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His smile disappeared, and he stepped closer, somehow parting her knees and standing between them. Or had they simply given way before his obvious intent? Rough palms curved over her thighs. She'd been a New Yorker for most her life. People did not get up in her face like this. She'd shove them back in a heartbeat, tell them to piss off, demand what the fuck or...something.
Maybe it was because she was sitting on the stage, and she had always experienced a shift there, as if she'd stepped into a world where the dramatic and unexpected were more acceptable. She inhabited a world of quirky people who could be infected with that same virus when they were close to a stage. Things that would seem over the top and out of place outside the theater were just the standard within it.
Or maybe there was an entirely different reason he'd caught her off guard.
Her pulse thudded against her throat as his gaze held hers. If she'd doubted the Dom thing before, she didn't now. His captivating voice was a low croon, close to a growl, a thrumming note that her body answered with a hard quiver, coming from those chambers that were suddenly wide open to him.
"Sometimes women get self-conscious about the way their bodies look when they're tied up," he said in a deceptively conversational way. "Like when I tie an ankle to a thigh, and they think the thigh looks too spread out, or the flesh of their stomach is squeezed between two wraps."
His hands slid along her thighs, back toward her knees, a short, intimate stroke. "The things I could do with these thighs," he murmured. He lifted his gaze to hers, and she discovered his eyes could look like a new penny caught in the rain. "When we first meet one another, we're shells. The shell might be pretty, but what I learn about you when I bind you will take me to what's deep beneath that. I suspect your eyes will look like heated molasses when you're aroused."
His gaze slid down. "Your nice breasts would become a pillow, where I'd rest my head and listen to your heartbeat, because when I tie you up, your submissive nature will rise. You'll want to give me that gift, lie still to serve my needs and desires, because I think your instinct is toward care and compassion, serving a Master's needs beyond his cock or orgasm."
His gaze slid back up. "When I uncover that instinct, that's when the shell completely vanishes and I'll know just how beautiful you are."
"You don't really see someone until you see their soul," she said, surprised she could even form words, let alone try to sound like she was reacting to his words as if he were giving her an instructional lecture, not a personal mandate.
"Exactly. That matters way more than what I see in a two-dimensional way. It's the best way for you to get to know me better, too." He moved back, though his hand whispered along her knee, a hint of how he could touch her. Maybe would touch her. "Like just now. When I was talking about tying you in rope, and things were all quiet and intense, were you seeing the skinny guy with questionable taste in second hand clothes, or did you feel the touch of a broad-shouldered god hung like a moose?"
She burst out laughing, as she was sure he'd intended, for his eyes sparkled with humor. The laughter brought a rush of good feeling, that sense of ease again, which had a peculiar reaction with things that weren't at ease at all, but on full, anticipatory alert around him. "Maybe something in between. Damn, you're good."
"I'm good because I'm honest." She saw that flash of sincerity, the hint of dead seriousness, the gleam in his eyes that said he would do all of that and more to her if she opened the door. What's more, he'd proven he could do it in less than a blink. The realization stole her smile and her breath at once, leaving her reeling.
"You have my contact info," he said, shouldering his pack again. "Ball's in your court, Julie. But I'll be ready to hold onto it when you send it back. All right?"
The look he h
ad upon her now expected--maybe demanded--an answer.
Though an innate part of him, Marcus's Dom qualities always had a deliberate, calculated quality to them that was overwhelming. In contrast, this seemed second nature to Desmond Hayes, something he wasn't conscious he was doing. Remarkably, it made him even more potent to her.
"All right," she said. Was her voice breathless?
As he nodded and turned away, she had a feeling he'd registered it. The same way she'd recognized the answering heat in his eyes.
Good Lord, who was this guy?
Chapter Two
"Okay, who the hell is this roofing guy? Desmond Hayes," Julie added at Madison's blank look.
"Spiderman," Logan supplied. Madison's expression cleared in a blink.
"Oh, Des! Sorry. I've been dealing with so many contractors." Madison leaned back in the span of Logan's long arm. The couple were on the front porch swing at Logan's house, where the three of them were sharing an after work drink. Julie was sitting on a facing chair, shoes off and toes curled over the edge as she drew her knees up to her chest. Through the screen that protected them from the ever-present mosquitoes, she could see the manmade pond Logan had on the large rural property. The acres of surrounding open fields and forest formed a cozy cushion for the clapboard farmhouse he'd renovated.
"Des is a 360 degree experience, isn't he?" Madison asked with a chuckle. "First you just see this grungy handyman, a little on the skinny side, though those eyes are as deep as moon craters. Then he gets to talking in that voice like...it's hard to describe."
"Keep trying and you'll find yourself in all kinds of trouble," Logan advised.
Madison dimpled at him. They'd only been married a few months, and so they still had that newlywed miasma around them that could be as wondrous as it was annoying. But since Madison was the only person Julie knew who'd had a worse dating record than herself, it was hard for her to be annoyed or resentful. Just wistful.
"That's all right," Julie interjected. "I'll say it. His voice already falls into the 'drop my panties and take me now' range. Look into those brown eyes, and it's a done deal. It's a bit disconcerting. The rest of the image doesn't fit."
"Well, at first you think so. But if you ever see him do his rope work, or the way he relates to a sub, you change your mind about that."
An understatement. Julie had recalled that moment on stage a million times. Des so inappropriately close to her for a guy she'd just met, her sitting so still and captured by whatever mojo he emanated. He was like some kind of freakish Dom wizard. Who did roofing on the side.
"Earth to Julie?"
