The Harlequin

"You missed the turn, Anita," Nathaniel said.

I cursed and braked too hard in the thin snow. I got the Jeep under control, then let us coast past our exit. I'd turn around. You could always turn around. "Sorry," I said.

"Thinking about Richard?" He tried for neutral and failed.

"Yeah."

"My fault, I guess; I brought him up."

"What's with the tone?" I asked. I turned into a section of town that was in the middle of being gentrified but hadn't quite made it yet. But we were headed back toward the riverfront.

"If Richard were a stripper, would you be embarrassed by him, too?"

"Drop this, Nathaniel, I mean it."

"Or what?" There was that first prickling run of energy over my skin. He was angry enough that it was making his beast peek out.

"You're picking on me tonight, Nathaniel. I don't need that."

"I believe that you love me, Anita, but you love me by hiding from what I am. I need you to accept who I am."

"I do."

"You tell Arnet that I'm not your victim, but you won't tie me up during sex. You won't abuse me."

"Don't start this again," I said.

"Anita, the bondage is part of who I am. It makes me feel safe and good."

This was one of the reasons I'd fought so long and hard to stay out of Nathaniel's love life. I did some stuff, nails, teeth, and I enjoyed it, but there were limits to my comfort level, and he'd been trying to push me past those limits in the last few weeks. I'd worried from the begi

"In some ways you make me feel better about myself than anyone ever has, Anita, but you also make me feel bad about myself. You make me feel like an evil freak, because of what I want."

I found a parking spot just down the street from Guilty Pleasures's glowing neon sign. It was unusual to find parking this close to the club on a weekend. Parallel parking is not my best thing, so I concentrated on that, while part of me thought furiously about what to say to him.

I finally got us parked and turned off the car. The silence was thicker than I wanted it to be. I turned as far as the seat belt would allow and looked at him. He stared out the window away from me.

"I don't want to make you feel bad about yourself, Nathaniel. I love you, damn it."

He nodded, then turned and looked at me. The streetlight glittered on tears. "I'm terrified that I'm going to drive you away. My therapist says that I'm either a full partner in the relationship, or I'm not. Full partners ask for their needs to be met."

Truthfully, I'd thought his therapist would be on my side, but BDSM was no longer considered an illness. It was just another alternative lifestyle. Damn it.

"I want you to get what you need out of our… out of us."

"I'm not asking for that much, Anita. Just tie me up while we have sex. Then do what we would have done anyway. Nothing else."

I leaned over and brushed the tears from his cheeks. "It's not the tying up, Nathaniel. It's that once I say yes to that, what's next? And don't tell me there isn't a next."

"Tie me up, make love to me, and we'll go from there."

"That's what scares me," I said. "I say yes to this, and there'll be something else."

"And what's wrong with something else, Anita? What scares you isn't my needs, but that you might like it."

"That's not fair."

"Maybe not, but it's true. You like being held down during sex. You like it rough."

"Not all the time."

"And I don't like being tied up all the time, but I like it some of the time. Why is that wrong?"

"I'm not sure I can meet all your needs, okay? It was one of the things that worried me about us as a couple from the begi

"Then are you okay with me finding someone else to meet those needs? Sex with you, bondage with someone else?" He said it fast, as if he were afraid he'd lose his nerve.

I just stared at him. "Where the hell did this come from?"

"I'm trying to find out what the limits are, Anita, that's all."

"Do you want someone else?" I asked it, because I had to ask.

"No, but you have other people in your bed, and I'm okay with that, but if you won't meet my needs, then…"

"Are you saying that if I don't come across, you'll break up with me?"

"No, no." He hid his face with his hands and made a frustrated noise. His energy level swirled back through the car, like hot water spilling across my skin. He swallowed the power back and looked at me. He looked pained. "I need this, Anita. I want to do it with you, but I need it with someone. It's part of who I am sexually; it just is."

I tried to wrap my mind around letting Nathaniel play sex games with someone else, then come home to me. I couldn't do it. He was right; I was forcing him to share me with other men, but sharing him with another woman… "So what, you'd have tie-up games with someone else, then come home to me?"

"I can find a master who doesn't do sexual contact. I can find someone who will just do the bondage."

"But bondage is sex for you."

He nodded. "Sometimes."

"I can't do this tonight, Nathaniel."

"I'm not asking you to; just think about it. Decide what you want me to do."

"You're giving me an ultimatum; I don't deal well with ultimatums."

"It's not an ultimatum, Anita, it's just true. I love you, and I'm happier with you than I've ever been with anyone for this long. Honestly, I didn't think we'd still be together this long. Seven months is the longest relationship I've ever had. When I thought it would be like all the rest—a few months, then over—it wasn't a big deal. I could behave myself for a few months, until you got tired of me."

"I'm not tired of you."

"I know that. In fact, I think you're going to keep me. I didn't expect that."

"Keep you? You make yourself sound like a lost puppy that I picked up on the street. You don't 'keep' people, Nathaniel."

"Fine, pick a different word, but we're living together and it's working, and it might last years. I can't go years without having this need met, Anita."

"It might last years; you still talk about us like we won't last."

"Years is lasting," he said, "and everyone gets tired of me, eventually."

I didn't know what to say to that. "I'm not tired of you. Frustrated, puzzled as hell, but not tired."

He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. "I know that, and if I didn't feel secure enough, I wouldn't make any demands. I'd just go on being unhappy about this, but if you love me, then I can ask for what I want."

If you love me, he'd said. Jesus. "It must be true love, Nathaniel, because I'm not booting your ass to the curb for this."

"For what, asking for my sexual needs to be met?"

"Stop, just stop." I rested my forehead against the steering wheel and tried to think. "Can we please drop this for now, while I think about it?"

"Sure." His voice sounded hurt.

But his voice could sound hurt; I was out of my depth. "How long have you been saving this conversation up?" I asked, still resting against the wheel.

"I kept waiting for there to be a quiet time, when you weren't ass-deep in alligators, but…"

"But I'm always ass-deep in alligators."

"Yeah," he said.

I rose and nodded. That was fair. "I'll think about what you said, and that's all I've got tonight, okay?"

"That's wonderful. I mean it. I was afraid…"

I frowned at him. "You really thought I'd dump you because of this?"

He shrugged and wouldn't look at me. "You don't like demands, Anita, not from any of the men in your life."

I unbuckled my seat belt and slid over so I could turn him to look at me. "I can't promise that this won't eventually break me, but I can't imagine not waking up beside you most mornings. I can't imagine not having you puttering in our kitchen. Hell, it's more your kitchen than mine. I don't cook."