My skin is still on fire. All of it, even the parts I’m pretty sure Eli never smeared with cinnamon-heart lube. It’s making it hard to concentrate on anything else. I want to just lie here and be happy embers, but I can hear his mind clinking.

He’s always been a loud thinker.

I trace my fingers through the fuzz of dark hair on his chest. “What’s churning in there, love?”

I feel his smile, and his regret. “I’m sorry. I’m trying not to go all cerebral on your afterglow.”

Too late—and I’ve always gotten off on his brain too. I lift my head up and rest my chin on his chest. “That was amazing, but you know that.” He’s glowing plenty, even if he can’t keep his brain quiet.

“It was.” He strokes my cheek, his eyes holding a hint of melancholy. “Kink isn’t always like that. It’s powerful, and it can be really amazing, but that was…” He stops, clearly out of words.

It doesn’t matter. I have them. “It was the most overwhelming sexual experience I’ve ever had.” So deep it almost felt holy. I grin and make a face at him, because holy isn’t where I want this to go. “What the heck is in that lube, anyhow?”

He chuckles, and some of the melancholy clears. “Dom secret.”

I wrinkle my nose. “I joined the wrong team, did I?”

I see the seriousness land with both feet—and the compassion. The intention. Whatever just scared him serious, he clearly intends to take care of me first. He reaches out and strokes his thumb along the curve of my collarbone, the tenderness palpable. “I don’t know that you’ve joined any team.”

Ah, that’s what’s got him by the short hairs. I smile and stretch up to kiss his cheek. “You’re composing, Eli. Listen to the damn music that’s already playing.”

His eyebrows fly up.

I grin. Surprising him is still fun. “Stop worrying about the labels. We know what we need to know.”

He blinks. “Which is what, exactly?”

I wrap the words up like the sexy, careful, deeply intended gift that they are. “In what just happened—did you get what you needed?”

He nods slowly.

I smile and will him to hear my truth. “Do I look like a woman who had any scrap of what she needs go undelivered?”

The grin starts all the way down deep inside him—and then it stutters. “That might not be what you need tomorrow.”

I hit his chest, and this time I have enough muscles back online to make it register.

He laughs. “The next time I tie you up, remind me that you’re feisty when I set you free.”

There we go. His soul just got there, even if his brain hasn’t caught up yet. “Next time, huh?”

I watch as his brain and his soul collide—but not for long. It’s my turn to drive this thing. I lean in and kiss his cheek again. “Of course there will be a next time, silly. They might not always look like this, because I don’t know how often I can do what I just did and be a functional human being who remembers how to speak. I might need space, or contrast, or a lesson on how to use your leather straps.”

That makes his eyebrows do really funny things.

I don’t care. We’ve got this, and I can see it, even if he can’t. “Eli, my big fear was that I wouldn’t be able to participate in your kinky world in any meaningful way. That would have been a deal breaker, an unworkable crack in our foundation, just like if I hated listening to your cello or you thought lingerie was for women who’d sold their self-worth to the devil.”

His eyes are laughing, even as his arms reach to pull me in tighter. “You can dress up in sexy scraps of lace and listen to me play the cello any time you want.”

I don’t bother hitting his chest again—it seems to have very little effect. “Focus. Foundations. Cracks. The horrible fear that you lived in a world I couldn’t understand or value or join.”

His laughter flees. “Join is a big word.”

I shake my head. I refuse to let this get hard. I already did my time there. “It doesn’t have to be. Maybe I visit, maybe I move in, maybe I turn into Fettered’s resident lingerie maven and let you tie me up one Thursday a month.”

He raises a hand.

I snicker. “Fine. Every other Thursday.”

He grazes his knuckles down the curve of my breast, somewhere in the vicinity of my heart. “You’re saying we can figure this out.”

I lean in and kiss his adorably confused lips. “Yes. I showed up, you pushed me, and something spectacular happened. The rest is negotiable, unless you get really unreasonable.”

He laughs. “Most subs sit meekly in their Dom’s laps for aftercare.”

I don’t do meekly very well. Especially after I’ve just done wondrously shattered. “I might need some latex pants for that part.”

This time his laughter shakes the ceiling. “I’ll ask Ari where she shops.”

I smirk. The day I can’t sew a pair of pants hasn’t arrived yet. Although shopping for them with Eli in tow might be a lot of fun.