Nora smiled at the memory of a long-ago journey through Europe they’d taken together. An anniversary gift from Kingsley.

“We’ll always have Belgium. And what was her name?”

“Odette.” Søren opened the box that held her collar.

“Oh yes. That was it. She was fun, wasn’t she?” While in Belgium, she and Søren had toured a little brewery and had met a beautiful Swiss translator named Odette. During the tasting, Odette had flirted shamelessly with them both—she and Søren had dueled over who knew more languages. Søren won, but just barely. After the tour, Odette had come back with them to their hotel room in a renovated castle. Nora had been young then, only twenty-four, and had never been that intimate with a woman. Søren hadn’t touched Odette, but he’d certainly enjoyed watching the two of them together that night.

“You’re smiling, Little One.” Søren brought her collar around her neck and locked it on. While his fingers were at her throat he toyed with the necklace she wore always these days. It had three charms on it—two rings engraved with the words Everything and Forever and a small silver locket Nico had given her as a token of his adoration. They made a gentle clinking sound like tiny wind chimes when she moved.

“Good memories,” she said. “So many good memories I’ve forgotten some of them.”

“Speaking of memories, I have a gift for you. A gift in memory of something.”

“You don’t have to give me anything,” she said, keeping her eyes low, respectful, submissive.

“I know,” he said with that touch of arrogance she’d always loved and loathed in equal measure. “But it was time I gave you this.”

He held up the bundle still covered in its fabric wrapping.

“What is it?”

“You’ll find out. But you have to earn your gift first.”

“It’s not a gift if I have to earn it,” she reminded him.

“Then we’ll call it a ‘prize.’”

“How do I earn my prize?”

“Trial by fire.”

“You are in a mood tonight, aren’t you?” she asked. “Sir?”

“Do you accept the challenge?” he asked, his eyebrow cocked, his smile tight but amused. She was thirty-eight years old, and she had loved Søren since she was fifteen...and yet...after all this time he could still scare the shit out of her.

God, she loved him.

“Yes, sir,” she said. “I want my prize.”

Søren cupped her face again, kissed her lips again.

“I already have my prize.” He kissed her on the forehead.

She stood unmoving and made no protest as Søren stripped her naked. He unbuttoned her blouse and slid it off her arms. Under her shirt she wore a black corset, which he took an unnecessary amount of time unlacing. The more eager she was to have him inside her, the longer he took getting there. Her own fault for falling in love with a sadist, not that she regretted it. He unzipped her leather skirt and pushed it over her hips and down her legs. His fingers on her bare skin as he unhooked her stockings set her to shivering, even more when he tickled the bottoms of her feet as he pulled them off.

If she hadn’t loved Søren before, she would fall in love with him again for looking at her thirty-eight-year-old body with the same desire that had once gazed on her naked seventeen-year-old form. She’d never suffered from a lack of self-esteem and had, more than once—rightly—been accused of being egotistical. A woman who took money from men for the privilege of letting them worship her had to have more than her fair share of confidence. But finding herself so much closer to forty than thirty had taken a little getting used to. Time had only increased Søren’s beauty. The gray in his hair could barely be distinguished from the blond. The years had sharpened his features, scraped off the rough edges, and sculpted him into a man worthy of all the respect and love she had to give him. She had an older man to adore and a younger man who adored her.

Life was good.

“Someone’s quiet,” Søren said as he lifted her off her feet and laid her onto the bed on her back. The linen sheets tickled her, made her aware of every nerve in her body. “Are you nervous?”

“I was thinking about tomorrow.”

“‘Do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry about itself,’” Søren said.

“Yes, Father Stearns. I’ve read Matthew, too.”

Søren set a basin on the nightstand by the bed and soaked a small white towel in the water.

“Good. Now stop worrying and hold still while I set you on fire.”

Nora held still.

Fire-play wasn’t so much about pain as it was fear. Fear and its mirror twin—trust. She closed her eyes while Søren painted her stomach with an ice-cold gel that smelled of rubbing alcohol. He took each of her wrists and buckled them one by one to the headboard with leather cuffs.

Søren lifted the candle off the bedside table and moved it slowly up and down her body six inches or less from her skin. When he inflicted his sadism on her, he did so intently, with respect for the act and respect for her willingness to serve him. Playing with fire was dangerous and it was rare when Søren asked her to submit to this sort of edge-play. She knew him. When anxious, troubled or under stress, he centered himself with sadism. He could pretend he wasn’t worried about tomorrow, but she knew better. It was on his mind as much as hers.