When her eyes finally dragged their way back up to meet mine, she didn’t smile. She just locked onto me, holding the stare like a dare. A silent challenge. One I already knew I was going to take.

She stayed plastered to my side, one hand roaming down my stomach, tracing the edge of my shorts, daring me. Teasing me. I was hard as a steel beam again, and she couldn’t keep her eyes or hands, off me.

Her hand brushed against mine under the water. Maybe it was the current. Maybe not. I let mine stay there. Then, slowly, her fingers slid over mine and kept going. I glanced at her, and she was sipping her drink like nothing was happening — except her eyes were locked on mine again, hungry now. Wild.

She’d played the part in both dominant and vanilla relationships over the years, but nothing had ever really hit that deep place in her. That place where control becomes comfort. Where the right touch, in the wrong place, from someone who understands what you crave before you even say it... lingers.

The trail wound up and behind the edge of the beach, where the sand gave way to dry scrub and stone. Birds in the trees. The ocean still visible, but quieter now. She kept walking, that loose wrap barely clinging to her, letting the breeze lift it just enough for me to glimpse the curve of her thighs. The cut of her bikini. The sway of her hips with every step.