“You’re a blight on the whole BDSM community,” Shaw said. “BDSM is an opportunity for people to explore a variety of trust and power issues in healthy ways while—”

North laid a hand on Shaw’s arm. “Ok, Shaw.”

“He needs to know—”

North shushed him, his hand running down Shaw’s bicep, and the touch was like static electricity. “Ok, Shaw.”

“Please. Oh my God. My hand.”

“This hand?” North said, and he grabbed the pen and pushed it a few millimeters.

Brueckmann screamed. He collapsed to his knees, and his forehead clapped off the desk so loudly that for a moment Shaw thought he had heard a gunshot. But Brueckmann didn’t pass out. He just leaned there, crumpled against the side of the desk, unable to fall completely because of his hand.

“You know, the hand is one of the most nerve-dense parts of the body,” North said. “Sensory, motor control, all of that. So.” He shifted the pen again, and this time, Brueckmann’s scream was cut off by vomit, which poured down the front of his leather jacket as he struggled to keep from falling and letting the pen tear through his hand. “It’s really sensitive.”

“And,” Shaw said, “easy to damage permanently. A few more rounds with my partner, and you might not be able to close a padlock, or latch a dog crate, or snap a collar around a boy’s neck.” Shaw twisted the knife so that light shimmered along the blade. “That would be a real shame, wouldn’t it?”

“I can’t—” Brueckman was still spitting, trying to clear his mouth. “Look, I already sold his car, and if you want his money, you have to wait until Monday when I can make some phone calls—”

Shaw struggled to keep his face impassive. He struggled not to let the blitz of questions and possibilities show in his features. The semi-subterranean part of his brain that was always gathering data, collating it, sifting, processing, that part of his brain had suddenly whipped into a higher gear, and Shaw was trying to figure out why what Brueckmann said was so important. It had to do with Mark Sevcik’s Facebook page; Shaw knew that much.

North said, “You think we’re here for Mark Sevcik’s money. For his car.”

Brueckmann blinked up at them.

“You take everything,” Shaw said, the words falling out before he’d fully realized what he was saying. “Is that it?”

For a moment, the only noise was the tinny sound of an old man moaning on one of the many screens.

“All of it,” North said. “Right now.”

“Some people come to me,” Brueckmann said, head down. “They want something else. More than all this. They want somebody who’s really in control of them. They need it.”

“Men and women?” Shaw said.

“Only men.”

“And?”

“And I offer a service. I’m giving them something they need: stability, a fulfilling relationship, the kind of sexual satisfaction they could only dream about. I give them belonging. I give them a collar, and they put it around their necks.”