She'd asked for this—begged for it, really, over weeks of whispered confessions in the dark. "Make it feel real," Maria had said, her voice catching on the words. "I want to be terrified. I want to fight you and lose. I want to scream and know you won't stop unless I say the word." He'd listened without judgment, only repeating the rules back to her until her breath came fast and shallow. The safeword was red. One use and...

She came home wrong The mattress still holds the shape of where Suzie should be. John lies in the hollow she left behind, naked, one arm flung over the empty side like he could will her back by touch. The clock on her nightstand glows 1:17 a.m. Her last text sits open on his phone: Staying at Lisa’s, love you. He has reread it twenty-three times tonight, thumb hovering over the heart he sent back, the one that now feels o...

1. Ignition The morning light is thin and sharp, slicing across the marble island like a blade. Lily sits on the high stool, knees pressed together, pulse drumming so hard she feels it in her teeth. The notepad waits between them, innocent white paper that already knows too much. He walks in barefoot, still in the faded T-shirt he slept in. The sight of his bare forearms (veins standing, muscles shifting under skin) makes...