Page 43 of Suite 7

The coffee finishes with a final hiss.

“Pour two cups. Mugs in the cabinet above. Take your time.”

Two simple white mugs. I pour slowly, watching the dark liquid fill each one, and I almost ask about cream before I stop myself. He already told me. He takes it black. I add cream and sugar to mine, one packet, a splash, and I feel him notice that I didn’t ask.

“Good. Bring them to my desk. Mine on the right. Yours on the left.”

I carry them, and place his where he specified.

“Now kneel.”

My head snaps up. “What?”

“Kneel. On the floor. Beside my chair.”

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Do I look like I’m kidding?”

“Kane — making coffee is one thing, but⁠—”

“But what?”

He watches me carefully. “You knelt for me in Suite 7. Blindfolded, in front of someone you thought was a stranger. But here, in private, when you know exactly who I am? Now it’s too much?”

“That was a scene. This is⁠—”

He crosses to me.

Not toward his chair. To me, specifically, and I go still because I was braced for another argument and this isn’t that. He stops close, tips my chin up with one hand, and presses a kiss to my forehead.

Slow. Unhurried.

My throat tightens and I don’t understand it. Nothing hurts. There is no reason for the burn behind my eyes, and I blink hard and fast because I’m absolutely not doing this in Kane Sinclair’s office over a forehead kiss. I’m a grown woman who manages national brand crises before noon on Sundays.

He draws back and looks at me. Doesn’t comment on whatever he sees.

“People don’t just kneel beside office chairs,” I say, and my voice is not entirely steady.

“Submissives do, when their Dom asks them to.” His voice is quiet. Not the instruction tone. Just Kane. “So I’ll ask again. Will you kneel?”

My mind says no. My body leans forward, already wanting to comply.

“Color?”

His voice cuts through the spiral.

“Green, Sir.”

“Then kneel.”

I lower myself to the floor beside his chair. The floor is cool and hard against my knees. I’m aware of the position, me on the floor, him above me, and my heart is hammering and I can smell the faint cedar of his desk and hear the city going quieter beyond the glass, and somewhere in all of that my breathing starts to even out before I’ve decided to let it.

He sits. Reaches for his coffee. Takes a sip.

“Perfect. You made this exactly right.” He reaches down and cups my face, his thumb moving across my cheekbone. Then he releases my face, picks up his coffee again. “Stay there while I work. Be present. Let yourself feel what it’s like to not be managing anything.”

“For how long?”