This time her reward was him reaching down and with both hands, snapping the strap on the side of the thong so that the satin front panel fell away, exposing her entirely to him. That was definitely worth sitting on her hands. The move was so hot she felt her mouth fill with saliva, excitement rushing through her like a shot of whiskey on a cold night.

It was just the beginning. When he bent down, he traced the inside of each of her thighs with his tongue, a teasing caress so close to the core of her desire.

“This is how this works,” he murmured against her skin. “You only come once I give you permission. If you’re getting too close, you can move your hand to tap my head to let me know you don’t have control over yourself and need a pause. But I will give permission, and you will come when I think you’re ready, so don’t worry about that . . . I don’t get off on leaving you unsatisfied. I want the opposite.”

Shawn wanted to protest that his rules weren’t particularly fair, but she didn’t want him to withdraw his touch, nor did she want to waste time worrying about particulars when he was essentially promising to bring her to orgasm.

“Nod your head.”

So she did, and the minute she did, she knew it was a delicious decision. His tongue shifted to her pussy, his fingers gently tugging her lips apart so he could lick her deeply and thoroughly.

Shawn almost came, but she remembered the rules and managed to tap him on the shoulder, frantic and disappointed all at once. She didn’t want to fail. She didn’t want to have to move. She wanted to play by his rules and win the game.

Rhett stopped, his eyebrows raised as he stared at her over her pubis. “So soon? Really? Damn, Shawn.”

Her cheeks flushed with the heat of her embarrassment. She didn’t like to disappoint. So she slowed her breathing, pulling her knees in closer so that the arousal wasn’t quite so intense, and relaxed her head back. When she had control, she returned her hand to behind her backside so he would know she could again accept his plunging tongue without careening into an unallowable orgasm.

It was then, as he first began to use two thumbs to massage her lips up and down that she wondered what the punishment would be if she did accidentally orgasm. And then she wondered at her sheer excitement at the thought of him taking his palm to her bottom and spanking her in retribution. Oh, God. Shawn fought to stay in control, fought to keep her body relaxed. Even if the punishment was sweet, she couldn’t unless it was purely an accident. She had to obey.

She had to obey.

It was the dirtiest, sexiest, hottest thought she’d ever had.

One that almost made her come.

But she wrangled herself back from the edge by biting her bottom lip behind the tights so hard that she felt the wet trickle of blood. The sting distracted her enough to prevent her from rushing over the edge too soon.

It was a wise choice, because in the next second, Rhett gripped her thighs and split her legs apart, his tongue flickering over her clitoris for the first time.

“Mmm,” he said. “So pretty. So swollen. You’re doing so well, Shawn. I’m very, very pleased.”

That shouldn’t sound nearly as exciting as it did.

But when he licked her clitoris again, before dipping his tongue inside her, she didn’t care about whether it made sense or not. She was too busy yanking her hand out to smack wildly at him so he would stop.

It was too late. His tongue was lazily lapping at her, and by the time he started to lift his head, she was screaming behind the nylon, and gripping his head with both hands so he wouldn’t stop. She came hard and fast, cramming his tongue into her with a ferocity that startled her. It was a tight, unsatisfying orgasm, a wild desperate constriction of her tight inner muscles, a single ice cube on a blistering summer day. It momentarily cooled her, but then simply left her wanting much, much more.

Plus, she had broken his rules and she knew it.

Instantly, as her body shuddered to its final completion, her pussy still aching and wet, she let go of his head and fell back, afraid. Not afraid of him hurting her, but that the punishment might be that he would deny her his erection plunging into her. Because she knew that she really, really needed that. That she would actually possibly beg if it was required.

This night could not end until he had filled her to capacity.

* * *

RHETT wasn’t surprised that Shawn had come. Exactly what he had wanted had happened—she had let go entirely. She had let go through allowing him to control the situation, and it was the hottest thing he’d ever seen. He had a steel grip on his own desire, but his cock was throbbing and the taste of her was on his tongue. He wanted her, but her wanting him was even better.

But if he wanted to continue the way they’d begun, which he definitely did, he couldn’t just sink inside her and stroke them both to satisfaction. He had to follow through.

Knowing she needed some fresh air, he pulled the tights down around her neck. She gulped in air and before he could say anything, she was speaking an achingly sweet apology, her eyes wide in the dimly light room.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to . . . it’s just I haven’t had sex in a while, and it just came over me and by the time I realized it, it was too late and I already was, and then I didn’t want to ruin it, so I grabbed—”

Rhett covered her mouth again. “Shh. I know.” He brushed her damp hair back off her forehead. She was flushed, eyes darkened still with her desire. “But you do need to be punished. Do you agree with me? Do you need to be punished?”

She knew what he was asking. If she said yes, he would continue the way he had started. If she said no, he wouldn’t. Even if she said no, he would still make love to her, but in a more traditional sense. He wasn’t a masochist, nor did he want to leave her unsatisfied. But he would prefer it if she said yes. He would prefer it deep down into the very depths of his soul, and as the seconds ticked by, the agony of the wait gripped him in the balls and his throbbing cock, still trapped behind the cotton of his briefs. He hadn’t realized how much he had wanted this, wanted Shawn, until it all rested on what happened next.

Wanting to hear her speak her desire, Rhett fully undid the gag hanging around her neck, tugging it until it fell to the mattress beside her ear.

“Do you? Answer me.”

If she said yes, then he was certain Shawn was absolutely the perfect woman for him.

“Yes,” she whispered, her chest heaving, the sweet scent of her desire rising between them. She swallowed hard. “Yes, I need to be punished.”

Rhett felt a massive swell of satisfaction and desire, intermingling with each other. Fuck, yeah. She was on board, and he was going to make her damn glad she was.

Then she added, with a boldness he wouldn’t have expected of her at this point, “I promise I won’t come again.”

That was possibly the best news he’d ever gotten. He kissed her, a deep, worshipful kiss, his palm cupping her cheek, the feel of her mouth opening for him, tugging at him in a deep, intrinsic way.

“That’s perfect,” he told her. “Exactly what I wanted to hear.” He skimmed a hand down low, over the strip of dusky blond hair covering her soft folds. She sighed.

“You’re so beautiful, Shawn.”

She was. He liked her like this, flushed and dewy, color rising above her breasts, her lips parted on a sigh. He also liked her laughing, that saucy spark in her eye, that devilish glint. And he was going to like her on her knees.

So he pulled his hand away. “On your knees, facing the wall. Hold on to the headboard.”

Her eyes widened as the reality of his words sank in and she felt the loss of his touch. He thought she had the courage to go through with it, but he wasn’t sure. He was asking her to take a total leap of faith, to trust him. A man she admittedly didn’t know that well.

But he was her husband.

Though he wasn’t going to use that title now. He knew how far to push, and bringing that up would cause her to bristle. She was still an independent and feisty woman who ran a business. She would have a point where she would balk, and likely that would be it.

While she pressed her lips together and slowly rolled over onto her stomach, her gaze darting back at him over her shoulder, Rhett came up on his knees, debating whether stripping his briefs off would reassure her or scare her. He didn’t want her to think in any way that he would actually hurt her. So he left them in place for now and leaned over her shoulder and murmured, “I really won’t hurt you, Shawn. I’ll never hurt you. And you can always say stop at any time.”

Just to show her he was serious, that he would always be respectful, he skimmed her hair off her shoulders onto her back and trailed his fingers down the bumps of her spine, skimming her hips, and the perfect curve of her ass. Then he gave her a light smack. She jumped a little, but before he could get a second swat in, she was dragging herself up into the position he had demanded—on her knees, hands gripping the headboard.

Thick saliva filled his mouth and for a second, his vision actually went black as the enormity of her submission hit him. Then he smacked her perfect, tight ass, harder this time.

A tiny gasp flew out of her mouth, and her knuckles whitened as she gripped the bed more thoroughly. With his left hand on the small of her back, Rhett moved one knee in front of her, the other behind, so he could get the perfect motion. With each smack, he took it a little harder, the slap of his palm on her skin a loud crack of satisfaction in the quiet night. With each spank she let out a little cry and jerked forward from the momentum of his swing. But she always tilted her ass back up for him ever so slightly, whether she was even aware she was doing it or not. She took it, and came back for more, until her backside was a stinging red, and he couldn’t go much harder without leaving her with more than a lingering soreness.

Caressing the apple-smooth ass cheeks, he leaned forward and whispered gruffly, “Is that enough punishment, or do you deserve more?”

Shawn rested her head on her arm against the wall and gazed back at him with eyes limpid with desire, her breathing hitched, words a strangled whisper. “That’s for you to decide, not me.”

And with that, he knew that she was absolute perfection, and everything he could have ever asked for in a woman.

CHAPTER NINE

SHAWN stared back at Rhett, her excitement and confusion and shock at her own response all swirling together and leaving her waiting in breathless anticipation for his next move. She didn’t understand why she was allowing his dominance, why she was so titillated at the idea of him allowing her pleasure, as opposed to her taking it freely, but she was. Rhett ran his thumb over her bottom lip, over the laceration her teeth had left when she’d torn into the flesh to prevent her orgasm.

“You’re right. It is up to me whether you need more punishment. But I think that shows I can stop here for now.” Teasing his hand over her bottom he slipped between her cheeks and stroked into her soft heat. “But stay in this position.”

It wasn’t an order, exactly, it was more of the way it was. He was in charge, and holy shit, she liked it. She did. She had of course in the past wanted the men she’d been with to take pleasure in sex with her, but she had never wanted to please them, exactly. The difference was subtle, but profound. She wanted to please Rhett, give him the greatest satisfaction possible.

The feelings were scary and intense, but the overlying pleasure was so great, her aching body so desperate for the feel of him, that she thought she might agree to do just about anything. The palm of his hand on her ass had stung, the pain a little more acute with each strike, but she had enjoyed it, no question. It had made her more aware of her skin, her body, the bounce of her breasts and the tightness of her clitoris. Everything he did made her feel as if she were discovering nerve endings and depths of her body that she had never known existed before.

Clinging to the top of the bed, she moaned as he skillfully used his fingers to stimulate her even more, two fingers going deep inside before dragging down between her legs, soaking her with her own desire, before one of the two fingers slipped inside her backside. The unexpected invasion caused her to jerk slightly, but she bit her lip again to cut off the protest. She wasn’t allowed to protest or she would be punished again. Only if he was hurting her.