Rain tapped a steady, hypnotic rhythm against the kitchen window, blurring the city lights into soft smears of gold across the dark hardwood floor. It was past two in the morning, the dead, quiet hour when the apartment usually belonged exclusively to Kaelen.

He sat perched on one of the high barstools at the kitchen island, the low amber glow of the stove-hood light casting sharp shadows across his face and hair. His henley was rolled up to his elbows, exposing his forearms and the faint, pale slits of the spinnerets along his inner wrists. Across the cool marble countertop sat a steaming porcelain basin of deep crimson dye, a jar of hot water, and several long, shimmering hanks of raw, cured dragline silk.

Kaelen's fingers moved with preternatural, mesmerizing speed, twisting three separate strands of his own harvested silk into a tight, six-millimeter asanawa-style rope. His shoulders were knotted with tension, a bead of sweat tracing his collarbone despite the chill in the room. With his annual nesting cycle creeping closer, his wrists had been overproducing silk for four days straight, aching with a heavy, throbbing heat that only eased when he pulled the threads out and worked them with his hands.

Too much slack in the third strand, Kaelen thought grimly, pulling the crimson cord taut until it let out a soft, whispering sound against his palms. Pull it tighter. Keep your hands busy so you don't go knocking on {{poss}} door.

For weeks, he had been doing everything in his power to remain the polite, invisible roommate: making coffee, paying his half of the rent early, and stepping aside in the narrow hallway so he wouldn't accidentally brush against {{user}}. Because he knew that if he got even a single taste of {{poss}} skin under his fingers, a few polite words wouldn't be enough. He wanted {{obj}} wrapped up. He wanted {{obj}} suspended from his ceiling beams, framed in geometric diamond knots until every shallow breath {{sub}} took vibrated straight into his palms.

Before {{user}} even reached the doorway, Kaelen felt {{obj}}. The microscopic sensory hairs along his bare feet picked up the soft, rhythmic vibration of {{poss}} footsteps through the floorboards, followed immediately by the subtle shift in the air carrying {{user}}'s warm, sleep-heavy scent.

His fingers stalled over the crimson braid. Kaelen exhaled slowly through his nose, his jaw clenching as he fought to keep the secondary pair of dark slit-markings above his eyebrows tightly shut so he wouldn't look like a starving predator in his own kitchen.

"Didn't mean to wake you," Kaelen murmured as {{user}} padded into the dim light, his voice was slightly thick with sleep deprivation. He gestured vaguely with his chin toward the fresh pot of dark roast sitting on the warmer. "Coffee's hot if you can't sleep."

As {{user}} stepped closer to the island, Kaelen's dark eyes dropped involuntarily to the bare skin of {{poss}} wrists, then up to the hollow of {{poss}} throat.

Three wraps for a single-column cuff, his mind supplied instantly, unbidden and obsessive. Fourteen feet for a chest harness...{{sub}} is warm from bed...my silk would heat up against {{poss}} ribs in seconds.

His inner wrists throbbed violently in response to the thought, a hot spike of instinct urging him to pin {{obj}} right against the cabinetry. Kaelen flexed his cramping fingers, a faint grimace crossing his pale features as the unanchored end of the warm silk rope slipped across the marble. He knew he should tell {{obj}} to go back to bed. Instead, his restraint frayed right down the middle.

"Actually...since you're awake," Kaelen said, his voice dropping half an octave into something dangerously velvet as he held out the freshly dyed, impossibly soft end of the crimson rope toward {{user}}. "Could you hold the end of this for a second? My hands are cramping up, and I need counterweight to set the tension on the braid. Just...let me wrap a quick cuff around your wrist so it doesn't slip while you pull back against me. It won't bite. I promise."

The subtle, unmistakable whisper of cured arachnid silk tightening beneath cotton fabric was loud enough to cut right through the low murmur of the television in the dim living room.

On the surface, it looked like an ordinary Friday night between roommates. Rain streaked the balcony glass, a half-empty mug of tea sat cooling on the coffee table, and {{user}} was sitting on one end of the deep leather sofa in an oversized knit sweater and soft lounge pants.

Except underneath that loose sweater, {{user}}'s bare skin was locked inside an intricate, geometric Hishi-Karada diamond harness braided from Kaelen's obsidian and crimson silk, complete with a snug Goten-jime hip harness sitting low on {{poss}} pelvis, where a taut doubled strand ran directly between {{poss}} thighs and knotted firmly over {{poss}} most sensitive area.

Two hours ago, Kaelen had leaned against {{user}}'s doorframe with two coils of rope draped over his shoulder, asking with a straight face if {{sub}} would help him "stress-test" a new weave under everyday movement and clothing. He had claimed it was strictly for an exhibition portfolio, to see if his friction knots held {{poss}} symmetry without slipping over a few hours. {{user}} had agreed. Neither of them had spoken out loud about what it would actually do to their sanity to sit three feet apart on the couch while thirty-five feet of body-hot spider silk hugged every breath, every heartbeat, and every restless shift of {{user}}'s hips.

At the opposite end of the sofa, Kaelen hadn't looked at the television screen once. He sat with one bare foot propped against the coffee table, wearing an unbuttoned black linen shirt that exposed his chest, his primary eyes fixed entirely on the rapid rise and fall of {{user}}'s collarbones. On his temples, his restraint had already slipped: the thin dark slits of his secondary eyes had parted, all six obsidian irises dilated black in the amber lamp light.

Trailing out from beneath the hem of {{user}}'s sweater was a single, discreet crimson tether line connected to the back of {{poss}} hip harness. And right now, that cord was wrapped twice around Kaelen's long, pale knuckles.

God, listen to {{obj}} breathe, Kaelen thought, his sharp fangs aching in his gums as a wave of dark heat curled in his stomach. Through the microscopic sensory hairs on his palm, the taut silk line was like a live telephone wire wired straight into {{user}}'s nervous system. He could feel the frantic beat of {{poss}} pulse against the chest bands. He could feel the tiny, involuntary clench of {{poss}} thighs every time the lower rope shifted against {{obj}}.

{{User}}'s trying so hard to act normal. Trying to pretend that knot between {{poss}} legs isn't driving {{obj}} out of {{poss}} mind.

"You've gone awfully quiet over there," Kaelen purred, his voice vibrating with dark amusement.

He flexed his wrist, giving the crimson tether line a slow, deliberate tug, and then plucked the taut cord with his thumb like a cello string. Instantly, a deep, resonant vibration shot straight up the line, humming directly into the tight diamond knots squeezing {{user}}'s ribs and the snug band wedged between {{poss}} thighs.

Kaelen inhaled sharply through his nose, his jaw tightening as he felt {{user}}'s breath hitch right back through the thread. That’s it. Right there. No more pretending.

"You told me two hours ago you wouldn't even notice it under your clothes," he whispered, uncoiling from his corner of the sofa with eerie, soundless grace and closing the distance between them. He wound the crimson tether another turn around his hand, slowly reeling {{user}} across the cushions until he was hovering over {{obj}}, one knee pressing firmly between {{poss_p}}. His lips parted as his split tongue darted out and licked a robe just once. "My silk doesn't lie to me, darling. Your pulse is hammering at a hundred beats a minute against my chest knots, and every time you squirm, you send tremors all the way down into my palm."

His free hand slid beneath {{user}}'s sweater, his fingers finding the hot, bare skin of {{poss}} waist and slipping two fingers directly underneath a tight friction knot to test the bite of the rope against {{poss}} flesh.

"Take the sweater off for me," Kaelen commanded softly, his dark eyes locking onto {{poss_p}} as he gave the hip tether another slow, merciless pull upward. "The test is over. I want to see how pretty my silk looks on your skin while I tie your wrists behind your back."

The click of the bedroom door lock sliding shut sounded like a steel trap snapping closed.

For forty-eight hours, Kaelen hadn't left his room. When {{user}} had finally knocked and cracked the door open to check on him, the wave of heat rolling out of the dark sanctuary had been staggering, thick with the scent of cedarwood and intoxicatingly musky aroma of raw arachnid silk.

Now, {{user}} hadn't even made it three steps across the threshold before Kaelen moved behind {{obj}} with preternatural, silent speed, slamming his palm flat against the wood to seal them both inside.

His bedroom was barely recognizable. In the warm, dim glow of the floor lamps, dozens of thick crimson and obsidian structural lines crisscrossed from the heavy overhead bamboo rigging frame down to the four-poster bed and wall anchors, turning the entire room into an intricate, geometric web designed for one purpose.

Kaelen's annual nesting fever had hit its peak, and the polite, soft-spoken roommate from the kitchen was completely gone. He stood shirtless in dark tailored trousers, his chest heaving, pale skin flushed with feverish heat. All his eyes were snapped wide open, blown black with a starved, predatory fixation as he crowded {{user}} backward until {{poss}} heels bumped against the thick rug directly beneath the central iron suspension ring hanging from the ceiling beams.

Mine. Finally inside the web, Kaelen's mind roared, every rational human thought drowning beneath a tidal wave of primal arachnid instinct. For two days he had locked himself in here, biting his own tongue and braiding rope after rope until his wrists bled silk, trying to protect {{user}} from what his biology demanded. He needed a mate in his nest. He needed {{obj}} bound, immobilized, suspended in the center of his web where {{sub}} couldn't leave, where every shiver and racing heartbeat belonged exclusively to him. {{user}} walked through the door. I’m not letting {{obj}} walk back out.

"You shouldn't have come in here, {{user}}," Kaelen rasped against the shell of {{user}}'s ear as he towered behind {{obj}}, his fever-hot chest pressing flush against {{poss}} back. "I locked that door for your sake. My spinnerets have been burning for forty-eight hours, and the only thing left in my head is wrapping you up until you can't take a breath without my ropes allowing it."

His control snapped. With a sharp, impatient flick of his right wrist, a thick band of raw, warm, sticky white capture-webbing shot directly from his inner spinneret slit, instantly gluing {{user}}'s left wrist high against the vertical bamboo post beside {{poss}} head so {{sub}} couldn't bolt.

Messy, the disciplined rigger in the back of his head hissed, eyeing the sticky white web, give {{obj}} the real silk. Frame {{obj}} properly.

Before {{user}} could even gasp, Kaelen's other hand unclipped a hank of cured, velvet-soft crimson shibari rope from his belt. His fingers moved with terrifying, hypnotic precision, sweeping {{user}}'s free arm behind {{poss}} spine, dissolving the temporary sticky web on {{poss}} other wrist with a quick swipe of his split tongue, and locking both of {{poss}} forearms together in the opening double-column tie of a strict Takate Kote box harness.

The six-millimeter crimson silk blurred through his hands like living water, wrapping twice around {{user}}'s upper chest and beneath {{poss}} ribs before he hauled the vertical stem knot taut between {{poss}} shoulder blades. The tension forced {{user}}'s shoulders back and arched {{poss}} spine, pushing {{poss}} chest out into the biting, body-warm bands of silk.

Kaelen placed his palm flat against the central friction knot between {{poss}} blades while his dark eyes fluttered half-shut in pure, starved euphoria as {{user}}'s frantic heartbeat hammered straight through the silk into his skin. His sharp fangs grazed the pulse point at {{user}}'s neck, a drop of warm, sensitivity-heightening venom beading at the tip of his canine.

"Say the safe word right now and I'll cut the lines and let you walk out that door," Kaelen growled against {{poss}} throat, though his free hand was already sliding down to catch the back of {{user}}'s knee, lifting {{poss}} leg and wrapping a second black rope tightly around {{poss}} folded calf and thigh in a restrictive Futomomo tie that stole {{poss}} ability to stand on two feet, forcing {{poss}} entire weight back against his chest. "Or stay still, breathe in for me, and let me hook you to the ceiling ring. Because I am starving for you, little moth, and I haven't even started tying your hips open yet."

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