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  Drew traced his hands down her slender back, taking a moment to marvel at her silky texture before finding and unhooking the clasp to her bra. It was blue, it matched the interesting panties, it was on the floor with the rest of her clothes and his shirt.

  “Two years, really?” He skimmed his hands over her rib cage, brushing his thumbs along the edges of her small breasts and enjoying the tickle of her firmly pebbled nipples across his chest.

  When he was standing and Eva was barefoot, he was just tall enough that she couldn’t kiss him unless he bent down. She tried, much to Drew’s delight, stretching up on her toes. He bypassed her mouth and went for her neck instead, and as he worried at the muscle below her ear, he finally gave into temptation and curled one hand over her breast. Her nipple hardened against his palm, and Drew reveled in the sigh that followed his fingers over the sensitive pink and white contours.

  He still had jeans on, and they felt increasingly restrictive. Drew’s fingers met Eva’s over the zipper and they shared an awkward laugh. She looked chagrined, like a kid caught reaching for a forbidden cookie. Drew had to remind himself to keep his hands moving, to get the offending pants off. Only after he slid them down did he consider he might have kept his boxers on.

  Too late, though, and they were both completely naked, which reduced his brain to little more than a placeholder in his skull.

  “We should get under the covers, it’s freezing,” Eva said before he could reach for her. Drew followed her down the narrow hallway, delighted by the view.

  Her bedroom was furnished in a cozy, traditional style with a four-poster bed and a quilt that looked antique. It surprised him. He’d expected sleek and modern, minimalist, like an art gallery. This, while not fussy, was decidedly old-fashioned, though the dark taupe paint and the few knickknacks scattered about made the room look more eclectic and artsy than it might have.

  She was turning the covers down as neatly as she might for sleep, and Drew recognized the tension that had returned to her shoulders. Her narrow back was straight and stiff and turned directly his way.

  “Two years is a long time. You nervous?” He stepped behind her and slipped his arms around her waist. So tempting to let his hands roam. He resisted as much as possible and was rewarded by the simple trust evident in Eva’s touch when she wrapped her hands over his forearms and pressed him closer.

  “A little. I think I’m making decisions because I’m horny. Those are not usually the best decisions.”

  Drew laughed and squeezed tighter, feeling every millimeter of contact between his skin and hers as a delicious, warm promise of things to come. “I’ll do my best to keep you from regretting it.”

  His approach was more measured now than it had been in the living room. He wanted her anxiety gone, her senses engaged. He wanted to make her smile. So he mapped out a course with his hands, tracking every dip and rise he planned to cover later with his mouth. His fingers circled the spots his tongue would linger in the longest. When Eva arched into the gentle exploration, lifting her hands behind her to rest at his neck, Drew felt a sense of achievement he knew he really hadn’t earned yet.

  But it was still so sweet, such a triumph, having this particular girl in his arms after all that unprecedented effort. And if he wanted her in more than his arms, wanted her knotted in place in his home with a rope she could never hope to untangle, he was aroused enough to ignore that desire in favor of something a little more conventional.

  Eva turned, smiling, and pulled him onto the bed with her in a giggling heap. Giddy, out of his head with want, Drew rolled her under him in one smooth motion and held her hands as he pressed his hips down. His cock, rock hard and eager, caught against Eva’s pelvis and then snapped down to ride against her pussy. They both cried out at the hot friction, and it was all Drew could do not to push forward just that tiny bit, angle his thrust and enter her right then. Condom be damned, babies be damned.

  He took her mouth instead, fucking it with his tongue until they were both breathless. Eva writhed against him, heels on his ass for leverage, groaning. When Drew realized she was pleasuring herself against his length, he almost came on the spot.

  “Get the—”

  “Condom.”

  They spoke over each other, and laughed again as Drew reached for his jeans to retrieve the rubber from his wallet. Only one, which he replaced every few months if needed. He suddenly wondered why he didn’t carry more, a whole pack of emergency condoms, in case he found and desperately wanted to spend a whole weekend in bed with the hot girl of his dreams.

  But they only had one, so they would have to make the most of it. Protection in place, Drew crawled back to his spot and tucked his hands under Eva’s shoulders, cradling her. She worked a hand between them, finding his cock and stroking it firmly.

  “You don’t seem rusty at all,” he choked out. Her hand felt so much smaller than his own, so foreign. She pulled him at just the right speed, just the right intensity, and he saw stars when he closed his eyes. When he opened them, she was guiding him to her pussy, rubbing his tip inside her.

  “Some skills you never lose,” she said with a shaky grin. She was flushed, trembling, and he wasn’t sure if it was nerves or arousal, but it was far too late to turn back.

  At the last second, remembering it had been a while for her, he considered lube—but then it was evident they didn’t need any. Eva was so wet, so slick and hot and soft, that when she arched her back to meet his first thrust, Drew knew he wouldn’t last long.

  He didn’t need to, though. Eva came after only a few delectable moments, eyes shut as she strained against him, mouth open and panting. Drew drove deeper, and then let his body take over as Eva’s trembling began to ease. He pushed his cock deep into her warmth again and again, and the divine tension he’d suffered for weeks finally built and broke and shattered him beyond repair.

  Chapter Five

  Drew wished he were less distracted. He wanted to lose himself in what he was doing with the ropes, and the way Eva’s skin looked exactly as he’d imagined it would when he restrained her. It was Sunday afternoon, a long shoot, and the mood as the four of them worked was relaxed and congenial. He had worried that things might be awkward, that Eva might feel awkward, if they revealed their budding relationship to Danny and Sheila. But their subtle shows of affection passed unremarked, and soon they were caught up in the work anyway. The day had the potential to be perfect.

  Instead, all he could think about as he relaxed between posing sessions was his brother Seth’s revelation, shared over a late pancake breakfast that morning after he’d gone home from Eva’s to shower and change. The simple, classic diamond solitaire Seth had showed him so proudly. Seth’s plan to ask his girlfriend Allison to marry him, while the family was in town over the Christmas holidays. They had been dating only a few months, but Seth said he knew she was The One.

  Allison was a great girl, and Drew liked her a lot. He was thrilled for his brother, but it was still disconcerting to think of Seth getting married. It marked the end of an era.

  “Okay, folks,” Danny said, startling Drew from his train of thought. “Break’s over. Let’s move on to the next one, see what we can get done before lunch.”

  “What’s next, again?” Drew was already bending over the duffel bag of neatly wrapped rope bundles, looking for the lengths he might need.

  “Shinju,” Danny replied. “You sure you’re okay with this, Evie?” The tie would bind her breasts tightly above and below, squeezing them into prominence. It was the first binding they would photograph that was overtly sexual.

  She looked a little nervous but nodded. Drew realized she was still wearing the deep red Chinese silk robe she had taken to throwing on over the bodysuit, and he wondered why.

  Then his thoughts abandoned him as Eva sat on the floor in front of the backdrop and let the robe slip from her shoulders to puddle around her waist.

  She was topless. Right there in front of everybody, in the middle of the after
noon. He had no idea why it was about a million times hotter to see her breasts this way than it had been the last time he saw them. He nearly whimpered openly as his cock stiffened at the sight.

  As Danny fussed with the drape of the silk around Eva’s hips, Drew tried to gather his scattered wits and look as though he weren’t about to keel over in shock and lust. “Um, the black rope, right?”

  He thought back over the conversation of that morning, trying to recall hearing Eva agree to do the shinju binding topless. Nope. He remembered nothing. Either she and Danny had talked about it when he wasn’t there, or he’d been more distracted by Seth’s engagement than he ever would have thought possible.

  “Yeah. We’re keeping the robe draped over her legs, it’ll go nicely in the shot. Honey, you need help with anything?”

  The lighting for the next several shots was to be more dramatic, and Sheila was busy shutting out the sunlight and arranging the reflectors.

  “No, I’m good. Hey. Wow. Evie, you’re going to make me look all kinds of bad when I get back to being the model. My boobs aren’t nearly as pretty as yours,” she quipped, as she fiddled with the equipment.

  “Oh. Um, thanks?” A deep blush spread over Eva’s face and chest, and Drew could see her start to hunch her shoulders, a marked change from her initial statue-straight posture. He was surprised to feel a surge of protectiveness. He didn’t want her to be stiff and self-conscious; he wanted her to be open and comfortable, and to enjoy this.

  “You don’t have to fish for compliments, Sheila,” he quipped. “Your boobs are every bit as nice as Eva’s. It’s just we’ve all seen yours enough times that the novelty has worn off.”

  The round of laughter that followed seemed to relax Eva a fraction. Sheila’s comeback relaxed her a bit more, and within a few minutes, the four were back to talking and joking as they had before the unveiling.

  Drew was glad for the enforced slow pace of the photo shoot, which required him to stop every few minutes while Sheila took pictures of each step during the process. The more artistic shots would come at the end, when the binding was complete; these photos, however, were meant to be instructional. It made the whole thing more impersonal, more clinical, and the friendly mood in the room certainly lent itself to a platonic approach.

  None of that changed the fact, though, that Drew was wildly turned-on from the moment he looped the first coil of soft black nylon braid around Eva’s slim, taut body. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it weren’t clear from the start that Eva was feeling it too. Her eyes were half closed, her lips parted, while a gentle flush once again warmed her face and chest. Not the embarrassed red of a few minutes earlier, but a soft glow that accompanied the rush of blood to engorged nipples.

  “Not too tight,” Danny murmured at one point when Drew was close to finishing the binding. “Not during the instructional stuff, anyway. If she’s okay with it, you can make it snugger for the shots we do after that.”

  Drew realized it was the first thing anyone had said in a while except for brief instructions from Sheila about when to stop so she could take pictures. He had been too wrapped up in wrapping Eva up, too involved in the pressure of the rope and his fingers against her skin. Lost in the way her silken flesh gave under the restraint, and in the wholly enraptured expression she wore. As though she was mesmerized. Which is why Danny spoke to me, not to Eva, Drew thought. She was in no state to converse.

  Eva was in deep subspace, drugged by the rope. Danny and Sheila had noticed it before Drew, obviously. Or rather, Drew had noticed but lacked their objectivity since he was a willing participant. Perhaps even the culprit.

  “Evie?” he asked as Sheila angled for another set of shots once the binding was complete. “You doing okay, sweetheart?”

  She blinked slowly, pupils wide, and nodded. A sleepy smile crossed her lips, and Drew suddenly wanted to kiss her more than anything he had ever wanted in his life. He sneaked a finger up to her lips instead, his breath catching when she closed her eyes and opened her mouth a fraction to flick her tongue against his fingertip.

  “Hey, hey, enough of that!” Sheila smacked Drew’s hand away. “You can do that on your own time, Casanova. This is business right now. Evie, c’mon. Sit up straight. Pull your arms away from your sides just a little. Drew, get out of the shot.”

  Her abrupt, no-nonsense tone helped Drew snap out of it, and pulled Eva mostly back into the land of the living.

  He went to the little fridge where Sheila kept water and sodas, pulled out a can of cola and brought it back to hand to Eva once Sheila finished. Then he took himself off to the bathroom, where a few seconds with his head under a briskly cold faucet helped restore him to his senses enough to brave returning to the room.

  Eva was holding the cold can of soda to the back of her neck, and she shot him a mortified look when he walked back in and threw himself on the couch. Shelia was busy untying the ropes, which made Drew vaguely jealous. Not only because he wanted to spend more time touching Eva, but because he was proprietary about his handiwork. He had to admit, though, it was probably wisest for them all to take a break.

  “So…” He grinned at the group, all friendly innocence. “Who’s buying lunch?”

  * * * * *

  The afternoon was worse, in many respects.

  For one thing, the binding was more time-consuming, a very complex and decorative weaving that secured Eva’s arms behind her back. She had the body stocking back on, which helped some from Drew’s perspective. Unfortunately, now she was on her guard and couldn’t relax. The ropes chafed, the knots hit uncomfortable pressure points, her stance was stiff and awkward.

  Drew was close enough to realize she was also still turned-on. She was obviously trying to deny it, though, trying to keep from letting herself go. The situation was making her anxious and irritable.

  Drew knew some people responded strongly and instantly to bondage, particularly ropes, in the way that most people only reacted to intense foreplay. He’d seen something like it in clubs a few times, but only in people he knew were experienced submissives.

  Eva’s response, though, was as surprising as it was remarkable.

  “She’s a total rope slut,” was Sheila’s pithy assessment.

  “Yeah, it’s pretty extreme,” Danny agreed, clearly not minding the development in the slightest. “But it makes sense. I always thought she protested too much.”

  “I’m right here, you know. I can hear you.” Eva frowned and tried to flex her shoulders.

  “Oh, honey, don’t try to do that right now. It looks like you’re about to dislocate something.”

  Eva snorted at Sheila’s show of concern. “It feels like I’m about to dislocate something. And my nose itches.”

  “Drew, scratch her nose. In fact, you know what? We’re going to take five here. We’ll text you when we’re on the way back. Come on, Danny, let’s go for a walk or something.” On her way out, Sheila gave Drew a piercing look that he struggled to interpret. Was she angry with him? Did she want him to do something?

  Eva was rubbing her itchy nose against his fingertips, clearly not very satisfied with the arrangement. “Can’t you untie me?”

  “No, not unless it actively hurts or something’s going numb. We’re too far into this. It would take forever to redo it, then they’d have to reset the lighting, and I don’t think Sheila’s in any mood to wait around for that. Is your nose all scratched now?”

  “It’s better,” she confessed with sigh, “and this doesn’t hurt, exactly.”

  Drew traced his hands over the knots and then let them trail over her shoulders, where he began to work at the taut muscles as much as Eva’s position would allow. She was sitting on the floor, knees folded neatly to one side, and when Drew sat behind her to get a better angle on the massage, her fingers brushed lightly against the crotch of his jeans.

  Both of them held their breath for a moment, then released it again as he settled in behind her. They were clearly pretending it hadn’t hap
pened, and Drew was all right with that. Acknowledging it would probably only worsen the situation. Given that he had been walking around half hard all day, he really couldn’t take having things worsened at that point. Their encounter the previous night had, if anything, made his need keener instead of easing the pressure. It was as if, rather than working her out of his system, he had only worked her deeper in.

  “I can’t untie you,” he said as he worked his fingers more firmly against her, “but I could try to relax you.”

  She tensed instantly, pulling away, and Drew mentally smacked his forehead for dropping such a stupefyingly obvious line. “I mean really to relax you, not—”

  “I know what you meant.”

  “Sorry.”

  “No. You shouldn’t apologize. I know you’re trying to help.”

  “Okay. So then let me help.”

  She took a moment too long to answer, and Drew knew he was about to hear less than the truth. “I just want to get this over with.”

  His response, given without thinking, was more forceful than he meant it to be. “No you don’t.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Figuring he might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb, Drew leaned forward and pulled Eva back by the shoulders until her arms pressed against his chest again. He could feel her wild pulse, her quickening breath, and it gave him courage to continue in his reckless course of action.

  “You don’t want to get this over with. You want to drag it out.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “On the contrary, I know many things about you, Miss Godfrey. Including some things you apparently don’t want me to know.”

  “Oh? Such as?”

  Always one for a challenge, Drew held Eva tighter to prevent her escape, leaning over her shoulder and turning her slightly to look at her. “Such as the thing about how turned-on you get when I tie you up.”

  He kissed her before she could answer, muscling his way in, giving in to the impatience that had plagued him all afternoon. They were both breathing hard when he finally let up and continued talking.