10. Vera
I wake up already aching.
For a disorienting moment I can’t figure out why. Then: Kane’s room. The equipment. His kiss. His hands on my skin. The way he touched me and then stopped.
No touching. No orgasms. You wait.
I groan into my pillow.
My body has no patience for anything ordinary this morning. Every brush of the sheets feels like too much. The morning sun through the windows feels too warm. Even the silk of my pajamas is too much
This is Day One.
Could be three days. Could be a week.
I’m going to die.
My phone buzzes.
Kane: Good morning. Color check.
My thighs clench involuntarily at seeing his name on the screen.
Me: Green. Frustrated. But green.
Kane: Good. That frustration? That’s you learning. How did you sleep?
Me: Fine.
Kane: Liar. You barely slept because you kept thinking about last night. About my hands on you. How close you came to getting what you wanted.
A pull low in my stomach. He’s doing this on purpose.
Me: That’s not fair.
Kane: I never said this would be fair. I said it would teach you something. Big difference. Now go to work. And remember, no touching.
Me: As if I could forget.
Kane: Good. That’s the point. Check in tonight.
He doesn’t wait for a response. Just leaves me staring at my phone, frustrated and already counting the hours until he texts again.
Work on Tuesday is, if not fine, then manageable.
That’s the thing about having a brain that runs on systems. You can apply a system to almost anything, including want.
I identify the problem: I’m frustrated and overstimulated and thinking about a man who has temporary custody of my orgasms. I acknowledge the problem: noted, filed, not relevant to the client brief currently open on my screen.
I give it a box and I put it in the box and I close the lid.
I do this approximately forty times before noon.
It works, more or less. I review the Nakamura contract.
I draft talking points for Thursday’s press call.
I eat lunch, and when my mind drifts to his hands on my wrists, I bring it back.
This is not a difficult skill. I have been filing inconvenient feelings since I was twenty-two and Damon first told me I was too much and I decided to believe him.
I think about not touching myself on my way home. The absurdity of it, the way Kane Sinclair has somehow turned my own self-control into an act of submission, made my competence into a gift I’m giving him. It’s almost funny. I file that too.
By Tuesday evening the box is full.
I eat standing at the kitchen counter, leftover pasta I barely taste, because taste seems to require more processing power than I currently have available. Afterward, I collapse on the couch and flip channels without seeing them.
My mind keeps sliding back to his room. His hands on my hips. The look on his face when I’d kissed him, the exact moment his control had cracked and then reassembled.
The box opens slightly.
The weight of my own body. The press of my thighs together when I shift position. The pulse that hasn’t stopped since last night.
I close the lid. Hard.
Because he’s made me off-limits to myself.
I shower, not cold water, because I’m not giving him that satisfaction, hands strictly functional. Soap, rinse, done. I do not linger. I do not give in to what my body keeps asking for.
But I want to.
God, I want to.
But I don’t. Because he told me not to. And somehow obeying him feels more important than the relief would be, which is a sentence I don’t examine too closely before bed.
Me: How long?
Kane: Until you stop asking that question. Sleep well, Vera.
The message feels final in a way that makes it worse, that he can close a conversation, leave me here, burning, while he presumably sleeps peacefully.
I lie in the dark and the sheets are too soft and too warm and everything is too much and the cotton against my bare legs and my tank top with each breath and the insistent pulse between my thighs that won’t—
This is Day One.
I’m not going to survive this.
Wednesday arrives and the box doesn’t work anymore.
The moment my alarm goes off, the sound scrapes across my nerves like a wire without insulation.
I silence it and lie still for a moment, taking stock the way I always do: identifying, labelling, filing, and find that the filing part has stopped functioning.
The thoughts won’t go where I put them. They sit on top of everything, heavy and insistent, and underneath them my body is already awake in a way that has nothing to do with the alarm.
This is stupid, I think clearly, in the shower, water beating too-hot against my shoulders. I’m a grown adult woman and I’m following the instructions of a man who told me not to touch myself and I’m complying like — like what? Like it means something. Like he’d even know if I choose to disobey.
I turn off the water. Get dressed.
The seam of my underwear is noticeable in a way it has never been before. I change. The next pair is worse. I stand in my bedroom at seven-fifteen in the morning conducting a sensory audit of my own lingerie drawer because Kane Sinclair has apparently rewired my entire nervous system.
I file this under not thinking about it and go to work.
Work on Wednesday is not manageable.
My assistant Kim asks if I’m feeling okay twice before ten o’clock. The contract on my screen might as well be written in a language I used to know.
A colleague stops by my desk to touch my arm while asking about the Nakamura account and I go so still he asks if I’m alright, and I say fine, tired, and the moment he’s gone I press my palms flat against my desk and breathe until my heartbeat settles.
The box is not working. Every sensation goes straight through without filing — the rasp of my jacket collar, the quality of the air conditioning, nothing between me and what my body wants and the fact that I’m not allowed to have it
This is idiotic. The thought arrives with some force by mid-morning.
He set a rule that makes no practical difference to his day and significant difference to mine and I’ve been following it for two days because — why, exactly?
Because I agreed to? People agree to things and change their minds.
That’s what renegotiation is. He said so himself.
I get up. Walk to the small unused conference room on the third floor, the one nobody remembers exists, and my hands are shaking slightly as I pull up Kane’s number.
I have his number because Sloane made sure of it, years ago. In case of emergency, she said. Both of us in each other’s phones, no excuses.
I wonder what she’d make of this emergency.
I never call him. Ever.
He answers on the second ring. “Vera?”
The sound of my name in that voice. My chest tightens, one involuntary beat.
“What the hell are you doing to me?” The words burst out. “I can’t think. I can’t focus. I’m a mess. My own body is betraying me and it’s too much.”
“Take a breath.”
“I don’t want to take a breath. I want—“
“Vera. Breathe.”
Something in his tone makes me obey. I drag in air. Release it slowly.
“Good. Again.”
I do it again. The sharp edge of panic dulls.
“Now tell me. Properly. What’s happening?”
“I’m frustrated. And angry — at you for making this so hard, at myself for agreeing to it. Every sensation feels amplified. I can’t stop thinking about your hands.”
“That’s exactly what should be happening.” His voice warms. “Your mind is learning to wait. That’s what I asked for.”
“It doesn’t feel like progress. It feels like I’m losing my mind.”
“You’re not. You’re becoming present. That intensity — that’s you waking up.”
I press my forehead against the cool glass of the window. “I don’t know if I can do this.”
“Yes, you can.” No hesitation. “You’re doing beautifully.”
“I almost broke the rule this morning.”
“But you didn’t. That took more than you’re giving yourself credit for. I’m proud of you for that.”
“You’re proud of me for not touching myself?” I try to make it sound incredulous. It comes out breathy.
“I’m proud of you for surrendering this control. For trusting me with it. For being honest about how hard it is.” A pause. “Now — have you eaten today?”
I blink. “What?”
“Lunch. Have you eaten?”
“I... no. Not yet.”
“I thought so. When you’re frustrated, self-care goes first. Eat something with protein. Then get back to work.”
“Kane—”
“Vera.”
Just my name. And I’m nodding even though he can’t see me.
“Yes, Sir.”
“Good girl. Text me when you’re done.”
He hangs up.
I order a salad with grilled chicken. Force myself to eat it even though every bite feels mechanical. But I do it because he told me to. Because his attention to these basic details, that he noticed I hadn’t eaten, that he asked, makes me want to be worth that attention.
Me: Done. Ate the whole thing.
Kane: Good girl.
I stare at that longer than I should.
Then:
Kane: I’m thinking about you.
I set the phone down. Pick it up again. Read it twice more like the words might change.
Two texts. Eleven words between them. And my whole chest is doing something I don’t have a clinical term for.
The fact that I care this much — that good girl over a chicken salad did something to my pulse, that I’m thinking about you is currently the most important sentence in my phone — that goes in the box.
The box is now a warehouse.
“Okay, seriously, what is going on with you?”
Sloane sets down her latte, studying me with the focused attention she usually reserves for client briefs. I’ve seen her do this to a room full of executives. It’s no less unsettling at a coffee table.
“What? Nothing.” I snap back to attention.
She doesn’t respond. Just looks at me. Tilts her head slightly and looks some more.
“Sloane—”
“Shh. I’m reading you.”
I wait, which is the wrong move because it gives her time.
“Okay.” She picks up her latte and takes a slow sip before she answers, drawing it out on purpose. “You’ve got that look.”
“What look.”
“The one where you’re two seconds from either killing someone or dragging them into a closet.” She grins. “Mystery man?”