Page 49 of Suite 7

“Yeah? How’d that go?”

“Well. She’s a good match.” I pause. “We’ve agreed to an ongoing arrangement. I’m negotiating terms with her tonight.”

He settles back. “Tell me about her. What’s she like?”

And here is where I should give him something vague and privacy-preserving. I’ve done it before with previous arrangements. I know exactly how to answer this question.

“She argues,” I say. “Tests limits. Has an opinion about every instruction I give her and voices every single one before she complies.”

Marcel looks at me.

“She sounds exhausting,” he says.

“She’s not.” The correction comes out faster than I intend. “She’s — it keeps the dynamic honest. She doesn’t comply blindly. She engages with everything and then she chooses. That’s different.”

Marcel is quiet for a moment.

“Hm.” He tilts his head. “So you found yourself a submissive version of Vera.”

He’s grinning when he says it.

“God, can you imagine? Vera Beckett, yes Sir, whatever you say Sir —” He’s shaking his head at the image, still grinning. “That woman would last about forty seconds before telling the Dom his technique needed work and suggesting three alternative approaches⁠—”

“She lasted considerably longer than that.”

I hear exactly what I’ve said approximately half a second after I’ve said it.

Marcel’s grin stops. Not fades. Stops. Like a frame frozen mid-motion.

The silence is about three seconds long and contains approximately everything.

“She—” He sets his coffee down, both hands, flat on the desk on either side of it. “You just said she. As in⁠—”

He stops. His expression moves through disbelief, then calculation. Then he just looks at me. “You have firsthand data on this. Specific. Recent. Firsthand data.”

I look at the drawing on my desk.

“Kane. You just defended Vera Beckett’s ability to submit. With evidence.” A pause. “Vera Beckett is your new submissive.”

Not a question.

I say nothing, which is the same as saying everything.

Marcel leans back in his chair. “Tell me what happened,” he says finally.

So I tell him. Marcel listens through all of it without interrupting.

When I'm done, he exhales and looks at me.

“Okay,” he says. Just that. One word, doing a lot of work.

“Vera Beckett.” He says. “Your sister’s best friend is your new submissive.”

“Yes.”

“And Sloane doesn’t know.”

“Sloane doesn’t need to know. This is between me and Vera. It’s an arrangement, it may run its course in a few weeks, it may not go anywhere, there’s no reason to upset Sloane over something that might resolve itself.”