“You didn’t ask for a full tour.”
“I might now.”
Then his mouth touched the mark.
Not a kiss on my mouth or a hand between my legs. His lips brushed that tiny hidden piece of me like he’d found something private and wanted to know whether I’d let him keep looking.
The sensation shot down my spine.
I closed my eyes.
Dex kissed the ink drop again, then the sensitive skin below it. His stubble scraped lightly. My hands slid back to his shoulders before I could stop them.
“Sensitive,” he murmured.
“You’re smug for a man who just discovered basic anatomy.”
His smile pressed against my skin. “This isn’t basic.”
No.
It wasn’t.
I needed to get out.
Dex rolled to his side and drew me with him, still close, still too warm. He pulled the ugly sheet over my hips, then tucked it without making a big thing out of it. The gesture hit too hard. So did the way his jeans stayed abandoned on the floor, the way he left the metal on the nightstand, the way he acted like not putting it back on was somehow still safe.
“Don’t make me regret taking those off,” he said.
I stared at the restraints across his body, out of reach.
Then I looked at him. “Do you already regret it?”
“No.”
The answer came too fast.
Dex’s hand settled on my waist over the sheet. Heavy. Warm. Not holding me down. Just there.
I wanted to hate it.
I meant to move away.
Instead, I stayed still and listened to his breathing slow.
The sign outside buzzed in the dark. The cheap sheet smelled like bleach and old smoke, and underneath it my skin still held the heat of his mouth, his hands, the place behind my ear where he’d found the only mark that wasn’t in Crystal’s file.
He’d noticed it like a lover.
In the morning, it would ruin him.
The thought was supposed to get me moving.
I stayed where I was.
Dex’s thumb moved once against my waist. “Get some sleep.”
“You first.”
