I breathed deeply and evenly. As the minutes passed, my embarrassment cooled and my horror faded. I know that man in the family room, I told myself. He was my lover, my night owl, my Matt, and he would never force me into something I didn’t want.

I shifted on the mattress and gasped.

With my heart rate settling and my temperature normalizing, I realized I was feeling something else. I eased a hand into my panties. Whoa. Was it the video, or was it catching Matt pleasuring himself? Arousal coated my fingertips.

I was turned on.

Chapter 4

MATT

EXHIBITIONISM

I want to fuck her with an audience. I both do and don’t want to share her. I want to reveal her like a possession, to draw off her clothes the way one might unveil a painting. She is no object, and yet I want to objectify her.

I want to see her embarrassment. When I bring her out, when I expose her to strangers, I want to feel her tremble and watch her blush. The thought makes me hard. (If the thought excites me this much, what would the reality do?)

I want to make our most private act a spectacle—not often, maybe not more than once, but I need this. Why do I need this?

I want to talk to her while we do it. I want to remind her that they are watching, to arrange her so that they have a good view, and to tell her that they are going to see her come. And when she comes, I want to call her a good girl and then send the watchers away, because she is mine …

Hannah and I walked side by side through Larimer Square. It was Sunday evening, warm and windy, and shoppers milled beneath the canopy of lights. A stranger recognized us. Hannah was civil while I bristled in silence.

Strangers …

Automatically, I recalled my first entry in the journal Mike had given me.

When I bring her out, when I expose her to strangers …

I shivered in the warm night and my dick stirred in my slacks.

“You okay?” Hannah took my hand.

I stopped, startled by her touch. We hadn’t been touching much these days. Whether it was catching me jerking off to a threesome or my failure to propose, I didn’t know, but Hannah had rebuffed me every night since—until I quit trying. I went to bed late and didn’t reach for her. I showered alone after she left for work.

“I’m fine.” I brushed my thumb across her fingers. Even that small touch was intoxicating. My breath came faster.

“Can we please act normal tonight?” she said.

“I wasn’t planning on making a scene.”

“Matt—”

“If you feel the need to prep me, I should probably stay home.”

We stared at one another. It was Father’s Day and Hannah had insisted that we visit her family. She’d dragged me to a salon that morning to get the black dye trimmed out of my hair. I had “Frankenstein hair,” she’d said, and she didn’t want to “freak out her family.” Though she had tried to laugh it off, I knew what she really meant: my hair was an unsightly reminder of the faked death fiasco, and her parents didn’t need extra reminders about my insanity.

We had spent the afternoon combing Larimer Square for a gift for her father. Exasperated and out of options, we’d stumbled into John Atencio, of all fucking places, surrounded by engagement and wedding rings. “Cuff links,” I’d growled at the saleswoman.

It was getting dark by the time we were ready to go.

“I want them to see you,” Hannah said. She squeezed my hand. “I want you to … get to know my family better, and for them to see how amazing you are.”

“Don’t you mean how sane I am? How well-adjusted I’ve become?”

“You’re hurting me,” she whispered. “That’s not how I see it and you know that.”

“We need to get going.”

I dropped her hand and walked briskly to the car. I carried a small black bag from the jeweler—sterling silver cuff links—extravagant, admittedly, but Hannah wanted to make a good impression tonight. I’d also bought two bouquets of peonies for her mother and sister.

I drove slowly through Denver, past my old apartment and past Lot 49, past that patch of green space where Hannah and I had touched for the first time, and down the familiar roads toward the house where she grew up.

I parked at the curb. Hannah’s fingers curled on my leg.

“Here.” I passed the John Atencio bag to her. She took it and replaced her hand on my thigh, rubbing gently. She knew what that touch did to me …

“Mm.” I gazed at my lap. “I feel like a well-behaved dog being rewarded.”

“You’re nervous. I get it now.”

“Did it take you all night to figure that out?” I exhaled softly, controlling my desire. “Do you think I don’t want your parents to like me—that I’m indifferent to their opinion?” I gazed at the lawn stretching toward the house, all the windows dark. I pictured a much younger Hannah playing on the grass. I also thought about giving Hannah a home and making her happy there.

“You’re smirking,” she said.

“I’m having unsettling visions of domestic bliss. Remembering, too … the first time I drove out here, and you came running across the lawn.” I pointed. Ghostly sadness gripped me. “God, I can still see it, the way you looked. I can smell that night, taste it. I know that…”

She touched my inner thigh. “Go on.”

I kept pointing, searching for words.

“I know that I’ll die with those memories in me. I know those are the kind of memories … that last.” I focused on Hannah. Her face was vibrant, her expression unlike anything I had ever seen. I knew that whatever had been left unsaid, she understood. I also knew that the old cosmic trick was playing itself on me. The greatest cynics fall in love.