“I won’t tell. I’ll never tell.”
“It’s better he and I...we should be friends only. It hurts him but it would hurt worse to tell him I love him and still keep myself from him. At least this way perhaps he’ll feel free to find another.”
And then Søren had thanked her. She didn’t even know what to say to that other than, “What for?”
“For not being angry that I love someone else.”
She could only stare at him a moment, utterly baffled.
“Of course you love Kingsley. Who wouldn’t?”
After all, she loved him, too, in a different sort of way. Especially after tonight she loved him. He and Søren had given her pleasures she’d never even dreamed of. She felt a deep kinship with Kingsley, like they were the same person or at least had the same nature. She couldn’t quite understand, didn’t have the words for it, but someday she would know.
* * *
“And what is it? What secret nature did you two share?” Marie-Laure asked.
“We’re switches. There aren’t that many of us around. Others don’t trust us, don’t get us. Only we get us.”
“A switch?” Marie-Laure pressed her face closer to the glass of the window. “I thought he was of the Dominant persuasion, to use the terminology of your world.”
“He is, definitely. Most of the time he is a Dom. But that’s not all he is. He’s a Dominant and a submissive, a sadist and a masochist. You can be all of the above. It’s rare but it exists, especially in those of us who have incredibly strong libidos. We want it all and we want it all the time.”
“Sluts, in other words,” Marie-Laure taunted.
“And proud of it,” Nora said entirely without shame or remorse. “You see, Kingsley loves topping, loves inflicting pain. But every now and then, when he gets the itch to be on the receiving end, you simply cannot hurt him enough. If I had tied him to the floor and kicked him with steel-toed boots, he wouldn’t have tried to stop me. I did more damage to Kingsley in one night than Søren would do to me in a month. Thank God Kingsley doesn’t get into that mood very often. The kind of pain he likes, it takes weeks to recover from. Søren loved Kingsley...loves Kingsley,” she corrected. There was no past tense with Søren. When he loved, what he loved, who he loved, he loved eternally. “Sometimes the only way to show someone you love them is to let them go. It’s hard, though. It’s so f**king hard.”
Nora closed her eyes as Wesley’s face came back to her, the vision of him the day she went back to Søren. Kicking Wes out of her house was worse than any pain Søren had ever inflicted on her, any pain she’d ever inflicted upon herself. She wished Wes knew the same.
“So you saw your lover with another...and it didn’t infuriate you?”
“No,” Nora said simply. “Why would it bother me? It didn’t bother him to see me with Kingsley. It was sexy.”
“It’s perverse.”
“Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it.”Marie-Laure narrowed her eyes at Nora and studied her as if an alien sat tied at the end of her bed. Nora stared back, unflinching, unashamed.
“You sit there and you tell me that my husband ordered you to have sex with another man...and after you do, you find out he’s f**king him, too. They used you for their perverse pleasures, beating you and passing you between them like a whore...and you defend them?”
“No, I don’t defend them. I f**ked them, and I enjoyed it.”
“They f**ked you.”
“Semantics.”
Nora felt one of the ropes snap behind her wrist. Her heart punched the insides of her ribs. She had to stay calm. Now might finally be her chance. She had no plan, none at all. If she could knock Marie-Laure unconscious, she might be able to get out the window. Surely not every window in the house had been nailed shut.
“Marie-Laure, sweetheart, kitten, come here. I’m going to tell you another story. And I want you to look me in the eyes while I tell it so you know I’m telling you the truth.”
“Oh, good. I do love your stories. Sounds as if I should be grateful that my husband didn’t want me. Otherwise, I might have been subjected to your fate.”
“Oh, yes, poor little me. Had to have sex with the two most beautiful men on the planet in the same night. It was torture by orgasm. All, I don’t know, five or six of them.”
“You were how old when you met my husband?”
“Fifteen.”
“No wonder you turned out like this. And my brother.”
“You know Søren’s not a vampire, right? He’s a sadist. You don’t turn kinky just because he bites you.”
“You make a joke of everything.”
“Only the shit that’s funny. And you thinking Søren made me kinky? Now that’s funny.”
“You deny it?”
Marie-Laure left her post at the window and walked over to stand next to Nora. Nora kept her wrists tight together and prayed Marie-Laure wouldn’t notice the cut ropes or the razor blade she clutched in the palm of her hand.
“I do, actually. Here’s the thing, and pay attention. I’ll say this slowly so you can understand every word.”
Marie-Laure stood by Nora, her arms crossing and her face a mask of pure condescension.
“Søren,” Nora began, “is a sadist and a Dominant and that’s it. That’s all. He’s not into pony-play or age-play. He doesn’t cross-dress or want foot worship and he doesn’t feel any need to make me iron his shirts while wearing nothing but an apron and high heels. He doesn’t fetishize hair or feet or shoes or balloons or bestiality or anything other than pain. He doesn’t want to play doctor. He doesn’t want me to be his puppy on a leash. He doesn’t want a harem. He doesn’t want a man in a gimp suit following him around on his hands and knees. His desires are pure and simple. He wants to inflict pain on a submissive partner who enjoys accepting that pain. His needs are few and pure. But me...”