Page 50 of Windlass (Seal Cove #3)

Angie leaned back as Stevie dropped her towel, her shower-darkened blond hair dripping down her shoulders and sending little rills running over her breasts. The urge to lick the water droplets from Stevie’s body was stronger than the ever-present urge to run.

And if she did run? Would she return, stuck like a comet in Stevie’s gravity because Stevie was the closest thing to safety she’d known in years?

What did it even mean to try as her friends had suggested?

How was she supposed to let go of the instinct that had driven her all her life and had more than once saved her life?

How did a person stay ? Stevie stared at Angie for another heartbeat, her eyes asking a question Angie wasn’t sure she could answer.

Not quite yet. She uncrossed her legs just enough to hint at what Stevie might have instead.

Her body had always outperformed her words.

Stevie’s eyes hardened into a decisiveness that sent a wave of slick heat between her thighs and a tremor through the secret room she kept locked in the back of her mind.

Luckily, there wasn’t time for self-analysis.

Stevie crossed the floor and pushed her back on the bed, her hands pinning Angie’s biceps to the comforter.

The feel of Stevie between her legs was exquisite.

She burned as hot as Angie, and Angie arched into her.

If Stevie would just toss Angie’s legs over her shoulders, they could—

Stevie’s mouth found her ear and wiped sense from her mind, stopping only long enough for Stevie to reach into the bag at the side of the bed and step hastily into her strap-on harness.

Angie sat up to help fasten the straps, which were as blue as the toy itself. It looked new. She didn’t care if it was or not, she . . .

Couldn’t finish the lie. She cared deeply. She didn’t want Stevie looking at anyone else the way she was currently looking at Angie. Ever . God, she was such a liar. She could never stand by and watch Stevie fall in love with someone else. Stevie was hers , possessiveness be damned.

Something glimmered darkly in Stevie’s hand: a coil of sleek black rope.

“Stephanie Ward,” Angie murmured, expecting Stevie to blush. “You knotty girl.”

Stevie did not blush, her grin absolutely wicked. “Pun intended.”

That grin undid her. Her throat was nearly too tight to breathe. This need was new. In her previous experience rope play had been cathartic, but always edged with distrust. No doubt a therapist would have an opinion about that. This, though, was a new feeling. She couldn’t qualify it.

Stevie unspooled the rope and fiddled with a knot. When she’d finished, Angie recognized a basic handcuff tie.

“Who have you done this with?” Angie didn’t mean to ask, but too late—the words were out, and the (hypocritical) jealousy with it. Stevie had been far too quick with that tie for someone whose hands were shaking.

“Your mom.”

“ Stevie .”

“You,” Stevie said, holding the cuffs out for Angie to slide her hands through, “in my head, far too often.”

Her heart wrapped around the words like a gold-sated dragon. She didn’t care if it was an evasion or not, and she rather thought not. Stevie hadn’t lied to her about her past so far, at least as far as she knew, and she trusted Stevie. She trusted her completely.

The rope was soft and cool against her skin. When she tried to lean back again, Stevie tightened the slack. The jerk sent a jolt right through her, and she nudged her hips closer to Stevie’s, seeking relief.

Stevie kissed Angie’s wrists. “Now don’t move.”

Angie was only too happy to obey. Stevie circled the twin bed until she came to the headboard, which was a simple affair of wooden bars.

Simple, but surprisingly sturdy. Stevie didn’t bother with a tie.

She looped the rope around once and wrapped the slack around her own wrist, which would put her in control of the tension on Angie’s hands.

The surety of the motion temporarily liquefied her spine.

Back at the foot of the bed, Stevie pulled until Angie’s arms rose over her head.

“And my feet?” she asked because she was perhaps a bit of a slut. She liked the way the rope looked tethering them together. She liked it too much.

“You’re going to need those free.”

The black of the rope around Stevie’s forearm contrasted with her golden skin.

She could feel Stevie shaking through the cord.

Angie shook too, arching her back to signal to Stevie that while she was more than welcome to stare at Angie all day long, she could do so with her hand on Angie’s clit, thank you very much.

Stevie slid her unbound hand along Angie’s thigh and hooked it over her shoulder.

The soft unfocused look in her eyes as she glanced down suggested Angie was visibly wet now.

Stevie scratched Angie’s skin from ankle to hip as her hand retraced its steps, then slipped between Angie’s legs to stroke her once.

Angie flung her head to the side and muffled her moan with her shoulder. Stevie repeated the caress, painting Angie with her own desire. Lips skimmed the inside of Angie’s knee. Then a tongue. She shuddered. She’d been shuddering. She would shudder apart soon with or without Stevie inside her.

She tugged at the rope for something to grab onto. Stevie jerked it, grinning again as with a languorous stroke the tip of the shaft teased Angie open.

“Angie.” Those blue eyes were suddenly serious, though still dilated. Stevie’s hips continued their slow, hypnotic rock.

“What?” she managed to gasp.

“What are you afraid of?”

“I’m not—”

“An inch with each answer, a withdrawal with a lie.”

This woman knew her better than she’d known to fear. She stared at Stevie, heart thundering, pulse pounding painfully in all the places Stevie had aroused, and understood precisely how thoroughly she’d been outmaneuvered.

Angie fled serious discussions, and when she couldn’t flee, she shut down.

Emotional release was equally difficult, the one exception being sex.

Getting fucked lifted some of that oppressive weight, and Stevie had seen that, offering her the opportunity for honesty under one of the few circumstances she could handle it.

“Myself,” she gasped. “I can’t trust myself.”

Stevie slid in an inch. A miser’s inch. It wasn’t remotely enough, especially with the way Stevie apparently knew how to use her hips.

“What else?”

“That’s it.”

Stevie retracted that inch, which had been significantly more satisfying than she’d given it credit for now that it had been taken away. Angie’s cry of protest was met by Stevie’s raised brow.

“Hurting you,” Angie said, panting. “I’m so afraid I’ll hurt you.”

She got that inch back, but no more.

“Running. I’m afraid of running. I get scared, and I run, and—” She moaned as Stevie slid deeper, struggling to remain coherent. “You deserve so much better.”

Stevie pulled all the way out with a wet pop that left Angie shaking. “Never say I deserve better than you.”

“Stevie—”

“Promise me.”

“I promise. Please—”

“And?”

“Please, I need—”

“The truth, Angela. What are you so afraid of?”

“Losing you.” The truth Stevie had asked for came out in a sob. “I can’t lose you. I can’t. Stevie, I need you so much it hurts my teeth.”

She didn’t mean it carnally. Well, not entirely, anyway. She couldn’t afford to need anyone the way she needed Stevie, but it was too late. She did. The axe would fall where it may.

“Angie—” Stevie’s whisper brushed Angie’s thigh, hot and sweet. Her thumb still teased, and rather than numb Angie’s desire the confession pushed her into a new frontier.

“That’s the truth,” she said. “I swear.”

“Well,” said Stevie, wrapping another twist of rope around her hand, “thank fucking god.”

“What?”

Stevie’s thrust sang up her spine and slammed Angie’s eyelids shut as her whole body rose to meet it. Rather than repeat the motion, however, Stevie pinned her there, perhaps unaware that doing so risked ending this prematurely, for the angle was exquisite.

“I need you too. Not so much it hurts my teeth, though. You might want to get that checked out.”

“You’re an asshole,” Angie said, laughing. The motion shook her body, which created a ripple of pleasure she couldn’t help squirming to extend.

“I’m kidding obviously.” Stevie kissed her thigh. “You wreck me, Angela.”

“Wreck me, then?” She couldn’t help the evasion as she moved her hips to illustrate her request. It was habit.

Stevie’s words had penetrated every part of her, and the emotion that responded only had one name, and it was too big for her to put into words.

Not yet. She stared at Stevie, hoping Stevie could read her mind, but instead she saw hurt.

“I’m scared of one more thing.” Angie stumbled over the words.

“You mean I gave you everything too soon?”

“Depends on how you use it.”

Stevie’s smile erased the hurt. “Okay, what else scares you?”

She held Stevie’s eyes, needing her to read between the lines. “I’m scared of being trapped.”

“I have you literally tied up right now. Why would you let—”

“ Love is a trap.”

Every part of Stevie froze except her eyes. Those darted from Angie’s right eye to her left, searching, seeking, terrifyingly hopeful.

“Are you—”

“Yes. A thousand times yes and all that. Now, will you please, please , fuck me?”

“Angie—” Stevie stopped herself, glanced at Angie’s mouth, then back at her eyes and at the rope that bound them. Angie saw the moment Stevie decided to let Angie off the hook, and she saw the moment after that when Stevie changed her mind again.

“Why is love a trap? Tell me, and I promise I won’t stop.”

Angie strained at her binding, the delirious relief of Stevie moving inside her too much. She would burst with it, and it wasn’t enough.

“Fuck me hard, and I’ll tell you,” she barely managed to say. Whatever Stevie was doing with her hips was heavenly.

“I’m making the rules.”