No matter how special a human brain was, it was still the brain of an animal.
And once it saw a pattern, once it was conditioned to a clear, rewarding expectation, it began to crave. The neural pathways wore smooth with repetition, turning anticipation into reflex, into need. Especially when the reward was a guaranteed hit of pure, obliterating pleasure.
It was base, and brutally effective. A dog salivates at a bell just because whenever a bell sounded, it got itself a treat.
And Stevan's blood runs hot at the sight of a book cover.
Every time the announcement of a new romance edition hit the presses, a specific and humiliating tension would coil low in his gut. His body, trained to a finer point than any soldier's, would betray him with a traitorous tightness in his trousers.
Who had turned the Empire's most disciplined warden into a fucking dog?
Her.
