Chapter 3
3
H im
I sit in the darkness, surrounded by a million screens. Most nights, each screen shows a feed from the different cameras I have spread around the city.
Tonight, each one reflects her face.
Inara, who calls herself Swallow. Submissive. Little bird.
It’s late. She should be weary. But there’s a bemused twist to her lips—the ghost of a smile—as she moves around her townhouse.
In all the time I’ve been watching her, I’ve seen a range of emotions from her. Most days, she looks hardened and haunted, like she’s forcing herself to move forward.
But I’ve never seen her like this. Soft and wide-eyed. Almost. . . peaceful.
I take satisfaction in knowing I’m responsible for it. I gave her what she needed tonight.
My own body is tense and ready. The prize was within reach. I could’ve grasped it.
Her rules said “no touch,” but she wanted me to break them. I could sense it.
It took everything I had to let her go tonight. To let her walk out of the club and into a cab out of my reach. Only the knowledge that I could track and surveil her in the privacy of her home finally allowed me to let her leave.
I’m used to watching her at a distance. She’s beautiful enough to make people on the street stop and stare. In person, she is more intoxicating than I realized.
I must go slowly. Of all the people I’ve hunted, she’s the wariest. She presents a strong face to the world, but inside the thick walls she’s built, she’s fragile. A clever hunter knows how to proceed with care, to trap the bird before it knows it’s in a snare.
She disappears into the shower and emerges minutes later with her wet hair braided down her back. Her golden skin glows. She faces the mirror to brush her teeth, then turns, admiring the marks down her back.
I lean forward in my chair. My lungs pump like bellows working overtime.
She arches her back, and her lips part. Her lids grow heavy. She reaches back and presses on a distinct bruise. One of the marks I left with the flogger. The cameras don’t transmit any sound, but I can tell she’s let out a small, sighing moan.
My chair creaks under me. Every muscle in me strains?—
There it is. Her cheek curves in a hint of a real smile.
It lasts only a fleeting moment before it’s gone, and she completes her routine. She pads naked to the closet and dresses in a simple sleep set. Then she takes her gun and clears each room in her duplex. She checks the armed security system and each door and window lock twice. She thinks this will protect her from the world. From monsters like me.
She’s wrong.
Her guard is back up when she settles into bed. She sets her gun on the bedside table but doesn’t go to sleep right away. Using her cellphone as a light, she sits and sketches in the notebook she keeps close to her at all times. My fingers cramp with the need to get my hands on it. Having every inch of her life on screen isn’t enough. I want to pry her apart, get under her skin. I want to know her innermost thoughts.
And I will. All the hunting I’ve done on the streets of New Rome has prepared me for this moment. For her.
I must go carefully. Tonight, I was just a top to her. A nameless, faceless stand-in who gave her the pain she needs.
She doesn’t know I’m always watching. That I’ve been hunting her for years. I’ve spent more time hunting her than all my other victims combined.
Soon, it’ll be time to reveal myself to her, and she will know me as I know her.
But first, I need to get her attention.
* * *
Inara
Smoke billows around me. My eyes sting with it. It’s all I can taste, all I can see.
“Inara!” someone is shouting.
I spread my arms, accepting my death. It has to be this way.
I’m ready.
And then ? —
There’s a blast of excruciating heat. Strong enough to sear my flesh from my bones. I turn and leap into the cool air. I’m falling from a great height. I will not survive, but it’s lovely, this surrender. The darkness is cool and sweet.
But I know this is the end.
I know I’ve died. The pain and fall were too great for me to survive, but the dream continues. Death comes for me and folds me in a powerful embrace. And instead of feeling dread, I feel relief. In oblivion, I am free.
“Inara,” Death says my name. I reach up into the darkness, stirring the seething void like smoke, and the darkness begins to take the shape of a man ? —
I jerk awake, my hands in the air like I’m holding off an attack. Or cupping a man’s face.
I dreamed of my death again. The first time this dream came to me, I was ten. Over the years, I’ve dreamed it again and again, returning to me like an old friend. And each time it takes over my sleep, it becomes more detailed. There’s more color, noise, even the grainy feel of thick smoke. One day, I will experience it fully, but I won’t be dreaming. I’ll be living my last moments. When I finally know how the dream ends, I will be dead.
I don’t know the day or hour I’ll die. I only know that I’ll recognize it when it’s here.
And I have the feeling it will be soon.
But the death dream I just had is different. I dreamed of the end and past that. I know, in dream logic, that I had to be dead.
Because Death sounded like him. The mystery dom from last night who claimed a hold on my psyche, and I’m afraid to find out what that means.
I flop onto my back, and my lingering dread dissipates. I’m alive and awake and covered in deliciously sore spots. Marks the dom left on my back.
Who was he? He knew my name. Not only that, he wanted me to know that he knew it. He might be someone I’ve scened with before, or someone I’ve met, someone from work. But I would’ve noticed his intense presence if I’d met someone like him before.
Inara, he said in that beautiful voice. He’s unlocked the deepest parts of me, the parts I’ve tried so long to hide.
My sex still throbs from the orgasm he gave me. If I close my eyes, I can still feel the touch of his flogger. His marks are like lingering kisses on my skin. It’s my favorite part after a scene, bearing the marks and bruises for days afterward. I admired them in the bathroom mirror last night, but now, they only make me feel like I’m missing something.
I’ve never allowed myself to scene with the same person twice, for their protection and mine.
But I want to scene with him again.
What would it be like to have a dom? Not just an anonymous top or someone to scene with. A real dom who would be a regular part of my life. Someone to hold me. Care for me. Touch me. . .
It’s been years since I’ve allowed anyone to touch me. I haven’t craved it until now. Until him. . .
I pride myself on never needing aftercare. I can take care of myself. But in the moments after he made me come, my skin throbbed with a new poison, a new need. He left marks deeper than the red flush on my skin.
Last night, I fell asleep feeling like someone was watching over me. A powerful, shadowy presence smiling down on me. And, in my dreams, I could hear a deep voice crooning Little bird. . .
Even now, I sense him with me.
Have you ever wondered what it’d be like to let go? Let someone else take over?
The dom had given me what I wanted. He made my outsides hurt more than my insides. And then, he gave me what I needed. And now. . . I’m craving more.
But I can’t shake an unsettling feeling because the dom knew my name. How? Our encounter was supposed to be anonymous. Club Empire caters to the elite and operates on strict rules.
I don’t like it. He knows me, and I don’t know him. He has the advantage.
Maybe I can dig a little and find out who he is. I won’t misuse my detective’s badge, but I have other ways of investigating.
What am I thinking? What happened last night was a one-time thing.
No matter how much I long for more.
I rub my arms. I still can’t shake the feeling I’m being watched. It’s silly, but it makes me flee to the closet to get dressed. As I move about my townhouse, getting ready for the day, I can almost smell the dom’s sexy, woodsy cologne. I must be imagining it.
But as I leave for work, I can’t help but think that one way or another, I’ll be seeing the mysterious dom again.
* * *
Darling Inara,
Today marks the anniversary of the first time I saw you. It was so long ago, but I remember how blue the sky was, how crisp the air. You stepped out of the shadows and tilted your face to the sun, and the light illuminated your perfect face.
Then you felt me watching and stared into the shadows. Even then, you could see beyond what other people see. You could sense the darkness.
I’ve spent every waking moment hunting for details of you. I learned your name. Inara. A beautiful name for a beautiful girl. It means many things, but then I discovered one form of your name means swallow. The bird. A beautiful and fragile creature, like you. Swallows fly vast distances, chasing the warmth of summer.
You have a much darker gift. You see the worst parts of people. You wish you could shut your eyes to it, but you can’t. So you do what you can to fix the world.
Your homing instinct is broken. And I fear I am the one who shattered it.
It wasn’t meant to be like this, my swallow. I’m still hoping that one day, I can make it right.
Until then, remember to spend a moment in the sun.
Forever yours,
BK