“Enough!” Jason could see he’d hit a little too close to the truth. Lemaitre scowled at him, his eyes dark with pain. “Yes, it’s the truth. I don’t want her here. Yes, I admit it.” He bowed his head until he collected himself. “I’m sorry. I know you wanted her near.”
“Oh, I’m going to have her near. I’m going to Marseille to win her back, and then I’ll stay with her, go wherever her talent takes us. I love her.”
“I know you love her, because I’ve seen you together. I see how you’re both hurting now. But if she’s truly your slave, she’ll come back to you when she’s ready. And if you’re a good Master, you’ll give her the space she needs right now.”
Jason wondered how Lemaitre could be so wise about power exchange, about Master/slave relationships, and so stupid about other things, like accepting Sara into his life. Either way, he was right. Sara had requested space and Jason was obliged to give it to her.
“Have patience,” Lemaitre said. “She’ll be okay. Let Theo and Kelsey look after her for a while.”
Chapter Sixteen: Now
Jason’s phone pinged while he was at lunch. He flicked onto his messages, hoping it might be Sara. He hadn’t heard from her in almost two weeks, since she’d gone to Marseille. But no, it was Theo.
Sara says please stop txting her.
It’s sad, dude.
Jason grimaced and tapped out a reply.
Why won’t she talk to me?
Because she’s busy.
Too busy for one text? “I’m okay, Jason”
You sound like a woman.
Stop.
Jason pushed away his half-eaten plate and hunched over his phone, and tapped out the one question he had to ask.
Have you been sleeping with her?
No reply. Jason applied the capslock.
WELL, HAVE YOU?
Theo’s reply came a few seconds later.
I asked but she refused.
She’s slept with Kels several times.
What???!!!
Joking.
Idiote.
Then, a moment later, words that soothed some of his ire.
She misses you. She doesn’t say, but...
Oh, no. Theo wasn’t leaving him hanging with an ellipsis.
But what?
No reply.
Call me when you get a min, Jason typed.
No.
I need you to call me.
No.
Just tell me how she’s doing. She’s okay?
If she wasn’t, I’d tell you.
Is she sad?
There was a long pause, then Theo typed, Two more weeks.
Two more weeks, what?
Two more weeks, act is ready.
I can see it?
Yes. In Marseille.
Now stop txting.
I’m busy. She’s busy.
Tell her I love her and I miss her, he typed quickly.
No reply.
* * * * *
Sara lay back on the grass in a meadow a few miles outside the city. A small brook outlined the clearing, as well as a ring of great, old trees. Marseille was beautiful in late summer, warm and breezy. A few hundred feet away, two tails of aerial silk wafted in the breeze. Theo had hung them from a thick branch of the largest tree, and he and Kelsey played on them, practicing tricks and showing Sara some of the rudiments of their art.
It took skill and strength, Sara thought. But mostly it took trust. It was just like duo trapeze. She’d heard from Baat, learned he was feeling better now that he’d completed the first phase of his rehab. Sobriety is a whole new world, he’d written. I feel like a new man.
Sara was trying to feel like a new woman. She wasn’t finding success at it, not so far. Oh, her act was coming along, thanks to Theo and Kelsey’s encouragement. The show in Marseille had its own rehearsal space, and Minuit’s artists gave her plenty of time to practice. All that was going great, but...
She watched Kelsey and Theo fool around on the silks, speaking a cobbled-together mixture of French and English. Since she was staying at their house, she’d learned a lot about their relationship. They kissed a lot. They touched a lot. They fought a lot too, but they always made up. She wished now she hadn’t blown up at Jason, disappeared and left his ring behind as if it meant nothing to her. She wished she’d given her and Michel Lemaitre’s newborn relationship a chance, rather than spewing anger and accusations at him.
She wished she didn’t have so many regrets.
“You two sure know how to have fun,” she called as they swung across the clearing. They were together, a happy couple. Sara was alone, by choice, because she thought it would make everything easier to deal with. Maybe she’d been wrong.
In two days, Lemaitre—her father—was coming to check out her new act. Theo said Jason would probably come too, but what if he didn’t? What if he’d found some other slave by now, a slave who was perfect and normal, and truthful and obedient?
She could text Jason and ask him. She could call him right now on the phone but she was afraid. With them, it had always been about what happened when they were face to face. The chemical reaction that occurred when they were in a room together, or gazing into each other’s eyes. Would it still be there? Lemaitre said she had to spend this time growing into her new self...but two big parts of her new self weren’t there.
Kelsey came over to sit by Sara while Theo showed off, doing a series of pull-ups on the silks.
“Feats of strength,” Kelsey yelled. “We want to see them.”
He grinned over his shoulder and levered his body into a right angle with the ground. His sculpted muscles contracted into statue-like perfection.
“Whoa,” Sara breathed. “How does he do that?”
She laughed. “Jason can do it too. I’ve seen him.” She looked over at Sara, covering her mouth. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring him up.”
Sara tried to sound casual. Unaffected. “It’s okay.”
Theo was doing an actual handstand on the silks now. They applauded and cheered, then lay back on the blanket again. “He’s going to break his neck, isn’t he?” asked Sara.
Her friend shrugged. “Maybe. Hopefully not. I learned a long time ago that Theo is gonna do what Theo is gonna do, and that’s why he’s so good at what he does. You’re the same way when you’re on the trapeze. Fearless. It’s good to be that way. It frees you up to create.”
“I guess.” Sara rolled onto her side, picking at twigs and blades of grass. “But is it hard to be married to someone like that? Someone so fearless?”
“Sometimes it’s hard. But love is worth the risk.”
“Was there ever a time you didn’t trust him?”
Kelsey burst into laughter. “Oh, lady. I could tell you some stories.”
“I’m waiting. Tell.”
Was Kelsey blushing? She covered her eyes, then looked back at Sara. “Let’s just say Theo and I didn’t have the most conventional start. The first time we slept together, I wasn’t sure if he was going to kiss me or choke the life out of me. I was a fearless little innocent myself, and I got involved with him just after...after Minya died.” She looked over at Theo, swinging in the silks. “There were so many whispers, so many terrible things people said. Some people said he dropped her on purpose, that he murdered her—” Her voice cracked and cut off. “Well.”
“That seems crazy,” said Sara.
“Yes, it does, but for a little while, I doubted.” She drew in a sharp breath. “I hate that I doubted, but people are so complicated. In my heart though, I knew the truth. He never meant to harm Minya. He’d never harm anyone. For all his hardass, dominant ways, the man’s as gentle as a fly.”
It was Sara’s turn to laugh, because Theo seemed anything but gentle. He spent most of his free time berating her in practice sessions.
“He’s a tough coach,” said Kelsey, reading her thoughts. “But he only means the best for you.”
“I know.”
They fe
ll silent, watching Theo practice tricks and drops that looked terrifying, although Sara knew they were safe. After a while, Kelsey turned toward her, brushing her hair off her face. “We can talk about him if you want. About Jason. About trust. That’s why you were asking, wasn’t it?”
Sara stared at the ground, at the little pile of twigs she’d broken and rearranged. “I miss him so much. I wanted to be with him forever.”
“You can still be with him forever.”
“But I fucked up, Kelsey. I left him. I’ve ignored his calls, his texts.” She covered her face. “I never even said goodbye.”
“You were angry. He kept a big secret from you.”
“But I kept a secret from him too.” Kelsey was sweet, taking her side like a loyal friend, but over the past couple weeks Sara had come to realize how unfair she’d been to her Master. “When I kept a secret, Jason punished me and we moved on. He forgave me. When Jason kept a secret, I closed myself off and ran away. If I love him, why did I do that?”
Kelsey sighed and touched her hand. “You didn’t run away. You took the time and space you needed to process some serious upheaval in your life.”
“Maybe,” Sara said, burying her head in the blanket. “But I don’t know where things go from here. I’m scared to face him. I don’t know what he’ll say.”
Theo descended the silks and started toward them, only to be waved away by Kelsey. “We’re talking about girl things. Periods and stuff. Can you wait a sec?”
He turned and walked in the other direction, and settled to lounge beside the tree. He laid his head back and closed his eyes, so calm, so at peace with the world. Why couldn’t Sara find that peace? “Men have it easy,” she muttered. “Especially dominant men. They ask for whatever they need and they always get their way.”
“That’s not true,” said Kelsey. “You can ask for what you need, too. You can get your way. What do you need from Jason?”
“I need him to always do the right thing. I need him to be perfect.”
Kelsey glanced at her husband, who spied on them from under his eyelids. “They’re never perfect. So no, you can’t have that.”
Sara covered her face with a groan. “I made a mistake, leaving him. I wasn’t thinking. I was confused about who I was.”
“Are you still confused?”
“Yes.”
Kelsey reached out to squeeze her shoulder. “Again, this is pretty normal. Do you love him? Do you think he loves you?”
“I don’t know. He kept secrets from me. He should have told me Lemaitre was my dad, don’t you think?”
“I didn’t tell you either. Theo didn’t tell you. We’re all guilty, but you’re only angry with Jason. It doesn’t seem fair.”
Kelsey was right, as much as she hated to admit it. “I’m not even angry anymore,” she said. “But I don’t know what to do now. All these things happened—”
“And you didn’t know how to handle them. Okay, that’s called life. It happens with me and Theo all the time. We survive, we regroup, we talk things out. We get over them and grow past them and it becomes part of the fabric of our love. You know?”
The fabric of our love. That was a pretty way to put it, especially for two silks artists. Now that Theo was on the ground, the silks were flying free, almost close enough for Sara to touch. But her and Jason’s love wasn’t like fabric. It was more like a trapeze at the moment, off-balance, swinging back and forth.
“Maybe I just need to hang on the bar for a while,” Sara sighed.
“What? I don’t think alcohol’s the answer,” said her friend with a frown.
“No, not that kind of bar. I was thinking about trapeze. You do tricks, but then you take breathers where you ‘hang on the bar.’ And you relax and exist and just...hang.” She shook her head and rubbed her forehead. “I’ve been so stressed, so worried about everything. About Baat and Jason, and the act, and the Citadel and Lemaitre, and Las Vegas, and my future. Maybe I need to stop stressing about everything so much and just...”
Kelsey smiled. “Hang on the bar for a while?”
“Yes. And apologize to Jason, and forgive him, and ask if we can try things again.”
“You realize Jason texts Theo every day. How’s Sara? Is she happy? Is she okay? Does she miss me?” Kelsey chuckled. “You two can have a nice, long discussion about how much you love each other when he comes to Marseille to see your act.”
Oh yeah, her act. The main reason she was here. “I think Jason will like it,” Sara said, “but I’m nervous about performing for Mr. Lemaitre.”
“You mean your dad?”
“I can’t think of him like that. He made it clear in Paris that he wasn’t interested in a father-daughter thing.”
“Aw, Sara. He’s interested. He cares about you.”
“Does he text Theo every day?” she joked bitterly. “He hasn’t tried to contact me once.”
“Well...” Kelsey thought a moment. “If I had to guess, I’d say he’s taking a little breather on the bar.”
“Maybe the bar at the Citadel,” Sara said. “Or some other sex club. He has his priorities.”
Kelsey shuddered. “Oh God. I just realized something. I slept with your dad. I was his plaything for a whole week.”
“Theo allowed that?”
“Theo loved it, watching Lemaitre torture me. I won’t tell you the particulars since he’s your father and everything. Believe me...” She shuddered again. “You’d be traumatized for life.”
“He’s not very nice, is he?”
“Lemaitre? Sometimes he’s not, but he has a huge heart under all that Lord-and-Master posturing. I know, I’ve seen it. Even if he won’t be your father, I’d accept him as a friend.”
Theo glared over at them, spreading his hands. “You’re still talking about your periods? There is so much to say?”
“I love you, honey,” Kelsey called out, laughing.
He rolled his eyes at her and then gestured to Sara. “Come, ma brillante. Your turn on the silks.”
Sara watched the fabric twist in the wind. “I better not. I’ve only ever done trapeze.”
“Go try it,” said Kelsey, nudging her. “It’s fun. If you want, I’ll go with you.”
“Can it hold both of us?”
“It could hold an elephant, silly. Come on.”
Kelsey gave her some rosin and showed her how to make hand and foot “traps” so she could hold on once she climbed up. The fabric looked so soft billowing in the wind, but in her hands it felt hard and strong, like it could literally hold an elephant. Theo climbed up too, on the opposite silk, and he and Kelsey demonstrated how to do some of the moves in their act. In Minuit, their act was dark and tragic, but here on the silks, they laughed and teased each other, and the day was warm and bright.
“It’s fun, no?” asked Theo, swinging away from her. He was back a moment later. “More fun than girl talk.”
“Nothing’s more fun than girl talk,” Kelsey said. “Except flying. Hey Theo, make us fly, please?”
“Um,” Sara said as Theo nodded and started down the opposite silk. “What is this flying thing?”
“You’ll love it,” Kelsey assured her. “Everyone should try it once.”
Theo let the other tail blow free and took the girls’ silk. “Kels, Sara has her hand lock?”
Kelsey made sure Sara was secure, then looked down at her husband. “We’re good.”
Sara wasn’t totally good, but Kelsey winked at her and told her to relax. Theo grabbed a big handful of the tail and pulled it to one side, then the other, creating a wide, swinging, circular momentum that really did feel like flying.
“Oh my God,” Sara yelled. “This is crazy.”
“I know, right?” Kelsey laughed like a maniac. Below them, Theo smiled and guided their flight. Each time he pulled the tail out a little farther, so they went in greater and greater circles, until the sky above them spun in a dizzying whirl. Life is about hanging on, Sara thought, clinging to the silk. Some
times it’s just about hanging on for the ride.
She half-laughed, half-cried thinking about Jason coming to Marseille, and hung on for dear life until Theo took pity on them and let them down.
* * * * *
Jason flew to Marseille Sunday afternoon with Lemaitre. The trip to the picturesque coastal city only took an hour and a half in his private jet. They didn’t chat. Lemaitre worked on his laptop, occasionally pausing to stare out the window. Jason drifted, lost in memories of his times with Sara, both the good and the bad.
What now? he wanted to ask Lemaitre. You started all this. How will it end? They all moved through Cirque’s world by his hand, like human chess pieces on an extremely colorful board. If Lemaitre approved Sara’s act, then he’d send her to perform somewhere and Jason would go with her. That was going to happen. The rest of it—the hows, whens, and whys—were still up in the air, like Sara’s red trapeze.
Or would it be some other color now?
He didn’t know. Even Lemaitre didn’t know, and Theo wasn’t talking. All he would say to Jason’s pleas for information was, “You’ll see.”
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