I talk, filling his continued silence. “Anyway, I get your rule. It’s about safety. Pregnancy, STDs. And, probably, you don’t want to risk it, given who you are and—”
“Not just that.”
I wait.
His gaze shifts down, slow and heavy as a caress, over my chest, my stomach, to my toes and back to the empty, aching places between my legs. “It’s a fetish.”
My brows go up. I don’t speak.
“Breeding. Come… A kind of ownership thing.”
Something long-dormant curls to life inside me. Not quite in my sex, not as high up as my heart. Someplace in between. Someplace secret and private.
My eyes flick to the side and down, to where his thick, heavily-veined erection strains up. Hungry.
That’s how he looks. Ravenous and ready and very, very dangerous.
It sends a fresh thrill through me, this one shimmering out to every nerve in my body.
“I’m, uh, not good at…” He clears his throat and looks toward the wide French doors on the back wall. “I need control.”
My head tilts as I try to figure out exactly where this is going. “You want to control me, you mean?”
“Well, yeah.” He throws me an ironic, humored look, though it’s nowhere near a smile. “Not what I’m saying, though. I need control to make this…” His hands are big, tight fists in his lap. “Work.”
“This?”
“All of it. My life. The balance.”
Slowly, realization sets in. “And if you lost it, you’re afraid you’d… What? Lose everything you’ve built? Your career? Reputation?”
“More than that.”
“Okay.” I search his face for some clue as to where this is going. Come up empty. “I don’t get it, Zion.”
“This. Here.”
“Camp?”
“My people. They’re like…”
“Family.” In that moment everything clicks into place. “You’re afraid of losing them. If you’re, what? Real? Yourself? If you show them…” I screw up my face. “Isn’t this the whole point of coming here, though? Being yourself? A few weeks a year, you get to—”
“Two. Two weeks a year.”
My mouth drops open. “That’s it? Seriously? And the rest of the time you’re, what? Faking it?”
His eyes meet mine. “Mostly.” He looks bleak, alone. I want to hug him.
“I still don’t get it. You’re afraid of losing control? With these people? Your family? Why would…” And then I see. And it splits me down the middle. Crushes my heart. “You’re faking with them, too.”
“I don’t…” He stands, runs his fingers through all that wavy beach hair, and paces, his body too big and intense for the space. I look away from his ass, ignore that he’s somehow still half-hard, despite the sharp turn our conversation’s taken. He may look like a sex god, but right now, he’s just alone. So alone.
I stand, half naked and awkward, knees wobbly, butt aching where it’s been flogged, and walk to him, the fringe on my top swishing noisily. I wish I hadn’t worn this ridiculous thing.
“Come here,” I say, undoing the tie at my neck and letting the halter fall in a puddle at my feet.
His eyes skip down to my breasts, then back up.
