“Personal descriptions?”

“Just gender and what position they fill in a relationship and how they fit into the club—and the hierarchy. As the owner, you could possibly be identified. No one else.”

The hard knot in Xavier’s gut began to unwind. Not an exposé. She didn’t plan to out the members. She couldn’t lie to him if he was watching for it, and she wasn’t lying now.

“I want you to think back to the first scene we did.” He waited until she nodded. “You were embarrassed, Abby. You felt exposed, even though others around us were also doing scenes. How would you have felt if you realized someone was studying you like a research monkey?”

Pink flowed up her neck and into her face. He’d never known anyone who blushed so often—or so beautifully.

“Answer me.”

“I would have…have left.” Her gaze stayed on the road, but her fingers tightened on the steering wheel. A car passed them. A logging truck rumbled past on the other side. “I didn’t think writing about a social network could possibly hurt anyone or put them at risk. And the lifestyle wouldn’t welcome a sociologist, but I hoped my paper would help BDSM be more accepted. I wanted to show the honesty and communication. The caring. I thought it would be good for the community.”

Wanting to help. Yes, she might have started the project because she needed the paper, but in a uniquely Abby way she’d ended up trying to help. Xavier’s anger kept seeping away. “Go on.”

“People weren’t in a bedroom—they were in a club, doing intimate performances right out in public. So how could it be wrong to observe? That’s what I thought.” Her eyes gleamed with tears. “But I saw the reactions last night. And Summer’s today. I should have realized that, to the members, they’re not in public but inside their family. I was blind.”

She bit her lip. “Or maybe I didn’t want to see it.”

For someone so intelligent, that was a difficult acknowledgment. “You probably didn’t.”

Her voice dropped. “I can’t think of how to make it right.”

True repentance. Xavier took a slow breath, fighting the way she softened his heart. The research was only the first of her offenses. The taste of the second was bitter. “You and Nathan are lovers? Involved?”

“For months,” Nathan had said.

“We were during the spring.” Her laugh held a doleful note. “He broke up with me before he left for Maine. The day before I came to the club.”

Before I ever saw her. Another hard ball in his chest loosened. “Did you join because of him? Partly?”

Her lips trembled as she nodded. “I thought if I learned more, maybe we could make it work. Maybe I’d be comfortable with what he wanted.”

She hadn’t appeared comfortable last night.

“I’m a moron,” she said under her breath.

“Why do you say that?”

“We had a committed relationship. Monogamous. We’d agreed. But that girl last night knew him. He’d been…with…her before, hadn’t he?” She glanced at him.

“If you’re asking if their scenes included sex, then yes.” Xavier rubbed his shoulder and winced at the pain. “So the first day at the club, you told me the truth when you said no significant other.”

“Of course. I wouldn’t lie.” Dismay filled her face. “You thought I had. Last night you believed I’d cheated on Nathan with you.” She stared straight at the highway, blinking away tears. Slowly her chin firmed.

She hadn’t lied to him. The rush of relief was unsettling. He might tell himself that it was because he hadn’t misread her personality, but he knew better. “I’m pleased to know you weren’t cheating, Abby. More relieved than I like.”

“I don’t particularly care.” She blinked her eyes hard. “I’m no concern of yours.”

He shifted in his seat to study her. Her jaw was tight, her eyes haunted. Nathan Kemp had damaged her ego—and so did I. Her self-confidence in relationships had been fragile to begin with.

Unfortunately he wasn’t the Dom to put things right. She needed someone who could commit to her. That someone wasn’t him, and the thought of doing her further harm was more than he could bear. She’d already decided to break off any relationship with him. This was obviously the right time for her to return to her own life.

* * *

“Nice place,” Abby said, staring at the golden and tan Mediterranean-style home. How could Xavier’s club possibly provide enough income to afford a Tiburon mansion overlooking the bay?

His lips twitched. “Thank you.”

The door to a three-car garage slid up, and she pulled in.

Without waiting for her, Xavier got out. With his sprained ankle off the ground, he held on to the car door as she unpacked the light wheelchair and wheeled it over.

“I appreciate the chauffeur service, Abby. Come in, and I’ll call you a taxi,” he said. When he tried to wheel up the incline into the house, she realized he couldn’t use his right arm—and a wheelchair required both. As he used his uninjured foot to assist, the muscles on his jaw grew tighter. He was hurting and too stubborn to ask her for help.

The big bad Dom would normally expect a submissive to serve him…but she wasn’t his. The knowledge was demoralizing. Painful. He might have forgiven her to some degree, but what they’d started… That was gone. He’d undoubtedly written her off as a total loser.

Which was good. She’d given up on men, right? Jaw clenched, she pushed the wheelchair up the ramp into the house.

They entered a tall foyer with red-gold hardwood flooring. The walls held the creamy warmth of the exterior. Stairs curved up to an inside balcony.

“In there, please.” He pointed, and she wheeled him across the wide space into a living room. The subtle colors of the beige walls and carpet and white leather furniture were a quiet frame for the stunning view of Angel Island and San Francisco across the bay.

“How beautiful.”

“Thank you.” When he pulled out his cell phone and punched a button, she realized he had a taxi service on speed dial. Maybe for his club members? Or maybe he sent all his women home this way.

She wasn’t one of them, though, was she? Odd how depression could darken the sunlight streaming through the glass. As she walked to the window, her brows drew together. With a two-story house, the master bedroom was probably upstairs. How would he get up there?

Not my problem. The couch looked comfortable, and he was an adult. But when the taxi service chirped a busy signal, her mouth overruled her mind. “Who will you call to stay with you?”

“I’ll manage, thank you.” His black eyes held no emotion. He punched a redial into the phone.

“You can’t. You need someone here to help you.”

“It’s not your problem, Abigail.” His mouth flattened. Busy signal. Redial.

“I bet you’ve got ibuprofen upstairs in your master bath. Your clothes will be up there. But you can’t get up the stairs, can you? You certainly can’t cook, balancing on one leg and using one hand.”

“That’s enough,” he snapped. His anger came through clearly. Busy. Redial.

Fear turned the pale walls an ugly red, and her heart banged against her rib cage, knocking her back a step. He’s furious. Don’t make him yell. Just stop.

He’d manage. He’d be fine.

He wouldn’t.

“You need someone to help you.” She snatched the phone out of his hand. “I’m staying the night, so deal with it. Y-yell at me if you want to, but I’m s-staying.” Her shoulders knotted. She braced her legs, preparing for the screams. The names. Nausea twisted her stomach.

His mouth opened…and closed. He leaned back. His gaze traveled from the phone in her tight grip upward in a comprehensive sweep to linger on her face. “If I can’t get out of this chair, Abby, why are you afraid of me?”

She blinked.

The anger was gone from his voice as if it had never occurred. Resting his elbow on the chair arm, he cupped his chin in his hand and watched her.

“I’m not afraid.”

“Really?” His gaze didn’t waver. “Apparently you continue to have difficulty identifying your emotions. Are your muscles tight? Hands sweaty?”

She resisted the urge to rub her palms on her jeans. “This is—”

“Abby.”

“Fine. Yes.”

“Your eyes are wide. Is your breathing fast or slow?”

She was panting. Had retreated a step. “Okay. I’m scared.” Which seemed really stupid.

“Do you think I’d hurt you?”

“No! No, you wouldn’t.”

“Then what are you afraid of?” As his voice rose, she flinched. His eyes narrowed. “Who used to yell at you, Abby?”

“That isn’t—”

An eyebrow rose slightly in the ominous signal of a Dom growing impatient.

She was far more submissive than she’d thought, because the answer slid from her as if greased. “My father.”

His finger stroked the beard stubble on his jaw. “Was he abusive?”

“It wasn’t like that.” She walked to the window, needing space. A view. An escape from those penetrating eyes. “He had cancer. A brain tumor. We didn’t know—he wasn’t diagnosed until a year or two later.”

A gull soared over the ferryboat churning across the choppy waves toward Pier Thirty-Nine. Her father had loved to visit the wharf, but then the bustling became more than he could tolerate. “If he got excited at all, he’d burst into a rage. For so long, we didn’t understand why. We thought we’d made him mad, and Mom would cry.”

“Just you and your mother?”

“Um-hmm.” The backyard had a wide stone patio with a pool and hot tub. Grassy stretches extended on each side like wings. Farther out, the land rolled downhill. “Xavier, it’s not imp—”