Parker gave her his number.

I tried not to look, but not hard enough, apparently. I heard more of the conversation than I wanted to, so I took Olivia into the water and tried to focus on having fun with her. Then I saw them take out their phones. They obviously exchanged numbers.

I wonder if he’ll bother with an excuse. He doesn’t owe me an explanation. We’re not dating, and we’re definitely not exclusive. He’s perfectly entitled to fool around with skinny blonde bitches who throw themselves at him in front of his young child. And I’m not at all bitter about it.

“Got you,” Olivia exclaims joyfully, as she slams her tiny fist into the ocean and splashes me with water.

“You little monkey. I might have to dunk you in the water.”

“No,” she yells out, closing her eyes tightly.

“One,” I say, lifting her up into the air, “two… three.” I lower her down quickly as if she’s falling but stop just short of dunking her head under the water.

Olivia splashes me again, which she seems to find endlessly amusing. Parker is on the phone now. Probably a business call. I’d prefer him to be working than talking to pretty blonde bimbos. Shit, have I always been this insecure?

Yes. Yes, I have.

We’re deep enough in the sea that the water is above my waist. I still don’t look skinny, but at first glance, most people—especially men—just see a big pair of tits. I prefer that to them seeing my big ass. You can spot the women who are comfortable in their skin from a mile off because they’re casually playing in the water at barely ankle height, usually screeching and pretending they can’t catch a ball just to appear girly to the muscular guys that adorn this beach. Christ, I hate LA sometimes.

Other times, it’s cool. Like when the hottest guy on the beach slowly walks towards me with all those pretty women stopping to stare at him. Parker’s walking towards his daughter, but they don’t know that I’m not his wife and mother to this child.

I smile as he approaches, knowing it will make every other woman jealous. Besides, I don’t technically have a reason to be mad at him. I’ve never been one for making men feel like shit over the little things. I much prefer saving my energy for the times they really act like tools. Then I let loose.

“Sorry about that,” Parker says, taking Olivia from me as she reaches out for Daddy. “Former acquaintance. One with no class, apparently.”

“It’s okay,” I reply, perhaps a little too casually. “Turns out Olivia much prefers playing in the sea to building sandcastles anyway.” Right on cue, Olivia swings her arm into the water and splashes Parker, before erupting in a fit of the most adorable laughter I’ve ever heard.

“I spoke to Marie a minute ago and she’s agreed to babysit Olivia tonight.”

I frown. “I’m free tonight, and I’d be more than happy to work late if you’re going out. It’s not like my day has been all that stressful so far.”

“Actually, I’m hoping you do have plans for tonight. That’s my awkward way of asking if you’ll come to dinner with me.”

That sure sounds like a date, but I’ve been wrong before. Please don’t ruin this one by telling me you’ll pay for my time. Screw it, after what Parker and I have done, subtlety seems a bit pointless.

“Do you mean a date?” I ask.

“Yeah. That’s the plan. A friend is opening a restaurant and asked me to come for the test run to give my opinion on the food.”

“Is it a fried egg restaurant?”

“No,” Parker replies with a smile. “Italian. I’ll have you know, I’m quite the connoisseur when it comes to Italian food.”

“Really? Because judging by your cooking—”

“I never said I could cook it.”

I smile. “Alright, sounds like fun. I’m in.”

We drop Olivia off at Aunty Marie’s and make the slow drive into Hollywood for our date. Parker undersold the restaurant. His ‘friend’ just so happens to be a Michelin-star chef, and the restaurant opening has a movie premiere feel to it, with an actual red carpet outside the front door. I assumed this was typical Hollywood overkill, until I got inside and looked around the room. I’m not great with faces or celebrity culture in general, but even I recognize a few people who have walked real red carpets in their time.

Once we sit down, I don’t care who else is in the room. None of them are more interesting than the man seated opposite from me, although his usual charm and confidence are notably lacking.

He hasn’t done this much before.

I always assume that men as good-looking as Parker have dated hundreds of women, but Parker doesn’t date. He meets women and has his fun with them before moving on. He’s brought me here because he thinks I’m the type of woman who needs dating in addition to all the kinky sex. How long will it be before he decides I’m not worth the effort? I saw one of his former ‘acquaintances’ at the beach today. He had fun with her once. Maybe they even went on a date. Then he got bored and moved on. I’d bet good money that happened when she tried to get serious.

Is it possible to have both a genuine, loving relationship and a sex life as exciting as ours? I don’t want to choose between the two, but with Parker, I might have to.

“Do you want to go to a bar?” Parker asks after dinner. “There’s a great little place about a five-minute walk from here.”

“When you say ‘great little place,’ do you actually mean an exclusive bar full of celebrities? Because you definitely undersold the restaurant.”

“There may be celebrities there,” Parker admits. “But none of them have a patch on you.”

I smile, even though he sounds a little cheesy. He’s only asking me to the bar because it’s what you do on dates. I know that’s not what he actually wants.

“Let’s go home,” I say, before leaning in to whisper in his ear. “I’ve been a naughty girl, and need to be punished.”

Parker moans gently in my ear and presses his body against mine. His cock is still soft, but I can feel it pulsing and coming to life.

The traffic is mercifully light on the way home, but the journey still feels like a lifetime. Just thinking about belonging to Parker again has me fidgeting in my seat, and fighting the urge to place his hand between my legs. During the day, I’m practically part of the family. He places his complete trust in me to look after his daughter. At night, I’m his to do with as he pleases, and I trust him to look after my body. He’s never disappointed.

“Before we get started,” Parker says, as we step inside the house. “I want to show you something. Something big.”

I raise my eyebrows. “I’ve already seen that.”

He laughs. “I mean ‘big’ as in ‘significant.’ For us.”

“Okay,” I reply slowly. “I’m interested.”

Parker takes my hand and leads me up the stairs towards the bedroom. He steps into the bedroom but tells me to wait outside. Thirty seconds later he comes back out holding a single key. The key doesn’t look like it goes with a pair of handcuffs. It’s much more like a key to open a door.

Oh shit, I think I know what the key is for.

Parker leads the way to the locked door that I’d almost forgotten about. I see it every day, but I’ve never even let myself be curious about what’s on the other side. Tami would say it’s suspicious and linked to his dead wife. Perhaps that’s why I don’t think about it.

“It’s time for you to see what’s behind this door,” Parker says, as he slides in the key and unlocks it.

Tami would tell me to run and not look back. A locked room should set off alarm bells, especially given Parker’s past. But trust is all about being tested. Trust is easy when you’re never asked to act on it. Parker trusts me and I trust him.

That’s why I follow him into the room.

The door slams shut, leaving us standing in a room that is almost pitch black. The room is windowless, and the thin strip of light under the door does little to illuminate the room. I stand still for fear of walking into something. Parker presses a light switch on the wall, but it takes a few seconds for the spotlights on the ceiling to kick into gear, and even when they do, they’re faint and leave the room in a dingy orange glow.

That dingy orange glow is enough to reveal the contents of the room. The important stuff, at least.

“Wow,” I remark. “It’s… wow.”

“What do you think? Honestly.”

I don’t know what to think.

The room has everything you might expect to find in a normal bedroom, but it’s nothing of the sort. There’s a four-poster bed, there’s a sofa, lots of chests of drawers, and even a small wardrobe. But that’s only half of it. Each post of the bed has a chain with a metal hoop on the end. The bedsheets look more leather than silk, and hanging on the walls is an assortment of whips, ropes, and blindfolds. I don’t even recognize half the objects on top of the dresser. There are chains on the walls, and ropes hanging from the ceiling.

“You’re awfully quiet,” Parker remarks.

I’m speechless. I’d been planning to keep things a little more normal tonight, but now my mind is racing with possibilities. He could punish me in ways I can’t even imagine.

“I’m… I’m wondering why we didn’t come straight in here the other night.”

Parker smiles and takes a large piece of silk from the wall.

“Are you ready?” he asks.

I nod. He places the silk over my eyes and shuts me off from the world. It’s just the two of us now.