Hi, trying something new here. Had an idea and decided to go with it. Hope you like. I'll update every Wednesday at the least, if not every Wednesday and Friday. Don't have a beta and probably won't have one, so please bear with me, these are coming to you hot off the press.

Judging the Merits

"Don't be afraid," his velvet voice said.

My heart was racing. Probably pounding so much that he heard it as if it were screaming. Did he know I was scared?

It wasn't that my heart was screaming out of just my fear but more my . . . anticipation. Even then, anticipation brought with it a whole lot of the unknown. But wasn't that what this was, the unknown? Wasn't that why I was lured here? Why I was very willing, literally, to take a walk on the wild side and let go of everything I've ever known?

"You have no reason to be afraid."

"I'm not." It trembled, I tried to mask.

"Aren't you?" he said with a small hint of amusement.

The change in his usually cold demeanor brought my eyes up and were met with the strong muscles of his back as a black dress shirt was stretched over it, almost in some sort of tension. There was a buckle in the middle of his back in a lighter shade of black from suspenders that he wore. I'd never met anyone who ever wore suspenders before but he should never take them off. The way they tapered along his strong back and framed his chest, it was sinful. Even the way he wore his pants that cost more than a my rent molded to him like they were designed only for his glorious body.

He had one forearm resting on the edge of the floor-length window he was staring out, his forehead pressed to his fist as he stared out at the Seattle skyline at twilight. The sun was finally calling it quits and its last rays ran their fingers along every inch of his body like a long lost lover's caress. My tongue licked my lips, not subconsciously, but out of an almost unquenchable need, my breath caught in my chest as I watched the beautiful evening sun dance through his unruly hair, over his broad shoulders, down the angle of his slightly bent nose that was still perfect, across his strong neck and jaw. His pale skin practically glistened from where his shirt was rolled up on his forearm and across his cheeks. And then my heart started to kick it into high gear again. I wondered if he could see my reflection fidgeting in the window; he hadn't looked away from it since I was brought into the room by one of his many different employees. I could never keep track of all of them, not who they were but what it was that they exactly did do for him or what title they carried.

I stood shivering in the minimally furnished, wide expanse of his hard wood floor. He wasn't a man of many things, but the things he did have were priceless. Ancient rugs, antique boudoirs, gold and platinum plated fixtures . . . in wasn't ever overbearing but completely opulent nonetheless. My mind raced as I swayed a bit in the middle of the open living room of his penthouse suite that took up the top two floors of this building - also his - wondering if maybe I'd made the wrong choice.

Nervously my eyes darted around the dark room, that was only getting darker with the fleeting sun while I bit my bottom lip and combed the ends of my long brown hair through my fingers. All this built up energy just couldn't find a release . . . at least not the one I wanted, the one I needed. My breathing hadn't stopped racing since I was brought here by the limo he had pick me up. The driver didn't talk to me, even though I asked him dozens of questions. He just drove. No one said a word, not the woman who usually welcomes me into the building at the concierge desk. Not the man who rides the elevator with me whenever I visit, not even the one who opened the door to the penthouse, all except the enigma in front of me. They all knew. Maybe they weren't allowed to say anything to me, maybe they didn't know what to say to me. But either way it was obvious by the shifting stares and the strangled exhales that they knew what tongiht meant. And I wondered if it would always be like this. Would I always be left in the dark—in more ways than one?

But another part of me, the part that was shamelessly the reason I was here, wanted it to always be like this. To have some allure to this mysterious, powerful man. Whose voice alone made my thighs quiver and one look had every knot in my stomach clenching. Whose very breath on my skin had me salivating and even the ghost of his fingers over me had my whole body trembling. My heart screamed whenever he was around and everything about him drove me crazy. And I hoped it would always be like this.

"Well . . . here we are Miss Swan. What we both knew it would come to. After all, you came to me. You sought me out . . . . Have you decided?" Still his back spoke to me, and I wanted so badly to see his face. I needed to see those striking eyes that held my captive that very first time again to feel whole. To know that I was making the right decision, but he denied them to me, knowing that he couldn't be the last influence in this. I needed to make the choice . . . the pledge . . . the commitment for myself. "Are you ready?"

My eyes slammed shut; my breathing raced after my erratic heart and every cell in my body twitched. I silently prayed that in the morning I wouldn't regret this . . . if I even remembered it in the morning. But then my mind flashed with images of his "courtship" as he called it over the past three months. The countless silken touches, the heavy breathes on my cheek, and that look in his eyes. God, that look. It screamed power and lust and desire and everything that was forbidden in this world. His eyes alone were enough to melt polar ice caps, to starts fires the likes of which desert brush has never dreamed of. My thighs clenched along with my chest. I'd made my choice. If I was honest with myself, I had made my choice one night three months ago in a small boutique where those eyes had first started the fire that I knew would never be put out.

With a loud audible gulp my numb legs took one step forward. "Yes."