by Lilia Moon
He’ll be happy to kick my ass a lot harder than this pile of rocks just did.
Quint picks up on the third ring. “Hey, asshole. Why haven’t I seen you at my bar in freaking eons?”
I lie back on a stretch of warmed rock and moss and throw an arm over my eyes. “Because I’ve been busy. And because I’m a shitty friend.”
He chuckles. “Glad we’ve gotten that out of the way.”
I snort. Quint’s the head trainer, bartender, and general hard-ass at Seattle’s best kink club, but he’s not a guy for small talk. He will, however, gladly go as deep as anyone needs to go in the big conversations. Especially if there’s ass kicking involved. “I met someone.” A predicament he’ll understand. His favorite barmaid did not make his life easy when she showed up.
I hear a grunt from the other end that could mean anything. “How’s she feel about your ropes?”
That’s a more complicated question than it sounds, but I start with the easy part. “She’s the one who makes them.”
“You’re tying up Liane Granger?” Quint starts laughing. “Don’t fuck it up, or Damon will have your head.”
The owner of Fettered is the man who sent me on this damn errand, so he’ll just have to deal. “I’m trying not to fuck it up. That’s why I called.”
“Ah.” There are some clinking sounds, and then a weird thud. “You have my full attention. Shoot.”
“We did a scene.” I’m not about to tell him where. He was one of the guys in the sea kayak I dumped into Lake Union. “Hit some resistance when I asked her to let go into my ropes.”
A snort, this one definitely amused. “You and your penchant for asking.”
I’m not the same kind of Dom he is. “She needed asking. And even that pushed on her pretty hard. She likes to be steady on her feet.”
A long silence. “What are you going to do about that?”
I don’t know, but the guy who climbed up these rocks has some ideas. “Maybe a suspension scene. Take her feet way off the ground. Show her the ropes can be trusted.”
“That might be a smart move for some guys.”
I don’t like the last three words. “Why just some guys?”
“You’re not that kind of rope artist. You hardly ever do suspension scenes unless it’s a demo. So it’s the man in you who wants to push her off her feet. Why?”
I suck in a painful breath as that blow lands. “Shit, next time warn me you’re going to throw punches.”
He snorts again. “You called me. You know that’s always a possibility.”
I did, and I do. And he asked a damn good question. “I don’t know.”
“Bullshit.”
I don’t know if he can see my glare all the way from Seattle, but I try. “I don’t know what Meghan sees in you.”
He huffs out a laugh. “I don’t either. But I do know that if you’re staring that kind of situation in the eyes right now, your Dom instincts are likely fucked. Make sure the rest of you doesn’t walk your ropes into anything stupid.”
Like a suspension scene that literally tries to uproot the woman who just told me she likes her roots.
I sigh. “Right. Thanks.”
He chuckles. “No problem.” And then he’s gone, because Quint does long goodbyes about as well as he does small talk.
I roll over and tuck my phone into the small rucksack I carried up here, and pull out a bottle of water as I lever myself up to sitting. The climb and the guy who just hung up both kicked my ass. Now it’s time to take a look inside and see what’s left.
I get about halfway through the bottle of water before I’ve finished my inventory—and when I do, I scowl at my newly decluttered brain, because very little of what’s left is about Liane. It’s all about me. Me and my instincts to push and upturn and generally wreak havoc, with my ropes or without them.
Because it usually works.
Because it lets people find new ways to be who they really are.
And because I have a deep distrust of roots.
I stare out over the view of Liane’s lake and let that last one sink in. I’m the boy who left farming and grew into a man who frees myself and everyone else from the restrictions of being planted. Which is deeply ironic, because I should know better than most that restrictions aren’t always limiting.
Liane’s aren’t. Her roots run deep, and pulling them up would diminish who she is. Believing any differently is my issue, not hers—and bringing it with me into a scene almost led us badly wrong once already.
But this isn’t about a rope artist who almost screwed up.
It’s about a man who still might.
I’m good at freedom. At rapid evolution. At hell-bent change. I could easily shift the logistics of my life to stay in Crawford Bay as long as I want. That isn’t the problem, and neither are her roots. She needs a partner willing to grow some, and if I want to audition to be that guy, I need to figure out if I can embrace putting my feet in dirt and leaving them there.
I know we’re not that far in yet, but we could be, and I’m a rigger. We look at the end game before we start.
I breathe in, feel the sunshine on my shoulders, and look. I grew up on a farm. I left. I never expected to put my feet back in dirt again. I didn’t love the farm, but I didn’t hate it. Clearly, though, it still powerfully shaped my beliefs about what it means to be a feet-in-dirt person. Someone who wants the world to be small and safe and repetitive and closed.
There’s some of that in Liane, in her appreciation of the cycles here. In going out to her studio day after day to add twist to fiber. But she’s also someone who blew up a good and steady career to make art. To craft a dream. She runs a B&B at a fraction of its full potential because she wants to. She has two best friends who challenge everything I’ve ever believed about small-town people living small-town lives.
I make a face into the sun as the rest of it lays itself out, naked and raw, for me to look at.
I asked for a chance to enter her life and see it from the inside, but when I asked it, I did it on the arrogant assumption that I would change her.
I never entertained the idea that it might change me.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Liane
I give my spindle a good, sharp roll up my thigh and drop it off the edge of the chair I’m standing on. It heads toward the ground, spinning madly and adding twist to the seven strands of jute and silk I’m feeding in from my top hand.
Nobody sane uses a spindle to make rope, but it’s somehow turned into the primary way I do this. I started hand plying to make samples, because it’s not worth rigging up standard rope-making tools for three feet of output. Then I discovered it’s actually the fastest way to make twenty or thirty feet of rope too. And it’s fun. I ply off my balcony sometimes and feel like a kid with a spinning toy.
I eyeball the sample hanging from the hook by my head that I’m using as a gauge and twist some of the ply back on itself to see if I’m getting close to a match. This particular customer likes soft rope, and jute and silk both love twist enough that it’s easy to get carried away.
My studio door creaks open, and I look over, my smile a little uncertain as I spy man and kitten. Matteo came back late in the night and left a note asking for a plate of breakfast to be left out for him. Which I did, assuming he still wanted time and space to think—or he figured I needed more.
Which probably isn’t wrong. Whatever this is between us is moving at the speed of a spindle making three feet of rope, and I haven’t caught up enough to know what to do with this man of lightning and softness who has maybe wandered into my studio this morning for no other reason than to say hello.
I nod at Trouble, slung over his shoulder and purring loud enough I can hear it. “Did he bother you last night?”
Matteo chuckles. “Nope. We had a fun game of chase the shoelaces when I got back, and then he curled up against my chest and slept most of the night.”
I smile, more than a little jealous of my kitten. A w
hole lot of things aren’t clear inside me yet, but that kind of simple snuggling wants to call me in, moth to flame.
Which isn’t always a good outcome for the moth.
Matteo sets Trouble down on my bench. “He also pounced on a huckleberry this morning, so he had a bath in your kitchen sink.” He shoots me an apologetic look. “Sorry, there are probably smarter places for me to have done that.”
The snicker sneaks out before I can squelch it. I hop off my chair and set down my spindle. The giggles that are threatening don’t mix well with precarious perches and tools with pointy ends. “I’m amazed you both lived through the experience.”
He scratches in behind Trouble’s ears. “We managed. I don’t think he actually wanted to be a purple kitten.”
I have no idea how they’re still friends. “He must really like you.” My feet are moving in his direction, even if the rest of me isn’t sure that proximity is a good idea.
I freeze as he looks over at me, his eyes deeply serious. “Sometimes complicated things get pretty easy if you just go ahead and do them.”
He obviously got more thinking done last night than I did—or at least it took him some place a lot more sorted out. I suck in a deep breath. “I don’t really know what that means.”
He smiles a little and shrugs. “You need something different from me than the way I usually charge into the world. My head can make that really complicated, but it might be as simple as respecting your roots and honoring what you’ve grown from them.” His thumb brushes my shoulder, which is bare this morning, tracing my dandelion ink. “Exploring your really interesting assortment of flowers. Watering them.”
Damn. When this man looks in the mirror, he really looks. “I don’t want you to be something you aren’t.” Been there, tried that, have the scars.
He shakes his head, still brushing hit thumb over my dandelion. “You called me on some of the assumptions I walked in your door with, and I did some interesting thinking last night on why those are there. But we’ve had moments where something really amazing has gelled between us, and that’s me too. I want to see what happens if I stay true to who I am, but check some of my assumptions at the door.”
I can feel the orchid he drew on me yesterday lighting up in reply.
And the quietly fluttering panic.
He doesn’t say a word. He just tips up my chin, staring into my eyes like he can read anything he needs to there. Then he takes half a step back and holds out his arms. “Let me hold you while you think.”
I step forward, my feet casting a vote before the rest of me has a chance to file an objection. My moth wings fold up on my back, quivering.
His arms circle me lightly. Support that doesn’t try to tug me off my feet. Staking my orchid.
I close my eyes and soak in the warm stability he’s offering. I carry some assumptions with me too, and he’s already shown me just how much space there is for some of those to change. I swallow. “What am I thinking about, exactly?”
His chuckle rumbles under my ear. “About whether I get to tie you up again.”
“What?” I push away from his chest, but he has me good and thoroughly staked. My head backs away, but the rest of me stays firmly attached.
His grin looks entirely unrepentant. “It’s where I do some of my best thinking.”
I can’t help it. The snicker that tried to escape earlier leaks out now. “Is that what you call it?”
He kisses along my temple to my ear. “Yes. I do some of my best thinking naked. But I know you have work to do this morning. So I plan to keep my clothes on, but I’d like to do a tie for you to wear while you work.”
That sounds… dubious. I dodge his kisses, which seems to amuse him more than anything. “What kind of tie, mister?”
He grins at me, and nothing in his eyes looks innocent. “It’s called a karada. A rope dress.”
I answer the eyes. “And would I be naked under this dress?”
His grin finds wattage that melts parts of me that had no idea they could become liquid. “Yes.”
There are voices in my head arguing. For prudence. For safety. For getting actual work done. And one voice with no words at all. That remembers Daley’s sketch. That hears him asking for a chance to see if we can find our way to that again while leaving my feet firmly planted in my garden.
I reach for the hem of my tank top.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Matteo
I can see the caution in her eyes, the uncertainty—but the fingers heading to the bottom of her shirt are saying something else. Something full of fire and light and daring, and I am entirely blown away that she’s willing to let that out to play right now.
I do a head check and a gut one, because I meant every word I said. I left a bunch of mental clutter and some of my most cherished assumptions up on a rock last night and more outside her door this morning, which means I’m running without a lot of my usual guide wires in place. I need to have my head on straight, especially if things get flammable.
With that look in her eyes, they’re absolutely going to.
My cock is rising to the occasion, and I spare him a wry thought. I’ve been rigging for twenty years—you think he’d know by now that his turn never comes first. I reach out and skim my hands up Liane’s ribs as she peels her tank top off. She squirms, fabric over her face, and makes a noise I definitely want to hear more of. She tosses the tank top, much to Trouble’s glee. He pounces, and I leave him to it. I did my damnedest to tire him out before we came out here, and it’s a while yet before I need him asleep.
Liane’s giving me the eye—the kind that says I’m doing bad, bad things in her studio and she just might let me.
I grin. “You can say no to gratuitous touching while I tie you up if you want.” I brush my thumbs over her nipples. Consent has been given and she knows what to expect from me. I no longer need to fight fair.
She raises an eyebrow, even as she leans into my hands. “That sounds like less fun for me.”
I growl and give her nipples a good, strong tug. “Behave. You have work to do, remember?”
She makes it halfway to a glare before she realizes this is all part of the game. “I’m finishing an order for Samara. If it sucks, I’ll tell her it’s all your fault.”
That’s a very good threat. Samara would not be pleased—and she knows exactly how distracting a rope dress can be.
I reach for the button on Liane’s jeans and tug. “These too.” I keep my hands on her waist as she undoes the button and zipper, and then I follow the jeans, trailing kisses down her belly as they fall.
She catches a breath as I lean in and bury my nose in her arousal. I’d lick, too, but that would blow up today’s plans before they’ve hardly begun. I sit back on my heels, run my hands down her legs to the bunched up pants at her ankles, and smile up at eyes full of confused desire. “Step out of your jeans, sweetheart.”
She reaches for my shoulders to keep her balance, which makes me feel like a king crouching at her feet. I work her pants off. Slowly. Letting us keep balance together. Letting the slow, incidental touches say what fast, fiery ones never could.
When she’s back with both her bare feet on solid ground, I reach for the bag I brought in with me. I can tell by how much her eyes widen that she didn’t notice it until now. I stand up and set it on her bench, taking the neat coils out slowly. With this woman, the art starts early. “These are my favorite ropes. I’ve had them for three years.” That’s either going to freak her out as she figures out they’ve touched other women—or she’s going to understand the gift I’m trying to offer.
Ropes that are a part of me.
I lay them across her fingers.
Her breath catches again. “I made these.”
I smile. Gift, accepted. “Yes, you did.”
Her fingers close around the well-worked coils. “Jute and silk.”
Soft and strong. Imbued with so much of who she is.
I wrap my hands next to hers a
nd close my eyes. I came out here with intention. With purpose. To play with roots. To see what happens if I use my ropes to provide those, for her and for me. My first-ever attempt to be a feet-in-the-dirt rope artist.
If I can be that guy, if I like being that guy, I’ll know it here first.
If I can’t, I’ll damn well make sure she has everything I can give her to hold her steady while I flail.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Liane
Something is different.
He’s tied me up before, he’s had me naked before—but something in the way he’s looking at me now has an entirely different energy than anything I’ve ever felt from him. It takes me a minute to work out what it is, even though I can see it so clearly in his eyes.
Courage.
Whatever he’s about to do, it isn’t easy for him.
He nods, and then he steps around behind me, tying a simple overhand loop in the rope as he goes. His hand makes contact between my shoulder blades, pressing the knot into my skin as one rope slides over each shoulder. I watch the ends pool at my feet. Twenty feet. That’s how much rope he has. He has a longer one in this set too, and a shorter one.
And my mind needs to stop worrying about how long the rope is. I’m not its maker right now. I’m the woman he’s tying up.
He comes around in front of me and eases the two ropes together, tying a knot just under where my collarbones meet. I somehow find my words. “That’s a little creepy.”
He grins and kisses my nose as he makes another knot. “Not a noose, I promise.”
A few more efficient, neat loops of the rope and there’s a series of four or five knots running down between my breasts to my lower belly. He runs his hand down, pressing them into my skin. I watch the parallel lines and the knots, captivated by the visuals. Then he takes the rope ends between my legs and I’m not thinking about aesthetics anymore. My clit sits up and squeaks as silk and jute invade.
