I can’t seem to catch my breath. He walks to the far end of the room and pulls a drawer open from a large, ornate dresser. My eyes seem to have a mind of their own when he’s around. I can’t stop them from roaming the broadness of his bare, muscular back, from drinking in the smooth, tanned skin. Being alone with him in this room makes me think I understand what people must feel when they fall inside a lion’s enclosure at a zoo. I’m in another world. His world. A world full of danger and unknowns.

For the hundredth time in the last hour, I think of all the things I should feel. I should be terrified. I should be thinking up a way to escape. I should be thinking about my article more than how it will feel to have his hands on me. But no amount of thinking seems to do a thing. My mind practically hums with an electric need, a burning desire to feel his touch that’s so intense it makes my stomach feel sick.

I test the strength of the fabric holding my wrists together and to the bedpost above my head. It’s tight, just like it was every time I’ve checked in the short time since he tied me up. Every confirmation of how trapped I really am only pushes the exhilaration into another gear.

All my thoughts are snapped to the present when I see what he pulls from the drawer. It’s a leather paddle about the shape of a ping-pong paddle, but the material is soft and almost floppy. He whacks it against his palm a few times as he strides back toward the bed with a grin that sends chills through my body.

“Did you think you were going to get away with the way you’ve talked to me?” he asks.

“W-what?” I ask.

“You remember the words?” he asks. He presses his warm palm to the small of my back, forcing me to arch it and stick my bare ass out farther.

“The words?”

He makes an impatient face. “The safe words.”

“Yes,” I say quickly.

“Good. Then bend over for your fucking punishment. If you want my cock, you need to take your punishment like a good girl. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” I breathe, squeezing my eyes shut and leaning forward. I grip the fabric holding my hands to the bed tightly.

I brace my entire body, waiting for the blow that I know will come while my thoughts churn wildly between what the hell am I doing and I can’t believe Patrick Woods is about to spank me. I’m never going to admit this to anyone outloud, but the farthest I’ve ever been sexually before this was when Henry Miller made out with me in a movie theater and tried to put his hand between my legs. So I wasn’t exactly picturing my first sexual experience to be anything like this.

A soft touch at the base of my neck makes me jump. He holds his hand there, leaning closer until the heat of his breath tickles my ear. “Relax, baby. It’s only going to hurt as much as it needs to.”

“How much is that?” I ask, hardly feeling comforted.

“Just enough to make sure you have the most intense orgasm of your fucking life.”

I close my eyes again, nodding quickly and waiting.

I hear the sound of the paddle hitting my ass a split-second before the pain comes. I mentally brace for something so intense I’ll have to hold back tears, but to my relief, it’s more like a lingering sensation of heat, like I sat on a metal bench the sun had been beating down on. The heat gradually recedes until there’s only a lingering tightness on the surface of my skin left to remind me of the blow.

Patrick helps it along by bringing his mouth down and kissing the area just outside where he paddled me. My mouth opens in a wordless gasp from how clearly I can feel the pleasure of his touch. After the pain, the soft, warm and wet contact of his mouth and tongue on my skin feel so acute and real that I already feel an orgasm welling up inside me. Jesus. He wasn’t kidding when he said I was going to have the most intense orgasm of my life. I can already tell.

He paddles me two more times, kissing away the pain each time before he tosses the paddle off the side of the bed.

“You were perfect,” he says soothingly. He runs a tender hand up my spine until he reaches my cheek. He turns my head to to the side and leans around to kiss me on the mouth for the first time. All the tension in my body melts away in the kiss. I melt away.

When he takes his lips away from mine, the pain from the paddle is nothing but a distant memory, lingering only enough to add a sharp edge of power to every bit of pleasure his touch brings.

“I wanted to drag this out more, but I can’t wait. I need to fuck that tight little pussy,” he says through gritted teeth.

I listen to the sound of his zipper and belt. I’m still facing the headboard and can’t see him until he slides in front of me and lifts my leg to lay beneath me. I only catch a quick glimpse of his cock, but my eyes widen at how big and thick it is. Wow. My pussy clenches at the thought of something so large coming inside me.

I expected him to pin me to the bed or take me from behind, but he’s just waiting beneath me, roaming my body with his hands with a cocky grin.

I’ve never been in a situation remotely like this, but my body begins to rock on its own, hips moving through the air and dipping slightly until the first time the warm head of his cock brushes my wet folds. I gasp, tightening my grip around the fabric holding my wrists together and above my head.

“That’s right, baby,” he says, gripping my hips with his strong hands. “If you want my cock you’re going to have to work for it.”

“Oh?” I ask with a wicked grin. “Because I’m pretty sure you want my pussy just as much. Maybe I should make you work for it.”

I think I’ve made a mistake and pushed him too far when I see the way his glare darkens as he looks up at me. “Be careful what you wish for,” he says.

“I want you to fuck me,” I say boldly, chest heaving as I take in barely controlled breath after breath. What the hell is coming over me?

He slides out from under me and gets to his knees in one smooth, powerful motion, taking a spot behind me where he grips my hips so tightly it almost hurts. I jump as he spanks my tender skin with his bare hand where he paddled my ass just minutes ago. “I was going to let you take it slow, but now you’re going to get it all at once.”

Without any more warning, he pounds into me. I cry out as my walls are stretched to their limit in an instant. It feels like his cock buries itself in me past my belly button, but he doesn’t give me time to adjust or wrap my head around all the sensations I feel. He pounds into me again and again, each thrust stinging with less pain and flooding me with more pleasure and warmth than I could’ve ever imagined. Distantly, I realize I’m already gasping out his name.

“Oh God, Patrick. Oh God, yes!”

“Say my fucking name,” he growls. He cups his hand around my chin and turns my face to him so he can see me. He watches me hungrily. “Say my name. Beg for my cock.”

“Please Patrick. Give it to me,” I gasp.

“Fuck,” he groans, pounding himself deeper into me.

His pace increases until it’s feverish, until I lose all track of time and know only that I’ve never come close to feeling something like this, until I forget that it’s Christmas Eve and I forget that there’s a blizzard outside and that he’s a dangerous criminal and I’m supposed to be writing an expose on him. I forget everything except the places where our bodies collide. I forget to care or to feel afraid. All I know is the pleasure of his touch and the promise of more, the building explosion of my orgasm that threatens to shatter everything I thought mattered with its power.

He toys with the climax swirling to a head inside me. He brings me to my breaking point more times than I can count, pulling back at the absolute last moment and letting it ride back enough for him to resume his pace and drive it back to the forefront of my mind.

He starts to accent every thrust with a slap of my ass and a grunt of effort. “This what you wanted?” he asks. Slap. Thrust. “You wanted me to fuck you like this, did you?” Slap. Thrust. “Now you’re going to get a pussy full of my cum.” Slap. Thrust.

Each slap pushes my pleasure to an entirely new level, making the slight sting mingle with the pleasure until I can’t tell the difference between the two. Every sensation turns into a blinding, searing white light that is inches away from exploding through my body.

“I’m cumming,” he groans.

I know I should stop him. He’s not wearing a condom and I’m not on the pill. But I’m so far from thinking logically or responsibly right now that the thought of caution blows over me with as much significance of a warm breeze.

“I want it,” I groan.

My words trigger him. His grip tightens and he drives himself into me, roaring with pleasure as his cock pulses and fills me with warm cum. The climax that he was holding at bay within me finally washes over me too and completely re-writes what I thought I knew about having an orgasm. It doesn’t just curl my toes or make me want to squeeze my eyes shut and squirm while it flows through me. It’s an experience. Life-changing. More powerful than any drug could possibly be and more incredible than any sensation I’ve ever had. My hands clench into fists so tight they hurt and my body convulses until even the walls of my pussy are tightening and relaxing around his cock like my body is trying to milk every last drop of cum from him.

I keep thinking the feeling will fade but for what feels like an hour, wave after wave of pleasure bursts through me. I don’t even remember him untying my wrists or getting out the lotion he spreads over my tingling ass to soothe away what’s left of the pain. It feels like an age when the final aftershocks of my orgasm fade and I’m left more exhausted than I’ve ever been in my life. He’s still leaning over me, tenderly rubbing my back and massaging my body from head-to-toe.

“That was incredible,” I say.

“You weren’t so bad yourself,” he says smugly.

I turn to swat at him, but he catches me by the wrists and flips me, where he pins me to the bed by my wrists. He lowers himself down and steals a kiss. He pulls away from the kiss but keeps me pinned, face just inches from mine as he looks into my eyes. “I was hoping to fuck you so hard you wouldn’t dare rat me out, but I have to admit, I want more than that. I want you to stay.”

I bite my lip. “I think the blizzard outside is going to grant your wish.”

“I’m not just talking about tonight. I want more. I want everything,” he says.

I laugh because he must be joking. “Is that just what you say to get a two-night stand from girls?”

He shows no sign of humor. “It’s what I say when I think I’ve found the woman I want to bring into my son’s life. It’s what I say when I don’t want to ever let someone go.”

“Does that happen often?” I ask, still half-grinning even though my heart is thumping wildly.

“This is a first,” he says.

“What about his mother?” I ask.

“He’s adopted. My sister became a junkie and couldn’t take care of him, so I took him in a few years ago. But he’s my son now.”

I raise an eyebrow. “What if he doesn’t like me?”

“He liked you. He gave me the secret signal.”

I laugh. “You’re making that up.”

He finally grins back at me. “Maybe. But he’ll like you. I know he will. Especially if you join us for Christmas tomorrow.”

“How will we get to your house if the blizzard doesn’t let up?”

“Well, that’s an easy one. We’re already in my house.”

“Oh,” I say faintly.