"Rina."

Cannon's voice stops me as soon as we cross the threshold into our apartment. After cleaning up at the office, we walked home together, though I made sure to stay at least five steps away from him at all times, trying to act normal, trying to remember how I normally walk. What do I do with my hands when I'm walking down the road with a friend normally?

But nothing feels normal anymore. Nothing feels normal because every time I look at Cannon's face, I see him in an entirely different light. I see the sexy as hell man who lifted me onto a table in the middle of our office, shoved my skirt up around my hips and fucked me senseless.

And I already can't wait for him to do it again.

That's a good thing, I try to reassure myself. It means that trying to get pregnant will be enjoyable for us both. I mean, he certainly seemed to enjoy fucking me. And he's still stealing glances at me every few seconds as we walk up the street, whenever he thinks I'm not looking.

But it's just lust. I have to remember that. It's NSA—we both agreed.

I'm used to this. I do this all the time. It probably just feels a little different with Cannon because we already know one another, because we're friends. It doesn't mean I'm catching feelings. I'm stronger than that. I can just enjoy this for what it is—a quick, sexy fuck that I need in order to get what I want.

We crossed through our lobby, still awkwardly a few steps apart. I felt like our doorman must have been able to tell, somehow, psychically, just by looking at us, what we'd done. When he said hello, I practically jumped a foot in the air and leapt away from Cannon.

Cannon, for his part, just laughed at me, then waved to Mike.

"Where have you two been so late?" Mike called happily.

He always asks questions, I reminded myself. He's just being friendly. Not suspicious. Nobody cares if you and Cannon hooked up.

"Stuck in the office," Cannon replied with a smirk in my direction.

My face flared red hot. It's still red hot, even after the long elevator ride to our penthouse. And now, the moment I step out of that elevator—did it feel hotter than normal in there?—Cannon's voice stops me in my tracks.

I glance over my shoulder at him. His eyes are on me, fixated, the way they've been ever since the office. "Yes?" I ask.

"Where are you going?"

I half-laugh, half-shrug, with a glance down at myself. I managed to put myself together reasonably well enough to make it home on the darkened streets, but if anyone had looked closely at my outfit, they'd have seen that my shirt is missing half its buttons, tucked into my skirt to keep it together, and my skirt itself is wrinkled from where it was bunched around my waist. Not to mention my hair, which is a nest of tangles from where Cannon gripped it as we fucked on that table.

"I'm going to shower," I say, in my most sarcastic tone. This should be obvious.

But Cannon steps toward me, and I forget about obvious. I forget about everything, even breathing, until he's right in front of me, and his hands are wrapping around my shoulders, gentle but firm. "Do you really want to clean up yet, if we're just going to get filthy again?" he asks, his voice low and sultry.

I swallow, hard. "Oh, I... didn't think about that."

He lifts a single eyebrow. "Shouldn't we try to fuck as often as possible while you’re ovulating?"

"Um..." I lick my lips. His gaze drops to follow the trail of my tongue. "Yeah. Yes. That's... probably, yes. Are you good to go again, though? So soon?"

That draws a long, loud laugh out of him. "Rina. Trust me." He catches my waist then and tugs me against him, until our bodies pressed flush together. Already I can feel the hard swell of his cock against my inner thigh, growing thicker by the second. "I'm always good to go."

For me, or for anyone? Part of me wants to ask. The rest of me knows that's a train of thought I don't want to go riding. So I just tilt my head up and smile slyly at him. "How do you want me, Cannon?"

He runs his hands through my hair, then gently tugs it to tilt my head back farther, as he bends down to claim my mouth in a hot, slow, searing kiss. I feel that kiss all the way down to my belly, into my toes. I feel it in my veins, set me alight from the inside out. When we break apart, I'm trying to catch my breath from that kiss. He has other ideas, though. Without warning, he lifts me off my feet.

On instinct, I wrap my legs around his waist for balance, as he walks us backward toward the couch. "How do I want you?" he muses, his voice still lower than I've ever heard it before, a soft, sexy sound, with his mouth pressed right against my neck. "Hmm... Good question. Besides immediately?"

My belly tightens at that. He wants me. But of course he does. He wants to fuck me—I already know that. Don't read into it, I scold myself.

We bump into the couch, and he lets go of my legs, drops me back onto my feet and sizes me up for a second. "Take off your skirt."

The simple command in his tone gets me wetter than anything we've done so far. I grin at him as I slowly reach for my zipper, peel it off, and then push at the hem of fabric to let the skirt fall around my ankles. His eyes drop straight to my body, white hot lust evident in his hungry gaze as he studies my bare pussy. My shirt parts too, since half the buttons are missing, and his eyes trail up the flat plane of my stomach to where the shirt still clings together, only the top two buttons in tact, holding it together over my lacy bra.

Then he steps forward, grabs my collar, and tears the shirt the rest of the way open. He peels it off me and deposits it on the floor beside my skirt. He reaches around for my bra next, and I reach forward at the same time to start to undo his pants. But he clasps my wrists in one strong hand and holds them for a moment, pinned between us.

"Ah, ah," he murmurs, those dark eyes of his searching out mine once more. "You asked how I wanted you. Do you like being obedient, Rina?"

My eyes widen, as does my smile, as I step closer, push my wrists closer to him to let him gain a better grip. "As long as you like telling me exactly what to do... sir," I add as an afterthought. I've role-played a little with guys before. But none of them have ever looked at me the way Cannon is now—like he simultaneously can't believe I'm real and also like he wants to devour me whole. That hungry gleam in his eye is equal parts dangerous and hot as hell.

"Good girl," he replies with a half-smile. "Turn around."

I spin around in front of him, my heart skipping. He lets go of my wrists, but only long enough to let me turn my back to him. Then he catches them again, holding me easily with just one hand. He pauses for a moment, and I steal a peek over my shoulder, only to find him picking up my shirt from the floor, which he quickly wraps around my wrists and knots, just tightly enough that I can't pull my wrists apart, but not too tightly to hurt.

"How does that feel?"

"Good," I reply.

He tugs the knot a little bit tighter. "Good what?"

"Good, sir," I amend, grinning broader now. "Thank you, sir."

He steps up behind me, and I can feel his bare chest against my back as he drops his own shirt to the floor. He runs his hands up my sides, one hand sliding around to trace the flat plane of my bare stomach, while the other caresses the edges of my breasts, slow and teasing. "You like this? Feeling under my control?"

"Yes, sir." My belly tightens at his words, his touch, everything about him. I never imagined Cannon could be this sexy or commanding. There's so much you don't know about a person, even a guy you know so well, until you meet their bedroom persona.

His, I have to admit, I'm finding hotter than I ever could have imagined.

"I like this too." He runs his hands up my back, over my shoulders, then down to encircle my breasts, his hands cupping me while his fingers trace my areolas, zeroing in on my nipples, which are already starting to harden, despite the warm temperature in our apartment. "You are so fucking sexy, Rina. Your perfect body, your dirty mind..." He adds his thumbs to pinch the very tip of my nipples between his thumb and forefinger, rolling gently. I gasp faintly, leaning forward, unable to help myself, swayed by his touch. "I love feeling you respond to me. Feeling you tremble at my touch." He tightens his fingers, and another gasp escapes me, my nipples rock hard now, the sensation hovering right on the threshold between pleasure and pain.

He keeps me there, not pinching hard enough to hurt, but just hard enough that the pleasure drives me mad. I try to arch my back, press my chest forward into his hands, but he pulls my body back against his. "Did I tell you to move?" he says softly, dangerously.

I swallow hard, again. "No, sir."

"Then don't move, Rina. Not until I say you can. Understand?"

I nod my head, licking my lips at the same time. Fucking hell. I'm already soaked, I can feel it, a faint trickle working its way down my thigh.

"Good," he practically purrs, his lips just beside my ear. I can feel his breath on my cheek, hot and smelling faintly of mint. "Now, what am I going to do with you, my obedient, dirty little girl?"

A shiver runs up my spine. He chuckles softly, clearly able to feel that. He lets his hands trail down my sides, one reaching around to slide over my stomach again, then down the edge of my hip, across my mound, until his fingers slip between my legs and stroke along the outer edges of my pussy lips. That, too, draws another soft chuckle from him.

"Wet already, dirty girl?"

I bite my lower lip and cast a glance over my shoulder at him. "You know how to get me wet every time, sir."

He leans against me a little harder, and I can feel that thick, fat cock of his digging into my lower back. Every inch of me wants him, wants to feel him inside me again, stretching my walls, making me ache as he fills me up. But I know better than to ask for what I want right now. He's in control.

His eyes flash, dark with desire. "Spread your legs."

I glance down at the couch, realize I'm positioned right in front of the arm of it. I press my lips together, shoot one last look at him, and then step my feet wider, spreading them as instructed.

His hand, still between my legs, slips into my slit now, stroking along my length, his finger gliding easily through my juices.

Then he bends me forward, over the arm of the couch, fast. I gasp, my hands still bound behind me, tied by my shirt. Now his hand leaves my pussy, and I bite my lip to ignore the ache between my legs, resisting the urge to protest. I don't want him to stop touching me.

But he's only paused to unzip his pants, and push them down his legs. I glance back as he steps out of them, my eyes widening yet again at the sight of his glorious cock. I don't know what I expected—I knew Cannon had a lot of lovers, and I knew they never complained about him. A lot of them tended to text afterward, trying to get him to come over for another hookup, though I know he never obliged. Now I understand why they wanted round two, after going one round with his cock.

He's so big.

Part of me is almost proud that I can handle him.

He catches me looking at him, and grins knowingly. "Hungry for me again already, Rina?"

"So, so bad," I admit, my eyes still fixed on his cock.

"You like when I stuff you full?" He steps forward, until the tip of his cock presses against my ass. With one hand, he guides himself between my pussy lips. But once there, he only strokes the tip of his head along my slit, coating himself in my juices, not pressing forward, not yet.

A single, breathy moan escapes my lips. "Cannon..."

Something about that, me saying his name, seems to snap him out of the spell we've been under. Suddenly, his eyes spark, and I can tell he won't be waiting or teasing me anymore. Now, he's the hungry one.

"Fuck, Rina." He presses his hips forward, the tip of his cock spreading my lower lips an inch at a time. He doesn't stop, doesn't back off until he's slid, inch by inch, all the way into my pussy, in a single slow forward stroke. I moan, unable to help myself, because fuck, it feels so good when he does that, stretches my pussy to its very limits. I can feel every inch of him inside me, straining against all my walls at once, and it drives me wild. No one has ever filled me like this before. No one has ever made me feel so completely, utterly full, and I never want it to end.

But he's drawing back already, and a mewl of protest escapes my throat. I try to arch back against him, levering off the couch. He just presses one hand to the small of my back and forces me back down. Then, without warning, he thrusts into me again, harder this time.

"God, you're so tight," he growls between clenched teeth, pleasure written all over his face, his eyes half-hooded as he gazes down at me, bent over in front of him. "You have a perfect fucking pussy, you know that Rina?"

"Perfect match for your perfect cock," I reply, then gasp again when he draws back and thrusts into me once more.

It doesn't take him long to build up a rhythm, and between him pounding into me from behind, and the way my hips grind against the couch as he fucks me, it's not long before the pressure starts to build deep in my belly.

Then he slides a hand between my legs, his finger pressing against my mound, inching toward my clit, while all the while he keeps up his pace, fucking me hard, fast. "I want you to come for me, Rina."

His finger reaches my clit, and the combined sensation has me gasping to catch my breath, that pressure rocketing higher and higher.

"Come for me," he commands, and my heartbeat speeds up, my hips bucking as I thrust forward against his hand, pinned between his hand against my clit and his cock still pounding into my pussy.

"I'm coming," I manage to pant between breaths, the pressure so high now I can't stand it, can't focus on anything except the sensation of his cock, his fingers. "Fuck, fuck, I'm coming..." I trail off into a loud moan as the orgasm hits hard, my pussy convulsing around his shaft.

But his fingers don't stop moving. He shifts the pressure, works them against my clit softer now, in gentle circles, knowing I'll be sensitive, but also knowing how much pressure to keep on me to make my clit start to pulse again already. "Oh, I'm not done with you yet," he promises, and that dark curl of pleasure in his tone makes my belly tighten.

He angles his hips so his cock drags along my inner walls, and between that and his gently circling hands, rolling my clit underneath the pads of his fingers, it's not long before that pressure builds right back up again. "Come again, Rina."

I cry out, almost before the words are out of his mouth, unable to contain it any longer. This orgasm leaves my legs shaky, my heart pounding, my whole body on fire.

And still, he doesn't stop. "One more, Rina." He slows his hands even more, presses against my mound more than my clit this time. I'm sensitive as hell, though, so even that light touch—especially that light touch—stokes another fire in the pit of my stomach.

I lose track of the orgasms. All I can sense anymore are his fingers, his cock, and the spikes of pleasure that shoot through my veins every time he touches me, fucks me, lifts my hips and angles himself deeper into me.

When he finally comes with a growl of pleasure, it's all I can do to keep myself from screaming aloud at the white hot rush of his cum inside me, coating my inner walls, sending yet another spark of heat through my body.

He draws out, and I gasp at the rush of heat that trickles down my inner thighs, coating the couch beneath me.

“Wait.” I cast a glance over my shoulder in protest. “I need to lie down. Keep my legs up, so…” So more of his cum doesn’t escape.

He’s still breathing fast, and his eyes are just starting to clear from the haze of lust that had taken them over. “Shit. Sorry. I didn’t realize…” He runs a hand through his hair, then reaches down to undo the shirt around my wrists.

“It’s ok.” I smirk. “I know getting girls knocked up isn’t usually your goal…” When my hands are free, I spin around and lie on my back.

Cannon, for his part, grasps my ankles and pushes them up around his shoulders, kneeling in front of me now. His hands run along my calves, my thighs, savoring the touch as he gazes down at me. “I’ll get the hang of this eventually,” he promises.

I laugh. “Hopefully it won’t take that long.”

He quirks an eyebrow. “Why, sick of fucking me already, Rina?”

My cheeks flare red. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I know,” he replies, still smiling. But there’s something behind that smile. A look in his eyes that I don’t quite recognize. Something almost…wistful.

When I figure I’ve been on my back long enough, I sit up and gently pull him toward me. Tug him into a slow, searing kiss. Our naked bodies press flush together, and for a moment, I allow myself to get lost in that kiss.

Then I remember.

NSA.

He seems to remember the same thing at the same time, because he draws back from the kiss, eyes searching for mine. I duck past him and head toward the kitchen.

"I'll clean up," I say, but he catches my wrist, stops me.

"You did the last one. This one's mine." For a long moment, those dark eyes of his study mine. I think he's going to say something else, for a split second. Then he shakes his head and smiles. "You go take that shower you wanted. I think we're sufficiently dirty now."

I smile back, though it doesn't quite reach my eyes, I know. Because deep down, I'm already thinking... are we? Deep down, I already want to fall right back into bed with him.

NSA, I remind myself, for the last time tonight. "Thanks," I say, and then I force myself to disentangle my hand from his and march toward my bedroom, alone. I really do need that shower, after all.

* * *

Over the next few days, we wind up going off-chart. I have one more green heart day of ovulation—or at least, when my phone app estimates that I'm ovulating sometime around now—but we decide that hooking up for a few days past the green hearts marked on the chart can't hurt. After all, sometimes the schedules can be slightly off. People get pregnant at all sorts of points in their cycles.

That's what I tell myself, anyway. And Cannon agrees readily.

On the second day of this experiment, we hooked up in the morning before work—Cannon lifted me onto the kitchen counter, and I wrapped my legs around him, holding his face against my chest as he fucked me until we both came screaming.

That night, we took our evening shower together. The first time, up against the shower wall, I expected. But what I didn't expect was that after we'd finished, and we set about washing each other down, Cannon would remove the shower head from the wall and slide it between my legs, pinning me in place against his body as he directed the stream at my pussy, making me orgasm over and over as he held me.

"I read that when women orgasm during sex, it can help the sperm reach the egg," he told me afterward, by way of explanation. But I couldn't help noticing that, after that, our sex shifted a little. We took longer at foreplay—he started off day 3 by going down on me before we even fucked, and that night, I couldn't resist the urge to drop to my knees in front of him and lick the length of his long, thick cock, savoring his thickness, his velvety soft smooth skin over the hard steel of his shaft. He stopped me before he finished, of course, since we need to make sure all of his cum winds up in my pussy.

But something about that seemed different. We weren't just fucking for a baby, not entirely, not anymore. We were getting each other off in other ways too. Drawing this out, making it more pleasurable.

I tell myself that's normal. Natural. After all, we both like sex. We should enjoy this process, even if there is an end-goal that we're doing it. It doesn't have to all be mechanical, robotic make-a-baby sex. We can have fun with it along the way.

Then comes day 4. By then, we're way past my ovulation cycle. It would be another couple weeks before I'd know if anything took, if I'm pregnant. At this point, if I'm not pregnant already, we'll have to wait until next month to try again.

But when we get home from work, after a long day of pushing a hell of a lot of boring paperwork across my desk, and we turn on the TV expecting to both cool off this time, since our agreement was to only fuck on days when it's plausible that it might impregnate me... I find myself casting sideways glances at him.

And I catch him doing the same to me.

Halfway through the TV show—one of our favorites, the show we watch religiously every week together, and normally would never miss an episode—it's clear neither of us are remotely paying attention.

That's when Cannon grabs the remote and flicks the TV off.

"What are you doing?" I ask, my voice soft.

He spins toward me with a shrug and a smile. "Were you watching?"

"Kind of."

"What just happened, then?"

"Um..." I bite my lower lip.

"That's what I thought." His dark eyes catch mine, and I can't look away from him, not when he's looking at me like this. Through me. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"That we're both really bad at paying attention to that show?" I guess.

His smirk widens. "That we're clearly distracting one another." His hand comes to rest on my leg. Begins to trail up it. "We might as well admit it."

My throat tightens. It's all I can take to swallow and clear it enough to answer. "Admit what?" My heart hammers in my chest. Does he mean...?

"Admit that we want to fuck, chart or no chart."

Oh. Right. Of course. I don't know what I expected. But even this, even fucking just for fun rather than for the purpose we agreed to, it feels dangerous.

Still. When he slides his hand higher up my thigh, I can't resist. "I mean, it can't hurt, can it, to squeeze in a few extra days...?"

"Definitely not." He leans closer, his breath hot on my face.

I tilt my chin up to meet his gaze. "Might as well."

His eyes search mine. "No harm no foul. Unless..."

"Unless?" I lift my chin, try to tamp down the trepidation building in my chest.

"Unless you're worried about our agreement."

"What, NSA?" I force myself to laugh, casually, as if it means nothing. "Of course not. We're both pros at that, you said so yourself. Right?"

For a long, quiet moment, he searches my face. I hold my breath. Half of me is wondering if he's going to say something. Admit something. The other half, the stronger, smarter half, is pretty sure he's just checking me for cracks. Making sure that I'm not doing something stupid like catching feels for him. "Right," he finally says, and I breathe out a sigh.

Though whether it's a sigh of relief or disappointment, I'm not really sure.

Luckily, I don't have too much time to dwell on it. He crushes his mouth to mine, and I lose myself in his touch, his kiss. Before long, he's lifting me in his arms, carrying me into his bedroom, our lips still pressed together, tongues entwined. He drops me onto the bed and spreads my knees, kneeling between them as he trails hungry kisses down my chest, my stomach, to my hips, then my inner thighs, sucking and nipping at my skin until I'm gasping.

Only then does he flick his tongue along the folds of my lips, one at a time, slow and seductive. "God I love the way you taste," he murmurs against my mound, before he delves his tongue between my lips, along my slit, swirling the tip to taste my juices, which are already pooling there, because goddamn it, Cannon makes me wet every time he touches me.

Then, without warning, he hauls my legs over his shoulders and pulls my ass to the edge of the bed. His hands grip my ass, hard and firm, and his tongue flattens into a wide plane as he begins to lick me harder, faster. When he pushes the tip of his tongue inside my pussy, I cry out. He curls it inside me, strokes it along my front inner wall, right across my G-spot. My hips buck toward his face, and without thinking, I reach down to grip his hair and pull his face harder against me.

His chin slides between my legs, and his hands tighten on my ass as he tongues me faster. He has so much control—he knows exactly how to curve his tongue, and when to flatten it out and slide it across my clit to make me gasp and buck with building desire.

"God, I'm so close," I find myself panting, before long, but he slows down then, keeps me hovering at the brink. Slides his tongue in and out of me at a slower pace, circles my clit less often, lets himself savor me.

That makes me twist and try to arch my hips closer to him, impatient. But he just chuckles, mouth still pressed firmly against my pussy, and I moan in frustration.

"Please," I finally gasp, when I can't take it anymore. "Cannon, I need to come."

He pauses entirely then, and his dark eyes flick up to mine, gazing at me across the plane of my belly. He arches a single eyebrow, and I hold his gaze, knowing how I must look, how desperate the look in my eyes must be.

"Please," I repeat.

He smiles. And then he redoubles his pace, licking his tongue straight across my clit, over and over, the pressure intense and spiking fast. I cry out with relief, release, as the orgasm sweeps through me. My pussy walls clench and release, rhythmic, as the climax hits, and he takes advantage of that. Slides one finger inside me, and keeps tonguing my clit.

I gasp at the added pressure. Tighten my fists in his hair, clench hard as he tongues me more, faster, straight back toward another climax. This time when I finish, I scream his name, my whole body shaking with the force of it.

He draws back, grinning, and kisses his way up my prone body until he reaches my mouth. "God I love hearing you do that," he murmurs against my mouth, right before he kisses me, hard.

I taste myself on his tongue. Taste myself, mingled with his scent, his flavor, so specific and unique to him. I part my lips, twine my tongue around his, and raise my legs to wrap them around his waist, hungry for him now, hungry to be fucked properly.

And he obeys, giving me exactly what I want. That fat cock of his, deep in my pussy, stretching me, driving me wild with every hard thrust.

He makes me come twice more before he finally finishes inside me, and we collapse across his bed in a sweaty, tangled mess of sheets. This time, I lay there for a long time, savoring the feeling of his body pressed to my side, the scent of sex hovering in the air. I’m lying next to a puddle at the foot of the bed, but we're both so exhausted from the long day, from the hard fuck, that neither of us move to clean it this time. We don't move toward the showers either. We just lie there along his bed, his arms wrapped around my waist, my head resting on his chest, knees up to ensure that I maximize my chances, savoring the feel of each other. Our scent hangs thick in the air, and the last thing I remember thinking before my knees sink down sideways over his thighs and I drift off to sleep in his arms, is that I should really go back to my own room...

But that's the last thing in the world I want to do right now.

I wake up with a start in the early hours of the morning. We've both shifted a little in bed—I'm curled on my side now, and Cannon is wrapped around me, his legs against the backs of mine, his hips against my ass, his arm curled possessively, protectively, around my waist. I reach down to slide my hand along his forearm. Tangle my fingers through his, and behind me, against the nape of my neck, I hear him sigh softly in his sleep.

I swallow hard and stare at his bedroom wall. It's funny—it looks so much like mine, and yet our rooms are the reverse layout of each other's, the mirror image. Like the opposite world I suddenly find myself living in.

I shouldn't be doing this. Sleeping here. Having sex with him off-chart. Letting him go down on me, inviting all these other questions into our agreement. This was never supposed to be about the sex. We were fucking for one reason, and one reason only—to make a baby.

But now... as much as I hate to even think it, as much as I don't want to admit it to myself, because I know what a fucking mess it will cause... I'm worried.

Because I promised Cannon we would keep this arrangement professional. I thought I could do it, I really did. I figured I could fuck him and everything would stay the same—our friendship, our living situation, our relationship at the office as coworkers. My lack of any feelings for him beyond friendship.

Instead... I think I'm starting to do the one thing I swore I wouldn't do. The one thing that would break this NSA agreement between us.

I think I'm starting to fall for him.