“You wouldn’t have let me run like she did. You care about me. He let her. She was alone. Ella is alone, Chris. If she’s blowing me of then ine. She’s blowing me of, but I can’t do that to her.”

“We aren’t blowing her of. We’re trying to ind her.” His hands gently caress my hair. “I’m glad you know that I would come after you now. You didn’t always.” He settles his palms on either side of me on the desk and studies me a moment.

Thankful for what this beautiful man has added to my life, I reach out and play with a spiky lock of his blond hair. “I know now. That’s what counts.” I purse my lips at my momentary distraction. “I haven’t forgotten what we’re talking about. You aren’t of the hook. You should have told me about the mob connection.”

“If I tell you I was protecting you, you’re going to come unglued, aren’t you?”

My ingers fall from his hair. “Yes.”

Obviously ighting a smile, he says, “Then I won’t tell you. I think . . . hmmm, yes . . . this would be a good time for me to show you a way to escape.”

My pulse is racing all over again. “Escape?” I ask for one of his “escapes” all of the time. He never gives them to me. He always says it’s not the right time or I’m not ready. He never volunteers.

“I have something to show you,” he adds, and there is a deinitive, sensual gleam in his eyes. “Take your clothes of.” He reaches for his shirt and pulls it over his head.

I’m used to Chris ordering me to take of my clothes but, for once, he’s getting na**d at the same time as I am rather than playing the power card of watching. And while I mean to join him in the process of undressing, his shirt comes of and my mouth goes dry. I think I’ll take a moment and enjoy the view.

I stall, hoping for more skin and a longer show. “We need to be na**d for you to show me whatever you want to show me?”

“Yes.” He sits down to take of his boots. “Get na**d and I’ll show you.” He stands up, towering over me again. I forget how tall he is sometimes, but I never forget how deliciously male he is. He arches a blond brow. “Need help?”

My sex clenches and my ni**les tighten. My entire body knows I’m about to delve into new territory. It’s in the air. It’s in the lecks of ire dancing in his eyes.

I pull my shirt over my head and toss it, revealing my black lace bra. He watches my face, and it’s even more erotic than him looking at my almost-bare br**sts.

He lifts my foot to his leg, barely glancing away from my face to tug of my shoe and sock, then repeats the process with the other foot. His hand on my denim-clad calf is incredibly arousing.

He lets go, taking several steps backward. “I’ll let you do the rest.”

He wants to watch me. It’s all about time and anticipation with him, and it does what he intends. I’m wet. I’m ready. I want to know what he has to show me.

I unzip my jeans and shimmy them down my legs, kicking them away. My eyes meet his, and heat replaces the lutters in my belly. I reach for my black thong, shoving it down my legs.

Still he holds my stare, and I unhook my bra and drop it. My br**sts are heavy; my body is alive in ways only Chris can create.

Slowly, his gaze lowers to my br**sts and my ni**les tighten and throb. He doesn’t touch me. I don’t expect him to. This teasing is part of who he is, and he is what I want. Then his eyes lift, illed with male satisfaction and the knowledge of how easily he afects me; how easily he turns me into a wanton, eager player in his sensual games. And I’m ine with him knowing that. These games are sexy and they’re no longer emotional tightropes.

Chris closes the distance between us and surprises me by touching me, his hands sliding to the side of my face. I think he likes to do what I won’t expect, to keep me guessing and on edge.

He leans me against the desk, his body molding mine, and I love the way he is hard where I am soft. The way he absorbs everything that I am and somehow makes me more in the process.

“Do you trust me, Sara?”

“Yes,” I say, and my voice cracks with the ache I feel for this man. “Like I’ve never trusted any other person in my life.

Completely.”

“Then trust me when I say what you witnessed that night at Mark’s club was me going too far. What you and I do is not the same. When I tied you up, when I spanked you, that was mild BDSM. What you saw was extreme— too extreme. You and I decide what is right for us.”

“Yes, I know. I like that.”

He leans down and brushes his lips over mine. “I love you.”

“I love you, too. And why does your saying that right now make me nervous?”

He rests his forehead against mine, trails his ingers down my arm. “Because you know I’m going to take you somewhere you’ve never been. That’s part of the high, Sara. The adrenaline rushing through your body. The unknown soon to be discovered.”

He straightens and then reaches over to open the center drawer of his desk. I watch as he removes a long velvet box and my stomach lip-lops at the sight. I’ve seen one of these boxes before. I know there’s a toy inside.

I hold my breath as he holds it between us, and lips it open.

I stare down at a black logger with eight ministraps dangling from the handle, and my heart jackhammers. All I can think of is my irst night at the club, when I heard the painful cries of a woman being publicly logged. “No . . . I . . . ” I shake my head. “No.”