"It was inevitable that she found out about him, of course. I'm a Mistress, but I'm her sub, and your Mistress always knows everything you're thinking. You and Violet aren't there yet, but you would have been, you already sensed it coming. I broke down and told Tamara everything, the pain was so awful, his rejection.

"She loves me, has always looked after me, so she pretended she was me, went to his parents, told them what he was. Of course, it was his worst nightmare. Or so he always said it would be."

Her expression shifted, became dreamy, the closest to tranquility Mac had yet seen reflected in her face. "Tamara called me, told me to come over to his apartment, that she needed to show me something." She turned those soft brown eyes to him again. "You remember Bambi, the original book by Felix Salten, not the Disney whitewashed version? When the stag comes to get Bambi, to show him Man, with a capital 'M', lying dead on the forest floor, shot in a hunting accident? And Bambi is so afraid to get close, because the idea of Man was larger than life to him, something beyond his understanding. I was afraid like that when I walked into the room, smelled the blood. I was so afraid, because he was an extension of who I am, and if it had become too much for him, it would become too much for me. I was doomed. But Tamara made me come look at him, look at his face.

"He had shot himself, and was lying on the bed, curled up as if sleeping. There were thin tracks dried on his cheeks, and the side of his head was all blood. But the amazing thing was his face. His expression. It was so peaceful, so...released at last. It was then I understood, something I don't think even Tamara understood as much as I did at that moment. All of them are looking for that release, all of them who are dedicating so much energy to hiding what they are, keeping it separate from the vanilla world. I can help. What is a sub but a person who wants to return to the bosom of an All-Powerful Mistress or Master, be watched over and cared for? Sometimes, I wish it was me. I imagine it is me, and I can be like them, at peace. But I'm a Mistress, and it's up to me to take care of a sub, help them find pleasure through pain, release through death. It follows and fits, don't you see?

"'There is Another who is over us all, over us and over Him.' Just as Bambi said. I am the 'Other' who can make things right for people like my love, my Thomas. We're all afraid to embrace death, even when we know it's the best thing for us. I could have helped him, so he never had to experience that awful moment with his parents. I could have released him and revealed his truth to them, so they would at last know, as he always wanted them to, but not be around to see their rejection or pain from it. He didn't have to suffer, none of you do.

"Struggle all you want, love," she noted the tensing of his muscles. "Those are lag bolts, holding that into an oak floor with solid sub-flooring beneath. Tyler entertains all sorts of guests here, drives them near insane, so he's made it strong. You'd have to be Superman to get that loose."

She rose, went to Jonathan. Mac shouted around the gag, tried in some way to communicate to Powell the fatal mistake he was about to make, fought the chains, the bench, shoving off with his knees, his thigh muscles straining. Powell glanced over at him, then his attention was caught by his Mistress as she fondled him. He had stripped down, so now he was as naked as Mac. Being naked in the same room with Powell was a nauseating experience all by itself, but as Mac strained at his bonds, the lingering after-effects of the drug they had given him only made him dizzier.

Kiera cuffed Jonathan's right hand, locking it to the cross, bent and did the same to his right foot, completing the process of making him helpless.

She came back to Mac, freed his gag with a rough jerk. "You can tell Jonathan what it is you wanted to say, now that I've gotten you all nicely trussed."

"You might as well kill us both and be done with it," Mac spat out blood, regretting that he just missed her boot. "Violet isn't coming."

"Of course she's coming. I expected her here already."

"Violet was involved in a car accident early in the week. She went to visit her mother today."

Kiera stared at him a long moment and Mac pulled his lips back in a feral grin. "Really messes up your plans, doesn't it?"

"You're lying," she said flatly, though there was a seed of doubt in her eyes. "If that was true, you wouldn't have told me, to buy you more time."

"Unless I'm just sick of listening to your babbling rationalizations of why it's okay to murder people in cold blood." Mac weighed his options and made his choice. Kiera wasn't going to believe anything except what would take her by surprise. "Violet is a cop, like me, Kiera. She shot someone in the line of duty this week. You'd have heard about it on the news. Remember, the highway driver killed by a state trooper? That trooper was Violet. She got a flesh wound and she's on desk duty all week. Tyler probably didn't know she wasn't back at work yet."

"Liar!" She seized the cat and Mac ducked his face automatically, protecting himself as she brought it down. It caught his ear, shoulder, the back of his neck, one cheekbone. The smell of his own blood, the burning pain of his back, all of it was adding to the nausea. If I'm going to die, let's get on with it before I have to throw up on myself.

"Why won't you understand that I'm trying to help you, release you from your pain? The hiding?"

"Because I accept who I am, Kiera," Mac snapped. "Unlike you and your dead boyfriend, I realized a long time ago that being a sub is just part of who I am. An important part, but not all of it. I enjoy serving a Mistress's pleasure, as much as I enjoy being a cop, or watching a Buccaneers game, or spending a day out in the Gulf on my boat. Being a sub doesn't make me less of a man. And to Violet, it makes me more of one, more of what she wants.

"All you're doing is making excuses. You're killing because you can't stand your own pain. Your sister fucked up your head early and you're acting out. It's not about you playing God, it's about the kill. Just seeing my blood is starting to make you shake. I can see it."

"What the hell is going on?" Jonathan demanded.

"Well, welcome to the party at last," Mac said derisively. "She's going to shoot us both in the head and make it look like Tyler did it. I'm a homicide cop and I've been tracking her. She's killed three other guys this past six weeks the same way. She'll call your parents after she does it, to make sure your nearest and dearest know what you are." He raised a brow, blinked against the blood running down into his eye. "Do you want my mother's phone number? Oh, sorry, that will mess you up further, because my mother died some time ago."

Thank God, because this would kill her.

"Shut up!" Kiera struck out again. This time her aim was wild, hitting him a glancing blow on the shoulder. She dropped it, turned to a cabinet and pulled out her gun, a polished nine millimeter, a Walther P99. A neat little gun to make a neat hole in his head. Mac forced himself to keep his eyes open as she jammed the barrel against his temple, her trembling finger on the trigger.

"Jesus Christ." Powell yanked against his bonds. "Jesus. I don't want any part of this. Kiera, Mistress..."

"Oh, do shut up." Kiera turned the pistol toward him.

"No," Mac snapped, with enough thunderous force to snatch her attention back to him. "Why kill him first? He's not going to tell anyone about you, a self-centered bastard like him. You want him to suffer, remember? Then he should live."

She hesitated, uncertain, and the gun turned back toward Mac. "I should just kill you," she said slowly. "You're the one who needs release. You're too angry. I can feel how much pain you're in."

Most of it from that damn cat, he thought dryly. "Do it," he urged, his eyes glittering, focused on her, focused on the gun. "Do it and let him go."

"Mackenzie." A voice came down to them from the top of the stairs. "You know better than to give a Mistress orders. I've taught you better than that."

Chapter 21.

Son of a bitch, son of a bitch, son of a bitch. Mac would have said it out loud if he thought it would help.

He turned his head over, fighting the sick waves of pain rolling over him. Violet stood at the entrance to the dungeon in street clothes.

"You're not dressed for the occasion," Kiera said, her gaze and the gun swinging toward Violet as his pixie made her way, one casual step at a time, down the stairs.

"I had thought to change upstairs, but I wanted to come down here and see what I was missing. Apparently, quite a lot."

"You stop right at the bottom, and you keep your hands where I can see them. You ruined it, Mac," Kiera said, though she never took her eyes off of Violet. "If you hadn't made me pull the gun, we could have had some fun first.

"I want you to take off your clothes," she told Violet. "Strip down to your underwear, so I can be sure you're not carrying anything, and move slowly. I hate to order a Mistress, but I've got to see this through, you see?"

She backed up as Violet reached the bottom of the stairs, keeping the gun trained on the smaller woman at chest level. That fragile network of curves, flesh and muscle, the vital organs beneath. Panic gripped Mac, caught him up as it hadn't since he was an unarmed rookie in the middle of a domestic fight, a baby in a crib two feet away while the drunk father waved a loaded .38 at the teenaged mother. He had managed that. He would manage this. He would not let Kiera kill Violet. It wasn't going to happen. He made it so in his mind, made it so in his resolve, let it coat him like armor.

"There are only the dungeons for us, Violet." Kiera's eyes were expressive, appealing. "We're like medieval torturers who can only live with the prisoners, dispensing pain and release, never letting the world above see who we all really are because they can't bear our truth."

"Wrong." Violet took the final step down. "I want Mac. In The Zone, out of The Zone. I want to eat dinner with him, watch him shave in the morning, listen to him yell at the political pundits on TV. I want to nag him to mow the yard, and wake up curled up next to him in the early morning." Her glance went to Mac, lingered on his back, the hot fury of her reaction piercing through him, though she kept her voice admirably even. "I want that as much as I want to have him chained for my pleasure in a bedroom. I want him to be there for me, with me. I want him to take care of me, and I want to take care of him. Don't you want that, Mac?"

He locked gazes with her. "Absolutely, sugar."

For a remarkable second, it was just the two of them in the room, all the danger, blood and restraints gone. Then they came back, as Violet shifted her attention to Kiera. "The dungeon is only one part of it, Kiera, as Mac told you. You had one situation that went bad. You could have found someone else if you hadn't given up."

"He won't accept you that way. He's a cop. He can't take you out into the light of a normal relationship."

"Wrong," Mac said. "I can, and I have."

"Your shirt," Kiera snapped. "Now."

"You don't have to do this," Violet said, slowly toeing off her shoes, pulling her shirt out of the waistband of her jeans. "This can't end well, Kiera. It's gotten out of your control."

"Oh, please," Kiera chuckled. "If there's anyone who understands the presence or absence of control, it's Mistresses like us. I've been neck-deep in the practice of it since I was a teenager. You're a rank amateur."

"A Mistress is born, not made," Violet returned. "You're not a Mistress, Kiera. You never were. You're your sister's sub, which makes me the one in the room with the true control. If you give me the gun, it will be over and there won't be any more hurting."

"This is the last time I'm going to tell you. Take off your shirt," Kiera snapped. "And save your pathetic two-hour class in police psychology."

Her finger had moved off the guard back to the trigger. Mac heaved against the bench, heard wood groan.

Kiera shot him a glance. "Give it up, Mac. This is over. If she hadn't been a cop, if she hadn't known, we could have had so much fun with you gagged. I was going to let her play, let her get you and her off one more time. We might even have let Jonathan do you like I promised. You don't understand. But you will. You'll understand when I shoot. I'll see it in your eyes, and we'll all know I've done the right thing. Now, Violet," she snarled.

"Fine." Violet yanked the shirt over her head, pulled it off her arms and flung it into the air between them, a projectile of cloth aimed for Kiera's face.

Kiera's trigger finger jerked, and the gun went off. Eyes locked on the muzzle, Mac saw the gun kick high. She was going to miss. Violet rammed into the taller woman, sending them crashing over a heavy wooden chair, taking it with them in a tangle of arms and legs. The bullet hit the wall as the gun spun away out of Kiera's hands.

Violet had police training, but Kiera worked out in a gym regularly and had her in strength and weight. When she rolled to her feet and took a martial arts stance, leaped forward and tackled Violet before she could go for the gun, she demonstrated she'd had contact training as well. The two women made it to their feet. Violet landed a punch, but Kiera knocked her back with a hard kick. Undeterred, his fiery Mistress rolled, rammed forward, slamming them against Jonathan's cross. Powell grabbed a generous handful of Kiera's hair, and she screamed, turning on him as Violet yanked a gun out of an ankle holster.

Kiera shoved her elbow into Powell's stomach, gaining her release, and flung herself on Violet before she could get the gun up. She rolled Violet over with another hard kick to her mid-section, taking her wind and making her drop the gun. Violet spun and grabbed her, and they went over Mac, tumbling to the other side of him. Violet landed on the bottom, her head hitting the wall. Kiera struck her, rolled off and scrambled away.

When they rolled over, the bench groaned, and the significance of that exploded in Mac's mind. As Kiera went for the gun and Violet tried to orient herself, he heaved against the bench. Not up and back this time. Left, then right, left, then right.

The anchoring had been designed for the pull of an aroused sub, resistance anticipated forward and back. He snarled, heaved again, side to side, fast as the pumping of a piston, every muscle screaming, demanding release, despite the awkward positioning of his legs. The floorboard cracked, twisted.

He roared, using the sound to galvanize him to further action. Th. e floor ripped in response. The right side of the bench came loose abruptly, unbalancing him. Mac rolled with it, using the momentum to tear the bench free and coming to his feet, face to face with Kiera, who had just claimed the gun and leveled it at Violet. The roll put him squarely in the middle of them. He kept going, a forward charge, the bench anchored to his front like a Roman wooden shield.

Violet screamed his name. The gun fired. Kiera shrieked as he took her down under him. One wooden leg drove into her left breast, the other under her right arm. The impact to the breast caused a scream of pain. Still manacled to the bench, he had no mobility in his hands, and she still had the gun, but then Violet was there, stomping on her wrist, knocking it away, while Kiera abandoned all training and went after his face with teeth and nails.

"Roll off," Violet shouted. Mac obeyed slowly, fighting through a haze of pain roaring through his body as if his insides were on fire, but his sense of self-preservation galvanized him to get him away from those wicked nails. Violet swung down with the P99 and clipped Kiera's temple, stunning her, but the woman lunged forward nevertheless.

"Watch your feet," he managed hoarsely, but it was too late.

Kiera caught Violet's ankle, yanked, making her land with a heavy thud on her back. Violet's foot caught her squarely in the mouth, snapping her head back, and then Mac was back on her, adrenaline filling in as his body weakened. He aimed better this time. When he landed, the four-by-four solid polished leg of the bench went directly into Kiera's face, caving in her skull with a sickening crunch.

There was no finesse to it, nothing but clear, brute strength, messy and final. Kiera's body went slack. Mac closed his eyes as the burning in his back merged with the burning in his gut. God, he was going to throw up after all.

"Let me out of here!" Powell screamed.

"Shut up," Violet snarled, not bothering to look at him while she freed Mac from his restraints and moved him off the mangled bench onto his back. Onto blissfully cool tile that gave him a second's respite from the fire in his gut.

"Mac. Oh, Mac."

Fuck. He hurt. His hands automatically went to his abdomen, where the bullet had punched through the board and into his body.

He heard a heavy thud above them and started up, but she slid her arms around him. "That will be the local police. We're here!" she shouted as the footsteps continued above them.

"Likely... soundproof," he reminded her.

She bounced up, loosed Jonathan with quick jerks, threw a robe at him. He caught it automatically, but before he could bolt, she caught his cock barehanded and twisted hard enough to turn him white, a maneuver Mac remembered had been very effective on him.

"You go up and show them how to get down here. Tell them we have an officer down and we need EMTs. Right now, you're just an idiot on a questionable kidnapping charge. You run, and I'll have you marked on the attempted murder of two cops, you got me? I'll make sure you get a prison cell with the meanest son of a bitch Master you've ever met in your life, whose idea of a bedtime lullaby each night is making you scream in pain."

Powell bolted for the stairs, but she was already kneeling by Mac again. He was covered in something wet. His own sweat, he realized, though he was trembling uncontrollably. The pain was enormous, sick waves of it.

"Afraid you're not seeing me at my best," he said, through clenched teeth.

Her eyes darkened, "Jesus, Mac, if this isn't your best, I'll be overwhelmed when I finally do see it. You took a bullet for me, you jerk."

"Can't...couldn't...have to protect you. Keep you." Her hands were light, like the touch of angel wings on his flesh. "Sorry I involved you...but you did it."

"We did it, Mac. Mac...Mackenzie," she snapped sharply.

He pulled himself out of the pleasant white haze enveloping him.

"Mackenzie." She was very close to him now, her lips just above his. She had the most beautiful eyes, even when they narrowed as they did now, telling him she meant business, and there'd be hell to pay if she wasn't obeyed. "I absolutely forbid you to die. Do you hear me?"

"Yes...Mistress."

"So all that sappy stuff you agreed to, about wanting to be with me forever, letting me nag you, you just said that to buy us time and save your ass, right?"

He managed a smile. "You bet."

She eased her hand under his shoulder, trying to avoid the torn flesh from the scourging, but Violet could tell all his focus was on the lethal agony in his midsection. He didn't even flinch when her fingernails accidentally caught in a welt, reopened a half-clotted wound on his shoulder.

"Oh, Mac."

"You shouldn't...have come. Could have killed you."

"Don't make me slap you around in your current condition," she said, trying to keep her voice steady, though fury and fear were pumping through her in equal measures. "You'd be dead, she'd be gone and we'd have had to run her down before she got someone else. I was at my mother's late, didn't start here until about 7:30 because I couldn't raise Tyler on the phone."

Had almost not checked her messages, God help her. She kept talking, knowing he wasn't hearing half of it, but hoping he could hold onto her voice like a lifeline. "I knew he had left for his tour, so I figured T K were in the dungeons with you, waiting on me like he said. Though I couldn't understand for the life of me why you would have agreed to go alone with them without waiting for me, unless..." Her voice caught. "I thought you set it up as some sort of surprise for me. To make me feel better."

"Not brave enough...for that. They...twins...always scared the shit out of me."

She fought tears with the smile. "I was pulling up the driveway at about five after nine when your sergeant called me, said you hadn't reported in. I figured something was up. Mac. Mac!"

"Wh-What?" He blinked his eyes back open, but the pupils were dilated, no focus.

Where the hell were the EMTs? She put her hand over his, over the wound, let him feel her touch over the source of his pain. "Mackenzie, I mean it. You're going to obey me, because you've told me over and over there's nothing you'll refuse me. You understand? I don't care how much you hurt, you will not wimp out on me. You hear me? Mac?" She shouted it, and he jerked.

His silver eyes focused on her for the barest fraction of a moment, enough that she saw he acknowledged her words, lingered on her face in a way that made the tears win, roll down her cheeks. His hand brushed her leg, rested on her thigh. "Yes, Mistress," he repeated. Then he lost consciousness.

They airlifted him to Tampa General. When the copter touched down on the pad, Violet jumped down, a step ahead of the gurney. She stayed out of the way, but refused to be pushed back as the EMTs ran Mac across the ground to the ER doors. Nurses and a doctor burst out, sprinted to meet them, falling in with the rapid procession headed through the double doors to the prep area.