Alexander had received directions from Isobel to get into a cab and wait for her to send the address, so here he was in the car, driving around aimlessly. Stockholm passed by outside, but he had a hard time dealing with the uncertainty of not knowing what was about to happen. On the surface, it might look like he moved through life taking things as they came, but until now he had never understood just how much control he exerted over his own life, how accustomed he was to controlling his world.

His cell phone beeped.

Bastugatan 16.

Alexander gave the driver the rather posh Södermalm address, leaned back in his seat, and ran his hands down his thighs. He had dressed completely in black, as she had told him to. Narrow black chinos, black T-shirt. Black socks, black shoes. No underwear. Not as sexy a feeling as you might think, but Isobel was in charge, and he obeyed. On one side of him was a bag full of the toys they had bought, on the other a bouquet wrapped in cellophane.

The cab pulled up outside a red building from the late nineteenth century.

Alexander walked through the doorway, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. The place smelled faintly of cigarette smoke.

“Alexander De la Grip?” he heard, and an elderly woman with a furrowed face and a checked apron appeared. She looked like a concierge from an old film, and it suddenly felt as if he had stepped back in time.

“Please,” she said.

She opened the door to an elevator covered with ornate iron dragons and red, velvet-clad walls. From the ceiling of the elevator, a golden lamp shone faintly. She pressed a button, closed the barrier, and shut him in. The elevator rattled upward.

When it stopped, he stepped out.

Isobel was standing in the doorway to an apartment, and Alexander’s heart almost stopped.

“Hi,” she said quietly, and a shiver coursed through his entire body. In her white dress, she looked like a goddess, momentarily come down from Olympus to amuse herself, unconcerned by whether her pleasures would be too much for an ordinary mortal partner to handle. She had one hand on her hip.

“Come in.”

“Where are we?” he asked when he stepped into the apartment. He put down the bag and glanced around. “Whose place is this?”

The décor was extravagant, all dark colors, full of gold and oriental patterns. So far from what he would have expected of her.

“Does it matter?”

“Isobel …”

“No, I don’t have to explain anything to you.”

She raised an eyebrow and asked: “Are those for me?”

He held out the bouquet. It was the first time he had given her flowers, and he had spent a long time in the store before he caught sight of the orchids. Wild, exotic, luxurious flowers in a vibrant lime green color. She took the bouquet and let her eyes move over him. She nodded approvingly, went away, and returned with a heavy vase. She placed the orchids in it and then set it down on a table in what had to be one of the most overcrowded rooms he had ever seen. Golden frames and mirrors, dark furniture, masses of paintings and other little trinkets. Heavy velvet framing the windows. Stunning views out toward the glittering water of Lake Mälaren, the inlets of Kungsholmen and Norrmalm—the entire city, actually. The place looked familiar somehow. He knew he had never been here before, yet he recognized the style. He took a step toward her but she shook her head so he stopped.

“Take off your shirt,” she ordered.

Without a word, he did so, dropped it to the floor and stood still, letting her eyes have their fill. He had good genes, was strong and toned from boxing, and he had nothing against the avid way Isobel was staring at him. As he started to unbutton his pants, she gave him a quick shake of the head.

“No. I’ll tell you when. I want to talk first.” Her voice was steady, but he could see the change in the color of her face, see the blood making her cheeks flush, clearly make out her pert nipples through the silky material. She was naked beneath her thin, billowing dress—there wasn’t a sign of panties or a bra.

“There’s champagne,” she said with a gesture toward a silver bucket. “Pour half a glass for me. And a whole one for you. Drink it and then pour another.”

“Are you planning to get me drunk?” he asked, amused.

“No. But I plan to lower your inhibitions.”

“Babe, I have no inhibitions,” he said. But he did as she said—pulled off the foil, unwound the metal wire, twisted the cork free, and poured one glass for her, one for himself. Raised the glass to her, looked her in the eyes, and sipped the ice-cold liquid.

“Drink,” she ordered.

He emptied the glass and poured another.

She smiled. “Good boy.”

But there were limits, even for him. He did not like to be called a boy. He took a step toward her, an automatic attempt to restore the balance between them and regain the control he hadn’t realized he would miss so much.

“No,” she said, and he paused again. “Sit there.” Isobel pointed to a leather-clad chair with a high back and no armrests.

Alexander reluctantly obeyed. He put down the glass and sat, leaned back against the ornate leather backrest.

Isobel came toward him. As her dress billowed around her body, he caught a glimpse of pale curves through a slit in it, and then she was in front of him. Alexander’s hands went up. He wrapped them around her waist, spread his legs, and pulled her toward him. He buried his face against her stomach, inhaled the intoxicating smell of her. Isobel placed a hand on his head. At first she caressed him, but then she grabbed a fistful of his hair. She pulled his head back, looking him directly in the eyes.

“From now on, you don’t do anything I haven’t told you to. Not with your hands, not with your legs, nothing.”

He squared his shoulders.

“I’m going to give you a safe word,” she said.

“I don’t need one.”

She pulled slightly, and he resisted the temptation to move away from her.

“I’m going to give you one,” she repeated calmly. “Your safety is my responsibility, and you have no idea what’s going to happen today. So if you say gold, I’ll stop. Okay?”

“Okay then,” he said.

“Are you going to obey me? No matter what I say?”

He met her gaze, had trouble bringing himself to answer. Define obey, he wanted to say.

“Say: Yes, Isobel,” she urged him, pulling slightly at his hair.

“Yes.” Shit, he really hadn’t thought it would be this hard.

Her grip tightened.

“Yes, Isobel,” he said quickly.

She smiled—a slow, satisfied grin—and let go. “Good boy.”

“For God’s sake, Isobel,” he snapped, and he ran a hand through the hair she had been holding in an iron grip. He really hated that phrase.

She cocked her head. “Who’s in charge?”

He ground his teeth. Part of him wanted to get up and leave, tell her to go to hell. He wasn’t here to be degraded, hadn’t realized what it would take to subordinate himself. What she would demand of him.

“Alex?”

“You’re in charge,” he said under his breath.

She handed him the glass. “Drink.”

He did as he was told. Emptied the glass. He had come here on an empty stomach, and the alcohol went straight to his head.

She was in front of him again. Her dress moved provocatively around her body, and he was on the verge of reaching for her again. It was automatic.

“Put your hands behind the back of the chair,” she ordered.

He hesitated, but then reluctantly complied.

She rewarded him with a smile that went straight to his cock. Then she pulled her dress up over her thighs, spread her beautiful legs, and straddled his knee. She placed her sweet-smelling hands on his face and kissed him deeply. He squirmed beneath her, and she pressed herself against his naked chest. She broke off the kiss, took hold of his head, and pressed his face against the deep neckline of her dress. He greedily kissed and licked her skin, wanted to use his hands but held them obediently behind the chair.

When Isobel got up from his knee, he was breathing so hard he felt giddy. Alcohol, testosterone, and carbon dioxide were a heady cocktail in his bloodstream.

“God, Isobel, let me …”

“Not yet,” she said. The thin material of her dress was damp where he had kissed her. She ran a hand over one of her magnificent breasts, smoothed out the material so that it strained against her generous curves and the hard, pouty nipple. He stared, feeling he would do and agree to anything to get her back on his knee.

“What would you like to do right now?” she asked gently.

“Get up, throw you onto that table, and fuck you. Hard,” he said through clenched teeth, not remembering ever being so horny.

She smiled sweetly and gave him a long look, as though she was weighing up a number of different options.

“Yes, maybe we’ll finish up with that,” she eventually said. She leaned against a black table that looked at least a hundred years old. Stable, steady, overloaded with bowls, pots, and other trinkets. Her dress parted, revealing her thighs again. God, he loved her soft thighs. She started to touch herself. Almost distractedly, her index finger disappeared among her red locks, moving, petting, teasing.

Alexander didn’t blink, his gaze firmly set on the enticing scene. She then came over to him and pushed the same finger into his mouth. He sucked. She inserted another, and then a third, moved them in and out, used his mouth the way he wanted to use her body. It felt as if flames were licking his body now, hissing, crackling flames of lust.

“I never understood the point of masturbating in front of someone else,” she said quietly, and pulled her fingers from his mouth. He wanted to leap up, take her back, but it was as if he were rooted in his chair. Her finger moved among her red locks again.

“But people can change,” she said, and she started to finger herself more purposefully. She put her other hand on Alexander’s shoulder, steadied herself against him while she moved her fingers increasingly quickly. Her breaths were like a hot wind against his cheek, and his entire body howled at him to take over.

“If you touch me now, that’s it for this evening,” she said in warning. “I want to come without you laying a finger on me. You only get to look, understood?”

He couldn’t nod, couldn’t answer, could only stare.

The scent of her. The warmth vibrating between their bodies. The wet sound of her fingers moving. The slight pain when she dug her fingernails into his shoulder—all of this made his head pound, his blood roar. She came silently, powerfully, and then stood panting in front of him. The smell of sex and of Isobel reached him, and he wanted to eat it up, drink it in, wrap himself up in it. He had practically come too. Isobel looked at him with hazy eyes. She grazed his lip with her index finger and he caught it in his mouth, sucked it as if it were the only thing that stood between him and everything worthwhile in the world.

“Please, Isobel, please, I want to be inside you,” he said huskily, feeling that he would go along with anything.

“Soon,” she said.

She took her champagne glass and sat down on a low, plush couch opposite him, sank down into the dark velvet.

Alexander licked his lips, following every movement she made. She sipped from her glass, crossed her legs, pushed her hair from her face.

“This is Eugene Tolstoy’s apartment,” she said. “He let me borrow it.”

That explained the brothel-like elegance. Alexander hadn’t known his uncle had an apartment in Stockholm, but Eugene had always been rather secretive, so …

“Did he know what you planned on using it for?”

She bit her lip. Her cheeks were rosy, and she looked exactly like what she was. A sex goddess. His sex goddess.

“What do you think?”

“I probably don’t want to know. Can I come over and sit next to you?”

She nodded, and he quickly moved over to her.

“Are your trousers tight?”

“So goddamn tight.”

He was so aroused it hurt.

She looked down at his erection, leaned forward, and moved her hand up and down, up and down over his pants, until he couldn’t sit still any longer.

“Isobel,” he warned her, and took hold of her wrist.

“Let go of me,” she said.

“I don’t want to come in my pants,” he pleaded.

Her eyes narrowed. Their gazes locked.

“Shit,” he swore, and let go of her hand. He didn’t want to come like this. In his pants. Like some horny teenager. She caressed him. He gave up and let himself go, moved toward her hand. He panted, it throbbed, his body began to contract, and he closed his eyes. But just as he thought he was about to come, she stopped.

“Get up.”

He opened his eyes, couldn’t really think; his heart pounded, and he had practically no blood left in his head. But he did what she said.

Isobel stayed on the couch.

“Take them off.”

He unbuttoned his pants with some effort. He carefully pulled them down, stepped out, and then stood naked and erect in front of her.

She leaned forward, brushed against him, and he shook, actually shook at her touch.

She looked up. “You want to fuck me now, right?” she said.

He nodded eagerly, could already see himself taking her, harder than ever, taking sweet revenge for the torment she had subjected him to.

Isobel raised her chin. “But I’m not ready.”

She got up from the couch, brushed against him with her shoulder, and he shuddered. She opened the bag he had brought with him and took out the white whip. When they’d bought it, Alexander had thought it almost looked like a toy. In her hands, it definitely looked real.

“See the ottoman?” she asked.

He turned around, spotted the piece of furniture—a big, heavy divan or footstool, without a backrest, square, bulky, covered in dark velvet fabric. Golden lion’s paws as feet. Typically Eugene. Probably smuggled Russian goods from some old royal palace.

“Lie over it. On your stomach. I’m not going to tie you up.” She smiled demonically. “Yet.”

So far, he had been sure he would be able to cope with whatever she suggested. But now … Would he really do this?

Reluctantly, he got down on his knees. He steeled himself and lay down, over the ottoman, as she’d told him to, then adjusted his position. Isobel came over to him. As she got on her knees, he heard the rustle of her dress, saw the white material from the corner of his eye. She put a hand at the base of his spine, stroked his back. He shivered, was about to explode, just from her cool touch.

“If I do this, I’m going to do it properly. If you don’t want it, then say so. Otherwise, say: Yes, Isobel.”

Alexander stared at the floor and was struck by the surreal sensation of being naked, on his stomach, on top of an ottoman, in one of the most decadent apartments he had ever seen, trying to decide whether he was going to let a red-haired goddess spank him or not. He studied the oriental rugs. If he wanted to back out, now was the time to do it.

But he didn’t. Couldn’t deny that he was more turned on by this game than he’d thought was possible.

“Yes, Isobel,” he said, his voice sounding forced to his ears.

“Good boy,” she murmured.

She reached between him and the ottoman and took hold of him. He couldn’t help but groan when he felt her longed-for touch, but he forced himself to be passive, to be jerked off by her long, strong fingers. He had never realized how vulnerable he would feel, how the slight sensation of uncertainty could increase his arousal, how frustrating and stimulating it was to have no control over what was happening.

He closed his eyes, felt his balls tighten, the blood rush to his cock. She let go. Stood up. Left him again, just as he was about to come. He had to bite his lip hard to stop himself from swearing, to stop himself from begging her to continue.

“Lie still,” she said.

He forced himself to relax, to empty his mind.

Felt a breeze when she raised her hand.

Heard the sound of the whip whistle through the air.