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“Yes!”

“Held down. Held safe. Mine to take.”

“Yes, it’s exactly what I needed.”

“Nobody’s ever doing it any other way again. You hear me? Nobody takes from you anymore. People give. People give you what you ask for. That’s it.”

A sob breaks free of me, and it’s not a sad sound. It’s the sound of light pouring into the darkness that has suffocated me for so long.

He feels it. His rhythm shifts, deeper, slower, every drag of him against my insides hits the place that makes my vision spark. His thumb traces my throat, and his other hand grips my hip, and I can feel the trembling start in my thighs, climb my spine, ring through my whole body like a bell.

“Dante! I’m gonna?—”

“Come on, baby. Let me see how fucking gorgeous you are when you break for me.”

The wave doesn’t crest. It detonates. My back arches off the cross, and the cuffs catch my wrists, and I’m screaming into his shoulder, white blooming behind my eyes, every nerve in my body firing at once. He keeps going through it, drawing it out, his hand at my throat steady and present andsafe, until the second wave hits me on top of the first and I’m shaking so hard I can’t tell which way is up.

He comes inside me with a low, broken sound against my neck. I feel it. Every pulse of him. The heat of him filling me up, marking me in a way I’ve never been so desperate for.

He doesn’t pull out right away. He stays there, forehead to mine, breath ragged, hand sliding from my throat to my cheek.

“There you are,” he whispers. “There you are.”

He reaches for the cuffs. Right wrist first. He unbuckles it and lowers my arm slowly, kissing the inside of my wrist where the leather pressed, then guides it around his neck. The left wrist next. Same kiss. Same care. The second my arms are free, I fold into him, and he catches me, one arm under my thighs, the other locked around my back, lifting me off the cross like I weigh nothing.

He carries me to the padded bench. Sits with me in his lap. Wraps me up in his arms like a blanket made of him.

That’s when the shaking starts in earnest.

It rolls through me in waves, head to foot, my teeth chattering even though the room is warm. I can’t stop it. I don’t try. I press my face into the crook of his neck and shake, and he holds me tighter, his hand stroking up and down my spine in long, slow passes.

“You did so well, baby. So fucking well.”

“I’m—I don’t know why I’m?—”

“Shh. I know. Let it out.”

“I’m not scared, Dante, I’m not, I just…”

“I know you’re not. You’re okay. You’re safe. I got you.”

It's a relief. That’s the word I couldn’t find. The shaking is relief, and underneath the discovery that I gave up control, and I’m still here. I’m still me. He tied me up, and I’m not broken. He filled me up, and I’m not empty. He took everything I offered and gave it back to me a thousand times over.

Gerald’s ghost was in that room when I walked in. I felt him in my hands when I touched the cuffs. He’s not here now. He’s not anywhere on my skin. There’s just Dante, and warmth, and the slow, steady drum of his heart against my cheek.

“Thank you,” I whisper.

“Don’t thank me yet.”

“Dante…”

“Every damn time, baby.” He kisses the crown of my head. “Every damn time you ask, you get this. You hear me?”

“Yeah,” I reply.

“Say it back to me,” he demands.

“Every time.”