Seth swallowed hard. “Right,” he softly agreed.

Kaden sadly smiled. “I have to do this. I don’t like that I have to make arrangements like this.” His smile faded. “We should have had fifty or more years together.” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I want her to be happy, Seth. I want her to love and live and not spend her years in a black hole. Worse, I don’t want her to kill herself.”

“You think she’d do that?” One more worry on Seth’s plate.

“Not if she has you. She’ll have you to serve and take care of her. She’ll hurt, she’ll grieve, but if she has you she’ll keep putting one foot in front of the other. She won’t have a choice.” He opened his eyes again. Seth saw he was near tears. “I’m not saying you’ve got to do anything with her tonight. I’m saying you need to let things happen between the two of you. And it will happen. It can’t not happen.”

Kaden glanced at the cable box, where the time was displayed. “You need to call Ben and Helen and tell them you won’t be home tonight so they don’t worry.”

Seth numbly nodded and pulled out his cell phone to make the call. While he did, Kaden walked to the kitchen. He returned a moment later with two fingers of bourbon over ice and retook his place on the sofa.

“Let’s get you moved in by this weekend, okay? I want you settled as soon as possible so I can get the two of you into a routine. She needs structure.”

Seth had spent several nights at their house over the years, usually after a late-running card game or after having too much to drink after a cookout, but this felt different.

Weird.

The voice didn’t sound like his own, Seth thought. “Okay.”

“When does this semester end?”

Seth tried to force his brain to work. “A couple of weeks.”

“Did you already register for the next one?”

“Not yet.”

“You need to stop by the registrar’s office and talk to them, find out the procedure for taking time off. If you still need to take one class at a time or something that’s okay. You don’t want a heavy class load for a semester or two at least.” He looked away. “I doubt you’ll miss many.”

Seth stiffly nodded.

Kaden continued, his voice sounding hoarse. “I’ll get the paperwork drawn up for you next week.”

Seth shook his head. “I don’t need paperwork. I trust you.”

“I trust you, too. The problem is, Leah won’t be able to function. I need someone with legal authority to make decisions and get shit done. I need you to have a power of attorney, medical proxy, DNR order, my living will has to be changed, bank accounts, all of that. I need you on all that paperwork for her, too. Might as well do it all and make it official. It’ll make our lives easier later on. One less thing for me to worry about. Get it done and over with.”

Seth numbly nodded. That even control-freak Kaden could think of all of this at a time like this…must be the attorney training.

Kaden took a deep breath. “I don’t want to die in a hospital. I want to be here. We’ll have to get hooked up with hospice when the time comes. At least you’ll be able to practice your nurse training,” Kaden attempted to joke.

Seth snorted, but Kaden knew it wasn’t total amusement.

“Sorry, buddy.” He paused a moment before he softly continued. “I want to be cremated. Whatever Leah wants to do with the remains is okay with me. You may have to help her make that decision. I’ll have a few things prepared. I’ll give them to my partner, Ed, so when it…happens, you can just call him and he’ll set the other balls in motion for you. You can focus on her for the immediate time, and Ed will take over and handle that stuff for you both. Okay?”

Seth nodded. Surreal. Nightmare. Wormhole still looked like a viable option.

Kaden leveled his gaze at Seth. “I don’t like talking like this. I don’t like planning like this. I want it fucking done and out of my way. Out of our way. I want it handled now, so I don’t have to think about it anymore. I want it done now, while I can think about it, so I don’t forget anything and we can spend the rest of my time doing what needs to be done for Leah.” He took a sip of his drink. “I don’t want her reverting in her stress.”

“What do you mean?”

“I know at first some of what I’ll ask you to do to and for her might run contrary to what you think and feel is right. Remember, I know her and I know what she needs. You have to trust me. You cannot let her put up a wall. If she does, she’ll hide behind it and then we’ll lose her. She’ll sink back into her old behaviors, and you won’t ever be able to get her back once I’m gone.”

“I thought you said you didn’t have to worry about that anymore?”

“I also told you she’s had three—well, now four—sessions in twenty-four hours. Usually she only gets them twice, maybe three times a week, if that, and sometimes I barely touch her. What you saw just now was mild compared to what she’s already had today.”

Stunned, Seth shook his head. “That was fucking vicious, man. You mean that was on the low end of the scale?”

Kaden nodded and sipped his drink, frowning. “You saw her ask for it. Physical pain like that helps her process emotions and ground herself.” He met Seth’s gaze again. “You can never let her emotionally detach. That’s almost too far gone if she gets to that point. You’ll learn to recognize her nonverbal cues, her body language. Sometimes all she needs is a barehanded swat to the ass to make her feel better. Sometimes she needs a lot more. Sometimes she’ll ask if she recognizes what’s going on. Your job is to spot the times when she’s not cued in to herself and doing it for her.”

“This is a lot to fucking learn, man. Are you really that worried she’ll cut herself again?”

“Why do you think I was chopping the vegetables before dinner? I won’t take the chance.”

Seth heard their bedroom door open. A moment later, Leah walked into the living room, her hair down, face washed and free of makeup, apparently wearing nothing but her collar and a long T-shirt that hung to midthigh.

Kaden held his hand out to her. “Come here, love,” he said.

She walked over and took his hand. She pressed her lips to the back of his hand before he pulled her into his lap. She curled there with her face buried against his chest, looking more like a lost child than a woman nearly forty years old. He kissed the top of her head, resting his chin in her hair, and met Seth’s eyes.

“Thank you. For both of us.”

Seth nodded.

* * *

They sat silently for a few minutes. Kaden shifted position, and Leah sat up and looked at him.

“Love,” he said, “Seth’s said yes.”

Her eyes teared up, but she nodded and looked at Seth. “Thank you,” she whispered.

He nodded.

Kaden patted her on the thigh. “Let’s go over a few ground rules, okay?”

She nodded.

“Are you comfortable calling him Master right now?”

She hesitated, but Seth answered for her. “Dude, I’m not comfortable with it yet. Can we wait on that? Please?”

Kaden thought for a moment. “How about ‘Sir?’ There needs to be a title.”

Leah nodded. “That’s fine, Master.”

Kaden sadly smiled and stroked her cheek. “Maybe that is better, for now. Less confusion.” He looked at Seth. “Okay with you?”

What was he supposed to say? He shrugged. “I can live with that, I guess.”

“Good. It’s important. Not all the time, just during play and when we’re formal.” He returned his focus to Leah. “We won’t be totally formal for a week or so. Let’s let things settle down. Seth’s going to move in, and we’ll start teaching him everything. You’re going to have to help him learn, especially at first.”

“Yes, Master.”

Seth so could not get used to that.

“Very good, love.” Kaden looked at Seth. “I think you’ve already noticed that. It’s one of our codes. We can use it even if we’re out with vanilla folks. We can still be formal in some ways and no one ever knows.”

Seth dumbly nodded.

Kaden continued. “I know that might take you a little while to get used to, and that’s okay. But it is important. Tomorrow night we’re going to the club, and I want you to go with us. Might as well bring your stuff over, at least plan on spending the night.” Seth started to protest, but Kaden intercepted him. “I’m not going to ask you to do anything tomorrow night except watch and learn. You need to see for yourself what we do, what happens.”

Seth relaxed. “Okay.”

Kaden looked at Leah. “Tell Seth our rule about your behavior.”

She looked at Seth. “How I behave reflects upon Master. My behavior must always honor Master.”

“And your behavior now will reflect upon Seth, too,” Kaden said.

She nodded.

“Very good, love.” Kaden kissed her temple. “He’ll have to learn things for you. You will have to be patient with him, especially at first. If he says or does something that’s contrary to what should be, you can red light and explain it to him. However, you need to understand, many things he won’t do exactly like me. He’s not me, and you will have to grow comfortable with that. Understand?”

She nodded.

Seth spoke up. “Red light?”

“Tell him.”

She looked at Seth again. “Safe words. Red, yellow, green. Red means immediate stop of activities, or if we’re someplace vanilla, it means we immediately switch to full vanilla mode until we can go somewhere private and talk about it. Yellow is caution. It means we need to check in with each other. Green is everything’s okay.”

Seth felt weird asking but knew he had to. “Is that what you were asking her back there?”

Kaden nodded as he stroked her hair. She closed her eyes and leaned into his hand, nuzzling him.

“You’re going to get an eye-opening experience,” Kaden said. “You’re going to get over any bashfulness with her.” His voice softened as he stared at Leah. “You’re also going to learn things about yourself you never knew. You’re going to have the time of your life, man.”

Kaden stroked her cheek and turned her face to his. “You have to get used to listening to him, too. When you’re alone with him, even if it’s just at the store or something, it’s as if you were with me. You must obey him.”

She nodded.

“He will take care of you. I promise.” Kaden’s eyes flicked to Seth, and Leah looked at him.

Seth nodded, barely able to speak. “I promise.”

Another sad smile. “Thank you,” she said.

Kaden kissed her again. “You’ll come to trust him the way you trust me. It’ll take some time. That’s why I wanted to start now with this, while we have time. I need to be able to spend time with him and show him.”

She nodded.

“From now on, the rule about asking for permission to speak to someone doesn’t apply to Seth. In fact, he can grant you permission to speak. He’ll pretty much be going everywhere with us from now on, so his word is as good as mine.”

She nodded.

“Seth’s going to need some time to get used to the way you normally dress around here,” Kaden said with a smile. He slipped his hand under her shirt. “In addition to not being totally formal, why don’t you keep a shirt handy for a while?”

Seth couldn’t get the memory of Leah’s naked body and shaved mound out of his mind. “I doubt that’s going to help,” he grumped.

“I don’t mind helping you with that,” Leah softly said, blushing.

Seth frowned, certain he’d misheard her. “Huh?”

Kaden closed his eyes and kissed her temple. “It will happen sooner or later.”

Seth felt like his body went numb. “Okay. While I’ll admit there’s part of me that wants to take you up on that right now, there’s another part of me screaming bloody murder that I’m totally creeped out by you both being so okay with this.”

“It’s okay, Seth,” Leah said. Her voice had dropped almost to a whisper. “Kaden and I talked.” She took a deep breath, and her eyes brimmed again. Damn it, he hated seeing her so upset. “He’s right that it will happen eventually. It’s not fair to you to keep you hanging. I don’t want to do that to you.”

Seth started to speak then snapped his mouth shut again, speechless. He finally managed to string coherent words together. “Give me some time to get used to this, guys.”

Kaden opened his eyes. Seth saw he struggled not to cry. “I don’t have a lot of time. We don’t have time for blushing bullshit. I don’t have time. I know you’re weirded out. I know it’s uncomfortable.” His hand stroked her hair again. Seth suspected it was more an unconscious gesture to comfort himself at that point. “There’s no use dancing around the fucking issue. While I appreciate that you love me enough to not be a prick about this, you don’t need to spare my feelings. After a couple of weeks with us I think you’ll understand how and why I can do this.”