by Lynda Aicher
“I take it the play didn’t stay in the bedroom for long.”
“Yeah.” Kendra nodded in absent agreement to Cali’s statement, her mind half in the past. “Before I knew it, I was his submissive whenever we were alone or went to a fetish club. The really stupid thing is that I didn’t mind it at first. I was a little uncomfortable, but he’d put on the charm and persuade me to do it.” She looked up, catching the eye of both women. “You have to understand another thing. Eric works for my father. He went to Harvard with my older brother. He has all of the family credentials required to impress my parents and the connections to get whatever he wants. On paper, he’s the perfect guy.”
Allie made a sound of disgust. “Anyone can sound good on paper. Trust me, in my line of work I’ve met more than my fair share of men who look good on paper but are really the scumbags of the earth.”
“When did it start getting bad?” Cali’s question was asked with the gentleness that good mothers seemed to culture.
Kendra pushed away from the table and stood, taking her coffee cup to the sink. Staying seated was impossible. She poured the almost full cup down the drain and watched the brown liquid splash over the white porcelain, marring the pristine surface. She braced her hands on the edge of the counter, pressed the sharp edge into her palms and stared, unseeing, out the small window over the sink.
“I agreed to move into his penthouse about a year after we started dating. Our parents were certain the next step would be marriage. ‘A perfect match,’ my mother said. I realized my mistake almost immediately. I became his full-time slave the very first night. He chained me to the bed, laid down the rules, set the punishments and never looked back. Only I didn’t get a say in any of it.”
“I don’t want to sound harsh,” Allie said. “But why didn’t you leave?”
“How?” Kendra cleared her throat, hating the way her voice shook. “I’d just given up everything to move in with him. For once in my life, my parents were proud of me. According to my dad, I’d finally done something right in my life. And Eric wasn’t a monster all the time. So I justified his actions. Took the blame for starting it all and felt the shame even more for actually liking the pain.”
“How?” The confusion was blatant in Allie’s voice. “I just don’t understand that part at all. What can you possibly like about pain?”
“I get it,” Cali said so softly, Kendra almost didn’t hear her across the kitchen. She looked at her friend, aware that the admission was hard for Cali. Her hands were clasped in her lap, but her spine was straight as she challenged Allie with a cool stare. “At least, part of it. When the pain and pleasure blend it becomes something different. Then it’s not about being harmed. It’s about...” She paused, her hand motioning as she searched for the right words.
“Letting go,” Kendra finished for her. She moved to lean her forearms on the island that separated the kitchen from the breakfast area. “About trusting someone to give you an ecstasy you can’t get anywhere else. When it’s done right, you can ride the high for hours.” At least, she could after her Scenes with Deklan.
Allie’s perplexed glance swiveled between the other two women. “You guys make it sound like a drug.”
“Sometimes it feels like one.”
Kendra nodded her consent to Cali’s statement and added, “But for me, it goes even further. It gives me focus and makes everything else go away. Eric caught on to that quickly and used it.” She looked at her hands, picking at the cuticles, the small bites of pain grounding. “The degradation and humiliation didn’t start until after I moved in. The name-calling, the list of rules, the looks of disgust that eventually surpassed all the others. That became my life. He forced me to quit my job, drop my friends, and took away everything until he was my life. By then, pain was my only out.”
Cali’s soft sound of sympathy was meant to be soothing, Kendra was certain, but it rubbed against her like sandpaper, exposing all of the areas of her soul left raw from Eric’s abuse.
“But Kendra...” Allie leaned on the table, her eyes earnest. “That’s not good for you.”
“I know,” Kendra scoffed, the self-disgust coating her words. “By the second year he had me hooked on the pain-pleasure mix until I couldn’t...I couldn’t come without the pain. By the third year it had digressed to mostly just beatings without the pleasure. Of course, he blamed me for ‘making him that way.’” She mimed the finger quotes around the last words. God, she hated him. Hated everything he’d done to her. Everything he’d made her feel.
“Asshole,” Allie mumbled under her breath.
Kendra smiled in agreement.
“Didn’t your family notice anything?”
She shook her head, her stomach cramping at even the thought of her family knowing. She dug at her cuticles, absorbing the sting until she could continue. “They saw what Eric wanted them to see. What I let them see, which was anything but the truth. The pressure was mounting for our engagement and I knew I couldn’t do that. I tried to leave, and he cuffed me to our bed for three days.” She couldn’t acknowledge the gasp that came from Cali. “So then I got smarter and I planned. The night he whipped my back to shreds was when he found the packed bag I’d stashed in the closet. After that I hid it in my gym locker. My gym membership was one of the few things I was allowed to keep. After all, he couldn’t have me getting fat.” Running had truly saved her then.
“Did you ever think of pressing charges against him?” This came from the lawyer of course.
Kendra actually laughed at that question. “Right. The scandal alone would’ve had both of our families pointing accusations at me. There’s no reason for them to believe me.”
“I’d say a bloody, whipped back would have been reason enough to believe you.”
“But he always had the trump card,” Kendra admitted, her voice low with the weight of her confession. “He kept my membership to the leather club from before we dated. There were pictures too. Ones he took of me...” She couldn’t finish and instead let the sentence dangle.
They were all quiet for a moment before Cali said, “We could always kill him.” Kendra’s head snapped up to see Cali looking completely serious. “I’m sure Deklan knows people who could take care of that.”
Kendra tilted her head, trying to determine if her friend was bluffing or not. A quick check to Allie told her the other woman was as equally confused. The notion was so strange, coming from the normally straight-laced Cali, that it only took another second before Kendra burst out laughing.
“Yeah,” she said around a chuckle. “I can just see me bringing up that topic.”
“What?” Cali’s brows arched, pulling off the innocent look. “You don’t see yourself saying, ‘Yes, Sir, I’d like a spanking. Oh, and could you off my ex while you’re at it?’”
“God, don’t,” Allie implored, reaching across the table. “The man would probably take her seriously. Then we’d all be charged with accessory to murder.”
“Only if we’re caught.”
Allie shook her head and tapped her forehead on the table in fake affront, which caused them to laugh even more. She lifted her head and shot the others her best courtroom death glare before she straightened, pushing her hair away from her face. “We’ve digressed. And I’m going to assume that last bit was a joke.” She pointed at Cali, whose only response was to hide a choked laugh behind her hand.
Kendra couldn’t resist adding, “I’m sure Deklan wouldn’t get caught.”
“Right.” Allie shook her head and stood, taking her cup to the sink.
Cali followed her, and the three of them all turned to lean against the counters, forming an intimate triangle in the open kitchen.
Allie crossed her arms over her chest and looked at Kendra. “Are you okay now?’
She braced her palms on the counter behind her and stared at the floor, giving the question some thought. Was she okay? She nodded and looked up, smiling. “I’m getting there.”
“Is Deklan helping
with that?”
Allie’s gaze whipped to Cali. “What do you mean?”
Kendra cleared her throat, her attention back on the wood floor. She couldn’t bear Allie’s scrutiny. “I’ve been seeing him at the club for the last six weeks.” The heat rose up her neck once again and she wished she’d left her hair down so it would hide some of the flush.
“And has it helped?” Cali asked again, gently nudging for an answer.
“Yes.” The answer barely left her lips to hang softly between them.
Cali stepped up and engulfed Kendra in a tight hug. “Good. That’s good. There’s nothing wrong with that.” She stepped back. “Deklan’s a good man. He’d never harm you.”
Kendra sniffed and nodded. “I know. He’s proven that to me too.” He really had. In more ways than Eric had the entire time they were together. But she wasn’t a fool. She’d gone to great lengths to protect herself this time. But then, meeting outside the club on sometimes solitary jogging paths wasn’t exactly safe and protected.
“Wait a minute,” Allie said, finally catching up with the conversation. “You mean you’re still doing that stuff after everything you went through?”
“Allie,” Cali admonished. “Don’t judge.”
“I’m not judging. I swear. I’m just trying to understand.”
“I know it sounds crazy,” Kendra agreed. “I’ve told myself that over and over and over. It didn’t matter though because as much as I tried to deny it, the need was still there.” She finally met Allie’s eyes, trying to get her friend to understand. “You said earlier it sounded like a drug. For me, the need for pain is. Not abusive pain, but the consensual pain that comes with pleasure. Going to the club, signing a contract with Deklan was better than sliding back into another abusive relationship.”
She clenched her fist and blew out a long release of air. “When I left Eric, I swore I’d never go back to that. And I won’t. Not the kind of relationship I had with him. But as much as I tried to deny it, as much as I told myself I was crazy to want it, I couldn’t stop the cravings. Mardi Gras night I finally gave in to the need.”
“So that’s what happened to you,” Allie cut in. “I never believed you’d been dancing that whole time.”
Kendra lifted her shoulder and shot her an apologetic glance. “I told myself it was just once. To prove that I didn’t need it. Only Deklan took over.” She thought back to that first night, to how he’d made her feel. How safe she’d been with him in control. “And he showed me what I’d been looking for all along. I went back two weeks later and signed a contract with him.”
“A contract? They have contracts for those kinds of things?”
Cali chuckled at Allie’s disbelief. “I know. I had that reaction when I first found out too. But if you think about it, it’s a really smart and safe thing to do.”
Allie shook her head. “Who knew?” She focused in on Cali, her eyes narrowing. “Did you have a contract with Jake?”
“No. We just kind of evolved.” She rubbed her fingers absently at her neck and Kendra smiled, knowing what was under the turtleneck sweater. “He actually dropped all of his client contracts to be with only me.”
“But you and Deklan are in a contract?” Allie’s brow was wrinkled as she tried to understand the dynamics.
“Yes,” Kendra said, finding Allie’s confusion funny when it probably shouldn’t be. “I knew that if I was going to try that stuff again that I wanted the safety of a public setting and having the rules defined in writing before I played. And I only agreed to do it with Deklan because, well, I knew him outside of the club some. And—” she tipped her head toward Cali, “—because I trusted Cali’s judgment.”
“Mine? Really?”
“Yeah. I’d met Jake enough times and had seen you together to know that he’s not an abuser. He makes you happy. Really happy, not gloss happy.”
Cali’s cheeks flushed and she smiled. “He does.”
“But that’s not a guarantee that Deklan isn’t the same as your ex,” Allie challenged, ever the doubter.
“You’re right, it’s not. But I have to trust myself and my instincts at some point.” Kendra shifted, crossed her arms over her chest and met Allie’s intense brown eyes. “I know exactly what I overlooked in Eric to gain my parents’ approval. I’m not stupid and I refused to let that man control my life any longer.” She blinked rapidly, holding the moisture back. “Deklan has helped. A lot. He’s a decent man, which makes him an even better Dom. I won’t live the rest of my life hiding from myself because I’m afraid of what I might find.”
Kendra’s voice had risen in intensity, and the sudden quiet seemed stark and heavy. Her chest heaved, the fire in her blood chasing away the chill and making her skin clammy under her sweatshirt. She processed her own words, let the truth of them sink in and ground her further. Six weeks ago she’d never have been able to say that.
“Wow,” Cali said softly. “That is so courageous. I wish I’d had your strength when I was your age.”
Allie stared at the floor, but she nodded in agreement. “Yeah.” She looked at Kendra. “You got me there. Case closed.” She gave Kendra a quick hug then stepped back, shoving her hands into her jean pockets. “I don’t understand it all, but then, I don’t need to. It’s clear that you know what you’re doing.”
“Thanks,” Kendra said, another weight lifting from her chest. “I finally feel like I do.”
Allie tipped her head to the side and her eyes narrowed once again. Kendra tensed, knowing that look. “There’s just one more thing though. You never answered why you’re working at Target. Who are you hiding from?”
Kendra exhaled, her shoulders drooping with the reminder of her other problems. She gave her curly-haired friend a grim smile. “I’d hate to face you in a courtroom.”
“I’d have to be in one first,” Allie said under her breath before she waved it away. “Never mind. So spill.”
“Fine,” Kendra sighed, swiveling her head, trying to loosen the muscles that were gripping her neck in a vise lock. The rest of her confession seemed minor compared to what she’d already revealed. “Everyone. Eric, my parents, his family. I know Eric won’t let me go. My parents will only pressure me to return and lecture me on commitments and image, and I can’t deal with that. I needed time to find myself again. To get strong enough to face them all.”
“Wait, go back.” Allie rolled her hand mimicking a rewind. “What do you mean, Eric won’t let you go? Is that what that letter was about last month?”
“What letter?” Cali looked between the two. “What’d I miss?”
Kendra rubbed her hands over her face, both exhausted and agitated at once. “Yes,” she admitted before dropping her hands to rest on her hips. “Eric tracked me down. The letter was a warning.”
“Oh God, Kendra,” Allie exclaimed. “You have to go to the police.”
“And do what?” Kendra challenged back. “It won’t solve anything. Nothing’s changed, except I’m not letting him control me anymore. I didn’t go back. I didn’t run again. I’m still here, living my life as I want.”
“What if he hurts you again?”
She shook her head. “He won’t do anything that would reflect back on him. Right now he’s just full of threats.” Closing her eyes, she put out a silent prayer that she was right about that. But if she truly believed what she said, she wouldn’t have taken all of the precautions over the last nine months to stay hidden. She wouldn’t jump at every person who came up behind her and she wouldn’t panic over a letter.
A hand-delivered letter. But she wasn’t running scared again. She would deal with Eric when he finally manned up and showed his face.
“I hope you’re right,” Allie said, looking unconvinced. “You’ll ask for help if you need it, right?”
Kendra nodded, not sure if she could answer verbally. She glanced at the clock. “I’ve gotta get going.” Not that she had plans that night. She didn’t go to the club on the nights Cali would be the
re. Deklan understood that and would text her when he knew Cali would be at the club, and Cali was almost always there on Saturdays. Kendra still had a strange hitch about letting her friend see her in a different light. Maybe someday she’d be brave enough for that, but not yet.
“Me too,” agreed Allie.
In unison they moved to the sliding door that led to the back courtyard. Now that most of the snow had melted, Allie and Kendra could cut through the open area to get to their condos.
“Be careful, okay?” Cali said, pulling Kendra into a quick hug. “Thank you for trusting us and sharing so much. We’re here for you. Got it?”
“Yeah, thanks.”
“You know,” Allie inserted, giving Kendra a one-armed squeeze, “I’m starting to feel like the old prude, hanging out with you two.”
Cali laughed. “What are you talking about? You’re younger than me.”
“Maybe, but I can assure you my sex life is very vanilla when I do have one.”
“You could always try the club,” Cali hinted with a sly look.
“No, thank you.” Allie gave a firm head shake of denial. “I tried it that one time. That was enough for me. To each their own, but that stuff is not for me.”
“Oh, come on,” Kendra chided. “It wasn’t that bad. You seemed interested enough from what I saw.”
Allie gaped at her, her big brown eyes opened wide in apparent shock. “Interested? Try stunned stupid. I mean, I knew places like that existed, but I was totally unprepared to actually see it.”
A low rumble bounded out of the air, and all three women peered out the window in search of the source. Dark clouds were rolling across the sky at a fast clip, leaving an ominous feel to the early evening.
“That does not look good,” Allie observed. “And here I thought we were done with snow.”
