His erection lay between Danger and Will, and my mouth watered, wanting to taste him in the worst way, to feel the rush of his blood beneath my tongue, but he wouldn’t allow me to rise or to use my hands. He left me again and grasped an ankle, ran his fingertips along my instep, sending a startlingly sharp wave of pleasure up my leg before ripping off another strip of tape and wrapping it. He seemed to be growing more impatient as he worked. He pulled, spreading my legs wide, and secured it to the frame with another strip. After showering my calf and the inside of my knee with soft, hot kisses, he did the same to the other ankle, spreading me even farther.

Then he stood over me like a king observing his conquest. I lay open and exposed. I’d never been particularly self-conscious, but I couldn’t help a moment of doubt as he gazed at me. His expression was so intense, so magnetic, however, that all doubt melted. But I could never have imagined what would happen next.

He started at my ankles, first rubbing them with his thumbs, then leaning in, placing the tiniest of kisses along my skin, grazing his teeth a microsecond before he bit down. Just barely. Just enough to cause a slight spike in pain.

I gasped at almost the precise moment he did. Then I understood. I felt his reaction to my pain. Felt it bounce off him and into me like a ricochet of pleasure that stabbed into my center. He did the same to the other ankle. Each bite crackled like lightning beneath my skin, and I squirmed with need and uncontrollable delight. He licked, then drank, then bit as though taking tequila shots up my legs, and the insane exhilaration washing through me, filtered through his own tactile response, caused me to cry out softly. But it was enough to get his attention.

He straddled me again and tore off another strip of tape, only to secure it over my mouth before descending on Danger and Will. His teeth grazed an erect nipple, just hard enough to cause another spike, another stab, another ricochet.

I threw back my head and wiggled helplessly as he did this over and over, giving every inch of my body the same amount of attention. Even the insides of my wrists, covered by tape, were not safe. He just bit harder to get the reaction he wanted, tensing each time and pausing to let the pain wash over him and back into me.

Without warning, he dipped lower, forced my legs even farther apart, and suckled the folds between my legs, feathering soft strokes with his tongue, whipping me to the brink of orgasm. I gasped behind the tape as an intense pleasure pooled in my abdomen. I became molten lava, scorching hot beneath his touch, and the swell of cl**ax flared to life deep in my core. I moaned as it flourished and grew in size and strength like a summer tide. He pushed his fingers inside me, milking it even closer until I almost begged for release.

Then he sank his teeth into the delicate folds, the pain pushing me higher, up and up until the bittersweet sting of orgasm burst inside me and spilled through me like a boiling sea.

Before I came down entirely, Reyes crawled on top of me, grabbed a handful of hair to secure me to the spot, and slid inside me, burying every inch of his erection in one quick thrust. I bit down, whipped my head back as my cl**ax rebound. He began to move inside me, exquisitely slow at first, then harder, faster, as though desperate with need. With hunger. Another wave of pleasure rippled through me as I felt his own orgasm growing. Pulsating. Rocketing through him.

He thrust into me with a fierce fervor, seeking that high until it cracked and shattered inside him, the ethereal sensation crashing against his bones. I followed suit, coming for a second time, pleasure so sharp and raw, I forgot how to breathe. His cl**ax felt like white-hot sparks falling over my skin as reality settled around us once again.

10

You’re the reason I get up in the morning.

That, and I need to pee.

— E-CARD

I woke early the next morning to sticky wrists and a raging headache. I felt like Barbara, my brain, had exploded into a liquid goo but Fred, my skull, was keeping everything intact. I slipped out of bed quietly, trying not to wake my affianced, and stumbled to the bathroom. My head and everything attached to it hurt. My hair hurt. My lashes hurt. My brows hurt possibly most of all. Even my earlobes hurt. Perhaps that last orgasm caused a mini-stroke. I checked my mouth to see if it was lopsided.

Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, I took my morning tinkle and brushed my teeth – not at the same time or anything, though I could multitask like that when in a hurry.

Having left my brush in Reyes’s bathroom, I went through the now open bedrooms and into his apartment. Before I made it to the bathroom, however, I heard a painfully soft knock on his door. As I made my way toward it, the doorknob jiggled as though someone was testing it.

I furrowed my brows and stepped closer. Since I was wearing only a nightshirt, I cracked open the door to peer into the barely lit hall. A woman with long black hair stood on the other side. She was clearly just as surprised to see me as I her. She jumped back, startled; then a slow dawning spread over her, and the stark jealousy I not only felt but also saw in her expression raked over my frayed nerve endings.

“I’m looking for Reyes Farrow,” she said, her voice low, as though not wanting to disturb the neighbors. “I’m Sylvia Starr.”

I knew who she was, but why in the hell was she showing up at Reyes’s apartment so early in the morning? I decided to call her on it.

“This is his apartment, and it’s way too early to receive visitors.”

She blinked, appalled, but I wasn’t sure if it was my tone or the fact that another female was in her love interest’s apartment.

She tried to hand me her card. “Can you ask him to call me? We need to set up a time for an interview I’m doing for News at Seven.”