“You want this, Casey? You really want this? No feelings, no strings, just lessons?”

“Yes. There’s no reason this won’t work perfectly. I mean, except for the fact that it’s one-sided. I’d be getting a lot more out of it than you would. What can I do for you?” she asked, so damn earnest and cute.

He laughed once more. “Trust me. I’ll be getting plenty out of it.”

Namely, he’d be getting her out of his system, and once he did it would be even easier to be around her. Maybe he wouldn’t be in a state of constant arousal every time they went to the movies or dinner.

“Are you sure?”

“Casey. You’re going to need to stop questioning me,” he said in a commanding tone. “That’s your first lesson. The next one starts now.”

4

New Orleans, evening . . .

He threw the napkin on the table and reached for her hand. Her expression was one of complete surprise. “Dance with me.”

Her lips quirked up and she seemed to understand what he’d done. Given her an order. She nodded demurely and he led her to a small sliver of a dance floor, near where the woman with the microphone was singing a Billie Holiday number. He pulled Casey in close. She tensed briefly, as if unsure where to rest her hands, whether on his shoulders or waist. He planted them firmly on his shoulders, and wrapped his arms around her sexy, slim waist that fit perfectly in his hands.

“Just relax and let me lead,” he said, whispering in her ear, a waft of her tropical scent drifting by his nostrils. She shivered briefly against him, and that nearly did him in. He stayed strong, swaying gently, guiding her in slow, sensuous moves. “I’ll show you how to let go, but you have to trust me. And that’s where it starts. With trust. I’m not a Dom, you’re not my Sub—we’re not going to join a BDSM club, or sign a contract. But I can show you how good it will feel when you give up control.”

She breathed in sharply, as if acclimating to new air on a distant planet. “Why do men like a woman to give up control? What is it about the lack of control that men like so much?”

“It’s not that they like a lack of control. But a man wants a woman who gives herself to him. He wants a woman to melt into his arms, to get aroused from a kiss on the back of her neck,” he said, and traced a fingertip gently under her hair, watching her reaction as she drew in a breath. “It’s the hand on her arm.” He trailed his fingers down her bare skin to her elbow as he leaned in to whisper, “Or warm breath near her ear.” She gasped, and he kept going. “He wants a woman who’s so turned on, she’ll nearly beg for it. He wants her abandon. He wants to be the only one to make her feel that way.”