You smell intoxicating

Hans had one of my arms trapped at my side. He caught my opposite wrist with one hand and held it down over my head; his legs straddled my hips. I couldn't do much more than wriggle, and when I tried Hans twisted his fingers in my hair and pulled my head back. As he sat up my body was forced to arch until I was staring at the curtained window behind me and I was too taut to move at all.

My heart was pounding.

I couldn't see him, but I felt Hans lean forward. His breath caressed my neck. He kissed my throat and worked his way down, pausing to suck on my skin at the junction of my shoulder. I trembled. I wanted to collapse and I wanted to explode, but Hans didn't let me go. His breath was hot on my skin; it stroked my chest where those two buttons were undone.

I whimpered, but then Hans was kissing me again; his lips brushing my skin through the narrow vee of parted fabric at the neck of my blouse. His teeth closed in a teasing nip before he straightened again.

Hans uncurled the fingers in my hair and lowered me to the bed. He even released my wrist, but I barely noticed: I was too busy staring up at him, wide-eyed and desperate to catch my breath. He looked back at me with heavy-lidded, hungry eyes. When he spoke, there was a growl in his voice that worked very well with his accent and left me almost as terrified as it did turned on.

"Well now," he asked rhetorically -- it had to be rhetorical, because I was in no shape to reply -- "What was it you requested last night?"

I stared at him. If he really stopped and made me wait until next year for more now, I was going to... to... Hell, I would kick him out and hope I had fresh batteries in my nightstand, probably.

Hans stroked my cheek with his thumb. Then he dragged the tip of his index finger down my jaw and neck and hooked it into the vee of my blouse, where he tugged down sharply enough to pop open the button I'd left done and three more below it.

My breath caught. Oh, yeah: I had mentioned something about having my clothes torn off, hadn't I?

Hans splayed his fingers down over the expanse of my newly exposed flesh. His nostrils flared briefly and he leaned forward, holding me down with his hand on my chest while he brought his mouth to my ear. "Abigail," he whispered while kissing the lobe of my ear, "you smell intoxicating." He took a deep breath and growled -- a rumbling burr in the back of his throat. "Like coconut and vanilla and adrenaline and sex," he confided.

Oh damn: so he could tell when he was turning me on. So unfair. I think I might have started to hyperventilate, but Hans covered my mouth with his lips before I could start to. I moaned against him instead, and his hand slipped to the side, under my blouse, under my bra; cupping my breast.

I have small breasts. Hans' hand completely covered it. A flex of his fingers massaged what little flesh I have, and then his thumb brushed roughly across my nipple. My areola puckered from the stroke, and I clamped my legs together as the rest of my body responded with a spike of lust. I don't think an ansible could have gotten a faster response.

I have never -- never -- been touched like that. Groped by a drunken frat boy? Yes, once. Fondled -- under my clothes? Never.

The shock kept me from doing anything. I liked it. I liked it. I liked it! What the hell was wrong with me? I was letting someone -- a man so big there would be no stopping him if push came to rape -- fondle my flesh while pinning me to the bed, and I liked it. Was I insane? Or just depraved? Proper women don't let men do that, no matter how sexy said men may be. And they certainly don't enjoy it if it happens anyway! But here I was: moaning under Hans' kisses; letting his mouth crush me into my mattress and his hands wander freely over my breasts while my hips bucked and squirmed with a need I've never felt for anyone who wasn't a figment of my imagination getting it on with another such figment, and I was raking my fingers over Hans' back and biceps like some sort of morally depraved slut.

Which was bullshit, of course. I mean: I love Megan. And Megan loves sex. But she isn't just my best friend: she's the best person I know. So it was kind of hypocritical of me to think she was awesome while I was freaking out that I was enjoying what Hans was doing... except panic had already set in, so it was definitely too late to stop myself from hypocriticizing all over the place.

I pushed Hans away, which was completely ineffective, and gasped "Stop," which wasn't. Hans froze, took a ragged breath, and pulled back.

"Are you alright, Abigail?" he asked. "I wasn't hurting you, was I?"

I swallowed and shook my head. Even through my panic I felt a gratifying thrill at how husky his voice was -- he was breathing shallowly, too. "I'm okay," I managed to assure him. "But: New rules."

Hans chuckled and sat back. He seemed to be recovering a lot faster than I was. Seriously, the man had a very unfair advantage here. "Alright," he said. "What are these ones?"

I took a couple of deep breaths and sat up as much as I could. I had to prop myself up on my elbows -- I couldn't do better because when Hans had sat back he'd trapped my legs and all I could really do was bend at the waist, which was a little bit of a thrill and a little bit scary. Trapped, you know?

"Clothes," I said. Did I really want to disallow what had been happening? Honestly, frenzied undressing -- or, at least, partial undressing -- featured in a lot of my fantasies. It's just that the person being undressed in them was never me.

"Clothes?" Hans asked. There was a crinkle at the corner of his eyes, like he was suppressing a smile. Bastard! He was enjoying this, and I didn't know if it was that he liked being told what to do or if he was just being smugly self-satisfied that in the span of a few minutes he could push my boundaries to the point that I had to make up new ones.

"Uh," I said. "Yeah. Clothes. Um. They're there for a reason. So, skipping under is an 'ask first' thing." I was breathing a little more steadily. Making rules put me in control; being in control calmed me down... a little. I was kind of disappointed by that. The sort of un-calm that Hans provoked was pretty incredible -- up until the panicky meltdown part.

Hans nodded amicably. "And what about removing them instead?" He raised one hand and trailed it down my blouse's open vee of parted buttons. I shivered and goose bumps raced up my arms. There was that sense of un-calm again. His fingers stopped at the first button to have held against his earlier assault. He toyed with it absently while he waited on me.

My mouth felt too dry to talk, but somehow I managed. "You can always ask," I croaked. Except that I liked the rush when he took charge -- when it didn't panic me. "But if it's something I've let you take off before, you don't have to." I did better when something wasn't completely new. I figured that caveat ought to give him the room to provoke that rush and me the prior experience to prevent a freakout. Right?

Hans smiled and tapped the button he'd been toying with. "Anything else?"

I swallowed and shook my head. There was a sparkle in his eye that made me wonder if he took my restrictions as a dare. Sort of a 'I bet you can't control yourself enough to follow this one,' kind of thing. "Nope," I said. "That's all. Carry on." I don't know why I was being so brazen. The 'oh shit, paranoia!' part of me refused to let go of the fact that I would be in serious trouble if I lost that dare -- and there was that un-calm rush again.

The rush was furthered by Hans' abruptly enthusiastic grin. I squeaked in alarm.

"Wait!" I said, and Hans actually did. "On second thought, you should probably go."

Hans blinked at my abrupt one-eighty. "I should?"