“He owned her about ten years, I think.” Griffin twisted the cap of his water and took a drink. “But she told me she’s known him since she was fifteen. Love at first sight, apparently. For both of them.”

“Ten years…” Zach couldn’t wrap his mind around it. His own marriage had lasted ten years. “She said he’s a sadist. I assume she means he’s…”

“A sadist,” Griffin said simply. “He’s sexually aroused by inflicting pain and humiliation. And he’s phenomenal at it. The Pope there is Machiavelli’s wet dream.”

“Phenomenal? It doesn’t seem that difficult to hurt someone.”

Griffin scoffed. “Look, any jackass with a baseball bat can beat up somebody in the street and in five seconds they’re begging for it to stop. Søren can beat you up and in five minutes you’re begging him to never stop. That’s his gift.”

“He’s a priest. A Catholic priest. He has vows—”

“Which he doesn’t break except with Nora, as far as I know. A Catholic priest who only has sex with one consenting adult woman? Jesus, they’ll probably make him a bishop. Real sadists don’t need to fuck. They need to fuck you up.”

“I can’t believe Nora could stay with someone who hurt her for so long. She’s so…”

“Dominant? Yeah, she’s one helluva Switch. She’s as dominant now as she used to be submissive. You wouldn’t recognize her if you saw her six years ago. Of course you wouldn’t see her face anyway because it’d be buried in his lap.”

Zach had started to take a drink of his gin and tonic but he set his glass down again.

“He forced her to do that in public?”

“Hell, yeah. Fucked her a few times in public, too. Well, not public—private parties. I got invited once. The only time I ever got to top that woman. One of the best nights of my life. He beat her, fucked her, passed her around. He and King would tag team her a lot. Most dominant thing you can do is give your submissive to someone else to play with.”

“Nora allowed that?”

Griffin choked on a laugh and turned to meet Zach eye to eye. “Allowed it? Man, she fucking loved it.”

Zach shook his head. “I don’t believe it. Who would enjoy being treated like that?”

“Believe what you want. All the submissives down here would sell their souls to belong to him. That’s why he’s number one. He’s the real thing. He doesn’t play to get laid. And he doesn’t do it for money like some people. He does it for pure sadistic pleasure.”

“But Nora…why does she do it?”

“Lots of reasons. But for him mainly.”

“Surely he doesn’t approve of her being a Dominant.”