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  “What was the most intense sexual experience of your life?”

  I froze in mid stride. It was Leticia’s voice, coming softly from somewhere behind me. I switched on a lamp and saw her sitting quietly on a sofa, her legs curled up beneath her. She had changed into a sweater and jeans. Her face looked pale and tragic, as though she were grieving.

  “A threesome I had with two young women,” I said without needing to think. “It happened several years ago.”

  “But you still think about it?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Why?”

  I shrugged. “It was intensely erotic,” I said. “Sometimes images from that night still flash through my mind.”

  I hadn’t moved. I was still standing in the hallway entrance. Leticia lapsed into a reflective moment of contemplation and impulsively I turned the lamp light back off, sensing that the darkness and the distance would somehow make it easier for Leticia to share the thoughts she had been harboring. I heard her move on the sofa, as though the dark had made her more comfortable.

  “What was it about that encounter with those two women that made it so erotic?” she asked.

  I drew a deep breath, and considered the question. “It was a combination of elements,” I said. My eyes had re-adjusted to the night so that I could make out the deeper darkness of the sofa and the other room furnishings, yet Leticia’s voice still sounded disconnected.

  “One of the women was a young submissive – one of the first ones I had trained.”

  “Was she younger than you?”

  “Yes – a couple of years younger. I met her at a nightclub and we dated for a month or so before our relationship developed into one between a Master and his sub. She was very willing – she wanted to explore her own sexuality and so she was hungry for experiences. BDSM was something that resonated within her – she was a natural. I knew it from the first evening I took her home.”

  “Then why didn’t you take her as a submissive immediately?” Leticia’s voice came out of the dark.

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Everyone needs to make the discovery for themselves,” I explained. “You can’t force someone to submit and expect them to enjoy the lifestyle just because you do. I simply led the girl along the path until one night she realized that the need to surrender herself was intensely arousing for her. After that I began to train her.”

  There was a long silence, and I imagined Leticia frowning on the sofa, gathering and assessing the information as more questions bubbled to the surface. At last she said, “What was her name?”

  “Chloe,” I said.

  “And the other girl? You said the encounter was a threesome.”

  “Her name was Laurie,” I said. “The girls were friends.”

  “And you all just tumbled into bed together?” There was a sudden hint of curiosity in Leticia’s voice.

  I laughed lightly. “No,” I said. I leaned my shoulder against the hallway wall and made myself comfortable. “I told Chloe that I wanted her to bring another girl to our next training session. We had been together for several weeks, and Chloe had demonstrated an amazing willingness to obey all my commands. There was nothing the girl would not do – she was sexually insatiable. When I told her what I wanted, she arrived on my doorstep the following day with Laurie.”

  “And this Laurie girl… was she submissive?”

  I nodded, even though I knew Leticia could not see me in the darkness. “To a lesser extent,” I said. “She was very beautiful. She had long black hair and very pale skin. She was the physical opposite in every way to Chloe. I think that was part of the attraction, and one of the aspects I remember about that night. Seeing those two girls together – the differences between them as they obeyed each of my instructions – is one of my most vivid memories.”

  “What did you make them do?”

  “Nothing,” my voice hardened for an instant. “I don’t make women do anything. I asked them to make love to each other and they did.”

  “While you watched?”

  “To begin with.”

  Leticia fell silent again and I waited in the darkness. I could hear her breathing – a slightly breathless ragged quality to each exhalation.

  “How did you feel that night?” Leticia asked. “When you were watching those two girls together.”

  I frowned. “I don’t think I understand…”

  “I want to know how it made you feel,” Leticia cut across me. “I need to know what it was exactly about that night that made it so memorable that the details are still fresh in your mind all these years later.”

  I pondered the question for several seconds and then reached for the lamp switch again. The dull yellow light spilled across the living room so that I could see Leticia’s face.

  “I remember watching the two girls laying on the bed,” I began. “They were kissing each other – totally immersed in exploring each other’s naked bodies. They were both whimpering softly and making little gasps of excitement. I was standing beside the bed, watching them – realizing that I had made this scene happen. It was a powerful moment. I understood then that as a BDSM Master I had control over women who submitted to me, and that sexually, nothing was beyond my will. I was already on the path to evolving into a BDSM Master, but that night seemed to bring the power of that role into full clarity. It had a profound effect on me.”

  I fell silent and Leticia said nothing. She was perched on the edge of the sofa with her knees together, hunched over as though she might spring to her feet at any moment.

  “Does that make sense?” I asked finally.

  “Yes,” Leticia said. “It makes perfect sense… and it proves my point.”

  I arched an eyebrow. Leticia no longer looked distressed. Now there was sudden resolve in her expression.

  “What point?” I asked warily.

  She turned her head to me. “That we are all a product of our experiences,” she said abstractly.

  I said nothing. Leticia let out a long sigh and I realized suddenly that I was holding my breath, waiting for her to continue.

  “Jonah, just as that night with those two girls had a profound effect on the man you have become, so did my early experiences impact on me,” she began carefully, measuring each word before she uttered it. “That night shaped your future in the BDSM lifestyle. My first experiences had exactly the same intense effect on the woman I am today.”

  She saw me frowning, realized I still didn’t understand. Leticia got to her feet and came towards me. “You asked me earlier tonight about my fantasies – those things that arouse me,” her voice became small with her self-consciousness. “I think it’s time I told you the truth.”

  I felt a sudden rush of anxiety wash over me. Leticia was close enough for me to reach out and touch her, but my arms hung heavy at my side. She looked up into my eyes, and at last her gaze was steady and unwavering.

  “I like to watch,” Leticia said.

  * * *

  I went to the sofa and sat down beside her. An inch separated us, yet it seemed to represent the place where we had arrived at in our relationship – on the verge of breaking apart, yet still within reach of each other – still able to cling together if we could find a way to close the distance that was not just a matter of physical space.

  It was emotional. Maybe ideological.

  Leticia was staring blankly at the wall. Her hands were clasped in her lap, the knuckles white, her fingers twisting and restless with anxiety.

  “When I first interviewed you I told you about an experience I had when I was younger,” Leticia said, like she was talking to the room. “Do you remember?”

  I frowned. I had a vague recollection, but nothing more. I shook my head slowly and Leticia made a self-depreciating little laugh. She glanced at me. “I’m not surprised,” she confessed. “Compared to your encounters it was very mundane… but to me, that experience had a telling impact on my sexuality and my personality,” she said.

  I thought back – Leticia
and I had talked about so much during the first interview that I honestly could not recall details. I closed my eyes and sat back in the deep leather upholstery, trying to play back memories of the interview and our long conversations.

  “It was when I was eighteen,” Leticia said as she began to quickly recount the details. “I was at my girlfriend’s house for the weekend. I woke up in the middle of the night and found her with her lover in her parent’s bedroom. They were having sex – and I stood in the doorway and watched it all.”

  I remembered suddenly, and I sat up with a dawning sense of understanding.

  “Yes,” I said. “It’s coming back to me.”

  Leticia nodded. “I watched them having sex, and they put on a show because they knew I was watching. They wanted me to watch them. It was as arousing for them as it was for me. They even pushed the door wide open so I could have a better view and invited me to join them… which I did not.”

  “But you still had an orgasm.”

  “Yes,” Leticia blushed suddenly. “I had an orgasm just from watching them.”

  We fell silent for a long moment. Leticia was perhaps reliving that night from so long ago. I was suddenly seeing the pieces of the puzzle that was Leticia falling into place.

  “Do you remember anything else about the first time I interviewed you?” she asked softly. “Do you recall the conversation after I told you about that encounter?”

  “No,” I admitted with a sound of apology.

  “You asked me if I still think about that night,” Leticia said, then turned her face to mine and stared deeply into my eyes with a desperate kind of plea for me to understand. “And I answered you,” she went on. “I told you I still think about that experience. Every. Single. Day.”

  I sat back as everything suddenly began to make sense, but through the thinning haze, Leticia was still talking.

  “I think it’s in my nature,” Leticia shrugged. “My fantasies all revolve around that night. If I don’t recall that particular incident, then the things I do think about all revolve around me being a spectator – watching the sexual exploits of others through a door, or a window… or like images on a screen,” she shrugged her shoulders and let out a long sigh that sounded like relief – like the lifting of some heavy burden. “It’s probably why I became a journalist,” she added. “My job is all about observing – watching and recording the lives and incidents of others.”

  I reached out at last and took Leticia’s hand. It was cold, her fingers trembling.

  “I understand,” I said gravely. “And it makes sense. We are the product of our experiences,” I agreed. I was sad because I realized Leticia and I were divided by a sexual incompatibility that I saw no way to bridge. “It seems we have a problem…”

  Leticia sat stiffly for long seconds. The empty house seemed to press in around us. Her eyes were closed, and her expression grim. Her brow furrowed with a crease of resolve. She opened her eyes slowly, like she was waking from a nightmare, relieved that the fears she had dreamed were not reality, and then she fixed her gaze on me with a stubborn determination.

  “It’s either a problem… or an opportunity,” she said. “It’s going to depend on how we both decide to look at it.”

  * * *

  I flashed Leticia a wild look, and then studied her face carefully, as if it were something new and intriguing to be explored. Her gaze was steady but behind her eyes swirled a smoke of emotion and nervousness.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, muttering each word with exaggerated care.

  Leticia arched her eyebrows for a wicked instant, and then the demure mask she normally wore slipped back over her features.

  “It’s late, Jonah,” she pleaded wearily. “And this is something new for you to think about,” she squeezed my hand. “I’ve been struggling with these thoughts for months – twisting and turning, looking for ways we can make this relationship work without losing the essence of what makes you the man you are, and me the woman that I am. Why don’t we sleep on it, and then we can talk again tomorrow?”

  She got to her feet quickly and her hand slipped from mine. She stood, arching her back as though stretching after a long drive over a thousand miles of bad road. Her breasts pressed against the fabric of her sweater. She had her head thrown back, her face lifted to the ceiling with her eyes closed. She yawned dramatically and then drifted towards the staircase. When she reached the banister she cast me a sultry look back over her shoulder.

  “Are you coming up to bed?”

  * * *

  I rose from out of a dream into a wakefulness swirling with exquisite sensations. I lay, bewildered for an instant, and then blinked my eyes open. It was utterly dark, but I could see the silhouette of Leticia propped on her knees beside my head. She was leaning over me – and then I realized with a start what was happening.

  Her tongue flickered low across my naked abdomen and then with a single lunge, she took me into the warm wetness of her hungry mouth. I heard her moan, a whimper that sounded like contentment, and then I felt the instinctive response of my own body as I hardened between her lips.

  “What are you doing?” I hissed in surprise.

  Leticia let me slide from her mouth and stroked me lightly with her hand. “I would have thought that was obvious,” she whispered in the darkness, wicked mischief in her voice. She arched her back so that I felt her nipples brush against my abdomen, and then dipped her head back over the top of my shaft so that I could feel the ravenous swirl of her tongue.

  “Why?” I persisted. It was out of the ordinary for Leticia to behave this way.

  Leticia didn’t answer. I felt the wetness of her lips slide back down over me, and then the hot moist grip of her mouth once more.

  I felt myself swelling, felt the flutter of her tongue along the underside of my shaft as she massaged the ridges and veins of my cock. I grunted, felt my breath seize in my chest and the start of my quickening pulse. I reached up and ran my hand along her naked back, tracing the shape of her body until my fingers dipped between the cleft of her bottom and she shuffled her knees wider on the mattress like an invitation.

  My fingers brushed the wetness of her and I heard Leticia sigh and then her body seemed to go soft. My cunning fingers found the hard little nub of her clit and she pushed back instinctively, craving my touch. I feathered my palm lightly between her thighs until she began rocking her hips and the play of her mouth up and down the length of my shaft became erratic as her own arousal overwhelmed her.

  “Yes!” she hissed. “God, yes, Jonah!” She went stiff for a moment and I saw her throw back her head, the silhouette of her outlined against pale moonlight through the big bedroom window. I saw the long perfect line of her throat and the pointed curve of her breasts. One of my fingers dipped inside her and Leticia gave a gurgling shudder that sounded like a growl.

  “What have you been thinking about?” I growled.

  Leticia rocked her hips, drawing the press of my finger more deeply inside of her. I heard a ragged rasp of her excitement and then the silence of her holding her breath. She was stroking me slowly, her focus suddenly on her own need.

  “I couldn’t sleep,” Leticia muttered.

  “So what have you been thinking about?” my tone became more demanding. Leticia’s head fell forward and I felt the tickle of her hair as it fell between my thighs. Her body was clenching and then going soft as if she were moving to some primal rhythm. She tried to take me back into her mouth but I withdrew my finger like a threat.

  “What have you been thinking about?” I insisted. Leticia whimpered, suddenly deprived of the thrust of my fingers. She swayed back with her hips to keep contact. I flicked my touch across her clit and she seemed to fold at the waist as if her muscles had turned to melted wax.

  “You!” she hissed. The sound of her voice was strained, as though she spoke through clenched teeth. I felt the grip of her hand around my length pulse tight and then release, like she was mirroring the clenching rhythm of h
er own body.

  “What am I doing in your fantasy?” I asked carefully.

  Leticia stayed silent. Her body was trembling, her skin seeming to spark with the fire of her passion. I slid my finger deep inside her and she began to undulate. She sobbed and her arms went weak. Her upper body collapsed until her cheek was resting on my torso, her hot breath coming in ragged pants against the pulsing flex of my cock between her fingertips.

  “You’re training a woman – teaching her how to submit to you,” Leticia confessed. “It’s the same…” she cut the words off suddenly with a gasp that became a low throaty moan as I slid a second finger inside her.

  “The same what?” I was relentless now. Leticia began to push back against me until my fingers could go no deeper and the palm of my hand was a tease against her clit.

  “The same fantasy I’ve been having for months!” the words when they came were tortured by her lust and her embarrassment.

  “And this arouses you?”

  “Yes,” Leticia cried out, and then changed to a small soft voice that I barely heard, “because I’m in the room too. I’m watching you both.”

  Leticia’s sudden orgasm seemed to wrench her in half. Her knees collapsed and she writhed on the bed as her muscles clenched fiercely around my thrusting fingers. She groaned and then cried out again – a sound that was unmistakable and yet with no coherent form. It was the sound of her release, a shattering climax that left her broken and gasping, breathless and trembling.

  I said nothing.

  I lay in the darkness, Leticia close beside me, the scent of her arousal like a perfume that hung on the air. She was croaking gulps of air, the sound of her ragged breath rattling in her throat as she came down from the perilous peak of pleasure, drifting back to earth like a fallen leaf.

  Leticia had told me everything she had been thinking – told me in perhaps the only way she knew how for I doubted she would ever have the resolve and nerve to tell me the dark depths of her fantasies through reasoned conversation.