He closed his eyes.
“And fuck the negative train of thought that women would only love you because you’re a billion-dollar baby.” She kissed his ear. “Baby, I fell in love with you before I knew you had billions.”
Shocked, Ronin slowly turned around on the barstool. “What did you say?”
“I said I love you. And you were right; I’ve been holding back on telling you. I don’t know why. I fell in love with you months ago. That night I gave you the picture of me bound? I’d planned to confess all, but I chickened out. I believed I had plenty of time, and I wanted the moment to be perfect.”
“Then, the next day, you walked out after you discovered—”
She put her fingers over his lips. “That you’d withheld so much from me that I felt like I didn’t even know the man I’d fallen in love with.”
“So you fell out of love with me?”
“No. But I did hold back from telling you all this time. Not out of spite, but out of fear.” Amery pressed her lips to his in a lingering kiss. “Because loving you is a scary thing, Ronin Black.”
“Amery. I’m . . .” Speechless. Instead of trying to find the words to fit the moment, he fit his mouth to hers, pouring everything in his heart and soul into the kiss.
When they finally ended the lip-lock, Amery said, “Wow.”
He nuzzled her neck. “Say it again.”
“Wow.”
He smacked her ass. “Say it again.”
“I love you.”
“I’ll never get tired of hearing that.”
“I’m sorry you ever doubted how I feel about you, Ronin.” She tipped his head back and brushed his hair out of his eyes. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about taking the Okada job. But I promise it wasn’t because I wanted to hurt you. Or that I don’t value you or your opinion. I fucked up by not telling you. It won’t happen again. And I’d planned to come over last night and apologize before I found out about Naomi.”
“Thank you. Apology accepted.”
“Now. Don’t you have something else to say to me?”
Ronin twined a section of her hair around his finger. “I’m the luckiest man on earth because you love me.”
“Not that.” She placed her palms on his cheeks and tilted his face back. “You know it scares me that you won’t discuss what the doctor said at your follow-up appointment.”
Her fingertips brushed the tops of his ears, and he discreetly ducked his head to free himself from her touch. After years of fighting, his slightly disfigured cauliflower ears were a source of embarrassment for him and the main reason he wore his hair long—to cover them up.
“Ronin, I’m not letting this go.”
“The neurologist is being overly cautious. He insisted no contact sports and no practice with contact sports for six months. Then in the next breath he said—” He stopped. He didn’t want to tell her this.
Because you don’t want to believe it.
“Come on. Your life is an open book to me. No secrets, remember?”
Ronin couldn’t look at her. “He said that medical science was only now starting to understand the effects of repetitive brain trauma, and hopefully by the time some of those symptoms showed in me—because it was a given that they would—there’d be better drugs and medical options to treat it.”
“So you’re worried about long-term effects?”
“I wasn’t until he brought it up,” he said dryly.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I hate the thought of you walking away from me now because of how I might be in the future. Jesus, Amery, I realize how goddamn selfish that sounds.”
Amery curled her hands around his face. “Let’s focus on the short term for now, okay? Just getting you through the next six months without you stepping into the ring or sneaking into underground clubs to prove you’re the biggest badass in town, okay?”
He pressed his lips to her forehead. “Okay.”
“And if you’re worried that I’ll think you less than a man because you’re temporarily sidelined? Think again. You’ll always be more man than I can possibly handle.”
Ronin was stunned by the depth of her acceptance.
“I take it you haven’t mentioned your doctor’s suggestions to your instructors or your sister?”
“No.” A soft chuckle rumbled out. “I had this plan to continue to throw myself into Black and Blue Promotions, leave the training schedule as is, with me focusing on working with the lower-belt classes, thinking maybe no one would notice.”
“They’ll notice. Whether anyone would mention it is another matter. I won’t meddle in your business decisions, but when it comes to your health and happiness? I have a personal stake in it, and I expect full disclosure. Even if it scares you.”
Ronin wanted to turn the tables and demand full disclosure from her on whether they’d be permanently sharing living space during those six months.
“So now tell me the rest of it.”
“The rest of what?”
“What Naomi said last night. Her threats to you.”
“Psycho fucking broad wiped her red lipstick off on my shirt.”
“Shiori did see that much. She worried Naomi might’ve gotten violent with you.” Amery studied him for a beat and said, “But that isn’t what worries you—that I’ll find lipstick on your collar.”
“No. Evidently Naomi visited Twisted. She talked to the manager, and he mentioned I hadn’t done a rope demo in a while.” He watched her face carefully. “Naomi said if you weren’t willing to be my rope model at the club then she’d volunteer.”
Amery paled but rallied with, “What else did she say?”
“Baby, it’s not important.”
“Yes, it is. So tell me.”
Ronin jammed his hand through his hair. “She said your unwillingness to be publicly bound speaks of your shame and undermines my expertise. She reminded me of something I’d said to her on more than one occasion—that teachers don’t let students dictate the lessons.”
She paled further, if that were possible.
“Do you see why I didn’t want to tell you?” When he reached for her, she backed up.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t let her get inside your head either,” he said curtly. “What happens between us—”
“It sounds like what doesn’t happen between us is an issue.” Amery rounded the end of the counter and snagged her coffee cup. Then she walked to the windows at the far side of the dining room and stared out.
Was he supposed to go to her? Or leave her be?
How would you want her to act toward you in this situation?
He’d want her to give him some time to think. So he gave it to her.
Ronin had finished two cups of coffee by the time she wandered back into the kitchen. He waited for her to speak.
“Do you remember when you told me about being a rope master, you said that you are also a teacher? And part of who you are is teaching people who are interested in the art the right way to do things?”
He nodded.
“And regardless if I wanted to participate in your kinbaku or shibari demonstrations, you would be giving those demonstrations on another rope model?”
Yes—but that was before he’d fallen in love with her.
“Somehow, in the time we’ve spent together in the past few weeks, that issue hasn’t come up. Maybe I’d hoped it was out of sight, out of mind . . . but it’s never that simple. It’s also unfair to you if I refuse to be your model in a public venue.” Amery affixed her troubled gaze to his. “You know I’m fine with what we do when we’re alone together. I didn’t even blush too much when your sister made it clear she knew we wouldn’t be together if I weren’t into your ropes.”
“Did Shiori say anything else?”
“Just that you were a record holder and your mother and grandfather are aware of your rope skills.”
“But that is not common knowledge. So I figured my grandfather must’ve m
entioned my . . . proclivities to Naomi’s family.” He paused. “You know how after you figure something out, you think, Why didn’t I see the signs? Naomi had no qualms about letting me bind her with rope, right away. That should’ve been my tip-off she’d been warned about my rope master status.”
Amery cocked her head thoughtfully. “Maybe her need for . . . more of the S and M side of BDSM should’ve clued you in that she wasn’t a stranger to bondage and sex clubs and that you didn’t somehow ‘turn’ her because she’d been in the lifestyle before she met you.”
Why hadn’t he considered that?
“I never asked if you went to Twisted when we were apart. Not that I’d hold it against you, but I have to know if you did.”
“Yes. I did bind someone else at the club. In a private room, not a public demo.”
She stared into her coffee cup. “Who?”
“A model I’ve used in the past.”
“What happened afterward?”
“You know that I don’t fuck rope models, Amery.”
“Except me,” she said softly.
“That’s not the same thing. After I tie you, I fuck you because we’re alone, because you want me to, because I want to absorb your bound beauty into me, and because I love you, goddammit.”
“But that doesn’t change the fact that you’re a teacher. You want to show off your skills and demonstrate the right way to use shibari and kinbaku. How long before you’re demanding that I get on board with it?”
Then Ronin was in front of her, gripping her upper arms and hauling her against his chest. His stomach churned seeing her tears. “I’m not demanding you accept that side of me without discussing compromise.”
“The compromise would be mine. You want me to be your rope model in private and in public.”
“I want you in my life. That’s all I care about right now. Don’t cry.” He kissed the corners of her eyes. “Please.”
“You have to let me go.”
He froze. She’d told him she loved him and now she asked him to let her go? No. Fucking. Way. “Amery—”
“Ronin, you’re hurting my arms. Let me go.”
He released her and gently rubbed on the red spots.
Amery burrowed into him. “I don’t want to deny your needs because you’d resent me. Living with that would be worse than being naked and dangling by a rope in a roomful of strangers. And it seems doubly cruel to say no to you when you’re already giving up a part of yourself by not fighting for the foreseeable future. I know that practicing kinbaku is a physical need for you as much as fighting is.”
Was demonstrating his rope skill really a physical need for him?
Yes.
No.
Maybe.
Fuck.
Should he point out she’d overcome her aversion to being photographed and maybe she’d feel the same about being his rope model for demos?
Should he tell her that no matter if they were alone in his practice room or at the club in a room packed with people, all he’d ever see was her?
As much as it killed him to see her struggling, he had to let her decide her limits on her own. And he had to think about what compromises he’d make to keep her in his life.
“I just wish I had someone to talk to about this.”
“What about Molly?”
“It’d scar her. She blushed as red as your ropes when she saw the cover for Cherry’s book.”
“I thought she’d come out of her shell.”
“She has. But knowing her boss is your rope model might put her right back in it. It’s not something most people understand. I know I didn’t.”
“What about the author? She helped you come to an understanding about the lifestyle before.”
Amery regarded him. “She’s very straightforward. She’d tell me that my trepidation wasn’t wrong and I should listen to it.”
“Are you looking for someone to tell you something different from that?”
“I don’t know. I’d like to talk to someone who’s been in the situation.”
“Let me see what I can do. If I can think of anyone who can help you make an unbiased decision.”
“Thank you. Now I need to get to work.” Amery kissed him and disentangled from his arms. “Are you teaching tonight?”
“Depends. Are you working late?”
A strangely guarded look crossed her face.
“I don’t want Okada to be the elephant in the room.”
“It won’t be.”
Yeah, with Naomi running around in Denver doing god knows what and Amery’s concerns about bondage demos, her job with Okada was the least of their concerns—and wasn’t that ironic?
She bent over and picked up her purse; then she kissed his cheek. “I’ll keep in touch with you and let you know what’s going on.”
Her reaction was too dismissive for his taste. He crushed her to his chest. “Less than an hour ago, you told me for the first time that you loved me, so, baby, you don’t get to storm off without telling me that at least five more times. I’ve been waiting so damn long to hear it from you.”
He felt her smile against his chest. She opened her mouth over his heart and blew a hot breath through his shirt. “I love you, Ronin Black.”
Ronin tipped her head back to get at her mouth. He kissed her in the seductive way that turned her into putty, and he couldn’t wait to get his hands on her. “I need to be inside you.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
Amery didn’t protest until he lifted her to the back of the couch and quickly bound her arms behind her with her long leather purse strap. She broke the kiss with, “Seriously?”
“Don’t pretend you don’t like it,” he murmured against her throat as he inched her skirt up her luscious thighs and pulled her panties aside.
“I love it, so it seems silly that it always catches me off guard.” Somehow she hooked her toes underneath the waistband of his gi pants and dragged them down his legs.
“Damn, do I love that you’re so flexible.” Keeping one hand braced on her lower back, he used his other hand to align the head of his cock to the wet opening of her body. He pushed in slowly, savoring every inch of her pussy enveloping his shaft and every soft groan spilling from her lips as he filled her.
When he stayed buried in her to the root without moving, she rubbed her lips across his collarbone. “I love you. Show me how crazy it makes you when I say it over and over as you’re fucking me hard.”
And he did, secretly satisfied that by the time he finished, she’d said it a dozen times.
Not that he was counting or anything.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
AMERY was outside, securing the metal drop downs over her windows, when she heard someone call her name. She glanced over to see Shiori leaning against a black limousine. She wandered over, brushing the dust from her hands. “You’ve stopped by twice in one week. Are you bored?”
Shiori smiled. “As a matter of fact, I am. But that isn’t why I’m here. I wanted to see how things went with Ronin last night.”