would leave the priesthood and make her marry him. And that would be that. Her freedom would be gone, vanished. He would never let her top Kingsley again, or anyone for that matter. He’d made that abundantly clear.
Alone and with only five hundred dollars to her name, she had to make a decision. She couldn’t sit on her ass and cry all night. Although it was certainly tempting.
Once upon a time she’d been happy. Truly happy. Somehow she’d lost that somewhere along the way. Whenever she’d lost anything—her car keys, her driver’s license—Søren would take her by the shoulders and tell her to retrace her steps. Walk backward from now to the moment she last had it.
When was she last happy—truly happy—out in the world?
Elle walked backward in her mind, back past the fight she’d had with Søren, past the day at the doctor’s office, past the morning she’d woken up nauseous and had thrown up so hard both she and Kingsley had known immediately what had happened...
With her sleeve, Elle wiped her face and looked up at the moon and the stars. For so long she’d lived among city lights she’d forgotten that the moon wasn’t all there was in the night sky. And although a riot of stars danced across the heavens, it was the moon that drew her gaze. Kingsley had a conservatory on the roof of his Manhattan town house filled with tropical plants and rare flowers in a glass box the size of a large bedroom. She loved the scent of hothouse flowers in bloom and spent lots of time up there reading and watching the city go by her. She’d often wait for Søren there, staring out the glass walls onto Riverside Drive. She’d watch for Søren and smile when she heard his Ducati’s engine and saw him roll up in front of the house.
The last time she and Kingsley had had sex, it had been on the fainting couch in his conservatory. Earlier that night he’d beaten her brutally in his bedroom and fucked her raw. But a few hours later, they’d taken wine up to the conservatory and she’d ordered him to strip naked. With so many plants around them no one could see into the conservatory unless they looked in from the roof, which meant that maybe God was watching. She liked that idea. That night she’d doused King with scalding candle wax until he was so hard and turned on he begged her to fuck him. She straddled his hips, took him inside her. While he was in her and she on top of him, she’d looked up at the moon high overhead and had a moment of purest happiness. Søren would be home soon, she remembered thinking. And until then she had Kingsley to keep her company. Søren never left her alone when he was gone. He was always with her in one way or another.
Elle wanted that again, that happiness she’d lost along the way. And the last place she’d had it was in Manhattan with Kingsley in his town house.
Maybe it was still there.
Slowly she got to her feet and shouldered her bag. She brushed the dirt off the ass of her pants and headed toward the road. It took two hours to reach the city of Guilford. She didn’t bother getting a hotel room. She found the one bus station in the city and sat in the lobby waiting for the first worker to arrive. While she waited for someone to show up, Elle pulled out her book and stared at it. The pages were crinkled and bent, thick with ink. The Virgin. She wasn’t sure about the title anymore. Daphne was only a virgin for about the first fifty pages. And being a virgin was a negative state. Nothing to brag about. Those years Elle had been a virgin, the lack of sex she was having was the least interesting thing about her. Who was Daphne really? Daphne was a runner. That’s who she was. She ran track and cross-country, she ran when John chased her, and at the end she ran again, she ran away. The Runner didn’t sound very romantic. Maybe something else...maybe...
Elle crossed out the words The Virgin on the front page and wrote a new title.
The Runaway.
There. That was better.
At 6:00 a.m., a boy who didn’t even look old enough to drive, much less work at a bus station, arrived for his shift. She was in no mood to talk so of course he asked her how she was, where she was from, why she was here so early.
When he asked her where she was headed she answered with one word.
“Home.”
35
New York City
FREEDOM IS OVERRATED.
It was all Juliette said and all she had to say. Kingsley had her in his arms in an instant, kissing her as if the world would end if he didn’t. And of course, he had to save the world.
“Are you sure you want to be mine?” he asked between breathless kisses.
“Yes,” she said. “Absolutely.”
“There are things you need to know.”
“Fuck me first. Then tell me.”
Kingsley laughed in purest joy. He swept Juliette up in his arms and started up the stairs.
“Put me down,” she ordered. “I can walk.”
“I’ve always wanted to carry a woman up the stairs and ravish her.”
“I won’t stand in the way of your dreams then,” she said, putting her arms around his neck as he mounted the stairs. He carried her straight to his bedroom, kicked the door shut behind him and pushed her onto her back on his bed. It took only seconds to strip her naked and to cover her body in kisses. He kissed her from the graceful turn of her ankle, up her muscular calves, over the soft flesh at the inside of her knees, the long line of smooth skin on her thighs, until he buried his tongue inside her and made her moan for him. His blood was pumping, pounding in his veins. He could feel every muscle in his lower back and stomach tightening with need for her. He licked her clitoris until she shuddered, coming hard with a hoarse cry. He’d missed that sound, the sound of her climax, the taste of her in his mouth, the sight of her on his sheets. For two months he’d convinced himself he’d never see her again, never have her again. He cupped her breasts and pinched her nipples—hard.
“That hurt,” she said, laughing and recoiling at the same time.
“I had to make sure you were real.”
“You’re supposed to pinch yourself,” she told him.
“Where’s the fun in that?”
“You don’t have to pinch me. This is real,” she said. “I lived without you as long as I could stand. I couldn’t wait another day to see you.”
He kissed her breasts gently now, sucking her nipples until they hardened in his mouth.
“Come inside me,” she said. “Please.”
He straddled her thighs and pushed her wrists down deep into the bed, holding her there.
“What are you asking me?” he asked.
“No condoms,” she said. Kingsley froze. He wanted to be inside her bare so much it hurt. And he could. He was clean. And he knew she was, too. But still...
“You know what happened the last time I fluid-bonded with someone...”
“I won’t get pregnant. And if I did...I would keep it.”
Kingsley felt something open up inside him, like a safe that had been cracked and everything that had been hidden, everything valuable was there for the taking. It terrified him to be this vulnerable.
“You can have my cum when you earn it,” he said.
“Tell me how to earn it and I will.”
“Stay,” he said in his most commanding tone. She stayed.
He went to his closet, found a black briefcase and brought it to the bed.
“What is that?” Juliette asked.
“Something I’ve wanted to use for a very long time.” Kingsley flipped the combination—2663—and opened the case. From it he pulled a long thin metal chain with a cuff on the end. He bent and locked one end of the chain to the bedpost at the foot of his bed. He took the cuff at the other end of the chain and held it in his hand for Juliette to see it.
“Pick a number between one and ten,” he said.
“What am I choosing?”
“I’m not telling you until you’ve chosen.”
Juliette answered quickly. “Seven.”
“Perfect,” he said. He grabbed her leg, put her foot on the center of his chest and locked the cuff around her ankle. “Seven days.”
“What???
?
“You picked seven days to stay in my bedroom chained naked to my bed.”
“What?” Juliette demanded.
“Don’t worry,” he said in a paternalistic tone. “This chain is long enough so you can reach anywhere in my bedroom and my bathroom. You stay here seven days, locked in. I’ll bring you food and water and anything else you need. You don’t put on clothes. I’ll touch you when I want to touch you, beat you when I want to beat you and fuck you when I want to fuck you. And in seven days, if you’re still here and haven’t asked me to unlock you, then you get what you want from me. Are these terms acceptable to you?”
“You chained me to your bed.”
“Are you complaining?”
“Not at all.”
“You said freedom was overrated. Let’s see how you like being my property and my prisoner.”
“I love it already. But I’d love it more if you were inside me,” she said, sitting up on her elbows. She spread her legs for him by way of invitation, an invitation he eagerly accepted. He rolled on a condom and entered her hard and swift and she arched beneath him, taking him deeper. The thin metal chain hissed softly as he fucked Juliette as hard as he could. Chaining her to his bed wasn’t enough. He had to hold her arms down by her wrists, push her legs open with his knees and impale her against the bed with his cock so deep inside her he might not ever get it back out again. If he died inside her, so be it. He’d die happy.
“I love you,” he said, kissing her face.
“I love you, too. I didn’t want to.”
“Get used to it.”
“Loving you?”
“Yes. And doing things you don’t want to do.” He gave her a devilish grin and she laughed, a joyful laugh.
“There’s nothing you could make me do that I wouldn’t want to do,” she whispered, pressing her breasts against his chest.
“I accept that challenge.”
Juliette loved rough and brutal sex, so he gave it to her as hard as he could. And then after he held her and kissed her and when the desire for her had grown to a fever pitch again, he took off all his clothes, pulled the covers down and made love to her until she couldn’t take anymore.
He wrapped her in his arms and rolled her on top of him. She rested her head on his chest and they lay there together in his bed for a long time doing nothing but being.
Being still. Being loved. Being together.
“Tell me what I need to know,” Juliette said at last as she lifted her elegant head and looked him in the eyes.
“I can’t be faithful to you,” Kingsley said. “And it’s not for the reason you think.”
“Not because your libido is stronger than your common sense?”
“That might be part of it,” he admitted. “Also, I love having sex with men as much as women.”
“I would never keep you from that part of yourself. I might ask to watch sometimes.”
Kingsley smiled but only for a moment. Then the smile was gone.
“Do you know what the word Switch means?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“You like being hurt in bed, being dominated.” Kingsley tapped the bruise on her bottom lip that his too-eager teeth had given her.
“Very much. I need it,” she said.
“And I love hurting you and dominating you. But there are times when I want to be dominated myself, when I need to be hurt. I don’t want that to be part of us. I want to keep that part of me separate from you. From us.”
She nodded. “I can accept that.”
“Please don’t tell anyone. It’s not something I want advertised.”
“Your secrets are my secrets,” she said. “I’ll protect them with my life. There’s something you should know about me, too.”
“Tell me,” he said.
“I do want children and I’ll have yours for you. But my mother’s doctor said her condition can run in families. Can you wait a few years until I’m certain it won’t pass to me?”
“I can wait,” Kingsley said, almost relieved. After all he’d been through with Elle, and failing her like he had, he wasn’t ready to even think about being a father yet. “We should wait.”
“My mother’s symptoms started when she was a teenager, and I haven’t had any. The doctor says I shouldn’t be afraid to have children. He gave me his blessing. But still, you should know the possibility is there.”
“I’m not scared,” Kingsley said. “My parents were perfect. My childhood was perfect. And my sister still committed suicide. There are no guarantees in life. But you’re worth taking the risk for.”
“If we have a child, it might look like me.”
“You mean a girl?”
“You know what I mean.” Juliette laid her arm across his chest displaying the contrast in their skin color. He kissed her arm.
“I hope our children look like you. They would be beautiful then. I don’t want ugly children. I’m very shallow.”
She laughed to cover her tears, but Kingsley saw them anyway.
“Something else,” she said. “I don’t think I want to get married. I’ve been trapped in something too much like a bad marriage.”
“You never have to worry that I’ll force you to marry me,” Kingsley said, laughing. “Not my style.”
“And I want to work,” Juliette said. “A real job where I’m paid. I need to have my own money.”
“You can work for me. Calliope starts Columbia this fall. I’ll need a new assistant.”
“Work for you?”
“I pay very well. And it will be your money. If that doesn’t convince you...maybe the fringe benefits will.”
“I like the sound of that,” she said with a seductive smile. “I handled all of Gérard’s files in his home office. I did half his work for him. If something happened to him, I could have taken over as ambassador without missing a step.”
“You should have let me assassinate him.”
“No,” she said, tapping him on the end of the nose. “No murders. It’s a—what did you call it? Hard limit?”
“I suppose I have to respect it then.”
She kissed him on the lips, on the neck, on the chest, on the old scar that had faded along with the pain it had once given him. “One more thing, mon roi.”
“Name it,” he said.
“I want a collar,” she said.
“Why?” he asked, surprised by her request.
“You told me you’d never collared a woman. Or man. I’ll let you have your freedom to be with whomever you want to be with. But I want something in return, something you haven’t given anyone else. I need that for us.”
Kingsley bent his head and kissed her. Then he slid out from under her and grabbed his pants off the floor and pulled them on. Somewhere in this bedroom...
He went back into his closet and found the bag he’d taken with him to Haiti. He hadn’t unpacked it. And it was still there.
From a locked box on the highest shelf he pulled out a knife he’d carried on many of his missions when he was still ostensibly in La Legion.
When he returned to the bed, Juliette sat up. Even naked she looked elegant and regal, powerful, graceful. She was everything he’d ever wanted in a woman right here. And he would never let her go.
He set the bag on the bed and opened it. From it he took the black belt that had been his own souvenir from his nights with Søren back in their school days. Søren had beaten Kingsley with the belt and Kingsley had beaten Juliette with it. It had wounded them both so it would do for a collar. He wrapped it around her neck and with the tip of the knife put a hole where the buckle would fit. After measuring her neck, he sawed through the leather with the blade cutting off the excess. He wrapped it around her neck again and this time, he buckled it.