Domination

When we got off the plane we had a check and a secret. The check paid the debts; the secret, though, can’t be erased, not even with the tattoo covered.

When I saw Iván raise his phone and smile, I knew the drill had been a trap—and that I wouldn’t leave that basement intact.

I hadn’t done anything wrong. Even so, while I scrubbed the floor on my knees, I felt my body belonged to him more than ever.

I’d been waiting two years for his call. When it finally came, I knew I’d obey anything he asked, however absurd or degrading it was.

When the wooden door of my cell creaked open after midnight, I knew it was him. I closed my eyes. I didn’t come to the convent fleeing the world: I came fleeing what I felt for that man.

In the airport bar, only one seat was free. I took it, not knowing that the redhead across from me was about to destroy my entire life.

We arrived at the meeting ready to hear reproaches. No one warned us that that afternoon we’d be the ones doing the teaching.

When I walked into her room I thought we were just going to talk. Ten minutes later I was in my boxers, trembling, and I heard the door open again behind me.

Three weeks of voice notes negotiating limits. That night I arrived at his loft with my wrists ready for rope and a yes that would learn how to be nuanced.

My heels were killing me when Andrés leaned over the counter and whispered that the conference room would be empty all night.

Roberto humiliated me for years in front of everyone. When the Association offered to train him, I knew exactly what I wanted to do with him.

Marco thought they were going to the cinema. He had no idea she had planned every detail weeks in advance, including which pocket he kept the key in.

Valentina was lying on the bed in a turquoise top and lace panties. When she looked at me with that smile, something inside me broke.

When I entered the director's office that afternoon, I knew the question wasn't whether I would accept his deal. It was how much I was willing to give for a crown I no longer cared about.

Her eyes behind those glasses had been chasing me from across the bar for years. The afternoon I brushed her wrist, I knew she was waiting for something too.

I saw the videos: women strapped to machines, electric shocks, lashes while they ran. And still I dialed the number. My will was spent.

Selena had spent months molding them into perfect pets. What she didn’t expect was for the buyer to arrive with a third collar under his arm.

When I put on the mask in front of the mirror, I stopped being myself. What happened after in that garden I didn’t tell anyone until today.

Three months of writing to each other. One step across his threshold. What came next wasn’t what he promised: it was everything my body had been demanding for months.

When the blonde’s heels echoed down the corridor and the chain pulled at his collar, Adrián knew he was about to learn what it meant to be property.