“Nothing makes sense,” Kathryn muttered, talking to herself. A habit she regularly indulged in, whether other people were in the room or not.
At the moment, the room she happened to be in was Jake’s office. Jake, aka the cyber police, preferred any investigative work be done on his system, which required a palm print and a retinal scan. But with the types of investigations they both tended to be involved in, who could blame him?
Her fingers swiped to Scott Delaney’s number on her phone. After two rings, he answered.
“Father Delaney. How may I serve?”
The man who’d recently disgraced himself by streaking past them while they were all on vacation together in Mexico, splashing them all with a cannonball, and buying a round of drinks for half the resort, was now a man of the cloth? Fat chance.
“Well, well, well,” she said with a giggle. “There’s one confessional I know to avoid.”
“Nonsense, my child. I’ve heard it all.”
“That’s what scares me. I’m, um, not on speakerphone, am I?”
Scott’s tone turned serious. “No.”
“Good. I need the police report from the night Troy was shot. I got his medical records from admissions.”
“Do I want to know how you got them?”
“Toss an investigative nurse in the middle of a hospital, and the answer is no. You don’t want to know.”
“Glad I didn’t ask. I’ll have someone send you the report. What email?”
“K at Russo Investigations dot com.”
“Something wrong?” he asked.
Kathryn heard the strain in Scott’s voice. It was always stressful when a lead detective caught on to the poorly hidden fact that you weren’t ready to share a hunch.
Instead of misleading him with something lame like just checking something out, or a flat-out lie, Kathryn answered honestly. “I don’t know.”
“Understood.” Disappointment colored his response.
“Scott,” she said earnestly, “I don’t know now. But I’ll tell you the moment I do.”
“Hey.” His tone lightened. “I know you will. Do what you do best.”
Kathryn saw the email notification. “It’s here.”
“I’ll let you go.” Scott cleared his throat. “Yes, go. Go with God, my child.”
“According to this,” Kathryn mumbled to herself as she pored over the police report, “the assault happened outside a club.”
A night club, she assumed.
“By the descriptions, it could almost be Club Lazarus. But with a blood-alcohol level that high . . . he arrived at the club only an hour before the attack. How could he have a blood-alcohol level that borders on gag on your own vomit sort of drunk that fast?”
“Planning a wild night?” Jake asked, popping his head in.
Embarrassed, Kathryn felt her cheeks warm. “Just researching the case with Troy.”
Jake interrupted her for a kiss. If his mouth nibbling hers didn’t kick her pulse into high gear, the tight jeans and leather jacket he was wearing were sure doing the trick. The bright Colorado sun in the rich blue sky meant Jake and the other woman in his life were going for a ride.
“Enjoy Cecilia,” she said, referring to his Harley. “Hey. Is it true there’s no alcohol served at any clubs? Like Club Lazarus.”
Jake nodded. “It slows a person’s responses. Makes them more tolerant to pain, and less likely to use their safe word if and when they need to.”
“What if someone brought in their own?”
Jake stroked the scruff of his chin. “Too risky. If the person is caught, it’s one of the quickest ways to get tossed out. Their membership would be revoked right away, and they’d be blackballed.”
Kathryn poked around in the pencil cup on the desk, bypassing six other pens before finding a bright purple one to take notes. It couldn’t have been Club Lazarus.
“I have purple pens?” Jake asked, amused.
“Pink ones too.”
“You, uh, sure you don’t want your own office?” He chuckled, picking up a pen with a sparkly unicorn on top.
Kathryn gave him a resigned shrug. She’d take one if she had to. But with Jake gone so often, it was the one place that screamed Jake everywhere she looked. And the smell of his leather executive chair . . . one whiff, and it was like he was there. It had crossed her mind more than once to have her way with that leather.
His lips tickled her smile. “My office is your office. But would it kill you to leave your panties around?” The man in the dangerous jeans cupped her cheeks and left her one lasting kiss. “See you in a few. Call if you need me.”
Once he left and the temperature of the room lowered to a reasonable level, Kathryn got back to work, comparing reports from the police and the hospital.
Breathalyzer . . . clean?
Scrolling through years of police reports on Troy, Kathryn stopped. Breathalyzer installed in his car . . . clean. A dozen instances of being pulled over by the police for suspected DUI, and every time clean. But on two occasions requiring hospitalization, including this one, a blood draw revealed blackout-drunk levels of alcohol.
Her vision blurred. After rubbing her eyes, she was ready for a break. A minute or two researching the BDSM world—definitely not looking at porn—might perk her up. Within a few sites, research was about to take on a whole new meaning.
Seriously, some of this shit should have an are you really sure? disclaimer on it. When a website asks if you’re eighteen—as required by every single splash page before she could proceed—it should mean you’re ready to see what’s on said screen. Maybe they could give you a visual warning with a nude image or two. A provocative pose. The scandal of a reverse harem.
As with all her research, Kathryn was sure she’d seen it all. From a medical perspective. And this, she convinced herself, was medical research.
After all, I’m a nurse. A damn good one. How kinky can it be?
From Jake’s private compound high on a Colorado mountain, the good thing was that no research was off-limits. Which also happened to be the bad thing. There are rabbit holes, and there are rabbit holes. And these were definitely not her mama’s rabbit holes.
One woman was decked out in clamps like a Christmas tree, with every erogenous zone of her body pinched. Earlobes. Nipples. The three at her hoo-hah made Kathryn shut her eyes tight, recapture her bravery, and look again in jaw-dropping disbelief. Staring, she couldn’t get over the woman’s smile. She looked satisfied. Content. Maybe even refreshed.
Polite pass. I think.
She wondered what a real threshold would be for her. At what point will I have to use my safe word?
Kathryn’s attention turned to a YouTube link. The word fire got her attention, and paired with B-D-S-M sounded intriguing. Click.
A woman with bright red lips was bound to a bench, not the exact type Kathryn had sat on in Club Lazarus, but similar. A series of flaming wands tapped along the bare skin of her back, touching her for moments at a time. All the while, she lay there, moaning.
Kathryn searched around Jake’s desk. Her preference sheet had to be here somewhere. It didn’t take much shuffling, and Jake would definitely know she’d moved his cheese, but she found it.
Could she imagine herself in the woman’s place, with a blazing wand lightly pounding along her back? It wasn’t exactly turning her on, but being touched by fire intrigued her.
I’m not a pyromaniac, I’m just interested.
She ignored the cautious little voice in her head and scanned the form.
Hmmm. That sort of kink seemed to be missing. Moving lower, she checked the little box next to other and wrote on the line fire play.
At the bottom of the screen, a few images caught her eye. They were the sort of easy-click, instant-buy products that others with a fire fetish seemed to have purchased. She didn’t have much interest in the outfits, toys, or assortment of piercings, but a few pieces caught her eye. Things like horse-riding gear, leashes, restraints of an imaginative range, and collars.
Why hasn’t Jake given me one? Maybe it’s only for a club? Or a scene?
Jake Russo owned every part of her and had topped it off with an engagement ring. Was a collar really that important? Fighting the impulse to buy one for herself—which sort of defeated the purpose—Kathryn didn’t care what links she clicked next, but she had to move on.
Click.
It took her a second of staring at the screen to realize she hadn’t accidentally happened upon a crafting site. Instead, she’d entered the world of bondage.
Shibari. Kinbaku. Silk. Jute. Cotton. A rainbow of colors that made her insides dance with delight. Fire play might have been intriguing, but it was these two little words that ignited an inferno between her legs and in her soul.
Rope play.
If love at first sight existed beyond Jake, it was this. Beautiful, ornate, elegant knots that bound a sub, keeping her, or him, in their place.
There were dizzying variations on the subject. Sometimes bent over, the submissive would be secured with her arms behind her back. Sometimes spread-eagle, with the arms winged against the bent legs, and tied together to be taken. Or tamed. Bound in a hog-tie was a common image, where every so often the sub was gagged.
There was a small population of criminal activity that might enjoy Kathryn’s inability to speak, since her testimony often resulted in their new life behind bars.
I’ve been gag-ordered, but never actually gagged. Would I like it? Would Jake?
And then there were the suspensions. Amazing Cirque du Soleil-like feats where the sub was tied and hanging in beautiful poses that should probably be reserved for gymnasts and stunt doubles.
The more Kathryn looked, the harder it was to look away. The elegant knots spoke to her in ways nothing else did. Being bound. Forced to submit. Taking everything she was given. Her pleasure or punishment at the sole discretion of her Dom. Why was that unbelievably hot?
But it was also the ropes themselves that were alluring. The deep reds, royal blues, and wine shades of purple made the bindings their own intricate works of art. They were beautiful. Richly colorful. And . . . familiar.
Where have I seen those before?
Kathryn clicked back to the police report. This time, she double-clicked on the attachments, focusing on the photographs.
Studying the images closer, she struggled. This was a damn good lead.
She blew out a frustrated breath, flipping between photos of the shibari knots and Troy’s last attack. In those images, there were unusual imprints on his skin, similar like those left by shibari knots. But no ropes. It was like wishing for a downpour from a raindrop or two. Maybe this wasn’t about Troy.
I’ve seen these ropes before.
Frustrated, she shot up and paced.
But where? A website? Netflix?
She fidgeted with some stray strands of her hair, flicking them between her fingers before tucking them behind her ear.
A grocery store? Or a gas station? Maybe a home improvement store?
She and Jake had started building a raised vegetable garden in the back. And every home improvement store was fully stocked with all sorts of rope. But only in neutral colors, most being rough-textured and industrial-strength.
No. That’s not it.
Exasperated, she huffed, stopped in place, and shut her eyes.
Red. The ropes I’ve seen are rich shades of cherry red.
She couldn’t lay her finger on why this was important, but it was. It took Kathryn several more laps across the length of the office to dislodge the memory, but it worked. She let out a small gasp.
Here. I’ve seen them right here.
Kathryn rushed through bookmarking the pages and saving them to her favorites on the browser before making her way down the long flight of stairs and to the expansive bay of the garage.
With Cecilia gone, left behind in the oversize ten-car garage were three other equally impressive motorcycles, two sports cars, and an assortment of rugged trucks and SUVs, an extension of Jake’s masculine presence in every leather seat and chrome accent.
A small smile emerged. The man was everywhere.
She stood, staring at the closed cabinet, remembering the last time she’d stood there.
The memory was sharp and vivid, and ripped open the wound of seeing yet another side of Jake. The cold, dark tower of a man whose tormented hazel eyes barely recognized who she was. It was then that Kathryn understood Jake could be dark. Even dangerous, according to him.
I nearly lost him that night. Again.
But it was within these cabinet doors that she’d happened upon the ropes. Even without looking inside, she could envision them, tied in neat bundles, hung on a tidy row of hooks.
Her fingers paused in brief hesitation before she pulled open the cabinet door.
There they were, exactly as they were left the last time she saw them—an assortment of alluring cherry-red ropes she’d mistaken for mountain-climbing equipment. Which made perfect sense. After all, they were in Colorado. And lived high on a mountain.
Leaning closer, she inspected the ropes again, this time looking with more than her eyes. With two fingers, she traced the fine, smooth fibers, following the lines to a single knot holding the bundle in place. She could feel something tightening around her heart.
Have others been in these ropes? How many subs has he had? Has he tied all of them up? All of them except me?
The tempting bundles dangled from various hooks, but it was the knot that caught her eye. She pulled one down, cocking her head as she lightly traced the knot, memorizing its structure as she untied it. She wanted to know him. This part of Jake. To understand him better.
Kathryn wasted no time unraveling the bundle before winding a length of it around her wrist. Then she held out a longer length like a jump rope and flipped it over her head, letting it fall to her butt. With the rope low around her ass, she pulled, satisfied that a rope this size could hold her up.
Cirque du Soleil, here I come.