“Might I ask where you are going thusly attired?” J.P. asked.

“Jail. Obviously.” The elevator door opened and Zach stepped inside. He smiled at J.P. knowing full well that’s exactly what Nora would have done. “It’s just about the book.”

If it was possible, J.P.’s eyebrow seemed to arch even higher.

“It’s never just about the book, Easton.”

* * *

When he put her in the handcuffs, she knew she was in trouble. The third time they ever saw each other she was wearing handcuffs. She wore them not for reasons of kink but of law enforcement. It was raining that night when she got caught for the first and last time. When she arrived at the police station and the cop pulled her out of the squad car, he was standing there just behind her mother. What was he doing here? she asked herself and then realized her mother must have called him out of fear and desperation. What a sight she was that night—soaked to the skin, bedraggled, wearing her school uniform with her hands cuffed behind her back. She’d glared at him from behind the veil of her wet hair, and he looked back at her with ironic amusement. But that wasn’t the only look in his eyes. There was something else there, something it would take years before she fully understood.

She understood it now.

She sat on the floor gagged and handcuffed to the bedpost. In forced silence, she leaned back and watched him. A young woman with pink and blue hair was strapped spread-eagle to a St. Andrew’s cross. With a cat-o’-nine-tails he tattooed the girl’s back bright red with welts. The girl squirmed and cried out. She begged him to stop. He didn’t stop.

After a few minutes the beating ceased. He laid the cat aside and strode over to where she sat on the floor. He knelt in front of her and ordered her to meet his eyes.

“Are you ready to apologize now?” he asked her. “Or shall I continue beating Simone?”

The only thing worse than one of his beatings was being forced to watch while someone else took the punishment that was rightfully hers. She slowly nodded her head.

“Good girl,” he said. He stood up and walked over to the girl on the cross. He unbound her wrists and ankles. Simone stepped gingerly off the platform and knelt on the floor. She kissed the top of his bare feet and rose up again. He bent his head and in a voice too low to overhear, whispered something in her ear. The girl blushed and smiled. She asked for permission to kiss his hand. He granted it.

Simone kissed the center of his palm, gathered her clothes and left the room. They were alone again.

He walked back to her and squatted in front of her. He untied the gag and waited.

“You have something to say to me?” he asked.

“Yes, sir.” She took a ragged breath. “I’m sorry I forgot to call, sir. I apologize for worrying you. I was so tired when I got home I went straight to bed.”

“It takes mere seconds to call and let me know you arrived home. You are my most treasured possession. Your value to me is beyond what you can conceive. It is my duty to protect you. You know my rules. And you know better than to flout them.”

She hated when she disappointed him. But it wasn’t her fault she was so tired. He’d kept her up until

3:00 a.m. beating her and f**king her over and over again. It had taken everything she had to just make it to her bed that night. She knew she’d worried him when she hadn’t called. But it was galling to be treated like a teenager with a curfew. She’d refused to apologize at first. She was twenty-six years old, for God’s sake.

“Forgive me, please. I’ll do anything.”

He raised his eyebrow and she knew she’d made a mistake.

“Anything?”

Her stomach fell through the floor.

An antique black rotary phone sat on a table in his private quarters. He only ever used it for one purpose. He used it for that purpose now.

She didn’t look up when the door opened. She knew from the shoes who it was who’d entered. Black riding boots. Men’s riding boots.

She shouldn’t have said “anything.”

He returned to her and released her from the floor. He didn’t remove the handcuffs, though. He kept her hands cuffed behind her back. He’d made her wear her old school uniform tonight in honor of the first time he’d seen her in handcuffs.

He unbuttoned her blouse and pushed it roughly off her shoulders. His mouth crashed onto hers and he kissed her until her lips were sore and swollen. He kissed his way down her neck and across her shoulders and br**sts, leaving a trail of bite marks and bruises. He pushed her onto her back on the bed and wrenched her skirt up to her hips. He yanked her white cotton panties down her legs, over her white knee socks and saddle shoes. His fingers pushed inside her and spread her wide for him. He gripped her arm and shoved her onto her stomach. She felt his hands between her legs again separating her, prying her open. She braced herself and groaned as he pushed inside her. He rode her with fierce thrusts that left her gasping. She didn’t want to moan or cry out. Not with an audience standing at the foot of the bed smiling and watching everything he did to her. But he wrenched the cries from her. She pressed her face into the bed and bit the coverlet trying to stifle the sound of her climax.

He kept thrusting and she was close to her second humiliating orgasm when he came inside her with a ferocious final thrust. She whimpered as he pulled out of her. She rolled onto her side and brought her legs up to her chest. Now they were both looking at her.

The man in the riding boots strolled toward her. He crawled onto the bed.