One in particular caught my eye: a long black leather handle gave way to a metal wheel with spikes sticking out of it. The object-no, toy- as James was always so quick to correct me- looked menacing. The spikes threatened torture on the wheel, ropes, whips, handcuffs… My heart began to race. I looked down the table. A cat o’ nine tails was laid out beside the pinwheel. The leather tendrils snaked out over the edge of the table. I ran my finger over the coarse leather delicately. I quickly pulled my hand back as if it had been burned by fire. My skin began to sting with the memory of the leather. My mind went back to the first time James whipped me. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end. The sensation made me smile. Each device on the table had a story. Maybe some day one of them would tell my own… It began on a hot autumn day. I sat in the office’s lobby with about a hundred other girls. The number was actually closer to fifteen, but I felt so intimated by the competition it may as well have been a thousand.
