“I won’t tell. I’ll never tell.”

“It’s better he and I...we should be friends only. It hurts him but it would hurt worse to tell him I love him and still keep myself from him. At least this way perhaps he’ll feel free to find another.”

And then Søren had thanked her. She didn’t even know what to say to that other than, “What for?”

“For not being angry that I love someone else.”

She could only stare at him a moment, utterly baffled.

“Of course you love Kingsley. Who wouldn’t?”

After all, she loved him, too, in a different sort of way. Especially after tonight she loved him. He and Søren had given her pleasures she’d never even dreamed of. She felt a deep kinship with Kingsley, like they were the same person or at least had the same nature. She couldn’t quite understand, didn’t have the words for it, but someday she would know.

* * *

“And what is it? What secret nature did you two share?” Marie-Laure asked.

“We’re switches. There aren’t that many of us around. Others don’t trust us, don’t get us. Only we get us.”

“A switch?” Marie-Laure pressed her face closer to the glass of the window. “I thought he was of the Dominant persuasion, to use the terminology of your world.”

“He is, definitely. Most of the time he is a Dom. But that’s not all he is. He’s a Dominant and a submissive, a sadist and a masochist. You can be all of the above. It’s rare but it exists, especially in those of us who have incredibly strong libidos. We want it all and we want it all the time.”

“Sluts, in other words,” Marie-Laure taunted.

“And proud of it,” Nora said entirely without shame or remorse. “You see, Kingsley loves topping, loves inflicting pain. But every now and then, when he gets the itch to be on the receiving end, you simply cannot hurt him enough. If I had tied him to the floor and kicked him with steel-toed boots, he wouldn’t have tried to stop me. I did more damage to Kingsley in one night than Søren would do to me in a month. Thank God Kingsley doesn’t get into that mood very often. The kind of pain he likes, it takes weeks to recover from. Søren loved Kingsley...loves Kingsley,” she corrected. There was no past tense with Søren. When he loved, what he loved, who he loved, he loved eternally. “Sometimes the only way to show someone you love them is to let them go. It’s hard, though. It’s so fucking hard.”

Nora closed her eyes as Wesley’s face came back to her, the vision of him the day she went back to Søren. Kicking Wes out of her house was worse than any pain Søren had ever inflicted on her, any pain she’d ever inflicted upon herself. She wished Wes knew the same.

“So you saw your lover with another...and it didn’t infuriate you?”

“No,” Nora said simply. “Why would it bother me? It didn’t bother him to see me with Kingsley. It was sexy.”

“It’s perverse.”

“Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it.”

Marie-Laure narrowed her eyes at Nora and studied her as if an alien sat tied at the end of her bed. Nora stared back, unflinching, unashamed.

“You sit there and you tell me that my husband ordered you to have sex with another man...and after you do, you find out he’s fucking him, too. They used you for their perverse pleasures, beating you and passing you between them like a whore...and you defend them?”

“No, I don’t defend them. I fucked them, and I enjoyed it.”

“They fucked you.”

“Semantics.”

Nora felt one of the ropes snap behind her wrist. Her heart punched the insides of her ribs. She had to stay calm. Now might finally be her chance. She had no plan, none at all. If she could knock Marie-Laure unconscious, she might be able to get out the window. Surely not every window in the house had been nailed shut.

“Marie-Laure, sweetheart, kitten, come here. I’m going to tell you another story. And I want you to look me in the eyes while I tell it so you know I’m telling you the truth.”

“Oh, good. I do love your stories. Sounds as if I should be grateful that my husband didn’t want me. Otherwise, I might have been subjected to your fate.”

“Oh, yes, poor little me. Had to have sex with the two most beautiful men on the planet in the same night. It was torture by orgasm. All, I don’t know, five or six of them.”

“You were how old when you met my husband?”

“Fifteen.”

“No wonder you turned out like this. And my brother.”

“You know Søren’s not a vampire, right? He’s a sadist. You don’t turn kinky just because he bites you.”

“You make a joke of everything.”

“Only the shit that’s funny. And you thinking Søren made me kinky? Now that’s funny.”

“You deny it?”

Marie-Laure left her post at the window and walked over to stand next to Nora. Nora kept her wrists tight together and prayed Marie-Laure wouldn’t notice the cut ropes or the razor blade she clutched in the palm of her hand.

“I do, actually. Here’s the thing, and pay attention. I’ll say this slowly so you can understand every word.”

Marie-Laure stood by Nora, her arms crossing and her face a mask of pure condescension.

“Søren,” Nora began, “is a sadist and a Dominant and that’s it. That’s all. He’s not into pony-play or age-play. He doesn’t cross-dress or want foot worship and he doesn’t feel any need to make me iron his shirts while wearing nothing but an apron and high heels. He doesn’t fetishize hair or feet or shoes or balloons or bestiality or anything other than pain. He doesn’t want to play doctor. He doesn’t want me to be his puppy on a leash. He doesn’t want a harem. He doesn’t want a man in a gimp suit following him around on his hands and knees. His desires are pure and simple. He wants to inflict pain on a submissive partner who enjoys accepting that pain. His needs are few and pure. But me...”

“You what?”

“Three years before I met Søren, I started burning myself with my curling iron. I would thread needles though my skin for fun. After I left Søren and became a Dominatrix, I started playing with Kingsley. Off the clock and without getting paid, I played. And I played hard. I had a whole stable of pony-boys, I did medical play with the sexiest little girl sub you’ve ever dreamed of, I adored having my feet worshipped. I did every kind of edge-play you can name and then I even invented a few of my own. I had a harem, I had orgies. I did the sort of shit Søren never even dreamed of. I fantasized about kink before I met him. I still did it after I left him. I did with him, without him, by land and by sea and by air. I did it every chance I got and with everyone I could. I did it for money, for pleasure, for pain and for the pain of pleasure. He does kink because he has to. I do it because I want to. And every time I did it I did it for me. You think Søren turned me into this?”

Nora shot her hand out as fast as a striking cobra and grabbed Marie-Laure by the neck.

“Bitch, please—I’m kinkier than he is.”

She dug her fingers in hard and deep and pushed the woman onto the floor. In the struggle to take Marie-Laure down, the razor blade was knocked away. Didn’t matter. She could kill her with her bare hands. Nora held Marie-Laure down by the throat, squeezing as tight as she could. She’d be unconscious in seconds. Nora couldn’t—wouldn’t—let go...all the while praying that neither of the boys had heard them hitting the carpet.

Marie-Laure’s face turned red and her squirming quieted.

“Kingsley’s file...” Marie-Laure managed to croak the words out.

“What about it?” Nora demanded in a harsh whisper.

“He said don’t underestimate you.”

“Good advice.”

“We took it.”

The world went black.

26

THE KING

Kingsley parked the car far from the house and walked silently through the woods, moving in a different direction than he’d gone before. They had come this way, Marie-Laure and whatever crew she’d brought with her. He saw the troubled earth beneath his feet, the footprints in the marshy soil. She would have two men with her at least. Maybe three. Not much more. She’d need to pack light and take as few risks as possible. The more people involved, the more danger of one fucking something up or turning on her. Less was more in certain operations. Back in his days working for the government, when he was sent on a mission alone, he knew that was when the stakes were the highest. And they couldn’t get any higher than this.

So he went alone.

Upon reaching the edge of the woods he paused. He’d have to cross an acre of open lawn to get to the house. Best to stay back and avoid detection. He waited for a wind to come through. When it did and the trees rustled, he slung his rifle across his back, climbed a tree and perched on a heavy branch. With binoculars he surveyed the house. One window and one window alone was illuminated from within—a bedroom on the second floor. Marie-Laure could have been a world-class sadist herself. She certainly had the mindfuck mastered. She taunted them by giving a hint to her location and yet demanded they not come unless they wanted to die.

No one seemed to be outside. He surveyed every inch of ground and saw no one on patrol. They were inside, all of them. Though God only knew where in that massive house. Nora had been the target, the one taken. Wherever Nora was, that’s where Marie-Laure would be. There would be a guard inside the room most likely, but there was no way he could get a shot off from here. Not unless they all conveniently showed up in one room and decided to stand at the window. He had to go in.

The wind rustled again and Kingsley dropped back to the ground. On the darkest edge of the woods, he took a deep breath, and jogged across the open field to the house. He didn’t sprint—too dangerous. He had to at least go slow enough to see where he stepped. He reached the house and pressed his back to the outer wall under the west side where he could remain hidden even from moonlight. Had this been his mission, Kingsley would have contracted a thief to disable all the alarms, the motion-sensor lights. Seems he and Marie-Laure thought alike.

Now at the house, Kingsley remembered Søren’s instructions.

There’s a window by the servants’ entrance. It will probably be the safest way in. Once through the window you’ll be in a butler’s pantry that no one uses anymore. The entrance to the servants’ hallway is outside the pantry. It runs behind the bedrooms on the second floor. There aren’t entrances into every room but most of them. At the very least you should be able to hear them, hear where they’re hiding her.

Kingsley had asked him if he was sure. A servants’ hallway could be the miracle they needed. If he could even hear into the rooms without them knowing he was there, he’d have the advantage.

I’m certain. The servants never used the halls. But Elizabeth and I did. We hid in those hallways when the servants were about.

Kingsley had left his rifle in the woods. It would be useless at close quarters. He’d strapped several handguns to himself when he’d left the car. He prayed he wouldn’t have to use them. The first shot fired would kill one of them. The second shot fired would kill Nora.

Kingsley used a corner of his shirt and brute force to break the lock on the window. Without hesitating or pausing to look around, Kingsley dropped into the butler’s pantry. The stairway was not much wider than the span of his shoulders and the hall only wide enough for one adult at a time. One adult or two children.

Kingsley pulled a penlight from his pocket and flashed it at his feet. He didn’t need to see, only to hear, but if there were rats in the hall, he wanted to be prepared. One stray sound could mean the death of him and Nora both.