He got a grip on my leash at my back and gave it a gentle tug.

My eyes popped open.

“Sex on the brain with you,” he said softly, his gaze not just on my eyes, but roaming my face.

And throat.

“What?” I asked.

“Worse now, knowing what a sweet fuck you really are.”

“What?” I repeated.

“Since we became something that was gonna be, I’ve been like a goddamned teenager. Practically all I could think was how I was gonna do you. Never had that for a woman. Always could compartmentalize. That was a different part of life and I kept it there.”

I was not your everyday girl, case in point, being collared with a scarf in bed with a hot Dom who was now, I was thinking, also officially my boyfriend.

But still, I figured most girls would take that as the compliment I took it as.

This being huge.

“Well, I have a feeling you ticked a few things off that list last night.” I paused. “And this morning.”

He smiled at me, brushed his lips against mine, pulled a hint away, and reminded me, “Worse now, Ryn.”

Ah.

I got it.

I lifted a hand to his jaw and said, “Honey, your stamina is awe-inspiring, but you wore your fucktoy out. This girl needs a rest period.”

His lips were quirking (in a cocky way, which obviously was a hot way) when he said, “I don’t mean I’m gonna take you again now. But you told me the other night what you’d been thinking the days we were apart, and I didn’t tell you that I was alternating liberally between wondering why I was being such a huge fucking dick, and jacking myself to sleep thinking what I wanted to do to you when we worked it out.”

Suddenly, I was not tired at all.

“You jacked yourself to sleep thinking about me?”

“Yeah, and babe,” he went in for another lip brush, and clearly had read my mind because he went on to say, “you’ll watch me jack off. And you’ll jack me off. But fucking you out fucked me out, so your man needs a rest period.”

I smiled huge at him because he was being cute, but also because I would someday get to watch him jack off.

I bet it was like everything Boone did.

Incredibly freaking awesome.

He proved he didn’t need that much of a rest period because his eyes took in my smile, then his arms went around me, and he started making out with me.

Boone finished this off by running his lips along my cheekbone, down to my chin, along my jaw, and in my ear, he said, “Doze, Rynnie. I gotta make some calls, and after you get some rest in, I’ll make us breakfast.”

That sounded like a plan.

“Okay, Boone.”

He kissed my neck above the scarf that was still there.

Then he got out of the bed, pulled the covers over me, bent in and kissed my shoulder, and I watched as he walked naked to his bathroom.

But once that fabulous view was out of sight, it didn’t take me long to be out.

Because seriously, my man was a fuck machine, and this girl needed a rest period.

* * *

I was sitting on the kitchen counter, nightie on, legs open.

Boone was standing between them, wearing nothing but jeans.

We weren’t in the throes of doing it again.

We were eating oatmeal.

I was a big fan of oatmeal, especially since it meant Boone didn’t one-up my breakfast because everyone knew even burnt hash browns and not-so-great eggs were better than oatmeal.

“Big meal last night, light but solid breakfast,” he said, and my eyes went from my bowl to him. “I’ll knock your socks off tomorrow with my version of Sunday brunch.”

Right.

Straight up, this was freaky.

“How do you always know what I’m thinking?” I asked.

“Just then I knew because you were looking at your oatmeal and smirking.”

Well then.

Huh.

I spooned up more oatmeal, mumbling, “I need to work on my poker face.”

“There is absolutely no reason you need to hide your thoughts from me, Ryn.”

At the steely tone of his voice, my eyes flew to his.

“Or anything,” he went on. “Any emotion. Any reaction.”

And there it was.

We were diving straight into some heavy.

I liked the jokey, bantering, fucking-a-lot zone we’d been in a whole lot better, so I teased, “There might be some thoughts best left hidden. Christmas presents? Birthdays?”

His gaze stayed direct, but grew soft when he said, “I’m not feelin’ playful about this subject, Rynnie. We’re doin’ this and we’re important, so I hate to say it, but your reprieve is over.”

Great.

Though I liked the “we’re important” part a whole lot.

Boone kept talking.

“You fought hard not to give me your emotion the other night and then you were fucked up about giving in. You gotta know, we both need to understand why you did that.”

I sucked in breath.

Shit.

He wasn’t starting out small.

His head ticked and he said, “Release.”

I let that breath go.

He watched me super closely after this and I knew he was recalling the incidents I’d done this before, and maybe putting shit together, and since I didn’t want to get into that right now, I got into something not important.

My father.

“My dad was an awesome guy. He was really good-looking. Funny. Charismatic. Everyone liked to be around him. Especially women,” I shared.

Boone put his oatmeal aside, turned fully to me and put his hands on my knees.

Crap.

On the one hand, it was incredibly cool he was indicating unequivocally that I had every bit of his attention.

On the other hand, it was rare I talked about this (like, never) mostly because I didn’t think Dad deserved my time, even to bitch about him.

“So,” I went on, “it’s not a reach to think, with a guy like that, the everyone who liked to be around him included his children.”

“Rynnie,” he whispered, knowing now where this was going.

But this was my heavy.

Or part of it.

And we were doing this, and Boone would eventually need this, and he was right, we both needed to understand it.

“I’m guessing you know I was not a pretty, pretty princess. Not daddy’s little girl. I wasn’t daddy’s tomboy either. I was me. But he was like, the greatest dad a kid could have, on the surface. Handsome. Successful. He walked into a room, and by the sheer force of his personality, everyone looked right to him. That was the dad to have. That was the dad to be proud of. That was the dad you wanted to shine his light on you. And he did, Boone. He shined his light on us. And when he did, the heavens opened, and the angels sang. When Dad made us laugh, because he could be really funny. Or when Dad took us to a movie and then to get ice cream sundaes and we’d talk about the movie and he’d treat us like adults. Like what we had to say was akin to a review from Siskel and Ebert.”

I stopped suddenly, turned my head to the side, and put my bowl by Boone’s.

“Ryn,” Boone said gently, wrapping a hand around the side of my neck.

I looked again at him.

“But he’s like a whirlwind. He’d sweep into a room and sweep you off your feet and then he’d cast you aside, leaving you dirty and broken and used in his wake.”