Sophia had been seeing Patrick for six months before she asked him to slap her. Not in anger. Not in play that blurred into something cruel. She wanted his open hand against her cheek, deliberate and controlled, while she looked him in the eye. She wanted the sting, the shock, the heat. She wanted to feel it travel down her neck and settle between her legs. She wanted to know what it felt like to be so completely held by a man that even pain became a kind of worship.

Patrick was not a violent man. He was tall and quiet, with wide shoulders and careful hands. In his work he fixed old furniture, restoring what was broken until it could hold weight again. With Sophia he was tender in ways that surprised her. He liked to cook her breakfast. He remembered the names of her friends. He touched her like she was made of something precious. So when she first brought up the slapping, he did not answer right away. He sat back in his chair and looked at her across the table.