else was a turn-on? Sucking your big, luscious cock. And coming with your big, luscious cock in my ass. Oh, and being spanked. I’d definitely love to do that one again. And a thousand other nasty things. The question is, am I going to try them with you or with someone else?”
Kon choked out a startled chuckle. “I assume you’re home alone right now and Mr. Right isn’t sitting there listening to all this big-luscious-cock talk?”
“Brian’s out of the picture. I called off the wedding the day after I met you.”
“You’re kidding.”
She said, “Being with you helped me realize how dishonest I was being with myself. I’d like to return the favor.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you felt something more than hormones when we were together. So did I.”
He was quiet a moment. “Listen, I told you when you left—”
“Yeah, I know what you told me. It’s bullshit,” she snapped. “I know it, and I’m hoping either you know it or you’re capable of figuring it out.”
His sigh sounded exasperated. “You said it yourself—it’s just about sex. Remember? You claimed not to be naïve.”
“It was what I thought you wanted to hear,” she admitted. “You were telling me we’d never see each other again.”
“Why does everything have to be romanticized? Okay, so I changed my mind. I do want to fuck you again. You want nasty? Glad to hear it. My big, luscious cock is yours to use and abuse. Just park the romantic shit at the door.”
“Sorry, I’ll take a pass.”
It wasn’t what he’d expected. She could hear it in the dead air. “Suit yourself,” he said, right before he broke the connection.
The phone calls stopped. Darla told herself it was for the best. How long could she have maintained a physical relationship with Kon while denying her true feelings? As much as her body craved him, she couldn’t—wouldn’t—backslide into self-delusion.
On a rainy evening a week and a half later, Darla received a package by same-day courier, a small padded envelope with no return address. She turned it over it in her hand and felt her pulse stumble. It was from him. Somehow she knew it was from him.
The envelope was too small for photographs—unless he’d transferred them to a flash drive. She shook it. Something rattled inside. She tore the envelope open and spilled the contents on her kitchen table.
A single earring. Clip style, with a hammered brass disk and strings of beads. Just seeing it brought that afternoon rushing back, all the mind-blowing details she’d tried, and failed, to exorcise from her memory. Damn him for doing this to her, the manipulative son of a bitch.
Something was clamped in the little brass jaw—a sheet of glossy paper folded into quarters. What kind of note had he written that couldn’t have been sent more easily and cheaply by email? She freed the paper and unfolded it.
And screamed. Her Chihuahua, Monster, leapt off a chair and escaped to his little doggie bed in the corner.
“That prick!”
The paper was a flyer advertising a photographic exhibit titled “D. Bound”. It was illustrated with a full-color photo of herself, nude, tied to the fake Corinthian column in Kon’s studio. The view was from above, so it had been taken when Kon stepped up on the ladder. The snug ropes around her waist dug into her soft, pale skin. Her arms were drawn tightly back. Her breasts jutted as if in offering, the tip of each adorned with a gleaming brass ornament from which dangled several strands of beads. One knee was bent, the sole of the foot pressed to the column. Her hairless slit was clearly visible, the labia moist and swollen with desire.
“No, no, no, no, no...” she groaned.
During the photo session, Darla had been oblivious to the technical and artistic decisions Kon made. Now she saw how masterfully he’d handled the composition and lighting. Her body was a sensual landscape of light and shadow, every dip and curve rendered in
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