Cardinal's Rule by Tymber Dalton

shrugged.
    “Do you think she still loves you?”
    Slave looked out his window. “I doubt it,” he softly replied. “Not as badly as I hurt her. I think what she said was probably more out of pain, over what she went through then, not what she really feels now.”
    Landry wasn’t sure he agreed with that assessment, but he let it go. He didn’t know the woman beyond what slave told him and his own brief interactions with her.
    But he intended to get closer to her.
    Much closer.
    Back at their room, he made slave strip and bend over the end of the bed. He delivered twenty-five vicious strikes with a rattan cane, not breaking the flesh but immediately raising welts on his skin, crossing the existing bruises from their previous nights at the clubs.
    Slave took his punishment without complaint.
    After their pizza arrived, he allowed slave to sit, naked, at the small table to eat before ordering him back to the floor again where he could work on his laptop. Then he settled on the bed, still dressed, to watch TV.
    Occasionally glancing at his phone, Landry wondered if she’d call. He didn’t miss that she
    snatched the card with the hotel room info on it from him and pocketed it before Bob could take it.
    He also hadn’t missed the brief longing that crossed her expression before slave got in the car at her house.
    He suspected a little tiny piece of her didn’t want to see him go.
    * * * *
    Landry glanced at his phone when it buzzed on the table between the beds around a quarter
    after eleven. Pleasantly surprised, a smile creased his face as he read the caller ID. Honestly? He’d almost given up on hearing from her that night. He answered. “Hello.”
    He listened for a moment and then said, “Not at all, I was still awake. I’ll be right there.” He hung up and stood. Slave remained kneeling on the floor. “You’d better be right there when I get back.
    Do not move. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. Could be a few minutes, could be a few hours. Could be all fucking night.”
    He slipped on his shoes, grabbed his room key, patted his pocket to make sure he had the ring, and walked outside. In the dark he quickly scanned the parking lot and saw her parked next to his rental. She drove a brand new Lexus SUV.
    The passenger window slid down. “Get in.”
    He reached for the door handle. “I’m glad to see you. I’ll admit this is rather unexpected.”
    She drove without speaking to a nearby park overlooking Sarasota Bay. He waited her out as
    she stared at the water.
    “What the fuck is your game, Landry?” she finally asked.
    “No game, I assure you.” He didn’t miss the fact that she used his first name.
    “Why not leave everything to Cris? He’s your…partner, right?”
    “Because he has lost the right to own anything after this. Before I found out about his
    transgression, yes, I considered him more than just my slave. He was my partner in every way. My lover. My love.” He took a deep breath. Why hold on to his pride when he had nothing left to lose? “I owe you.”
    “You don’t owe me shit.”
    “You’re wrong. No, it’s not technically my fault what happened, but I still feel responsible. For example, take your boy today. If he got into a fight at a club—”
    “He’s not my boy.”
    Landry successfully suppressed his smile. “Oh. I’m sorry, I thought from what I saw—”
    “He’s a client. And…a friend.”
    “Boyfriend?”
    “That is none of your fucking business.”
    “I’m asking you to marry me, therefore yes, it is my business.”
    “You’re crazy.”
    “No,” he said, settling back in the seat. “I’m tired. Honestly? I don’t know if I’m going to get through this or not. They say I probably will, but there are no guarantees. I need this cleared off my plate one way or another as soon as possible.”
    “Doesn’t Cris love you? Why not forgive him and move on? He didn’t hurt you.”
    Landry dropped his voice. “He told me about your