One of the thinner tentacles trailed the edge of my bra, and another the band of my panties.

“Please,” I whispered.

“Please what?” he asked, but the look on his face said he knew exactly what I wanted.

But I played the game and said, “Slide inside my bra and panties, touch me, suck me, make me come.”

“And what do I get out of it?”

“I’ll return the favor,” I said.

He grinned, and then it turned into a smile that was full of as much lust and eagerness as anyone could have wished for, and I did wish for it.

“Ladies first,” he said.

It took me a second to realize what he meant, and then he slipped those long, thin pieces of himself inside my clothing and began to caress and tease along my br**sts, and at the top edge of my panties, not really sliding inside them, but only playing just inside the band, when I knew he could go so much farther down.