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"Yes."

He pulled the other ribbon free with his fingers. The lace fell away. His mouth went to one breast, then the other, learning, his tongue working a circle that arched my back off the mattress before I knew I was moving. He talked to me between kisses, not much, just enough to keep me on the edge of his voice. You are beautiful. You are mine. Say it again. I said it again. Each time I said it his hand tightened on my hip and his mouth went a littleslower, and the heat in me built low and steady until I could feel it behind my knees.

He undid the ribbon ties at my hips one at a time. He took the panties with his teeth, a slow drag of wine silk down my legs, the brush of his knuckles on the outside of my thigh making me twitch. He kissed the inside of my knee. Higher next, slower, deliberate, his mouth a hot patient suggestion against the crease of my hip while I tried to remember how breath worked. He hooked his shoulders between my thighs and settled in like a man who was not going anywhere, and when he finally put his mouth on me the world above the bed went small.

My hands tried to come down. They could not. The tie held. The soft burn of it sang against my pulse and I arched into him instead, into the slow patient pressure of his mouth that knew exactly what it was doing. My hips lifted. He pushed them back down with one forearm across my belly, broad and warm and immovable, and the press of him there sent another bright shock through me. His other hand stayed wrapped lightly around the silk above my head, the way you hold a leash you are not pulling on yet. He let me know he had me. He was not letting go.

I could feel the heat building low under his mouth. Tight, tighter, a knot pulling in on itself the way a string winds before it snaps. My breath went in shallow and did not come back out clean. My thighs started to shake on either side of his head and he made a low sound against me, approving, like he had been waiting for exactly that.

"Daniil."

It came out broken. I heard it break.

"I have you."

He slowed. On purpose. The build went from a hum to a shake to a long bright unraveling that started behind my belly and went all the way to the soles of my feet, and when it took me I said his name into the ceiling and my bound wrists pulled hardagainst the silk above my head and he held my hips down with his palm and did not lift his mouth until I was finished shaking. He worked me through every aftershock, gentle now, until even my toes had let go.

He came back up over me with his mouth wet and his eyes black.

"Beautiful," he said. "Again."

He undid his shirt one handed. The other hand stayed on my wrists. I watched the line of his chest come out of the cotton, the bruises along his side already going yellow at the edges, the hard plane of him, the scar on his left index knuckle catching the lamp. His belt went next, a slow drag of leather, the soft clink of the buckle, his eyes on mine the whole time. He was making me wait. I had stopped being patient halfway through the first kiss and he knew it.

When he came back down he braced over me on one forearm, looked at my face, and said, low, "Tell me."

"Please."

"Tell me what you are."

"Yours."

He pushed in.

The first slide of him took my breath. I felt the whole length of him settle into me, careful, every inch a stretch I had to give him room for, and then he was all the way in and he stopped. His forehead came to rest against mine. His eyes did not leave my face. His breath shook out across my cheek, uneven, controlled, the breath of a man holding himself on a leash for me.

"Look at me," he said, low. "Do not close your eyes."

I did not close them. I looked at him through it. He moved once, slow, just enough to drag the breath out of me, and stayed deep.

"Whose is this?" he said.

"Yours."

"Say it again."

"Yours, Daniil. Only you."

"Chloe."

"I'm here?"

He started slow. His eyes stayed on my face. One hand stayed pinned flat over my bound wrists above my head, the silk a soft band between his palm and my skin, the other under the small of my back, lifting me up into the rhythm of him. His mouth went to my throat, open, hot, finding the spot under my jaw and staying. He went slow until slow was not slow anymore. Harder, then. The bed shifted under us. I felt the hand on my back tighten, his teeth at my pulse, the build climb and climb until slow was a word I did not have anymore.

He said my name against my throat, rough, almost a warning, and pulled back enough to look at me. His pupils were blown black. The control in his jaw was a thing I could see now.

He pulled out, only long enough to turn me. He guided me up onto my hands and knees in one steady motion, bound wrists resting in front of me on the mattress, the silk pale against the dark blanket. He came up behind me. He took a second. I felt his hand smooth down the line of my back, hip to shoulder and back, like a man steadying a thing he loved before he used it the way he wanted to.

One hand settled at my hip and stayed there, fingers spread, thumb at the small of my back. The other wound careful into my hair and gathered, gentle, controlling, until my chin lifted and the line of my throat opened. He held me like that. He pushed back in and the angle hit somewhere new, somewhere deep, and I made a sound I did not know I had in me.