At the mailbox, I slide my gift and note inside, close the door, and walk back to my vehicle.
I have my laptop open before I’m even in the seat. One click, and her security feeds bloom across the screen.
I watch as she parks and gets out. Heels clicking. Hair twisted high. Blouse tucked into that tight black skirt.
She doesn’t check the mailbox. Not yet. She grabs her bag and disappears inside.
Five minutes pass, and she comes back out.
She sees my gift the moment she opens the mailbox and stares at it for a beat. Her fingers hover before they move, but she doesn’t open it there.
I watch her through the living room feed as she steps in, locks the door behind her, and sets the box down. She hesitates before opening it.
When she lifts the lid, her expression fractures.
She lifts the blindfold as if it were a snake ready to strike. She doesn’t flinch or drop it, but her breath catches, her mouth parting.
“It’s not only a blindfold, Laurette. It’s a promise, and you already said yes.”
I zoom in. Her pulse flutters at her throat, and that flicker gives her away. She’s feeling the rush.
Mine now.
Her hands tremble as she reads the card. Once. Twice. Maybe a third time.
She clutches the blindfold, her fingers curling tightly around the satin. She presses the card to her chest, eyes closed, breathing slowly.
That’s when I’m certain her front door will be unlocked tonight.
She may fight, may shiver. She may question every cell in her body now that darkness has fallen.
But she won’t run.
She wants this.
She wants me.
Tonight she’ll kneel, waiting, offering herself not in words but in posture.
I sit in my Escalade and continue watching her feeds, the glow of the laptop a second moon. She lingers in the bathroom for a while, reappears, and disappears again. I can’t see inside that room, but I like not knowing. The guessing sharpens the hunger.
It’s 9:59 when I slip out of the vehicle and cross her lawn. The front door is unlocked.
Consent confirmed.
I move as a shadow, hoodie up, every camera angle already mapped in my head. Blind spots noted. She won’t catch my face on any feed. Not yet. I’ll be a ghost until I decide otherwise.
The door yields beneath my hand, my invitation inside, and I step in. The smell in the air hits me first. Undeniably her. Something soft and floral beneath sharper notes of wood polish and burning candles.
Every room is quiet. I move slowly and deliberately, my footsteps soft and measured.
I already know this space. The couch faces the north wall with a throw draped over the arm. Law journals are stacked on the coffee table. The hallway is to the left of the console table.
Her surveillance gave me the blueprint, but being here gives it flesh.
The hallway stretches ahead, a corridor to something sacred. Dim light from a nightlight slants across the hardwood, and the bedroom waits at the end.
Each step is precise, but my pulse doesn’t follow suit. It pounds behind my ribs.
