POV: Kesley

The silk against my eyes was cool and absolute. I couldn't see him, but I could feel him, the particular weight of his presence in the room, the way the air seemed to rearrange itself around his body. The carpet fibres pressed into my knees. My own heartbeat was so loud I was certain he could hear it.

"Don't move," he'd said.

I didn't.

The seconds stretched. Five of them. Ten. Long enough that the anticipation became a physical thing, a warmth spreading downward from my chest, settling between my thighs where the lace was already growing damp.

Then his footsteps. Not approaching me. Moving away. The closet...