She’d been an idiot. Of course, he wouldn’t want to be tied up. Hadn’t he confided his history to her? It couldn’t have been easy for a powerful male like Aden to admit to her that he’d been a slave in his former life, that he’d been forced to submit to people much weaker than he was—both men and women—that he’d been bought and sold, used like a piece of property.

Idiot wasn’t harsh enough. She was an ass. She crawled off the big bed, determined to fix this somehow. She was a writer, damn it. Words were supposed to be her forte. She shuffled over to the bureau where her few clothes were stashed and realized she’d have to shower first. She was sticky with sweat and . . . other things. The shower was still running, and her brain had no problem conjuring up images of Aden’s big, powerful, naked body, steam filling the glass enclosure, hot water flowing lovingly over every inch of smooth muscle and skin . . .

She shook herself out of the fantasy. He hadn’t invited her to join him. Quite the opposite, in fact. He’d even closed the door.

Ass, she cursed herself again.

But she still couldn’t put clean clothes on over her stinky, sticky body. She also didn’t feel like being naked when Aden finally emerged from the bathroom. Sure, he’d seen, and probably licked, every inch of her, but that was then. This was now, and if he was pissed at her, she didn’t want to face him at her most vulnerable.

She glanced around. Aden had been wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt earlier. She could pull that on until . . . She frowned, realizing he’d picked up all of his clothes on his way to the shower. Just her luck. She’d fallen for a neat freak. Casting around for a solution, expecting the shower to turn off at any moment, her eye fell on an antique armoire against the far wall. Maybe there was something in there she could put on, a robe or another shirt.

She crossed over to the tall closet-like piece of furniture. It was similar in design to the dresser, with latticework cutouts in a floral motif, but the inlays were tortoise shell and sliced so thin that when she pulled open the door, the light shone through in rich gold and chocolate brown. She stroked her fingers over the beautiful workmanship as she pushed the door fully open . . . and then she could only stare at what she’d found.

There wasn’t a robe, wasn’t a shirt, hanging inside. But what there was aroused so many different feelings that she couldn’t process them all. She’d known Aden was dominant and had suspected his dominance was more than simply an alpha male personality, but this . . . this was whips and chains, handcuffs and arm restraints, collars and blindfolds, and other things she could only guess at.

She didn’t hear the bathroom door open, didn’t know Aden was there until she felt his heat against her still-naked back and smelled the fresh soap scent of his skin. His arm reached around her and lifted a flogger from its hook. It was leather, a light brown suede that gave its multiple tails a deceptively soft appearance.

Aden dragged the soft suede across her naked breast, and Sidonie felt every one of the multiple tails as they slid over her engorged nipple until it ached. Her breath grew uneven, and her heart was going a mile a minute. But she wasn’t afraid. She was exquisitely aroused, with wet heat dripping between her still sticky thighs.

Aden lowered his mouth to her ear. “Do you know what I thought when I laid eyes on you for the first time, Sidonie?”

Sid tried to come up with something clever, something to break the unbearable erotic tension that was freezing her in place. But she could only shake her head mutely.

“I thought how beautiful your pale skin would look under the lash,” he purred, trailing the flogger down over the curve of her breasts to her belly. He lingered above her swollen pussy lips, switching the flogger around and stroking the hard handle between her thighs, before snaking the multiple tails over her hip and down to her leg.

Without warning, he snapped the flogger in the air, letting her feel the barest kiss of suede against her thigh. Sid shivered, her nipples hard points of desire, her pussy drenched in heat. Aden closed the small distance between them until his body was flush with hers, his cock a heavy length against the curve of her butt. She closed her eyes, letting her head fall back against his shoulder.

His lips closed over her neck, and she reached up, curling her fingers over the back of his head, caressing him, holding him against her.

“Shall I show you, Sidonie? Would you like to see how pretty your skin would look?”

Sid trembled, afraid to admit her own desires. “I want you to fuck me,” she said in a whisper so soft that she wasn’t certain he’d heard until his arm came around her waist and she was spinning around. Before she could draw a breath of surprise, Sid found herself bent over the bed, her butt in the air, her legs spread wide as Aden nudged her feet apart.

His thick fingers dipped between her legs, spreading her lips, testing her wetness and finding her slippery with arousal. “You’re soaking wet, habibi,” he chided. “Such a wicked girl.”

His hand stroked the full length of her slit, gathering moisture and dragging it over the skin of her butt, as if to demonstrate how very wet she was.

“Ask nicely,” he murmured, his voice a rumbling burr of sound. “And I’ll give you what you want. What you need.”

“Aden,” she whispered, the words scraping against her dry throat. “Go fuck yourself.”

His chuckle in response was far too happy. As if he’d hoped she’d defy him.

“Bad girl,” he hissed directly into her ear.

She heard the swish of the flogger before she felt the sting of its kiss. Her pussy clenched, and she could only groan, her back arching as she offered herself, her body begging for what her brain refused to admit.

“Pink and pretty,” Aden crooned, and then the whip swished again, on her other butt cheek. “Mmm,” he said appreciatively. “Lovely.”

“Aden,” she said, trying not to whine.

“Yes, Sidonie?”

Sid swallowed the knot of desire choking her throat, every nerve in her body stretched thin, hanging on the precipice and screaming for release. “I really need—”

She didn’t have a chance to finish her sentence. One of Aden’s strong hands flattened on her lower back, holding her in place, and then his cock was slamming into her, a long hard thrust that went deeper than she would have thought possible. She felt him all the way to her womb, all the way to her heart, as he thrust in and out in a steady rhythm, as she pressed her chest into the bed and arched her back, inviting him to go deeper still.

Aden fisted a hand in her long hair, wrapping it around his fingers as he bent low over her back and tugged her head backwards, bearing her neck.

“Mine,” he growled against her hot skin. And that was all the warning she got before his fangs bit into her vein, and her entire body convulsed in orgasm. She buried her scream in the bed covering, her hips bucking against him as his fingers slipped under her body and deep between her thighs, delving into her wetness until he found her clit, then stroking and pinching until Sid thought she’d die as wave after wave of sensation rolled through her body, scorching her nerves, winding her muscles so tightly she could no longer move, only feel, as Aden’s thick cock continued to pound into her, as his snarl of possession shivered against her skin.

He lifted his head, his fangs sliding free of her vein, his breath a silken brush over the flushed skin of her neck.

“Say it,” he demanded, his tongue roughly licking her wounds closed.

Sid had trouble making sense of his words, her mind fogged with bliss, her synapses overwhelmed with sensation.

Aden’s hand came down sharply on her ass, and she moaned.

“Say it,” he repeated.

She thought hard, then finally realized what he wanted.

“Yours,” she agreed, panting. “I’m yours.”

Aden’s roar of climax sounded like a shout of victory, his hot release filling her, setting off a final orgasm that left her overcome by too many emotions, too many feelings all crowding together, all demanding that she feel at the same time.

Aden collapsed over her sweaty back, breathing deeply as he sucked in oxygen, one arm braced to her side, the other stroking her face tenderly.

“Breathe, habibi,” he murmured, his tongue brushing her cheek, tasting her tears.

Sid nodded and tried to concentrate on just that. Breathing. Inhale, exhale. Slow and steady.

“What does that mean?” she managed to ask, then drew in another lungful of air. “That word you call me.”

“It has different meanings, but for you, it means sweetheart.”

“Habibi,” she repeated, testing the syllables.

“Hmm,” he agreed. Sliding a muscled arm around her waist, he dragged them both farther up onto the bed, settling against the pillows with her a limp weight against his side.

“I want you to stay here today,” he told her. “It’s not safe for you out there.”

“You mean because Silas sent that guy on the train, but I don’t get it,” Sid said fretfully. “What would she want with me?”

“I’ve never kept a woman around before. Maybe she thinks I like you.”

“So, I’m the only one?”

“Stop fishing, Sidonie. What do you need to know?”

Sid found enough energy to drape herself over his chest, so that their eyes were more or less even, his expression filled with a patient humor that made her want to bite something, him for starters. She blinked at the thought. She’d never been a biter before she met Aden. Come to think of it, she’d never done a lot of things before she met Aden. This bad boy fling was turning out to be a lot more than she thought. The question was, what did Aden think it was, and was Sidonie about to get her heart broken?

“Okay,” she said, hoping she looked more alert than she felt. “I like you. Probably more than I should, given your . . . dangerous profession.”

Aden laughed out loud. “Is that what we’re calling it? My dangerous profession?”

Sid slapped his chest. “Don’t make fun. What would you like me to call it?”