“It’s not a no.”

Justine let out an uneven laugh. “Damn you. Why don’t you just say yes?”

“Because trust is not something I can talk you into. It’s your choice. What does your gut tell you?”

“I don’t trust my gut, either.”

Jason was silent, waiting patiently.

She didn’t understand herself, why she was even considering it. The rational side of her brain was aware that he was tempting her into some kind of novelty sex. But her intuition pulled toward a different understanding. As she stared into his midnight eyes, a word came to mind … “charmer.” Not the modern definition of the word, but the ancient biblical meaning: a worker of spells, binding blessings or curses to an object using knotted cord.

One night, and then he would leave.

“Promise you wouldn’t trick or hurt me,” she said suddenly.

“I guarantee it.”

Flutters awakened inside her as he fitted his hands at her waist. “What if I don’t like it? What if I want you to stop?”

“You’ll have a safe word. The second you say it, I’ll stop.”

“What if I forget my safe word?”

His lips twitched. “All you have to do is answer a security question, and I’ll send you an e-mail to reset it.”

Justine smiled uncertainly and took a nervous breath. There was no compelling reason to trust him; in the most objective terms, they hardly knew each other. And yet somehow he seemed to understand her better than any man ever had.

“Okay,” she managed to say. “You can spend the night with me. And in the morning, you’re out of here. Deal?”

“Deal.”

She led the way to her bedroom, excruciatingly aware of his footsteps behind her. She turned on the bedside lamp and opened the closet door.

“Cinnamon,” Jason said, as a whoosh of spiced air was pushed outward by the motion of the door.

“It’s a clothes sachet.” Actually the fragrance was from the besom broom she kept at the back of the closet, the rushes heavily anointed with cinnamon oil. However, she wasn’t about to start displaying all her craft-related accessories—not her broom, candles, or crystals, and especially not her spellbook. Standing on her toes, she reached up to the top shelf and pulled down a bundle of soft red hemp rope, no more than five millimeters in diameter. Hesitantly she gave the little bundle to Jason.

After running his fingers along the fibers to make certain they were soft, Jason glanced at Justine quizzically. “What do you use this for?”

“Spell-casting circles.”

“It’s perfect. Do you have any more?”

Hesitantly she retrieved two more bundles. As Jason took the rope, Justine thought there was something interesting in the idea of using rope from her rituals for a ritual of his. She watched him unroll one of the lengths of hemp. “You’re not planning to mummify me, right?”

He shook his head. “I only know a few basics. But a Shibari master would need more rope for complex patterns and suspensions.”

“Suspensions?” she asked with vague alarm. “Hanging in the air? Like a Christmas ornament?”

Jason grinned briefly. “Don’t worry. You’re staying on the ground.”

She let him draw her to the bed. His manner was relaxed, deliberate. A ritual, he’d said. She understood the value of rituals, designed to provide structure and meaning. But sex as a ritual was a new concept. How had Jason guessed at something she had never known about herself?… That her innermost desires might extend to something like this. What had been the giveaway? What had she said or done?

She remained standing as he sat on the edge of the mattress. He pulled her between his spread knees. “What if I like this?” she asked anxiously. “What does that mean?”

He understood what was worrying her. “Everyone has secrets. Twists and kinks they wouldn’t necessarily want other people to know about. There’s nothing wrong with having fantasies.”

His fingers went to the fastenings of her jeans and worked at them deftly. Justine kicked off her sandals and held on to his shoulders, feeling bewildered and scared and excited as she lifted one leg out of her jeans, then the other. Jason pushed up the hem of her knit shirt, and she pulled it over her head. Seeing the tiny copper key dangling from the chain around her neck, he asked, “Would you mind if we took that off?”

Justine hesitated before lifting the long chain over her head and setting it on the nightstand.

Jason touched her breast over the unlined bra, stroking the curve with the pads of his fingers and then the backs of his knuckles. Leaning forward, he pressed his parted lips against the deep curve. She felt him breathing hotly, sucking through the fabric until it was wet and her nipple jutted into the delicious ache.

“What’s your safe word?” he whispered.

“Chicken.”

He smiled and unfastened her bra, drawing it from her shoulders. Pulling her to sit next to him, he made a soothing sound as he felt her trembling. “You don’t have to be scared. I’m not going to hurt you.”

“I’m not afraid of that. I’m afraid I’ll feel silly.”

He considered that. “Sex with dignity is never really an option.”

“Yes, but—” She gasped as he hooked a finger into the side of her panties and eased them down.

“Relax.”

“I’m not good at relaxing.”

“I know,” Jason said kindly, tugging at the other side of her panties. “That’s why I’m going to tie you up.”

Her breath caught as he slipped her panties off. She clamped her inner thighs into a prim, tight seam, acutely aware of his every movement. She watched as Jason tied a simple knot with a loop at the end. Lifting her ponytail, he laid a length of the rope around the back of her neck. “I’ll start with a lightning harness,” he said, threading a section of cord through the loop. “It won’t restrain you in any way.”

“Why is it called a lightning harness?”

“It makes a zigzag pattern.”

Justine stared at him fixedly as he knotted the cord at the high center of her chest. Now that he had begun, he had the intent look of someone trying to solve a complex puzzle, or someone absorbed in a fascinating hobby.

Jason leaned forward, clamping the loop with his teeth to hold it in place while he reached around her back with both arms and rigged the rope across. Justine jumped a little, feeling his mouth so close to her skin, the searing rush of his breath. He drew his head back, created another loop, and repeated the process. Each time he wrapped the rope around her back, he used his teeth to hold the front loop in place. With each new loop added, he moved lower and lower on her body. The rope began to form a zigzagged web across her torso.

“Most of these are slipknots,” Jason said. “Any time you want to stop, I can have you out of this right away.”

Justine didn’t want him to stop. It felt unexpectedly pleasant, this slow and meticulous binding. She spoke like someone in a trance. “Can I talk while you’re doing this?”

He threaded another loop. “Talk the whole time if you want.”

“This is like a new sport: extreme macramé.”

“Are you uncomfortable?”

She shook her head. It was strange to feel snug and so exposed at the same time. Her br**sts protruded between the lines of rope in a way that made them feel larger, fuller. The harness had formed a light corset that seemed to contain and concentrate all the sensation in her body. Justine could feel her heartbeat between her thighs and at the insides of her elbows and the tips of her breasts. When the last loop had been threaded at her navel, Jason tied it with a hitch knot. His hands moved over the web of cord on her torso, his palms warm and soothing.

“More?” Jason asked, looking into her eyes.

Justine nodded.

His voice was soft. “Stand up, honey.”

She complied, her heart beginning to pound as he drew the rope between her thighs and up behind her to loop around one of the back cords. Another pass between her thighs, so that now a cord lay on either side of her vulva. This was more directly intimate, more erotic. Justine cleared her throat and said shakily, “That could turn into one heck of a wedgie.”

“I’ll keep it loose.” He ran a finger beneath the cord. She gasped a little as his fingertip brushed the verge of soft, sparse curls. “Does this feel okay?”

Justine could hardly speak. “Yes.”

A finger slipped gently beneath the other side, his touch wicked and knowing. “Not too tight?”

She shook her head.

With his finger still hooked beneath the cord, he slid his knuckle to the shadowed channel between her thighs, and circled gently at the top of it. Her knees went weak, and she gripped his shoulders to keep from falling.

Jason lowered her to her back with infinite care. Her limbs were loose and splayed, her br**sts plumped high between the bands of rope. He reached for more of the hemp and bound her hands together, attaching them to a cord at her waist. Every movement was measured, the rigging progressing in a fluid and soothing rhythm. He kept glancing at Justine’s face, sensitive to every nuance of her expression.

She had begun to breathe deeply, mesmerized by the sensation of being constricted by degrees, her body seeming to swell against the web of rope. Bound. Spellbound. There was no room to be embarrassed, no room for words or even thought.

Moving behind her on the bed, Jason gently turned her head to the side and unfastened her hair. The loose waves cascaded over his hands. His strong fingers curved beneath her head to lift it slightly, massaging her scalp. Justine moaned in pleasure and relaxed as he cradled the weight of her head. One of his hands worked down to her nape, gripping the tight muscles with delicious squeezes until they loosened.

Jason bent over her, his lips grazing hers in an upside-down kiss. “More?” he whispered.

“Yes. Yes.” She lifted her face, her tongue touching the edge of his mouth where the masculine texture of shaven bristle met the silk of his lips. She felt the shape of his smile, smelled the hot mint of his breath. His fingers stroked her throat and face tenderly. She was lost, floating, her blood humming.

Keeping her eyes shut, Justine waited as he moved to the other side of the mattress and grasped one of her ankles. He took her foot in both his hands, warming her sole, her toes, his thumbs massaging into the sensitive arch. She writhed, delight unfolding like a multifoliate flower. His lips brushed her heel before his teeth dug in lightly. The little nip caused her to twitch in surprise, runners of heat going through her, a bloom of intimate moisture between her thighs. A nibble at her toes, a ticklish kiss, and then Jason began to wrap her ankle. His hands were gentle and clever, bending her leg until her heel nearly touched her bottom, winding the thin, soft rope in a spiral toward her knee.

Justine opened her heavy-lidded eyes to watch Jason’s dark silhouetted form. He knew what he was doing. Every tug of the cord tightened the urgency inside, hunger and confusion knotting exquisitely until she writhed from the inner pressure. A large, warm hand came to rest on her stomach.

Jason was looming over her, hooking a muscular arm around her bent knee. “Beautiful,” she heard him say softly. “The patterns on your body. Red cord and ivory skin. Like an image from a shunga print.” He kissed the inside of her knee. “If I had a soul, I’d have sold it for a chance to see you like this.”

How peculiar it was that she could feel na*ed and secure all at once, all her protections gone. She was nothing but a bundle of bare flesh tied in red cord, her nerves charged with need. Jason worked carefully, purposefully, tying and threading rope to shape her body as he wanted. Her knees were drawn upward and secured so that she was held defenseless and exposed. She was throbbing everywhere, her sex full, the air wafting coolly against a slick of moisture.

Jason drew his hands over her legs, tracing the pattern of the cord. The air was filled with the mingled rhythms of their breathing. Even with her eyes closed, Justine could feel the intensity of Jason’s concentration on her. It gave her a disembodied feeling, being held and stroked and restrained, no choice except to submit.

Jason reached down to the ropes on either side of her groin and readjusted them, gently stretching each cord between the outer folds of her sex so that she was spread open. She began to tremble and strain, her insides pulsing and closing on emptiness.

Another whisper. “More?”

“Yes,” she said on a sob of breath.

Seconds passed while she writhed in the restraints, her bound wrists flexing, her toes curling. His hands gripped her bottom, forcing her to hold still. His mouth descended, covering her with slippery heat and sinuous flicking. She gasped, struggling against the ropes. Slowly his thumb worked inside her, rubbing deep circles while her muscles clutched helplessly at the new invasion. Her spine turned molten, and she dissolved in the heat, coming so hard she couldn’t draw breath to scream.

His thumb withdrew, his mouth playing on her, easing her into softness. Wordless minutes passed, while he cradled her trussed body as if she were a vessel he drank from. The lamplight slid over the dark head between her thighs, the layers of his hair touched with gold. She whimpered in surprise as the need built again, her swollen flesh tightening and twitching.

She felt the caress of his breath as he spoke hoarsely. “Use the safe word, Justine, or I’m going to take you while you’re tied. Do you understand, honey? Tell me to stop before it’s too late.”

“Don’t stop,” she managed to say, the words sweet and raw in her throat.

He pressed a rough kiss at the entrance of her body and stood to undress. His body was sleek and powerful, shadows cutting across his golden skin like tiger stripes. Standing at the edge of the bed, he gripped the harness of ropes and pulled Justine to him. He was astonishingly strong, lifting her without effort. She was helpless to move or participate, her body so neatly restrained that he could manipulate her like a toy.

Reaching down, Jason positioned himself and entered her in a wet, skewering thrust. His mouth came to hers, absorbing her pleasured groans. He continued to kiss her as he gripped the ropes, using them to lift and rock her against him. It was like riding on waves, a steady undulation while the cords held her open, exposing her sensitive flesh to each lubricious plunge. His mouth covered hers, his tongue filling her, while his hands gripped the ropes to make her ride every hard thrust. She bounced helplessly, weightless, sightless, washed in the heat of a cl**ax so prolonged that it had no definite beginning or end.

She had never surrendered herself so fully, had never imagined it possible, and yet it was what she had always craved, to be sublimated in pure feeling. To hear her name in Jason’s voice, his body shuddering against hers, the thick pulse of him buried within her. To feel his arms go around her, his face nuzzling hard into her neck.