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“Finish the list, Tamsyn.” He added a testing note of dominance into his tone to see how she’d react. Now they were making progress toward a more intimate relationship, he wanted to know if she’d respond submissively or balk at being given a command.

Because she was obviously fucking perfect in every way, she melted.

Snatching up the pen, she pinned the list down with her cast and speed-ticked her way down themaybeboxes without a second thought. Everything from clamps to Shibari, whips to watersports. The top sheet flicked aside and she continued down the second page with the same determined flair.

Merrick snorted softly, knowing they’d need to revisit the list again at a future date. “Tamsyn, darlin, some of these you really need to think about.”

She completed her task and sent him an arch look that twitched his dick, then flipped the top page back. Her finger tapped all the other checked boxes in that column, then she lifted her shoulders as if to ask,What’s the difference?

Well, the point went to her, he supposed. Her body was an unexploited, unsullied canvas, and he suspected her mind was much the same. Explaining a kink wasn’t the same as experiencing it, and he got the feeling she needed the hands-on approach to understand the depth of what she was getting involved in.

Which suited him fine.

Indicating the line at the bottom of the second page, he smiled. “If you’re happy with your choices, darlin’, sign it.”

He waited until she finished writing her name again, then nudged her off his lap. Scooping the papers into one bundle, he pointed to the doors leading to the hallway. “While I order dessert, you take these to the desk through those doors and give them to Lydia.”

Apparently, he’d dropkicked a puppy off the roof if her expression was anything to go by. She was horrified and scared shitless at the prospect of… leaving him? Going out there alone? Interacting with strangers?

With her, there was an endless list of possibilities.

“Go on.” His tone brooked no argument.

It was a testament to his feelings for her that the staring contest she initiated amused him. Of course, she barely lasted thirty seconds of direct eye contact with him before his flat Dom stare trumped her defiant one.

When she snatched the paperwork from his hand and stomped toward the door with her attitude swinging like a pendulum, all Merrick could think was how much fun she was going to be when she let herself go.

How lucky he was to be the man who watched her find herself.

Chapter Six

Tamsyn

If she hadn’t already lost her voice, it would be gone now.

Sitting on the couch in Merrick’s living room, her legs curled under her, Tamsyn stared at the strangers infiltrating what she considered her safe space. The woman didn’t seem so bad, but the man…

Ice came to mind.

Cold, impenetrable ice.

Merrick had introduced them as Anarchy and Jasper when he let them in almost twenty minutes ago. Since then, she’d been living in a constant state of unease with pale, frost-blue eyes studying her every move. Not that she’d made many.

Anarchy rested a red portable screen on her thighs, her fingers flying over a set of keys with letters on them. Her eyes were a dark, warm brown, and her face was friendly.

“I don’t think you’re going to get any answers, kitten. The girl’s mute.”

“The girl has a name, Fairfax,” Merrick growled from beside Tamsyn. “I suggest you use it in her own home.”

“Don’t get your dicks in a twist,” Anarchy muttered absently, her attention on the screen in front of her. “I’ll get the answers I need when Tamsyn is ready to give them. Don’t push her, J. She’s not a criminal for you to interrogate.”

“Bet I could get her to talk.”

Tamsyn felt her tongue wither in her mouth. She didn’t know why they were here, only that Merrick’s friend Grit worked with them both at his old job. It probably wasn’t a good thing that they’d decided to pay Merrick a visit, especially when he didn’t seem to be on pleasant terms with Jasper.

“Merrick, do you know any good hiking routes around here? I asked Grit, but he wasn’t sure. Not too many guests come here for trailing around in the woods, I guess.”

“Uh… hiking?”