He settles, propped on his elbows between my legs, and kisses my thigh, looking up the length of my body at the red rope against my skin. “You look amazing.”

I whisper out a raspy “Thanks,” watching rapt as he bends, lips parted. And, God, I believe him.

He groans a split second before he makes contact, and when he does it’s like a bomb goes off inside me. Something seems to break loose with the wet slide of his tongue. I fall back, arms stiffening in their hold, back bowing off the mattress so I can arch closer. I know now that I haven’t just been waiting for this since last night; I’ve been waiting for it every second since I last felt his tongue between my legs. His mouth is warm and strong. Kissing there like he would my mouth, small kisses and gentle licks release my first cry, and he grunts, pushing his tongue up into me and just . . . losing it.

Finn was always borderline rough and clearly wanted control the two other times we were together, but this . . . this is different. It isn’t just the rope around my arms or the way he has me pinned beneath him. It’s the way it feels like we’ve crossed into a different space—before it was just a one-time thing, a two-time thing, just sex. But this time, it’s like he’s peeling away the layers to show me a secret side of him.

For a flash, I’m aware of how loud he is, sucking and smacking, and how loud I am, crying out and saying his name and other garbled words—but I can’t hold on to the inclination to be self-conscious. I can’t because with the vibration of his groan spreading through me, and the way he uses the knot at my belly to rhythmically pull me against his mouth, I’m coming so soon, so hard it claws up my thighs and explodes like heat and wet and pure fucking bliss, sliding silvery all along every inch of my legs. My skin feels flushed and electric, and I can hear my own hoarse cries echo sharply in the mostly empty room. Finn keeps going, diligently working his mouth over me, but I’m gasping as I come down, my legs trembling and weak. I want to push them together, but his hands spread across my thighs, holding me open, pressing them flat to the bed.

He grunts out a No and reaches beneath me with one hand to deliver a sharp smack on the outside of my thigh.

I’m too far gone to be shocked. When he spreads his hand over where he’s just struck me, and rubs his rough palm in slow, soothing circles as he hums, I immediately want the sharp crack again because of the way it melted into delicious heat under his sweeter touch.

Finn is watching me, his lips pressed gently against my clit, concentrating his gaze on my face. He pulls away just enough to whisper, “Tell me how that felt.”

Does he mean the spanking or the mind-numbing orgasm? Or the way I can barely move after he made every muscle in my body clench? Regardless, the answer is the same. Blinking, I open my mouth, slowly stringing the words, So . . . fucking . . . good, together in my head. Before I can get them out, he smiles against me, returning to the maddening kisses, the licks and tugging on the knotted rope. I let the words and every thought in my head fall away and push into him, circling my hips closer to his mouth.

My face feels hot, my cheeks flushed. The rope tickles along my skin, pulling up and down in a rhythm that matches the teasing flicks of his tongue. My nipples are hard, aching, and I want his fingers to find them, his mouth to find them. I want him everywhere at once. I feel heavy and desperate, my entire world oriented by where he’s touching me and where he’s not.

I must be saying something because the sound of his voice breaks through the fog. “That’s right,” he says, murmuring softly. “Fuck, look at you.”

But I’m looking at him. His soft hair is between my legs and his eyes, those fucking eyes are staring right back at me, waiting. He curls a finger inside and bends his head to continue sucking, and that’s all it takes. My back arches off the mattress and I cry out, falling to pieces again inside his web of silken rope.

I feel like melted chocolate poured across this bed and moan quietly when Finn’s hands smooth up over my belly, gently unfastening the knot.

“It may tingle a little when I take it off.” He kisses where the knot was, where there’s now an indentation of what almost looks like a flower on my skin. “It’ll be sensitive.”

“Okay,” I say on a long exhale. And it does; as he unwinds the soft rope from my arms, reversing the intricate crisscross pattern across my body, I can feel the air hit the delicate lines on my skin, but only for a split second before Finn’s mouth slides along the same path, licking, kissing, soothing everywhere it feels so sensitive.

It’s overwhelming how good this feels, and how gentle he is. When my hands are free, I slide them both over his shoulders and up his neck, holding his face to my chest as he licks and sucks at the rope lines beneath my breasts.

Finally, he pulls my nipple into his mouth, tongue circling. “So fucking good,” he murmurs, switching to my other breast, fingers ghosting along the fading lines.

His hands find my wrists and he guides my arms over my head, looping the rope around them again.

“Okay?” he whispers.

“Yeah.”

Bound like this, I can leave my arms over my head or loop them around his neck. But for now I leave them where they are and relish the feel of the comforter beneath my back as Finn grips my hips and drags me to the foot of the bed.

Reaching between my legs, he strokes me with two fingers, making a V as he slides over my clit and then inside, repeating the pattern again, and again.

“You’re so damn warm.” He bends, kissing my hip.

Finn pulls away and steps back so I can watch him push his jeans and boxers down his hips, kicking them onto the floor. He grabs a condom from a box in the top drawer of the dresser but doesn’t put it on yet.

Instead, he climbs up on the bed, straddling my chest. Above me, he feels like fire, the heat emanating from his skin unlike anything I’ve ever felt. I feel like I’ve grown extra nerve endings over the parts of my body that were covered by rope.

He braces a hand beside my head, gripping his cock with the other. “Kiss me.”

When the broad head of his cock touches my lips, I let my eyes fall closed at the sound of his groan. I love the tight flare of the crown, the taste of him. I lick around the tip, opening wider when he slides more into my mouth, rocking just in and out while I play, getting him wet enough to slide easily past my lips.

“You like it?” he asks, voice rasping. “The feel of my cock on your tongue?”

Nodding, I open my eyes to see an expression on his face I’ve never seen before: frenzied adoration, as if he’s never seen anything more amazing in his life.