Prologue: PRISONER

I'm naked and spread-eagled on the bed.

My hands are anchored above my head to the heavy wooden headboard, my legs parted and vulnerable to the cool penthouse air.

And I am aching.

A deep, desperate, hollow throb is pulsing right between my thighs, so intense it makes my entire body tremble against the black Egyptian cotton sheets. My pussy clenches over nothing, slick and humming around the tiny, relentless bullet vibrator buried deep inside me.

Every nerve ending is on fire, begging for the one thing—the one man—who's currently seated on a chair, holding a sleek black remote in one hand, nursing a glass of scotch in the other, and watching me squirm like I'm his favorite show.

He is raw, masculine perfection.

Fully shirtless, his broad shoulders taper into a dangerously narrow waist, his chest and abs carved with hard, visible muscle that glistens under the low amber lights filtering through the floor-to-ceiling windows behind him.

Lower down, a pair of loose, black lounge pants ride sinfully low on his hip bones, exposing the razor-sharp V-lines of his lower abdomen—and the dark, intricate ink of a tattoo that stretches like a shadow from his lower ribs, curving all the way around his torso and up his broad back. The discipline required to have a body like that is mind-boggling.

And then there’s the contrast that drives me completely out of my mind: sitting perched on the bridge of his nose is a pair of thin, silver wire-frame glasses.

The sharp, intellectual frames are a wicked contradiction to the sheer strength of his body. They give him the look of a ruthless, calculating strategist who could cold-bloodedly strip a company of its assets in a boardroom—right before he pins you to a mattress and makes you forget your own name.

Rowan depresses his thumb on the remote, bumping the vibration up a single, agonizing notch. A muffled gasp tears from my throat as the sharp buzz sends a wave of liquid heat straight up my spine. He takes a slow, unhurried sip of his scotch, his dark eyes, magnified behind those delicate lenses, tracking every single twitch of my thighs, every frantic heave of my chest, the clamps around my nipples. My hands pull at the restraints around my wrists.

"Still fighting the ties, sweetheart?"

His deep voice is as smooth as velvet. Calm. Disciplined. Completely in control.

I stop moving. "No," I rasp. My toes curl tightly against the relentless pressure in my core.

"No?" A slow, dark smirk curves his lips. He sets the scotch glass down on the side table with a quiet clink. "Because from where I'm sitting, it looks like you're still trying to dictate the terms."

He turns up the pressure by a dial. I throw my head back and cry out as sparks dance behind my eyelids.

"Look at me, sweetheart," he orders. I force my eyes open in obedience. "Remember, you do not come until I allow it," he reminds me.

"Please, Rowan. I'm burning up," I whimper, arching my back, my hips tilting upward in an embarrassingly needy plea for relief. "T-turn it off."

He tsks and slowly rises to his feet, all six-foot-five-inches of him towering over the bed. "Still trying to dictate the terms,” he insists. “What am I going to do with you, sweetheart?"

He steps toward the bed with the deliberate, predatory grace of a man who already owns every inch of the territory.

When he climbs onto the bed, crawling over me until his broad frame traps me against the sheets, the cool air vanishes, replaced instantly by the overwhelming heat of his bare skin and the rich scent of cedarwood and mint. The soft fabric of his low-slung pants rides against the bare skin of my inner thighs, teasingly close to where I'm dripping for him.

His calloused hand moves up my ribcage, slow and heavy, his fingers brush teasingly against my clamped nipples before his long fingers wrap firmly around my throat. He exerts enough pressure to make me feel lightheaded.

"You have no idea what you stepped into, Joanna," he rumbles, leaning down until his lips brush the hypersensitive shell of my ear. The cool metallic rim of his wire-frame glasses brushes my cheekbone, sending a violent shiver straight down my spine. "You think this is just a quick thrill. But it's going to be so much fun turning you into my obedient sub... stripping away every last bit of control you think you have until you're begging me for rules."

A sharp gasp escapes my throat, my pulse hammering wildly against his palm at the dark promise in his voice.

"Starting with how you address me in this bed," he adds smoothly, his thumb tracing the swollen line of my lower lip. "You don't call me Rowan when you're tied to my headboard. Is that clear?”

“Y-yes…,” I whisper.

He stares down at me, his whiskey eyes sparkling with challenge and dark amusement. Then I hear another click of the controller. The vibration between my legs kicks up another notch.

Rowan lets out a low, dark chuckle that vibrates right through my chest as I let out a broken moan. My vision becomes hazy and hooded.

I bite my lower lip, steeling myself against the orgasm that’s threatening to rip through me.

His fingers tighten around my jaw, tilting my head back to force my eyes to lock onto his behind those sharp lenses.

"Look at me," he commands softly, the absolute authority in his voice leaving zero room for resistance. "No hiding. No second-guessing. No coming until I tell you to. Tonight, your mind belongs to you, but this sweet, aching body is my prisoner."

His dark gaze burns into mine with a promise of complete, breathtaking surrender.

"Tell me who owns you tonight, sweetheart. And say it properly."

"Y-you do," I pant, my heart racing a mile a minute. "You do... Sir."

"Good girl," he purrs against my lips, just before his mouth slams onto mine.