The ruddy light in the cold stone room is dim, but it is enough to make out every detail of the cowering figure. He is nude save for a studded leather collar around his neck; slender and fragile, he is on his knees, enduring the wrath of his Mistress. Sta...
The golden autumn sun flowed across the immaculately-landscaped grounds of Cavanagh House like honey. Hannah and Jonas walked together companionably, only the steady crunch of the gravel beneath their feet and the distant sigh of the breeze stirring the t...
The late-autumn light was fading quickly as Professor Lucas Wainwright slipped a thick sheaf of papers into his briefcase and snapped the locks closed. The beginning of a new academic year was always a difficult time, and he was in no mood for staying lat...
When Donna lifted her veil, I thought my heart would burst. Could it really be that this woman - this angel - had agreed to be my wife?I swallowed and glanced back down the aisle. The pews were packed with our friends, family, and the other assorted acqua...
"So," Hannah said, crossing her legs, "you signed your first contract, and shot your first films.""I did," Jonas said with a wry smile. "They weren't, I'm the first to admit, my finest work, but they earned me a certain notoriety in the business.""They di...
Lunch was a quiet affair. Jonas and Hannah ate in companionable silence, enjoying the excellent food the house chef had prepared for them. Hannah stole many a secret glance at her host; she was trying to conceal how aroused his story had made her, but it...
It took Jonas half an hour to deal with the phone messages that had come in during the morning. By the time he returned, Hannah was sleeping peacefully. Jonas smiled and closed the door softly."Miss Maxwell?" Hannah awoke with a start, then flushed and st...
The leaves flamed gold and red in the low autumnal sun, and the single-track road which meandered through the deep forest was cloaked in shadow. The seasons turned, and the timeless English countryside bore the change with grace and ease.Suddenly, the sil...
The light pouring through the window was strange, Margaret thought sleepily, then realised why: surely it was too yellow, to bright to be natural? It trickled through the blinds like liquid gold and pooled lazily on the tiled floor. Who would melt so much...
By five o'clock on a cold winter's afternoon, the interior of St. Stephen's was warm, welcoming, and filled with any number of partially-inebriated students celebrating the imminent end of the university term. Over the muted thump of the music, voices wer...
The door opened without warning, and a sweet feminine voice said, "Professor Wainwright? I think I'm your four o'clock."Lucas looked up irritably from the pile of papers he was reviewing, then removed his spectacles and took a longer look at the pretty yo...
There was a hesitant knock at the door.Professor Lucas Wainwright swore softly, though it sounded loud in the stillness of his office. Refusing to be hurried, he finished the sentence he was writing, capped and put down his pen, and called, "Yes?"The door...
The snow fell slowly that afternoon, drifting in flurries over the fields and forests, and settling in large, powdery drifts against the venerable buildings of the university. From his window, looking out over the manicured gardens of St. Stephen's Quad,...
The first thing a visitor to the quiet Minnesota town of Lake Wannacum is likely to say (other than "Where the hell is the interstate anyway we've been crawling along these dirt tracks for hours, my sat-nav said this was the cross-country route to St. Clo...
The sun was slipping toward the western horizon by the time we made it to the cottage. Our route had taken us a long way out of the city, along winding country roads, up into the wild hills. From there, we had reached the single-track road which followed...
