“You don’t say a fucking word,” he tells me. He leans in, his eyes closing and he sniffs me.
 
 Is that a thing? Do men sniff women? Nobody has ever done that to me before. Yet I think it might be the hottest thing I’ve ever experienced.
 
 I add it to my list of micro tropes I have to put in my book before all thoughts of dragons and soldiers rush out of my head.
 
 “Perfect,” he mutters. His lips press to the inside of my thigh, hot and reverent. I shiver, already on the verge of breaking. Not from fear. From anticipation. From the sheer weight of his gaze on my skin. I feel every cell in my body vibrating. Waiting. Needing.
 
 He kisses my other thigh, his lips teasingly warm, then he looks up at me through hooded eyes. “Do you know what it was like, watching you fall apart every night on my screen. Knowing I couldn’t touch you?”
 
 I shake my head breathlessly.
 
 “It was torture, Francie. Pure agony. I wanted to taste you. To feel you. To make you come so much you’d be begging me to stop.”
 
 I can’t remember how to breathe.
 
 And then his tongue flicks out to taste me. Just a slow, single stroke, and I lose every coherent thought in my brain.
 
 “Oh God,” I gasp, my head falling back.
 
 “He won’t help you.” For the first time a smile flickers across his lips. Like he knows the tables have turned. The hunter is being hunted.
 
 And I’ve never wanted to be caught more in my life.
 
 “You’re already so wet for me,” he says, running a finger along my opening. Then he presses it between his lips, his tongue flicking.
 
 “Asher…” I need him. Oh god, I need him.
 
 “What did I tell you? No talking.”
 
 It’s a game. I know it. I love it. My body responds to it like it’s a dance it has always known the steps to – a timeless waltz only we can follow.
 
 His thumbs press gently into my skin, parting me wider. His mouth follows. I feel his warm breath on me, so tantalizingly close to what I need. Then he devours. Not gentle this time. Full of intent. Savoring, worshipping, fucking me. My fingers flutter down, raking through his silky hair, my nails scraping his scalp.
 
 He groans out my name and it vibrates through me in the most pleasurable of ways.
 
 I want to cry out. I want to say his name. I want to beg him. But I have to keep my lips clamped together to stop myself.No talking.Instead I let him take the lead, dragging pleasure out of me with every lash of his tongue.
 
 And then he pushes a finger inside of me and groans again.
 
 “So tight,” he mutters. “Fuck.”
 
 It’s too much. It’s not enough. I’m being undone with every touch.
 
 It’s so clear by the way he uses one hand to press down my stomach, the other to tease me into oblivion, that I’m not in control anymore. Maybe I never was.
 
 I arch against him, unable to stop the way my hips buck to meet every stroke of his tongue, every curl of his fingers. My thighs are trembling; my world is narrowing to nothing but the slick heat of his mouth and the filthy sounds he makes as he devours me like I’m his last ever meal.
 
 He pushes a second finger in, cursing at my tightness, then curls them, just slightly, but enough for the delicious pressure in my belly to uncoil. Stars start to burst behind my eyelids. I’m one tongue lash away from climaxing.
 
 And then he pulls back.
 
 I whimper, the sudden emptiness making my eyes snap open.
 
 He looks at me, his mouth wet with my slickness. “You don’t get to come until I say so,” he growls. “You gave me control. Don’t think about taking it back now.”
 
 I open my mouth, not too proud to beg, but he shakes his head, reminding me that the game is still on. I’m still not allowed to speak.
 
 And then he stands, unbuttoning his shirt, his eyes not leaving my face.