Amery shook her head. They’d gone round and round about him taking photos of her bound, to show her how beautiful she supposedly looked. But she wasn’t ready for that. She didn’t know if she ever would be.

“Anyway, thank you.”

“I enjoyed it.” She drew circles on his chest. “Are you staying tonight?”

“Yes. Now wrap yourself around me like you’re prone to and go to sleep.”

She smiled because she knew how much he liked having her wrapped around his body—even when he wouldn’t admit it.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THE following week, after one of the worst days of her career, Amery dragged her ass to a hole-in-the-wall bar that served strong, cheap drinks. It was the type of joint where people went to drown their sorrows alone. No guys trolling for a hookup. No bar floozies scamming on guys to pay their tab. No crazy sports fanatics with the TV cranked to ten thousand decibels. No annoying blowhard carrying on a never-ending cell phone conversation. No perky wait staff in skimpy clothing. Just an old bartender with a limited mixed drink repertoire and plenty of isolated booths and tables for one.

She ordered two gin and tonics at happy hour prices and drained the first one in two gulps. After the booze took the edge off, she leaned her head back and closed her eyes.

In addition to business problems today, her mother had called to nag her about her father’s clergy anniversary party. Being in a lousy mood gave her the balls, guts, whatever to tell her mother that she wouldn’t be attending the party.

Shocking that a minister’s wife knew so much profanity and had no issue using it on her daughter. Pissed off and pushed into a corner, Amery had hung up on her, which carried the unhappy consequence of receiving a phone call from her father. She shouldn’t have answered, but being in a foul mood had allowed her to unload on him and he’d hung up on her too. After that, she’d half expected a stranger to walk in and stage a religious intervention on her parents’ behalf—or possibly they’d just hire an exorcist—because obviously she was possessed by the devil if she dared to speak to her parents in that manner.

She snickered.

No one in the bar looked at her as if she were crazy for laughing alone in a dark booth while knocking back two-for-one mixed drinks.

Maybe she’d had a fight with her parents, and her friends, and she might be cracking the want ads for a new job, but at least she had a decent relationship for once in her life.

Although maybe indecent was a better term for what was going on with Ronin. The man could f**k like a dream. He made her feel like the most beautiful woman on earth every time he touched her. He demanded and yet he gave back. Sexually everything was going great. She trusted him with her body, knowing they could give each other exactly what they needed.

But on a personal level? When she wasn’t basking in the afterglow of astounding sex, or when he wasn’t literally tying her up in knots, and she considered what she knew of him beyond the surface stuff . . . she realized it was only surface stuff.

He focuses on you so completely that he reveals little of himself.

What he’d told her of his life and training wasn’t an intimate peek into him, but information she could’ve found on his Web site. And since the night she’d gone to the club and afterward they’d had that shockingly intimate conversation . . . he hadn’t revealed anything personal about himself. So that, coupled with Deacon’s comments about her being in Sensei’s flavor-of-the-month club, brought her doubts about the seriousness of their relationship to the surface.

Speak of the devil. Her phone dinged with a text message from him.

RB: Where are you?

Drinking. Where are you?

RB: On my way to get you. Tell me where you are.

I’m lousy company. I’ll call you later, k?

RB: Not okay. Where are you?

I don’t need a babysitter. I’m fine.

RB: I won’t baby you at all if you just tell me where you are.

Why?

RB: I want to see for myself that you’re fine.

See? Now, that was boyfriend-ly concern, wasn’t it?

No—he wanted control.

Bullshit. He cared about her.

Didn’t he?

Screw it. Even if he didn’t and this was a fling, she wanted to see him tonight.

She typed I’m at the Rialto Lounge.

RB: On my way, hang tight.

Too late, I’m already loose.

Then she shoved her phone in her purse and bought herself round number three.

So her vision was a tiny bit blurry when he walked toward her, but Amery would recognize that distinctive gait even four sheets to the wind. “Hey, sexy man. Lemme buy you a drink.”

“No, thanks. I’m your DD since it appears you could use one.” Ronin looked around. “Interesting place. Come here often?”

“When I need to.”

“What happened that sent you scurrying into this lounge lizard’s paradise?”

She wasn’t drunk, but she had a buzz, and that conversation would be a buzzkill. “Bad day and no, I don’t want to talk about it.”

Ronin grabbed her chin and peered into her eyes. “Too bad, beautiful. Why are you drinking alone?”

“You’re here now, so technically I’m not drinking alone. Just buy me another drink and quit judging me.”

He headed to the bar and returned with a tall glass.

“What’s this?”

“Coke. I’m not down with your plan to keep drinking until you pass out. I snagged you some pretzels too.”