Monday. A message from her on WhatsApp. “On Wednesday, can you whisper what you want to do? You must tell me something dirty where I work. Please.” The exciting early stages together. Seven weeks of dating, a handful of hot and heavy evenings discovering each other’s bodies and minds. Uncovering her longstanding love of spanking and a desire for unexplored levels of submission, matched by my willingness to dominate her, t...

It was a typically sizzling Spanish summer day in June. The intense heat was dissipating as late afternoon approached, bringing relief to my fatigued body as I wove through a dense forest on my way to a remote beach I had spotted on Google Maps. It was my second day of backpacking solo down the south coast towards Valencia. I’d spent the previous week partying hard at a festival with a group of friends from back home in E...