“I am so sorry,” I say.
“Don’t be,” she mutters, covering my marks—mymarks—all over her. “I like it. It’s…like proof. You’re not a rough person, Kyran. I woke up this morning and sawall thisin the mirror andfelthow badly you wanted me.” Cheeks softly pink, she murmurs, “It wasn’t a terrible experience.” She heaves a sigh. “Unfortunately, you want me too much. And therefore cannot control yourself. So, no cuddles for me. Unless…”
“Unless?” I whisper.
She hums. “Well, I suppose…” She selects another card, from a different building, scans it, inviting the divot beneath her lip back to torment me. “Icouldtie you up.”
I freeze with the thieved egg salad sandwich halfway to my mouth.
Seafoam glass glides my way, sultry. “Would you like that, e-boy?”
This is playing dirty.Sodirty.
I. Am.Obsessed.
Sothisis what Morana looks like when she’s done imposing familial relations between us.Thisis herflirting.
Lowering my eyes, I murmur, “Yes, mistress. I would.”
She shudders, then she cusses and fixes her attention squarely back on her tasks. “I forgot. You don’t call bluffs.”
“I wonder how you managed to forget that.”
“A real wild mystery. It’s almost like I have things on my mind and a guy who keeps trespassing.”
Trespassing? I’m not trespassing. She, very clearly, invited me in. I canshowher trespassing, if she’d like. I do happen to know her landlord’s chaotic assistant, who would be nothing but supportive of my breaking and entering in the name of love. That is to say, Crisis would give me a key in a heartbeat.
I take another bite of my sandwich. “Are you going to tie my hands above my head, or behind my back?”
“Ew.”
“There’s an allure to both, the sheer helplessness…the power play.”
“Stop talking.”
“I’m partial to above my head, because then you could cinch them to the headboard and—”
“Kyran,” she snaps, fully scarlet. “I believe I said…stop.”
Crap. She did.
I hang my head. “Forgive me my neglect. I shall accept whatever punishment you deem appropriate.”
Her eyes roll, but she says, “Let me redecorate your room,” as though she’s had such a “punishment” locked and loaded, just waiting for an opportunity to get it out there.
“My…room?”
“Yes.”
“You genuinely want to redecorate…my bedroom?”
Finding enough scraps of space on the table, she settles her bowl and plate of picked-at food amid the town, turns her whole body toward me, and leans in. “Yes, baby,” she tortures, “let me leave my fingerprints all over your personal space. It’s only fair, right? I want to repay every last one of your favors on me…”
A shiver rocks my fragile body.
As fast as she closed in, she pulls away, adding, “At your own expense, of course.”
Smiling into the final bite of my sandwich, I say, “When do we start?”
