I can’t tell what feels heavier, my eyelids or my head in general. It’s been an incredibly long day, accomplished on an incredibly small amount of sleep, and the words of the manuscript I’ve pulled from my submission inbox are starting to blur together. We’ve been back in Seattle for five days, I’ve had four sessions with Flynn, and I’ve spent the past three nights tossing and turning or waking up in a cold sweat with Andrew Lincoln’s whispers still ringing through my head. Now that the flood gates have been opened, I don’t seem to be able to keep him out of my thoughts anymore. Or to stop myself from replaying that night in my head over and over again with such clarity that sometimes I feel like I’m still there. My nightmares are more vivid and terrifying than ever before. Drudging Lincoln up in therapy night after night is exactly as painful as I thought it would be. He seems to linger over me like a specter that I can’t escape. His shadow is everywhere, like the thick cover of clouds that persist over this city through the long, cold months of winter.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Grey?”

I jump slightly at the intrusion, then turn towards the door where Stevens stands with his knuckles still held against the metal door frame. His eyes aren’t focused on me, though. They’re pointed in the direction of the low groan and squeak from the newly placed chair in the corner of my office. Taylor turns away from the monitors on the desk in front of him and gives Stevens a once over.

Despite a very long discussion that lasted nearly the entire flight home, Christian fired Woods right after our return from New York.  I tried to argue that it wasn’t his fault he lost me at the hotel since I’d purposely sent him away so that I could get out undetected, but Christian can’t look past the fact that Woods didn’t even know I was missing until he got into my room, found it empty, and tracked Evan down to ask where I was.

You could have been kidnapped, he’d argued.

What if you’d been mugged or attacked in some back alley and left for dead? We wouldn’t even know you were missing until it was too late.

It’s a hard sentiment to argue when part of the reason I can’t sleep at night is the because of the time that very thing happened to me, but none of this was Evan’s fault and I made sure that even though he wasn’t with me, I planned everything that night exactly as Taylor would have. I wasn’t reckless or rash, I chose a public place where people knew I would be, and Luke was with me the whole time. But Christian was firm that he didn’t pay for security that could be thrown off with something as simple as, I’ll be fine, take the night off. So, while Taylor screen applicants for a replacement, he’s stuck with me.

“Come on in, Stevens,” I say, closing the open document on my computer and replying to the email it was attached to with a request for more pages. Taylor watches intently while he takes a few tentative steps into my office, but once he starts to settle down in the chair across from me, he turns back to the surveillance footage switching between Christian’s facility in Kent, GEH, my house, and the door to the street downstairs. I smile at Stevens to get him to relax. “I want to talk about your newest title.”

“I did everything you told me to do,” he says, immediately defensive. “You said follow the passion and my daughter loved Coburn’s first book. She was self published, she didn’t have representation for her next book, and I made her an offer. If that hasn’t panned out, then maybe what we really need to talk about is how your methods aren’t as great as you think they are…”

I take a deep breath, reach into the bin on the corner of my desk, and take out the report I pulled this afternoon. “I wanted to talk to you because it’s been twenty four hours since Coburn announced her book release on her website, and I have your pre-order numbers. I thought you should see them.”

His brow furrows as he reaches out for the paper in my outstretched hand, but as he starts to scan the data, the lines in his forehead smooth away and his mouth drops open.

“5,500?” he gasps.

“That’s right. Turn’s out your author had quite the following. You’re daughter’s not the only one who can’t wait for his next release.”

“But… but that’s more than The Black Rose.”

“Yeah, don’t rub it in.” He looks up at me again and, when I roll my eyes, his face breaks into a smile.

“You were right.”

“I’ll try not to let it go to my head.” He laughs and shakes his head with incredulity, but whatever he’d planned to say next is cut off when Taylor’s phone starts to ring and we both turn to look as he answers it.

“Taylor. Yes, sir.” Without a goodbye, he slips his phone back into his pocket, locks his system, and slowly rises from his chair. “Mrs. Grey, Mr. Grey is downstairs.”

An acrid taste creeps up into my mouth. Not because Christian’s here, but because of where he intends to take me. As difficult as my four solo sessions with Flynn have been this week, I know our joint session is going to be even more brutal. It’s one thing to have to relive your own trauma. It’s another thing entirely to have the person you love there to witness it too.

“Alright,” I breathe, thankful I manage to maintain my smile for Stevens’ sake. He hands the report back as he gets out of his chair and once I’ve filed it away again, I too lock down my computer and we all make our way out of my office.

“Thank you, Mrs. Grey,” Steven says, holding his hand out to shake mine. I glance down at it, then place my hand on the shoulder of his jacket instead.

“Call me Ana.” With a wink, I walk away and Taylor falls in line half a step behind me. He holds open the door to the GSP office, calls the elevator, and pushes the button for the ground floor while I send a quick text to Grace to ask how her afternoon with Calliope and Kennedy at the zoo went.

The air is cool and the shadows are long once we make it out of the building and I spot Christian’s car idling on the curb. Taylor keeps two fingers pressed against the inside of my elbow as he guides me across the bustling sidewalk and opens the passenger side door of the Maybach for me. It’ll be just Christian and I for the rest of the night, so I make sure to smile and thank him for today as I tell him goodnight and step inside.

“I don’t know, Grey…” a disembodied voice says through the speaker phone of the car. Christian silently reaches over to take my hand and kiss my fingertips, then signals his way back into traffic all without interrupting whoever it is he’s talking to. “This is my entire life’s work. I started building this company when I was twenty four years old. I’ve poured my blood, sweat, and tears into it.”

“I know, believe me. A business isn’t just products and profits, it’s years of sacrifices. It’s failures and it’s successes. It’s time away from your family and the things that you love. It’s your vision, and it’s not lost on me that your vision is what’s gotten you to where you’re at. I don’t want to take that from you, I want to partner with you. You and your team are just as valuable to me and my company as your technology.”

“So you’re telling me my people aren’t going to lose their jobs?”

“Sam, I’ve known you since I was sixteen. Your son went through YEC with me and you wrote the recommendation letter that got me into Harvard. You know me, and you know that I do not undervalue what your people do for this company.”

“Yeah… you’re right.” He sighs. “Alright, Grey. You’ve got a deal. I’ll sign the contracts and get them to your office before I get out of here tonight.”

“Great, I’ll make sure my assistant is there to receive them. We’ll talk soon, Sam.”

“Looking forward to it. Have a good night.” The phone clicks off, but Christian immediately pushes his finger back into the voice control button and instructs the system to call Ros.

“What can I do for you, mein Führer?” she answers.

“Charming, Ros.”

“Did you get the deal done with Eikhoff?”

“Yes, he should be sending the signed contracts over within the hour. Tell Barney he has thirty days to strip whatever we can use and integrate it into the system before we shuck the LLC.”

“Should I give HR a heads up for any transplants?”

“No, there won’t be any employee retention after 30 days.” My brows knit together and I blink over at him in confusion, but Christian’s eyes stay focused on the road ahead of us. “I’ll be unreachable for the next few hours. Andrea is waiting at the office for Eikhoff’s contracts to come in, so forward anything urgent to her and I’ll deal with it once I get home.”

“Alright. Enjoy the rest of your evening. Let me know if you happen to find $80 million dollars lying around anywhere.”

“Ros…”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good bye.” The call drops again, but this time, Christian’s hand doesn’t move to the button on his steering wheel. He reaches over to me and takes my hand.

“I’m sorry, I really tried to finish up before I left the office but it’s been a brutal day.”

“Yeah, I got your Google Alert.”

“Google Alert?”

I pull out my phone, and swipe down on the screen so I can review all the notifications I’ve ignored throughout the day. “Emergency Crews Dispatched to Grey Testing Site.”

He frowns. “Great. As if I didn’t have enough on my hands with public opinion.”

His hand untangles from mine and he moves as though he’s going to make another phone call, but before he can press his finger into the Bluetooth button, I quickly reach out and cover it with my own fingers.

“What happened?”

“It was nothing really. Just a… malfunction.”

“Another explosion?”

“No, nothing that serious. The safety features programmed in after the last malfunction all worked fine. We just need to fine tune a little before we start testing again.”

I take a deep breath and gnaw on the inside of my cheek. Christian’s poker face is perfect, so I can’t tell whether or not he’s downplaying whatever it was that happened. But he pulls into the parking garage near Flynn’s office before I get the chance to question him further and my mounting apprehension over what we’re about to go through pushes everything else out of my mind. When he finds a spot and shifts the car into park, it feels like a giant rock drops into my stomach.

I pull in a deep breath of air, and slowly let it out through my lips.

“Hey,” he says, unbuckling his seatbelt and turning to face me. His hand moves across my cheek and into my hair. “How was your day?”

“Fine. Taylor got me the big pickle from the deli on Union St. this afternoon.”

“He’s a good man.”

“He is. But he scares the shit out of half the people who work for me.”

“Good.” I roll my eyes, and Christian uses the hand on the back of my head to pull me towards him. At first, I think it’s just going to be a quick, passing kiss because we’re in a parking garage and running late. But as I start to kiss him back, his hands move so that his thumbs rest across my jaw and he can coax my mouth open. Once my lips part, his tongue slides across mine in a slow, but sensual rhythm. The soft caress melts away some of my misgivings. It pulls me into him, clouds the parts of my mind that worry over the imminent breakdown I’m about to have in therapy, and gives me one last moment to just bask in the feel of him. There’s comfort in his kiss, from which I can draw courage.

“You ready?” he asks once we’ve finally pulled away from one another.

I nod, but the gesture is only marginally stronger than the whisper I’m able to conjure. “Yeah.”

“Then let’s go.” We climb out of the car, and immediately reach for each other as we make our way towards the elevator. His hand is warm in mine and imbued with a strength that is obvious even when he’s gentle. There are few things in the world that bring me solace the way that Christian’s hands do, and I remind myself of that fact as that very same hand moves to my lower back and he uses it to guide me through the door of Flynn’s office.

“Good evening, Mr. Grey,” Flynn’s receptionist greets us. Her purse is on her desk, and her keys are in her hand, so I guess that she was waiting for our arrival before she left for the night. With sure fingers, she picks up her phone, dials a four digit extension, and lets Dr. Flynn know we’re here. Once she’s set the phone back down on the receiver, she smiles and slings her bag over her shoulder. “He’s ready whenever you are. Go on in.”

“Thank you, Clara,” Christian says. He turns to me and leans down to kiss me on the forehead, then takes my hands and walks with me through the double doors.

Flynn is already in the padded armchair he usually occupies during our sessions, though he’s too distracted flipping through a bound stack of papers in his hand to do more than offer us more than a half-smile as a hello. I realize only after I’ve sat on the couch across from him and cuddled up against Christian’s side that the stack of papers he’s perusing is my manuscript.

“Oh good, you got past the first hundred pages,” I begin, though my attempt at a joke comes out weak and shaky. “That’s a good sign that it’s not unreadable.”

“On the contrary,” he replies. “I think the story is lovely. It’s well written, romantic, smart…”

“Sounds like there’s a ‘but’ coming.”

He takes a breath, uncrosses his legs, and places the manuscript on the arm of his chair. When he leans towards me, his eyes glimmer with a kind of understanding pride that reminds me of my father. “It was shallow. And that’s fine, if that’s the story you wanted to tell. I really do think it’s well written. But I think you and I both know that this is not Escape. You poured your soul into that story. You took your pain, you laid it out, and you found a way to come out the other side through your characters. I felt that. This… I can’t feel you at all in these pages.”

“Focusing on the pain wasn’t what I needed when I wrote that. I thought it would be better to ruminate over love and… uh…” Words fail me, because they’re a lie, and I feel a rush of guilt. The truth is, he’s right. That book wasn’t the tool I used to work through what had happened me the way that I told everyone it was. It was an reprieve from it. An excuse not to think or feel. To lose myself in fantasy. The actual plot is so hastily thrown together and mechanical that I can’t even remember writing most of it. It isn’t filled with trauma, it’s a thing that exists entirely outside of it. Like a shield or dream.

“I couldn’t…” I whisper.

“Couldn’t what?” Flynn asks. My hand clenches Christian’s and I look over at him, holding my jaw painfully tight to keep my lips from trembling. He leans in close to me and rests his forehead against mine. The tips of our noses barely touch. I can feel his breath and the gentle, encouraging stroke of his thumb across the back of my hand.

“It’s okay,” he whispers, and after clearing my throat, I nod and turn back to Flynn.

“I couldn’t go through it again. I tried, but I couldn’t. Escape was incredibly painful to write, but I soldiered through because I wanted to. I wanted to think about Christian. I wanted to remember every second we had together and writing about him made me feel close to him when I was missing him more than I could ever admit to anyone. Writing about him gave me an excuse to love him from afar. It was worth it to have to relive the pain of what happened with Elena every single day to have that. But this is different. I don’t want to think about Lincoln. I don’t want to remember him and I certainly don’t want to feel close to him. He terrifies me and the only way I’ve been able to stop him from completely destroying me is to just take everything I feel about him and what happened, put it in a box, and pretend it didn’t happen. As long as I can do that, the box stays closed and he stays locked away.”

“That’s interesting,” Flynn says. “The box. Is that a visual technique for you? Putting your feelings away and pushing them aside?”  

I shake my head. “It’s a metaphor.”

“A metaphor for what?”

“I think of it like Pandora’s Box, the thing that holds all of the terrible things we’ve been through. Keeping them inside keeps them from overwhelming me. As long as the lid stays closed, I can keep myself stitched together so that I could be mother to my daughter. I can forget about the feel of him on top of me and his hands on my body long enough to be intimate with my husband…”

“Ana,” Christian says, shifting towards me and encasing me in his arms. It’s not a reaction I can control, but my body tenses and cringes away from his touch, and he releases me in an instant. I offer him an apologetic look, pleading for understanding with my eyes, then I look down at my hands and finish without facing either of them.

“Every time I talk about him, or even think about him, it’s gets harder to keep him inside.”

“And what happens if he gets out?” Flynn asks.

There’s a rattle inside of me, like a caged animal pitching and fighting against the metal bars of his prison. It makes my heart skip a beat. My chest gets tight. I have to concentrate to breathe normally. And a potent sense of dread moves over me like a total solar eclipse.

“Ana?” Christian encourages me.

“Then he’ll get what he wanted,” I reply, whispering through my constricted throat. “I can’t even tell you all the dark thoughts that went through my head right after it happened. I’m scared that if I let him out, he’ll overwhelm me and he’ll drag me down into the darkness with him until he destroys me.”

Christian shakes his head, then shifts and reaches over to rest his fingers against my jaw so he can turn my face to his. “No, he won’t. Baby, he can’t touch you. He can’t do anything to you. He is gone. You are safe. Calliope is safe. I’ve made sure of that.”

“You can’t hire security to protect me from him, Christian. The damage is done. The scars are already there.” My voice breaks, and I have to look up at the ceiling to stop the tears pooling in my waterline. “Sometimes it feels like everything that’s happened since that night is just borrowed time until the inevitable happens.”

“Don’t talk like that. Don’t let him do this to you. You are fine. You are here, with me, and life goes on every single day. You are an amazing mother, and you are absolutely everything to me. That is what is inevitable. Me and you. Lincoln is the past and we have so much to look forward to in the future.”

I nod, but return my gaze to my fingertips so he can’t see the hopelessness that still lingers in my eyes. It’s hard to hear the way he practically pleads with me to believe him, to see the desperate way he wants to make all of this better, and yet, to feel the same terror in my heart in spite of all of it. I want to be reassured by his words. I want to accept the safety he’s promised and return to the life I had before all of this happened. But I can’t. I don’t know how. And the longer Christian stares at me, trying to assure me that none of what happened matters anymore, the more the dangerous beast inside of me thrashes against his cage to prove him wrong.

I glance up at Flynn and find his eyes moving between the two of us with an interest that is more curious than diagnostic. He gives no sign that he has his own insights or sage words of wisdom to navigate us around this impasse.

“Aren’t you going to tell me that he’s gone and I can move on?” I ask.

“Will that help you?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I’m here. You’re the expert, remember?”

He uncrosses his legs, making the leather on his chair groan. “I think you’re giving Lincoln a lot of power, Anastasia.”

“Giving him power?” I repeat, almost in a gasp as I struggle to restrain my incredulity. “You weren’t there. You didn’t watch him walk over two bodies to take my daughter into his arms and have to sit there, helpless, and let it happen. You didn’t smell the smoke from the gunshots, or see Christian fall to the floor, or feel his blood pour out of his body with your hands. You didn’t have to hear him beg you to run, to leave him to die so that you could escape. You didn’t have to accept that you were about to be taken from your family and have unspeakable things done to you and that no one would be able to stop it. You didn’t have to be glad for it because you knew that the faster he got away with you, the faster he got away from Calliope and the faster someone would find Christian so they could save his life. That’s what I saw, and still see every time I close my eyes. In my nightmares, it’s still happening. All of that is inside of me and I can’t live with it. You can tell me I’m wrong for how I’ve handled everything since then, but I did what I did because I was drowning and locking down my feelings and going after the people I thought were a threat to my family was the only thing that made me feel like I could stop it.”

My voice breaks on the last word and I devolve into tears. Christian reaches forward to pick up the box of Kleenex from the table in front of us and as I yank two of the tissues free, Flynn picks up a notepad on his side table and jots down a few notes.

“I’m sorry,” I say, once I’ve regained control over myself again. He smiles and sets his pen down.

“Don’t apologize for your pain, Ana. It’s valid. I don’t mean to discredit what you’ve been through. You’re a survivor and whether it’s the violence or the sexual assault, you’ve experienced trauma that is clearly overwhelming for you. That’s normal. But I think your coping mechanism serves Lincoln more than it serves you.”

“I needed to feel in control of something. Finding the people who were involved with the conspiracy against Christian and making sure they couldn’t pick up where Lincoln failed made me feel like something real was being done. That it didn’t matter how long Carrick’s investigation was held up in city budgetary meetings, or that we had to fight to prove my father innocent when I watched Lincoln slaughter his own people right in front of us. I was protecting us, and as long as I could do that, I wasn’t unleashing Pandora’s Box.”

“But that’s exactly my point. I think you’re missing the key lesson the legend of Pandora’s Box is trying to teach, Anastasia.”

“And what’s that?”

“When Pandora opened her box, she released evil into the world, but do you know what she kept?”

“She didn’t keep it. She closed the box before it could escape…”

“But what was it?”

My lips mash together defiantly, but eventually I answer. “Hope.”

“Exactly. And it is hope that is all man has left to hold onto as we face the wickedness that she released. Hope is what stayed in the box, and so it is only hope that we have left. Putting Lincoln in a box isn’t locking him away, it’s holding onto him.” He reaches back to pick up my manuscript, then sets it on the coffee table between us. His eyes glow with warm encouragement. “I think you need to open the box.”

****

I leave the session in tears. Shaking. Needing Christian to hold me as he guides me past wondering eyes to the parking garage. It’s devastating, and not because Flynn has spent the last better part of our hour pushing me further past the walls I built around this than I’ve ever dared to let myself go before. It’s because I failed. I went as far as I could but just as we started to finally get somewhere real, I shut down. Something inside of me snapped close like a mouse trap and I wasn’t strong enough to pry it open again. I broke down into near hysterics and started hyperventilating. Even now, as Christian helps lower me into the front seat of the car, I can’t stop sobbing.

“I’m sorry,” I say, hiding my face in my hands in humiliation while tears continue to stream in hot, red streaks down my cheeks. He closes the driver’s side door behind him, then reaches across the center console and lays a flat palm over my back, dragging it slowly up and down the knotted line of my spine.

“Let’s get you home.”

I shake my head. “No. Can we wait a minute, please? I don’t want Calliope to see me like this.”

He nods and continues to rub my back in patient silence. His fingers trace soft lines up my neck and into the roots of my hair. He drags his hands through my long locks over and over again, each time letting the strands escape his gentle hold in a cascade of feather light touches over my back. With every pass, his touch soothes away the fear and the dread, until I regain enough control to choke back my tears.

“It gets easier,” he says. “After awhile, you say it so many times that it starts to lose meaning. It starts to feel like a recitation and you get further and further until eventually, you can say the whole thing aloud without wanting to run away from it.”

“Maybe I made it worse,” I choke out in defeat. “Maybe Flynn is right. Maybe putting him in a box really is holding on to him, and I’ve put so much into keeping him locked away that I can’t wrench him out anymore.”

His mouth opens, but words fail him. I can see an unnamed emotion shift uncertainly behind his eyes, and just before he answers, he lets out a long, burdened breath and nods as though he’s reassuring himself as much as he plans to reassure me. “Then maybe we can force him out.”

“What do you mean?”

His hand skims up to the side of my face, and his thumb brushes away the moisture from my cheeks. “Do you trust me?”

My answer is immediate and free of doubt. “Yes.”

“Then tell me your safe word.”

My brows knit together. We’re in a parking garage that’s still full and there isn’t much room for either of us to maneuver in the Maybach. He couldn’t possibly want to… not here…

“Red?”

“Is that a question?”

“Red,” I say more firmly. The hard knot in his throat moves as he swallows with determination and leans over to kiss my forehead.

“Remember that,” he tells me. Then he starts the car.

Pulling out of the parking garage, I assume that he’s taking me home to play out a scene similar to the one that got me out of bed all those months ago. But that proves to be wrong when he misses the turn for the street that would take us to the freeway. I stare through the window and examine the landmarks around us, trying to guess where he’s taking me. Once I figure it out, I wish I hadn’t.

“Christian, no!”

The low click of the turn signal doesn’t waver under my outburst and he navigates smoothly around the corner of Virginia Ave and into the parking garage under Escala. I grab onto the leather upholstery so hard my knuckles turn white. I’m beyond the point of shaking, I’m paralyzed. When the car stops, not a single part of me responds to the desperate cries of my brain to flee. Apparently fight or flight isn’t the only kind of natural panic response. My body chooses playing dead.

“We’re going to go upstairs,” Christian says gently, moving with the utmost care as he pulls the keys from the ignition and turns to face me again. I shake my head, though I’m not sure the movement is perceptible. “Your safeword is in play. If it becomes too much, you can leave at any time.”

“No, I can’t go up there.”

“This is the box, Anastasia. This is where you put him. You want to draw him out? Let him go? Come with me, and let me open the lid.”

I blink at him through wet eyelashes. “I can’t, Christian. Not here…”

“Yes you can. And I’m going to be with you the whole time.”

My fingers stay curled around the seat, and my limbs remain frozen. I feel completely inept. I can see his hope reflected in the smoky curls of his eyes and in the flushed part in his lips. But it changes nothing. I’m weak. Lost in grief. Afraid of a shadow that has a hold on me more real than I’d let myself realize.

And I hate it.

I hate that this is where I’ve ended up. I hate that this is what I’ve become. I hate every tear and every tremble of fear. I hate that it’s all because of him. That I’ve let him terrorize me to this point. That I’ve lost the girl who could face anything, who believed that good will always overcome evil in the end.  I hate that I’ve let him take her from me.

Christian’s right. This is how I take that back. I could go upstairs to where it happened and prove to him and myself that I’m not going to be weak anymore. That I am stronger than this. That I won’t let him have this power over me. That he can’t drag me down because I choose the light. I choose my family. I choose my life.

Except, I can’t move.

“Help me,” I whisper.

Christian tilts his forehead until it’s pressed against mine.  “Always.”

My heart thunders in my ears as he makes his way around to my side of the car and opens my door for me. His warm hand engulfs mine and pulls me up out of the car, into his side. I cling to him, breathing in his familiar masculine scent and letting it wash away my doubt and trepidation. In his arms, I can walk easily down the ramp to the lower level of the garage, but the second the elevator comes into view, my knees buckle underneath me.

“It’s okay,” Christian says. His hands tighten their hold on me, and my weight shifts onto him. He half carries me into the elevator, and when the doors close, I’m convinced I’d be on the floor if it weren’t for his support.

The voice that asks for the passcode sounds sharper than I remember. More sinister. The last time I’d heard it, I’d barely paid attention to it at all. I was too consumed with Christian’s wanton lips and touch to register something I’d reduced to background noise months and months before. But now that voice seems to echo through the small, enclosed space as though she were shouting. Christian enters a six digit code that I don’t even know anymore, and once I feel the shift of the clamps releasing and jolt of the car as it moves up the cable, I whimper and bury my face into his chest.

His arms twist around me like a protective barrier. I force myself to focus only on the feel of his lips on my hair, as though they have the power to erase everything around me. And maybe they do. It’s easier to silence the voice in my head screaming for me to turn around and to push down the rising panic from the depths of my stomach as long as I concentrate only on the gentle pressure of his kiss and the soothing words he whispers to me. I can even watch as the number over the door roll past until finally, they read 31 and a high ping sounds as the car starts to slow.

The doors roll back and Christian nudges me forward.

It’s cold in the foyer, which is different than I remember. This place had always been filled with the warmth of Christian that made it feel like home. But that’s gone now. There are no bright, welcoming flowers on the table in front of the elevator or inviting smells wafting in from the kitchen. There’s no golden glow from the chandelier or wink of flames in the fireplace just visible in the great room to coax me forward. Everything feels hollow, like an empty shell, and the echo of my heels over the marble as Christian pulls me further inside are punctuated by flashes of my memories of Andrew Lincoln’s footsteps ringing through my head so clearly I actually jump and look over my shoulder to make sure he’s not behind me. Once we get to the place under the arch between the foyer and the living room, my muscles seize and I can’t force myself forward any more.

“Almost, baby,” Christian encourages me. “Just a few more steps.”

“This is where she died,” I reply, my voice as empty as the room. I look down at the floor below my feet and recall the blood that pooled around our nanny as clearly as if it were still staining the immaculate marble. “This is where it started…”

“I know.”

I start to shake and the cold air of the room pricks at my lungs as though it’s full of needles. It’s dark, just like it was that night. But now that darkness feels ominous. Heavy, even. The apartment is filled with a tangible threat that makes the hair on the back of my arms stand up and has my heart thundering in my chest.  

“That’s where Luke got shot,” I say, nodding towards a spot only a few feet away. My eyes move into the living room, which is illuminated only by the moon and the lights of the buildings around us. It casts the sparse furniture in silver light that creates long, menacing shadows across the empty floor. The chair Gia had sat in that night is gone, but the couch she’d segregated Christian and I to while she cradled Calliope in her arms still stands in exactly the same place. “That’s where we were.”

“Yes.”

I look to the window, which has been replaced since that night as it had been shattered by a stray bullet. “That’s where Gia died, and Kommer. That’s where he grabbed me, and where you… where you…”

The words cut off as my throat gets tight and my lungs fail under the pressure. I pant and tighten my hold on Christian, worried my legs will give out. The room around me starts to spin, the corners of my vision darken, and a high pitched sound rings through my ears. But just before I devolve into a full blown panic attack, Christian turns me towards him and looks deep into my eyes.

“That’s what you see. Do you know what I see?”

My lips tremble around my response. “What?”

He moves me back a few paces, until I’m standing right over the place I’d fallen over Ava’s body.

“This,” he begins, “is the place I stood the first night you came here. After your very first session with Flynn when you wouldn’t let me touch you and you left without kissing me goodbye. I stood right here for a long time after I watched you leave. It was the first time in two years I let myself hope.”

“You did?”

“Yeah.” He tugs me forward a few paces, to where Luke had fallen. “This is where you were standing the night you came up here to get the key for your apartment downstairs. I was there, at the piano, and you stood right here in a black dress that hugged every curve of you in a way that made me want you so much it hurt. That was the night we made love for the first since you left me.”

I can picture the scene he describes perfectly. The way the moonlight highlighted the contours of his arms while his fingers moved with a skill I remembered oh so well over the keys of his piano. The way my tongue went dry at the sight of his bare chest and yearned to taste his skin. I can still hear the soft melody of the song he played.

I take a deep breath and, as I let the memory swirl through my mind, I find that it isn’t met with resistance.

Christian’s fingers lace tightly with mine, and when he walks forward into the living room, I’m surprised that my body doesn’t fight against him. My legs have regained their strength. My knees have stopped shaking. I move willingly and a small, but noticeable amount of the burden I’ve been carrying with me all this time falls to the floor and dissipates into the air like smoke.

“This is the couch I bought after you told me my empty apartment freaked you out,” he says, smiling now as he looks down on the white fabric with an almost longing kind of nostalgia. “And it’s the place I spent my first sleepless night up with Calliope. I sat there with her swaddled in my arms, praying she wouldn’t start crying again and wake you up.”

He moves again, to a few paces shy of the window.

“This is where we danced on my birthday the first summer after I got you back. Over there is where Kate sat when I showed her your engagement ring for the first time. We spent our wedding night right there in front of the fireplace. Up those stairs is where Calliope’s first bedroom was. That hallway leads to my office where I used to sit at my desk and dial your number every morning, praying you’d answer and give me the chance to fight for you. And down that way is first bedroom that was ever ours.” He stops and faces me again. His hands hold me with a tenderness that washes away the cold and once again lets me bask in the sunny heat of his love. Like that beach in the Maldives or the fireplace in the cabin in Vermont. Like the soft sheets and down comforter on the bed in the other room where I told him I wanted to be his forever. Where we committed ourselves to each other and let go of all of our hurt. He steps closer to me, his face hovering over mine so that his lips are a mere breath away. “This is the place we built our life together, Anastasia. That and the hundreds of other single, perfect memories we made here is what I see. He can’t touch that. And he’ll never be able to take that away from us.”

I take a deep breath and turn so that my back is pressed into his chest and my eyes can scan the room without caution. The memories we’ve made here together come back to me, slowly, like half forgotten dreams. I sat there, covered in blood, while Lincoln’s eyes hungrily devoured me from across the room. But I also sat there with Luke through countless movie marathons. With Kate and a glass of Chardonnay every time Christian went out of town. That’s where Christian made love to me before I left for my final year at Harvard.

I step out of his embrace and start to pace, focusing on each and every place in this apartment tainted by Lincoln’s memory and willing the happier times to overcome him. To drive him out. To make him disappear. And to my surprise, it works. I feel the burden of him lift away more and more with each happy memory that transcends him. But halfway between the wall of glass and the kitchen, I stop and my eyes find a crack in the marble floor. There’s a divot in the stone that’s been ground out and re-polished, probably by Elliot from when he and Kate lived here. I doubt anyone else would even notice it now. But I do. And I remember exactly how it got here. It’s what remains from the bullet that moved through my husband’s body and nearly took everything from me.

“What about here?” I ask, eyes fixated on the imperfection in the marble. “What happened right here?”

Christian slowly moves up behind me and places each of his hands on my exposed arms. I turn to look at him, waiting for his answer, but when it comes, it’s not what I expect.

“This,” he says, and he leans down to kiss me. His lips are gentle, as soft and inviting as they’ve ever been. His hands cradle my face and his body pushes into mine. I can lose myself in the silky brush of his tongue over my lip and the way it moves against my own once he’s granted access to my mouth. Then his hands move down and his nimble fingers work to undo the buttons at the front of my blouse. With three buttons left, impatience wins out and he yanks the remaining fabric apart, sending the last plastic rounds tinkling down across the floor.

I press my mostly exposed chest against his and kiss him harder. He reaches back to unhook my bra while my hands pull at the knot in his tie, loosening it just enough to pull out of his collar and over his head. It means our lips are forced to part, but the moment they do, he bends down for my breast. I groan and let my head fall back, pushing my nipple into his eager mouth while the tips of my hair dance languidly against the naked skin at the base of my spine. A ripple of pleasure moves over my entire body, leaving trails of goosebumps over my arms and the tops of my thighs.

“Christian,” I gasp when his teeth sink down into my over sensitive nipple. He eases the sting with the massaging suckle of his lips and a long lick of his tongue. Then he swivels his face back and forth across my breasts, into my cleavage, and begins to leave a wet trail of kisses down the shallow, defined line along the center of my stomach. Both hands move up to cup and knead my breasts, so once he gets to the waistline of my slacks, I quickly reach down to undo the fastening myself and shimmy them down my legs. When I begin to roll my panties over my hips, he looks up at me and his satisfaction over my eagerness is clear in his eyes.

It’s quite the scene. Me standing in the middle of the living room, drenched in moonlight. Exposed before the city. My panties stretched tight between my legs and Christian on his knees with his face between my thighs. But the most amazing part of it all is that that is all I think about. We’re standing in the middle of where it all happened, and as I look down into my husband’s eyes, I’m no longer standing over the place I almost lost him. I’m standing in the middle of our first home, indulging in the happiness that we’ve experienced here. Together.  

I grab onto his hair while I writhe over his tongue, and let the heat he draws out of me melt away the last of the anxiety still pulsating through me. I’m quickly and entirely absorbed in the feeling of his mouth pulling and sucking and massaging the most sensitive parts of me, and yet… there’s clarity too. Perhaps it’s levity. Perhaps it’s just distraction. But as the tides of a powerful orgasm begin to rise within me, I no longer feel the shadows of the apartment like living and menacing things. I find familiarity in the quiet, fortitude in the memories of the life we lived here, and solace in the pleasure of my husband’s mouth.

When my orgasm begins to fade and I come crashing back into reality, panting and shaking at the knees, Christian pulls me down to the floor with him and covers my body with his. His knees rest at my sides while he sits up to pull the half unbuttoned shirt over his head and fishes through the opening in his trousers to pull out his erection. I reach up and wrap my arms around his neck so I can draw him back down to me. Our lips meet. Our tongues entwine with each other. And then he slides home. All the way. Every single inch of him, in one slick motion.

“Oh god!” I moan, arching my back up off the cool, stone floor and into his naked chest. He takes hold of me, his strong hands pulling me tightly against him while he kisses me and nudges my legs further apart with his.

His eyes never leave mine. My body grips him with hot, wet friction that’s heaven and home all at once. My breathing comes harsher and harsher with each thrust, interweaving with the small cries and moans of pleasure that roll out of the deep parts of me that only he could ever reach.

There’s nothing left but him. The sound of his grunts and moans. The taste of his mouth and sweat beading over his skin. The smell of sex. The apartment, Lincoln, dark and terrifying memories… none of it matters. Not while I have him in my arms. Not while we still have this.

And in that moment, as welcome heat and pleasure starts to swell inside of me, I have an epiphany. All this time I’ve been afraid that, despite his death, Lincoln had still won. That he’d done enough damage to leave me mortally wounded and I would never recover. But this is what he wanted to destroy. The bond between Christian and I. And even after the deceit, the secrets, the fear, and the hurt… that’s the one the thing that came out of this undamaged. Because I love him as much today as I did before. More even. And as we lie over the place where the very worst had happened, making love with one another, he proves to me that he feels the same. That nothing has changed for him. That the shadows that feel so threatening inside these walls can’t touch what exists between him and I. And that is what protects me. Not Taylor. Not Woods. Not Luke. That is how Christian keeps me safe when no one else can.

He’s the keeper of my soul.

I cry out as I’m overwhelmed by a second orgasm and Christian tumbles right down after me, pushing as deep as he can while he pours his release inside of me. The release is cathartic. It takes with it all that’s left of my pain and leaves only my new found sense of peace.

When we eventually leave the apartment and make our way back home, the box is open.

Lincoln is gone.

And I am free.

Next Chapter

I don’t notice that we’re travelling without security until we’ve reached our destination. The expensive looking sports car Christian helped me into at the hotel didn’t feel out of place despite the fact it could only accommodate two. I guess I assumed our security team would follow us in the SUV, but when we make it to the venue for Daves’ party, no one meets us at the entrance of the building.

“Where are Taylor and Woods?” I ask after we’ve stepped into the elevator and Christian has pressed the button for the rooftop bar.

“We don’t need them,” he says curtly. “You’re with me.”

I stare blankly back at him, unsure of how to react. This is the man who was so concerned about my safety that he’d assigned me a security detail for years without my knowledge. He hired three CPOs to be with me at all times just last year. Some of our worse fights have been over my disregard for their necessity…

And then I remember what he said to me last night.

I can protect you, Anastasia. Better than Sawyer. Better than anyone.

I hang my head, my worst fears confirmed. Nothing was resolved last night after all. We’re not fine.

“Christian, I’m sorry about Luke,” I tell him for the dozenth time. “I really do–”

“Stop,” he interrupts me, keeping his eyes focused on the steadily rising number over the door. “Not here.”

My breath catches, almost as if the chill is enough to freeze the air in my lungs. Nervously, I start to chew on my bottom lip, thinking  about his promise back at the hotel. His darker, kinkier predilections have always excited me. Enticed me. Turned me into a carnal creature not only willing, but actually desperate to do anything and everything for his pleasure. For mine. But as I taste the energy flowing between us, I find that my excitement is overcome by something else.

Anxiety.

“Christian…” I begin, but the moment his name crosses my lips, he’s on me. I feel the wall of the elevator at my back in the same second his lips come crashing down on mine.

“Did you doubt him, Anastasia?” he snarls into my mouth. “When you let him take you away from my security team to confront people who could be our enemies, who could want to hurt you? Did you worry where Woods or Taylor were with him?”

The words are an accusation, but my body is too consumed with his touch to pay any mind to his vaguely threatening tone. He’s planned it that way. He can play my body as adeptly as he plays the piano, and he uses that against me. His teeth pull at my bottom lip too harshly, and when I whimper, he soothes the bite away with a deep, soft kiss. His hands dig into me one second, then massage me the next. The juxtaposition of pain and warm pleasure create a reaction inside of me that I can’t control. My senses are heightened, my skin more sensitive, and the muscles between my legs clench with sweet anticipation. He knows my body better than even I do, and I’m putty in his capable hands.

I take a shaky breath. “You can protect me, I know that.”

“Good.” Soft fingers trail up the side of my arm and tug lightly at the sleeve of my dress. “I’m very aware of what’s under here and I want you to know that I’m thinking about it. I will be, all night. While you schmooze and mingle, I’m going to be standing by your side, holding your hand, and imaging what it’s going to look like later when it’s covered in my come.”

Holy fuck.

The elevator pings and the car slows to a stop. Christian leaves one last, chaste kiss on my lips, then takes my hand as the doors pull open and leads me out into the cool June night, not even giving me a chance to catch my breath.

I press my lips together as we meld into the crowd and try to shake away the kinky, sex-tinged thoughts that seem to fully occupy my mind. It’s difficult. My breasts are bare against my dress, so every slip of the soft fabric caresses my nipples, and the tightness of the straps wrapped around my body feels too much like bondage for me to forget.

Stay focused, Ana. You can do this.

 

The party is beautiful. There’s just enough light to illuminate the trees against the outer perimeter and make navigating the crowd of tables and people manageable. The bar is busy, the music is good, and the city looks down on us from every direction. Daves is standing on a podium near the railing, delivering the speech I listened to him give at least fifty times over the last few days.  

“There she is,” I hear Scott whisper with relief. Christian and I turn in his direction and find him standing off to the far side with Carmen and a few people I don’t recognize, but who I assume work in the New York office. I nod in their direction and as Daves’ speech comes to a close, Christian leads me toward them.

“Carmen,” I say, reaching out to shake her hand first. “Great party.”

“Yeah, it didn’t turn out so bad.” She smiles back, then turns to Christian. “And you brought Grey. I didn’t realize you were in town.”

“Last minute trip,” he replies. “You look great, Carmen. As always.”

“Awh, flattery is not going to make me forget that you stole ‘Sure Connections’ right out from under me this week. That one stung, Christian.”

“Business is business. You know that.”

She sighs, but nods. “So I suppose now that you have connectivity under control, you’ll be expanding your state project off the west coast?”

“Yes, but not with ‘Sure Connections.’ Their technology is slow and outdated. I plan on stripping it’s resources and selling what I can.”

“What? Sell it? You fought me for SC for six weeks, Christian!”

“And you told my wife that I asked you not to hire her. You had to know I wouldn’t let that slide.”

The indignace on Carmen’s face vanishes, replaced by blank shock. Her mouth actually drops open and it takes her several seconds to recover. When she does, her back goes straight and her deep brown eyes turn black. It’s a look I’ve seen before, the carefully controlled sense of power. The CEO. And it’s mirrored on my husband’s face right now.

“What do you want for it?” she asks.

Christian smiles. “You know what I want, Carmen.”

“Not going to happen, Grey.”

“Well…” He shrugs. “Enjoy your weak signal output.” Carmen rolls her eyes and takes a drink from her flute of champagne, while I scramble for a way to erase the animosity building between them.

“Christian, have you met Scott?” I ask, grasping at straws. “He’s my New York counterpart.”

“Yes, I’ve heard,” Christian says. Scott grins and takes his outstretched hand.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Grey. Ana here has told me so much about you, I feel like we’ve already met.” His gaze shifts to me. “You sure are a lucky man.”

“Yes. I am.” Christian takes a step closer to me, wraps his arm around my waist, and kisses my hair. To the casual observer, it might have been an innocent show of affection, but I know better. It’s a claim, which may not fully resonate with Scott, but it does with me. And suddenly my mind is filled with the images he’d conjured back in the elevator. The same images he promised would be going through his mind all night. When I turn to look at him, I can see the promising glimmer in his eyes that tells me he’s kept his word.

“I’m glad Ana was able to drag you out tonight,” Scott continues, oblivious to our silent exchange. “I know how hard it is to get Emily out to these kinds of things. She thinks they’re dull.”

“It’s a party for a book that’s not even out yet,” the woman standing on Scott’s right says. “No one’s even heard of The Black Rose before.”

“But they will,” Scott says, through clenched teeth. “Things have to be built before they blow up.”

The woman shrugs and takes another sip of her drink, looking bored, while Scott takes a deep breath. I look between the two of them with confusion.

“I’m sorry. Do you work at GSP NY?”

“Oh, god no,” Scott answers for her. “This my wife. Emily, this is Anastasia Grey. From Seattle.”

“Wife,” I repeat, hoping the word doesn’t sound as shocked to everyone else as it does to me. She gives me a tight smile and holds out her hand.

“It’s good to put a face to the name,” she says. “Scott talks about you all the time.”

“Does he?” Christian asks.

“Of course,” Scott says. “Ana here has made quite the splash at Greenwich. You should be proud.”

“Very proud. My wife is the most incredible woman I know.” Christian turns to me and brushes my hair from my shoulder. His hand trails down my back, lower and lower… down to what’s his. And with the slight, but noticeable, emphasis he put on the word ‘wife’, I can’t help but think to myself that he might as well have just peed all over me for all his efforts to mark his territory.

“I’m going to get a drink,” he says. “Thirsty?”

His hand begins tracing over my behind, and the fabric of my dress is just thin enough that I can tell the pattern isn’t random. He’s tracing letters. M-I-N-E. Over and over again.

I can’t tell if it’s a declaration, or a promise.

And I can’t tell which of those possibilities it is that’s making my knees feel weak.

“Yes,” I croak, then clear my throat to hide my hoarse response. “Please.”

He smiles. “Don’t wander off.”

I nod, but his eyes stay fixed on Scott as he walks away. Scott smiles back, though I’m not sure if he’s trying to be friendly, or taunting him. Either way, he’s biting off more than he can chew with Christian. I’m still trying to swallow what he’s given me just tonight.

Christian. Swallow. Lingerie. Shit!

Focus, Ana!

I take a deep breath and turn to Carmen, who also watches my husband walk away, though with a different kind of interest.

“I’m sorry about that,” I tell her. “If I had known that you two were… I wouldn’t have brought him.”

She smiles and lets out a small, patient laugh through her nose. “Don’t worry about it, Ana. I knew who you were when I hired you, and despite the optics, Christian and I are actually old friends. He’s ruthless, but so am I. And I know that what goes on between GEH and GC has nothing to do with your value at GSP. In fact, I wanted to offer you my congratulations. I saw your numbers for your branch’s latest release. It’s outstanding.”

I smile. “Thank you. But I have to give the credit to my team. Jacki has worked extraordinarily hard on this project and I think we’re seeing that reflected in sales.”

“Well whatever you’re doing, keep it up. We might just have to bring some Seattle to New York, right Scott?”

“Absolutely.” He tips his glass in my direction and I immediately begin to analyze his tone and body language. Never before has he been able to accept Carmen offering me praise without some sign of bitterness or resentment, but this time… he actually seems genuine. Maybe our talk this afternoon was real. Maybe he really does want to move forward as partners. Maybe I was overreacting back in the office.

Except I can still feel the heat of Christian’s MINE on my behind…

“Here, baby,” Christian says, coming up behind me and offering me a flute of champagne. I take a sip and am surprised. Normally, the champagne at these kind of parties is watered down and dry, but I find that, in this case, I enjoy the crisp flavor as much as the feel of the bubbles tickling my tongue.  

“Delicious. Thank you, my love.”

“Of course.” He pulls me close and lowers the volume of his voice so that only I can hear him. “If I were you, I’d drink that quickly and get another. You’ll need it later.”

“Will I?” I ask, but he doesn’t return my playful tone. His eyes cloud over. “What?”

“Nothing.” He turns me so that his back is to Carmen and Scott, and I’m shielded from their view by his body. “I was just thinking about holding this glass to your nipples and watching them harden through that dress.”

He tilts the glass towards me, but I hold my fingers up to keep the cool glass away from the silk fabric over my breasts. “The scene isn’t supposed to start until after we’ve left. You’re not playing fair, Christian.”

“I never do.” He cocks his head to the side, and blatantly stares down at my chest as if he’s mulling over a complicated decision. “Maybe instead I’d pour champagne over them and clean it away with my tongue…”

“Christian.” Again, the muscles deep inside me clench, and his face breaks into a victorious smile.

“Look at that. It seems I don’t need the glass after all.”

I look down to see the outlines of my hardened nipples through the fabric of my dress, and groan. This damn bra!

“Fuck!” I hiss, and Christian takes my chin in his fingers.

“I don’t want to stay long.” I nod and drain the champagne still in my hand, but when I turn for the bathrooms, he stops me and hands me a small wooden box. “Take this with you.”

“To the bathroom?”

“Yes.” His voice is firm and even though I meant it when I told him the scene hadn’t started yet, I react to the command as if we were already in our a room alone and he had me on my knees.

“Yes, Sir,” I whisper back, then tuck the box into my purse and weave my way through the other guests to the bathroom.

I figure the best bet for my sensitivity problem is to just fill the openings in my bra with tissue paper to create a barrier between my nipples and dress, but the fabric is too thin for even a single layer of tissue to go unnoticed. The bathroom is empty besides me, a miracle for a party this size, so after several minutes deliberation, I do the only other thing I can think of, despite how humiliating it will be if someone walks in. I press the button on the hand dryer, and dip my breasts below the warm bursts of air.

By the grace of god, I get away with it.

Once I’m sure that the dress situation is under control and I’m not going to walk back out into a party filled with Gallagher Corporation execs looking like Jennifer Aniston in a season five episode of Friends, I pull the box from my bag and ease back the hinged lid.

Two silver balls connected by a small, black string lie on a bed of velvet and just the sight of them makes me wish I had a spare pair of panties.

The first time I wore these was on a jet ski in the middle of the sound, and they’d wound me up so tight, I practically dragged Christian to our bedroom to have my way with him. The second time was Paris…

My train of thought stops.

Paris.

God, what I’d give to be in the place now that we were then. Before the lies. Before the hurt. Before I had to wonder what his intentions were when he got me alone. Truthfully, I shouldn’t worry. I know that. He’s never given me reason to worry before and he’s not the one who’s changed here. I have. I’m the one who got us here and I’m going to have to be the one to get us out.

With shaking fingers, I reach into the box and remove the balls. I shouldn’t wear them. I’m already wound up so tightly I could explode, and I still have to get through the rest of this evening before he takes me back to the hotel and fucks me six ways from Sunday. But if we’re going to move forward, he needs tonight. He needs to control me. And this is part of that.

I grip the balls tightly in my hand, and duck into the closest bathroom stall.

 

The party is in full swing when I emerge from the restroom. Daves corners me on my way back to Christian and asks to introduce me to several of his author friends, most of whom express to me over and over again their disbelief that Walter got the Anastasia Steele to represent his title. There are a few critics and journalists in attendance who ask about my next book, but I easily divert their questions back to The Black Rose. By the time I’m able to escape, Scott and Emily have already left, Christian and Carmen have retreated to a table near the bar, and the balls inside of me have done their job so well, I don’t know that I’ll make it back to the car, let alone our hotel room.

“I’m just surprised,” Carmen says as I approach and pick up the extra glass next to my husband. “I didn’t realize you were so passionate about clean energy.”

“I’m passionate about innovation. This isn’t just about clean energy, it’s about unlimited energy. Accomplishing what was previously thought to be impossible.”

“Oh I know your line, Christian. Your media blitzkrieg has made it all the way to New York. You’re really putting in the hours to get people to buy into this stuff.”

“That’s my PR team. This project is so much more expensive than we anticipated and the only way I’m going to be able to continue funding it is if I’m able to get the Mayor and city council to sign off on significant tax breaks. To get that, I need public support.”

“And a father in the Mayor’s office.”

“Ah, if only it were that easy.”

Carmen laughs and takes another drink. “Well, I think it’s a noble idea, but I also think you’re an idiot.”

“Really?”

She nods. “Don’t you realize what will happen if you pull this off? Eliminating the need for combustible fuel will eliminate the need for the corporations who make that their business. The Saudis, Exxon, BP, Halliburton… You prepared to take them on too?”

“I’m not worried about oil companies.”

“Don’t let your confidence in the technology make you a fool, Christian. This won’t be like stealing a tiny fiber optics company from me. These people will come for you, by any means necessary. Just a few years ago, there was a man named Howard Cook who used to run a company out of LA that focused on clean, renewable energy. He even got a patent approved by the USPTO. But right before he was able to start production, he was indicted for fraud and his company was torn apart and sold for pieces. Who do you think paid for the lawyers to investigate him?”

“Sinopec, 2011. And the technology his company patented was bought by Chinese oil barons, who have invested millions into keeping it buried. I know all about Howard Cook. He was clown and I won’t repeat his mistakes.”

“Alright, if you’re sure. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“Oh, believe me, Carmen. I’d never accuse you of not offering unsolicited advice.” She laughs, and Christian empties his glass before turning to me. “Are you ready?”

“Yeah,” I practically beg. Carmen smiles as Christian places his hand on my lower back and, after a brief goodbye, he leads me back through the party towards the elevators. I do a quick scan of the crowd for Walter and find him laughing and toasting before a crowd of admirers. Our eyes meet and I’m able to give him a very proud smile before stepping into the elevator.

The moment the doors close, Christian’s arms wrap around me from behind. “And now…” he says, his low, seductive voice trailing off as he leaves a trail of kisses down the slope of my neck. I hum my pleasure back to him, and push my body into his, relieved to finally be here. The soft touch of his lips and the heat of his breath on my windchilled skin make the ache between my legs unbearable. I no longer feel the chill of the night air, my body is flushed with heat.

“Christian,” I say in a soft, needy breath.

“My love?”

“What were you and Carmen talking about?”

His lips don’t stop as he replies, and his hands continue to move freely over my dress. “The fusion project.”

“I know that. I meant, about people coming after you…”

“No one is coming after us, Anastasia.”

“But that man, the one the oil companies came after?”

“They found proof he was overstating company profits and defrauding investors. That’s not going to happen to me.”

“Just because you haven’t committed fraud doesn’t mean they won’t find another way to come after you.”

“And I’ll be ready.” His hand slides up my stomach to cup my breast and my head lolls back on his shoulder as I’m flooded with endorphins.

“You’d tell me if there was anything to worry about, wouldn’t you?”

He lets out a harsh sigh and his hands fall away from my body. I turn and watch him back into the wall and place his hands on the railing. The lust in his eyes has been extinguished, replaced now with irritation, and I don’t understand why.

“I just want to know,” I tell him. The elevator jolts as it stops on the bottom floor, and once the doors slide open, Christian pushes off the back wall to exit.

“Well there’s nothing to know.”

He stalks past me, leaving me to follow behind in his angry wake. He hands the ticket for our car to the valet and then leans against a pillar to check emails on his phone. He doesn’t even so much as look at me the entire time we wait, and the car is silent after we’ve pulled through the drive and out into Manhattan traffic.

“I wasn’t going to do anything,” I say, staring at my hands. “If that’s what you’re worried about. I told you I was done with all the scheming and I meant it.”

“You really think that’s the part of this that’s driving me crazy? You don’t think I understand going to extremes to protect our family?”

I shake my head with dismay.  “I told you I was sorry about Luke. I shouldn’t have been sneaking around with him behind your back, and I wish I could take that back, but I wasn’t unfaithful to you, Christian. You have to believe me…”

His jaw twitches. “Tell me he’s nothing and all is forgiven.”

“No it won’t, because it would be a lie and you know it.”

“Then pick up your skirt.”

“What?”

“Pick up your fucking skirt, Anastasia.” His eyes flash to me, a menacing warning, and I hurry to reach down for the hem of my dress. My body slides down in the seat so I can lift the fabric up over my hips, leaving my barely there panties exposed.

He reaches down between my legs and presses on my clit through the lace. It moves the silver balls back and forth, and I clench. Another press, and I gasp. He repeats the motion over and over again until I’m soaking wet and ready to come, but just before I do, he hooks his fingers under my panties, reaches inside of me, and pulls the black string so that the balls slide out of me and into his hand.

The promising heat vanishes the second they’re gone.

“Clean these,” he says, dropping them into my lap. I look around for a napkin or handkerchief, but find nothing.

“With what?”

He looks over at me, and his eyes move down to my lips. I swallow and look down at the glistening silver spheres in my hand. He watches intently as I slide the first one into my mouth, tasting myself on the metal. I suck hard and swirl my tongue over the smooth surface, then do it again with the second one.

“Good girl,” Christian praises me as I hand the balls back to him. He tucks them into the pocket on the inside of his tuxedo jacket, and I turn to look through the windows, hoping to see some landmark that will give me an idea how close we are to the hotel where I’ll finally get the release that was just robbed from me.

“Wait… This isn’t the way back to the hotel.”

Christian shakes his head. “No, it isn’t.”

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.” I frown and turn to look out the window at the passing buildings and side streets I’ve never seen before. We drive out of the business district, then the residential areas… Traffic soon thins out until it’s almost non-existent. When we finally pull over and Christian takes the keys out of the ignition, the block we’ve ended up on is completely deserted. It’s not the kind of place I would imagine Christian choosing as a destination. There are no restaurants, hotels, or bars. Not even a dive. Most of the businesses on the block seem to be boarded up, except a bail bondsman a few doors down from where we’re parked, and a pawn shop across the street.

“Don’t move,” Christian tells me.

He climbs out of the car and I turn in my seat so I can watch him walk around to my side. When he opens my door, I take his hand and let him pull me out onto the sidewalk, but while his fingers stay entwined with mine, he doesn’t move. I jump slightly at the sound of the car door slamming behind me, and the resulting echo up the deserted street, while Christian steps close to me, his body only just not touching mine.

“Mmm,” he hums with contentment, sliding his hands over the sides of my neck and up into my hair. I can feel his heat wash over me when he leans down and presses his lips to mine with a warm affection that feels familiar and comforting in contrast to everything that’s happened between us over the last twenty-four hours. I move my hands up over his arms to trace the lines of his biceps, which are stark and impressive under my fingertips even through his jacket. There’s an undeniable, yet dormant strength to every line on his body. A  tantalizing and sensual juxtaposition to the gentle touch of his hands and lips that bring goose bumps to the surface of my skin. “I love you, Anastasia.”

“I love you too,” I breathe back, entranced by the feel of his lips still brushing ever so lightly against mine. He smiles, then takes my hand again and tugs me towards the double doors directly behind us. There’s lettering on the glass that’s too peeled and faded for me to read, and the small entryway inside is flooded in florescent light that highlights the yellowing linoleum floors. We step through one more door that’s heavier and closes with a loud clunk, then make our way to a desk on the other side of the room. There’s a woman sitting there, seemingly so engrossed in whatever she’s typing that she doesn’t even look up as we approach.

“Good evening,” Christian says.

Her eyes move up, but her fingers don’t stop. “Do you have an appointment?”

“Odysseus.” She nods and looks back down at her computer screen again, and while we wait, I find myself pondering Christian’s response. Odysseus. The Greek king whose epic journey to get back to his love after being torn away by war is quite literally the stuff of legends. And Penelope, the wife who remained faithful to her king despite her many suitors. I’m not sure if the comparison is comforting or worrisome.

What is this place?

“Ah, here you are,” the woman says, and instantly her cold, aloof demeanor vanishes. She smiles when she looks up at us and finally pulls her fingers away from her keyboard. “You’ll just go down this hall, through the door at the end, and down the stairs. They’ll take your key there.”

“Thank you,” Christian says, and again, he takes my hand and tugs me away. There’s nothing in the hall he leads me down that offers any clues to where we’re going, but I assume it’s something big when we go through the door and find a hulking man waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs.

“Key,” he grunts. Christian reaches into his pocket, removes an intricate, golden skeleton key, and passes it to the man, who I can only assume is some kind of security or bouncer. He slides the key into the lock on the door, and turns it with a click. Christian moves me in front of him as he opens the door and I take a bracing breath before step inside.

The first thing that hits me is the music. It’s low, but bass heavy. Not something I would associate with anything on the radio, which makes me think Christian hasn’t brought me to a trendy nightclub. The room is fairly dark, illuminated only by different colored strobes and spotlights that seem to create just as many shadows as they eliminate. It takes a few seconds for my eyes to adjust, but when they do, I go numb.

I never saw the inside of Kink back in Seattle, but I’ve thought of it enough that my mind has created a whole picture for me. I’d imagined stone walls with wooden furniture meant to restrain a submissive rather than make her comfortable. I thought the room would be lined with devices for torture and pleasure I wouldn’t be able to name. I believed that it would feel skeezy and predatory. The room before me, is none of that.

It could be an upscale lounge. The main floor is set up like a grid. Each seating area makes up a square about ten feet long by ten feet wide, and the smooth, black leather sofas they contain are recessed into the ground. The white stone walkways between each section reflect the lights moving over them well, adding color and a sense of whimsy to the overall ultra modern design. There’s a bar at the back that is illuminated so that it glows like ice. Nothing here seems vastly different from the club I was in the night before, except the people.

Everyone here is in various states of undress. Full suits, pleather bodysuits, lingerie, and several women who are completely nude. In many of the booths, there are people actively having sex while their neighbors carry on conversations over martini’s as if they’ve simply found themselves here with friends after a long day of work and there’s nothing out of the ordinary going on around them at all. There’s one particularly intense orgy taking place off to our right, but when I look away my eyes fall on another couple performing something I imagine to be very painful in front of two enraptured audience members.

“Don’t stare,” Christian whispers into my ear. “Watching is participation and only those who have been invited are allowed to participate.”

“How do you know about this place?”

“You think you’re the only one with Gresham’s phone number?”

I shake my head, grateful to know he didn’t come here with Elena. “No, I guess not. But, you’re not going to… not in front of all these people. Are you?”

“Voyeurism is not my thing, Anastasia. What is under this dress is mine, and mine alone.”

“So, what are we doing here?”

“There are private rooms in the back.”

“Good evening.” We turn and find a woman in a tight black dress smiling at us. Her makeup is overdone, but in a beautiful way. With her black hair piled on top of her head and her exaggerated black eyeliner, she looks like she’s just walked off a photo shoot for a pinup calendar. “Welcome to Sadique. Your room is ready, if you’ll follow me.”

Christian nods, then leans in as the woman turns to lead us past the bar. “Walk behind me.”

I take a step back and fall in place a pace behind him. There’s so much to look at all around me, but I force myself to stare at Christian, or down at our intertwined hands. A hundred questions bounce around my mind as we’re led down a dim hallway lined with doors in the same way as a hotel, but only one seems to stick.

What is he going to do?

“Alright, before you go in, I just have to get a statement of consent from both of you,” our guide tells us. “Do you acknowledge that anything that takes place in this room is fully consensual and that you haven’t been coerced into coming here tonight against your will?”

“Yes,” Christian says first.

“Yes,” I repeat.

“Good. Then I’ll leave this with you.” She hands Christian a key that’s similar to the one he used to gain entry to the club before. “If you need anything, just press the green button by the door and one of our staff members will assist you. Play safe, you two.”

She smiles as she moves past us, but Christian doesn’t wait for the clacking sounds of her heels to disappear up the hallway before he reaches down to unlock the door.

“Ready?” he asks, hand on the knob. I nod through my mounting nerves and hold my breath when he pushes the door open and steps to the side to let me pass.

This room is everything I imagined Kink to be. The walls are deep red instead of stone, but all the tools are in place. The room smells of fresh leather, so I assume everything here is new, but that also means that everything here is at Christian’s disposal. The belts. The whips. The rack of canes. There are metal instruments with sharp edges and clamps that make me cringe with pain just looking at them. Will he use those?

“Make yourself comfortable,” Christian says, walking past me. “There’s a bathroom there if you need it.”

“Are you going to punish me?” I ask, and he stops. He turns back to face me, but his expression is unreadable.

“Yes,” he says at last.

I start to chew my bottom lip. “Are you going to hurt me?”

“Do you think that’s something I would do?”

“I hope not.” The words seem to tremble as they cross my lips, but they have no effect on softening Christian’s expression. If anything, he turns colder. His eyes darken and his body grows stiff. Nervously, I suck my bottom lip beneath my teeth and look at the ground, wondering if my hasty confession will expedite the punishment he’s brought me here to deliver. When he steps towards me, I even jump slightly, but he doesn’t put his hands on me. He moves past me, fishes out the key again, and locks the door. With a sigh of relief, I turn my eyes back to the ground.

And that’s when I feel his touch.

The long fingers of his hand wrap around my arm and yank me back. I gasp as I fall into the door, expecting pain that never really manifests, then cower under him as he pins me to the wall. He grabs onto my jaw and tilts my head up so that I’m forced to look at him, and I see fire burning behind his eyes.

“This is why we’re here,” he growls. “Because you think there is even a possibility think I would hurt you. Because you must believe there is anything in this world that you could think or feel that I wouldn’t understand or that I would despise you for. Because it seems to me that no matter what I say or what I do, you still don’t trust me. You don’t communicate with me. And that’s not going to fly in here.”  I nod, though it’s difficult with his hand still on my face. He must feel that, because in that same instant, his fingers relax, his hand falls to his side, and leans down to press his forehead against mine. “You were unfaithful to me, Anastasia. Not with your body, but with your soul. You gave another man your truth and your fears, and that’s not something I can easily forgive. So, tonight, you’re going to submit to me. You’re going to place your trust in me, and you’re going to make me believe it. I’m not going to ask you not to look at me and I’m not going to ask you to stay silent. I want to hear you. I want you to talk to me, even if you think I’m not going to like what you have to say. And I want that from this moment forward.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Now, do you think I’m going to hurt you?”

“No, Sir.”

“Good. I don’t want to give you pain or humiliation, Anastasia. I want what I always want. Control.”

“I can do that.” I take a deep breath in. “Whatever you want, whatever I can give you, it’s yours. Just take it.”  

“Tell me your safeword.”

I swallow my last bit of trepidation and fortify myself with the love I’ve made him doubt. With the love I know he feels for me, despite the hurt I’ve caused him. “Red.”

“Good. Now, don’t move.”

He turns away from me and walks to the center of the room. I take him at his word and don’t force myself to look down at the floor. Instead, I keep my eyes trained on him as he brushes the tips of his fingers over a leather covered chair, then the ropes and restraints hanging on the walls. He considers each item he comes across carefully, often testing whichever thing has caught his eye before carefully securing it back to its place on the wall. In a way, I’m given a tour of the room myself, through his exploration of the implements he has available to him.

After testing the integrity of a piece of furniture that looks a little like a wrought iron chain link fence standing up against the wall with just enough padding to make being secured with the leather cuffs in each of the four corners bearable, he decides he’s seen enough and he returns to the leather chair. His eyes stay on mine as he sits down and slowly unravels his bow tie, and once he’s relaxed, he places his hands on either arm rest and settles back until he’s comfortable.

“Lose the dress,” he says. I reach back and start fumbling with the zipper, which makes me feel clumsy. But once I finally get it down enough that I no longer have to struggle to reach it, I remember the scene and try to reveal the rest of my body in a much more seductive manner. He doesn’t look pleased.

“I didn’t ask for a floor show. Show me what’s mine, Anastasia.”

Instantly, my fingers release their hold on the fabric and the dress falls to the floor in a pool of gray. Again, I feel somehow more than naked. The way the lingerie leaves so much of my skin exposed has me hyper aware of my body, and as I feel Christian’s gaze move over me, I feel like I’m the physical embodiment of sex. When his eyes heat with his desire, mine pools down between my legs.  

I step forward, shaking away the material that clings to my heels and wait for my next command. He lifts a finger and silently twirls it through the air, a signal for me to turn and give him the full view. I do, and once my back is to him, he gets up and presses his chest into my mostly naked back until I’m pushed flush against the door, then swings his hand up to smack me hard on the behind. I hiss at the sound.

“You’re too beautiful for your own goddamn good,” he whispers into my ear. I moan as his fingers begin to knead my flesh. “Do you know that I still fantasize about you? All the fucking time. It doesn’t matter how recently I’ve had you, or for how long. There comes a time, at least once a day, where I’ll be sitting in my office at GEH and the only thing I can think about is this.” His hands tighten on my ass again, and a small gasp of pleasure escapes my lips as his fingers pull me apart. “The way it looks when it’s pinked from my hand. Or when I have you bent over, spread open, and I can see my cock moving in and out of you.” He hisses as he takes a sharp intake of breath, and moves his fingers up the back of my arms to my shoulders. “You drive me fucking wild, Anastasia.”

“I feel the same for you,” I manage to breathe back. He groans and then pulls my head to the side with a sharp yank of my hair. I whimper with pain, but it’s quickly soothed away by his lips and tongue on the sensitive skin of my neck. I feel him nip me. I feel him suck. His mouth is so insistent that I’m sure he’ll leave me marked, but I can’t find it in myself to care. I’m too lost in the sensation of his erection grinding into my behind through his pants, and the texture of the door rubbing against my oversensitive nipples every time I squirm.

“Oh god, Christian,” I pant. His bites me right at the epicenter between my shoulder and neck, and then drags the tip of his nose all the way up to my ear, where he starts to suckle at my earlobe.

“Are you wet for me, baby?”

“Mhm.” The muffled sound barely makes it through my trembling lips, but he smiles all the same.

“Why don’t we check on that?”

He pushes more of his weight into me so that he can keep me pinned to the door without his hands and kicks the inside of each of my feet to get me to spread my legs. His thighs hold mine open as he reaches down, but when his fingers touch the miniscule scrap of lace that makes up my panties, he clicks his tongue in disapproval.

“This won’t do.” I’m jolted slightly as he hooks his finger beneath my thong and tugs, pulling my ass away from the door. I put my hands up to support myself in the new awkward position, while he grips onto the elastic that holds the lace together and then pushes his thumbs through the delicate fabric. Once it gives, he tears it all the way up the middle. My vagina is still framed by the tattered remains, but there’s nothing left to cover me. I’m exposed, open, and at his mercy.

One long finger drags up and down my lips, spreading my arousal up to my clit and back down again. Over and over, until my legs start to shake.

“Soaked,” he says. “God, I love the way you’re always ready for me.”

“Take me, Sir. Fuck me as hard as you can.”

My plea is met with a harsh slap across my ass, different from before. Harder. I clench with unexpected pain. “Ah!”

“That sounded an awful lot like a demand.”

“Please?”

His hand disappears from between my legs and once again tangles in my hair. However, this time, he doesn’t move my head to the side to give him easier access to my throat. He pushes me down onto my knees with bruising force.

“Open your mouth,” he commands. I take a second to regain my bearings, then do as he says. With one demanding thrust, he pushes his cock past my lips and my throat tightens at the unexpected invasion. I choke, and he starts to massage my scalp.

“Relax, Anastasia. Breathe through your nose.” I do, but my throat relaxing only enables him to push further inside. His hands act like anchors on the back of my head as he fucks my face, pushing me into him with the same force he uses to take me. My eyes start to water and mascara stained tears start leaking down my cheeks. I begin to drool. The sounds I make around him aren’t sexy and breathy, they’re wet and guttural. None of it dissuades him, and my arousal begins to pour out of me until the insides of my thighs are as slick as my inner lips.

“Oh, fuck!” he shouts, his deep timber reverberating with pleasure. “That’s it, Ana. Just like that. Shit! Shit! Shit!”

Just as quickly as he filled my mouth, he disappears. I fall forward onto my hands, sputtering and coughing, sucking in long pulls of air so I can catch my breath.

“Look at that,” he groans. I look up to see him slowly stroking his erection, and it takes me a moment to realize that it’s not for pleasure. The base of his cock is smeared with my lip color, and he’s spreading it up and down his shaft. “So fucking hot.”

His cock jumps in his hand and my mouth starts to water. I’m filled with such anticipation, such need, that I’m trembling on the floor. I want to leap at him, just like I did that day on the yacht. I want to get the lapels of his tuxedo jacket in my fist and push him back onto the bed on the other side of the room. I want to take what I want from him until I’m sated and satisfied. Waiting for him to do it for me is nearly torture.

“On your feet,” he says. I scramble up off my knees as quickly as I can, then take his outstretched hand. He leads me to a kind of bench that is separated into two halves. The padded top of one half is only a few inches off the ground, the other, a foot or so above that. Following Christian’s instructions, I kneel down on the lower half, then bend over the top.

“Fuck,” he breathes, dragging his hand softly down my back until he grips my ass. “The things I want to do to you…”

I want to tell him that he can do as he pleases. That I want him to use me the way he has in his fantasies. That I want to please him. But I don’t, because it would be redundant. He knows he’s in control. He knows I’m at his mercy. And the sting from the castigation I received the last time my pleas were taken as demands is enough to keep me silent.

“Don’t move,” he says, then he disappears out of my peripheral. Moments later, he returns with a bundle of natural fiber rope that scratches against the skin on my wrists as he fastens them to the legs of the bench. Next, he picks up a heavy metal bar with leather cuffs on either end, winds the buckles around each of my ankles, and then elongages the bar with a strong yank, pulling my legs so far apart, I can feel the stretch in my thighs.

“Too far?” he checks when I whimper.

“No, Sir.”

He paces around me for a moment, examining me, circling me like a shark closing in on his prey. I’m so tight with need, my insides start to ache. The energy pouring off of him as he drinks me in stokes the heat growing unbearably hot inside my belly. And when he finally falls to his knees behind me, I nearly cry with relief at his touch.

His hands slide up the backs of my thighs and dig into the flesh on my behind. He spreads me open, putting me fully on display, before he leans down and kisses my clit.

I scream.

“Easy, baby. We’re just getting started.”

“I need you,” I whine. “So bad.”

“All in good time. Relax.” He kisses me again, gently at first, but the more of my arousal he tastes, the more ravenous he becomes. Like he’s in a frenzy. It’s good that he told me he wouldn’t ask for my silence, because I wouldn’t hear his reminders or warnings over the loud, incoherent cries that rip their way from my chest.

“God, the way you taste, baby,” he says in a voice as rough as sandpaper. “So fucking sweet.”

“Mmm,” I whimper. “Don’t stop.”

“You like the way I eat you? The way my tongue feels inside you? Swirling around your clit?”

“Yes. God, yes.”

“Yeah? How about this?” He licks all the way up until he’s moved past my perineum and his tongue begins dancing around the entrance to my ass. It’s a surprise and my immediate reaction is to get away from him. I try to squirm, but the rough fibers of the rope around my wrists cut into my skin when I struggle, and his hands on my hips are more restraint than the bar between my ankles. He pulls back and spits on me, then uses his tongue to work the added moisture through my tightly bunched muscles. It’s taboo, and erotic, and filthy, and incredible. And when his thumb starts playing with my clitoris while he tongue fucks my ass, the room around me starts to spin until it dissolves completely into a sex crazed fog.

“Christian, wait,” I pant, thrusting my hips hard into the bench to gain some distance from his insistent, wonderful, intrusive tongue.

“Wait?” He sits back, but his tongue is immediately replaced by a finger that sinks deep inside of me. I clench again, and the added tightness makes even that one finger feel impossibly large. “Do you need to say something?”

My safeword. He’s asking for my safeword.

“I don’t want you to stop… I just, your tongue and my–” My entire body grows hot and I assume grows flush with embarrassment, and he responds by pushing his finger deeper inside of me.

“This is mine, just as much as any other part of you, Anastasia. Mine to spank. Mine to taste. And mine to fuck.” He starts to work another finger inside of me, and I let out a high pitched whine. “True or false, Anastasia?”

“What?”

“Is. This. Mine?” His fingers push and pull in and out of me with each word. I struggle to breathe through the rapidly blooming pleasure. Words fail me. Rational thought seems to all but disappear. I’m lost to sensation, until his fingers vanish and he hits me hard across the ass once more. “Answer me.”

“Yes. It’s yours.”

“You’re mine,” he corrects me, and his fingers are once again replaced by his tongue.

Unable to deny him without denying myself, I surrender to the invasion and find that, once I let go of my unfounded embarrassment and trepidation, I actually enjoy the feeling of his tongue ravishing my most forbidden erogenous zone. More than enjoy… the feeling is mind boggling. Pure, uninhibited hedonism that erases expectations and judgements and lets me bask in euphoric delirium. And when I realize he’s going to make me come, I find myself pushing back onto that perfect and oh so talented tongue.

“That’s right, baby.” He pulls away but continues to play with my pleated bunch of muscles, using my slick arousal to heighten the feeling. I start to build. Each pass of his thumb feels as though it turns up the temperature of my body until I’m burning, ready to explode into an all consuming orgasm. I’m close. So close…

And then his hand disappears.

“No! No, don’t stop!”

“Shh.” He turns away, fumbling with something I can’t see, and my orgasm dissipates. It leaves an ache throbbing between my thighs that I can’t ignore. My second denial of the night and every cell in my body begs for release. I can’t even close my legs and let friction do the work.

“Christian. Sir. Master. Please…”

“This is going to be cold,” he replies. My brow furrows, but that’s quickly wiped away by shock as Christian drips an icy liquid over my ass. Lubricant, I soon discover, as the chill vanishes with the friction of his fingers. “Take a deep breath for me, baby.”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m going to put a plug in you. It will be uncomfortable at first, but you’ll adjust. If you don’t relax, it will hurt.”

I take a deep breath and nod. “Yes, Sir.”

He presses the tip of something hard against my entrance and slowly works it forward. It’s easy to take at first, but soon it starts to stretch. Wider and wider, until the pleasure is overwhelmed with pain.

“Wait, wait, wait,” I beg, and he stops. His free hand begins to toy with my clitoris again and a finger dips inside of me until my muscles relax and the pain disappears.

“Almost, baby,” he whispers, and slowly, he begins to ease the plug the rest of the way in. When he leans down to kiss me, there’s a look of pride on his face. “This is going to be hard, Anastasia. And fast.”

I nod, and he moves behind me. His hands are rough and rude as he pulls me apart to make room for his erection, and he slams inside of me in one fluid thrust. The combination of him and the plug has me feeling overwhelmingly full, and his brutal, relentless rhythm threatens to turn me inside out.

“Oh, fuck!” I scream. His hand wraps around my hair and he pushes my face down into the padding on the bench, pressing down, holding me in place, as he ravishes me.

“Take it, Anastasia. Take all of it.”

He’s like a wild animal in the way he moves. The sounds he makes are raw and savage with his need, and his hands hold me so tightly I wonder if he’s hoping he’ll leave marks. It’s real control. Ownership. And all of that has me completely unravelling. Panting, moaning, screaming his name. For a punishment, he seems to be giving me everything I wanted leaving the party tonight.

“Oh god,” I scream. “Don’t stop, Christian. I’m going to come…”

“Oh, baby. You think I’m going to let you come?” I can’t register his response. I’m too lost in the urgency of my impending orgasm. But for the third time tonight, just as I’m about to fall over the edge of ecstasy, he stops and leaves me wanting.

“Fuck. No…”

“It’s amazing how fast you lose it, isn’t it? Five or ten seconds with no stimulation…” He leans down and claims my mouth in a slow, deep kiss that fans the flames of my desire for him, but does nothing to rescue the orgasm slipping through my fingers. By the time his lips pull away, I’ve lost it.

“Why?” I mewl.

“I told you I was going to punish you. You should know by now that I’m a man of my word.”

My protest is cut off as he slams inside of me again and picks up his relentless pace. He pounds into me like he’s trying to fuck the life out of me. And as if his assault wasn’t enough to bring me right back to the edge, he whispers and moans everything he’s feeling into my ear with each and every thrust. How tight I am, swollen from his repeated onslaught and denial. How much he loves looking at me, sweating and needy beneath him. How it drives him crazy hearing me scream his name. How I make him feel. How beautiful I am. How much he loves me. He builds me up over and over again only to deny me. And it goes on forever. I start to lose track of how many orgasms I’ve lost, and each time one falls out of my reach, the pain of its absence becomes more intense.

I came into this room fearing the items on the walls. But any torture they could inflict is nothing to this.

“Please,” I sob, tears rolling down my cheeks. “Please, Christian, let me come. I can’t take it…”

“Do you need to say something to me?” He pulls out of me to give me the chance to safeword, but I’m too distracted by the sight of his erection in his fist to consider it. His cock is bigger than I’ve ever seen it. The tip is so swollen from his own need for release that it’s nearly purple. My mouth waters at the sight of it, my body screams in need. I don’t want to safeword, because I don’t want him to stop. I want him to finish. I want him to finish me.

“Please, Christian. I’m sorry. I’ll tell you a thousand times that I’m sorry, but please! I can’t take it anymore. I can’t.”

“Yes you can.”

“Please… I don’t want to say it. It’s my word, Christian. But if I have to use it when I don’t want to, then it’s not my word anymore, and I need that word. Please, don’t force me to say it.”

For the first time, I see a crack in his otherwise perfectly stoic demeanor.

“Fuck.” His jaw tightens as he battles with the dominant determined to punish me for my indiscretions, and the husband who has only ever wanted to give me the world. His hand comes down on my back, his fingers dig into my skin, and slowly, he pushes inside of me once more.

“Tell me he’s nothing,” he says through clenched teeth.

My eyes screw closed and my fingers tighten around the bench. I’m at a loss. I know what he wants from me, but I can’t give it to him.

“He’ll never be you, Christian. I’ll only ever love you.”

He growls and then lowers his body down over the top of mine. His fingers work on the knots at my wrists and the buckles on my ankles, until I’m completely free of his restraints. Then he flips me over on my back, picks up his rhythm, and kisses me again. I wrap my arms and legs around him, holding him as close to me as is physically possible, and when I’m finally hit with the hurricane force of my orgasm, he pulls the plug out of me and forces me to reevaluate my personal definition of earth shattering pleasure. I scream his name over and over again until he too finds his release.

We come down panting, covered in sweat. My body is sore and weak. I feel drained. But only a minute or so after we’ve had the chance to catch our breaths, Christian gets up and reaches out for my hand.

“There’s a shower. Let me get you cleaned up.”

I nod sleepily, but let me help me to my feet. He half carries me as we make our way into the private bathroom, and sets me on the counter as he turns on the shower. He comes back to me and takes my mouth in a deep, all consuming kiss that lasts long after the room has filled with steam. Even when he lifts me into his arms and carries me into the shower, our lips never part.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper into his mouth.

“I know.”

The hot water burns against my sensitive skin, but I tolerate it because standing beneath the cascade means I’m standing in Christian’s arms. With a sense of care and gentility absent from the rest of this evening, he takes the soap and begins to clean my body. His hands soothe the sting from my raw behind. His fingers massage my shoulders and neck until I’m free of tension. He washes my hair, and holds me tightly against my body while I dip my head under the water to rinse away the suds.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

“I’m fine. Are you?”

He swallows, and backs me up into the shower wall. I can feel a plea in his lips as he kisses me again, and the desperate yearning in the way his tongue caresses mine. “When I got on my plane yesterday morning, I really believed you were leaving me,” he says at last.

“That’s not a possibility. You’re never going to lose me, Christian. Not ever.”

“I want to believe that, Anastasia. But this weekend has frightened me in a way that I haven’t been frightened in a very long time. Not since I brought you to this city four years ago. I feel like you’ve forgotten everything we’ve been through together. Everything we’ve promised each other. Every time I’ve vowed to love and cherish you, no matter. How could you possibly think I wouldn’t understand what you were going through?”

“I don’t know. I guess I just spent so much time just trying to forget, that I ended up forgetting all the wrong things.”

He rests his forehead against mine and nuzzles the tip of my nose with his. “I’ll never let you forget again. Perhaps I haven’t been what you’ve needed these past few months. But that will never happen again. I’m here for you. Always. And I love you, more than my own life.”

“I love you too, Christian. So much.”

“Do not betray me again.”

“Never.” He lets out a long breath, then lifts my left hand and places a gentle kiss on my wedding band. My throat constricts and my heart beats heavily in my chest until he reaches down to turn off the water. When he looks at me again, there’s new resolve in his eyes.

“I forgive you.”

“Thank you.” I push off the wall and into his arms, wrapping my own around him as tightly as I can. His lips press into my wet hair and then he lifts me out of the shower. We gather our things and leave the room hand in hand, leaving the hurt and betrayal behind us. By the time he’s buckled me back into the car, I can’t keep my eyes open any longer.

I fall asleep with his hand in mine.

Next Chapter

I hate the color of the carpet in the hallway outside Scott’s office. There’s too much red in the mottled fibers and I find it distracting as I pace back and forth, listening to Jacki’s concerns through the phone.

“My author is getting impatient. Four book stores are now completely sold out and the 2nd print has been delayed again.”

“This is a good problem to have,” I remind her. “You’ve moved over 12,000 units in two weeks, and despite being sold out in the brick and mortar stores, the online sales aren’t slowing down. This is a bestseller, and that is all you need to be telling your author right now. We’ll handle the semantics, she should be focusing on her next book.”

“I’m trying, but people are relentless online. She’s getting hounded on Twitter and people are starting to complain in their Goodreads reviews. Can’t you do something with the printers? She’ll relax if she at least knows something is moving.”

“I’ll make a call.”

“Thank you, Ana.”

“Hey, don’t thank me. You’ve moved more copies this month than GSP has on any other release in the last two years. You’re my superstar right now. Anything you need, I’m here for you.”

“I guess that’s what happens when you’re passionate about a project instead of just going through the motions, huh?”

“Funny how that works. Now go find me more diamonds in the rough. I’ll call the printers.”

“Right away, Mrs. Grey.”

“Bye, Jacki.” I smile as I hang up the phone, feeling a tremendous amount of pride in the first successful release under my tenure at GSP. I knew romance was a huge genre, but even I hadn’t expected numbers like these. It takes a lot of the pressure off of The Black Rose, and has my hopes up about new projects to help GSP expand over the next year.

“Ana?” Scott calls. I frown, then set a reminder on my phone to call the printing press back in Seattle before hurrying back inside.

It’s a little strange how different working in the New York office is from Seattle. Just as Grey Publishing is located in the same building as GEH, GSP NY resides on the eighth floor of the Gallagher Corporation tower in lower Manhattan. As a result, this branch has the best amenities available. Multiple conference rooms with expensive tech to aid in meetings, gourmet coffee in the break rooms to ease the mid-afternoon slump. It’s almost depressing how much better the view is, or how much bigger Scott’s office is than mine, but there are downsides too.

Everyone is on edge. All the time. The few people who have bothered to talk to me at all refuse to address me as Ana for fear of being too informal, and the organic conversations and sharing of ideas I’ve worked tirelessly to promote in my own office are completely absent from the few meetings I’ve attended with Scott. There’s too much fear. Too much competition. And today, that competitive spirit seems to be in full swing between Scott and I, though I can’t fathom why.

It’s been ten hours since the release date for The Black Rose was officially announced to the public, and he hasn’t moved from the computer since. Every thirty seconds, Walter Daves and I watch him refresh the matrix page so he has the most up to date pre-order numbers possible. But no matter how high they climb, he doesn’t seem satisfied. I’m starting to suspect that he won’t be as long as the numbers are less than what was on the report from Jacki’s sales this morning.

“What should we be at?” Walter asks nervously.

“There’s no should,” I say quickly. “These are all pre-sales. Your book hasn’t even been released yet.”

“Still…” Scott mumbles. He begins clicking his tongue as he refreshes the page again, but before the number repopulate Carmen pokes her head through the open door and raps her knuckles against the metal frame.

“I’ve got five minutes before my next meeting,” she says. “Any updates?”

Immediately, Scott’s attitude changes. He sits up straight and beams as brightly as my daughter did the first time she saw her pony. “Over a thousand now, and getting stronger by the hour.”

“Excellent,” Carmen replies. “Hopefully we’ll be over 2,500 by tomorrow’s announcement party. This is great work, team. Take some time to celebrate, you’ve earned it.”

“Thank you, Carmen,” Scott says. “Ana here was skeptical at first, but hopefully now she’ll see that there’s a method to my madness.”

I turn and blink in his direction, somehow managing to keep my mouth from dropping open in shock. There’s a method to his madness? Is he really intending to take sole credit for this? Nevermind that I’m the one who spent the last two months pouring through every single word to make it the best it could possibly be, while he’s never even read the thing in its entirety. The author is sitting right fucking here! And while I might still have some concern over what will happen once pre-sales are over and this book actually hits the shelves, and the hands of the critics, why would he express that doubt in front of Daves when the book has already gone to press and there’s nothing more he can do?

God damn it.

“We all ended up on the same page,” Carmen says. “That’s what’s really important. Congratulations, Mr. Daves.”

“Thank you, Ms. Gallagher.”

She winks, then hurries off to her meeting and I glare at Scott as he reaches down to refresh the page again. The pre-order column jumps another sixty numbers higher, and he lets out a boastful laugh.

“You know this really is excellent, considering these numbers are just for pre-sales. I bet once The Black Rose hits shelves, we’ll move fifteen, twenty thousand units in the first few weeks easily. You’ve done it, Walter. This has best seller written all over it.”

“Really?” There’s an uneasiness in his voice that mirrors my own, which only makes what Scott said to Carmen all the worse.

“Really,” Scott confirms. “In fact, I think Carmen’s right. We should celebrate. Why don’t I take the two of you out to dinner, and then we can head uptown for some drinks?”

“Tonight?” I ask.

“Yeah, tonight. What? You don’t eat dinner on Thursdays?”

“No, of course I do, I just…” Walter leans back in his chair next to me, bouncing his knee with nerves and avoiding eye contact. The truth is, Luke and Alexis should be landing at JFK in a few hours and I’m supposed to be meeting them and Damien Beaufort at ten. But I also am keenly aware that I am the sole person who represents Walter now. It’s my job to be by his side, to champion his work, and to be there when he needs support, just the same as Lydia was there for me only a year ago. And from the look on his face, now is when he needs support.

“You know what? You’re right, Scott. We should be celebrating.” I reach over and place a gentle hand on Daves’ forearm. “The hard part’s over, Walter. Now it’s time to bask in your success.”

He smiles. “Thank you, Mrs. Grey.”

“How many times do I have to ask you to call me Ana?”

“Sorry.” He blushes. “Ana.”

“Well, it sounds like it’s settled then,” Scott says. “Meet for dinner at eight, then we’ll head over to LAVO.”

“LAVO?”

“It’s a place I know. Trust me, you’ll love it.”

“Fine.” I give one last reassuring smile to Walter, then gather my things to go. As I exit Scott’s office, I hurry and fish out my phone to text Luke so that he can change the location of our meeting. Though, if I’m going to sandwich Beaufort in with Walter and Scott, Woods might become a problem.

I find him in the lobby, sitting in the same chair he’s occupied all day. He looks bored out of his mind, tapping his finger on the arm of his chair with each tick of the second hand on the clock.

“I’m so sorry, Evan. I didn’t think I’d be here this long today.”

“Don’t worry about it, Ana. We headed back to the hotel?”

“Mhm.” He reaches for my bag, which I hand over gratefully before leading the way to the elevator and out of the building. We’re not travelling with a car this time, so I reach out into the street to hail a cab, which isn’t an easy task at seven PM on a weeknight. Eventually though, we get a ride and I make it back to the hotel with just enough time to change and freshen up.

“Should I call for a dinner reservation?” Woods asks while I dig through my things for my room key. I bite my lip, and glance up at him with guilt that I hope is better concealed than I imagine it to be. Luke was always able to tell when I was lying, I can only pray that’s not the case for Woods too.

“Actually, I’ve got a lot of work from the Seattle office to deal with still. I think I’ll stay in for the rest of the night.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it’s been a long day. I’m just going to draw a bath, get my reading done, and order room service.”

“Okay. Can I order something for you?”

“No, I’m good. Seriously, take the night to yourself. I’m sure you need a night off just as badly as I do.”

“Alright. I’m just next door if you need anything.”

“Thanks, Evan.”

“Sure thing, Ana.” He waits until I’m securely in my room before retiring to his, and I watch through the peephole in my door until the hallway is empty. Once I’m sure I’m in the clear, I strip away my work clothes and make my way back to the bathroom to pull out my hair straightener. With traffic, I have only have about fifteen minutes to get ready and into a car if I’m going to make it to the restaurant in time, and I spend the first five of those deciding what I’m going to wear.

Google tells me that LAVO is a nightclub, and finding something appropriate amongst the clothes Gail packed for a business trip is a task all on it’s own. Eventually, I decide on an immaculately cut black dress that makes me feel powerful and in control, then work to get my hair as sleek and straight as possible. My eye shadow is darker and smokier than I normally wear it, and my eyeliner is thicker and jet black. I forgo a bold color on my lips, ensuring my look is strong rather than sexy, then pick up my purse and shoes and make for the door.

I feel a little ridiculous sneaking down the hallway, like the Pink Panther. I even go as far as to duck beneath the peephole to Woods’ door on the off chance he happens to be looking out and bypass the elevator for the stairs to prevent the high pitched ping from drawing attention to my exit. My ears warm with guilt the entire way down the thirteen flights of stairs, which I take in stockinged feet. Countless lessons in the past have me hyper aware of how wrong it is to ditch my CPO like this, but I ignore every instinct that tells me to go back.

I’m not without protection. Luke will be with me.

The pep-talk does little to bolster my confidence, but I get to the lobby and out the main doors all the same. A man is exiting a taxi right in front of my hotel, so there’s no need for me to wait for a car. I simply flash him a grateful smile, slide into the empty back seat, and slip the driver the piece of paper with the address of my destination.

We start with dinner at Perla in the village, then make our way up to midtown for LAVO. To my surprise, I actually recognize the neighborhood where the club is located quite well. It’s only two blocks away from the Plaza Hotel, which is where Christian and I stayed during that first fateful trip to New York.

Seeing the beautiful building standing tall and proud at the end of the street haunts me with memories. They’re not necessarily bad. Despite how that trip ended, there was a lot of good between Christian and I that week. But good or bad, the memories make me feel Christian’s presence, as strongly as if he were standing right next to me. And that presence hangs like a spector over what I’m going to do tonight.

Focus, Ana. You’re doing this for him.

“We can skip the line,” Scott announces. “They know me here.”

“Thank god,” Walter replies. “I thought we were going to be stuck out here for hours.” I follow his gaze over the crowd of people queued up along the side of the building, but when Scott wraps his fingers around my arm to lead me along beside him, I pull out of his grip.

“I actually need to make a phone call really quick. I’ll meet you inside.”

“Grey won’t let you off the leash even one night, huh?”

Whatever warmth I’d managed to fake through my inner turmoil vanishes instantly. I narrow my eyes and take a step back. “I’d be very careful about the way you talk about my husband in front of me, Scott.”

“Oh, come on, Ana–”

“No.” I let the cold refusal lay between us, growing heavier and heavier under my piercing stare, until he finally nods and turns, uncomfortably, back towards the building. I smile at Walter as a way of apology for the awkward exchange, then motion towards an empty part of the sidewalk. “Excuse me.”

Turning, I make my way to the end of the building and duck around the corner where I can lurk in the shadows of the alley. My hands seem to shake as I take out my phone and read the text I missed from Luke an hour ago telling me he and Alexis have arrived and Beaufort has agreed to the venue change. I quickly reply that I’ve arrived at LAVO, but once the text has been sent, a shiver runs up my back and I freeze. I feel him again. Christian. Like he’s standing here with me. Watching me. Warning me. I let my head fall back against the wall and take several steadying breaths.

He’s in Seattle. This is for the good of your family. Get it together, Anastasia.

My phone vibrates in my hand and I glance down to see the text from Luke telling me that he and Alexis are on route, so I quickly make my way back out to the main street and through the front entrance of the club. There is a litany of groans and complaints that follow me as the bouncer opens the velvet rope for me to pass, but it all melds into the music and hum of conversation as I step into the club.

Scott and Walter are already seated at a table when I find them, and Walter seems slightly uncomfortable with the too loud music, dim lighting, and crowds of drunk 20 somethings dancing through the clouds pouring from the strategically placed fog machines. Scott, on the other hand, looks overjoyed as he’s greeted by everyone who passes the table like he’s walked into an episode of Cheers. I sit and let them talk amongst themselves, staring nervously at my phone for the notification that Luke has arrived, praying I won’t see anything from Woods or Christian.

“What’ll you drink, Ana?” Scott shouts over the bumping bass. I glance up and discover a cocktail waitress standing over us, looking expectantly down at me.

“Just a water, please. Thank you.”

“Oh, no,” Scott says. “We’re celebrating, Ana, you’re not having just water. She’ll have a Cosmopolitan.” He leans into me conspiratorially, but speaks loudly enough that I’m sure both Walter and the waitress can hear. “It’s what the girls on Sex and the City drink. You’re going to love it.”

I raise an eyebrow at him, then shake my head and face the waitress. “I’ll have a double Patron on the rocks with lime, please.”

She nods, then scribbles my order down on the notepad in her hand. “Coming right up.”

“Tequila, huh?” Scott asks, nodding in approval. “I didn’t realize that’s the kind of night we’re having. Alright.” He bobs his head to the beat of the music until our waitress returns with our drinks, then he holds his above the table for a toast. “Here’s to Walter and The Black Rose!”

I lift my drink in the air, then throw it back in one, burning gulp. Cringing away from the bite of the alcohol, I sink my teeth into the wedge of lime on the side of my glass and then wait for warmth of the alcohol to relax away my trepidation about tonight.

“Let’s do another!” Scott yells, holding up his hand to flag down the waitress again. She nods once she sees him he pointing to our empty glasses, then Scott turns to continue congratulating Walter. When he lowers his hand though, he brings it down to rest on my exposed knee.

“Excuse me,” I say, pushing his hand away and picking up my illuminated phone from the table. “I’ll be back.”

“We’ll be waiting,” Scott says, winking. I grimace, but turn away from the table without another word. Luke’s text says that they’re in a private room, so I make my way towards the entrance of the club, glancing over my shoulder as I go to ensure no one is following me.

“Hi, my name is Anastasia Grey,” I tell the supermodel-thin hostess holding the clipboard at the front doors. “I think my party is already here… reservation under Luke Sawyer.”

She scans the list in her hands, then smiles up at me. “Yes, Mrs. Grey. If you’ll follow me.”

We walk down the one clear path, designated with thick charcoal colored carpet, around the dancefloor to the back of the club. There’s a hallway there that’s darker without the flashing strobes and spotlights, and fairly quiet despite the enormous speakers only few feet away on the other side of the left wall. At the end of the hallway, Luke stands before a closed door, arms folded over his chest. He relaxes his intimidating stance as we approach, but even after the hostess has turned and left us alone, he doesn’t take me inside.

“Where’s Alexis?” I ask.

“Outside. I thought we should feel this guy out before we just send her off with him. She might not be an ally, but if he turns out to be someone who might hurt her, we’re not just going to hand her over and walk away.”

I nod. “Yeah. Of course.”

“You ready?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“We can still walk away, you know. Just say the word and I’ll get you out of here. I’ll take Alexis back to Seattle tonight and you can go back to Grey without him being any the wiser.” As if to echo his sentiments, my phone begins to vibrate in my hand. I look down and see Christian’s name on the screen. A picture of him from our wedding day smiles back at me, almost as though it’s trying to coerce me away from the room, but I reject the call and slip my phone back into my purse.

“No, I’m going in there. This ends tonight.”

“All of it,” he affirms. “After this we’re done. For good.”

“I know.”

“Then I’m right behind you.” He steps aside to let me pass and after taking one last second to prepare myself, I reach out for the door handle and push my way inside.

Mr. Beaufort is tall. That’s the first thing I notice. He’s leaning over a fireplace at the wall opposite from me, and he doesn’t flinch or look over when I enter. Even with him facing away, there’s something imposing about his presence.

“Mr. Beaufort?” I say.

“Anastasia Grey,” he replies, finally turning to face me. I’m pleased to discover that he’s at least attractive, which should go some way to keep Alexis pleased with this arrangement should it work out. His hair is dark, and his features severe, but his eyes are an almost hypnotizing shade of caramel. There’s undeniable strength in the set of his broad shoulders and chest, but those eyes… they could melt ice in January.

“I’m glad you agreed to meet with me,” I say, standing taller so I don’t feel so small standing before him.

“The pleasure is all mine.” He steps towards me and reaches out for my hand, but when I give it to him he doesn’t close his fingers around mine in a firm handshake. Instead, he takes my hand with unexpected gentility and draws it up to his lips. “Your husband speaks of you often. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you for some time.”

“I trust I needn’t remind you that this meeting should be kept between the two of us?”

He smiles. “Don’t worry, Anastasia. Discretion is a very important part of what I do.”

“Good. Then let’s begin, shall we?” I turn and gesture back to the table, then follow him as he takes a seat. Luke moves a chair up close to mine, reaches into the leather case he’s brought along with him, and removes a single file.

“The girl’s name is Alexis Young,” I begin, passing the file across the table. “She’s twenty-four years old, and she’s been in the lifestyle for five years.”

“Previous dominants?” he asks.

“Several. She worked in a club in downtown Seattle for just under a year.”

“With Elena?”

“Yes. She was very popular.”

“Hm.” He flips over the front flap of the file, but I can tell by the set of his jaw that he’s less than enthused by my answer.

“For the last year, though, she did devote herself to only one dominant. I gather that relationship functioned very well.”

“Then why did it end?”

“He, um… he’s deceased.”

“I see.” Beaufort looks down at the paperwork in his hands again, scanning the dossier fairly quickly, until he comes upon something that piques his interest. “Not a lot as far as hard limits goes…”

I shake my head. “She’s very open to the needs of the dominant she serves.”

“That’s good.” He pulls out a photo of Alexis in a position uncomfortable for me to look at, though he inspects the photograph with the same diligence that an artist might use to divine inspiration from a raw lump of clay. I glance over at Luke, who also seems to be doing everything he can to avoid eye contact, and as I see the reflection of my own unease in the man who’s never once shown any sign of disquiet in my presence, the reason for all of the nerves I felt before this meeting becomes glaringly clear. I finally begin to feel the weight of what I’m really doing. Alexis was right before. I don’t know anything about this lifestyle. Not really. And sitting here with this man, talking to him about Alexis like she’s a commodity to be traded while he pours over the most intimate details of her life and sexual desires, feels… wrong.

This is wrong.

“She’s absolutely beautiful,” he purrs with lust. “I’d like to meet her.”

I stare blankly back at his expectant gaze, unable to move and unable to speak. The lump inside my throat refuses to budge, no matter how many times I try to swallow. I’m roiled in conflict over the desire to leave this room and the need to stay. A part of me that’s laid dormant under threats and fear has suddenly awoken, and she’s disgusted with this new me that’s taken a need as pure as protecting my family this far. Now the two halves war against each other for dominion, leaving me impotent in the middle.

“I’ll get her,” Luke says at last. He pushes away from the table and walks to a side door that leads outside. Beaufort stares at me with relative interest, but doesn’t try to further any conversation. That is until Luke opens the door, letting in both Alexis and the cold bite of the night air.

Beaufort stands. “Miss Young.”

I turn to look at her, hoping to gather any sign of her desire to be here from her face so as to ease this new found sense of guilt and shame, but she looks down at the ground.

“Mr. Beaufort. Sir.”

“Come here.” She immediately moves towards him, and Luke shadows her every step until they reach the table. It’s only then that I’m able to get up, and as I step back away from the table, I fight both the overwhelming urge to pull the girl away from Beaufort’s hungry gaze, and the part of me that wants to hold her there at any cost. He paces around her, evaluating her the same way Christian looks over a new sports car. “Kneel.” She does, and he smiles at me, clearly satisfied.

There’s an interview of sorts, though neither Luke nor I take any part. He asks her questions, she answers. He gives her commands, she obeys. Even when he asks her to undress right there in the middle of the room.

“Perfect,” he says, reaching out to tug one of her taut, exposed nipples. “Just perfect.”

I shudder.

“Thank you, Sir,” Alexis replies. His fingers tighten until she whimpers, a small castigation for speaking out of turn. Her lips press together in regret, but when Beaufort turns to look back at me, his eyes are alight with excitement.

“I’ll take her back with me for the rest of this week and put her through a kind of trial run. If this works out, I’ll be happy to send you a finders fee.”

“Finders fee?” I shake my head in disgust. “No… please, don’t.”  

“Surely you must want something, Anastasia.” I shake my head again and he furrows his brow in response, but seems to let it go. “Get dressed, Miss Young. We’ll go now.”

“Yes, Sir.”

She begins to put her clothes back on while Beaufort moves back to the fireplace to collect his jacket and briefcase. It’s the one second he’s even so much as taken his eyes off of her since Luke brought her in, and I pounce on it.

“Are you sure this is what you want?” I whisper.

She raises an eyebrow. “Yeah.”

“You can tell me if it’s not. You don’t have to leave with him if…”

“Ana, I’m good.” She smiles as she pulls her sweater over her head and slings her bag over her shoulder, then grips my arm with gratitude. “I haven’t had anything to be this excited about since I lost Charles. I mean look at him, he’s… he’s perfect.” Her eyes move over to Beaufort as he pulls his coat over his shoulders, and she starts to gnaw at her bottom lip.

I nod, though more out of defeat than acceptance. “If you want to go, then go. But… if you need anything, or if you need a way home, call me. You’re not alone, Alexis.”

“I know. Thank you, Anastasia.”

“Alexis,” Beaufort calls. He tilts his head a half of a degree to the side, a gesture for her to come, and she does. His hand folds posessively over hers and he begins to pull her from the room, but I stop them just before they reach the door.

“Alexis, wait!”

She looks back. “What?”

“The book. That was part of the deal. I want the book.”

“Oh, right. Excuse me, Sir.” Her hand starts digging through her bag as she walks towards me until she fishes out a very worn and beaten copy of a roughly bound manuscript. The title, Monster, is the only word on the cover page that’s visible through the creases in the paper.

“Deals a deal,” she says, passing the book to me.

“And this is it?” I ask. “This is the only copy?”

“Besides the one you already have. This one’s not even complete, so be prepared for a cliffhanger.” She laughs, but I turn and slip the manuscript into my bag without so much as a smile. When I turn back around, she’s already returned to Beaufort’s side.

“Thank you again, Anastasia,” he says. “I hope we’ll meet again soon.”

I nod blankly, actually hoping that once I leave this room I’ll never see him again. My stomach churns as I watch Alexis leave with him, and once the door closes behind them the last threads that hold me together snap. I start gasping as though I’m going to hyperventilate, and Luke quickly pulls me into his arms.

“Yeah,” he says, rubbing a comforting hand over my back and squeezing me tightly against him. “I thought this was coming.”

“What am I doing, Luke? How did I get here?”

“I don’t know.”

“She was dangerous. After what she did to Mia, after what she turned a blind eye to because of Gresham… there’s no telling what she would have done to get close to Christian. Especially with this in her hands.” I hold up the manuscript, then toss it on the table merely because I hate the way it feels in my hands. Luke does me one better. He picks it up, carries it over the fireplace, and tosses it into the flames. I fall back into one of the chairs, elbows on my knees, and let my head fall into my hands. “This is what she said she wanted. She wanted a dominant, I found her a dominant. Is that wrong?”

He ambles towards me, clearly choosing his next words carefully. “No. It’s not that you did something… wrong.”

“Then why do I feel like I just sold her like a piece of livestock?”

“Because this isn’t you.” He pulls me back up to my feet, holding me at arm’s length but keeping both hands on my shoulders. “This isn’t who you are, Anastasia. Don’t you see that? You’re letting your fear push you to do things that you normally would find abhorrent. You’re so scared of the ifs and maybes that you can’t even see where you’re letting these people lead you. That’s not the Anastasia I know. The Anastasia I know doesn’t need to sneak around behind people’s backs because she always does what’s right. She doesn’t need to make deals behind closed doors because she believes in what she’s doing enough to do it out in the open. This meeting, this is what Grey does. What Taylor does. What I do. This isn’t you. I agreed to help you because I didn’t know what else to do. Seeing you the way you were… I thought I was losing my best friend. But this, what we’re doing right now, this is how I actually lose you. This is how we all lose you. Because the person this is turning you into is not the Anastasia we all love.”

I let my head fall in shame. “I don’t know what happened. I just felt like I was trapped, you know? Like I was powerless. I just wanted to feel like I was doing something to protect us. To stop anything like that from happening ever again. I didn’t want to feel helpless anymore.”

“I know. But you’re not, Ana. What happened to you was fucked up, and I can’t even imagine what you’ve been going through since that night, but you are anything but powerless. Look at what you’ve done in the past few years. Look at where you are. Look at where your family is. It’s all because of you, and not because you made deals in the shadows. It’s because you always did it the right way. Hell, you faced down Elena Lincoln and won. You’re a boss-ass-bitch.”

I snort and quickly reach up to cover my smile. “Don’t make this a joke right now, I’m having a breakthrough.”

“Then you need to know that nobody thinks you’re weak. You have a strength that the rest of us who deal in secrets and schemes will never have. You have persistence, and patience, and love. No one can take that from you. Not Kozlowski, or Harrington, or Alexis… Not even Andrew Lincoln.”

I nod. “I’m so sorry, Luke. You tried to tell me before but I was too wrapped up in all of this to understand what you were saying. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Just remember this the next time I try to talk you out of something. You’re always wrong, and I’m always right.”

I laugh again and the cathartic release ends the war between the two versions of myself that has been raging inside of me. I take a deep, easy breath, and release months worth of tension. Peace washes over me and in the absence of uncertainty and unease, I finally feel myself again.

“Ready to go back?” Luke asks.

“Yeah.”  He wraps an arm around me as he leads me from the room, back out into the club. The crowd on the dance floor seems much more rowdy as undoubtedly more and more alcohol is passed around. I stand up on my tiptoes to search through the sea of faces for Scott or Walter, but our table is empty. I guess they could be at the bar, or maybe they had enough and left me behind. But either way, I figure I’ll send a text to tell them I’ve had enough for tonight.

“Can we go back to my hotel?” I ask, looking up at Luke.

“Yeah, I’ll get us a cab.”

 

Twenty minutes later, we pull up outside of The Dominick, and Luke gets out so he can walk me up to the front doors.

“Do you want me to come up?” he asks. “We can talk if you need to.”

“No, thanks. I’m just going to call Christian and get in bed. It’s been a long day.”

“Are you going to tell him?”

“Not on the phone. I don’t even know how to tell him… I lied. I’ve been telling him I was fine for months when in reality, I’m anything but fine. How do I explain this to him?”

“Well, it’s Grey, so I’d start by taking your clothes off.”

“Luke!” My lips scrunch together in irritation, and I throw an annoyed punch into his bicep, which he sluffs off with a roll of his eyes.

“The man is in love with you, Anastasia. Like, really in love with you. He’ll forgive you. Just tell him the truth, say your sorry, and move forward.”

“Yeah.” I nod. “You’re right. I’ll uh… I’ll see you back home?”

“Sixteen more watches of It Happened One Night couldn’t stop me.”

I laugh and pull him into a hug. “Thank you, Luke. For everything.”

“Ah, get the fuck out of here with that. You know I’m always here.” I smile, and kiss his cheek before turning and heading into the hotel. It’s late, so the lobby is empty and I take the elevator ride up to the fourteenth floor alone. Woods isn’t outside my door waiting for me, so I assume my absence has gone unnoticed. But once I slip my key into the pad and step inside my room, that assumption proves to be false.

My husband is sitting in a chair by the bed, a half empty bottle of brown liquor at his side.

“Christian,” I gasp.

“Welcome back, Anastasia,” he says without looking at me. He lifts the glass dangling from his fingers and drains it in one long pull. Once his drink is gone, he slams the glass down on the table with too much force and gets out of his seat.

I wince. “What are you doing here?”

“Me? What am I doing? That’s funny, I came here to ask you the same fucking question.”

Shit. He knows.

Next Chapter

I stare hopelessly at my computer screen, my fingers tapping mindlessly on my mouse button. I’ve read this book so many times now that the words are starting to meld together and it’s getting harder and harder to pinpoint exactly where this story goes off the rails. Every time I think I’m close to making a cut that will tighten the up the plot and make it flow better, I hit a wall because of some minute detail buried the weeds that ends up being crucial evidence to Peter Gillette, detective extraordinaire, solving the crime.

“Ugh, stop being so overly complicated and convoluted!” I shout in frustration at my screen, then burst into a fit of stress induced laughter and let my head fall onto my desk. I’m very seriously considering having a discussion with Christian about changing our names and disappearing into the night, just to escape the torture that has been The Black Rose,  until the long droning page from my desk phone interrupts my inner pity party.

“Mrs. Grey, Ms. Gallagher is on line one for you.”

“Thank you, Penny.” With a heavy sigh, I reach forward and pick up the receiver on the phone, then push the button next to the blinking light.

“Good afternoon, Carmen.”

“Hi, Ana. I thought I’d just check in. Are you ready for next week’s big announcement?”

“Oh, I’ve got it circled on my calendar.” I bite my lip as I hope and pray she doesn’t pick up the biting sarcasm behind that statement, but thankfully, if she does, she chooses to ignore it.

“Glad to hear it. Have you been to New York before?”

My heart seems to skip a beat as a quick flash of my memories of New York runs through my mind. The Empire State Building. My run in with Leila and being chased through the streets by the man I now was Anthony Kommer. Jack Hyde in my dressing room at the Today show.

“Yeah.” I swallow. “Yeah, I’ve been there before.”

“Great. And Scott’s got you set up with a hotel? Things to do? Sites to see?”

“Yes, he’s been very helpful.”

“Excellent. I’ve got a really good feelings about next week. I’m glad you and Scott are working better together. It really shows.”

Yeah, because he got is way. “I just hope it all reflects in sales.”

“It will. I’ll see you next week, Anastasia.”

“Looking forward to it, Carmen.” I hang up the phone and let out a heavily burdened breath. Five weeks ago, I was determined to make this book into a success. Today, with my deadline quickly approaching, it feels less like a challenge and more like a suicide mission.

I turn to my screen once more, repeating to myself over and over again that this book is going to make or break my career, and try to get back to work. But as I being hacking my way through the block of overly descriptive text I’m working to make less wordy and flowery, there’s an unexpected knock on my door.

“Come in,” I call, and Woods steps inside.

“Hey, Ana.”

“Evan?”

“Luke Sawyer is here to see you. Should I tell him you’re busy?”

“Uhhhhh…” My eyes flit between the manuscript and the clock before I shake my head. “No, that’s okay. Let him in.”

Woods nods and steps out, and thirty seconds later, Luke slides in through the still open door before closing it behind him.

“How’s it hanging, big shot?” he asks, flopping down into the chair across from me. I exhale, letting my lips flap in a very unlady like manner as I try to release my frustration.

“I have a manuscript that I’m supposed to turn into a bestseller by next week, but I’m afraid it’s going to be dead on arrival.”

“So, why are you pursuing it?”

“The author was previously our biggest seller, he’s got the support of the New York office and apparently that overrides what I think… it’s a long story.”

“Well, I’m glad I don’t have time to hear it.” I narrow my eyes at him and he flashes his signature broad, teasing grin back at me. It never fails to put me in a good mood, but I don’t really want to be cheered up right now. I want to break something and scream as loud as I can.

I turn away to look at my computer again so he won’t be able to tell I’m fighting a smile, but he leans over my desk with his hands folded lazily in front of him. “You wanna go to lunch with me?”

I frown. “I really, really wish I could, but I can’t. This book is going to press next week and there’s going to be a big party in New York over it and Greenwich is pulling out all the stops on marketing… If I fail at this, I’m going to lose my job.”

“Maybe taking a break for a few hours will help clear your mind.”

“I’m sorry, Luke.”

His good humor disappears and his expression turns deadly serious. “Ana. I really think you should come to lunch with me.”

“Wha–” My voice dies off as he raises an eyebrow and his words from Calliope’s party ring through my head.

‘We’re going to have to move quick if we’re going to fool your security. Expect me, all the time. Be ready.’

“Oh, right. Yeah, uh… I can’t take an hour or two. Let me just…” I reach out for my phone and hit zero to call reception. Penny picks up almost instantly.

“Yes, Mrs. Grey?”

“Penny, I’m going to head out for lunch and I won’t be available by phone. Have Abby push anything on my calendar until later this afternoon.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

After hanging up, Luke jumps out of his seat and I reach down with shaking hands for my bag. The truth is, though I knew this moment was coming, I haven’t really thought much about what I was going to do or say to Alexis once it did. We have no idea what her motives are or who she’s working with, so I don’t know if I’m about to walk into something hostile. That doesn’t change my mind about going, though. If anything, the unknown makes all of this more urgent and has me more anxious to nullify whatever threat she poses to my husband or my child. But summoning the courage to put myself back into everything I fought so hard to escape last year doesn’t come easy. I know going into this the way we are, without any help from Taylor, is a calculated risk. If something were to happen, Christian would have no idea where to even look for us.

“Hold on,” I say as Luke reaches for the door. There’s a notepad on my desk that I rip the top sheet of paper from and scribble three words.

Taylor. Ask Mia.

“What’s that for?” Luke asks, and I swallow as it tuck it under my keyboard to hide in case Woods happens to come in and glance over my desk while I’m away.

“Just in case,” I reply, then sling my purse over my shoulder and march out of my office with a straight back and squared shoulders.

Woods stands and fixes his tie as Luke and I make our way across the main floor, but I stop him with a gesture of my hand and sweet smile. Thankfully, when I speak, I’m able to keep my voice calm and level.

“I think we’re going to be okay, Evan. We’re just going to lunch and Luke here has a lot of experience keeping an eye on me.”

“Uh, Mrs. Grey… Mr. Grey–”

“Isn’t here, and what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon. And if he calls for me while I’m out, tell him I said he can talk to me about it tonight.”

“But, Ana–”

“Seriously, Evan. We’ll be fine.” He looks at me uncertainly, clearly warring with the decision, so I squeeze his arm and hurry from the office before he has the chance to argue further. But when Luke opens the door for me, I can see the hint of empathy behind his eyes. He knows full well the wrath Woods will catch from Christian if he finds out I ditched my security, so I make a mental note to ensure I get the brunt of the storm just in case word of my absence gets back to him.

In the car, Luke finally lets down his lunch pretense and turns serious again. He switches off the radio and turns into the light downtown traffic with as much focus as I imagine he once used patrolling the border while he served in the military.

“She works the late morning shift at the Starbucks across the street from GEH,” he explains. “I think because it’s a subtle way to keep tabs on Grey. It’s where Andrea gets his coffee every morning so it tells her when he arrives at the office and she can set up watch, which she usually does…. Over there.”

He points to a delicatessen a little ways down the street with large windows at the front of the store. It’s a place I’m familiar with because it’s where Christian orders his lunch from nearly every day. I’ve even met him there a few times to eat together since I’ve started working downtown again. The tiny, eat-in dining room is always busy, so it’s easy to be overlooked. It’s one of the reasons why Christian likes it so much. Directly behind the windows at the front of the store is a long wooden bar where most people eat their lunches while pouring over laptops. I’ve even seen a few of my authors camped out there with a reuben on rye trying to finish up their manuscripts before I come break down their door. Honestly, if she’s looking for a place to blend in, it’s not a bad strategy. No one would bother her or question why she was there, and GEH would always be firmly in her sights.

Luke pulls into a miraculously open space along the curb just a few store storefronts down from the Starbucks where Alexis should be finishing up work, shifts his car into park, and then turns to me with imploring eyes.

“You’re really sure you want to do this?”

“Dead sure,” I reply, not missing a beat. But my confidence doesn’t seem to have any affect on his.

“If she really is working for someone, Ana, confronting her means that they’re going to know we’re onto them. This could turn into Lincoln all over again.”

I swallow. “If she’s working for someone who plans to come after us, then it’s already Lincoln all over again. Last time, I sat around and waited. I let Leila follow me, I gave Gia the benefit of the doubt even though everything she did set off red flags, and it didn’t keep me, or Christian, or Calliope safe. It only made him stronger. I’m not going to nothing anymore, Luke. If there’s someone else out there, I want to know about it. And I want him to know that I’m coming for him.”

The conflict displayed on Luke’s face is almost painful to witness, but after several seconds deliberation, he sighs, nods, and opens his door. I follow suit and come around the car to meet him, but before I can charge forward for the coffee shop, he grabs me and pulls me into the inlet around the main doors of a thrifty clothing store.

“Do you remember the sting we set up against Elena Lincoln? The night we found out about the club?”

“Yes.”

“What did Taylor say to you?”

I search through the vibrant memories of that night for the dull ones of the time I spent with Taylor earlier in the evening. “If I tell you to do something, you do it.”

“Exactly,” Luke replies. “Now stay close.”

He turns around the corner first and walks slowly to the front of the Starbucks. I try the best I can to mirror his causal walk, but it’s difficult in the skin tight skirt and stilettos I wore to work today. After taking a brief look through the front window, he turns to me and nods, then leans against the brick facade and waits. “Keep an eye out for Andrea or Ros or… anyone from GEH that might recognize you,” he warns me.

I nod, then reach into my bag and pull out a pair of oversized sunglasses. The sunshine we enjoyed for Calliope’s birthday party is long gone now and the sky is dark with gloomy looking clouds, so the sunglasses are as out of place as they are unnecessary. But they do their job at concealing my face, at least at a cursory glance.

We wait for several minutes that feel like hours as my nerves mount and my feet start to ache. I glance down at the watch around my wrist probably thirty times, watching the hands tick away five minutes, then ten, until finally the door opens and the girl with the cloud of dark hair we’ve been waiting for saunters out onto the sidewalk. She turns up the block with only a quick look over at the imposing structure across the street, which shows none of the damage it sustained only a few weeks before.

I take a breath and step away from the wall. “Alexis!”

“Ana, no!” Luke hisses, but I ignore him. Alexis stops a few paces away from the front door, and whirls around to face us. I pull the sunglasses from my face and try to immolate the same, intimidating glare I’ve seen Christian use a thousand times. The curiosity behind her eyes vanishes the moment she recognizes me, and after gaping at the two of us for a few minutes she turns to run.

“God damn it,” Luke grumbles. He shoots me a look that tells me just how pissed he is, and takes off after her. Thankfully, running doesn’t seem to be her forté, because he catches up to her quickly, cutting off her route and forcing her to turn around, where I’m already waiting for her.

“Anastasia,” she pants.

“We need to talk,” I reply coolly. “Come with me.”

She turns and looks at Luke, who stands behind her like a brick wall and gestures her to follow after me. I lead her back to car and open the door to the backseat for her. She hesitates before climbing in, but with the crowd of people milling over the sidewalks, blocking her escape route, and my ex-CPO towering tall and intimidating behind her, she doesn’t have much choice to come along with us.

I reach down to flip the switch on the inside of the door to turn on the child locks before I close her inside and meander around the passenger’s side. Luke glares at me over the roof of the car before I can climb in.

“What happened to, if I tell you to do something, you do it?”

“I couldn’t wait.”

He lets out a heavy breath before yanking open the door and angrily stepping inside. I follow suit, and then put on my best poker face as he merges back into traffic.

We drive to a restaurant on the other side of the city. One that’s upscale and that you’d generally need a reservation made weeks in advance to get into. But when the maître d’ recognizes me, he leads us back to a private dining table without hesitation, despite the fact Luke is dressed in jeans and Alexis is still in her Starbucks uniform.

“What can I get for you to drink, Mrs. Grey?” he asks, after passing us the day’s custom menu.

“Iced tea, please. Alexis?”

She blinks at me in shock, then looks down at the menu. “Uh… I guess I’ll have the same.”

He nods, takes Luke’s order for a Coke, and disappears, leaving us alone to talk.

“Order what you want,” I tell Alexis, picking up my menu. “The food here is excellent.”

“What are you doing?” she asks, clearly suspicious.

“Treating you to lunch.” We stare at each other for a long beat. It’s clear she’s trying to figure out my angle, but I give her nothing to read into. I smile pleasantly, then return my attention to the menu. After the waiter returns with our drinks and takes our order, I fold my hands on the table and stare at her with purpose and as much confidence as I can summon.

“I know you’re watching us,” I say calmly. “I know you were following Mia, I know you were at the hospital when my sister had her baby, I know you were at the restaurant during my business lunch the other day, and I know you’ve been keeping tabs on my husband.”

“So you thought you’d bring me to lunch?”

“I want to know why.”

She scoffs, actually scoffs, and picks up her iced tea to take a drink without answering. I wait, not pushing her, not making any demands. Just staring at her expectantly.

“Look, I’m not going to tell you anything,” she says at last. “So you might as well save your money on this grossly overpriced restaurant and take me back. I don’t need all this pomp and circumstance from you.”

“Why? Is someone threatening you?”

“What?”

“We can protect you, you know. If someone is forcing you to watch us, we can protect you, hide you, set you up with everything could ever need or want. Just tell me who it is, and we’ll take care of it.”

She leans forward, elbow on the table, and rests her cheek on the heel of her hand. “Lincoln really did a number on you, huh?”

“Which should make you desperately want to cooperate with me,” I reply, a vague threat in my voice. “Because one way or another, you’re going to tell me who you’re working for. Whether it’s over lunch, or after my friend here has done whatever it is he has to do to get you to talk.”

“Lincoln’s dead, Anastasia. No one is getting paid anymore, so no one is coming for you. Congratulations, you won.” There’s a bitter bite to each of her words that isn’t lost on me.

“Then why are you following my family?”

She takes another drink and glances through the window behind me, at the panoramic view of the sound which is dark, and murky beneath the clouds. “I’m not a bad person,” she says at last. “I know you think I was part of what happened to you, but I really wasn’t. I never wanted to be. I didn’t spy on you like so many others did or try to sabotage Grey’s company. I’m not the villain you’ve made me out to be.”

“You threatened my sister-in-law. You talked her out of telling us what she knew about Gresham and stood by as he promised to harm each and every one of us.”

“I was trying to protect him.”

“Lincoln?”

“No, Charles.” I sit back, blinking. Charles isn’t a name I recognize until… I do. Charles Gresham. Mia said that Alexis was his favorite girl, that he requested her every time he came into the club, and when Christian finally shut it down, she’d yelled at him for taking away the only steady Dom she’d ever had.

“I know what happened to you that night,” she says, softly. “I’ve read every article and watched every news report about what went down in that apartment. You got the crazy girl and her psycho lover boy to keep you at Escala until he got there to finish what he’d started, but why do you think you had to wait for him at all? Where do you think he was?”

“He was with Gresham.”
“We were trying to leave,” she continues. “Charles never wanted to come after Grey, but he didn’t have a choice. If he didn’t do what Lincoln said, he’d expose him and Charles would have ended up in jail just like Elena. And eventually, he’d have met the same fate. We all would have, that became clear very quickly after… the asian kid, whatever his name was. He wasn’t going to keep any of us around.”

Hyun.

She breaks eye contact then, taking a moment to wipe away the tears pooling in her eyes.  I offer her the napkin in my lap, but she shakes her head and continues.

“Our bags were packed. Five more minutes and we would have been long gone. But we didn’t make it. Lincoln had gotten a key from somewhere and forced his way into the apartment. Charles did everything he could to stop him, to plead for our lives, but we both knew there wasn’t any hope. He had a can of gas in his hand and that’s not something you bring if you’re there to be reasoned with. Charles attacked him, but Lincoln was a better fighter than even I would have given him credit for. Still, it was enough for Charles to tell me to run. And I did. I ran from the building and waiting across the street, praying I would see Charles come through the front doors and whisk me away like we’d planned. But he didn’t. A few minutes later, I saw Lincoln walk out and… I knew. Part of me didn’t want to go up there and see it. I think I knew I wouldn’t be able to handle it. But, I also knew that if there was any possibility that he was alive, he would be hurt and he would need my help.”

“So, I ran for the building, but I hadn’t even gotten all the way across the street before the apartment windows blew out. Fire and broken glass rained down on the street and, suddenly, there were people everywhere. Trying to get out of the building, trying to get a better look at the damage. Every police car in the city showed up, every fire truck, and I stood there, horrified, watching them pull people covered in burns out of the building on stretchers. I think that I was holding out hope that Charles would be one of them, but he wasn’t. He was gone.”

“Alexis…”

“He wasn’t just my Dom, Anastasia. He was my everything. I know he did things that were inexcusable, but I made excuses anyway. I looked past the things he had done and the people he had hurt, because none of that mattered to me as much as he did. I did things that will haunt me until the day I die, but I didn’t have a choice. Not because he commanded me to, or even asked. But because I knew that’s what it would take to protect him. Haven’t you ever had someone you loved so much you would do anything to keep them safe? Even if it was wrong?”

I take a breath and nod. She presses her lips together, blinks away the tears that seem determined to leak down her cheeks, and returns the gesture.

“I loved him more than I have ever loved anything in the world, and Lincoln took him from me. Because he was trying to get to you.”

“Alexis, I’m sorry. But you have to know that Christian and I had nothing to do with Gresham’s death. We didn’t even know he was involved until two days before he died.”

“I know. I’m not crazy like that Williams girl or Gia Matteo. I know what happened, I know why it happened, and I know who’s to blame. It was Andrew Lincoln, and he’s dead now too.”

“So why are you following us?”

“Us?” she repeats. “This has nothing to do with you, Anastasia.”

“You watched me from the cafe across the street from where I work. You were at that restaurant I went to last week. I know you were watching me, I heard you. And I know you’re following my husband and both of my sisters. We’ve seen you, Alexis.”

“He’s not easy to find.”

“Who?”

She blinks again and looks away, but this time it’s not to hide her tears. She looks off into the distance, like she’s seeing something that’s not here. “I followed Mia because she’s his favorite. I remember how much she used to talk about him, about how close they were. Wherever she was going, that seemed the most likely place I’d find him. Then the blonde girl who moved into Escala gave birth and I knew he’d be there, but he was never alone. I went to your work thinking he might stop by, but he never did. You live in a gated community, and then there’s another gate at your house, so that was out. The only chance I have left is GEH.”

“Christian?” I ask, too sharply. “You’re trying to get to Christian?”

She nods, and when I look into her eyes, I remember Christian saying something about how angry she had been after Elena’s club was shut down. That she’d yelled at him. Perhaps, since she can’t take revenge on Lincoln, she’s decided to go back to the source. If Christian had never shut down that club, none of this would have happened to her.

“She had his sister, Alexis. Mia was in danger in that club, he couldn’t stand by and let Elena continue on after what she did to Mia. To the other girls who didn’t want to be there. I know you did, and I’m sorry for what you lost, but he didn’t have a choice.”  

“I know.”

“Then why are you coming after him?”

“Because he’s a dominant,” she says, and my face goes blank. “I worked very closely with Elena Lincoln, Anastasia. I know all about his past. I saw the girls she’d bring to him. I was in the courtroom the day you put Elena away, I heard him testify that he engaged in the BDSM lifestyle.” She glances down at my hands. “I know exactly what those marks around your wrist are from. Cuffs right? The metal kind that bite if you struggle too hard against them.”

I too look down, then tug the sleeves of my blazer to try and hide the faded marks from the cuffs Christian used to restrain me the night before. “He’s married,” I say firmly.

“And who are you?” she asks. “What makes you so worthy?”

“We love each other.”

She rolls her eyes. “Love is cheap. Every girl in this city could love Christian Grey. He’s hot, rich, successful… He doesn’t need love. He needs someone who will give him everything he actually desires. Power. He needs someone who will let him own them. Who will fulfil every one of his fantasies. Who will mold themselves into exactly what he wants them to be. He needs a submissive.”

“You don’t even know him. You have no idea what he wants or needs.”

“Those marks on your wrist tell a different story. He wants the control, and I’m sure you give it to him up to a certain degree. You play with the idea of BDSM, give him just enough to make him think he’s satisfied, but it’s not your way of life. You won’t let him hurt you, let him use your body in any way he wants. You’ll never give yourself to him, not really, and he’ll come to see that.”

“And you think he’ll take you?”

“Eventually they all do. Men are simple, Anastasia. They only ever want two things. Pleasure, and the women who give it to them.”

Mostly, her confession is a relief. Not because it thrills me to have another woman chasing my husband, but because I know Christian would never betray me. However, there was another woman who once lusted after him, coveted him, and when he turned her away, she did everything she could to destroy our lives. So even if she’s not part of some new conspiracy against my family, she’s still a threat and I won’t leave here until that threat is contained.

“Why Christian?” I ask, crossing my arms and leaning back in my chair. She furrows her brow, but answers anyway.

“He’s perfect. He has the money to truly take care of any girl who serves him. He has the looks and the body to make him desirable. And he’s powerful. Enough so that men and women bend to his every command even without the threat of punishment. You have no idea how much that appeals to a girl like me.”

I shake my head. “This is city is full of men like him. Rich, powerful, wanting. There have to be a dozen Doms just like him around this city. Single, and waiting for a willing submissive.”

“No,” she sighs. “There isn’t. I worked at Kink, remember? I know every player in the Dominant game. Hell, I’ve done scenes with the majority of them. Most couldn’t provide half of what Grey could and the others are weak. Scared. Too timid to fulfil the role I need them to. I thought I’d never find a match like I had in Gresham ever again, until I found an early draft of the book you tried to kill in his final records. Elena’s book. Then I got to read about all the things that he’s done or was willing to do. Even in submission he was strong, and when she’d let him take over…” Her words stop as she shivers, and my muscles tense reflexively. When her eyes flash up at me with unconcealed want, my teeth grind together. “He’s the Holy fucking Grail.”

“Unobtainable. What a fitting metaphor.”

“We’ll see.”

The waiter reappears then, placing our plates of food in front of each of us. I put on a gracious smile as he wishes us a good meal, all while weighing my options. There’s a deep degree of desperation in dedicating your life to stalking someone who could never want you in return. And desperation is more dangerous than malice. This girl can tell me she isn’t the same as Leila or Gia all she wants, but I’ve seen the things she’s willing to do for what she desires. For what she claims to love. Her obsession puts Mia, Kate, Calliope, and myself at risk if she ever chooses to see any one of us as leverage or a way to get to get close to Christian. So, while I know something has to be done, without the threat of immediate violence, I’m not sure what that should look like. Do I leave here and find some way to punish her from the equation, like I did with Kozlowski? Or do I find a way to change her mind? Give her something greater than what she currently seeks.

“What if I helped you?” I blurt out, and she looks at me suspiciously.

“Excuse me?”

“You say you want a Dominant who will meet your needs, I can help you find him.”

“How? You’re not in the lifestyle. You don’t know anyone.”

“Christian’s not the only well connected Grey in this city. I know people, powerful people. I can help you.” That last bit was a bluff, but she seems to take the bait.

“I’m listening…”

“Stay away from my husband, stay away from my family, and I’ll deliver the Dom of your dreams.”

She considers this for a moment, staring cautiously at me while she weighs the decision as though she’s trying to catch me in a double cross.

“This isn’t a trick,” I confess. “I keep my word. If you can keep yours, I’ll help you.”

“Fine,” she says at last. “Find me someone worthy, and you’ll never see or hear from me again.”

Oh, I’ll make sure that.

I reach across the table to shake her hand, then dab my napkin against the corners of my mouth before rising from my seat. Luke follows and for the first time, I glance over and see the way he’s looking at me. The emotion that paints his expression isn’t quite anger, but it’s not far off.

“Order whatever you like,” I tell Alexis as I pick up my bag. “Dessert, drinks… It’s on me.”

“Thank you.” With a curt nod, I move around the table, only stopping to ensure the maître d’ charges everything that’s ordered to my account. Once we’re outside though, Luke grabs me by the arm and drags me down the sidewalk to the car before nearly throwing me inside.

“What the hell was that?” he demands, the moment he’s shut his door behind him.

“What else was I supposed to do? She’s already lost everything, that gives me very little else to work with.”

“So instead you want to play like you’re Elena Lincoln?”

His insinuation hits me like a slap across the face, and if he wasn’t my best friend and closest confidant, I think that’s exactly what he’d have earned in return.

“How dare you!”

“What the fuck else would call what you just promised her?”

“Elena Lincoln was a sexual predator. She pushed girls beyond the boundaries of consent and turned a blind eye to abuse. I’m not forcing Alexis into anything. This is what she wants, Luke.”

He turns away and stares through the front windshield, jaw tight, muscles tense. He’s fuming and if didn’t trust him absolutely, it would be almost terrifying.

“Look, if you’re not comfortable helping me with this anymore, I’m not going to force you to.”

“You already have!” he screams back. “Jesus Christ, Ana, you’ve got me in a box here. We’re in this too deep now for me to go to Taylor and not risk destroying your marriage or your family, so the only option you’ve left me with is to abandon you and  you know that’s the one thing I would never do. You’ve put this all on me. I don’t want to go where this is taking us but you have given me no other choice.” His words ring through the car with an echo almost as loud as his shouts. I feel the harsh sting of his castigation and crumple beneath it.

“I’m sorry.”

His body deflates as he lets out a long breath and reaches over to pull me into a hug. I try as hard as I can to hold back the wave of emotion that threatens to completely overcome me, but the confrontation I’d just been through and its subsequent revelation demand release. So I cry into his shirt until I’ve gotten it out and I’m able to pull myself together again.

“I’m sorry,” I tell him again, and he nods in acceptance.

“This is it, Ana, okay? She told you straight to your face that there’s no one else out there. Once Carrick’s investigation is done, they’ll know who’s left from Lincoln’s circle and he’ll take care of them the right way.”

“If his investigation is ever done…”

“It will be. Soon. And we’ll let them handle whatever they uncover, okay?”

I take a breath, but nod, and he squeezes my arm reassuringly before he starts the car and takes me back to my office.

 

As per the new normal, Christian is still at work by the time I get back home that evening. My brain is full of jumbled passages of text and worries over Alexis, but I do my very best not to let any of that show as I feed and play with Calliope. I keep her up a little later than I normally would, wanting Christian to at least see her before I have to put her down, and thankfully, my patience pays off. He comes through the door just as I’m about to give up and take her to bed.

“Good night, Princess,” he whispers, leaning over the bars of her crib to kiss her forehead. She stares up at him and reaches out to touch his face, so he lingers there awhile. I can feel his torment over the hours missed with our daughter radiating off of him as he tries to force himself to leave her side, and it hits me harder than I’m prepared for.

“You really should try to make it home earlier,” I tell him, once we’ve stepped out of the nursery. “I know you’re busy but I think it hurts you to miss this time with her as much as it hurts her.”

“I know. Between our new slate of acquisitions and the fusion project, there just don’t seem to be enough hours in the day anymore.”

“Acquisitions? I thought you passed that off to Ros?”

“I did, but we’re coming up on end of year and we’ve got to get more aggressive if we’re going to…” He pauses, obviously changing direction mid-sentence. “This is my strong suit, not Ros’s.”

“So… these late hours are only going to get worse over the next few weeks?”

“I’m going to try my hardest to make sure the don’t.”

I take a deep breath, wrap my arms around him, and gently press my lips to his. He takes my kiss as eagerly as a man dying of thirst reaches for a drink of water. I can feel him change under my touch, his body relaxes, and he seems to breathe more easy. When I pull away and swipe the few loose hairs on his forehead away, he looks years younger than he did when he’d first returned home.

“Everything for the fusion project has been moved to the facility in Kent, hasn’t it?”

“Yes. Everything.”

“Then maybe… maybe it’s time Calliope went back to daycare.”

The tension in his face relaxes and he stands a little straighter. “Really?”

“Yeah. I know you like having her close and she needs you around more. Besides, she has teachers and opportunities there that she just don’t have at home. I think it’ll be better for everyone.”

“Thank you, Ana.” He leans down and kisses me again, but just as the kiss begins to morph into something more promising, his phone begins vibrating in the pocket of his trousers. He growls in frustration as he pulls away and takes his phone out of his pocket, but when he looks at the screen, the kind of frustration behind his eyes changes. “I’m sorry, I have to take this.”

“That’s fine. I think I’m actually going to go down to my office and do some writing.”

“Writing? You haven’t done any writing for months.”

“Well, maybe being around authors all day has struck my muse.”

“Your Calliope.” He smiles, and I respond with soft laugh that once again draws him to my lips. “I’ll come find you when I’m finished.”

“And I’ll leave a trail of breadcrumbs so you don’t get lost.”

“How about you leave me these?” His fingers toy with the fabric of my shirt, and after giving him a scolding look, I kiss him on the cheek and leave him to his phone call.

On the way to my office, I triple check each room I pass to make sure I’m alone and that no one is left in the house to come looking for me. My paranoia is so peaked that I feel like the eyes of the family photos that litter the back hallway are following me as I close myself inside the one room in the house that is only mine, and yet I remain undeterred. With a steadying breath, I settle down in the padded chair behind my desk, move my mouse to bring my computer out of sleep mode, and pull my keyboard toward me.

In truth, I have no idea what I’m doing, so I start the only way I can fathom. I pull up Google and type, ‘BDSM dating sites’ into the search bar. Unfortunately, the phrase gets millions of hits. I click the first link, type in my city, and begin scrolling through candidates. I’m not wanting for options, the kink is actually more prevalent than I’d anticipated, but pickings are slim in terms of quality. Most of the pictures posted are of balding, middle aged men and mattress with various toys displayed in a sparsely decorated bedroom. Many of the biographies I skim are either vulgar and disgusting, or peppered with romantic idealism. Not what a submissive like Alexis would ever be interested in.

It occurs to me, as I flip to the 17th page on the site I’m browsing, that she’s probably been through these same listings and come up just as I am. I try another site, and another, and once I find that I’m reading the same profiles I’ve seen before, I let out a deep sigh, fold my arms over my desk, and let my head fall down on top of them.

Why did I think I could do this? She was right, I have no ties to this community. I don’t know how a dominant meets a submissive, I lucked into mine. And if it hadn’t been for Elena Lincoln…

I freeze, then sit bolt upright. Elena Lincoln.

With another cautious look at my office door, I exit out of my browser, and click the GEH portal icon that’s only on my desktop because Christian worked out of my office for a few weeks while his office finished undergoing renovation shortly after we moved in. His information is already populated in the sign in box, so I don’t even have to make an attempt at a guess for his password, and after arguing with myself if I really should be doing what I’m about to do, I click the button to sign in.

Instantly, I have access to the entire GEH server. His personal welcome page is littered with neatly organized folders for acquisitions, legal, and each department. My eyes are immediately drawn to the one still highlighted in blue, as if it’s the one that’s been most recently opened, titled Fusion Project, but I ignore my curiosity and instead click through Taylor’s folders.

It takes a while to find what I’m looking for, but eventually I come across the records we’d pulled from Kink, Elena’s club. My mouth goes dry as I open the folder, but my guilt is quickly replaced with victory. Alongside the financial records are client lists and I’m relieved to find that Elena had been very detailed in her record keeping. The data she has on each dominant includes their contact information, hard limits, preferences for submissives, even their net worth. It looks like preferential treatment was given to the clients who came in with the most money in their pockets, so their files are the most detailed. I only only have to find one who Alexis was never paired with but, as I begin weeding through the names with the highest numbers in the income column, my door opens.

“Hey, you almost finished?” Christian asks.

I jump, and my eyes snap to his too quickly. A clear indication of guilt. His brow furrows and he steps inside my office, so I quickly back out of every folder open on my screen and hit the x to kill the program just before he’s able to get a look at what’s on my computer screen. Unfortunately, the window I had open behind the GEH portal, isn’t much better that what I just narrowly avoided him seeing.

“Fetish Life,” he reads aloud, clearly taken aback.

“Research,” I say quickly. “I thought I’d dabble a little in Romance.”

“Really?” His tone suggests I’ve piqued his interest, rather than angered him, and he smiles as he saunters back around my desk and casually sits in the chair across from me. “That book your employee told you to read really made an impression, huh?”

I let out an awkward laugh. “Yeah, I guess. I just… I’m having a fundamental problem with some of the more detailed aspects of the lifestyle.”

“Well, I don’t know why you’re trolling the internet when you have fully invested Dom right here, willing and waiting.”

“I’m not looking for Dom,” I say clearly. “I just… I don’t really understand how people in the lifestyle meet each other since everything is so secret. You know, when they don’t have an Elena Lincoln.”

“Well, it’s not always secret. A lot of people live the lifestyle quite openly. They’re a conventions, clubs… all kinds of ways for people to meet each other. It’s only the ones who would have something to lose if people found out that keep it secret.”

“And how do those people meet each other?”

He shrugs. “Networking.”

“Okay, but how do you network if you don’t want people to find out about what you do?”

“I don’t know, it just happens. It’s a fairly common fetish and it’s fairly easy to spot the indicators if you know what you’re looking for. My world is full of people who privately practice BDSM. Powerful people are drawn to power.”

This is I know from Elena. She’d put herself through college and grad school by being submissive to powerful men. It had been her saving grace at the time, only to end up being her downfall once she tried to get out.

“And you know people?”

“A few. There’s a guy I know in New York, Damien Beaufort. He owns a PR/Marketing firm that’s one of the best in the world. That’s where I got Jacqueline. He’s been in the lifestyle for… eleven years.”

“How do you know?”

“I introduced him to Elena.”

“Oh.” I frown, and he gets out of his seat, walks back to me, and places his hands on each of the arm rests of my chair before leaning down and taking my lips in a deep, long, passionate kiss.

“Anything else you need for your… research?” he asks, playfully.

“Couldn’t hurt,” I whisper back. He smiles again and stands up straight, staring down at me with the commanding look in his eye that makes me want to get to my knees.

“Meet me upstairs in five minutes.”

I nod. “Yes, Sir.”

He turns and goes, leaving me breathless and wanting. I shake my head to clear away the desire fueled fog, and pull up an email to send to Luke.

 

From: Anastasia Grey

Subject: Found.

Date: May 14th 2012, 10:43 PM

To: Luke Sawyer

Get in contact with Damien Beaufort in New York. He might be our guy.

X

Ana

 

Once the email sends, I power down my computer, sweep my hair back away from my face, and begin to braid it as I make my way up the stairs.

Next Chapter

Note: This chapter was finished very late last night and there was no time for a beta. Please forgive any mistakes.

“Okay, then blend on medium speed for about two minutes.” I pick up the mixer next to my bowl of ingredients, then cringe away as the beaters whir to life in case any chocolate batter sprays back at me. Thankfully, my undoubtedly Food Network level proficient skills with a hand mixer mean I stay dry, and as I watch the ingredients meld together in a luscious ribbon of dark, fudgy chocolate, my mind starts to wander back to the manuscript that has occupied nearly every thought I’ve had for the past four weeks.

What if we just cut the entire part where he goes to London? The killer is in Boston, that whole chapter is just a red herring and it’s the slowest part of the plot.

Keeping my eyes focused on the task at hand, I carefully lean over and stretch my fingers over the countertop until I can just barely touch the corner of the open Black Rose manuscript and pull it towards me. With a flick of a switch, I kill the power to the mixer, pull out one of the beaters, and lick it thoughtfully as I turn through the pages.

Shit. If we take out London, he’ll never meet the cobbler and that’s the key to the shoe print evidence that leads him to…

“How’s it going in here?”

I turn and see Christian standing in the doorway with Calliope in his arms. She’s already dressed in the party dress we bought for her last week and she looks just like a princess, all in white with a tulle skirt that billows around her like a ball gown. Tied around her waist is a deep navy blue bow that’s almost as big as she is.

I gasp. “Oh my god, look at you, birthday girl!”

“Pity!” she chirps, the excitement and pride clear on her face as her fingers curl around her skirts. Christian grins and leans over to kiss her mahogany curls.

“Not just pretty,” he says. “You’re beautiful, baby girl.”

“Just like a princess.” I walk towards them and kiss my baby all over her face, before moving up and leaving a more lingering kiss against Christian’s lips. “How was your daddy/daughter breakfast?”

“Just shy of perfect.” I frown, and he reaches up to run the back of his fingers lovingly over my cheek. “We both missed you.”

I smile and lean in to kiss him again, but Calliope reaches out with her hand and pushes against my face to stop me. “No, Mama.”

“Well maybe not both of you,” I laugh, then nibble on her fingers before turning back to her cake.

“You don’t have to do this,” Christian says, following me back to the counter. “I wanted to make this as easy as possible for you.”

“I know.” In truth, the 2nd cake is a bit excessive. He’s already ordered a gargantuan, four tier masterpiece from the same fancy bakery we used for our wedding cake. The final design is beautiful, with fresh fruit and flowers used as decoration over vanilla buttercream, but it didn’t feel right to me to let someone else bake my daughter’s very first birthday cake. So, I decided to go the traditional route and bake her a small cake that will be all her own.

He sighs, but nods. “Andrea should be arriving soon. She’ll be coordinating the florists, the cake delivery, and the caterers. The people from the petting zoo should be here within the hour to start setting up and we need them to be finished before the crew from Carnival Days gets here to set up the carousel and ferris wheel. Other than that, it’s just actresses I’ve hired to play the Disney Princesses and we’re all set.”

“All eleven of them,” I say, rolling my eyes.

“She’s too young to have a favorite princess, I didn’t want to be exclusionary.”

“Don’t you think this is all a little over the top? I mean, she’s only a year old, Christian. She’s not even going to remember this party.”

“Maybe not. But I will. And I want to look back and remember how happy my baby girl was on her very first birthday.”

The sincerity in his eyes makes my throat tighten. “Well, I guess there’s no arguing with that.”

“Good.” He leans over and brushes his hand softly through my hair before pulling me into him and kissing me deeply. I hum with content, but as he pulls away, his eyes fall on the counter and the still open manuscript I’ve left sitting there. “I don’t think so, Anastasia. No working on our daughter’s birthday.”

I narrow my eyes. “Christian Grey telling me not to work. Which of the two of us has been at the office six nights a week for the last month and getting home later and later each day?”

“But not today.” There’s a smugness to his argument as he reaches behind me for the manuscript and tucks it under his elbow. “I’ll leave this in your office. If you go back for it, you’ll have to give your Monday morning meetings standing up.”

As he turns to leave, I bite my lip and shiver under the rush of endorphins that flow through me. I’d been scared that my unexpected ‘red’ last month would scare away Christian’s kinkier side. Every night for the rest of that week, he’d made love to me. Sweet, slow, passionate love. But as the days turned to one week, then two, I started to crave his rougher side again. I didn’t know what to do. For days, I’d cursed my need to take back control in that moment, thinking of it as weakness, and went so far as to practice in the mirror how I was going to broach talking to him about how I was feeling. I had a whole speech planned out, but when I purposefully dressed in the most bondage-esque lingerie I owned and prepared to give it, my concerns turned out to be completely unfounded.

“Ana, if you want to play, all you have to do is ask.”

“But I thought, maybe, you wouldn’t want to after I’d safe worded.”

“I told you not to be ashamed of that.”

“But–”

“But nothing. I’m glad you did. You needed me to stop, and you told me. That’s all that word is for. You’re not taking something away from me, you’re not being weak, you’re communicating. And that, above all else, is what I need from you. I want you to talk to me about the things you want, and I want you to tell me to stop before I ever go too far.”

“So, you’re not mad?”

“Quite the opposite actually.”

“And…” I bite my lip. “You wouldn’t be opposed to maybe tying me up a little tonight?”

His face stretches into a deviant, sexy smirk. “Oh baby, I’m prepared to do a whole lot more than just tying you up. Now that I know you’ll stop me if it’s too much, I can trust you enough to really test your limits.”

And he has. Nothing too over the top, just new and different toys, restraints, and positions. In the wake of that night, he somehow seems more free. More confident.

More dominant.

Even this morning, I still have a faint red line around each of my wrists from where he’d zip tied me to the curtain rod over our window the previous night and tortured me with a vibrator while he told me all the ways he was going to make me come. I shudder with pleasure at the memory, until Calliope comes prancing back into the kitchen, looking interestedly at the batter I’m pouring into cake pans.

“Come here, sweetie.” I dip my finger into what’s left of the chocolate in the bowl and offer it to her. She’s never had cake before, let alone batter, so she stares at the brown goop cautiously. But after finally accepting a taste, her eyes widen with pure, unfiltered joy.

“Yummy!”

I giggle. “That’s called cake, and you get to eat that on your birthday. Do you know what today is?”

“Me!”

“That’s right! It’s your birthday. You’re one whole year old today.” It hurts to say those words out loud, to admit she’s not my little baby anymore, but I don’t let any disappointment in how fast this year really has gone by show on my face. I pick her up high into the air and spin her around, relishing in her giggles, until the doorbell rings.

“Who’s that?” I ask her.

“Gigi?” Otherwise known as Grandma.

“Let’s go check.” I bring her down and settle her on my hip, then head for the front door where we find, not Grace, but Andrea standing on our doorstep.

“Hi, Callie!” she squeals as I step aside to let her in. “Happy Birthday!”

“Me!”

I laugh. “That’s about as good as we’ve been able to get in terms of birthday.”

“Well, what more do you need?” She grins, then leans in to give me a hug. “How have you been? It’s been awhile since I’ve seen you around the office.”

“Yeah, well… I have to make myself scarce around Grey Publishing. Corporate espionage and all that.”

“Can’t have that.” She turns and beams at Calliope again. “My goodness, this dress turned out so beautiful.”

“Christian demanded we have something custom made. I thought it was going to be our one big splurge for the party and then he ordered a circus.”

She laughs. “Of course he did. You know, after last year, I would have never thought that man could love anything as much as he loves you. But this little one gives you a run for your money.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty hard not to fall under her spell.”

“We sure do miss having her so close,” she sighs. “Especially with all the fallout from the fusion project.”

“What do you mean?”

“It was just nice when he was able to visit her during the day. Sometimes, if he was having a bad day and taking it out on everyone, Ms. Bailey would go down and pull Calliope out of daycare and bring her up to him. He’d be fine after that.”

“Really? Well, uh…”

“I’m sorry, Ana. I didn’t mean to… I mean, we get it. It was just nice having her around is all.” She smiles brightly at me and wiggles her fingers at Calliope again, but the doorbell rings before I can change the subject. “I guess that’s for me,” she says. “I’ll take it from here, Ana. Mr. Grey’s orders.”

“Thank you, Andrea.” With a grateful smile, I turn back to the living room, where Christian and I spend the rest of the morning playing tea party with our little princess.

The last bolts are being screwed into the Ferris Wheel newly erected in our back yard when Christian and I take Calliope upstairs for her nap. He tries to use the little time we have before the first guests arrive to check his emails and look over a few of the new acquisition contracts left over from the previous week, but after insisting that he himself said that we weren’t to work today, I’m able to drag him down in the kitchen with me to frost Calliope’s smash cake.

“This is delicious,” he said through a mouthful of homemade chocolate frosting.

“But it would be a lot more effective if a little more of it made it onto the cake instead of into your mouth.”

“That sounds much less enticing.”

I give him a stern look and pick up one of the spreading knives. “Get to frosting, buddy.”

“Sure thing.” He dips his fingers back into the bowl of frosting and quickly brushes a dollop of it on my nose. My mouth drops open in indignation but he only grins back.

“So that’s how it’s going to be, then?”

“Looks like it.”

“Then just remember that you started this…”

“Don’t test me, Anastasia.”

I place my finger over the tip of the frosting spreader, pull it back, and launch bits of chocolate all over him. He licks the speck of frosting away that landed his lip and dives for me. The spatula falls to the floor as he lifts me off the ground and onto the counter. I guard myself incase there’s another chocolate attack coming my way, but his hands move up into my hair and his mouth meets mine.

“Now what am I going to do with you?”

“Love me forever and ever and ever.”

“Besides that.” He smiles again, and then his eyes look up at the pot rack hanging over the kitchen island, then at the clock, then back at me.

“Don’t you even think about it!” I tell him.

“No?” His fingers move to my sides and I devolve into a fit of giggles as he tickles me relentlessly, only managing to stop myself from falling to the floor by the strength of his fingers. I playfully plead for him to stop through my hitched breathing and laughter, and once he does he pulls me into his arms, holds me close, and kisses the crown of my head.

“Mr. Grey?”

His shoulders rise and fall, then his lips part from my hair and he looks at Taylor waiting stone faced in the doorway. “Yes, Taylor?”

“Your parents have arrived. The rest of my team is helping them carry in Miss Calliope’s presents.”

“They need help?” I repeat, and Taylor cracks a rare smile as he nods. With a last quick kiss, Christian helps me down off the counter, takes my hand, and leads me to the entryway where we find Woods and the four security guards we hired for this party carrying in so many wrapped packages, it looks like the delivery from FAO Schwartz’s annual Christmas toy drive.

“Oh my…”

“We might have gone just a little overboard,” Grace says, leaning in to kiss my cheek as she hands her coat over to Taylor. “But she only turns one once.”

“As made clear by the state of my backyard,” I reply. She beams and moves to Christian, and Carrick steps up into her place.

“I tried to stop her.”

“You did not.” He laughs, shakes his head, and pulls me into a tight hug.

“We’ve missed you, Ana. Sunday brunch hasn’t been the same without you guys.”

“I know. We’ve been meaning to get out there but we’ve just been… busy.”

Carrick looks over at Christian, blank faced, and nods. “Yeah, I imagine.” He steps to the side and reaches a hand out to Christian, while I pull Mia into my side. “How are you doing, son?”

“Great, thanks. You?”

“Really well.” They stand awkwardly before each other, clearly unsure what to say, and Grace and I exchange nervous looks.

“Knock, knock!” For the first time, I breathe a sigh of relief at the sound of that voice.

“Kim,” Christian greets her, warmly. She shrugs out of her jacket and sheepishly passes it to Taylor, before moving over to my husband and kissing each of his cheeks. “Where’s little Calliope?”

“Naptime,” he replies, and she pouts with disappointment.

“Hey, kiddo.” My dad comes through the door with a small package wrapped in the same cartoon wrapping paper he used to wrap my birthday presents in when I was a kid. I smile as I take it and then step into his open embrace.

“Hi, daddy. Thank you for driving all the way up here.”

“Oh, hush. You know we wouldn’t miss it for the world.” He kisses my cheek, then shakes Christian’s hand.

“Can we see the carnival?” Grace asks. Christian nods and as he leads the way to our backyard, my dad drapes an arm over my shoulder and gives me all the new details of a custom wood piece he’s been working on in his shop that he and Kim plan to sell at the Grays Harbor County Fair. Andrea already has punch and snacks spread out on the tables, so we gather around and chat amongst ourselves while we wait for the rest of Calliope’s guests to arrive.

There’s a lot of them. Most every child from the GEH daycare has been invited, even the ones much too old to be friends with Calliope in anyway, and along with them comes their parents. Which immediately explains the vast guest list. In addition to Ros and Welch, nearly every GEH department head is in attendance. As I make my way around the party, playing hostess, Christian and I speak with other Seattle business magnates, city councilmen, and some of the old money elites he schmoozes down at the yacht club whenever he has a big project that needs investors. Most of them have children, though one couple seems to have brought their niece, and every single one of them seems delighted by the grandeur of festivities. They get lost in business talk, congratulating Christian again and again on a recent acquisition his company has made, which they all make out to be a huge deal but he’s never mentioned to me. Honestly, most of it is hard to follow so when I see Luke and Jade appear through the patio doors, I’m only too anxious to get away and catch up with my best friend.

“Excuse me a moment,” I say politely, then squeeze Christian’s arm before turning away and hurrying up the stone steps. It’s only once I make it onto the veranda though, that I realize Luke and Jade aren’t alone. There’s an eight or nine year old girl walking a few paces behind them, glancing around nervously as she tries to stay hidden behind Jade.

“Hey, Luke!” I greet him brightly, pulling him into a hug. He squeezes me, then pulls away so I can do the same to Jade, and hands me the gift bag draped over his arm.

“This is incredible,” Jade tells me, glancing over the rides and the animals currently ripping up all my grass.

“Yeah. It’s a little much, I know…”

“No, it’s perfect. I’m sure the birthday girl is in heaven.” She winks, then pulls the girl I noticed early out from behind her. “Ana, I’d like to introduce you to my little sister, Jessica.”

I smile. “Hi, Jess. I hope you’re ready to play. There’s lots of fun stuff down there.”

“Can I go on the rides?.”

“Of course you can. I think they’re just about to do cotton candy. Do you want to go play with the other kids?” She nods, looks up to Jade for permission, and once Jade gives her the green light smile, she scurries off down the stairs to the crowd of children forming around the cotton candy machine.

“I’d better go with her,” Jade says, uncertainly. “She has a hard time opening up to people she doesn’t know and I don’t want her to feel left out.”

“Find me when you’re done,” Luke tells her. She tells him that she will and with a kiss, she turns and heads down the stairs after Jessica.

“Little sister, huh?”

“Sort of. Jade’s in the Big Brothers, Big Sisters program. Today was one of their outing days and somehow I knew this was going to top going to the bowling alley.”

“Oh, but that’s sweet. If you two ever break up, can I date her?”

“Absolutely, because if you ever manage to get that past Grey, you’ve earned it.” I laugh, but stop as I notice him glancing around warily.

“What?”

“Guard at the gate, back door, two on the outer perimeter, and Woods at the bottom of the stairs in the house. Is that everyone?”

I raise an eyebrow. “Yes.”

“And where’s Taylor?”

“In his office, watching on the security cameras. Why? Security not tight enough for you again?”

“No, I just want to make sure I know where all the eyes are so I can talk to you in private.”

“About wh–”

“Not here.” He takes my hand and drags me around to a small alcove where the balcony meets the house. It’s about a two foot blind spot between the security cameras on the east and south sides of the house, something only a man as ingrained in our security team as Luke was would know.

“What’s going on?”

“I think I’ve got everything we’re going to get on Alexis Young. If you want to move on this, I suggest we do it soon.”

“Have you figured out why she’s watching us?”

“No idea, but she’s spent just about every day of the last two weeks camped outside of GEH. She has to be collecting information, but I have no idea for who.”

My blood turns cold. “Okay, then we confront her and find out.”

“Ana, maybe this is something we need to get Taylor in on. She’s been dangerous in the past.”

“No. If Taylor knows about any of this, he’ll know you’ve been working for me and it won’t take him long to find out about Kozlowski or the tape we sent to the news to help Carrick’s campaign. Christian and I are finally back in a really good place, I don’t want to drag this shit back into it. We can handle this on our own.”

“I don’t know.”

“Then leave it to me. Tell me where I’ll find her and I’ll go talk to her myself.”

“Yeah, okay.” His voice is sarcastic, and he rolls his eyes to let me know that would never happen in a million years.

“Luke…”

“Fine. But we’re going to have to move quick if we’re going to fool your security. Expect me, all the time. Be ready.”

“Okay. I will.” He looks at me hesitantly for a few more seconds, but there’s not time for further argument because we both hear footsteps on the concrete patio coming in our direction. I expect security, but it turns out to be Christian, which is probably worse.

“What are you doing?” he asks, eyes narrowing in on Luke.

“Just talking,” I reply, quickly stepping out of the alcove and slipping my hand into his. He looks suspiciously between the two of us for a moment, which kills me, but ultimately decides not to press the issue.

“I think it’s time we brought Calliope down,” he says instead.

“Right. Enjoy the rides, Luke.”

“Sure.”

I pull against Christian’s hand, which is required because he doesn’t seem ready to end his overly intense inspection of my best friend. Luke gives him a tight smile and moves quickly past the two of us and down the stairs, and Christian turns his hard gaze down on me.

“Just talking?”

“He’s… in a new relationship. It’s all new to him and sometimes he needs some advice. I’m his best friend.”

“Everything good between the two of them?”

“Yeah.” I nod. “Everything is going great.”

He breathes a sigh of relief and regains his previously happy composure. “Then let’s go get our baby.”

“Our one year old,” I pout dramatically, and he kisses my forehead before taking me by the hand and walking with me back into the house.

Unfortunately, Calliope isn’t quite ready to wake up when I pull her out of her crib. She fusses and fights her droopy eyelids while I change and re-dress her, and once we’ve brought her outside, she seems less concerned with the party than she is with the ends of my hair.

“There she is!” Grace says excitedly, stepping away from Kate, Elliot, and Kennedy for what I’m sure is the first time since they’ve arrived. I smile at the three of them and hurry over.

“Oh, Kate, look at her! That dress is adorable.”

“I know, right?” She beams down at the baby in her arms, her eyes alight with joy, and my heart seems to expand in my chest. Calliope, on the other hand, seems less enthused by her cousin’s arrival.

“Dada,” she says, reaching her arms out for him. He takes her from me, and Calliope gives Kennedy a warning look before burying her face in his shoulder, the way she did to me.

Elliot laughs. “Defense as the best offense, I like it.”

“I’m telling you,” Grace chimes in, “she’ll be less possessive with a little brother or sister…”

“Not gonna happen,” Christian says. He rubs her back reassuringly and tries to bring her closer to the baby, but she squirms in his arms and starts to scream. He frowns and gives Kate an apologetic look. “I’m sorry, she just woke up…”

“Oh, I know about cranky babies,” she smiles back. “But you know, she might just perk up if she gets to open some presents.” Suddenly, Calliope sits up straight and looks at Kate with wide, hopeful eyes. Clearly, presents is a word she remembers from Christmas.

“That’s my girl,” my dad says, coming up behind Elliot and clapping him on the shoulder. “Let’s get to the good stuff, huh?”

“Ray!” Kate exclaims. “Have you met our daughter yet?”

“Not yet. And Annie has told me all about how beautiful she was, but I gotta say… for a writer, her descriptions do not do this baby justice.”

“Awh.” Kate’s beams at him and tilts the baby in her arms so my dad can get a better look. His face breaks into a smile as he leans over to drink her in.

“She got a name?”

“William Howard Taft,” Elliot replies, not missing a beat, and Kate rolls her eyes.

“Kennedy. Her name is Kennedy.”

“Isn’t it perfect?” I ask, smiling at my father. He nods and reaches out to tickle her lips with his index finger.

“Everything about her is perfect. Just perfect.”

“Dada!” Calliope tugs on Christian’s collar, making it obvious to us all that she hasn’t forgotten the word presents yet, and we all laugh at the impatient look on her face.

“Okay, birthday girl. Let’s go open your presents.”

With a stack of gifts in front of her, Calliope seems to get over her post-naptime grumpiness in no time. She sits with Christian and I, unwrapping package after package, in front of a crowd of onlookers. Each gift is more extravagant than the last, especially the ones from the higher ups from within Christian’s own company, and with each designer outfit, expensive toy, or exorbitant bond she opens, I notice Kim’s mouth growing tighter and tighter out of the corner of my eye. Calliope though, seems just as interested in the wrapping paper as she does the Dior trench coat Christian helps her open from Ros.

“Here’s one from Grandpa Ray!” Grace says, passing the package I took from my father earlier this afternoon to Christian and Calliope. I look up at him and he winks back at me. Kim reaches down and takes his hand in hers, then pulls in a deep breath like she’s preparing herself for something.

Calliope, an expert now, quickly tears away the paper to reveal a rather beat up copy Shel Silverstein’s Where The Sidewalk Ends. I glance down at it, brow furrowed, until Christian and Calliope start flipping through the pages and I see some very familiar markings on the pages.

“Daddy!”

“It’s the same copy you and I used to read every night before bed when you were real little. I thought maybe you and Calliope could carry on the tradition and it would be like…” He shrugs, always uncomfortable with emotion in front of people. “Like, I was there with you.”

“Of course you are.” I get up and throw my arms around him, hugging him as tightly as I can manage. “I love it, Dad. And she will too. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, Kiddo.” He kisses me on the cheek, then lets me go so I can sit with Calliope while she goes through the final few presents she has left, but every time I look up at him, his eyes seem to glitter with pride.

“No, no.” Calliope says, looking through the sea of wrapping paper around her and not finding any more gifts to open.

“All done,” Grace sighs.

“What about Christian and Ana’s present?” Kate asks. Christian looks over at me and smiles. I nearly roll my eyes, because I know he’s more excited to give her our gift than she could ever be to receive it, even though we both know it’s what she’ll love more than anything else in the world.

“Is it ready?” I ask.

“It’s down with the zoo waiting for us.”

“Well then, let’s go.” I take Carrick’s hands as he helps me to my feet, then wrap an arm around Mia as the crowd saunters down to the petting zoo. It was probably a mistake keeping her gift down here, because Calliope very quickly shifts out of gift opening mode with all the animals to look at and pet, but Christian manages to draw her away from a tiny little lamb, just long enough to get her attention.

“Ready, Princess?” he asks. She makes an overly excited sound in response and Christian disappears into the tent the people who own the animals set up for supplies. I hold tightly to Callie, feeling my own excitement mounting as I anticipate her reaction, but when Christian comes back through the vinyl flaps at the entrance to the tent, every emotion bubbling up inside of me vanishes and is replaced by shock.

“Ho-see!” Calliope cries with delight, throwing herself forward and reaching out with her arms. I tighten my hold on her and take a step back. Christian is holding onto a rope, leading a pure white pony, whose hair has been braided with baby pink ribbons, towards us.

“I-I…” I stutter, unable to speak as I stare down at the completely unexpected animal. “I thought we agreed on a puppy?”

“Every little girl has a puppy,” Christian says, running the flat of his hand over the pony’s back. “And you know how much she loves those cartoon pony toys she has.”

“Toys,” I breathe, but I have to recover quickly, because Calliope struggles harder and harder to get to the pony with every passing second.

“Ho-see, Mama. Ho-see!”

I glance up at Christian again and mouth the words, ‘we’ll talk about this later’, to him, then carry her forward and let her enjoy the gift that’s a surprise to both of us.

After Calliope has finally had her fill of her own brand new pony, and the rest of the animals in the petting zoo, it’s time for her birthday cake. I must take a dozen pictures of her sitting in front of the small round cake I baked her this morning, and her staring with interest at the solitary flickering candle in the middle while everyone around her sings. Once the song ends, she’s not really sure what to do, so Christian leans down and helps her blow out the candle, then lets her finally dig in hands first. Her beautiful dress is quickly ruined as every inch of her is covered in chocolate cake and frosting, but while the rest of our guests stand around eating the big cake and fawning over how delicious it is, I sit alone with my baby and watch with complete and utter rapture as she enjoys the tasty treat in front of her. With hands completely covered in cake, she curls her fingers into fists and looks over at me, shaking with elation and she hums a loud and clear ‘Mmmm’, and as the happiness of this perfect washes over me, my eyes well with tears.

It’s moments like this that make life worth living.

The party lasts far longer than we intend for it too. After cake, Calliope wants to go back down to the animals where she spends the rest of her party feeding goats and having my dad hold onto her while she rides around a small little enclosure on her pony. Eventually though, our guests trickle out, our family says their goodbyes, and Calliope passes out in her daddy’s arms. When we lay her down in bed, and see the smallest hint of a smile still painted on her lips, even in sleep, I decide that Christian was right earlier. All of this was worth it to see her so happy on her first birthday.

“Am I in trouble?” he asks, after we’ve closed her door and we’re finally alone.

“Far from it,” I breathe back, and lean in to give him a deep, loving kiss. He hums, then pulls back and brushes the wayward strands of hair from my eyes.

“It was a good party. Almost a shame that it’s over.”

“Over?” I repeat. “Oh no, my love. The birthday festivities may have come to a close, but the party is just about to begin.”

He raises an eyebrow at me, so I give him a tantalizing smile, take his hand, and drag him back to our bedroom.

Next Chapter

It’s amazing how well Jacqueline does her job.

The media coverage of the explosion at GEH yesterday has been ubiquitously negative all morning. Words like careless, malpractice, and dangerous have been tossed around every network as casually as they previously reported the morning weather. It has me wracked with worry over the true extent of what could have happened, and what this is all going to mean for Christian and GEH moving forward. But, somewhere around noon, the dialogue being used by the anchors and live reporters on the news about what happened seems to change.

It’s subtle. Incident becomes accident. Dangerous finds its way to tragic. Soon, the pundits are no longer asking “what went wrong?”, they want to know “what can we do to prevent another horrific mishap like this from occurring again?” I doubt anyone even notices the shift, but I can hear Jacqueline’s voice in every word.

By the time I leave the office, Christian’s publicist has appeared on every local station covering the explosion, and called in for interviews on at least two major networks. The messaging coming out of GEH is so flawless, it feels scripted. Aside from Jacqueline, I’ve also heard interviews from Ros and Welch, and not one word of their statements were inconsistent with the company line. The only person who hasn’t made a statement yet is Christian, and the news is so hungry for his press conference this evening, one would think the president was about to address the nation from the Oval Office.

Like I said, it’s amazing how well Jacqueline does her job.

 

After spending the first few minutes of the commute home reading the most recent article brought up by my newly reactivated ‘Christian Grey’ google alert, I drop my phone on the leather seat next to me, close my eyes, and let my head fall back on the headrest. As if the utter exhaustion wasn’t enough to weigh me down, I feel like I’m being torn apart by the completely paradoxical emotions rolling through me.

On one side, I’m just happy Christian got out of that building unscathed. I can’t count the number of prayers I said in those long hours I spent waiting on the sidewalk outside of GEH, bargaining with everything I had to see him walk out just the way he did. So it seems wrong for me to be anything but grateful now that he’s out and safe. But in the absence of the fear that I might never hold him again, I can feel the weight of what truly happened. How many people were put at risk? How many more people could have been hurt? How many more wives, children, or parents watched the smoke filling the streets around the building, wondering just the way I was if they would ever see their loved ones again? And all because Christian ignored the advice of experts and everyone around him, and pursued this project anyway. Is still pursuing it.

But his intentions are good.

Yes, his motivations are driven by unresolved guilt and anger over what happened with Andrew Lincoln, but he’s chosen to direct his need for control and power into something he genuinely believes will benefit humanity. There are risks, dangers that I wasn’t even aware of until yesterday, but history is littered with innovation that could have very well been catastrophic had it not been successful. To throw away progress simply because it’s better to err on the side of caution would mean we would never have airplanes, space shuttles, or electricity. As long as I’ve known him, he’s talked about how green energy was the next big frontier in technological development, and I know what it means to him to be pioneering the way into a cleaner, more ecologically sound future.

But Calliope was in that building.

“Ana?” I open my eyes and look up to meet my CPO’s concerned gaze in the rearview mirror. “There’s a coffee shop coming up here on this next corner, would you like me to stop and get you something?”

“No. Thank you, Evan, but I’m ready to get home..”

“Alright. Just wanna make sure I’m not losing you back there.”

I smile at his reflection, then reach down to pick up my phone again. I don’t know what kind of day Christian has actually had, so I’ve refrained from calling or texting in case he was in the middle of something important. But it’s past five now and his press conference isn’t for a few more hours.

How was your day?

 

Brutal. The only thing that’s gotten me through are thoughts of you.

I stare down at the text as Woods continues to navigate through the heavy evening traffic en route back to our house, and while his sweet words wash over me I can’t help but smile. The blatant sentimentality in his text strikes against the chord in my heart that wants to forget about yesterday and move forward like it never happened. Because the warmth that washes over me in that moment is the first sense of calm and ease I’ve felt all day. After dealing with Scott, Hailey, Alexis, the exhaustion from my sleepless night, and the lingering uneasiness from the cold, threatening voice that no longer seems to be confined to my nightmares, I don’t want to worry over or doubt the one absolute good in my life.

 

Him.

His love.

Us.

 

But Calliope was in that building.

 

God, I’ve never felt so torn in half.

 

I swallow, trying to push away the tightness that grips my chest, and respond to his last text.

Me too. I love you.

 

I love you too, baby. I’ll see you tonight after my press conference is over.

 

Okay, I’ll be waiting. Good luck!

He doesn’t respond, and I spend the rest of the ride home forcing Woods to play all of the old, corny car games my mom taught me when I was young to keep myself awake. When we finally do get back to the house, I’m single minded in getting Calliope back into my arms, and while it doesn’t take me long to find her, I’m surprised when I do. She’s sitting on the kitchen floor with Kensie, dressed only in a diaper, and she’s covered head to toe in chocolate pudding.

“What in the world?” I gasp, grinning. Her face lights up when she sees me, and she reaches out with sticky fingers for me to pick her up.

“Mama! Mama!”

“Hey, baby girl!” With no concern for my cream, chiffon blouse, I lift her off the floor and settle her down on my hip. “What are you doing?”

“Pudding painting,” Kensie answers, also getting to her feet. “She’s been a little antsy today, so I wanted to give her something to do with her hands. Unfortunately, she’s been more interested in painting herself than the paper I gave her.”

“And eating it,” I add, noting the chocolate goatee around her mouth. “Looks like my little artist is going to need a bath before dinner.” I inhale the warm, comforting scent wafting from the oven then glance behind me in search of our strangely absent housekeeper. “Where’s Gail?”

The voice that answers is both unexpected and unwelcome. “Oh, we weren’t doing anything so I thought I’d whip up some comfort food for you and Christian and give her a night off.”

I turn and find my dad’s girlfriend standing in the archway between our kitchen and living room, eyes shining with delight as she stares at the messy baby in my arms.

“Kim, what are you doing here?”

“Well, once we saw what happened to Christian on the news, your daddy wanted to get up here as quickly as possible to check on you. But you weren’t here. Gail told us you went to work so we’ve just been waiting around all day for you to get home.”

“Oh. Where’s my dad?”

She nods behind her. “He’s out back. Little Callie here got a splinter this morning playing on her rocking horse, so he sanded it down and put on a fresh coat of lacquer.”

I look down and notice for the first time that there’s a lilac colored bandage, mostly concealed by chocolate pudding, wrapped around her tiny little index finger. “What’s this, baby girl?”

“Owie,” Calliope replies, a pitifully wounded look crossing her eyes as she holds her finger up for me to see. I kiss it several time in rapid succession, then look at Kim again.

“Well, thank you for… taking care of her.”

She beams. “It was all Raymond. He’s so good with her.”

“Yeah.” I shift Calliope higher onto my hip and pick up a towel off the counter to wipe her hands so she’ll stop sucking the pudding off her fingers. “Your daddy would have a heart attack if he saw you right now. We need to go get you into a bath, munchkin.”

“No!” she cries, her hands moving back to her tummy so she can coat them in chocolate once again and smear the mess over the rest of her body. I laugh and scrunch my nose up against hers, then take her from the kitchen to her bathroom to get washed up and changed. She’s much grumpier after she’s been put into fresh clothes, but her attitude changes once she’s back at the dining room table with the bowl of the white fish, carrot, and leek puree Gail prepared this morning in front of her. Though, after getting to play with pudding all afternoon, she’s no longer interested in eating her dinner from the spoon I offer her. Instead, she dips her fingers into the bowl and shoves her whole hand into her mouth, laughing up at me every time she pulls away clean fingers.

“Mmm,” I hum happily when she begins bouncing in her seat. “Is that yummy?”

“Nummy!”

Kim laughs as she starts placing dishes from the meal she’s prepared on the table in front of me. “She’s a good eater, you have to give her that.”

“She gets it from her daddy,” I reply, not taking my eyes off Calliope. “As long as it’s freshly made and complex, she’ll eat it. Grace tried to give her a jar of Gerber apple puree the last time we were out together, but Calliope turned her bougie little nose up at it.”

“That’s because she’s spoiled.”

My eyes snap up and my back goes stiff straight. “Excuse me?”

“Oh, come on, Annie. She’s adorable but your husband gives her anything and everything she wants. If you’re not careful and start telling her no every once in a while, you’re going to have a little monster on your hands.”

It’s a sentiment that I’ve expressed to Christian over and over again, except that I would never call my daughter a monster. Yet, when Kim makes the same suggestion, my blood begins to boil.

“First of all…” I begin, but I’m cut off by my dad entering the dining room.

“Hey, Annie!” He moves from the door to my side in a motion so swift, it feels like he closes the distance in a single step. His hands smell strongly of varnish as he wraps his arms around me, but there’s something comforting in that. A nostalgic kind of ease that makes my worries over Christian, my irritation with Kim, and the battle I’m fighting at work seem suddenly uncomplicated and unimportant.

“Hi, Daddy.” I breathe in relief.

“You didn’t call me, sweetheart. I’ve been so worried about you.”

“I know, I’m sorry. I didn’t call anyone… I was—“

“Preoccupied, I know.” He releases me so I can settle back into my chair next to Calliope, then brushes his hand over the soft hair on top of her head before sitting next to me and graciously accepting the dish Kim offers him. “What happened, Annie?”

“I don’t really know,” I admit. “Christian says it was an accident. Something went wrong with the cooling systems on the prototype they built and then it exploded.”

“Is everyone alright?”

I nod, meekly. “The roof collapsed over the lab and one of his engineers broke his leg under the rubble, but other than that everyone was fine.”

“Good. When I saw the smoke and the broken glass on the news, I thought…” He pauses, his eyes shifting away into open space with a hundred yard stare. I reach over and take his hand, wondering if the images of GEH bring up painful memories from the war, but he doesn’t elaborate any further. With a slight shake of his head, his fingers grip mine and his mouth curls up into a forced kind of smile. “I’m just glad you’re all okay.”

“Where is Christian, anyway?” Kim interjects. “If he’s not home soon, dinner will be cold.”

“He’s still at the office,” I tell her. “He has to make a statement about what happened, so he’s giving a press conference tonight.”

“And you’re not going?”

I swallow. My dad is exactly the person I feel most comfortable talking to about the impossible conundrum I’ve been battling with all day, to help me figure out what I’m really feeling right now, but I’d prefer if we could have this conversation without Kim. I can feel his expectant gaze on me while I push the casserole Kim has made around my plate, and thankfully, he seems to read my reticence perfectly.

“Why don’t you and I go talk alone for a minute, huh?”

“Yeah,” I reply gratefully. He rises from the table and takes my hand, but before he leads me from the dining room, he turns back and kisses the top of Kim’s head in the sweet, loving way Christian always does to me.

“Thank you for a delicious dinner.”

“You hardly ate.”

“Well, don’t touch my plate and I’ll come back for it.” He smiles down at her. Easy. Carefree.

It makes me ache for Christian and reignites my guilt over the trepidation I’ve been feeling instead of simply being grateful that I didn’t have to face the alternative.

I take a reassuring breath as I follow my father through the back door onto the veranda. The sun is low in the sky, turning the water at the edge of my yard different shades of gold and scarlet. A small breath of cool wind makes the grass below the terrace sway lazily back and forth. It’s quiet. Serene even.

“What’s going on, Annie?” my dad prompts me, settling into one of the padded chairs around the glass table where Calliope’s rocking horse is drying. I take the seat next to him and look anywhere but his eyes.

“This project Christian’s working on… it scares me.”

“Well, of course it does. After what happened yesterday, how could it not?”

I gnaw on my bottom lip. “Yeah, but he’s not going to give it up. This project is more to him than just clean energy and fuel free sports cars… It’s his way of making sure what happened last year never happens again. I think I’m only just now starting to realize how much he blames himself for what happened, for not being able to protect me, and that guilt is keeping him from thinking straight. The explosion was an accident, but he was warned that what he wanted to do was impossible. Dangerous even. Ros said that all the experts he’s hired have told him what he wants to do can’t be done, even Elliot’s tried talking to him. But he doesn’t listen. All he cares about is the power this technology will afford him once it works and he can distribute it… but it’s already put him in danger once. What if next time he’s not so lucky? What if this investigation Carrick has to do now causes him to lose everything? The amount of fines he could end paying… I don’t know, Dad. I don’t know what to do.”

My dad sighs and leans forward, taking both my hands in his and waiting until I look at him. “Have you talked to him?”

“No. I don’t know what to say to him. Part of me feels like this is my fault. If I hadn’t fallen apart like I did, he wouldn’t feel the need to—“

“Hey, don’t do that. What you went through, most people can’t even fathom. Whichever way you needed to process that is okay. You’re allowed to feel however you feel, and so is Christian. It sounds to me like you two just need to get on the same page and that’s not going to happen if you don’t tell him exactly what you just told me.”

“I don’t want him to think I don’t believe in him. I think that’s why he and his dad fight so much. Carrick is a realist. Christian’s a dreamer. Whenever they clash over something like this, they fall apart and…” A brief image of Elena’s superior smirk flashes through my mind’s eye, and my head falls. “He needs someone on his side and I want to be that person. Always.”

“But you’re not on his side. Not if you’re not being honest with him about how you feel.”

“I don’t think it’s that easy.”

His chest heaves as he takes a deep breath and leans back in his chair again. “Maybe it’s not, by yourself anyway. Maybe therapy could help you—“

“Dad…”

“Annie, just listen to me for a minute, okay? I know you’re trying to be okay, but you’re not. You can tell us that you are until you’re blue in the face, but we all see it. You’re right. Christian blames himself for what happened and no matter what I’ve said, no matter what Carrick or Elliot or even your therapist says, nothing is going to change that. Not as long as he thinks you’re still barely holding on by a thread. If you want to help him, you’ve gotta help yourself, baby girl.”

“I have been. I’ve moved on, Dad. I’m just fine.”

“Ana.” The way he stares at me, imploring me with his eyes, seems to drill a hole right through my chest, and the edges of the void crumble away, expanding, until it feels like it’s going to swallow me in darkness. And from the shadows, I can hear the echo of Lincoln’s cold, vile threats. I can feel him standing over me. Watching me. Waiting for me.

“This isn’t about me,” I say, jumping too quickly to my feet. “I don’t need to talk, I need to forget.” I turn from the table and storm into the house, my hands shaking as I yearn desperately to get Calliope in my hands so that I can lock her away. But after pulling her from her highchair, ignoring Kim’s questions, and moving purposefully towards the stairs, I hear Kensie call for me from the living room.

“Ana? The mayor is about to come on TV.”

I stop and look through the open archway where she and Woods are already sitting on the couch, watching the news. Instantly, the vaguely threatening fog clouding my mind clears and the instinctual need to hide vanishes. I lean down and kiss Calliope’s cheeks, then take her into the living room with me, where I sit on the couch next to our nanny and focus on the headline dragging across the bottom of the screen.

 

Christian Grey to address Grey Enterprises Holdings Explosion

 

“Hi, Mama,” Calliope says, forcing her fingers into my mouth as I listen intently to every word being said on the television.

“Hi, baby,” I mumble back distractedly. My voice is pleasant, happy, but my eyes stay glued to the screen. My dad takes the seat on the sofa next to me then, Kim settling down on his other side. He tries to take the baby from me, but she screams, ‘no’. Her arms and legs wrap around me, so I rock her back and forth as Kensie turns up the volume on the TV.

The newscaster for KIRO 7 looks serious as she reiterates the events that happened the day before, but I note again how carefully she’s avoiding words like ‘wrongdoing’, or ‘at fault’. There’s a cut away, followed by an interview with Carrick that feels oddly antagonistic. Any discussion of the investigation being launched by the city of Seattle almost comes across as a violation. Unnecessary government meddling. There’s even a point where the interviewer asks a question in a way that subtly suggests that Carrick is being unnecessarily critical over the accident because of his relation to Christian.

“It’s no secret, Mr. Mayor, that you’ve clashed with Mr. Grey previously this year on corporate tax rates, which has stalled the approval of this year’s budget, and many pro-business city councilmen have sided with your son. Some have claimed that this investigation is merely a bargaining tool being used by the Mayor’s office to push your own agenda regarding tax reform.”

Carrick struggles not to roll his eyes. “We’re all pro-business, Meredith, let me assure you. And while my plan for comprehensive tax reform is beneficial to every Seattle resident, not just the wealthiest one percent, that particular issue has no bearing on this investigation. The city’s goal is to ensure that Grey Enterprises Holdings did not disregard safety protocols and procedures, whether intentionally or through negligence, and put the well being of the public at risk.”

“Well, hopefully we’ll get some additional insight into what those safety procedures were during tonight’s press conference. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.”

“My pleasure, Meredith.” The split screen merges back into one and the faintly hostile expression being worn by the anchorwoman vanishes immediately. Another subtle sign of Jacqueline’s due diligence.

I take a deep breath as the feed changes to the lobby of Christian’s building, where dozens of reporters sit before an empty podium. The video has been set up in a way that the damage from the explosion can’t be seen by the viewer. The shattered glass has been cleared, the floors have been polished. The only thing in view of the camera is the wall composed entirely of high definition screens, which display branding for Grey Enterprises Holdings with perfect clarity, even through the camera. The logo flashes three or four times, then the elevator just visible on the right side of the screen opens and Christian approaches the podium. A hush falls over the crowd of reporters and everyone one of us lean in closer to the TV.

“Good evening,” he begins, subtly adjusting his tie as he lays the cards with his speech written on them down on the podium. It’s the only sign of nerves in his otherwise perfectly composed disposition.

“Dada?” Calliope says, turning to the TV the moment she recognizes his voice.

I frown. “Kensie, will you take her upstairs and try to put her down? She shouldn’t watch this.”

“Of course, Mrs. Grey.” She takes Calliope from my lap, then disappears into the entrance hall. I tuck my legs beneath me on the sofa and my dad’s hand moves down to hold my foot in a gesture of support.

“Yesterday at approximately 12:45 PM,” Christian continues, “there was an explosion in the Grey Enterprises Holdings Research and Development laboratory. As of this morning, I have allocated all available company resources into the internal investigation being carried out by my own team and have instructed everyone involved in the accident to comply with and assist all state and local authorities with their external investigation. Though, undoubtedly, there will be redundancies. In the meantime, all research and practical applications of this project have been relocated to a safe, remote testing site located outside of the city. Miss Bailey and I have reached out to the families of the four people wounded in the accident and offered our sincere commiserations over what happened and made clear to them that GEH stands with them in every possible way as they receive care for their injuries. I would like to take this time to acknowledge and thank Seattle’s police and fire departments, who responded to yesterday’s tragic accident both quickly and heroically.”

There is a split second of agreement, followed immediately by the clicks and flashes of cameras and shouts of questions. Christian ignores all of it and moves onto the next card. Why he bothers with the cards at all, I’m not sure. His delivery is flawless, as if he’s reciting the speech from memory.

“It’s unfortunate that this project has been brought to the attention of the public before it’s completion, only because even my team cannot yet be certain of its full potential or the vast array of benefits this technology will afford this city, and the people of the world. The mission of Grey Enterprises Holdings is to constantly push the boundaries of innovation and invention so that we may build a more sustainable future. It is with that goal in mind that this energy project came to be. In conjunction with the world’s foremost experts in nuclear physics and engineering, GEH has charged forward into the uncharted frontier of clean, limitless energy. Too long have the goals of our greatest energy creators been to change the way we use energy, to burn fossil fuels and coal more cleanly or to simply reduce their consumption. But it is that kind of limited thinking that has failed us all. We’re being led to believe that the same technology available to us in the early 20th century is adequate for our needs today. I reject that. I reject that for all that modern technology has done to advance every aspect of our day to day lives, we create energy in much the same way we did a century ago.”

The room grows dark, and the high definition screens behind Christian go black. Then, there’s a cut in the feed from the press conference to a pre-recorded video that’s starts with dramatic music and the stark, compelling images of the consequences of wasteful energy. Pollution, waste, global warming… the clip paints a bleak portrait of the future until it introduces Christian’s fusion project as the answer to all of the world’s problems.

Grandiose promises are made. Everything from saving the environment to ending wars in the Middle East. It would feel over the top, if it weren’t so masterfully done, and the part that cuts to Ros and Christian talking about how nothing throughout history that was worthwhile was achieved without setbacks or adversity would be cheesy if he didn’t look so confident and handsome on the screen. He makes promises for thousands of good paying jobs for the people of Seattle. He paints a picture of the future that every parent would want for their child, that he specifically says he wants for his daughter. By the time the video ends, even I am left with such a feeling of hope that one would think he’d just introduced the key to humanity’s survival.

At first, the press don’t know how to react. No questions were answered about what really happened, and he didn’t even address the investigation being done by the city. His entire speech and the video they presented to a live television audience was just one big sales pitch. But if Christian’s nervous that his presentation didn’t make the impact he hoped it would, his face doesn’t portray it. He stands there looking composed and sure, until the spell of the vision he just laid out to the world is broken and the reporters launch their first questions at him from the crowd.

It’s brutal. For nearly twenty minutes he’s bombarded on live TV with inquires about what happened and what safety protocols were in place at the time of the explosion. Most of his answers are vague, capitalizing on an incomplete investigation to avoid saying anything incriminating. But just like it did this morning, the tone of the press conference quickly begins to shift. Christian continues repeating the economic benefits of this project, the job creation possibilities, and the environmental benefits, and eventually the press buys in. I sit on my phone until well after the Q&A has ended, reading the first reactions being posted online and nearly every one of them puts Christian in a positive light. The official GEH PixC account releases a photo from the press conference with a few choice excerpts of Christian’s speech, and the comment section is full of support for his project. There’s even an entire thread of discussion in the online feed for KIRO 7 News about how the city’s investigation against GEH is killing jobs.

“It sounds to me like you’ve got nothing to worry about, kiddo,” my dad says. “He’s put a lot more into this than I thought.”

“Yeah,” I agree. “Yeah, he did great.”

 

It’s late, too late for he and Kim to make the drive back to Montesano, so I help them get settled in one of the guest rooms. Once I’ve made sure they have everything they need, I check to make sure Calliope is sleeping soundly and head back downstairs to watch as much of the post press conference news coverage as I can. By the time I hear the garage open, signaling Christian has finally arrived home, it’s clear that he’s done exactly what he aimed to. So long as he plays his cards right, he and GEH should come out of this unscathed. And I’m glad to find the relief outweighs the sense of foreboding I still feel over the future of this project.

“You’re still awake,” Christian says, surprised when he enters the kitchen and finds me still perched on the sofa. He sets his things down on the counter, but hovers in the archway. “I thought you’d be in bed by now.”

“I told you I’d wait up.”

“But, you didn’t sleep last night. I would have forgiven you for going back on your promise.”

“That’s generous, but our bed holds no interest for me without you in it.”

The tired, serious look on his face breaks at my words, like the sun finally shining through a thick blanket of storm clouds, and he immediately moves into the living room to give me a tender kiss.

“I’m glad you’re awake,” he says. “I’ve been yearning for these lips all day.”

“Mmm,” I hum in response. “Then I’m glad I stayed up.”

He smiles again and turns back for the kitchen. “I’m going to have bourbon. Can I get you anything? More wine? Or would you rather have Tequila?”

“Depends on how tired you are,” I reply, coyly. His expression is alight with good humor, which makes me believe his drink is a celebration over his successful press conference, rather than a consolation prize after an overly difficult day. I watch every move he makes as he pours our drinks, realizing again as I take in his lithe, strong body how grateful I am that yesterday’s events are behind us and he’s safe at home. He saunters towards me with two tumblers dangling from the fingers of one hand, and his phone in the other. As he hands me the glass of silvery alcohol, music begins playing softly from across the room.

“I saw your father’s car outside,” he says, settling down on the couch next to me.

“He and Kim came to check on you. They saw the news coverage and were worried.”

“Then I’m sorry I was late.”

“That’s okay.” I pause to take a drink of my tequila, summoning the courage to talk to him about the parts of all of this that have had my stomach tied in knots all day, but before I can fully pull my drink away, his hand slides over my cheek and he pulls my lips to his again.

“Mmm,” he hums in content. “Tell me about your day.”

“Oh, it was fine.”

“Just fine?”

I sigh, then drain the rest of my glass, set it on the table next to the armrest, and crawl into his lap. “I lost Phoenix today.”

His brow furrows. “What happened?”

“Scott. He went to Carmen while I was out yesterday and told her we were moving forward with The Black Rose. I had to meet with the author today and let her know I’m not going to be able to get her published after all.”

“Did she take it poorly?”

“No. I kind of… subtly pushed her towards Lydia, so she’ll get published somewhere. I’m just upset that I’m not going to get the chance to work on the project myself. Especially when I’m now stuck with something that is going to take an actual miracle to salvage.”

“What’s her name again?”

“Who?”

“Your author.”

“Oh, Hailey Lewis.”

“I could pass her manuscript off to Elizabeth, if you want. Sign her to GP. It’ll mean she’s close and I can keep you updated on where she’s at in the publishing process.”

I narrow my eyes. “That might work on reporters, but not on me. I’m not about to pass off a book I know will be a best seller to my biggest local competitor. Nice try.”

He grins. “I had to give it a shot.”

“Uh huh.” Still smiling, he leans into me and kisses me again. But he doesn’t pull away this time. His lips linger against mine, pushing deeper until eventually his tongue slides purposefully into my mouth. I moan in contentment and wrap my arms around him. Blindly, he reaches behind his back and places the tumbler on his own side table, and with free hands he shifts me so that I’m pinned beneath him on the cushions. The weight of him seems to fill the emptiness I’ve held in my chest all evening, and it’s only too easy to forget all the things we still need to talk about with his warm, masculine scent swirling through my senses.

“Wait,” I gasp, but when I break the kiss, his lips simply move down to my throat.

“What?” he asks against my skin.

“We need to talk.”

“Later.” His hands move up and begin to knead my breast over my shirt. His fingers find my nipples through the fabric and with a sharp, biting pinch, I’m nearly lost again. His tongue is hot and smooth on my skin, his erection digs into my hip like he’s turned to stone. Every primal urge threatens to overcome me, but I resist. My fingers curl into the roots of his hair and I pull him back so that his mouth can no longer distract me.

“Now.”

He groans, but sits up so that I can squirm out from beneath him. “What do you want to talk about?”

“I—“ The words stick in my throat, and I have to swallow three times to coax them out. “I can’t go through another day like yesterday again, Christian.”

His shoulders fall and he sighs. “I know. And you won’t have to, I promise. We’ve found a new testing facility in Kent. Everything is being moved there tomorrow.”

“So? I’ll have to drive farther the next time you’re buried underground?”

“Anastasia…”

“You’ll be there too, Christian. Wherever they test the next prototype, you’ll go there, and if there’s another accident, another explosion… you might not be so lucky next time.”

“There won’t be another accident,” he says confidently. “Where everyone else sees disaster in what happened, we see progress. We’ve learned. It was a coding error that made the cooling systems fail and that’s easy to fix. The next one will be perfect.”

“You wouldn’t have tested the last one if you didn’t think it was perfect.”

“Mistakes happen, Ana.”

“And I don’t want you making ones that could cost you your life. You’re a father now, Christian. Think about Calliope and what would it would have been like for her if you never came out of that lab. She can’t lose you, and neither can I.”

“You won’t.”

“She was in the building!”

“You don’t think I thought about that every second I was down there?” There’s a flare of anger in his voice now. “You don’t think I worried constantly that the explosion was bigger than it was? That enough of the building had been damaged that she wouldn’t be able to get out, or worse. I know the risks, Anastasia, and it gives me no pleasure to take them, but this is what has to be done!”

“It doesn’t though! You can stop. You can scrap the project with the snap of your fingers.”

“After that press conference?”

My mouth drops open to argue, but no words come out. He’s right, if he doesn’t fulfill the promises he made to the public tonight, GEH’s credibility will be ruined forever. The thought is like a needle piercing the wall of a balloon filled with all the fight I was able to bring to this argument, and as it loses air, so do I.

“Hey,” he says, placing a finger under my chin and tilting my face back up to his. “It’s not going to happen again.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because I know better now. Because my team knows better. I won’t let it get to that point again and I’ll make sure the fail safes are in place and functioning before anymore testing is done.”

“You promise?”

“Promise.”

“And if anything makes you, or the people working with you think this is going somewhere unsafe, you’ll stop?”

“Yes.”

“No matter how close you get? Even if you think you’re on the verge of a break through?”

He sighs. “If it gets dangerous, I’ll pull the plug and move on.”

“Swear to me.”  

“On my love.” He takes my hand and places it over his heart. I glance down at it, feeling the heat of his hand and the steady thump inside his chest, then look up, past the gray of his eyes, searching for any hint of a lie or a bluff and finding nothing. I try to take comfort in that, but I also know that Christian has a perfect poker face.

 

Trust, Ana. He’s your husband and he loves you. He’s put everything on the line for you before. This is where you have to TRUST that he will stop when this is too much for you to bear.

 

With a slow, even breath, I lean forward and gently press my lips against his once more. We hardly touch. My kiss is a mere whisper of my love against his mouth, coaxing him, taunting him, and he takes it for exactly what it is. An invitation.

His arms twist around me and once again he lays me out on the sofa, covering my body with his. Through our clothes, I can feel his desirous heat melting over me like wax dripping from a candle. He lets out a need laden groan each time our lips part for even the smallest fraction of a second. His strong hands curl into my clothes with a barely contained violence, as if it’s taking every ounce of his already restrained self-discipline not to shred the fabric and let it fall in tatters to the floor.

This is how I want him. Right now, I need his dominance. Because, just like it did when he finally coaxed me out of bed last September, it means the power is truly mine. It’s a test of my trust, and his restraint. It’s a test of how far he’s really willing to go. One word to stop him. One word, and everything ends.

My teeth sink harshly into his bottom lip and he lets out a sharp, “ah!” before he pulls away. The disapproval of my small act of rebellion is clear in the eyes of molten steel that look down on me. I give him a playful, defiant smile.

“Uh oh. Now what are you going to do about that?”

He face twists with desire, and his words come out low and throaty. “You want to play?”

“Only if you consider dominating me a game.” He growls, sweeps me up off the couch, and slings me over his shoulder like a sack of flour. As he climbs the stairs, his strong hands grip the back of my thighs, digging into my flesh with unfettered want as though he’s exercising a great deal of restraint to keep them from moving up my legs to what he really wants. The hallway to our bedroom is dark, but I can feel the lines of his hard body through the thin, but sturdy cotton of his shirt. My anticipation mounts with each step, and by the time he tosses me onto our bed, my whole body hums with desire.

“Hands over your head,” he commands. Immediately, I reach up, pushing the tops of my forearms into the comforter. He pulls my shirt over my head, then makes quick work of the clasp and straps on my bra. The cool air wafting through the open balcony doors has my nipples hard and tight, and while he pulls my skirt and panties down my legs, his mouth ravishes both of them.

“Don’t move,” he tells me once I’m completely naked.

“Yes, Sir.”

After one last appraisal of my body in the moonlight, he turns to the dresser, pulls a black velvet box from the top drawer, and removes a single, silver key. I watch it glint in the pale iridescent light as I follow each and every one of his silent steps across to the carpet to the locked closet door on the other side of the room. It has its own light, and once he’s opened the door and stepped into the roomy space, the beam stretches over to the bed and floods over me. Each curve in my breasts, my shoulders, my hips, or my knees creates shadows opposite the glow that kisses my skin, and the contrast makes me feel sexy and desirable. I want to squirm. I want to call him back. I want to reach between my legs and ease the ache his touch has left me with. But I don’t. I lie perfectly still, because that’s how he said he wanted me.

“What is your safe word?” he asks, moving back to the bed with a complicated restraint mechanism that ends in two leather cuffs meant to secure each of my wrists.

“Red,” I reply, mouth dry. He nods and climbs on the bed, right over the top of me. His knees press against my sides as he buckles me in and his erection, still concealed inside his trousers, strains tightly against the fabric down his right thigh. I can’t help myself. I lean up, mouth open, and drag my lips over the bulge, letting my hot breath wash over him and seep through the material. The leather strap on the last cuff jerks violently as he hastily tightens it, then his hand finds its way under my jaw and he pulls my face up, forcing me to look at him.

“Don’t be greedy, Anastasia.”

I bite my lip at the chastisement, which makes him moan before he claims my mouth again. His kiss is different now. Demanding, fervent, and controlled. I can feel myself getting wetter and wetter with each brush of his tongue against mine and every nip of his teeth at my lips. My need for him blooms wildly from my core and through my veins until I’m whimpering for his touch.

“Please,” I whisper, because whispering is all I can manage.

“Please, what?”

“Master.”

The satisfied, sandpaper sound he makes after hearing that word is immediately followed by the jingle of his belt and the low sound of his zipper. “This is going to be hard and quick, baby,” he warns me. “Do not come until I tell you to.”

“Yes, Sir.” His hand comes down hard on my thigh, the slap sounding more violent than the sting in my skin really feels. I shutter and clench, then open my legs for him. He kneels between my thighs, back straight and proud, eyes smoldering, his cock gripped tightly in his fist as he stares and the apex of my thighs.

“So god damn beautiful,” he whispers in awe, then he pushes the crown of his erection against my entrance and takes me in one, hard thrust.

“Oh, fuck!” I scream, my back arching high off the bed as pure, uninhibited pleasure roils through me. He pulls back and slams into me, again and again, hard and quick, setting the rhythm for each pulse of the orgasm he’s determined to give me. I cry out his name, scream, and moan without any regard to the other people in the house, though I know deep down no one can actually hear us. And each gasp and feral sound of want he draws out of me only seems to make him more and more determined. His hands grip me with enough force to leave behind dime sized bruises. My scalp burns from where his fingers have wrapped too tightly around my hair. My lips are swollen from his mouth and my nipples throb from his teeth. But all of that is the perfect foil to the fiery pleasure mounting higher and higher with every passing second.

“Christian!” I scream. “Oh, please…”

“Please what, Anastasia?”

“I need to come.”

“Do you?” He pulls my leg up over his shoulder, wraps his fingers around my throat for leverage, and pistons deeper into me, testing my limits. I feel tight and swollen around him, my lips and walls quivering with the effort it takes for me not to explode, and the pleasure he draws from it is obvious on his face. “God, you feel fucking incredible.”

“Please!”

“You want to come, baby?”

“Yes! Yes! God, yes!”

“Who owns your orgasms?”

“You. Take me, Christian. Use me. I’m yours.”

He growls and leans over, his now naked chest pressing into mine and his lips brushing right up against my ear. “Scream my name when you come, and make me believe you really fucking mean it.”

He doesn’t have to wait long. He shifts so that the angle with which he moves against me both hits that perfect spot inside of me and rubs my clit against his skin. Two more thrusts, and I dissolve into oblivion.

“Christian! Oh, fuck! CHRISTIAN!”

It’s mind shattering. My orgasm wraps around me like a python, tighter and tighter with every pulse, winding me up, making my toes curl, and then everything releases all at once in a fantastic supernova. I pant desperately, incoherent versions of his name continually bubbling from my lips. My body shakes and convulses so violently he has to hold my hips down as he fucks me through the quivering pleasure. It lasts forever, and he never relents. By the time I finally come down, my skin is slick with sweat and every part of me feels like it’s been turned to jello.

“Beautiful,” he whispers, looking at me now as though something cosmic has shifted and now the world is perfect. He changes rhythm, his thrusts more erratic and sloppy the closer he gets to his own release. I can see his jaw tighten as he chases his orgasm, see the gray in his eyes darken, the muscles in his arms start to shake. He’s there. Right there. Any second…

“Red!”

Everything stops in an instant. One second, I’m full of him, the next second I’m left without. All traces of his weight on my body vanish.

Shit.

“Baby,” he says, his eyes moving wildly to each of mine as he quickly reaches up and untangles the restraints around my hands. Gone is every ounce of the unruly passion that had burned behind his eyes, leaving only concern in its absence. “What happened? Did I hurt you?”

“No,” I reply, voice shaking. “I just… I-I–”

“Hey.” He nestles up against my side, but his arms don’t wind around me like I expect. He doesn’t nuzzle me, even though his face is pressed against my hair. He’s as still as a statue, waiting for me to give him permission to do more. My breathing comes in harsh, wild pants, different from how they were when he made me come.

“I-I’m sorry,” I whisper, and he sits up.

“Don’t ever apologize for using your safeword, Anastasia. I never want you to be ashamed of that word. It’s yours to use however and whenever you want to.”

“I know. But you were…” I take a breath, realizing I’m about to start apologizing again. “I know.”

“What happened?”

“I just… I needed my hands back.”

“Was it too tight?”

“Yeah. I-I guess. I don’t know. Normally, I like it tight…”

“But not tonight.” he exhales and shakes his head. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have pushed you like that after the day you’ve had.” I nod, and he settles back down into the bed behind me again. “Are you ready for me to hold you?”

“Always.” I can’t help it, I want to apologize again, but instead I say, “I love you, Christian.”

“I love you too, Anastasia.”  

His arms snake around me, and he pulls my whole body flush against his until it feels like we’ve melded together. Eventually, my heart rate slows, my breathing evens out, and my eyelids start to droop. A welcome sense of calm crosses over me, seeping into each and every one of my pores and relaxing away all of the stress and anxiety of the past two days.

Because he stopped.

No matter how close he was, he stopped when I asked him to.

One word, and it was over.

 

That night, my dreams are free of smoke and fire and the cold voice of Andrew Lincoln.

 

She could have slapped me. She could have stormed up to me, pulled her fist as far back as she could reach and punched me hard across the face. It still wouldn’t be as devastating as those six words. Woods reaches out with his arms, holding them around me like he’s afraid I’m going to drop Calliope, or maybe just to take her from me, but I don’t relinquish her. The news of Christian being in imminent danger, that he might be hurt or worse, only makes me cling more tightly to our daughter.

“Ros…”

She shakes her head, then dashes the tears from her eyes with the backs of her hands and turns away from me. The police officer who has spent all afternoon keeping me back is standing a few feet away from us, facing the building and listening to the words coming through the speaker attached to his shoulder. She grabs his arm to get his attention.

“I need to know about the lab.”

“Ma’am, step back please.” He takes hold of her forearms, the same as he did to me, and tries to steer her back towards the crowd. She shakes him off, refusing to be dismissed.  

“This is my company and I need to know what’s happening to my people down there.”

“I’m sure you’re worried, but I don’t have any information for you at this time. If you could just step back and…”

“Christian Grey is trapped in that lab!”  She screams the words at him and waves her arm in the direction of the still smoking building. Behind me, the whispers of speculation and prayers from the crowd of onlookers that have been like a constant buzzing background noise for the last few hours goes silent. There is a reporter standing only twenty feet away from us and she stops in the middle of whatever she’s saying into the camera to gape back at us. Everything seems to stop. One second in time that’s suspended outside of reality, and then it all comes crashing down.

The police officer grabs the radio and reiterates what Ros just told him into it, which comes across more as confirmation than new information. Someone behind me shouts that Christian is dead and the sentiment is carried through the crowd like the swell of a wave, repeated over and over again.

“For god’s sake!” Ros shouts, her words like venom as she turns to face them. “His child is right here!”

“Ros!” My eyes flash in warning, then I turn to Woods in a panic. My hands shake as I reach out for him and simultaneously lower Calliope’s face to my shoulder. “Your jacket, now! Give me your jacket.”

He shrugs out of the dark gray suit jacket and hands it over to me. I manage to throw it over Calliope just before the reporter is able navigate her way across the glass covered sidewalk with her camera crew and shoves her microphone in my face.

“Mrs. Grey, KIRO 7 news. Can you confirm that your husband is trapped inside the laboratory where the explosion took place?”

“I, uh…” Calliope starts to cry again, incensed as she fights against my hold to get out from under the jacket. The reporter’s eyes flash down to her shape in my arms with a desperate kind of hunger. She covers the microphone with her hand and leans into her film crew.

“Keep the camera on the baby.”

Shit. I turn my back on her and look at our nanny, hoping my eyes convey how desperately I need to her listen and not ask questions. “Kensie, take Calliope. Go back to the house and pretend like everything is normal. Mommy and Daddy are just working late. We’ll meet you there as soon as we can.”

“Yes, Mrs. Grey.”

I move between Kensie and the camera, using my body to block as much of Calliope as I can while I shift her into the nanny’s arms just in case the jacket slips. “Keep her covered.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Kensie reaches down for my hand and squeezes my fingers. It’s a simple gesture of support, caring, but it feels too much like a condolence. I yank my hand out of her hold like she’s burned me.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Grey.”

“It’s fine, just go.”

She nods, then wraps Calliope tighter in her arms as she turns to leave. The crowd behind her is tight, rowdy with the arrival of those with family members who work in the building, and my heart clenches while I watch her try to push through them. I nearly call her back when I see her and my still crying child being jostled by people trying to get the officer at the line’s attention by screaming their questions over the constant noise of the crowd.  

“Woods, go with Calliope,” I say, not taking my eyes off Kensie’s ponytail, the only part of her I can track through the sea of people. “Don’t let anyone near her and keep reporters away from the gates once you get home. I don’t want her to be scared.”

“Mrs. Grey…” He leans in real close to keep the microphones still held in my direction from picking up what he’s saying. “My orders come for your husband and I’ve been instructed never to leave your side.”

“Then he can yell at me for sending you away after they pull him out of that lab!” I should care that there are cameras on me. I should care that everyone within earshot is hanging on my every word, hoping for some kind of new information I might have simply because of who I am to the company’s CEO. But I don’t. The only thing I care about is what is happening to my husband right now and that Calliope isn’t exposed and put in danger of being targeted because we weren’t careful enough with her in a crowd of strangers. Still, he doesn’t move to follow after Kensie.

“Mrs. Grey, perhaps you should come back to the house with—“

“No! No, I’m not going anywhere.” I lean in too, meeting him the rest of the way, and wrap my arms around his neck in a hug so that I can press my lips right up to his ear. “Please, Evan. The only thing that is going to keep me together right now is knowing that Calliope is at home safe. I need you to make sure that happens. I need you to make sure that she’s not scared. Please.”

He hesitates, but eventually nods. I mouth the words ‘thank you’ to him, and he turns me back to face Ros, Andrea, and Olivia.

“Those three,” he says, pointing at each of them in turn with his index finger. “You never leave their side. Do you understand me? Not for anything.”

The look on Ros’s face as she stares at the building tells me that she’s not going anywhere anytime soon, so it’s an easy promise for me to make.

“I won’t leave until he’s out.”

“Alright. Then… keep your cell on you, and take this.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a slender black cylinder. I recognize it instantly, because Luke made me carry a similar one last year after we found out Leila was following me. Pepper spray.

“Stay safe, Ana.” It’s the first time he’s used my name instead of Mrs. Grey, and I once again have to bite my lip to keep it from trembling. I give him a nod, because it’s all I can manage, and he turns and snakes through the crowd, following Kensie and Calliope to the car. It’s one weight of a million lifted off my shoulders and I get just one second to breathe freely. But sending my bodyguard away has immediate consequences and it comes in the form of hands that grab me from behind.

“Mrs. Grey, do you have any information to give the public regarding Christian Grey’s condition?”

The reporter. Without Woods hovering inches behind me, she’s immediately more aggressive. I try to take a step back, but she takes one with me, her microphone held so closely to my lips I’m sure she’s picking up the sounds of my breathing. It’s suffocating and more than a little intimidating, but thankfully the sound of clacking heels and repeated no, no, no’s bring Jaqueline to my rescue.

“That’ll be enough, Susan,” she says, getting in between me and the reporter with her arms held out in front of her like a protective barrier. “Mrs. Grey will not be answering any questions at this time.”

The reporter leans back on her heels and raises a skeptical eyebrow at her, but Jaqueline holds her ground. With a shake of her head, Miss Kiro 7 News steps back and motions for her camera crew to follow her back to their previous recording spot. They stop though, when an important looking town car pulls up on the street just behind us and Carrick steps out.

“Mayor Grey!” She picks up the cord to her microphone and makes towards the street, but the crowd keeps her from ambushing him. The frustration of being denied access to yet another important interview is clear on her face as she holds out her microphone and attempts to shout questions over the noise of people, street traffic, and emergency crews, but by the time Carrick makes it to me his security team has escorted her away.

“Ana,” Carrick breathes in relief, immediately pulling me into a tight embrace. “Thank god, you’re not hurt.”

I shake my head against the lapels of his jacket, holding back tears. “I wasn’t here. I was walking and I heard the explosion…” There’s more I want to say, but my throat is growing tighter with each and every word.

“Where’s Calliope?”

“Home,” I reply lamely. “With Kensie and Woods.”

“And Christian? Is he…?”

I can’t hold it back anymore. I let out a choking sob into his chest and start to shake. “I don’t know, I don’t know. All they’ve told me is there was an explosion in the R&D lab and he was inside. I don’t even know if they’re trying to get him out…”

“Let me see what I can find out.” He kisses the crown of my head and then releases me, moving with purpose towards the same officer who has rebuked both Ros and I all day. I turn and glance back at Christian’s partner and best friend. She has one arm folded so tightly across the front of her designer jacket that I’m not sure how she’s breathing, and three fingers from her other hand are pressed to her lips.

“They’re going to get him out,” I tell her, wrapping an arm around her back and laying my head on her shoulder. “They have to get him out.”

“Unlimited energy,” she replies. Her eyes are glassy with worry again and I’m not entirely sure the words she says aloud are directed at me. “This is what happens when you try to fuck around with the laws of physics. God damn it, I told him…” Her lips press tightly together and she takes a deep breath through her nose. “I swear to god, if he makes it out of there alive, I’m going to kill him.”

With all the uncertainty still hanging in the air, her words would be a cruel if I couldn’t see how much it hurts her to say them. She’s terrified, not just for her building or for her company, but for her best friend. So I squeeze her tighter, and let myself fall apart on her pretty jacket.

“I know. Me too.”

“Oh, Ana…” She turns and takes me into her arms, holding me up as I devolve into a sobbing mess. There’s too much here that’s too familiar. My eyes screw tightly shut to fight against the tears rolling down my cheeks, but blocking out everything going on around me only allows new visions to fill my head. Memories of Christian in a hospital bed, battered and unresponsive. The pain on his face during physical therapy that helped him regain his strength after surgery. The sound of the gunshot that gave him the wound that made physical therapy necessary in the first place.

“Oh god, what is it?”

I look up from Ros’ shoulder and see Elliot standing a few yards away. His eyes are wide and terrified. His hair is windblown. His cheeks are pink. Did he run here from Escala?

“What’s happened?” he asks again, moving closer to me. “Christian isn’t…?”

I shake my head, or maybe I’m just shaking so hard it does it all on its own. “I don’t know.”

“Jesus.” He takes me from Ros and tucks me inside his strong arms, then looks over the heads of the police officers and paramedics roaming around the empty space in front of us like they’re going to have all the answers. “Dad? Dad!”

One arm leaves my shoulder as Elliot reaches up to wave his father over to us, and while Carrick approaches, he turns me so that I’m facing him too. It’s not just Carrick walking towards us. He’s flanked on either side by a police officer and a fireman, both of whom wear important looking badges that I assume mean they’re in command.

“Well?” Elliot demands.

“The fire from explosion caused a collapse at the entryway. The parking garage above them caved in and now they’re trapped behind a wall of rubble and rebar. We can’t shift anything until we know it won’t cause a further collapse.”

Elliot looks at the fire chief. “I can help with that. I’m an engineer and I built this building. I know everything about it, brick by brick.”

“Good, get to the lobby,” the fire chief says. “My men will tell you where to go from there.”

Elliot nods and runs forward, but no one has asked or answered the only question I care about. “What about the people inside? Is anyone… hurt?” It’s the most I can stand to ask.

The police chief frowns. “We’re not sure, Mrs. Grey. The power system has failed inside the lab and all of our efforts to get some form of communication inside have failed.”

“What do you mean failed?”

“Oh my god.” Ros hand drops from her mouth to her chest. “He was worried about hacking… The lab was encased in lead so outside signals couldn’t get through to the systems inside.”

Because he had been hacked before. Because Andrew Lincoln had used the GEH servers against him before.

Ros takes a breath, and regains all of the composure she’s let slip since she was pulled out of the building. “So, we don’t even know if they’re alive in there?”

“No, ma’am. But we are doing everything in our power to get to them and get them out safely, I promise you that.”

“Oh, god!” I double over and begin sobbing into my hands again. Carrick is at my side in the next instant, pulling me back into him and nodding towards the officers.

“Then get to it, Captain. Keep me updated of any progress.”

“Yes, sir,” the officer responds, and both he and the fire chief turn and hurry away from us.

Carrick attempts to comfort me, but there’s no way I could find comfort in the hours that follow. I had thought, foolishly, that Elliot’s involvement in the rescue would move things along. That he would be so desperate to save his brother that he’d throw caution to the wind and dive head first into the debris that had him enclosed inside the lab. But he doesn’t. He spends hours evaluating the structural integrity of the support beams surrounding the caved in opening, ensuring that moving any of the concrete won’t cause further collapse. The logical part of me understands why this is a necessity. But my heart seems to tear further apart with every passing minute that Christian doesn’t emerge from the GEH building.

As the sun sinks low in the sky, and the shadows from the other skyscrapers around us grow longer over the sidewalk where we stand, the crowd noise begins to die down. Dusk sets in and the only sound left is staccato thud of helicopter blades over head and the shouts of the emergency crews below. I can’t feel anything. Not the pangs of hunger or the dry ache of thirst. My phone has been buzzing non-stop in my bag, but I ignore it. When candles start being passed around, like defeat has been accepted and we’re now collectively mourning the loss of the eight people now confirmed to have been in the lab at the time of the explosion, I hear a voice echo inside my head that I haven’t heard outside of my nightmares since that fateful night last July.

Looks like I still got him in the end.

“No!” I scream, pulling each of my hands out of Carrick’s and Ros’ hold. They look at me like they think I’ve lost it, and maybe I have. I shake my head, trying to dispel the echo of Andrew Lincoln’s voice, and back away from my loved ones. “I can’t stand here anymore. I can’t stay here and wait, doing nothing!” The police charged with crowd control have thinned out over the last few hours, giving me an opportunity to slip through and make it to the building if I run. I take it.

Carrick shouts my name to get me to come back and the few officers that are too far away to actually do anything issue warnings, but that’s not what stops me. A pair of strong hands latches onto my arm from behind and yanks me back. I look over my shoulder and nearly break down again when I see who has ahold of me.

“Ma’am, get back!” An officer yells at me, his hand on the gun at his hip as he runs towards us, but Luke holds out his hand to try and diffuse the situation.

“I’ve got her, Officer,” he says. “Her husband is inside, you have to understand.”

“Yeah, well.” He takes his hand off his gun, and motions with his head towards the crowd. “Just get back in line.”

“Yes, sir.” Luke nods, then tightens his fingers around my arm as he leads me back to the same place I stood next to Carrick and Ros, except now Jade is there too, waiting with a jacket and a pair of sneakers in her hand.

“I saw you on TV,” she says, holding the shoes out for me. “I thought you could use these.”

“Thank you,” I whisper, unable to fully express my gratitude under the weight of my grief. She smiles anyway, and helps hold me up as I switch out my shoes.

“I’ll take those, Mrs. Grey,” Andrea says, reaching out for my heels. I hand them over but look down at them in disgust. They’re a part of today. They’re a part of this nightmare.

“I never want to see those again,” I tell her. She nods, then my attention is drawn away by the jacket Luke drapes over my shoulders.

Finally, long after dark has fallen and the clock has ticked past midnight, the metallic whir of saws echoing through the air stops. My breath catches in my throat and my eyes move away from the front doors for the first time in hours, searching for paramedics preparing to enter the building to care for the wounded after they’ve been extracted. There’s nothing though. Only a heavy silence that permeates everything around me.

My heart thuds in my ears. I shiver, but not because I’m cold. My future, my entire reason for living, is hanging in the balance, and I know in the deepest parts of me that this is it. I’m about to get the answers I’ve been waiting for all day. But when five minutes turn to twenty, then thirty… I’m not certain I’m ready for them anymore.

Please be okay.

Please be okay.

Please be okay.

“Look!” someone behind me yells. My eyes, closed in silent prayer, snap open and turn back to the doors. The emergency crews are wheeling a gurney out of the building and the sight of it floods my entire body with fear until I see the group of men ambling out behind it. Barney, Welch, three men in ash darkened lab coats, Taylor, and then…

“Christian!” I sprint forward and for the first time, no one stops me. He turns in the direction I call out his name, then abandons the medical professionals there to examine him and his team, and rushes towards me. We meet at the top of the steps, halfway between the building and the sidewalk, and I leap into his open arms. Dust and ash from his clothes surround us in a choking, murky cloud when my body makes impact with his, but I don’t notice. I’m single minded as my lips come crashing into his.

“Christian!” I sob into his mouth. “Oh, thank God! Thank God! I was so scared I was going to lose you.”  

“Never. I’m right here, baby.”

A days worth of anxiety and grief begin pouring out of me, and I can’t hold it back. His arms snake around me, holding me against him as though he’ll never let me go again, and he whispers a long myriad of promises and reassurances into my hair. I take a deep breath, and manage to calm myself enough to pull away from him, then glance up into his eyes.

“Oh my god, you’re bleeding…”

“Oh.” He reaches up and touches his hair line, which is matted with dark, congealed blood. “It’s nothing. I’m fine.”

But he’s not. Now that the initial relief of knowing he’s safe has passed, I can see the damage. He looks as though he’s been torn straight out of war movie. Every part of him is gray with dust, except the lines down the side of his face that are streaked with the color of flesh from sweat dripping down his brow. His fine clothes are branded with large swaths of black from the heat and flames of the explosion. His normal musk is gone, replaced by something acrid that has a distinct chemical quality to it. His beautiful face is painted with exhaustion.

“Christian Trevelyan-Grey!” Ros storms up into the space between us and shoves him roughly enough that he stumbles backward a few paces. He quickly regains his equilibrium, and looks at her in confusion.

“Ros?”

“Are you out of your goddamn mind?”

“It was an acc-” His words cut off as she shoves him again, though he doesn’t lose his balance the way he did before. They stand a few yards apart, staring each other down until Ros finally breaks with a chest heaving gasp and throws her arms around him. “I am going to yell at you so hard tomorrow.”

“I know,” he breathes back. “I know.”

She lowers her face into his dust covered shirt, takes a deep breath, and then moves aside for Carrick. Both men seem to stiffen as they stand before one another, waiting for the other to speak first. Apparently, not even tragedy is enough to break through this cold war they’re currently fighting.

“Are you hurt?” Carrick asks at last. Christian shakes his head.

“No, I’m fine. It was close but… I’m fine.”

“Good.” The Adam’s apple in Carrick’s throat bobs as he nods his head, and, after a moment of hesitation, he steps forward and wraps his arms around his son. “Don’t do that to me again, Christian.”

“I won’t. I’m sorry.”

“I know.” Carrick nods, and sniffs hard. “I know.”

They pull apart, but Carrick doesn’t let go of Christian’s shoulder. Instead, he glances behind him, at the building, and his face turns serious.

“Look, I need to warn you. They’re going to–”

“Mr. Grey?” We all turn and see a young police officer approach the stairs from the direction of the building. Carrick’s hand immediately falls from Christian’s shirt.

“Yes?” he answers.

“I’m going to need you to come with me to triage, sir. Have a medical team look you over.”

“I’m fine, thank you.”

“I’m sorry, sir. That’s not an option.”

“It’s always an option. I know what an AMA is, consider this a refusal to be treated.”

“Well, if you’re refusing medical care, then I need you to step over here so we can have talk about the incident. I’m going to need a statement.”

“Oh.” He looks around blankly for a moment, caught unprepared, then nods. But Carrick calls out to stop him as he begins to follow the officer away from us.

“Christian!” He stops and turns back again. Carrick’s jaw tenses as though he’s trying to find a way to work around something he can’t bring himself to say. “Just… don’t say anything without a lawyer present.”

“What’s going on?”

“Sir, if you’ll come with me.” The officer tries to nudge him forward, but Christian doesn’t move.

“Dad?”

“Go, Son,” Carrick says. “Just remember that you don’t have to answer anything without a lawyer.”

I watch Christian’s chest expand with a deep breath before he breaks eye contact with his father and moves to follow the officer across the courtyard.

“Wait, is he being arrested?” I ask.

“No,” Carrick confirms. “Just detained until he can be questioned.”

“Questioned about what? What’s going on?”

That same look of being torn apart by some unsaid words crosses his face, and he shakes his head again. “You should call his lawyer, Ana.”

“Lawyer? You’re his lawyer, Carrick.”

“No, I’m not. Not anymore.” He takes a few steps closer to me, then hooks his fingers around my arm and pulls me aside. “Ana, this isn’t going to go away. He caused an explosion in the middle of the city. Three civilians were injured and I don’t even know what’s happened to the guy they brought out of the lab on a stretcher. The city of Seattle is going to have to open an investigation into what happened here today, and I’m the mayor now. It’s my job to oversee that investigation, so I can’t be apart of it. I can’t help you.”

I blink, feeling like all the air is sucked out of my lungs at once. “What does an investigation mean?”  

He swallows, and shakes his head again. “Call his lawyer, Ana.”

I nod, then move to Ros. Without Carrick, I’m not exactly sure which lawyer I need to get down here and she knows Christian’s corporate legal team better than anyone. She gives me a name, Andrea gets me a number, and thirty minutes later my husband has a team of men in pristine suits behind him refusing to let him answer any questions. It drags the entire interrogation process out, which seems excessive since he hasn’t been charged with anything. Elliot can’t stay to wait for answers because he’s got a new baby at home and Ros opts to go with the man who was injured in the explosion, a lab tech named Sheldon who broke his leg under falling debris. When the first rays of dawn start to color the sky above us, it’s only Luke and I left, and he holds tightly to my hand until Christian finally returns.

“Ready?” he asks, his voice like gravel and his eyes heavy with fatigue.

“Yes,” I reply, then turn to Luke. “Thank you for waiting with me.”

“Of course. Let me know if there’s anything I can do.” Christian gives him a tight smile and half a nod, then takes my hand out of his and leads me down to the street. There’s a car waiting for us, though it’s not being driven by anyone I recognize. I can see the clear wire connected to his earpiece though, so I assume it’s someone on Christian’s security team.

“Where to, Mr. Grey?” the driver asks.

“Home, please.” The driver nods and signals to turn into oncoming traffic, and Christian’s head falls against the headrest.

“What happened?” I ask.

“I don’t even know.” He opens his eyes and looks at me, but the cool confidence he normally exudes is gone. “We thought we’d figured it out. Welch built a prototype and I went down there to see it in action, but the cooling mechanisms gave out thirty seconds into his demonstration. There were safety precautions in place and every single one of them failed. Over and over again. We did everything we could to stop it, but it just kept getting hotter and hotter until eventually…”

“It exploded,” I finish for him.

He nods. “Thankfully the blast went up instead of out so we were able to avoid the shockwave. But everything was on fire then, blocking our way out, and the suppression system was damaged in the explosion. It took us over an hour to get it under control and then everything caved in. It was like every time we solved one crisis, something else happened.”

I shiver as I imagine what he’s gone through, then unbuckle my seatbelt and crawl into his lap.

“Ana…”

“No,” I whimper, cutting him off before he can tell me to get back in my own seat. My fingers curl into his shirt and I lay my head down on his shoulder, taking comfort in the steady rise and fall of his chest. It takes him a few seconds to accept that I’m not going to let him move me back onto the leather seat next to him, but once he does his arms wrap around me and he lays his cheek against my hair.

“I’m sorry, Christian.”

“We’re okay. Everyone was okay.” He kisses the top of my head, and we make the rest of the drive home in silence. The sky overhead is orange with the rising sun by the time we pull into the driveway. It’s nearly seven, and we should both be dead with exhaustion. But if Kensie got Calliope down at a decent hour last night, she should be waking at any time.

“I need a shower,” Christian tells me once we step into the kitchen.

I nod. “I’m going to check on the baby. I’ll be up in a minute.”

“Okay.” He leans over and kisses me softly on the lips, then untangles our fingers and pulls away from me. I feel immediately bereft. Not enough of the doubt and dread that plagued me all day yesterday have been washed away for me to feel comfortable having him out of my reach. I need him to hold me. I need to feel his heart beating under my hands and the heat of his skin pressed against mine. I decide I’m going to slip into the shower with him, maybe ask him to make love to me before we finally give in to our heavy eyelids and get some much needed sleep, but first I make my way up to the nursery.

The door to the guest room where Kensie sleeps when she stays overnight is closed, so I assume Calliope is still fast asleep. With as much care as I can manage, I ease open the door and tip toe across the floor, moving as slowly as possible as I glance over the railing of her crib. She’s staring at the mobile over her head, silent but wide awake. That is, until she sees me.

“Mama?”

My shoulders fall as all my plans for this morning fly out the window, but I smile and reach down to scoop her in my arms. She molds her body around mine and after giving her a few good morning kisses, I get her changed and let her help me pick out what she wants to wear for the day before I take her down to the kitchen for breakfast.

I expect things to be different. Our staff surely saw the news coverage of the accident and assumed that they wouldn’t be needed today, so I mentally go through what’s already been prepared for Calliope and debate whether or not I’ll need to make something for Christian or if he’ll want to get straight into bed. But when we get downstairs, it’s like I’ve walked into the movie Groundhog’s Day.

Gail stands in front of the stove, an omelet frying in the pan in front of her. Kensie is sipping a cup of coffee as she lays Calliope’s breakfast down on the tray of her high chair. And Christian stands behind the counter, dressed in a fresh suit, typing furiously on the iPhone in his hand. The scene is too familiar, too much like any other day. Like we haven’t been living through a nightmare for the past 16 hours.

“What are you doing?” I ask Christian as I place Calliope in her highchair. He doesn’t answer me right away, choosing instead to finish his email, or text, or whatever it is he’s doing with his phone.

“I’ve got to get back to the office,” he says, after finally putting down his phone and picking up the mug of coffee Gail has poured for him.

“What? What do you mean you’re going back to the office? Don’t you think you should stay home and take it easy for a few days?”

His phone buzzes on the counter and he picks it up while he answers me. “I can’t. I’ve got to be there to survey the damage, meet with my lawyer, and work with Andrea to find an offsite facility that’s large enough to relocate the fusion project to. Jacqueline is in a panic. This whole ordeal is going to be a PR nightmare and I’m going to need all the public support I can get now that everyone knows what we’re doing.”

My stomach drops. “Wait. You’re… you’re not going to scrap the project?”

“Of course not. We had a breakthrough yesterday.”

“Yeah, right before it exploded.”

“And we’ve learned from it.” He drains the rest of his coffee, slips his phone into his pocket, and moves across the kitchen to give me a kiss goodbye. “You should stay home today. Get some sleep.”

“Me? What about you?”

“I’ll be fine.” His hand brushes my cheek, and he gives me a small smile that I think is meant to be reassuring, but it misses that mark by about a hundred miles. I’m at a loss for words. What could I possibly say to explain why I don’t want him to go back to that building today that isn’t already obvious?

He leans down to kiss the top of Calliope’s head then looks up as the security officer who drove us home this morning enters the kitchen. Christian nods to him, then tells me he loves me again before following him out of the kitchen. And I watch him go, feeling like I’m stranded on an island in the middle of shark infested waters.

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