“I thought we could play,” I say, and I take a sip of wine. “I’ve been bad, and I need to be punished.”
M. rolls up his shirt sleeves, slowly, then enters the room, gazing at my body. His lips turn up at the corners in a sultry curve. He picks up the glass of wine on the table and takes a sip, still staring. He takes another drink, then sits next to me, runs his hand along my leg, the bare flesh of my thigh, the fishnet stocking.
“How bad?” he asks.
“Very,” I say. “I need to be whipped.” I sit up. “But first I want to suck your cock.” I slide off the bed. M. grabs my hand.
“Where are you going?” he says.
“Nowhere. I just want to change places with you. I want you to lie down so I can suck your cock.”
“Did I tell you to move?”
“No.”
He sets his wineglass on the table, then pulls me down on his lap, still gripping my wrist. “Maybe I want to whip you first.”
My heartbeat quickens. I don’t say anything. Has he guessed I put something in his drink? No, he wouldn’t be able to taste it—I hadn’t. Suddenly, it occurs to me that maybe he knew, all along, about the mark on Franny. Maybe he wanted me to see it and know he killed her. Maybe this is a prelude to my own death.
“Okay,” I say, “I’ll get the whip.” I hear the nervous flutter in my voice. M. looks at me strangely—he knows something is wrong. He doesn’t release me. I wait, to see what he will do.
Abruptly, he grabs a fistful of my hair and pulls my head back. I gasp. My wineglass falls to the floor. I’m breathing heavily, my head bent back so I’m staring at the ceiling. I know if I resist, he’ll pull me back even farther. His hand digs into my hair, twisting it until I groan.
Then he kisses me on the neck. He kisses me again and releases my hair. His other hand is still clamped around my wrist. I feel the slow movement of his lips and wet tongue on my bare shoulders and neck; I smell his sweat, the briny muskiness of his desire.
“You look really tired,” I mumble. “I thought maybe you’d like me to suck you for a while, give you a little energy.”
M. looks at me. “Is that what you thought?” he says, and he releases my wrist.
Tentatively, I get off his lap and down on my knees. I unzip his pants, waiting to see if he is going to stop me. He doesn’t. He stands, and I pull off his pants and shoes. He sits down again. I unknot his tie, then unbutton his shirt. I fold all of his clothes neatly, as he would do. He slides back on the bed so his back is against the wall. I hand him his glass of wine.
“Here,” I say, and he takes it. “I want you to relax,” I tell him, using what I hope is a very sexy voice. “Just close your eyes, drink the wine, and enjoy this. I’m going to suck you longer and better than you’ve ever been sucked before.”
I begin licking him slowly. His cock is already tense and hard, a blue vein bulging along the shaft, but my goal is the opposite, to slow him down. M., eyes closed, drinks the wine. I see his shoulders relax, his body settle. His head moves languidly from side to side. Smoothly, without changing tempo, I shift my mouth from his cock to the inside of his thigh, a less volatile part of his anatomy. I keep my mouth there, brushing my lips against him lightly. M. doesn’t care that I’ve relinquished his cock, or he’s too far gone to notice. He finishes the wine. I move my mouth to his other thigh, then later up to his stomach, noticing his penis is quite limp. He moans, a deep, relaxing sound. His palm opens, and the empty wine glass rolls out of his hand.
“Lie down,” I say.
M. moans, then says, sleepily, “What?” His eyes open, barely.
“Lie down,” I repeat, picking up his glass and setting it on the table. “You’ll be more comfortable,” and I help him stretch out on the bed.
“I’m really tired,” he mumbles. “I just need a few minutes,” and he closes his eyes.
I massage his legs and thighs, gently, then work up to his arms and shoulders. The pressure in my hands is soft, soothing, meant to relax. When I think he’s asleep, I lift one arm above his head. He mumbles something, but complies. The handcuffs dangle from the wall. Each cuff is connected to a very thick two-foot chain, which is bolted to the wall. Slowly, I put the handcuff on his wrist, then lock it. The chain is slack, not stretching his arms, and he doesn’t feel it. I lift his other arm and do the same.
I stand back and look at him, naked, his cock limp, Franny’s killer, and I feel nothing but disgust. I get the belt from his pants and wrap it around his neck. Then I get two pieces of rope from the dresser and tie his legs to the bed frame. I walk over to the VCR and turn it on. Franny is crying, the camera circling her, Rameau licking. M. still sleeps. I turn up the volume.
He jerks awake, a startled expression on his face. Disoriented, he looks at the blaring television, then feels his arms shackled to the wall. He twists his head and shoulders, craning to see, quite alert now, then he notices the belt around his neck. He looks back at me.
“Unlock these,” he says, his voice stern. “Now.”
He’s still playing the role of the disciplinarian. He still thinks he holds sway over me.
I lower the volume. “Why did you show me this video?”
“You didn’t believe I had Franny fuck the dog. I wanted you to know that I always tell the truth.” His voice is even and without remorse.
“Except you don’t tell the truth,” I say. “You’ve never told me the truth.”
“Unlock the cuffs,” he says. “The longer you keep them on me, the harder I’ll be on you.”
I ignore him. I hear Franny crying, and I also hear M. yelling at her to stay on the floor. His words infuriate me. I lower the volume even more. “I agreed to everything we did. Maybe I was reluctant, but I agreed. And that’s okay. But Franny didn’t agree, not to any of the things you did. You forced them on her. You … you went too far. There have to be restraints.”
Smiling slightly, he looks at me with a complacent expression. He is still unaware of the gravity of his mistake, unaware that there is a rift between us that cannot be mended. “Restraints,” he says mildly. “That’s a bourgeois concept.”
“You can’t just do whatever you like.”
“I see no reason why not.”
“Because you hurt people. You hurt Franny. You shouldn’t have done those things to her. It was immoral.” My voice trembles with rage.
He spits out a laugh at the word. “Immoral?” he says disdainfully. “She was under no obligation to stay with me. She could’ve left at any time. She chose not to. It was her decision, not mine.”
“She couldn’t say no to you.”
“And now you want to blame me for her weakness?”
“Yes,” I say, “you are responsible.” I hear the strain in my voice, feel the anger blazing beneath my modulated tone as I fight for self-control. I want him dead, and I know, in my present state of mind, I could perform the act easily. “You were the stronger one,” I say. “You can’t do the things you did without repercussions.”
“Repercussions? What repercussions? I feel no guilt for what I did with her. She was an adult. A consenting adult.”
He still isn’t aware that I know he killed Franny. He thinks my anger is about Rameau and all the sexual and sadistic acts he forced upon her. I glower at M. and he stares back at me, coolly.
He says, “She made her own choices. Maybe they were the wrong ones for her, but she made them. Why should I feel guilt because of that? I enjoyed watching her with Rameau—just as I enjoyed watching you. I know what I want, Nora, and I go after it. It’s that simple.”
“Not this time,” I say, shaking my head. “And not with me. You almost had me fooled. You said you loved me—and I almost believed it. But you don’t love me, or anyone else. You’re incapable of that.”
He looks at me placidly. I feel the urge to throw something at him, to knock the smug equanimity off his face. “You must really hate women,” I say. “You’re not even satisfied with controlling them—you have to humiliate them as well.”
He listens to this with an amused expression. Finally he says, “Are you going to throw a tantrum, Nora? You know I’ll have to punish you for that.”
I shake my head. “You just don’t get it, do you? I’m not playing this game anymore, and you can’t punish me if I’m not following the rules.” I walk closer to M. I place my palm on his head. His dark hair is soft and fine, like fleece in my fingers. “You forget who’s in bondage now,” I say. I reach lower, for his neck. “You forget you’re the one with a belt around your neck.”
As I touch the belt, I see, by the change in M.’s expression, that he finally recognizes the seriousness of my intentions. He is silent. I feel his body tense. Finally, he speaks.
“So this is how it’s going to end? You and I are through?” he says, and I hear a note of irritation in his voice. He was vain enough to believe I would never leave him, even if he showed me the video of Franny.
“Yes,” I say, and I cross the room to the television. He doesn’t know it yet, but my leaving him is the least of his worries. It’s time for him to learn that I know he killed Franny.
He quirks his eyebrow in a shrug. “All right,” he says. “So you and I are through. Now unlock the cuffs.”
“Watch the video,” I say. Franny looks at the camera, tears rolling down her face. I feel my anger resurfacing.
“Get these off—”
“Watch it!” I scream. My body shudders, and I take a deep breath to get myself under control. I need control now, I need it more than ever.
I play the shot that shows the mark on Franny’s buttock. I rewind the video, then play it over.
“You don’t see it, do you? You made a mistake, and now it’s going to cost you.” I freeze the picture. “Look at that,” I say, pointing to the mark.
“What?”
“You can barely see it. It almost looks like a birthmark, except Franny didn’t have any birthmarks.”
M. is squinting at the TV, trying to make it out.
“It’s a circle,” I say. “With a line slashed through it—exactly like the one the coroner found on Franny’s stomach.”
I see a look of panic—just a brief look, lasting only a second—before M. tries to cover it up.
“You can’t tell what that is,” he says. “It could be anything.”
“Only it’s not. It’s a circle with a line through it. Just like the one you cut on Franny’s stomach.”
I turn off the television. I walk over to the camcorder and switch it on, then go back to M. I straddle his chest, feeling his bare skin against my thighs. “You’re going to tell me how you killed Franny,” I say. “With the video you took of Franny, and the one I’m taking now of your confession, you’ll be in jail for the rest of your life—if you’re lucky. They just might give you the death penalty.”
M. looks me coolly in the eyes. “What makes you think I’ll tell you anything?”
I pick up the ends of the belt around his neck. “Because if you don’t, I’ll kill you.”
He lets out a short, snide laugh.
I pull the belt tight, cutting off his air. He struggles, and it takes all my strength to keep the belt tight. I am not prepared for the force of his efforts to stop me. Before I have time to react, he brings up his left elbow and shoulder, twists his torso, and jabs me in the ribs. A sharp jolt of pain cuts me in the side. It stuns me, and I gasp for breath. The slack in the chain gives M. room enough to maneuver. He slams his elbow into me again. The force of his blow knocks me off his chest and I fall into the table. It topples over, crashing to the floor, spilling his wineglass and the three candles and everything else on the tabletop. The drawer falls open, and a box of condoms, lube, nipple clamps, and metal ben-wa balls spew across the floor. The ben-wa balls, sounding like steel ball bearings, roll across the oval rug and onto the hardwood floor, bouncing into the wall. Two of the candles burned out on the way to the floor, but the third is burning a small hole in the rug. I stomp on it with my high heels, extinguishing the fire. There’s a pain in my side, and I see a mark on my shoulder where I knocked into the table. The skin is broken and bloody.
M. smiles, smugly. I pull off the heels and throw them across the room, then go to the foot of the bed. I grab the bed frame and yank hard, pulling the bed out, stretching M.’s arms until there is no slack in the chain that connects the handcuffs to the wall. I’m breathing heavily, the stitch in my side painful. I pull again, and hear him yell.
“Goddammit, Nora! These are cutting into my wrists.”
I go over to him and straddle his chest. “Now, we’re going to try this again,” I say. “You tell me how you killed Franny, or I’ll kill you.” I grab the belt.
M. sneers. “You won’t kill me,” he says.
I grip the belt tighter. “Try me,” I say.
“If you kill me, you’ll go to jail.”
I shake my head. “Harris knows what you’re like. I’d tell him you wanted me to do something really extreme, something on the edge. I’d tell him you wanted to experiment with breath control, that you wanted me to choke you. I objected, of course, but you said you’d beat me if I didn’t. So I played your game. Only problem, I choked you too long and too hard. So sorry. You die. It was an accident.” My rib aches from M.’s attack.
“They’d still go after you.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. They couldn’t prove murder. Manslaughter, possibly, or reckless endangerment. I’ll take that to see you pay for Franny’s murder.” I pull the belt so M. can feel it. “Now, start talking.”
He doesn’t say anything. His face is set tight, his jaw clenched. I yank the belt tight. He starts to gasp for air, and his face turns a dark red. Beneath me, his torso bucks slightly, but he’s stretched out completely now, and his efforts to fight me are useless. I release my hold.
“Ready to talk?” I say, but I don’t give him a chance to reply. I know he won’t give in so easily. I choke him again. I see the defiance in his eyes, and I pull tighter. His face turns dark red once more. He stares at me for as long as he can, then his eyes water and roll back. His mouth is open, gaping, soundless. I feel the aches in my upper arms and chest. My breath comes out hard and labored. I hadn’t realized choking a man would be so difficult, so strenuous. I keep pulling the belt, wondering if I’m going to stop. It would be a short step, from here to death. Just a little longer, and he’d be dead.