1 Chapter 1

Prologue

Atlanta, GA

SHE LAY QUIETLY, enjoying that delicious state that hovers between wakefulness and sleep, alternately drifting in and out of the latter. During the wakeful swings of the cycle, she was conscious only of occasional whispers of air as the central air-conditioning cycled on and off, stirring the dust motes hanging in the air as revealed by the late-afternoon sunlight filtering through the blinds of her bedroom windows. She was, as the romance novelists are fond of saying, ‘basking in the afterglow’. Their lovemaking had been more intense yet, at the same time, more tender than usual, perhaps because they had both known it would be the last time.

She had been very firm about that, telling her lover that she could not continue the relationship, given her changed status. She’d expected an argument or a bitter fight. In fact, she’d marshaled a litany of reasons as to why it was for the best and had been taken somewhat aback by the quiet acceptance. The only response she’d gotten to what was essentially an ultimatum on her part was a quiet “I see.”

It’s ironic,she thought as she dozed off again. She’d been prepared for a terrible scene—one that failed to transpire. In a way she was glad it was over, for her lover had recently become even more domineering and possessive than usual, and she was, frankly, tired of the frequent bouts of jealousy that precipitated ever more acrimonious arguments. There was another irony at work as well, in that today was Mother’s Day, and it was her incipient motherhood that she had given as the reason for suspending the relationship.

She wasn’t quite sure why she awakened again, her latest period of sleep having been deeper than the previous episodes, but as she swam up through the fuzzy layers of consciousness, she became gradually aware of a presence in the room. Coming to with a start, she recognized the leather clad figure with the black hood.

“What are you doing here?” she said. “I thought we agreed that it was over.”

The figure remained silent as it moved to the side of the bed. It was then that she saw the handcuffs and rope dangling from one of the figure’s hands.

“I see we’re going to be kinky this time,” she said aloud as she automatically stretched her arms and legs toward the corners of the four-poster bed, the better to allow herself to be secured to them. It was a game they’d played many times before, and she allowed herself to smile in anticipation of what was surely to come, even though she knew that she should be frowning at her wishes not having been adhered to.

She was still smiling when the figure produced a duffel bag and opened it, but the smile changed to a look of bewilderment when she saw something retrieved from it that was definitely not one of their usual toys. She began to scream when she realized what was about to happen and continued screaming for a time. When the screams finally turned into a gurgle, then stopped, the black-clad figure picked up the duffel bag, restored its contents, and left, closing the bedroom door as quietly as it had been opened. For a time, the only motion in the room was that of the dust motes that had been disturbed by the closing of the door and the only sound the occasional sigh of the air-conditioning. After a while, when the cool of the evening satisfied a thermostat somewhere in the house, the air conditioning ceased cycling, and finally even the dust motes were still.

They remained so until the next morning, when there was a knock on the door and her maid said, “Se?ora, I have brought your breakfast.”

Receiving no answer, the maid knocked again. “Se?ora, are you awake? It’s almost ten o’clock.”

There was no response from the silent room. Eventually the door was cautiously opened as the maid backed into the room holding a tray, pushing the door ahead of her with her ample backside. She was all the way into the room before she turned around. When she saw what lay on the bed, she dropped the tray with a clatter, and for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, the room was filled with screams of terror.

2

Atlanta, GACharles

THE LATE MAY heat, though not excessive, hit me with a blast as I entered the parking garage underneath the downtown Atlanta office building where my law firm was located. The heat did nothing to improve my mood, which had been spiraling downward for the past hour, although one would have to have been intimately acquainted with me to have picked up any indication of that from my demeanor.