Pleasure's Edge Read Free Page B

next.”
    It wasn’t a question. But she didn’t know how to phrase any sort of protest.
    Damn it.
    “Yes, we’l talk.” She went to pul her coat on, and he was right there, slipping it over her shoulders. She could smel him again, that ocean and deep woods scent. “Thank you for meeting with me today.”
    “It was my pleasure.”
    He was looking down at her, smiling. She drew in one last surreptitious breath, breathing him in.
    God, she real y had to get a handle on things. Get back to her usual self. But everything felt different with him. He was a dangerous man. But she’d never backed down from a chal enge before, and she wasn’t about to now. Even if this particular chal enge already had her doubting herself, had her wondering which one of them would real y end up on top.
    It had to be her.
    Had to be.

    two

    Alec locked the side door to the garage behind him and stomped up the front stairs of his gray Craftsman-style house on Beacon Hil . He shoved his key into the lock on the heavy wooden door, pushing it open with his booted foot and slamming it a little too hard behind him. Yanking his leather jacket off, he slung it over the coat tree, knocking it over and catching it with a muttered curse.
    Why the hel was he so on edge?
    It wasn’t as if there was any chance he’d lose in this deal with Dylan Ivory. He could spot submissive tendencies in a woman from fifty paces, and he’d been sitting right next to her. Close enough to smel the vanil a scent coming off al that wild red hair, mixed with something else. Something spicy and pure sex.
    His boots scuffed across the wood floors until he reached the thick Persian rug, where his footsteps were muffled until he hit the wood again on the other side of the room. He grabbed a glass from the heavy Spanish sideboard and poured himself two fingers of scotch, straight up.
    Dylan would be a chal enge; he’d realized that right away. But he enjoyed a chal enge. That wasn’t what had him so off balance. No, it was the fact that he had to have her. Had to have this woman in a way that made his skin itch to touch more than her hand. No question about it.
    Had to have his hands on her bare skin. Had to bind her, feel her muscles go loose as she gave herself over to him . . . Had to . .
    .
    He didn’t like that. Didn’t like that he felt so commanded by his desire for her.
    When was the last time that had happened to him? Had it ever?
    He was not the kind of man who needed anyone. Anything. He’d learned from his father wel . Independence was the key.
    Knowledge, experiences: These were the important things. And one reason why he’d spent most of his adult life looking for answers: reading, traveling the world. Not that he’d come up with anything conclusive yet.
    But he didn’t need to think of his father now. That was an ache that never seemed to go away. Dul now, after al these years, but stil present. Like a scar that wouldn’t heal.
    He threw back most of the scotch, reveled in the burn as it slid down his throat. But it did nothing to soothe him. He topped off the glass and took it to stand by the bay window overlooking the sprawling city.
    Seattle was its usual gray, but there were clear patches in the darkening afternoon sky, and he could see the distant silhouette of Bainbridge Island off Puget Sound. He sipped at his scotch, brooding over the view.
    Brooding over Dylan, damn it.
    Something about the way she held herself, so tightly control ed.
    He knew what happened when a woman like that let go. Was forced to let go.
    Oh, he’d never real y force a woman. He lived by the safe, sane and consensual credo, as did most of the people who traveled in his circle of BDSM clubs and groups. Stil , that wouldn’t change the fact that if he was able to bring Dylan down into subspace, if he could get her to open up, to let go, she would go down hard. She would unravel like a beautiful y made sweater.
    Not if. When.
    Where the hel was his confidence today?
    Maybe