“What? What do you remember?”

“The first time I saw you, you nearly gave a boy a concussion, because he committed the unforgivable sin of annoying you when you weren’t in the mood to be annoyed. He was talking back to a priest and stood up. I saw you stretch out your leg and hook your boot under his chair and slide it aside right at the moment he tried to sit back down. He landed on the floor so hard I heard a crack and thought it was either a rib or his skull. And you...”

“I put my feet on his chest.”

“No, you put your boots on his chest and told him to shut the fuck up. That instant, I knew you were either going to grow up to be a dominatrix...or a sociopath. I was hard as a rock watching you and you were barely sixteen years old. I could come right now thinking of it.”

“You don’t really think I’m a sociopath, do you?”

“You have a conscience. But you know what they call a sociopath with a conscience?”

It sounded like the setup to a joke so Elle took the bait.

“No, what do they call a sociopath with a conscience?”

“They call her ‘Mistress.’”

Elle stood up from her chair and walked to the window behind Kingsley’s desk. She pushed back the curtains and gazed onto the dark streets. Even during the dead of night, New York still felt awake and alive. Last night she’d been in a convent in rural upstate New York where the world went to bed at seven and woke up at four and slept like a corpse in the hours between. And not a man in sight. Now she was alone in a room with a man she’d beaten last year, a man she’d burned and bruised and brutalized. And God, it had been fun, hadn’t it? More than fun, it had been her. For years, ever since she was a teenager, her sexual fantasies had involved dominating men, tying them up, tying them down and fucking them half to death. When she’d finally gotten her chance to try it with Kingsley, she’d been scared. She’d even cried at first from fear and confusion. But the moment she let go and let it happen, she felt like...

“I’ve seen her, Elle,” Kingsley said as he came to stand behind her. She was acutely aware of his body so close to hers. She hadn’t had sex with a man for over a year, since she ran away and hid out at the convent. Any other man might not have made her feel so much in such close quarters, but it was this man who’d put a riding crop in her hand, given her permission to destroy him. Oh, and she had destroyed him, and in the process, she’d destroyed herself. Her old self. She still hadn’t found her new self yet.

“Who have you seen?”

“You. The real you. I’ve seen her.”

“What does she look like?”

Kingsley sighed and smiled. “She’s beautiful. Dangerous. All eyes are on her when she walks into a room. Men fear her but not because she’s the enemy. They fear her because she alone can show them who they really are. They fear this knowledge but will pay any price for it.”

“Is she happy?” Elle asked.

“She’s powerful. She can make her own happiness when she wants it.”

Elle turned and looked up at him.

“Is she with someone?”

“She isn’t lonely,” Kingsley said. “Not this woman. This is a woman who can walk into any room, find the most handsome face in the crowd, look him in the eyes and know she will take him home with her on a leash.”

Elle laughed at the idea. Sounded good to her.

Kingsley caressed her cheek with the back of his fingers.

He narrowed his eyes at her, his expression inscrutable.

“What? What is it?” she asked.

“I missed you,” he said, blinking as if attempting to clear a fog. “Forgive me. I just realized that.”

“I missed you, too. I thought about writing you but I didn’t know what to say.”

Kingsley turned his head, didn’t look at her.

“It didn’t matter. I was gone, too. I came home two months ago.”

“You left, too? Why? When?”

He paused before answering. “The day after you left, I left. And you know why. If I stayed...”

If he’d stayed, they—Kingsley and Søren—would have found her and brought her home, and no door, even one that said “No Men Beyond This Point,” could have kept them from taking her back.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“For what?”

She wanted to thank him for forgiving her even though she didn’t regret it. But instead she said, “Thanks for not kicking me out. Tonight, I mean. I wouldn’t have blamed you if you did.”

Briefly she met his eyes. She’d didn’t say what she wanted to say, couldn’t say it. Last year she’d accidentally gotten pregnant and it had been Kingsley’s. As much as he wanted children, she wouldn’t have blamed him for rejecting her pleas for help, sending her out into the night again, banishing her from his life. She was in debt now and hated it, hated owing him for something as simple as letting her back in the house she’d once shared with him.

“Elle...” He took her by the shoulders and met her eyes. “When Søren first told me about you, I called you his princess. And he said, no, you were a queen. And I laughed. But last year when you and I were together, when you cut me and burned me and you did it all with a smile on your face... I was wrong. He was right. You are a queen. At least...you could be one. Is that what you want?”

“I don’t know.”

“Tell me what you want.”

“I want a job.”

“This is a job.”

“I want money so I can support myself.”

“These are all very boring answers. Tell me the truth. What do you really want?”

“I don’t want to feel like this anymore. That’s what I want.”

He furrowed his brow at her. “How do you feel?”

“Powerless,” she said. “I’m afraid to say no to your ‘job offer.’ What would I do if you kicked me out? Where would I go?”

“Back to him?”

“No. I can’t. That’s the last place I could go.”

Kingsley nodded, seeming to understand her predicament.

“I can’t turn down your offer, can I?” she asked.

“Do you want to? Truly?”

The question seemed sincere, not teasing as it might have been. He meant it—did she want to turn down his offer?

“What’s the alternative if I say no?” she asked.

Kingsley opened a desk drawer and in the desk drawer was his locked cashbox.

“There’s one hundred thousand dollars in there. It’s yours if you want it. Take it and walk out the door.” He held up the key to the cashbox. “You can live on that much money for five years if you’re careful. Go south where the winters are warm and rents are cheap. Get a job. Go back to school. Be a lawyer or a therapist or a schoolteacher. Marry a rich old man for all I care. Start your life over away from here, away from me.”

“I don’t want your charity.”

“It’s not charity. After Sam left, you worked as my assistant for years without any pay other than room and board. I give it to you free and clear with no strings attached. You’ve earned it. All I ask is that you never contact me again. I spent an entire year worrying over you, feeling like you were my responsibility and I’d failed you. I won’t do that again. I can’t. Take the money and go, and I will absolve myself of all responsibility. My conscience will be clear. At least where you’re concerned. Or...”

“Or I can work for you. Here. As a domme.”

“Oui. And working for me here as a domme you will have a job, you will have money and you will have power.”

“Power? Working for you? If I work for you, you’d have all the power.”

“You won’t be my employee. You’ll be my queen. You will be my queen and in a year you will have all the money and power you could possibly desire. One hundred thousand dollars and you go tonight and you never come back. Or you stay and work for me and one hundred thousand will seem like spare change to you in a year. Think about it. I’ll give you five minutes.”

Kingsley turned and walked out of the office just like that, leaving her all alone.

Once alone Elle sagged against the wall, the choice before her dizzying. A hundred grand and she could start a brand-new life far away from here. Her passport was in her bedroom. If Kingsley hadn’t thrown everything out, she could get it and leave the country. Money was power. Money was freedom.