Her head cranes from side to side; I’m treated to the spectacle of the cords in her throat in motion, the way they draw the eye to the siren song of her neck. Where it descends to join the shoulders, where the collarbones bloom like fruits that must be tasted, licked, bitten. “For the duration of this contest, Detective, I want you to belong to me entirely or to no one at all. And when I say entirely, I mean that. In all possible ways.” My pulse rises. My imagination sparks; I tamp that down—here more than ever I cannot let my libido do the thinking.
