My mind goes still, my ears filling with an electric hum. The men take my extended arms and guide me face-first to the wood. Their touch is brisk and impersonal as my wrists and ankles are secured in cuffs. When their task is done, they, too, melt away. I shift, getting used to the position, and glimpse expressive faces above me—encouragement, apprehension, excitement, arousal… But none of it matters. None of them matter.
My cheek against the main support beam, I close my eyes and wait. I don’t know how much time passes before I hear his name—first in whispers, then shouts.
“Cross.”
“Master Dominic.”
My eyes shut, I still sense when he steps into the Epicenter. A hush moves over the crowd—a response to his reaction on seeing me? My question is answered a second later as a warm, bare hand floats up my spine and grips the back of my neck.
“Bad, bad kitten,” he whispers against my ear.
“I’m sorry, sir.”
His grip firms, fingers massaging the tense muscles in my neck. “I won’t go easy on you.”
I squirm in readiness, in fear, in anticipation. “I don’t want you to, sir.”
His chuckle is dark and sultry. “So be it.” He moves away, cool air rushing over my body and making me shiver. “Tonight, I’ll be demonstrating cold caning.”
There’s an uptick of surprise from the crowd. Gooseflesh ripples down my body as the words sink in. Cold caning. Caning without a warmup.
Oh, fuck me.
“The most important thing to remember when caning is the necessity of a pause-period after a strike.”
An ominous whistling of air is my only warning before the slender, rattan cane lands on my ass. I jerk against the cross, yelping from the immediate, brutal sting. Just when the pain begins to fade, when my heart begins to slow, the second wave of sensation hits—an intense burn radiating from the offended spot. I groan, twisting fruitlessly in effort to escape it.
“…seconds to a minute, so your sub can experience each strike fully. Cold caning should never be done lightly—as it’s extremely painful—and never on an inexperienced sub. But this little kitten knows what a cane feels like, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” I gasp.
“Are you thankful?”
“Yes. Thank you, sir.”
“Do you want another?”
Overriding every instinct, I say, “Yes, please, sir.”
Over the roar of the crowd, I still hear the whistle of air.
Again.
And again.
Waves of pain hit, one after the other, until endorphins finally flood my system. My mind hovers, quiet and peaceful, even as my body sobs, thrashes, and screams. There’s no pleasure, no space for it at all in his beautiful cruelty. But that in itself is a type of pleasure. At least for me.
“Three more,” he promises, strain in his voice.
“Yes,” I whimper. “Again, sir.”
Again.
And again.
33
Charlie and Dominic are yelling at each other, a pointless volley of accusations and insults flying over my head. I’m still naked—which is surprisingly easy when you’re in excruciating pain—and lying face down on the couch in the loft. Nate’s beside me, stroking my hair and distracting me from the fire that’s taken residence on the back half of my body.
“I’ve never been so disrespected!”
“Well, you’ve never been this stupid before!”
“I almost lost it, Charlie! I could have really hurt her, and it would have been your fault.”
“Bullshit. Not in a million years would you have hurt her.”
I almost laugh, but it’s not funny. I’m in pain, yes, but Charlie’s right—I’m not hurt. The blows were perfect. No broken skin, which is a miracle in and of itself. Just a world of discomfort on my ass, thighs, and shoulders.
Charlie continues, “Stop second-guessing your instincts. Stop trying to be someone you’re not!”
“Watch yourself, Rhodes.”
“You watch yourself, you arrogant shit. If Liam won’t give it to you straight, then it’s up to me. That woman lying there dropped out of the fucking sky and straight into your lap. She’s everything you want and need, but you threw her away!”
“Because she lied to me!” he roars.
I flinch at the raw feeling in his voice, glad for the cool washcloth over my eyes so I don’t have to see firsthand how angry he is. Nate’s hand stills, then resumes.
Charlie’s voice lowers, becomes almost gentle. “It’s not the same, Dominic. Can’t you see that? London isn’t using you, manipulating you—”
“Oh, really? What do you think tonight—”
“Just shut up and listen! We both know she would’ve never blindsided you like that if I hadn’t orchestrated it. Yes, London has some shit in her past that she doesn’t talk about. But so do you. So does Nathan. It took him two years to tell us what happened to him. And last time I checked, I still don’t know what made you leave the Navy!”
Do you want me to tell you about my last mission? How many people died on my watch? See the scar where I almost lost my leg and my life?
I twitch, feeling like the worst kind of voyeur. Give me pain any day of the week, but witnessing someone else’s? No way. Especially when the pain is wrapped up with almost-intimacy. Would he have told me? Given me a truth he hasn’t even shared with Charlie? I don’t want to know the answer—it scares the hell out of me, how much I want it to be yes.
The wall around my heart shivers. Inside me, the shadow-me looks up, waiting. Hoping for a ray of sunlight in the dark. Tears burn in my eyes. I’m so tired. So fucking tired of being alone. Of not trusting anyone. Of the nightmares, the duplicity. The daily pretenses I maintain.
“…do this again, Charlie. I really can’t. Ashley—”
“Is a dirty twat who almost landed you in a looney bin!”
“Enough!”
Charlie growls—literally growls. Her heels pound away from the couch toward the kitchen. Leather creaks as Nate leans down, his breath tickling my ear.
“Hey, you’re shaking. Are you laughing or crying right now?”
A muffled sob escapes with the lie, “I’m okay.”
“No, you’re not,” says Dominic, voice reedy with exhaustion.
“She’s dropping hard,” murmurs Nate.
“Give her what she needs,” snaps Charlie from across the room.
I barely hear the words, the dissolution of my reality all-consuming. Dominic’s voice hums beneath my misery, then two sets of hands lift me gently to my feet. Like a flower seeking sunlight, I melt into the warmth and scent of my Dom. One arm braces me mid-back, the other arm sweeping me up from beneath the knees.
I whimper with relief, then in pain as he walks toward the bedroom.
“Hush. I’m here.”
“Dominic.” His name is thick and slurred. “I’ll tell you. Everything. Please, don’t go.”
His arms briefly tighten. “I won’t.”
As I slip deeper into the void-like space in my mind, I hope against hope that he means it.
I was ambitious. Too ambitious, according to some. Borderline reckless in my pursuit of a story. But with each new exposé, my reputation grew, and reputations required maintenance. More—they demanded better. Bigger. My editors had come to expect it. My readers wanted it. There were even whispers in some circles of a Pulitzer on my horizon, and I believed with near-fanaticism this would be the one to catapult me into the realm of journalistic greats.
The interviews with the young women weren’t enough on their own. Despite the atrocities they recounted for me, despite the revulsion I felt listening to them, my logical mind knew I needed more. More than the word of three drug-addicted Russian teens who talked about famous, rich men paying for them, about escaping from labor-camp conditions only to be forced into prostitution just to eat.
I needed a connection. A name. And now I had it, via a photograph of a highly recognizable man leadi
ng a barely-legal young woman into the back of a limousine. The same young women who, one week ago, showed up in the morgue with an execution-style gunshot wound in her forehead. The man was Jeffrey Donalds. Supreme Court Justice. Willing participant and benefactor of an international, illegal sex trafficking ring operated by the Russian mob in New York.
Bingo.
I immediately sent the photograph to a tech who could tell me if it had been doctored in any way, then printed it and sent an additional copy to my personal email. Electrified at the possibility of renown, I ignored the voice in the back of my head warning me about risks. Stepping on the toes of law enforcement. Jeopardizing undercover work, Federal investigations… But I shut that voice up with rationalizations.
I was exposing one man—a criminal who didn’t deserve to sit on a bench of public office. Sure, the mob would be indicated, but really, who’d be shocked? Not them, certainly. Though I would be pointing a finger in their direction, I had no hard evidence of their involvement. And they knew it.
My recent interview with Ivan Reznikov, the suspected head of the Russian mob, had been both terrifying and exhilarating. He’d been amused by me, laughing often as we shared drinks and ceviche. A robust bear of a man in his fifties, he made no fewer than ten passes at me over the course of our time together. So I used it. Flirted and smiled. And Reznikov enjoyed the game, though he was too slick to take any of my bait. A master of evasion, he offered only the barest hints of culpability, and nothing that could be used against him in a trial.
Jeffrey Donalds’s life would go down in flames, and my praises would be sung far and wide.
34
In the warm sunlight, the truth is starker. Everything is brighter, harsher. The glimmer on the water, the coarse sand beneath my bare feet. The shrieking of children nearby and the crash of waves. Even though my ass is still tender, I’m glad to be sitting. The story is pummeling me as it comes up and out. I’m weak. Lightheaded.
The man beside me stares at the water. I can’t see his eyes, hidden beneath a tattered baseball hat and sunglasses. But he’s listening. I notice small signals—twitching of fingers, compressing of lips.
After a fitful few hours of sleep, I woke this morning to coffee and an offer to help me dress. I barely had time to process the fact he’d kept my remaining “aftercare” clothing before Dominic grabbed his car keys. Wearing drawstring pants, a T-shirt sans bra, an oversized cardigan, and flip-flops, I followed him numbly downstairs and into the crisp morning. I figured this was it—he was taking me home, he didn’t want to hear the truth, didn’t want to deal with my crazy. I couldn’t blame him.
But instead, he drove us to the beach in Venice. A cloudy morning, the white sands were vacant except for several clusters of homeless and black dots of surfers in the water. Over the last hour, as I’ve haltingly started my tale, the clouds have burned off. The sun now beats warmly down. Vagrants have been replaced by families toting umbrellas and coolers, and pairs of young women in skimpy bikinis.
Covering my eyes from the glare off the water, I watch a toddler dodging small waves on the shoreline. Nearby, his mother takes pictures.
With a deep breath, I continue my story. “I was unbelievably stupid to think Reznikov wouldn’t care. That he’d even enjoy the bad press. Get a laugh out of it. I was living in a fantasy land. Those women…” I falter, clearing my throat. “Those women trusted me. They gave me their truths, and I got them killed.”
Dominic stirs, head turning toward me. “How?”
“Reznikov found them,” I whisper brokenly. “It was the night before the story broke. Someone must have leaked the article, I don’t know… Three hookers winding up dead is rarely newsworthy, except I was still getting alerts. Same MO as the first victim. I went to the morgue to see for myself. It was them. They were executed for speaking to me about the trafficking ring.”
Instead of offering empty platitudes, Dominic nods. “Sounds likely. What did you do?”
Another layer inside me crumbles, revealing deeper, darker shame. “I went home and told Paul everything. He didn’t even know about the article. I’d kept it secret because…” My vision blurs with tears.
Memories of that night are jagged, malformed with emotion. Fear, anger, betrayal. I’d never seen Paul so infuriated, so violent. He’d thrown a chair across the room. So much yelling and name-calling. Panic and darkness. I’d begged for him to help me make it right. He’d threatened to have me arrested.
“Because…?” prompts Dominic.
I swallow hard. “My first lead on the story came from a phone call between him and his superior. He didn’t know I was listening. I heard a few Russian names and started there.”
He’s silent for long moments, then, “You used intel from a private conversation between Homeland Security agents to launch your own investigation?”
“Yes,” I whisper.
He whistles softly. “I would have been pissed, too. So Homeland Security was going after the trafficking ring, and you, what, thought you could singlehandedly bring them down first?”
“No. I don’t know. I tried to resist the pull of the story. I swear I did. First it was a few calls, then a few more. A name here, a name there. I didn’t know that anything would come of it, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. I knew it was wrong, that I should tell Paul, but I… I couldn’t. I was a stupid, naïve, selfish woman whose pursuit of fame killed four people.”
And my beloved dog.
Dominic’s silence lasts so long I’m certain his next words will be a goodbye. I tell myself I’m ready for it. That I’ll be okay, even though there’s nothing further from the truth.
“I made a call that killed six men.” His voice is soft, hoarse. “We had orders to retrieve an informant who’d been compromised. The intel was good—we knew where he was being held in the compound, how many insurgents were there. It should have been cut and dry. But I heard kids. Crying.”
Dominic grips the bill of his baseball hat, bending it, his knuckles white. “I sent three men to find our guy, and the rest of us started sweeping the place for those kids. We didn’t have much time. The drone was in the fucking air, and that compound was going down whether or not we were still in it.”
My heart pounds, chills racing down my arms. “Did you find them?”
“No. It was a trap—a recording attached to a remote bomb. In the seconds before it went off, we learned the informant was already dead. Two of my men were caught in the blast. Through the coms we could hear the other team take fire. It was a massacre. Total chaos.”
His breathing is heavy, shoulders tense. Without thinking, I clutch his fist, half-buried in the sand. He jerks, then slowly relaxes.
“If we’d stayed together, we could have made it.”
His voice has the familiar, bitter flavor of guilt. I don’t say anything. Not because there aren’t a thousand words, but because he wouldn’t appreciate them. Just like he knew I wouldn’t.
“You made it,” I say softly. “And that’s what hurts the most, doesn’t it?”
He glances at me, offering a short nod. “I was carrying a wounded teammate, fighting assholes in every corridor and trying to get out of that sandstone maze. I got stabbed in the groin. It was just a kid. No older than eleven or twelve. He came after me again and I knocked him out, then fell on my ass. Only then did I realize the man I was carrying was dead. I tied off my leg as best as I could and crawled the rest of the way out. Dragged myself up a hill and tried to get the drop called off, told command there were men inside. But it was too late. I watched the bombs drop from the sky. Heard the last communication line with my men die. Heard their final shouts.”
A sudden gust brings a hint of sea spray to us. I draw the fresh air into my lungs, feel the expansion, the beat of my heart. Proof of life. Never has it felt more real or heavy.
“I’m sorry that happened to you,” I tell him.
He pulls off his sunglasses, revealing tired eyes. “When I was told the higher-ups wanted
to give me an award for valor, I left the Navy. I couldn’t do it anymore. Couldn’t stop thinking about that kid stabbing me, how he truly believed I was the enemy. After taking some time off, I decided to start Titan. Where other private defense companies were commodifying war, I wanted to see if I could use my skillset for peacekeeping efforts.”
“A private NATO,” I muse.
“Yeah, without the politics.” He snorts grimly. “I’m sure you’ve heard how that turned out, my big dream. I guess we were both naïve.”
I laugh, the sound startling us both. “You’re a hero. I’m basically a criminal. I appreciate the effort, but there’s no comparison.”
“I’m no hero,” he says gravely, “and you’re not that person anymore, London.”
My laughter is hollow. “Then who the hell am I?”
“Among other things, a survivor.”
I avoid his gaze. “I haven’t told you everything.”
“I know.” He stands, dusting sand from his pants and offering me a hand. “You’re taking the night off work, by the way.”
My head shakes. “I can’t afford—”
His eyes narrow. “Are you saying no?”
That voice. It fills me up, bubbling through me like fine champagne. I didn’t realize how much I missed it, longed for it, until this moment.
“No, sir,” I whisper.
Strong fingers thread through mine. He lifts my palm to his mouth, pressing a kiss to the sensitive skin. “Good girl.”
Before I can stop myself, I ask, “Why aren’t you running away?”
His brows lift, a smile teasing his mouth. “When I’m afraid of something, I don’t run away from it. I run toward it. And, kitten, the only thing on this planet that scares me is you.”
35
The truth changed things between Dominic and me. Pulled threads, scattered beads, reworked patterns on our timelines. Created overlap.
When I look at him now, I see more than the promise of punishment. More than a man I respect and desire, who plays my body like an instrument made for his hands. He’s multi-dimensional. Imperfect. Emotional. Human. Warm and sensitive, mature and thoughtful. I’m not sure how much longer I can protect my heart. Or if I want to.
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