Yesterday, she’d gotten back the results of the tests the doctor had done. No nasty diseases. No pregnancy.

She patted her chest, smiling. Today, the elephant-on-the-chest sensation was gone. Yes, I’m getting better. The counseling definitely helped. So did Gabi, with her years as a victim specialist and her own history of rape. Kim could share with Gabi things she couldn’t tell Faith—and vice versa. The two women gave her sympathy, hugs, and an occasional hard dose of reality. Gabi, especially, would shake her head and say, “Yeah, of course you’re having panic attacks and nightmares. They might not ever go away completely, but they’ll subside.”

That helped a lot, knowing Gabi had gone on to have a life. To find love. And what a sweetie she’d found. Kim sighed. Marcus couldn’t disguise he was a dominant, but he kept his distance, never asking Kim to do anything, usually letting Gabi do the talking. Seeing his tenderness toward Gabi and the love he openly showed her had been healing in itself.

Why couldn’t I have found someone like that? Why did the slavers choose me anyway? Other women liked BDSM, went to the clubs, didn’t get Tasered and kidnapped. Chained and beaten. Why me? Because I’m a slut? Kim peered into the mirror. Did it show on her face maybe?

Gabi had stopped visiting BDSM clubs years before. I kept going, even drove back from Savannah to visit the Atlanta club. So maybe Kim deserved everything she’d gotten. Maybe she really was a slut and a fuckhole as Lord Greville had said.

Laughter came from the other room, breaking into her thoughts before the darkness overwhelmed her. With a shuddering breath, Kim pushed the bleakness aside and tried to remember what Gabi and the counselor had said. I’m not a slut. Not.

“Kim, get out here,” Gabi called. “The cookies are out of the oven. Jessica and Kari are hungry.”

Enough already. Recovering would take time. Eventually, the FBI would give her permission to go home. I can do this. After splashing cold water on her face, Kim joined Gabi in the kitchen where the comforting fragrance of just-baked cookies filled the air.

The phone rang, and Gabi made a sound of exasperation. “Here. Can you take these out?” She handed over the platter and turned to answer the phone. “Hello?”

As laughter came from the two women in the living room, Kim stood still, having to fight the urge to retreat into solitude.

Once she joined Jessica and Kari, she knew—knew—they would lighten her mood. That was something else that Gabi had done. When Kim had started to retreat from people, Gabi’d brought in a couple of her submissive friends. Being in the lifestyle, they had a good idea of what had happened and how a person might react. Their understanding, without Kim having to explain, was wonderful. She liked them.

The only light during her captivity had been her friendship with the other slaves. Like Linda, the older woman who—Kim swallowed—who that fat scumbag had beaten. As the attendants had been bandaging Kim’s back, she’d heard the bastard refuse to buy the redhead, saying she was too old. God, had Linda survived what the Overseer did to slaves who didn’t sell?

Kim hauled in a breath. Fretting wouldn’t help, or so the counselor kept telling her. Only it made her so…so mad. And guilty, like she’d abandoned Linda without doing anything to save her. But what could she have done? Maybe she—

Gabi cleared her throat and made a fist, gesturing in the way that meant full speed ahead.

I should never have taught her those old tugboat signals. Kim nodded and headed into the living room.

“You’ve got the cookies!” Jessica trotted over. After one bite, the short blonde moaned in delight. “Kari, this is the best recipe.” Another bite and she took a second cookie, sending a frown to the woman across the room. “And hey, thanks for not helping me lose weight.”

“Z likes you round,” Kari said. “I’m just doing him a favor.”

As Jessica curled up in a chair to nibble, Kim set the platter on the coffee table for Kari and tried not to laugh.

The very pregnant, sweet-faced schoolteacher was trying to lower herself into the other overstuffed chair. Finally, arms giving out, she dropped the last foot with a bounce and a squeak. After a squirm to settle, she gave Kim a composed smile. “Made it.”

“Uh-huh. God help you when you want to stand up again. And you still have another month?”

“If I survive that long.” Kari leaned forward to get a cookie and was stymied by her stomach. She giggled. “Help?”

No one could be grumpy around these two. Jessica was intelligent, logical, and assertive. Kari almost beamed with joy at the new life inside her, despite being so short and round she resembled a bowling ball. Kim handed her a couple of cookies. “Are you having a girl or a boy?”

“Dan doesn’t want to know, and I let him have his way. Though he’s getting ahead in winning arguments.”

Kim smiled. Yesterday, when Kari’s husband had dropped her off for a visit, she’d been spitting mad. Apparently Dan had seen her trying to adjust the driver’s seat to accommodate her stomach, but not so far she couldn’t reach the steering wheel. The dom had taken her car keys away.

Kim might have been angrier, except the man had driven Kari over himself. Hard-faced with cop’s eyes, he looked really mean, yet he touched his wife as gently as Marcus did Gabi.

It was nice to be shown that all men weren’t the enemy. But some are. Shoving the thought aside, she snatched a cookie and sat on the couch.

Gabi walked in, brows drawn together. She squeezed Kim’s shoulder before sitting beside her. “That was Vance—the guy from the FBI. He’s coming today.”

“Really? Good.” Kim’s anticipation surged. They’d asked her not to call her mother until they figured a few things out. Mom must be going crazy with worry. I need to go home. “When will he be here?”

“Right away.”

Jessica wrinkled her nose. “There’s a typical man. He probably smelled the cookies baking all the way across the city.” She leaned forward and picked up her glass of iced tea. “Speaking of which, can I take some home to Z? He loves chocolate chip cookies.”

“Who doesn’t?” Gabi said. “But sure, we made tons.”

“Eat up, Kari, and we’ll leave before Vance shows up. Otherwise I’ll question Mr. Closemouthed Special Agent about what’s going on, and he won’t spill, and I’ll get mad and be rude.” Jessica rolled her eyes. “He’ll tell Z.”

“And you’d love it.” Gabi snickered. “We all know you act out just to see what creative torture Z will use on you.”

Jessica pointed her cookie at Gabi. “Takes one to recognize one.”

“This is true.” Gabi’s satisfied smile looked exactly like her young cat’s after it had snatched a chicken wing from the table. “I’m not sure who’s more inventive, your dom or mine.”

Kim shuddered. “Don’t worry, fuckhole. I’m quite inventive at finding ways to break slaves.” The whippings. The cage.

“Kim.”

Kim jerked her head up at the sound of her name.

Worry darkened Jessica’s green eyes as she said, “I’m sorry.”

“Hey, I’m glad I’ve recovered enough that you forgot,” Kim said, remembering all the times she’d dissolved into tears. “Besides, it’s nice to be reminded there’s such a thing as teasing a dom for fun.”

Kari grinned. “In that case, you should have been at the last barbecue when Gabi called Marcus a cretin and asked him if he’d had an extra bowl of stupid that morning.”

Kim felt the blood drain from her face. What had he done to her?

“Easy, girl. He didn’t beat on me or anything.” Gabi bumped her shoulder against Kim’s. “I’d rather have had the beating. Would you believe the butthead threw me in the pool after I’d spent an hour on my hair and makeup? And I’d done some really cool temp tattoos around my arms too.”

Kim sputtered a laugh; the knot in her stomach eased.

“You looked so funny.” Jessica rose and hauled Kari out of the chair with a grunt of effort, before grinning at Kim. “She kept cursing him, and he pushed her back in—I think about four times before she cooled down enough to beg forgiveness. And then she hugged him.”

Kari snickered. “You deliberately got his clothes all wet. He didn’t know whether to laugh or curse.”

“Teach him to try to drown me.” Still smirking, Gabi walked with the other two women to the front, exchanged good-byes, then returned to sit beside Kim. “Hey, Jessica forgot Z’s treats—more for us.” Before she got a cookie to her mouth, the doorbell rang. “Well, hell.”

Someone from outside. Heart rate increasing, Kim grabbed her hand. “No, it might not be Vance. I hear another man too. You don’t know who it is.”

“I recognize the voices. It’s okay, girlfriend.”

After a couple of slow breaths, Kim managed to let go of Gabi’s hand. “Sorry.”

“Been there, done that. It takes time.” Gabi hurried to the door and opened it.

The agent walked in first, followed by…Master R? In jeans and a white shirt, he nodded at Gabi, and then his dark gaze went straight to Kim. Intent, powerful.