“I want you to hurt me,” she said. “As much as you want, sir.”

“You say that, but you don’t mean it.”

“I mean it.”

Søren slapped her.

Eleanor started. In openmouthed shock she stared at Søren. She raised a hand to her cheek. It burned.

“Now do you still want me to hurt you as much as I want?” Søren asked. The question wasn’t a question but a gauntlet thrown down. This is me, Søren was saying. Take me or leave me.

She took him.

She held out her hand, and Søren took it. For one second she thought she saw relief in his eyes.

He led her to the bedpost. A large trunk sat at the foot of the bed next to her calves. Søren turned a key and opened the box. Inside it she first saw nothing but more sheets. He lifted the sheets and from underneath them pulled a set of white leather cuffs. He stood and took her right hand. He pressed her palm to the center of his chest as he locked the cuff around her wrist. He did the same to her left wrist. After she could only marvel at the sight of her hands in the cuffs. So this was what love looked like? Now she knew.

“Say your safe word.”

“Jabberwocky,” she said.

“Good. At any time you can tell me if you need to stop. Tell me what you need and your request will be honored. Say your safe word only when and if you need me to stop everything. You give yourself freely to me. I would never force it on you.”

“I know, sir. All I want is to please you tonight.”

“You will. You already have. I will flog you first, cane you after. I won’t slap you again.”

“You can,” she said. “I think I liked it, sir.”

Søren dropped a kiss on the back of her neck.

“If you’re good. I’ll tie you to the bedposts after. I want you faceup during sex tonight for the first time. I will give you as much pleasure as I give you pain, perhaps more.” He pressed against her back. She felt him unbuttoning his shirt. She pushed back into him, needing his skin against hers.

“What is your favorite sort of pain to inflict, sir?”

“Cutting. Nothing arouses me more than someone who will bleed for me.”

“I’ll bleed for you, sir.”

“On the bed, when I’m inside you, you will, yes. That is enough blood for one night.”

Eleanor knew he referred to her virginity. She wanted to give him more. She would give him more.

He pulled a short length of rope from the trunk and weaved it through the buckles on her cuffs. He turned her toward the bedpost and secured her arms high over her head. She stretched out, breathing into the position, feeling exposed from her ankles to her neck. She couldn’t move her hands, couldn’t run away. Leaving him was no longer a choice. She couldn’t if she wanted to. She never wanted to.

Søren ran his hand over her back, touching every inch of skin. No one existed but her and Søren. The world had begun the moment she stepped into his bedroom. It would end when she left it. Everything outside his bedroom door disappeared into nothingness. She didn’t miss it at all.

The first blow of the flogger landed between her shoulder blades. Her back exploded in pain. She almost laughed from the shock of it.

He struck her again. Breath exploded from her lungs. Then again and again the flogger landed, sometimes in the same spot over and over again until tears filled her eyes. She could never guess where the next blow would fall. After fifty she stopped trying to guess. After a hundred she didn’t even care. It stung brutally, and her skin burned like fire. More, she wanted. More. Let him burn her to the ground. Let her rise again from the ashes.

The flogging ceased and Søren pressed his chest into her bare back. She cried out as his heat scalded her raw skin.

“Too much?” He slid his hands up her sides and cupped her br**sts. He teased her ni**les and now she groaned in pleasure. He’d become the master of her body already. Tied up like this she could give herself neither pleasure nor pain, nor any sort of release or relief. All sensation came from him and him alone.

“No, sir.”

“You want more pain?”

“I want all the pain you want to give me, sir.”

With her arms tied to the bedpost she could only see in front of her. Søren pulled something else from his trunk. She couldn’t see it, but she could guess from the sound of the air being sliced in two. When the cane contacted with the back of her thighs, she screamed. She didn’t mean to, but the pain pushed the sound out of her. Søren paused as if waiting for her to object, to ask him to stop. If he waited for her to ask him to stop he’d be waiting all night.

He struck her again.

A third time.

A fourth.

She’d never known pain like this pain. She’d never known strength like the strength she summoned to endure it. And soon she no longer endured it, she enjoyed it. The pain became a game to her. How much could she take? How much could Søren give? He enslaved her with the pain. No one would suffer this willingly, so if she suffered it, it must be because he owned her and could hurt her like this. And yet she’d come here of her own volition. And a single word could stop him. He owned her for the same reason. It made no sense, none at all, and yet her body understood. She knew her body understood because Søren dropped the cane onto the floor and wrapped a hand around her hips. He pressed two fingers into her and sank deep into her wetness. She’d never been this intensely aroused in her life.