Play With Me(7)

“Tell me about your bondage experience. Have you even been restrained before?” Again she blushed to the roots of her hair, and he sighed in resignation. A complete novice would never work. He should snatch the folder and hightail it out of here. Until he noticed the sheen of tears swimming in her eyes.

“Once,” she uttered.

Chase sighed. She wasn’t going to make this easy for him, and the thought of having to drag it out of her did not sound fun. “And?”

“And I don’t want to talk about it.” She tossed the pillow aside and pulled her legs underneath her chin.

Alarm bells went off for Chase. Time to say forget it and get the hell out of Dodge. “Just tell me one thing and I’ll let it go for now. Did someone hurt you?”

The air in the room grew thick and heavy in the few seconds she didn’t answer. She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and shook her head. A huge sigh of relief swept through Chase. Unfortunately stories of women being taken too far or being used badly in the name of BDSM were all too frequent in the community, and the thought of someone taking advantage of this one twisted his gut.

“I’m not looking to be rescued, Chase. I’m a big girl capable of making my own decisions. But I haven’t been with a man in over two years, and I need this. Please, give me a chance.”

Chase sat stunned at her revelation. Now he definitely wanted to know more. He had so many questions he didn’t know where to start.

She picked up the folder. “Do you want me to read this now? Are you going to insist on watching me go through every word?”

Ooh, the sass. He had just the thing for a mouth like that. Unfortunately he couldn’t go there—yet. “No.” He stood and moved toward the door. “You read through it and decide by morning. Either way, you still have a job at Altered Ego and I’ll expect you at the office at nine a.m. sharp with your cute shoes and a decision.”

Eve had stood from the couch and walked in the direction of the front door while he spoke, and now he took two strides toward her. She stepped back. “If you sign that contract, there will be no going back. Everything changes, no matter how hard you try.”





Chapter Three




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Eve leaned against the door and breathed deep. Chase’s sensual threat had gone straight to her * despite her best intentions. Hell, everything about the damned man went straight there. He personified sex with his gorgeous looks, but his voice was pure sin. She’d been horrified to find him at her door. Ever since she’d fled from the office today, she’d heard nothing but “no” over and over in her head. And the look on his face when he’d uttered it tortured her.

Now he’d come and gone, not with an apology but with an excuse for why he’d reacted the way he had. And a folder. She’d read his damned contract, but she didn’t care what the hell it said.

After two years of nothing but sickness and death, with no man in sight, she needed a boost when it came to getting her life back on track. This—she opened the folder and stared at the requirements—this would teach her once and for all if the fantasies she harbored could be more than mere figments of her imagination.

It was no accident she’d been drawn to Altered Ego when a position opened up. Fate had shone down on her. If Chase had gone a step closer to her bedroom, he would have seen a very familiar sight. Eve had ordered more than one of his black-and-white erotic prints from his Web site and had them framed and hung in her bedroom.


When she’d decided to gut her father’s apartment and start from scratch, she’d saved her bedroom for last. Chase and Murphy inspired quite a bit of the design without even knowing it. Eve wandered into her room and curled up on the big, plush bed. She glanced at the half-empty bottle of wine she’d been working her way through before she’d been interrupted. There’d be more of that later.

Exhaling a shaky breath, she laid out the folder in front of her and opened the flap. The familiar logo of Altered Ego was emblazoned across the top of the paper with the details listed below.

Her gaze skimmed to the pertinent information she sought. Words such as “insertion,” “predicament,” and “forced orgasms” leaped from the page. Panic swelled inside her, alongside the familiar sensation of fear. She tamped down those feelings and straightened her spine. They are just words typed out on white paper. Nothing to be afraid of.

She forced herself to breathe deep and exhale slowly and start at the beginning. This client wanted a long list of things to be included in the commission. Some would require clothes and some would not. All of them included her being restrained in some fashion, with an emphasis on rope bondage instead of cuffs or shackles.

The sessions would be long in order for Chase and Murphy to create the artistry the client requested, and her job would be to do more than simply lie there and go along for the ride. There were a myriad of emotions marked on the standard checklist. Eve turned the page, unwilling to linger on the details for too long. She wouldn’t be deterred.

The standard contract had far more detail, but Chase didn’t know she’d already seen one of these. One of the models had dropped one off last week, and since the envelope had not been sealed, curiosity got the better of her. Pretty much by signing this document, she gave permission to Altered Ego, and Chase and Murphy by way of ownership, to do anything they saw fit during a shoot.