“Mmm.” I wake and stretch, wincing slightly when my pelvic and inner thigh muscles remind me of how well I’ve been fucked. But I can’t complain; it’s a good kind of pain. The best. Worth every bit of soreness I’ll have today.

Very little about last night was as expected. Tristan didn’t roughly fuck me as though I was an empty body here for his pleasure. He took his time, caring for my needs. I came before him every time. He put my orgasm ahead of his own. Not at all what I expected after our earlier conversations about how he expected me to always please him without any regard for my gratification.

Yes. He wants me to be his submissive, but last night proved that he is willing to make some compromises in order for that to happen. I don’t think that he’s the selfish Dominant that he claims to be. Not even a little.

Every time was amazing, but that last time… just wow.

He crawled down my body, kissing my chest and stomach gently on the way down. His mouth followed my abdomen until he pushed my thighs apart and hovered over my pussy. Only his warm breath was on my skin. And then his lips found my entrance, and he kissed it softly, making my spine curl in pleasure. I was in heaven, but then he slipped his tongue into my slit and holy hell. I fell. I tumbled off the edge of the cliff.

Not a shred of anger lingered. It had been replaced with an intense longing deep within my groin. In the midst of passion, there was no discord. No hesitancy. No regret. We were the only two people on earth in that moment, like we’d always be together.

Tristan crawled up my body, again kissing everything between my groin and shoulders. I don’t think there was an inch that wasn’t worshipped by his mouth and tongue.

He kissed the sides of my face before my mouth. I could taste and smell myself fresh on his tongue, and that made me burn even hotter for him.

Despite the number of times he’d already been inside me, his cock slid into the slick slit between my legs with ease. He groaned as he moved in and out of me. The sound came from somewhere deep within his chest and was pure male. So masculine and strong and powerful.

I died a little when he grabbed my legs and hooked them over his shoulders. He slammed hard inside me, and I had to put my hands over my head and lock my arms so my head would stop banging against the headboard. My pussy took his cock like it was starving for dick. And maybe it was because it had been so long since it’d had any.

Vanilla sex? I don’t think so. The man took complete control of my body. He commanded my orgasms. Dominated the way he made me come around his dick.

Tristan Broussard fucked me harder than anyone ever has before. And I loved every second of it.

I admit that I toyed a little with letting go. With letting him dominate me. And I was surprised to discover that I didn’t really mind handing over control. Who could when you experienced that kind of ecstasy?

I said his name—Tristan, not Master—when I came for the last time. My eyes locked with his, and I could see the Dom inside him fighting to be released. I know that he wanted to demand that I call him Master. I could see it in the hard line his mouth was making, but he held back. For me.

His mouth covered mine completely when he moaned with pleasure and emptied his warm seed inside me. Giving me every drop. He was so deep when he came for the last time that it felt like we were two people fused together as one.

I clung to the euphoria for as long as I could before it slipped away; I never wanted the feeling to end. It was phenomenal.

Fuck. What a night.

I reach out and grab the pillow beside me, the one that Tristan pushed under my hips when he used it to angle them upward during one of our sexcapades. To enter me deeper. I giggle to myself when I feel that it’s still wet from all of the cum that leaked out of me onto it.

How many times did he come inside me?

Three?

Four?

Five?

Shit, I lost count. My mind turned to mush after that first orgasm.

And yes. It was that damn good.

One thing about having a physical relationship with someone who is obsessed with sex is that they know what they’re doing. I’ve never had a better lover than Tristan. He rocked my fucking world. I loved every single minute of it.

But it’s not enough to make me want to stay.

I sit on the side of the bed and see an old worn brass key lying on top of a handwritten note on the nightstand.

Pfft… the please is clearly squeezed in between the last line and his name. A total afterthought. No surprise there, but the shower suggestion isn’t a bad idea. I’m covered in Tristan’s dried cum, and I reek of sex. As much as I enjoyed last night, I don’t want to go home smelling like him.

Tristan’s office door is open, and he’s sitting at his desk working on his laptop. He’s wearing his reading glasses again. They make him look so damn intelligent, which I already know that he is. No man earns the kind of money that he makes without having some serious gray matter in his head.

He is seriously one of the sexiest men that I’ve ever seen. And his cock is so fucking perfect. Long and thick. Hard and silky-smooth in all of the right places. It’s too bad that I’ll never get to feel it inside of me again.

I’m studying his working figure when he looks up at me and smiles. His teeth are perfect except for one tiny overlap on the right side. And those dimples trying to hide beneath his facial scruff… they’re sexy as fuck. I swear to God that his smile has the power to combust panties.

The melting pot of his Creole ancestors has blessed him with an olive complexion that I’d kill for. So much more attractive than my Irish paleness. And his pale blue eyes against the contrast of his dark hair and skin are breathtaking. It’s like he got all of the best characteristics from each race and ethnicity contributing to his DNA.

“I see that you found my note,” he says.

I nod and hold up the key. “And this.”

“Good. Come in, and let’s talk about it.”

I enter his office and sit in one of the chairs across from him. He leans back leisurely in his chair and stares at me, saying nothing, while his rubs the scruff on his chin.

“What?” I ask.

“I’m just looking at you and remembering last night. And this morning. The sounds that you make when you come. And the faces too.”

Heat rushes to my cheeks; I feel like his stare is penetrating my very soul, and he’s able to see just how deeply I enjoyed having him inside me. How eager I was to do it all over again each time that he would crawl down my body and lick my pussy.

I can feel myself getting wet right now just thinking about it.

I know that it was wrong. I shouldn’t have given myself to him, especially knowing what I know about him, but my God he had this way of making me forget my own name. I’ve never come so hard in my life. And I’ve definitely never come that many times in one night.

He was exceptional at seducing me.

And I was exceptional at being seduced.

I’m the one to break eye contact. Because I’m terrified that he’ll see beneath my surface and figure out just how much I enjoyed fucking him. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“Why should I stop looking at you?” He chuckles. “However it is that I’m looking at you?”

I look up at him again. Unable to resist the challenge that I hear in his voice.

“Because your expression… it’s…” It’s the same as it was right before he went down on me. Like a predator about to devour its prey.

His head tilts and this innocent, boyish smile replaces the rakish one. “My expression is what?”

“You know what your expression is. And it’s making me uncomfortable.”

“I love the way you look when you’re uncomfortable. When your cheeks redden. It makes you look like a young, sweet, innocent girl. One who didn’t get her pussy filled with my cum last night and this morning.” His voice is deeper and seductive.

I bet he’s sitting behind that desk with a huge hard-on right now, just like I’m sitting here with wet panties. And if I let him continue to talk to me like this, we’re going to be on top of his desk going at it like a pair of jackrabbits.

I hold up the key. “Why did you ask me to bring this to your office?”

“It’s part of the deal that I want to offer you.” A deal. That certainly gains my attention. I sit a little taller and more erect in my chair. “What kind of deal?”

He goes to the cabinet casing the stacks of thousand dollar chips and opens the doors.

“The chips are gone?”

My heart pounds and mind frantically races.

Someone stole the chips?

Oh God. Does he think that it was me?

He’ll never let me walk away if he believes that I’ve stolen those fucking chips. He already considers me a thief who stole a hundred thousand from him. He’ll never believe me when I tell him that it wasn’t me.

Surely, he has surveillance. He must know that it wasn’t me.

“The chips have been replaced with something else.”

My heart calms a bit when I realize that he hasn’t brought me here for a confrontation or to coax a confession. “I don’t understand what replaced means.”

He removes an intricate wooden box from the cabinet. “I renovated this house when I purchased it ten years ago. The men doing the construction on the house found this box behind one of the walls. It was between the master bedroom and a small room that had been concealed by a wall. No one knew that it was there. Not even the realtor who sold the house to me.”

“What kind of room?”

“I suspect that it could have been accommodations for a house slave that the master took as his lover.”

A lover. A slave. Accommodations right next to the master’s bedroom. Doesn’t sound a lot different from what he wants to do with me.

“I did some research and found that the original owner of the house did own slaves. And one particular female house slave listed on the census was mother to several children. No father was named as far as I can tell, so I’m inclined to believe that the owner was likely the father of her children. But it’s just a hunch. No way to know for certain.”

“What a bastard.”

“You don’t know that. Maybe he treated her well.”

“Doesn’t matter. She was still a slave owned by another human being. That’s not right.”

“Maybe he loved her and set her free.”

Is he kidding me? “Doubtful.”

“You’re judging a dead man that you don’t know.”

“And you’re defending him.”

“I’m not defending anyone. Hell, the man may have never even touched the woman. Her children could have been fathered by ten different men for all I know. It was only a suspicion that I voiced. No need to get angry about it.”

Maybe I’m being a little hypersensitive about it because I feel like he wants to do the same thing to me, minus the children.

“I’m sorry. It’s just that I truly despise human inequality.”

“As do I, but forget about the room. Forget the man and woman that we don’t know. This is what I want to talk about.”

He lifts the top of the carved box, and it’s filled with ornate brass keys plus one heart-shaped padlock sitting on top. “These were the contents inside the box when I opened it ten years ago.”

“What is all of this?”

“I have no idea, but it has mesmerized me for a decade.” He removes one of the keys from the box. “The whole lot is worth something to a collector. I’ve had decent offers but I couldn’t bring myself to part with them for some reason. And now I know why.”

Feels like he’s talking in riddles. “What do you mean?”

“There were one hundred keys in this box. I tried every one of them and only one works to open this padlock. The one in your hand.”

The key has a brass heart-shaped bow and intricate shaft. It’s actually a beautiful key. The whole box is—that is if keys can be beautiful.

“I want to make a deal with you, Emma Lia.”

Whatever Tristan wants, Tristan gets. At any cost. This deal can’t be good for me, but I’m willing to hear him out. “What kind of deal?”

“I’m a gambling man and you’re a gambling woman. I propose that we make a wager to replace my original terms of my debt collection. One that doesn’t include my turning you over to the authorities.”

I’m suddenly keener to hear what he is offering. “I’m listening.”

“I still want you to be my submissive. I want that more now than I did yesterday. And I’m willing to negotiate our terms to make that happen. Even if it shifts the odds in your favor.”

I’m intrigued. “Tell me more.”