Bind by Sierra Cartwright Page A

moment, he wanted to see his initials there, in diamonds. “Is there anything you wanted to experience?”
    She hesitated, and he waited. Finally, she tipped back her head. “When I masturbate, I think about a man’s belt.”
    “I think we could arrange that.”
    “I might hate it. It could ruin the fantasy.”
    “It could,” he agreed. “And it could make it even better. Anything else?”
    “You’re asking a lot of questions, Mr. Donovan. Tell me about you, what it is you think I need to know.”
    “As I mentioned, BDSM isn’t something I’m merely into. Kinky sex like you’re suggesting is fine. Awesome, in fact. I definitely enjoy it. I’d love to see your body spread wide, held open for me. But I see that as an extension of a relationship rather than replacing it.”
    “I’m a bit confused. I thought it was all about the tying up and beating.”
    “To some people, it is. And that’s fine. To me, it’s much, much more. Tell me, do you consider yourself compassionate?”
    She blinked. “Of course.”
    “Loyal to your family and friends?”
    “Naturally.”
    “Someone who likes chocolate?”
    “Adores it,” she said, softly, as if it were a confession. “And pizza.”
    That little bit of information, he hung onto. “They’re part of who you are.”
    “Yes.”
    “The D/s dynamic is the same thing to me. I can’t separate it from my personality. Nurturer. Protector. Dominant.”
    “That sounds a bit scary.”
    “It doesn’t have to be. In fact, I’d insist you have a safe word, a way to immediately stop anything we were doing. You’d also have a word to slow things down, whether to give you a break or to reconnect emotionally or just to talk about how you’re doing.”
    “I’m not used to hearing men use the word emotional.”
    “It’s part of a real relationship,” he said. “I may not be as good at recognizing my emotions as you are yours, but I do have them, I promise you.”
    She gave him a soft smile, and he recognized that they’d had a small connection. He—they—could build from there.
    She looked out of the window for a few seconds, in silence. When she glanced back, a thoughtful frown was burrowed between her dark eyebrows. “So if we were to marry… You’d expect…” She squirmed a little. “You’d want to spank me? Blindfold me? Tie me up?”
    “All that, yes. We’d talk about which you were comfortable with, find your limits. But it goes beyond that for me.”
    “Beyond it, how?”
    So she was curious. Considering it, at least. “I’d expect that, while we were married, you would be my wife, but also my submissive.”
    “Isn’t that synonymous with servant? Slave? Yes-man? I’m not a puppet for anyone,” she said, scooting her chair back a little, putting distance between them. “I can’t be. I refuse to be.”
    “I wouldn’t expect that.” He kept his voice easy, moderated. “It’s clear that you’re intelligent as well as brave. I wouldn’t want anything less.”
    “Do you ever have…I don’t know how to put this. Regular sex?”
    “Regular?”
    “You know. Wham-bam. Wipe up with a tissue and you’re done?”
    “No,” he said bluntly.
    “Not ever? No quickies? Something where we can just get it over with?”
    “Lara, I’m not sure what kind of sex you’ve been having, but I promise you, you won’t want to just get it over with.”
    “That sounds a little overconfident.”
    He smiled. “I don’t think so. I will be so focused on you that you’ll want it to go on and on.”
    She laced her fingers in her lap, as if unsure what to do with them. “It’s clear that I don’t have any idea what it would mean to be a submissive or whether I’d like it or not. Like you said, whether it’s part of my personality.”
    “We’ll also talk about that, all of it. I’ll let you know my expectations, requirements.”
    “And what about mine?”
    He took her, her challenge—her tilted chin and narrowed eyes—very seriously. He