“We’re observing today. Why don’t you take a seat?”

I walk to the back of the leather couch but I don’t round to the front. My fingers curl into the soft material, and I lean in to support my weak knees. ”I’ll stand.”

Chris steps to my side. “Have it your way. You’re about to witness a group playroom feeding live from another area of the mansion.” He lifts a remote he’s picked up somewhere and the screen comes to life.

I gasp at what I see. There is a masked, na**d woman tied to a pedestal in the middle of a stage, while an audience—all masked as well--sits in observation.

A man in leather pants is circling her, and I think he is holding a riding crop. It fits a description I remember from one of Rebecca’s journal entries, but I can’t be sure. He’s teasing her, flipping her ni**les with the leather end of the crop, back and forth. She is moaning and passion is etched on her face. Pleasure. She feels pleasure, and to my dismay I can feel my body responding, the warm heat spreading in my belly.

The crop moves lower, and I see that it is flat with some sort of leather strings. It caresses her belly and between her legs. He steps closer to her, rubbing the leather in the V of her thighs and tugging on one of her nipples. I am suddenly wet and achy and embarrassed. The woman moans and the man stiffens and does not seem pleased. He steps back from her, no longer touching her with his hand or the crop.

He walks around her and stops behind her. And then to my dismay, he smacks her hard with the crop. I jump and gasp. He keeps hitting her, fast, and oh God, it seems so hard.

I turn to Chris. “He’s hurting her.”

“This is what she craves and he’s trained to know her limits. If it’s too much, she says her safe word and he stops.”

A chill goes down my spine at his intimate knowledge of what is happening.

“Watch, Sara.” It’s a command, low and tight, and unforgiving. “You need to understand that this is where Mark wants you.”

But this isn’t about Mark. It’s about Chris and it’s that knowledge that makes me turn back to the screen.

Another man is on stage now, and he’s holding some sort of cane. I suck in a breath as he hits the woman and her body bows forward. “Stop!” I yell and I whirl around and Chris’s arms close around me. “Enough. I’ve seen enough.” This was so much more, too much more, than the journals. “I want to leave. I want to leave now.”

Chris stares down at me, but he doesn’t turn off the feed. I can still hear the woman screaming. His expression is hard, his eyes cold in a way I’ve never seen them. “Now do you see why I wanted Mark to know you’re off limits? Why I said I was protecting you?”

I stare at him, tracing the lines of his handsome face, looking for the tender, laughing man I know, but I cannot find him. “It’s Mark’s club, but you’re a member.”

“That’s right.”

“Do you…beat women?”

“It’s not beating, Sara. It’s a form of pleasure. It’s helping someone get the high they need to be satisfied.”

My stomach knots. “And you know how to do that?”

“Yes.”

“And you like to do it?”

“I understand the need.”

“What need? How can you need to feel pain?”

“It’s a drug. A way to feel nothing else.”

“Are you saying that you like to feel pain?”

“Need Sara, not like, and not like in the past.”

“What does that mean?”

“There was a time when it was all that got me to the next day.”

“And now?”

“Not as often.”

“You let a woman tie you up and do that to you in public.”

“No. I stick to private rooms.” The calm I have managed to keep fades away. I push against him. “I want to leave.”

He holds me steadily. “You mean run away?”

“Damn it, Chris, you said I could go when I wanted to.”

He slides his hand around my neck, pulling my mouth to his. “And you said you wouldn’t run.”

“I just…I need out of this place, Chris. I need out of here now.”

He steps back from me abruptly, and pain radiates off of him and some part of me burns to go to him, to hug him. To tell him I think I might love him, but I can’t compute the man I’ve come to know and the man who is a part of this place.

“Please take me to my car.”

I watch him, his expression steel, his eyes still icy, and I feel him closing off from me. Or maybe this time, it’s me withdrawing. I am a mess, shaking inside and out. He hits the remote and turns off the screen, tossing it to the ground, then motions to the door. He doesn’t touch me and the walk down the hall is eternal. I don’t look at the men in their suits, unwilling to see the mockery surely in their eyes. Soon, we are in the dark car again, and the silence stretches thick and heavy between us. I am numb, unable to form coherent thoughts. I’m in a haze when Chris pulls his car behind mine.

“Come home with me,” he surprises me by saying. “Come home with me and give me a chance to explain, Sara.”

My chest has never hurt like it hurts now. “I can’t be what you need.”

He turns to me, and he starts to touch me, but he hesitates and lets his hands drop. “You are what I need. You make me feel alive, Sara.”

The use of my own words tightens my throat and a burn starts in the back of my eyes. I study him, search his face. “Can you truthfully tell me you will never need pain again?”

“This is new to me, Sara. That lifestyle has been my drug of choice. My way of feeling nothing. But I do feel now. I feel with you and for you. What it did for me it can’t do for me anymore.”

It is everything I want to hear and yet not enough. “But you can’t know you will never need that…place again.”

“Whatever I need you can give me.”

I shake my head. “No. No, I can’t.” I reach for the door and he grabs my arm. Heat races through me and I feel a sudden need to touch him, to feel him close. It overwhelms me, confuses me.

“Please don’t run, Sara.”

We stare at each other and something snaps between us. I don’t know who moves first but we come together in a hot, searing kiss, and the feel of his hands lacing into my hair touching me is everything I need and not enough.

I am panting when he presses his forehead to mine. “Come home with me.”

It would be so easy to say ‘yes’ but I am confused and uncertain. “I can’t think when I’m with you, Chris. I can’t think and I need to think.”

“I leave in the morning.”

“I know.” And I don’t want him to leave, which is a testament to how messed up my head is right now. I want space and time, but I want him with me, too. “I…think that gives me some time to process. I need…time.”

He pulls back, searching my face through the shadows of the dark car. “Okay.” His hands drop from me, and I am cold and lost without his touch.

Okay. He’s letting me go, and I know it’s what I’ve asked for, but it still hurts. I fumble for my purse and briefcase, and they are tangled in my feet. Chris helps me and I manage to slip both straps over my shoulder.

He reaches for the coat but I don’t want it. I need out of the car before I change my mind. I shove open the door and stand on wobbly knees, closing Chris inside behind me. All but running, I rush toward my car, clicking the lock and climbing in.

Once I’m inside, I turn on the engine and tear out of the parking space. The minute I’m on the road, driving away from Chris, the tears start to fall. I swipe at them, trying to see the road.

By the time I walk into my apartment, I am a mess. I lock the door and slide down the wooden surface and explode into tears. My phone beeps with a text message and I don’t look at it. Blindly, I push to my feet and find my way to a hot shower.

I have no concept of how much time has elapsed when I retrieve my cell phone and curl into a ball in the bed. Steeling myself for a message I am sure is from Chris, I glance at the screen.

Please let me know you are home safe. Then ten minutes later. Sara. I need to know you are okay. The messages continue until the final one, five minutes before. If I don’t hear from you soon I’m coming to check on you.

I’m fine, I type and drop the phone onto the mattress, but I’m not fine at all.

***

The next morning I barely pull myself out of bed and when I glance at the clock, I know Chris is gone, in a plane, headed to another city. I have a week to think, a week to miss him. A week to get my head on straight. I’m drinking coffee when I begin to think about what he’d said. Give me a chance to explain. The memory hits me like a cannonball, shaking me to the core. He craves pain so he doesn’t feel other things. What other things? Deep down is a growing certainty that there is far more to Chris’s past than I know. What has he endured and how can I judge him when I have no idea how horrific it might be?

I walk to my bed where I’ve laid out my black skirt and beige blouse, but a sudden need to be close to Chris sends me to my new suitcase, where I pull out the final dress from my gift bags, a cream-colored dress with a flare to the skirt.

When I open my front door to depart, I freeze at the sight of a large yellow envelope, with my name written in Chris’s handwriting. My heart squeezes and I reach for it, opening it with eager, unsteady hands. I stare at the drawing inside, unable to catch my breath. It’s a black and white draft of me, na**d and leaning against the window of his apartment, the brilliant lights of the city behind me. Attached to the drawing is a piece of paper that reads — You are all I need.

I drop my head to the paper, and fight the burn in my eyes. “Oh Chris,” I whisper. I love this man. Logic is screaming it’s too soon to feel such a thing but my heart has won this battle. And I am almost certain Chris is going to rip my heart from my chest before this is over, and yet, I can’t wish him away.

***

I arrive at work and for the first time since the club, worrying about facing Mark, only to hear from Amanda that Mark is off site for most of the day. It is the best news I can get; the space that allows me to regroup.

Needing something other than Chris and Mark to think about, I dive into my work, starting with a call to Ricardo from my cell phone. He answers immediately. “This is Sara McMillan from the Allure Gallery.”

He rambles in Spanish and I’m fairly certain every word is not a nice one. “I do not have time for this call, Ms. McMillan.”

“I have a client who wants a private viewing of your collection. He adores your work as so many of us do.”

Silence. “You admire my work?”

“Immensely. I was at the charity event and hoped to meet you. It would have been an honor. I would be thrilled to do so now.”

More silence. “Come to my private gallery Wednesday evening at seven o’clock. If I feel you are competent then I’ll invite your client to the next meeting.”

“Excellent. Yes. Thank you.”

“Do not bring Mark, Ms. McMillan.” He hangs up.

Mark. Not Mr. Compton. An uneasy shiver goes down my back, and I worry that he and Mark have a private club connection.

My cell phone buzzes with a text while I’m holding it and I click on the message to read, I don’t want to miss you but damn it I already do. Don’t run, Sara.

I inhale against the emotion in my chest and know I can’t promise him I won’t. I miss you, I type, and God, it’s so true.

Then come here and be with me.

I can’t. You know that.

I wait for a reply and wait some more. Finally I get a simple, I know. I know? What does that mean? It feels important to me to reach out to him somehow, to send him the message that I am here, I am trying to understand.

I wet my lips and type. But I wish I could.

He doesn’t reply and I don’t know what to think.

Lunchtime comes and I rush to the apartment building where Rebecca had lived, only to be told they can’t give out private information, and Rebecca no longer lives there anyway. I’m not going to let it discourage me. I’ll find another way to reach Rebecca. Visiting the club with Chris has me thinking about how easily Rebecca could have gotten into something too deep, too intense, and ended up hurt. My determination to find her is renewed with a new, fearless vengeance.

I stop by the coffee shop hoping to find Ava there and just outright ask her the name of Rebecca’s boyfriend. She’s out of town again. I spend the rest of my lunch hour calling through random numbers I’ve found in Rebecca’s phone directory getting nowhere. I decide to go the storage unit and dig around after work since it will be early when I get off.

By late afternoon, I haven’t heard from Chris and it’s driving me crazy. I have no idea Mark is in until he pokes his head into my doorway. “Mary is in the bathroom throwing up and I’m headed out to another meeting. I need you to work late.”

“Yes. Okay.”

“Good.” He is gone that fast.

I check the times the storage unit is open and I’ll have an hour to dig around if I leave right at eight.

***

I arrive at the unit at eight-fifteen, and I still haven’t heard from Chris. It’s making me crazy. He makes me crazy and I’m ready to throw myself into searching Rebecca’s unit for answers, hoping this makes me feel like I’m doing something worthwhile.

The instant I park and stare at the concrete building with orange doors, I remember how much I hate this place, but remind myself this isn’t about me. It’s never been about me. Rebecca is missing. I don’t believe for a minute she’s on vacation and ditched her apartment and left all of her things behind. It makes no sense. Why store her items? Still, doesn’t the unit infer she made an active choice to leave, and why am I still not buying that?