‘I’ll twist.’ he says, turning a card over.

I don’t know how, but I manage to keep a straight face when he reveals a six. ‘Oh dear.’ I whisper, taking my eyes from his cards, up his torso, his neck, and then onto his lovely face. ‘You risked it.’ I chuck my cards at him—the ones that collectively total sixteen. ‘I didn’t. Lose the shorts.’

He examines my cards on a faint curve of his lips, shaking his head. ‘You beat me, baby.’

‘I have the power.’ I start crawling my way over to him, not wanting to delay getting my hands on him. That was the longest card game ever. ‘How do you feel about that?’ I un-zip the fly of his shorts.

He doesn’t try to stop me. He pushes his back into the couch to raise his butt so I can negotiate them down his thighs. With the revealing of his arousal, I struggle to contain myself.

‘I’ll ask you the same question.’ he rumbles, low, throatily and with one hundred per cent sex in his tone.

‘I feel powerful.’ I throw his shorts over his head and take the pack of cards from his hand, placing them neatly to one side.

He reaches forward and rubs his thumb over my bottom lip, dragging it, his lips parting his eyes flicking to mine. ‘What has my little temptress got planned?’

I should push his hand away, but I don’t. ‘She’s going to surrender the power.’ I whisper, placing my hands on his thighs and reaching up until we’re touching noses. ‘What does my God say to that?’

He smiles, that glorious smile. ‘Your God says his temptress has learnt well.’ His big hands curl around my wrists and pull my hands up to rest on his shoulders. ‘Your God says his temptress won’t regret surrendering to him.’ His lips press to mine, and his tongue takes a slow sweep through my mouth. ‘But this God and his temptress both know how our normal relationship works.’ He cups me over my lace knickers and rests his forehead on mine. ‘And it works perfectly.’

I go rigid, but bear down on his palm to get some friction. ‘You’re perfect.’ My lips find his and my hands automatically seek out his hair. I’m yanking at it again. I just can’t help it.

‘I know.’ he mumbles around my demanding lips, sliding his hands around my waist and onto my bum. ‘I thought you surrendered the power.’

I couldn’t stop if my life depended on it, and I’m mentally praying on all things holy that he doesn’t stamp his authority because I’m desperate, craving, needing. ‘Please don’t stop me.’ I’m completely unashamed, still driving my tongue into his mouth.

He groans, pulling me into him and showing no sign of halting this. He’s letting me have my way with him. ‘You know I can’t say no to you.’

‘Yes, you can.’ I argue between firm, deep lashes of my tongue, although I’m stupid to remind him of this right now. He often says no, when I’m tired or if he’s really trampling me.

‘Not now.’ He’s standing with me wrapped around him, and I don’t even know it’s happened. I’m too consumed, but when the cool night air attacks my bare back, I’m pulling myself into his body, holding tighter and kissing harder. My brain isn’t given any space to think about where we’re going. I don’t care.

The rushing sound of the night waves gently lapping at the shore line is the first thing I hear. Then I smell the salty essence of the Mediterranean. There’s a chill in the air, but the warmth of his body fit snuggly to mine eliminates any discomfort. I’m burning up, and I don’t think even the Antarctic would cool me off. The wooden sleepers are taken with care as he carries me down to the sea’s edge, but he doesn’t take me into the water. He kneels and places me down on the soft, damp sand, ensuring our lips remain locked the entire time. My hands are wandering all over his muscular frame, my legs are writhing beneath him, and I’m fast losing my breath, my laboured breathing not helped when a gentle wave gushes up and breaks around my sprawled body, surrounding me in a shallow puddle of cool, salty sea water. My shocked, quiet yelp isn’t containable, my fingernails dig into his biceps and my back arches to try and escape the freshness, my lace covered breasts pushing into his bare chest. My burnt up state has instantly cooled.

‘Shhhh.’ he calms me, ‘hush now.’ His soft words relax me in an instant. I don’t know how or even why, I’m still cold, but he never fails to soothe me. He kisses his way into my neck, biting and sucking before he’s kissing his way across my face again. ‘I love you.’ he whispers. ‘I fucking love love love you.’

My heart bursts. ‘I know.’ My mouth skims his. ‘I know you do. Make love to me.’ It’s what we need to do right now. No fucking. No hard. Just love.

‘I never planned on doing anything else.’ He’s pulling at my lace and pushing my knickers down my legs. ‘We’ll call this one sleepy twilight sex.’

My hands are sliding up his arms until my palms are cupping his cheeks. His face is perfectly clear to me, despite the blackness surrounding us. Sleepy twilight sex may be a new favourite. ‘Deal.’ I murmur, shifting my legs to assist in the removal of my underwear.

His arm slips under the small of my back and lifts me a little so he can access the back of my bra. It’s removed with one hand and slid down my arms where I leave it suspended between my two wrists that refuse to release his face. I want to keep my lips on his, the gentle caressing of his tongue on mine sending me right to the highest level of Central Jesse Cloud Nine. My nipples pucker further, tingling with coolness but mostly with desire. And then he’s pulling his face from my hands on a moan and rearing back. He studies me for a few moments before sinking into me meticulously, thoroughly, perfectly, halting when he’s only half submerged.

His face is unreadable, but those greens are telling a whole other story. They are seeping into the deepest part of me. They are spilling with awe and devotion. ‘All the way?’ he asks, so quietly I almost don’t hear him above the light rush of waves.

I nod and tip my hips, quietly impatient. My alluring ploy works. He inhales a shaky breath and quickly lifts me when another wave creeps up on us. I cry out at the coldness again, but his sudden full penetration is more of the cause. He’s holding me against him as the water recedes, my cheek pressed to his throat, and then I’m on my way back down to the sand. My hands find their place on his shoulders and his forearms find their place on either side of my head. And we just look at each other. This in itself is beyond pleasurable. He’s completely filling me, and I can feel him pulsating. I’m even contracting around him, but neither one of us has any urgent need to hurry this along. It’s chilly, we’re both wet, but we’re perfectly happy. Nothing around us exists, just how we like it.

‘Do you want me to move?’ he drops his mouth to mine. ‘Tell me what you want, baby.’

‘Just you. However you come.’

‘I come with uncontrollable love for you. Is that good enough?’

It’s more than good enough. I kiss him instead of answering him, but he pulls away, his heavy, hooded eyes looking for a verbal reply. ‘It’s good enough.’ I accept on a quiet sigh, feeling like I’ve probably just sanctioned his challenging ways. But it is good enough.

‘I’m glad.’ He rocks his hips upwards, drawing a quiet intake of breath from me and strained neck muscles from him. ‘You feel so fucking good. I don’t know how I ever survived without this. I existed, Ava. I didn’t live.’ He pulls gradually out and pushes lazily back into me, pressing his lips to mine to capture my small cry of pleasure, mixed with more coldness as another wave surprises me. ‘Now I live. And it’s only for you.’

‘I understand.’ I say around his mouth, because I know that’s his next question. ‘I understand all of that.’

‘Good. I need you to,’ Out and in again, and there’s a sigh and tensing from both of us. ‘I love our normal.’

I smile, and squirm beneath him on another meticulous plunge. Our normal. I love our normal, too. Our normal is Jesse loving me so violently, it drives him crazy. It’s me returning that love. And it’s me accepting him in all of his challenging ways. I’m so over it.

I’m not even feeling the coolness of the sea lapping around me now. Desire is coursing through my veins, heating my skin, and I’m grabbing on to every drive with every muscle I possess. I equal his passion with my own, kissing him and feeling him, yanking at his hair and moaning. He’s swaying those hips back and forth so precisely, so evenly, that each thrust is hitching me steadily closer to climax. The softness of his tongue exploring every part of my mouth and the hard velvet of his cock sliding in and out of me is utter ecstasy, as always.

I let my displeasure be known when he breaks our mouth contact, but he ignores me, pulling back to study me while he maintains his pace. ‘I need to see you,’ he breathes. ‘I need to see those eyes smoulder when you come for me.’

‘Jesse,’ I’m panting. He won’t have to wait very long at all. The switch is flicking, courtesy of my Lord and his expert way with me. Knowing I’ll get chastised if I close my eyes, I work hard to resist the temptation of throwing my head back and clenching them shut. It’s hard when he’s doing this to me.

He lifts his upper body and braces himself on his fists. ‘She’s close.’ he observes quietly. ‘Control it, Ava. Don’t make me stop.’ He increases his pace, never allowing his eyes to leave mine.

‘Please, don’t stop.’ My hands find their way to his arse and grab on hard, pushing him into me.

‘You know what to do, then.’ He circles firm and deep, almost purposely making this more difficult for me. I bite back a cry, mustering up all of my strength to delay the inevitable until he’s ready. This calls for deep, controlled breaths, so I swallow hard and begin a sequence of breath regulating exercises. He knows that I’m struggling. He knows because there is a faint shimmer of a knowing smile looking down at me, and he’s firming up his strokes. His biceps are bulging, too, indicating a shifting of his fists in the sand where he’s trying to gain more leverage to torment me with his punishing love making. And God does he succeed. Every single time it just gets better and better.

I’m lying under him, soaking up his attentiveness, biting harshly on my lip, and I’m sizzling, bubbling, dying to let go. Through my wild sensuality, I’m searching for any sign that he may be close himself, and I begin to despair when I find nothing, but then his greens disappear behind his eyelids, only very briefly, and his hips jerk. He’s struggling. Fearful that he might slow to gather himself, I quickly wrap my legs around his waist and use every leg muscle I own to push him into me. It’s his downfall. He hisses, bucks again, and I shout my appreciation, moving my hands to his forearms and gripping hard.

‘You little… FUCK!’ His head flies back and his smooth pace rapidly advances into firmer strokes. I take the opportunity of his gaze away from mine to squeeze my eyes shut. I hold my breath, too. ‘Eyes!’ My darkness was brief. My lids are open again, and they are looking at a damp, hard face of frustration. Frustration that he can’t control it. ‘Fucking hell, lady.’ he pants. ‘You want to come?’

‘Yes!’

‘I know.’ He pistons into me, yells explicitly, time and time again, and then he barks ‘Come.’ And I’m besieged, my whole body going into meltdown as it’s attacked with violent shakes and is palpitating from the consistent bursts of release that just keep coming and coming and coming. I’m heated completely, his cum flooding me as he stills, moaning and grinding.

His breathing is sharp. My breathing is challenged. He’s still braced on his arms and he’s sweating profusely, while I’m rolling my head from side to side, almost disorientated from the intensity of my climax.