Author: Tiffany Reisz

“Neither can I,” Kingsley said, trying to keep a straight face. He refused to let Søren see how much he enjoyed sullying himself with this Catholic pianist who scared everyone at the school but him. “What were you thinking?”

“Clearly, I wasn’t.” Søren came over to Kingsley and took the rag from his hand. “Clearly I’m not.”

Raising his hand to Kingsley’s neck, Søren began to unbutton his shirt. Soon Kingsley had been stripped naked and lay facedown across the table. The edge of the rough wood tabletop cut into his hips. Søren had removed his leather belt and now used it to show him just how little he thought of Kingsley’s theology.

And after the extended whipping, when the back of Kingsley’s entire body was raw with fiery welts, Søren showed him how little their differences in theology mattered to him. Two hours of pain and pleasure passed in a red haze. They both ended up on the now spotless oak floor of the hermitage—Kingsley naked and Søren still clothed; Kingsley smiling and Søren trying not to.

On the floor they lay next to each other, staring up at the ceiling. Kingsley reached between them and sought out Søren’s hand. He found it next to his hip and let his fingers rest against Søren’s. And although Søren had been inside him only a minute earlier, it seemed too much of a liberty to hold his hand.

“I think I’ll like it here,” Kingsley declared. “Hellhole…peut-être. But it’s our hellhole.”

Søren finally smiled.

“It is. And it’ll be better when we’re finished. We can bring out a clean cot and mattress from the school. There are dozens in storage.”

“The floor works.”

Søren shook his head.

“I might hurt you on the floor. I want you to be comfortable. And we may have to sleep out here some nights.”

Kingsley’s eyebrow twitched. “Have to? Or want to?”

Søren turned and faced him. “Either. Both.”

Kingsley decided that both was his new favorite word. A minute earlier he’d been too shy to take Søren’s hand. But now he rose up, leaned over Søren’s chest and kissed him. Søren did nothing at first, didn’t even respond.

“You Satanic Catholic—kiss me back,” Kingsley said against his lips. Søren laughed, but then gave in and returned the kiss, lazily at first, but then with renewed passion. In seconds he had Kingsley on his back once more. The rough wood bit into Kingsley’s skin, but he relished the discomfort, gloried in the pain. This was life. Pain, sex, fear, sin…he thought he’d died the day his parents’ bodies were cremated and their ashes put into jars. But with Søren he discovered a new life, a life that wouldn’t have been his had his parents not died.

“Please…” Kingsley begged. “S’il vous plaît. I want you...” He fell into French and out again as they kissed. He hungered for Søren’s body and the moment of union they always shared after the beating ended.

Søren pulled away and gazed down at him. He touched Kingsley’s lips.

“I can’t.”

With a sigh, Søren rolled onto his back. Side by side once more, they stared up at the ceiling—Søren utterly silent and Kingsley panting from frustrated need.

“You meant it. You can’t…” Kingsley let the words trail off. He thought he’d believed Søren that night he’d confessed that he couldn’t become aroused without inflicting pain first. But that kiss, that incredible kiss…no man could kiss like that without his body responding.

“No. Something broke in me a long time ago. I won’t ever heal. Can you forgive me?”

“Non. I mean, no, you aren’t broken. You’re different. I must be different, too, that I don’t mind, that I like the pain.”

“You are different.”

“Vive la différence, oui?”

“Oui,” Søren said, laughing softly. “Vive la différence.”

“Do you think…maybe…somewhere there are others like us? Or is it just in the books by de Sade?”

Søren exhaled. “I think there would have to be others out there like us.”

“Terrifying thought.” Kingsley smiled at the ceiling.

“Truly.” Søren seemed to relish the idea. Kingsley certainly did.

“I’ll find them someday,” Kingsley decided then and there. “And I’ll give them to you. You can have a thousand people at your feet whenever you want them.”

“I wouldn’t need a thousand.”

“Just one, then. We should have a girl, you and I. If only for variety.”

“A girl would be nice.”

“Mary or Mary Magdalene?” Kingsley asked with a devilish grin.

“Mary Magdalene, of course. I’ve always found her the more interesting of the Marys.”

“And what will our Mary Magdalene look like?”

“She can’t be blonde,” Søren said. “And she can’t look like you, either.”

“Somewhere in between us? She’ll be pale like you but with dark hair like me.”

“We don’t ask for much, do we?”

“It’s a dream. We can make her however we want. Let’s give her green eyes.”

“I prefer black.”

“Both then,” Kingsley said gamely. “Black hair and green eyes. Or perhaps green hair with black eyes.”

“She sounds lovely. What is she like?”

“Wild.” It was the first word that sprang to Kingsley’s mind. Søren seemed to be so controlled, so cold and restrained. He should have someone warm and wild to balance that out.

“Wild…yes. Untamed,” Søren suggested.

“But not untamable. Otherwise she’ll run away.”

Søren shook his head. “She will run away, I’m sure. She wouldn’t be truly wild if she didn’t.”

“But she’ll come back?”

“Yes…she’ll come back. She wants us to tame her.”

“At least we’ll tell ourselves that,” Kingsley said, rolling onto his side and caressing Søren’s neck and collarbone.

“She’ll be wilder and more dangerous than both of us together.”

“I adore her already. But I promise I’ll share her with you,” Kingsley pledged.

“You’re giving her to me, remember? I’m the one who will share her with you.”

“Of course. Forgive me. She’ll be yours and you’ll share her with me, because no one man will ever be enough for such a girl as her. And the three of us shall be a new unholy trinity.”

“God help us all.”

“He’ll have to, with such a girl as this.”

“She sounds perfect.”

“She’ll be as perfect as we are.”

“Poor girl. What should I get you in return for such a gift?” Søren asked as he took Kingsley’s hand from his neck and laid it on his stomach.

“Rien…nothing. I have all I want.”

“That’s not true. You were saying earlier how much you missed your sister.”

Kingsley sat up and looked down at Søren.

“Oui. Mais…she can’t afford a visit. Both of us…neither of us…we have no money.”

Søren raised his eyebrows and gave Kingsley an arrogant half smile that sent his stomach dropping into his groin.

“I do.”

NORTH

The Present

Kingsley stood for a solid hour in his shower, letting the hot water and the steam soothe his aching body. They weren’t quite doing enough for him. He’d either have to give in and soak in the bathtub or ingest a Vicodin and vodka cocktail. Or both.

Both.

He’d wanted this pain, prayed for this pain, he reminded himself. For thirty years he’d craved this pain like a starving man craves food. And he’d been fed pain tonight—a feast of pain so bountiful he’d nearly choked to death on it.

Looking down at his feet, Kingsley saw the water turning from red to pink and then clear again. Søren had been particularly thorough with him tonight. His poor Eleanor—she really had no idea the level of violence her beloved was capable of. Søren kept himself in check with her. He had to. Only five foot three and one hundred twenty pounds at the most, she earned her pet name “Little One.” At the height of her career as a Dominatrix, she’d been deceptively strong. He’d made her strong. A little girl like her had to be strong if she wanted to compete with the other, more physically intimidating Dominatrixes on the market. What she’d lacked in height and weight, she’d made up for in strength and uncommon viciousness. Others of her kind balked at the dark fantasies their clients laid at their feet. If Nora balked she never let on. She only grinned and said, “I’ll do it…if you’re a good boy.” And they were all good boys if they paid enough.

But no amount of personal training could change the fact that Nora Sutherlin was a woman and fragile. At least compared to him. And when Søren gave in finally and beat Kingsley, he held nothing back.

Kingsley turned off the water and grabbed his plushest, softest towel. Even it felt like salted sandpaper against his raw, bleeding, welt-covered back. Maybe he would simply go to bed wet and sleep on his stomach. But lying on his stomach would be something of an issue, as well. Kingsley looked down the front of his body.

“Good God,” he breathed as he saw the mass of bruises his abdomen and thighs had become. God, even his…

A wave of vertigo struck Kingsley as he studied his ravaged body. Welts and bite marks were the least of the damage. He’d seen an intruder attacked by his rottweilers who’d ended up less brutalized than he appeared right now. It would take weeks for the worst of the bruises to heal. They covered his body in deep black whorls, marbling his skin from neck to knee. He feared sleeping. Tomorrow morning he knew he’d barely be able to move. Søren had destroyed him more completely than the night he first took his Little One to bed. Kingsley had tended to twenty-year-old Nora for a week after that night—icing her bruises, rubbing ointment into her welts, picking the shards of glass from her feet and bandaging her bloody skin. She hadn’t cried. Not once. Not even when she’d woken up bleeding onto the sheets. More than not crying, the damn girl had even smiled. Smiled like only a woman in love could. Kingsley hated her for that, for not shedding a single tear no matter how much she suffered. Søren had broken her body the night she’d lost her virginity to him, but he hadn’t broken her spirit. And Kingsley had to respect her for that no matter how much he envied her Søren’s wounds.

But now the wounds were his.

Kingsley nearly stumbled on his way to bed. Rarely did he ever sleep alone. His town house was never without a beautiful boy or girl more than willing to act both as his company and as his pillow at night. Now he wanted nothing in the world more than to be alone. He would lie in bed and get as comfortable as he could. And he would bring to mind over and over again the memory of what Søren had done to him only hours earlier. Even now images flashed across his mind’s eye.

Hands on his face…his neck…his back against the wall…the sound of fabric ripping…the touch of teeth on his sternum…fingers digging into his throat…the leather on his back, his thighs…hitting the floor with his knees…salt on his tongue…sweat on his stomach…his arms aching from the cuffs that held him immobile on the bed…and the penetration, so necessary and brutal... He’d closed his eyes at one point and wasn’t sure he’d ever open them again.