The Agreement

by Lund, S. E.

  "He was flying into a small base camp where he was going to do some work with a local charity." He glanced down at his hands when he spoke, as if it still hurt. "Even though we were political opposites and didn't always see eye to eye, when he died, it was as if the ground was ripped out from under me." He glanced back up and met my eyes. "Nothing has been able to fill the hole. Nothing. I took over the helm of his foundation because I thought doing his work might heal me in some way. That's how your father and I became friends. He came to the funeral and it was like he adopted me."

  I shook my head. "I guess I just never saw my father as someone who would do that."

  "What? Act fatherly?"

  I nodded. "I mean, he's an authoritarian type – head of the family and all. But not to, you know, step in and act as a father substitute."

  "He did. I relied on him to get through it." He looked back up at me and his expression was so earnest. Seeing his raw emotion, hearing it in his voice, something in the way he said it brought out emotions that were just under the surface and I couldn't help myself. My throat choked up a bit.

  "I know what it means to lose a parent."

  He smiled softly. "Your mother died of cancer a few years ago. The year before you went to Africa. Your father told me."

  I nodded and a silence passed between us.

  "Well, that's all I have," I said a little reluctantly, suddenly wishing I had more to ask. "I guess I should go. Don't want to keep you from the OR."

  We both stood and he extended his hand. I took it and instead of shaking, he lifted my hand to his mouth, his lips soft against my knuckles.

  "People have spoken so highly of you," he said, keeping my hand in his. "So has your father. In the past few days, I've read up a bit about you, reread your articles on Mangaize. Still so impressive. I don't know who I was expecting when I thought about meeting you. Someone older. Different. I was so surprised to actually meet you."

  I pulled my hand away. "What do you mean?"

  "Your writing – it's so visceral. Insightful for someone so young." I didn't know what to say about that and glanced away, stuffing my iPhone into my bag.

  "I'm glad we could meet and talk," he said. "I'd like to interview you sometime, talk about Africa."

  "I don't really like to talk about Africa."

  "Why?"

  "It was upsetting."

  He nodded as if in understanding. "Your father told me you had problems after you came back. You were there at the height of the famine. It had to be very hard."

  Problems… I didn't say more for my throat choked up at the thought. I nodded, glancing away.

  For my Honors Degree, I wrote an investigative series on the politics of famine in West Africa. I had the opportunity to go there and volunteer, then report from the scene because of my father's connections in philanthropic and political circles. I was so ambitious back then – so certain of my own mental strength. So determined to succeed and become a foreign correspondent and please my father. In the end, it was too soon after my mother's death. I was still grieving but saw the trip as a chance to move forward.

  My project had gravitas. Because of it, I won the Honors prize for my BA in Journalism at Columbia.

  I also had a nervous breakdown.

  Five weeks surrounded by the death and chaos that was the Mangaize refugee camp in Niger was enough to change my focus from politics to popular culture. From grave to glib.

  "I'd really like to just take you out for coffee or a drink," he said. "I feel like I've known you forever from everything your father's told me about you. But I probably shouldn't."

  "Probably," I said, although I didn't know why I agreed or what he meant. I stopped and turned to face him, our eyes meeting. "Can I ask why?" My face heated, but I was curious now why he thought he shouldn't ask me out.

  He shook his head quickly. "You're The Hangin' Judge's daughter," he said, his face dark, his brow furrowed. "I'm not the kind of man Judge McDermott's daughter should get involved with."

  I frowned. "He thinks very highly of you."

  He cracked a strange grin, that didn't reach his eyes. "He doesn't really know me."

  I said nothing more. What does he mean by that?

  We walked to the door to the café, his hand very soft on the small of my back, and he opened the door for me.

  "Thank you for doing an interview," I said once again as I stepped outside into the cool air, still a bit taken back by what he said.

  He smiled, a crooked grin. "Goodbye, lovely Katherine."

  That sent a jolt of pleasant surprise through me that only added to my confusion. Then the door closed and he walked one way, while I walked the other, the image of his face, his smile, in my mind's eye as I made my way down the street to the subway.

  Before the door to my apartment was even closed, I was on the phone with Dawn, telling her about my meeting with Dave and Dr. Morgan.

  "So I think you were right about him being a bad boy," I said, remembering his words at the café.

  "Why? What did he say?"

  "He told me he wanted to ask me out on a date, but that he wasn’t the kind of man someone like me should get involved with."

  "What?"

  "I know," I said, frowning. "Strange, right? He said my father didn't really know him."

  "Holy crap," Dawn said. "That's cryptic. And ominous. Like I said, stay away from him, Kate. He's trouble."

  I spent the rest of the week interviewing other people on my father's list of philanthropic giants for my article on charity for Geist. I had to turn it in before the weekend and so I spent my spare time working on it, polishing it before I had to send it to my editor.

  I wished I could see Drake again, despite his warning for there was just something so… enticing and slightly dangerous about him. It wasn't just that he was drop-dead beautiful. It wasn't just that he was a surgeon and skilled. He was powerful. Self-assured. But there was something else.

  It was something in his bearing that made you believe he could sweep you off your feet, like one of those bare-chested heroes in the bodice-ripping romance novels my girlfriends and I consumed like candy when we were teens. His dark arched brows and deep voice made you think he was out for plunder, like a pirate searching for treasure or some rich Lord of a great estate surveying the pretty daughters of his indentured serfs for his next trifle.

  I had to admit I resorted to Big a few times in the ensuing days…

  CHAPTER THREE

  Later that week, I sat at a tiny table in the corner of the patio at a small café in the upper West Side of Manhattan. I was waiting to meet Mistress Lara to talk about meeting the Dominant she'd promised I could interview for my research project. Although late October, the weather was perfect. I didn't want to miss the chance to sit outside one last time before winter set in. There were few patrons outside despite the warm weather and so we could talk in relative privacy.

  The sunshine and the nice weather did nothing to calm the butterflies in my stomach.

  I could have chosen a safe topic for my paper – something uncomplicated and straight-forward, familiar ground for me. Like the war in the Congo or rendition to Guantanamo Bay. I could have met with someone from the military – a veteran with combat experience or a military strategist – and used them as an informant. But I'd changed focus from politics to pop-culture, no longer able to handle the darkness of my previous areas.

  Instead, I decided to write about sexual politics and the world of BDSM, which had become quite a topical subject since those books were published a few years earlier. I created a profile at FetLife.com and spent some time reviewing profiles and reading message boards, fending off a few Doms who expressed an interest in spanking me.

  One of the Dommes on the board took me under her wing, offering to help me. I set up a meeting with Mistress Lara, as she called herself, a Domme who happened to be a lawyer in real life. She contacted me after I indicated I was a student interested in learning about the lifestyle for a paper I was
writing. She was hesitant to meet with me in person, interrogating me about why I needed to be anonymous. I had to confess my identity to her, and when she heard my last name, she made the connection and agreed to meet with me.

  "Just invite me to one of your father's fundraisers," she said over the phone. "When you're a defense lawyer, it never hurts career-wise to have friends in high places, especially judges."

  While I waited for her, I read over the excerpt she sent me of a Dom's letter to his sub. She said if I wanted to read more, she'd give me the password to the website where it was posted.

  I glanced down at my iPhone and read the excerpt for the fifteenth time.

  A letter to my sub.

  You trust me completely to know what you need.

  And I do know what you need. I know what to whisper in your ear to make you need me even more. I know how to touch, where to touch, when to touch.

  I know you.

  I've known every part of you – every naked inch, inside and out.

  You can relax completely with me. You can feel everything possible with me. You can respond with total abandon with me.

  It is what I most desire.

  I can't wait to bind you with my soft leather restraints and make you cry out my name as you come, again and again. Then I will kiss you, smothering your moans with my mouth...

  When Lara walked up to my table, I tore my attention away from the email. She looked so normal compared to her profile photo on FetLife, dressed in a sober blue pinstripe suit fitting to her occupation as a defense lawyer, her blonde hair pulled back into a tight bun, makeup impeccable, her lawyer's briefcase on rollers towed behind her. I didn't know what to expect, but in my mind's eye, I pictured her wearing a mask and black leather dress with impossibly high-heeled-thigh-high leather boots.

  "Kate?"

  I put my phone away and smiled.

  "You must be Lara."

  "The very one."

  She ordered an espresso from the waitress, and then sat down. After she adjusted her suit and removed her sunglasses, she turned her focus on me.

  "You look so different from what I expected," I said, my cheeks heating.

  "We're ordinary people, Kate. Just like you." She looked me up and down. "You're a pretty little thing. Petite. Sweet looking. I love those huge green eyes. I won't have any problems finding you a proper Dom, if that's what you really want."

  "I need someone to interview," I said, my cheeks hot. "I'm not here to find a Dom for myself."

  "Of course." She smiled, her eyes narrowing. "So, tell me why you really want to write about the lifestyle, of all things." The waitress brought her espresso, and she sipped it, eyeing me over the rim. "It's quite a stretch from the article you wrote on famine in West Africa. Aren't you more of a political writer? This is sub-culture."

  I took in a deep breath and went over my rehearsed response, having expected this question. I practiced my answer in my mind all morning, wondering exactly how to phrase my reasons so she would agree to be my contact in this quasi-secret world.

  "This is topical, given the popularity of recent books and films. I made the switch from politics to popular culture after my trip to Mangaize."

  "There has to be more than that. Something personal."

  There was, but I didn't really want to admit it. It wasn't a particularly stellar moment in my personal life. I sighed and decided to be honest. If I wanted her to be, I figured I should be as well.

  "To be honest, my last real boyfriend and I parted company over his interest in kink and my fear of it. Ever since we split, I've been thinking about how I responded. It scared me, but the truth is," I said, stirring sugar into my cappuccino, "I regret my over-reaction."

  She smiled knowingly. "And now you're curious. Did you read the excerpt from the letters I sent you?"

  "Yes."

  "And?"

  I shrugged, not wanting to admit how much it aroused me. "He's a good writer."

  "That's it? Nothing else?" She leaned forward. "It didn’t make you want someone like him?"

  "Well…" I said, embarrassed that I responded so strongly to it. "It was… thought provoking."

  "I bet you can't stop thinking about him."

  My face grew hot, and it wasn't the warmth of the sun. "Yes, but because of who I am, who my father is, I can't risk doing anything that might get me in trouble. I might get away with writing an investigative piece, but to really explore it as a woman?" I shook my head. "Can't go there."

  "That's a shame," she said and eyed me from under a frown. "People like you can't ever really be satisfied without doing it for real. I read your profile on FetLife."

  "What do you mean, people like me?"

  "You're a sub."

  I frowned. "What was in my profile that made you think that?"

  "Things." She smiled. "Besides, if you weren't a sub at heart, if submission didn't appeal to at least some part of you, you wouldn't have gone beyond reading a few books, fantasizing a bit. To actually contact someone in the lifestyle?" She shook her head. "That's the next step and that means this is really you, somewhere deep inside underneath all that self-judgment. You're pretty vanilla but there were a few hints in your list of fetishes that suggest you could be a secret sub."

  I frowned at that. "Like what?"

  "Bondage, bare handed spanking, hair pulling, leather corsets, kneeling…"

  "I just put those in so I didn't appear like a poser."

  She just grinned. "Sure."

  "So you don't think I can just be interested as a student writing a paper?"

  "It must appeal to you on a human level, sexual level, or else you'd write about something else. Either you're totally against it and want to criticize it or you're totally fascinated and can't stop thinking about it. I can help you. In fact, I enjoy teaching. But here's my warning to you. I won't go along with any kind of shocking exposé," she said, making air quotes, "so if that's what you thought you'd do, forget it. I will help you understand how things work and introduce you to some people I know. No names, though. As you can imagine, we're quite…" She paused and shrugged a shoulder. "Protective of our lifestyle. Puritans and moralists would love to try to discredit us. If people found out who really frequents our dungeons and fetish parties." She grinned at that. "Even people like your father."

  "Not my father?"

  "Not that I know of, but people of his status. All kinds of men and women enjoy kink, Kate. The public has the wrong idea. Some of us just get off on a bit of bondage, a bit of power exchange. Enhanced sensual experience."

  "You mean pain. I'm not into pain."

  "The pain and pleasure responses in the brain are very similar. It's all sensation."

  "My boyfriend wanted to spank me," I said, remembering our very brief and upsetting foray into kinky sex. "He wanted to do mock rape scenes, and it was too much. I was afraid I was with some kind of serial killer in the making."

  "He sounds like he had no idea what he was doing. Don't use him as an example of what most Doms are like."

  "Since I did some reading," I said and took in a deep breath. "I can't stop thinking about this. Not S&M, but bondage and dominance. Some of the descriptions by the Dominants – the way they talk about their subs. The way the Dom spoke to his sub in the letter you sent me." I shook my head. "It did something to me and I realized that I've always had this secret fantasy..."

  "But you always denied it, right? Because it was upsetting."

  I nodded. "I'm a feminist."

  "So am I." Lara smiled quickly. "You're attracted to a strong man who wants to take control over you in the bedroom, but that conflicts with your feminist sensibilities outside of it. It's a very common fantasy, Kate. Probably one of the most common fantasies for women. It’s harmless as long as you're safe and it's all done consensually." She looked out over the street and then her gaze returned to me. "That's our motto – safe, sane, consensual. Sex is sex. Pleasure is pleasure. Don't judge yourself – I always add unless it's illegal, o
f course. No animals or children."

  I sighed. "Of course. But it's hard as a modern woman to admit that I even consider it. My mother was a big feminist. How can I want this?" I shook my head. "I'm embarrassed by it."

  "You shouldn't be. Human relations are all about power exchange, finding some kind of balance that benefits those who interact together. Sexual relations are about pleasure and sensation, but power exchange still plays a role even in sex. Some people need equality in sex. Some people love to give up power to their partner during sex, some like to hold it. Some people prefer vanilla ice cream, some like Rocky Road with chocolate, marshmallow and nuts. That's all, sweetie." She raised her eyebrows. "Nothing moral about it."

  I took another sip of my cappuccino and studied her over the rim. "You make it sound so… normal. Logical. You teach?"

  She nodded. "I teach Dominants how to do D/s and S&M, how to be safe when using toys and restraints. I can tell you about my experiences as a Domme with male subs, but if you want a male Dominant's perspective, you need a man."

  "And you have someone for me?

  She nodded. "A friend. An actual professor. He's a great teacher and totally discrete."

  "He'll have to be really trustworthy. He'll have to show complete discretion and he'll have to agree that I remain anonymous."

  "I understand. I'm meeting with him later this week. In the meantime, I have this." She reached into her huge briefcase filled with files. "It's a template I use to get subs thinking about what they want. Fill in the blanks, cross things out, as if you were really interested and get it back to me. I'll give it to him and he can think about how he'd train you if you really were his new sub, and then you can meet and discuss it."

  "He knows this is all just theoretical."

  "Of course, sweetie," she said, but there was this tone in her voice that said otherwise.

  I took the contract and flipped through it. The first paragraph said it all: