Seven Wicked Nights (Turner #1.5)

Remember: you hurt her. She doesn’t want you. She just wants to hurt you back.

“Here’s the way it is,” he said hoarsely, fumbling in his pocket for the key to his room. He turned the lock, opened the door. “I’m not going to ask you to come inside.”

The high flush of anger was beginning to fade from her face.

“At least not yet,” he amended.

He held his breath and strode into the room. He rummaged about in the dim light until he found the rücksack he’d brought with him. When he found it on the chest of drawers, he looked up. She stood in the hall, a foot from his door, watching him warily.

“You want me vulnerable?” He sat on the edge of the bed, pack in hand. “That’s easy enough to manage.”

He tossed the bag across the room. It landed on the floor in front of her and skidded to her feet. His evening shoes came off with little effort; the coat required a little more work, the fit being tight. But he undid his waistcoat buttons easily. He looked up from his task to see her watching in horrified fascination.

“What are you doing?”

“Making myself vulnerable,” he bit off. “Now open the rücksack.”

Her brows drew down at the unfamiliar word, but she bent and picked it up. She turned it around a few times before loosening the drawstring cord.

“What you’re looking for is on top,” he said. Was it too much to take off his shirt? He decided it was. Instead, he sat on the bed, watching as she gingerly reached in and removed a thick coil.

It was old habit that made him travel with rope—that, or some misguided desire for safety. That rope had saved his life more than once. She frowned at the heavy fibers and touched the ends, carefully waxed to prevent unraveling.

“There,” he said. “Want me vulnerable? Then tie me up.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “You said you were curious. You said you wouldn’t trust me. Tie me up, and you can do with me as you please.”

And oh, how he wanted her to be pleased by him. Still, Evan had his own less pleasant suspicions about what she wanted to do to him.

She bit her lip, turned to glance down the hall. Moments passed while she seemed lost in contemplation. And then slowly she came forward. She pulled the door almost shut behind her and then paused, her fingers resting on the handle, as if waiting for him to spring forward. There was a strange quality to her movements, purposeful and yet uncertain. She didn’t speak as she advanced, did not say a word as she wound the rope in a loop round his left hand.

“That,” Evan said as she completed the knot, “is an excellent version of a middleman’s noose.”

She looped the rope to the left post of the bed, and then pulled the rope taut.

He felt a hint of nerves, and continued. “So-called because when three men are roped together, it’s the knot you’d tie to secure the man in the middle.”

She wound the rope around the post to his right, her mouth set in a grim line.

“Don’t worry.” He flashed her a smile. “We shall be just fine with only the two of us. No need for a third.”

Her head bowed, and her loose hair spilled over her face, hiding her expression. But the knot she tied round this wrist was tighter, her hands jerking the ends of the rope into place.

He really couldn’t move much at all, just wiggle his arms a little and twist his hand about. He hadn’t thought she would tie him quite so tightly. But when he shifted, the friction of the rope burned against his skin.

He wanted her to trust him. And for one brief second, she leaned over him, her hair brushing his throat. She could touch him anywhere, and he’d not be able to do anything about it. Her throat contracted in a hard swallow.

But she lifted her head and looked him in the eyes.

“And what,” she asked quietly, “do you think I am going to do now?”

He was scarcely capable of thinking at all.

“Well,” he said, “I can tell you what I want you to do. I want you to kiss me.”

Her pupils dilated.

“I want you to run your hands under my shirt. I want you over me. I want to taste you, and I definitely want to be inside of you.”

“Do you?” Her voice shook.

“If I’m to list the things I want, I want to own your quiet possession,” he continued, “and drive the wariness from your eyes.”

She swayed just a little at those words.

“But you didn’t ask me what I wanted. You asked what I thought you would do.”

“And what do you think I will do? Do you think I will kiss you? Touch you?”

He smiled at her. “No. I didn’t really think you had planned to lose your virginity to me over a wine spill. I think you are planning to walk out that door, leaving me tied to my own bed.”

Her eyes widened and she took a step back. “If you knew, then why did you agree?”

He couldn’t even shrug properly. “You wanted me vulnerable. I suppose I owed you that much.”