“More Beethoven?” she asked.

“The Moonlight Sonata. I can’t complain Beethoven didn’t write a piano part for his Ninth Symphony. He did give us pianists the Moonlight Sonata as a consolation prize.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“So are you.”

Eleanor took a deep breath.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Of course, Little One.”

“Are you as nervous as I am?”

He exhaled heavily. “I haven’t done this since I was eighteen years old.”

“So you are nervous?”

“Not at all.”

“Me, neither,” she said and meant it.

Søren dipped his head and her lips trembled against his. She hadn’t lied. She didn’t feel a moment’s nervousness. Only peace and desire as if this moment had been waiting outside her door her entire life and at last she could let it in.

She reached behind her head and pulled out the pencil she’d used to hold her hair back in a loose knot. Søren smiled at the pencil lying on her palm.

“You’re so certain you’re going to pass this test tonight?” he asked her. She laid the pencil on the piano by the candle, thrilled Søren remembered their long-ago talk about how she’d take only a pencil to the tests she’d knew she’d ace.

“I plan on blowing the curve.”

They kissed again, kissed through their smiles.

“Stay,” Søren said as he pulled away from her.

She waited on the piano bench as ordered. From now until the end of time this would be her life—Søren giving orders and her taking them. She would wait when he said wait and where he said wait and she would not move until he told her she could move.

Søren returned to the living room carrying a large ivory basin, a glass pitcher of water and a small white towel.

Her heart caught in her throat when Søren knelt on the floor in front of her.

“Søren, please don’t—”

“It’s Holy Thursday. This is what priests do on Holy Thursday.”

“Why?”

“Because Christ washed his disciples’ feet on the night of the Last Supper.”

She’d struggled with what to wear tonight, struggled until she remembered it wouldn’t matter. If she’d shown up in torn rags, Søren would still love her, still want her. And she’d be naked any moment anyway. She’d dressed in jeans and a sweater. Underneath she wore white lingerie that Kingsley had paid for and Sam had picked out. As weird as it was to get lingerie from Kingsley and Sam, she couldn’t fault their taste. Even if it was weird, she liked that. Life would be weird from now on. She was the mistress of a Catholic priest who was the best friend of the king of an S&M empire. Life was weird and wonderful and all she could say to it was Amen, Amen.

So be it.

Søren took her right foot in his hand and she shivered at the gentle touch. As he poured warm water over her feet, she sighed from the heat. So this was love? She tucked this feeling in her heart and hid it there. Someday she would write about this moment. She would write a book about a girl who fell in love with a god and then, to her complete surprise, discovered the god loved her back. Since he couldn’t be a man she would be a goddess and leave the mortal world behind for him.

He poured the water over her left foot and dried both her feet with the towel. Not even kneeling at her feet diminished Søren in her eyes. His long eyelashes cast shadows on his cheeks. One mutinous strand of hair wanted to fall over his forehead. She pushed it back and Søren pressed his cheek into her hand. As much as she railed and fought against waiting this long, she now understood why it had been for the best. They met each other as equals tonight. Her submission meant more because she chose it freely instead of letting the law or their age difference or anything in the world impose it on her.

Søren stood up and took her in his arms. He lifted her off the piano bench and carried her upstairs. She’d never been in his bedroom before, and it didn’t disappoint. It seemed a sacred space to her, the room where Søren slept. The white sheets covered the bed like a new-fallen snow. The dark wood of the four-poster bed appeared to her like the trunks of trees—strong and eternal. She felt like a virgin sacrifice brought to an ancient forest. Blood must be spilled for the gods to be appeased. She offered her own blood tonight and would pour it like wine on snow.

A glass of red wine sat by the bed. Søren raised it and drank from the glass. He handed it to her.

“Drink. It will relax you.”

She drank as ordered.

“I will be as careful as I can be tonight.”

“The more pain I feel, the more you enjoy it, yes?”

Søren opened a box on the bedside table and pulled her white collar from it. He stepped behind her as she kept drinking the wine.

“Yes. But I can still enjoy myself without torturing you.”

“You don’t have to be careful with me, sir.” She inhaled as he locked the collar around her neck. She breathed into its grip.

“You are my most precious possession. I will guard you with my life.”

He took the glass from her hand and sat it on the table again. She stared at it, taking her eyes from it only when Søren sat on the side of the bed facing her.

Without a word, he ordered her to remove her clothes. She could do that now, read his wants and desires without requiring his words. He’d trained her well, trained her for this night. And so she obeyed without hesitation, pulling her sweater off and dropping it to the floor. Her jeans she slid off next. She unhooked her bra and stepped out of her panties. It had been like this once upon a time in Eden. A man and a woman in paradise with nothing between each other, nothing between them and God. It had been like this once, and tonight when they made love they would step one foot back into Eden and see what had been lost and what could be found again.