He answered by leaning in, his mouth slanting over hers, his tongue delving past her teeth, doing a sensual slide into her mouth that sent a wave of heat through her body. “What you tell me stays with me,” he vowed. “Trust me, Kara.”

Her chest tightened uncomfortably, emotion welling inside her. Trust him? Was he serious? And why why why did she want to? This was how people got killed in this world. They fell for this kind of man, these kinds of promises. “I barely know you.”

He settled his cheek against hers, his lips against her ear. “You know me,” he said. “I see it in your eyes when you look at me.” He palmed her br**sts and molded them together, teasing her ni**les with his thumbs, and her thighs burned, the urge to clamp them around his hips impossible to suppress. “And I feel it in the way you respond to me.”

His gaze raked her br**sts, a hot stroke like his hand, before they lifted back to her face, and she felt the familiar punch of connection captivate her. He captivated her. He leaned in and kissed her again, a deep, sensual slide of his tongue against hers that seduced and drugged. And when his mouth moved to her breast, oh God, the hot suction of his mouth on her nipple was driving her crazy, driving her absolutely insane. She arched into him and his hand curved under her backside, shifting her weight, fitting the V of her body against his thick erection, the proof he wanted her as badly as she did him.

“You want me inside you?” he demanded against her mouth.

Yes. Please. “I want out of these cuffs,” she panted instead. “I hate not being able to move.”

”I like you in them,” he countered. “I like me in you.”

Yes, she thought again. Him inside her. He wouldn’t be asking questions. He wouldn’t be teasing her. “Then what are you waiting for?”

“Your secrets, baby.” He moved then, dragging his palms down her sides in a seductive path over her ribs, to her hips, until he pressed his mouth to her stomach, his hair tickling her br**sts, her skin. And when his chocolate brown eyes lifted to hers, he didn’t push her, or torment her like she thought he was going to. He took his declaration someplace completely unexpected and erotic. “I want to discover them all, every sweet spot you own.”

His fingers slid between her thighs, and she gasped as he delved into the wet, sensitive flesh, his shoulders pressing her thighs apart, his breath a hot tease, promising all kinds of pleasures to follow. And then his fingers were inside her, and his mouth closed down over her swollen, sensitive clit.

Her eyes fell shut, every nerve ending in her body alive with the feel of his mouth, his fingers, his tongue…oh God, his tongue…he was licking her now, driving her crazy. Licking and pumping his fingers. She jerked against the cuffs, trying to reach for him, frustrated when she couldn’t. Her legs lifted, and she wrapped his shoulders, trying to hold him in place, trying to make sure he didn’t stop too soon. She was close. So very close to release.

“Not yet,” he said, and his mouth was gone from where she wanted him most, his fingers too, his lips trailing up her inner thigh.

She glowered at him, the ache between her thighs and in her ni**les, too much to take. “You’re killing me. You know you’re killing me.”

A wicked smile touched his lips and he licked her clit and then slid up her body and kissed her. “Killing you with pleasure. Remember that.”

He pushed off the bed, reaching for his boots, and Kara quickly scooted away from him, sitting up and leaning against the bed, her knees to her chest. Protecting herself from another attack of pleasure turned to pain. But there was no protecting her from the impact of him sliding down his jeans and boxers, his erection jutting forward, thick with his desire and with the promise of the satisfaction he’d denied her.

He tugged a condom from his pocket but didn’t put it on. She wanted him to put it on, she wanted him inside her, and yet, she wanted to escape before she did something foolish and trusted this man.

His knees hit the mattress and he crawled toward her, and she had the impression of a wild, wicked beast in pursuit of what was his. Right then, she wanted to be his. She wanted everything else not to matter, to just disappear. The hunger in him washed over her, the possessiveness, and her body responded, the slick heat of arousal glossing her thighs. His hands came down on her knees. He kissed one and then the other.

“Open for me, Kara.” And his eyes met hers and she saw what was there, the demand she give him more than her body. The certainty she would if she wasn’t careful, if she didn’t do something to stop where this was going. She couldn’t afford to be weak. She couldn’t let herself give into the temptation to trust him.

“No,” she whispered. “I can’t.”

“You can.”

She wished she could touch him, that her hands were free. “You want too much.”

“I want everything. I told you that.”

“Everything is too much.”

He reached for her legs, easing them down, and pulling her beneath him. And she let him. She didn’t have it in her to fight what she felt for him, not like this, naked and pressed close to him. Not with his c**k thick between her legs, and him hard everywhere she was soft, right where everything else felt wrong.

He stroked hair from her face, staring down at her, and she saw that raw vulnerability in him she’d first seen in Denver, that pain he lived with, that made her ache with him. That she somehow knew he let few people see, but he let her. He surprised her then, reaching up and releasing one cuff and then the next, then cupping her face. “Everything is definitely not too much.”