"Do you trust me?" Mateo murmurs against my ear. I gasp when he guides the sliver of fabric up one side of my naked body. It’s satin, white, and cool against my skin. When I bow against him and grant him a pathetic shrug, the corners of his mouth twitch and he repeats his question. “Confías en mí?”

"Sometimes.”

“Your honesty drives me fucking crazy.” He skims the fabric across my upper lip, up the curve of my cheek and toward my temple. I glimpse my reflection—our reflections, naked bodies and all—on the mirrored walls and heat wiggles through me. “If you’re scared, baby, you can climb off now.”

The visit to Mateo’s house had quickly become a reenactment of my birthday—minus the interruption. We had cake and champagne in his kitchen as “Sympathy for the Devil” and—ironically—“Hallelujah” played over our heads. I had cast another glance toward the entrance downstairs, and he had looked at me in amusement. “There?” he’d asked, and I glided my tongue over my lips nervously. He had tugged me off the barstool, shaking his head slowly as we walked in the opposite direction. “Not there. Not for you.”

I’d sucked on the inside of one of my cheeks and narrowed my eyes. “Is there something wrong with taking me down there?”

He had paused and turned toward me. “I prefer our bad behavior to be done where you’re not asking yourself how many other women I’ve touched in the same room, but if it’s really what you want…”

The fact he gave a damn what I thought had made my heart stutter, but I had still whispered, “Just once.”

He had led me downstairs and into the second room on the left—the one with mirrored walls, it’s only décor a swing dangling from the ceiling. I had stared at it, swallowed hard, and he’d turned toward me.

“Are you sure?” he’d asked, arching his eyebrows, and I had nodded because I couldn’t find the words I desperately wanted to say. Because I was curious. Because I had wondered about his games more times than I can count.

Now, I shake my head. Clear my throat because it feels so raw. “No. I don’t want to go back upstairs. Not yet.”

“Close your eyes,” he orders. When I comply, I feel the fabric against my eyelids. Feel his hands behind my head as he secures the blindfold. “See, Jamila? It’s not scary.”

It’s not the blindfold that’s scary but the emotions churning inside me and the swing. He swears it won’t fall. Swears that he can take me any way, until I can no longer move or think or breathe, and the swing will be firmly attached. Still, as he checks the two straps—there’s one across my ass and the other across the center of my back—a shiver spirals down my spine.

He moves his hands up to mine, tightening my fingers around the metal chains on either side of my body. “Don’t let go.”

I nod my head, a gasp catching in the back of my throat as he swings me backward. I grip the metal harder, arching my body as the harness returns to him. He stops it from tilting backward again, the pads of his fingers grasping my ass. I start to reach out to touch him, but he makes a low noise in his throat and bends over to nip the inside of one thigh.

I quiver.

“No te sueltes.”

Don’t let go. Dear God, I already have.

I’m nodding again, moving my head up and down vigorously as he moves his mouth to my other knee. He slides the tip of his tongue from a small scar I’d gotten as a child to my thigh. He makes a wet circle over my skin—just inches from my sex—and when he draws away, my body stiffens and I blink rapidly inside the blindfold.

Where is he?

What’s he—

The swing teeters back, then forward. This time when he catches me, he spreads my legs far apart with one hand. “Don’t let go,” he warns once more. I feel his black hair against my neck as he bends his head to my breast to draw a nipple between his teeth. I moan. I moan because it feels like heaven and hell, all rolled into one package. “You drive me crazy, Jamila,” he rasps against my damp skin.

I nod. Cry out. “You too, Bailon. You—”

His fingers at the juncture of my thighs brush my clit, his touch harsh. “My name. I want you to say my name.”

“Mateo.”

Slipping one finger into the warmth of my body, he bends it slightly and my brain goes hazy. “Again.”

“Mateo,” I pant.

Turning his focus to my other breast, he rocks me gently against him, the sound of the swing an uneven rhythm that clashes with my heartbeat. I feel another finger at the opening of my sex. He hesitates, waits until my lips are parted and trembling, then he pushes it into me. “I want you now,” I say. “I want you now so much it hurts.”

He kisses my shoulder, and I hear him breathe in the scent of my perfume.

"Anticipation is the best reward."

“Lessons?” The laughter bubbling from my throat sounds like a sob. “You’re giving me lessons right now? What happened to dirty distractions being the best distractions?”

His chuckle washes over me, sending sparks from my head to my feet. I curl my toes around the stirrups when I feel him pull completely away from me. I hear the rip of foil and the growl in the back of his throat. When he touches me again, one of his hands is on my ass and the other covers mine on the metal chain. “Good point, Jamila. Such a good point.”

He presses his thick length against my sex. Crushes his lips to mine, capturing me in a kiss that explodes my world and leaves my vision starry despite the darkness. My feet leave the stirrups and my legs wrap around his waist to push him forward.

He thrusts into me, a broken breath falling from his lips. “Fuck, you’re incredible,” he groans.

Our bodies move together, each pump of our hips bringing us closer to release. My nails dig into metal on one side and into his skin on the other. If I hurt him, he doesn’t complain. Doesn’t say a word other than my name.

I’m losing myself. Tumbling rapidly. He waits until I’m tensing around him and my teeth are clenched to reach between our faces, tugging the blindfold from my gaze. Behind him, I see our reflections again on the mirrored walls. The sight of his body pumping into mine and the perspiration dripping from the sinewy muscles of his back makes my mouth go dry. It’s mesmerizing, probably one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen, and I don’t want to look away. But then he holds his hand to my cheek. “I’m right here, beautiful,” he says.

As I give in to the sweet tension dragging me under, the only thing I see are his eyes.

* * *

“You seem completely out of your element,” I tease a few days later. I bend over to inhale a rose before I glance behind me at Mateo. His hands are in the pockets of his jeans, and a slight smirk curves lips.

“And you’re completely in yours.” When I stand upright, he links our fingers together, bringing my hand up to his mouth to kiss the heel of my palm. “Are you sure you were supposed to be a nurse?”

Pressing my lips into a thin line, I move my head up and down. “I love flowers because I can’t grow them. My dad put Bella and I on garden duty when we were kids—we killed all the damn flowers. But you bringing me here is incredible.”

When I climbed out of bed after my shift this morning, there was a text from Bailon waiting for me. His afternoon was clear, and he had promised a surprise. Since surprises from Mateo are usually of the kink variety—like the swing that still leaves my mind reeling whenever I think of it—I expected that we would spend the afternoon tangled up with each other, our bodies crashing together and my heart going a little crazier for him. Instead, he shocked the hell out of me when he took off from my apartment in the opposite direction—toward Boston Public Garden.

“I know how much you love flowers,” he’d said, his grin matching the ridiculous look on my face, as he parked his BMW. The gesture is romantic, beautifully confusing, but I haven’t breathed those words to him. I don’t even want to breathe those words to myself because it will put life to everything we aren’t.

“I haven’t been here in years.”

Pulling me closer to his body, he glances down at me, one dark eyebrow cocked. “And all those pictures on Instagram? Are they that old?”

Laughing, I shake my head, and he reaches out and pushes a curl back when it falls over my forehead. “No, those are other gardens around town. Jesus, Bailon … do they all look the same to you?” He shrugs, and I roll my eyes so dramatically Bella would be proud. “I haven’t been back to this one because…”

I’ve piqued his interest, so he motions his hand for me to continue.

“I took my engagement photos here. Right over”—I scan the area in front of us and then point at the bridge over the swan pond—“there.”

I've mentioned Art to Mateo before, but this is the first time his lips have twisted into a sneer when I bring up my former fiancé, the first time the muscles in his neck gone taut beneath his bronze skin. “Do you want to go?”

My features crinkle into a frown. “Why the hell would I want to go?”

“Because I’ve reminded you of your fool fiancé.”

“And you’ve also reminded me how much I loved coming here. Besides, Art wasn’t a fool. We were just really young.” And incompatible. Art’s favorite pastime was asking his mother for permission, and it had left my nerves frayed. Still, it seems like he’s happy now—he had posted a photo of his daughter on Instagram the other day and I had sighed over it for far too long before I commented how beautiful she is. “Ending our engagement was mutual. And we’re both in a much better place.”

At least, Art is.

I let out a shuddering groan and tug at the hem of my shorts. Mateo’s expression is unreadable when I tilt my dark eyes to his, and I search his features for a moment before I rip my focus to all the colors around me—lush greens with splashes of ruby and violet and ivory. “It was dumb of me not to come back to this place.” A small smile steals across my lips. “Thank you for bringing me.”

“If it makes you do that?” He cups my chin and feathers the pad of his thumb over my lips. “I do it at thousand fucking more times. As long as you're not thinking about your ex-shithead.”

“No,” I whisper in a voice that’s as soft as his touch. “I'm not thinking about him.”

We hold each other’s gaze for a breathtaking moment, oblivious to everyone who passes us by. When I finally let my eyes drift to the ground and clear my throat, his fingers drop from my mouth. He skims them down—from the inside of my elbow to my wrist—before linking them with mine again. “I give you tours of chains and kink, you give me tours of flower gardens.”

“Aren’t you a poetic one,” I say with a grin. As we stroll through the garden, he listens intently at everything I say. Even though I'm sure he doesn't give a damn that this was the first garden in the country or what the official name of a plant is, he doesn’t stop staring at me. When my phone rings for the fourth time since we left his car, he nods to my purse against my thigh.

“Afraid to answer in front of me?”

I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear and scratch my nose. “Some guys just don't get the clue.”

His gaze darkens. “To be honest, I was just joking when I asked if you were afraid to answer. Who is”—a muscle in his jaw tics—“some guy?”

“Your lovely accountant.” I snort. Julian had gone silent for a few weeks, but that all ended a few nights ago after he started commenting on my social media posts again. I already know what he wants—well, other than to get laid—and I plan to call and turn him down as soon as I’m alone this evening. Since Mateo is staring at me expectantly, I twist my lips to the side. “He's going to some wedding, and he needs a date. I just haven’t had the chance to turn him down.”

I pull my phone out, intending on sending Julian to voicemail, but Mateo motions for it. “May I?” he asks in a voice that’s dangerously low.

My eyebrows jerk up to my hairline. “May you what?”

“Do you trust me?”

“Occasionally.” He gives me a tight smile as I place my phone into his hands. He answers it, turning his back to me and I scowl as I creep closer. He speaks in hushed tones, but every now and then I catch wisps of the conversation.

“Yes … that Bailon.” A pause and then Mateo releases a dark chuckle. “Yes, I think that she’s already aware, but you’re more than welcome to text her and let her know. I promise not to delete it.”

I nibble on my lip, worry my hands together until my fingers start to tingle. Finally, he drags his fingers through his dark hair and lifts one shoulder in a nonchalant shrug. “You’re a bigger idiot than I thought if you didn’t think I already did.”

“What did you say to him?” I ask the second he places my phone into my outstretched hands. Thinning my eyes warily, I drop it into my purse. “You didn’t bully him or anything like that, did you? He knows one of the doctors I work with and—”

“And you’re afraid I threatened to shove a stapler down his throat or—” When I suck in my cheeks, Mateo holds up his hands defensively, his mouth dropping open like I’ve just accused him of murder. “I just asked him to leave you alone.”

“You asked him?” I cross my arms over my chest, tapping my foot on the pavement walkway. “Somehow, I don't see you asking him to do anything.”

“Okay, I told him. And then he accused me of stealing his girl.”

“His girl?” I snort because I only went out to dinner with the man one time. “And what did you say to that, King Panty Crusher?”

He bends his mouth to my ear, his minty breath blowing strands of my hair. “I told him the truth. That I had his girl long before his ass ever met her.”