Stained Glass Shards

26.

When your lover takes your passion to a place you'd never believed you'd ever want to experience, the ante is upped each time. A person who allows the kink to be done to her finds profound comfort in biting, scratching, binding, and spanking—among other proclivities. It gets easier to be turned on your belly and be taken from behind while blindfolded, awaiting his touch. You won't be denied his...love—his version of love. You'll accept almost anything to ensure his time and affection. In no time, you will call out what you want him to do: 'pull my hair;' 'pinch me;' 'a bite there, please.' There will be nothing new after you've exhausted your imagination. But the one thing you'd like to do, like having sex in public, can't be done because you've never established such parameters. You'll allow him to tie you to the bathroom door as he licks you from bottom to top, but he can't possibly take you for a walk around The Charles at night, holding hands—kissing under the stars. Then again, when you're with another man, he'll take you both to dinner and sit next to you, raising your skirt beneath the table as you squirm. A dry finger gets slickened by the moisture in your folds. And he will massage your clit while your boyfriend goes to the restroom, and he'll watch your nipples bead through your thin blouse as you easily come to a quiet climax.

--Iliana Gardner, Stained Glass Shards

ELYCE

"We're going to have to dissect your book to determine what's real and what's fiction," Kevin Zipperer—affectionately called 'Zipper'—told me. "We have a few attorneys who concentrate on libel and defamation. Because you never signed a non-disclosure agreement, and we can show that he's done so with other girlfriends, we can prove he had no intention of keeping your relationship a secret. You weren't bound."

Poor choice of words.

Years of making millions until my brother and his friends amassed billions required a hoard of legal specialists at the ready to strike with or defend against lawsuits.

My brother was never a fool. He wouldn't engage in such a relationship without some form of legal protection for himself, like a non-disclosure agreement between him and the woman; most assuredly to protect The Pentagon Group, the corporation he and his friends created while in boarding school.

There were rumors that Griffin did the same with his high-profile relationships. He'd never asked me to sign anything. Maybe because I wasn't a serious conquest. There were no long-term plans with me. But having an agreement with his actress girlfriend prepared them to plan for a future—a prenuptial agreement, perhaps?

I listened intently as Zipper discussed Griffin's complaint. I answered questions as best as I could, grimacing whenever graphic details were addressed. I had known Zipper since I was a young girl when my brother went away to boarding school. Zipper and their other friends took care of Lark, who was a year younger but no less intelligent.

"Do you want to settle?" Zipper asked, looking stern and expectant for an answer.

"Settle?"

"If we can get Belanger to agree to terms you're comfortable with, we can keep this out of court."

"The damage is already done," I said. "He's filed. There are articles about us. My book is proof of this whole mess."

"But settling eliminates your need to testify in open court about details that may not have been written in the book or articles. It also reduces the expense of litigation. I doubt you'd keep enough of your advance and sales of your rights to this book to tide you over. You'll have to consider what's best for you." He put his hand over mine, pressing firmly in reassurance. "Lark already said he'd pay anything to make this go away. If we present Griffin—"