He moved faster, skin slapping skin, not as loud as the crack of his palm, but vying with the splash of the fountain.
“Ask now,” he rasped, lips warm against her shoulder.
“Please, sir. May I come?”
“You may.”
Thank goodness. The game, the restraints, his deep, commanding voice, his presence… all of it finally became too much. She cried out, pulling against the cuffs as pleasure rushed through her, past caring who might hear.
His rhythm broke, and his grip tightened. He pressed his forehead to her shoulder, and, for a few seconds, Leland came apart too, whispering something that got lost in the steady splash of the fountain.
The memory broke apart, and Julia opened her eyes to darkness. She often wondered what he’d said. Were they throwaway words spoken in the moment, or had they mattered?
She sat a moment longer in the fountain’s glow, the water still gently splashing, the night indifferent to all of it. Then she rose and started toward home.
The streets were quieter now with less traffic as the hour grew later. Too late. It wasn’t a bad neighborhood, but she was a woman walking alone at night. She gripped the pepper spray on her key ring and walked faster.
At the corner of her block, another prickle brushed her neck, and she glanced back. Nothing again.Still, the feeling of unease followed her all the way to her door.
Chapter 4
The curved screen spanned nearly the entire wall, a seamless sweep of high-definition feeds layered across a dark interface. With a tap or a click, any of them could be expanded, isolated, and tracked. Thermal overlays, motion detection, perimeter alerts—all running quietly beneath the surface.
State of the art. Nick Devlin did nothing halfway, especially when it came to security.
Leland sat forward, one hand resting on the edge of the console, the other on the mouse. A laptop sat open beside him, mirroring the system controls, giving him full access to every camera on the property. Inside the house and the extensive grounds, from the patio to the dock, including the front gate, the outbuildings, and the perimeter.
His gaze moved through the feeds, not lingering anywhere for long, taking in the broader picture. Movement patterns. Entry points. The rhythm of the night as it unfolded over the grounds.
On the perimeter cam, Boone moved steadily along the fence line, flashlight low, posture relaxed but alert. He paused near the far corner, checked the gate then continued on.
Everything was as it should be.
His attention paused on the tree-line cam. A shadow shifted along the edge of the frame. Too quick to track, too indistinct to identify. Wind, maybe. Or a trick of the light.
He watched a few seconds longer. When he didn’t see it again, his focus shifted to the dock. A boat had tied off in a slip not ten minutes ago. Its occupants had never gotten off. Hetapped the screen, enlarging the window. The scene came into sharper detail.
The mast had been rigged with ropes not meant for sailing. A woman stood against it, wrists bound, her costume merely a suggestion—torn fabric, bare breasts and thighs gleaming in the moonlight. The man with her, the self-appointed captain judging by his hat and swagger, circled her slowly, flicking a cat-o’-nine-tails against interesting stingy places.
Leland turned on the mic and listened to her beg for mercy. Her tone, posture, and the way she arched into each stroke told the story. This was role-play. Controlled and consensual. Typical member fun.
He moved on.
One feed wavered. A brief distortion in the image, gone almost as quickly as it appeared. His eyes tracked the timestamp, the adjacent feeds, checking for a corresponding disruption. Nothing.
As he jotted down the time and feed numbers on the incident log, the door opened.
Dev’s voice came from behind him. “Something wrong?”
Maintaining his forward focus, he shrugged one shoulder. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
The door closed with a click. Dev took the chair beside him, taking in the display with a single, sweeping glance before settling his attention on the same section Leland had been watching.
“What are you seeing?”
“Intermittent glitching,” Leland said. “Brief. Different feeds.”
“Same zone?”
