“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 c**k to the wet opening of her body. He pushed in slowly, savoring every inch of her pu**y 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 f**king 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?”