The car had stopped, engine off. Kingsley was awake and alert behind his blindfold several seconds before he heard Madame’s voice ordering, “Wake up. We’re here.”

Her voice was sweeter than any alarm clock. The way she patted his shoulder, slightly rocking him, reminded him of how his mother would wake him in the mornings before school.

“Here, let me get that for you,” Madame said. He sat up and held still as she untied the scarf. “Much better. I like to see that beautiful face.”

“Thank you,” he said. His relief was so profound to see again that he’d thanked her, forgetting she was the one who’d blindfolded him in the first place.

She tapped her lips with one finger. Oh, so he could only speak freely to her when blindfolded. Otherwise he wasn’t to speak unless asked a question. He would learn the rules of this new world soon enough.

The driver opened the door for them and Madame stepped out. Kingsley followed. The driver held out his arm, which Madame took. They walked ahead and Kingsley followed, lagging behind to take in his surroundings.

He’d been to beautiful homes before, luxurious homes, ancestral homes of counts and the old kings and their courtesans. He’d expected something like that when he’d heard of Madame and her château. Like Madame herself, her home didn’t disappoint. Large and looming, it was more than deserving of the name “château.” A massive stone box with five windows along the top story and four along the bottom, the shutters a pale blue. The exterior was made of river stone, all different colors of earth and clay, cloaked in climbing green ivy. The drive was long and twisting, leading to a tall iron fence covered in vines that surrounded the property. Outside the fence lay a forest, deep and dark. Yet for all that, Kingsley saw it more as a home than a castle. And what made it a home to him instead of a castle was simply this: There were lights on in every single window. Soft warm light and figures making shadows against the glass. People lived here. Lots of them. Someone had cracked a window for fresh air, and he heard voices, laughter, the pleasant mingle of friendly conversation. The people who lived here seemed happy.

In case they weren’t, he counted five possible exits if he had to make a run for it.

“Kingsley?” Madame called for him. “Come in. You don’t want to catch cold, do you?”

“No, Madame,” he said, keeping his smile on the inside. She was treating him like a child. It didn’t arouse him in the least to be infantilized, but he had to admit he did appreciate being fussed over. His superiors used him for his abilities. His lovers used him for his body. Nobody actually gave a shit about him. And surely Madame didn’t either, although it seemed to be her kink to pretend she did. If that was her game, he was happy to play along for now.

He increased his stride to catch up with Madame and her driver. She held out her arm and placed her hand on the small of his back to guide him through the front door and into the house. How many hundreds of times had he done the same thing to a woman on his arm? He couldn’t recall a single instance when a woman had ever done that for him. Or even a man. Madame was chivalrous. He almost told her that before remembering he wasn’t allowed to speak.

“Merci,” she said to her driver, who took her hand and kissed the back of it. “If you’ll find Polly for me and send her to my salon, please. Your coat, Kingsley?”

She helped him out of his overcoat and passed it to the man who was apparently both valet and driver and likely anything else Madame asked him to be.

She tut-tutted over his coat. “Not very warm,” she said, eyeing it with disapprobation. “But young people never dress warm enough in winter. I’ve finally broken Polly of the habit, but not Colette. Short skirts in January? I’ll never understand this generation. Do I sound like a fussy grandmother?”

“A little,” he said, though he thought she resembled a fussy grandmother as much as he resembled a fussy grandfather.

“Ah, perhaps. But you’ll feel the same when you’re my age, my boy.”

The driver-valet disappeared into a side room with their coats. Seconds later the man returned with a pair of slippers. He bent to remove Madame’s shoes and replace them with gold silk slippers, and disappeared again. It was all so graceful and well-choreographed that Kingsley imagined that was the thousandth time her valet had removed Madame’s shoes for her, the thousandth time he’d replaced them with slippers. Kingsley was certainly through the looking glass now. He found it civilized. For a man who was paid to lie and kill and steal, a happy home with well-mannered men—gentle men, even—seemed a kind of paradise.

“This way, dear.” With a neat crooking of her fingers, she beckoned for Kingsley to follow her.

They walked down a short hallway and Kingsley found the château as warm and inviting inside as out. True, it was elegant, tastefully decorated in warm reds and golds with plush Persian rugs covering the dark floors, but it wasn’t intimidating for all the luxury. Always the spy, he counted steps and exits as they walked down a short hallway and into a small sitting room. A fire had been lit and it alone provided illumination to the room. He hadn’t seen any overhead lights, yet—only lamps. The room was so deliciously warm Kingsley could have laid down on the floor and fallen asleep again.

“Welcome to our little château,” Madame said. She sat on a red-striped divan and gestured to the rug at her feet. Kingsley sat on it cross-legged. “Do you like it here?”

Finally, another question. He could speak.

“It’s very nice,” he said. “Not like I pictured from reading Story of O.”

“Appearances can deceive. So you have read the book?”

“Stole it from parents when I was a boy and read it when they were out.”

“Wicked boy,” she said, tut-tutting again, although he could tell she secretly approved. “My husband gave me a copy of it a week before our wedding. I was an innocent, a virgin. Only eighteen years old. He was thirty. He had ideas for us. It seems I may have gotten the wrong idea from it. Well, not the wrong idea. An idea he did not intend…” Her voice trailed off and she smiled at the fire.

“You want to know something funny about the book?” she said. “When Histoire d’O came out—you’re too young to know this—nobody would believe that a woman wrote it. It was too violent. Too terrifying. Too sexual. They thought a man had written under a woman’s nom de plume.”

“Whoever said that hasn’t met the women I’ve met,” Kingsley said.

“They certainly never met me.”

Kingsley laughed. With a graceful lift of her hands, she raised her veil and met his eyes.

For the first time Kingsley saw her face in full. Her skin was smooth, with only a few laugh lines here and there around her mouth and eyes. She had the face of a woman of thirty-five. But when she removed her hat, he saw that her hair was white. White-white. Not white-blond. Not silver. Not gray. White and pinned back in an old-fashioned sort of knot at the nape of her neck. The color and style made her look older, yes—almost fifty, if he was forced to guess—but it also made her look like a snow queen from an old fairy tale. He could have looked at her all night had she let him.

“I know you’re here to see Leon,” she said. “And you will. Privileges are earned here, however. Are you willing to earn that privilege?”

“Of course,” he said. Bien sûr.

“You may rest tonight, or you may serve tonight. I’ll allow you to decide that,” she said. “Before you answer, remember how you promised to earn your keep here.”

He remembered.

“What is your choice?” she asked.

“I’ll serve,” he said. He had sex every night with strange women. Why should this night be any different?

“Very good.” She nodded. “Ah, there’s our Polly.”

“Here’s your Polly,” said a woman standing in the doorway to the salon. Polly looked about his age, maybe a little older but only by a year or two. She had auburn hair that fell in fat curls to her shoulders. She wasn’t slim like Madame, but boasted magnificent curves. Full hips, full breasts, with a narrow waist that accentuated both. She was wearing a white silk nightgown and matching robe. He liked Polly already, if only because he was shallow and she was lovely—a young Mae West in stature though with a sweeter smile.

“Polly, this is Kingsley,” Madame said.

“Another stray you’ve brought home?” Polly asked, smiling. With a name like Polly there was little chance she was French. And the more she spoke, the more Kingsley could discern French was not her native tongue. She had an accent, American or Canadian, and he wanted to speak with her in English. He hoped she would allow it.

“A relative of one of our gentlemen is concerned for his well-being. Kingsley’s come to see that we aren’t mistreating the young man or holding him hostage.”

Polly grinned at Madame like they were sharing a secret joke at his expense. “I’m surprised you let him in.”

“Kingsley’s promised to pay in full for being allowed into the house,” Madame said.

“He is very pretty,” Polly said. “I can’t blame you for bending the rules a little for him.”

“Rules are made to be bent. Kingsley wishes to serve tonight. Would you like to take him? He’ll need to be fed and bathed and given a place to sleep, unless you want him in bed with you. If not, we’ll let the girls fight over him.”

“They’d tear him limb from limb,” Polly said. “Though from the way he’s smiling, he might enjoy that. I better take him if we want him in one piece by morning.”

Kingsley’s eyes widened. Did he have any say in who he slept with here? It didn’t sound like it. Of course, if all the women here were as alluring as Madame and Polly, then he hardly had much cause for complaint.

“We’ll see how we rub along,” Polly said, grinning. “Anything else, Madame?”

“I’m thinking…he might be the one for Colette,” Madame said.

To that Polly raised her eyebrow. “She’ll be happy to hear that. She’s getting impatient.”

“She is. And I hate to make her wait much longer.”

“It may snow tonight,” Polly said.

“It might indeed.”

Kingsley couldn’t begin to guess what the two women were talking about. Who was Colette? What was she waiting for? Was she waiting for him? And what did any of that have to do with the weather forecast?

“He’s been a good boy for me,” Madame said.

“He’ll be a good boy for me, too,” Polly said.

“You’re a treasure,” Madame said to Polly. Madame’s smile was luminous and genuine. The affection between the two women was obvious. “Kingsley, go with Polly now. Do everything she tells you to do. Understand?”

“Completely,” he said.

“Do you have any questions for me?” Madame asked.

“I can ask?”

She nodded. “I’ll allow one question. Polly can answer your others.”

One question?

“How many times have you lied to me tonight?” he asked.

Madame’s eyebrow arched high. Polly looked at him with new respect.

“Only once,” Madame said. Then she grinned. “But it was a big one.”

Polly snapped her fingers. Kingsley didn’t want to make her do it twice. He rose quickly and followed her from the room, but not before looking back one last time at Madame. She had a strange look on her face, like she was trying not to laugh. Or perhaps trying not to cry.

Once they were alone in the hallway, Polly spoke directly to him for the first time.

“You’re interesting,” she said in French.

“I could say the same to you,” he said in English.

She paused mid-step and looked at him.

“Are you American?” she asked, sounding hopeful.

“Half-American. Half-French. You?”

“Canadian,” she said. “Toronto. I was born here but we moved to Canada when I was four. Do you mind speaking English with me?”

He shrugged. “Not at all, if you don’t mind a French accent. Suppressing the accent is hard on my brain.”

“I love the accent. See? We’re rubbing along well together already. What do you think of us so far?” Polly asked as she led him into the kitchen and gestured at the table for him to sit.

“Not what I expected, frankly,” he said, sitting.

Polly tilted her head. “Why is that?”

“I was told this was a cult. That Madame was a dangerous cult leader, some kind of pied piper who seduced men away from their wives and families. So far, you all seem fairly…tame. No offense.”

“None taken,” she said, standing behind the chair opposite him. “But I don’t think we’re quite as tame as we seem.” She smiled and went to the stove where dinner awaited in large copper pots.

“You’re being awfully nice to me if this is a cult. Or maybe that’s how it starts—you butter me up and make me drop my guard and then you come in for the kill.”

“For the kill? You think we’re going to kill you?” Polly asked, taking bowls from the cabinets.

“You said the girls would tear me limb from limb,” he reminded her.

“Joking,” she said. “We have some girls here who like to play-fight over their favorite boys. It’s only for fun. At most you’d wake up tomorrow sore and smiling.”

“My kind of fight,” he said. “But Madame did put a knife to my throat and threaten to slit it if I lied to her.”

“That was only a test,” Polly said. “She’s not really going to kill you. That’s not her style.”

“What is her style?”

“If she decides to break you, she won’t kill you,” Polly said with a grin that made his stomach lurch. “She’ll just make you wish you were dead. Hungry?”