Congratulating the smiling bride, Sharon Richards wished she were somewhere else. Anywhere else.

If it weren’t for Simon’s hand at the small of her back, she was sure her fight-or-flight instinct would have taken over before long. It was ironic, seeing that the man who gave her the strength to endure this day was also the reason she wanted to flee.

“Sharon, I’m so happy you’re here with me today,” her mother said, pulling her into a tight embrace, her eyes betraying the pleasure of seeing her when she pulled back a few seconds later.

Her mother was radiant in her rose-colored dress, her vibrant red hair cut shoulder-length. It hadn’t been all that long since her mother’s eyes had been clouded with sadness over her father’s death. Seeing her full of life and energy again warmed Sharon’s heart.

“Where else would I be? It’s not that often one’s mother marries, after all. Well, at least I hope you won’t make a hobby out of it,” she said, keeping her tone light so her mother knew she wasn’t serious.

“I very much hope so, too,” Henry, her mother’s new husband remarked, joining them. He put an arm around his new wife, a tender smile on his face. He was a quiet man, almost the complete opposite of how her father had been. Maybe that was what had made it possible for her mother to open her heart to him and dare a new start.

“It’s good to see you, kiddo,” he said to Sharon when he was able to pry his eyes away from his wife, giving Sharon a brief hug. He turned from her to Simon. “I’m Henry Duncan. And you must be Simon.”

“Yes, I am. Pleased to meet you, and may I offer my congratulations?”

“Thank you. I know I’m the luckiest man alive today.”

“And I’m sure not just today,” Simon said.

Traffic had been so awful this morning that Sharon and Simon had barely arrived for the ceremony. There hadn’t been time for any introductions before.

The original plan had been for them to arrive a day early so they could enjoy dinner and a quiet evening with her family. A new case in the middle of yesterday had changed their plans. Life as a cop was never predictable and murder refused to stick to a fixed schedule. Sharon’s mother had sighed when she called and said she hoped they could make it after all.

On the one hand, Sharon was glad they didn’t have to spend last night with her family. On the other, they all would already have gotten to know Simon if they had.

He wasn’t the first partner she had introduced to her family, but he was different from her previous boyfriends. While everybody had secrets, his was a little less acceptable in the eyes of society, not that he tried to hide his lifestyle. She did.

There was no easy answer to what he did for a living when the truthful reply was running a BDSM club in NYC. Sharon was painfully aware it wasn’t even a question of whether somebody would ask, just when.

Apart from his work not being what her family would expect, that fact would lead to other questions she didn’t feel equipped to answer. So far nobody had seemed to wonder why she was wearing a long-sleeved dress on an almost hot autumn day. Knowing about Simon’s business would change that, and she didn’t care for people to know that her wrists still showed faint marks from a few days ago, when the rope that had bound her had cut into her skin as she’d struggled, halfway delirious from equal measures of pleasure and pain.

“I’m glad you could free some time to accompany Sharon here today,” her mother said to Simon now, and she meant it. Contrary to Henry, she’d met Simon once before and had taken an instant liking to him.

Sharon couldn’t blame her—he was a good-looking man with impeccable manners, polite and friendly when he wanted to be. He was wearing a dark suit that didn’t do much to hide his slender yet muscular body, and one part of her couldn’t wait to strip him out of it later.

“It’s my pleasure,” he said. “And it’s been years since I’ve been to Vermont. I forgot how beautiful the landscape is.”

Sharon zoned out while her mother and Simon continued talking. She looked around the restaurant with its adjoining ballroom that Henry and her mother had rented for the day. The owner—Louisa—was her mother’s oldest and best friend and she had done a wonderful job of arranging tables so groups of six could sit at each. She had chosen light blue tablecloths and each held a different arrangement of flowers. There also were candles in glasses, waiting for the evening when they would be lit to give the room a soft glow. Right now, sunshine fell through the huge glass windows at one side of the room, bathing the space in an almost ethereal light.

Everything looked fresh, inviting and befitting a second marriage. Her mother might have said yes to marriage but not to church, a white dress and a stilted reception. This was a gathering of family and friends on a joyous but quiet occasion. Forty-two people had been invited and Sharon knew them all, most of them for as long as she could remember. She snapped out of her thoughts when Louisa called out, telling them that the first round of refreshments was waiting.

A few minutes later, with drinks in hand, they all toasted the happy couple and people migrated into new groups, chatting and enjoying themselves.

“Let’s get outside, have some fresh air,” Sharon suggested. She was glad when Simon didn’t ask and took her arm, leading her to the double-wide doors that connected the room to the patio.

Stopping just outside, Sharon closed her eyes, took a deep breath.

“Want to tell me what has you on edge?” Simon asked.

She opened her eyes, met the worried gaze of his dark eyes. “Don’t tell me you don’t know. Most of the time, you know me better than I know myself.”

A small smile curled his lips upward. “I do.” He became serious again. “I know you’re afraid of your family finding out who I am, but you don’t have to tell them anything you don’t want them to know.”

She sighed, curling her fingers into fists before she could give in to the temptation to rake them through her hair. “I’m not ashamed of you, not at all, but I think some things should remain private. Does your family even know what you do?” Why have I never asked before?

“My brother, yes, my sister, no. My sister and I are not close. We have a good enough relationship, but she married right out of high school, moved across the country to Portland and we only see each other every other year.”

She turned to him, then put her hand on his shoulder, needing to feel him close.

“So what does he think about this, your brother?”

“I think his comment was ‘to each their own.’ But to tell you the rest of the story—he came to visit me in New York right after I started the business. He wanted to see the club. I told him he didn’t want to know, but he wasn’t to be deterred.”

Sharon sighed. “I’ve never wanted to talk to my family about what I like in the bedroom, and I don’t want to start now.”

Lifting her chin with a finger, he made sure to keep her gaze when he spoke next. “You don’t need to worry. Nobody will ask you anything like that.”

“But you don’t know…”

Leaning in, he kissed her, his lips lingering on hers for a sweet moment, making her long for more. Withdrawing, he cupped her cheek. “Trust me?”

“I do, but…”

“Sharon, there you are.”

Turning her head, she spotted her brother making his way over to them, his son in tow. Bracing herself for another round of introductions, she smiled.

* * * *

To Sharon’s surprise it was already late in the evening, the room basking in the soft light of numerous candles, with several couples dancing on the improvised dance floor when the question came up for the first time.

“So, Martha told me you have a business in the city?” Henry asked Simon while he looked over at his wife and shared a look with her. If Sharon’s stomach hadn’t been in a tight knot, she would’ve enjoyed the deep affection between those two.

“I do,” Simon answered. “I started working for an oil mining company right after business school, but later I invested what I earned there into my own business.”

“It sounds like that was a smart idea,” Martha said. “What is it you’re doing anyway? I don’t think I asked.”

Sharon tensed, and Simon, his hand on her hip, stroked her through the fabric of her dress.

“To make a long and boring story short, my business is all about networking and customer service. I provide meeting spaces for people to conclude their respective businesses.”

Sharon almost snorted at the description. Martha in turn smiled at Simon. “I was never much interested in business. Maybe that’s why I became a teacher. I wanted to deal with people, not concepts and numbers.”

“Which is a much more worthwhile cause, if you ask me,” Simon said.

“You and Sharon met through your business, didn’t you?” Henry asked Simon, but Sharon answered before Simon could.

“Yes, there was a murder on the premises.”

“What happened?” Martha looked from her to Simon.

Sharon shook her head. “It’s not important. Let’s not drag up such a sad story on this happy day. I found out who did it and well, I got to meet Simon.”

“Who would’ve thought that your job could have such nice side effects?” Martha said, looking from her daughter to Simon and back. “That said, how’s Jenn doing?”

Sharon was glad for the switch in topics and told her mother all that was new with her friend and partner. A new slow song started soon after and Henry turned to Martha, asking for a dance, prompting Simon to take Sharon’s hand.

“Would you care for a dance, too?”

“I didn’t know you could dance.”

He smirked. “I’m not a professional, but I think it will do.”

“In that case, yes, I’d love to.”

She let him guide her to the dance floor where they joined the other dancers. He took the lead, and it was good to give in and move with him. It wasn’t unlike the games they played in the sanctuary of his club. With him she could completely unwind, didn’t need to be strong, to make decisions when she didn’t want to.

Closing her eyes, Sharon took a deep breath, releasing some of the tension that had kept her on edge the whole day. Why was this so hard? She wasn’t ashamed of him or herself. The last few months had taught her a lot about herself, and she had found a measure of peace and acceptance she hadn’t deemed possible.

Simon and she had grown closer during that time, too. They were similar in the way they viewed the world, their humor was compatible and no man had ever respected her and her boundaries the way he did. They differed in that he liked—needed—control where she needed to let go. They were made for each other.

Still, her job and career demanded her absolute silence when it came to the nature of their relationship. Thanks to the Marlene Davis case that had led her into Simon’s club, her colleagues were aware of what Simon did for a living, that he’d been on the list of suspects. If she ever admitted to her relationship with him, they would wonder, at the very least.

“Relax, Sharon,” Simon said, tightening his hold on her a bit.

She looked up at him and his worried expression before she scanned the room. Her mom was dancing with Henry, her expression warm and loving. She spotted her brother and his son. While James was doing his best to look happy, he was obviously suffering from the separation from his wife, even though Connie had never been the right woman for him.

There were also others, some friends of her mom, some of Henry. This was a quiet and surreal affair, so different from life in New York where the only peaceful location she knew was Simon’s apartment where the building towered over the city.

“I can’t,” she admitted. “I want to be here, and I want to be as far away as possible at the same time. I love you and I know I’m failing you, but I’m afraid of being found out, being inspected like a butterfly under a microscope.”

Simon shook his head. “People will see what they want to see. In this case, they want you to be happy, and I think we could convince them that I’m not about to screw you over. Nobody wants to know what you prefer when it comes to a lover. Nobody will ask. Apart from Jenn, that is.”

She laughed. She couldn’t help it. He had wanted to break some of the tension and managed to do so without any effort. It was true, Jenn was curious about BDSM subculture, and wasn’t afraid to ask whatever came to her mind, which had made dinner with her, her Baptist pastor boyfriend and Simon a special kind of hell.

“It’s a pity that the one thing that could help me relax is out of the question here,” she said, getting on her toes to kiss him.

Something in his gaze darkened, and it sent an instant shiver down her back. “You’re not the only one on edge, and we might not be at home, but I have every intention of doing something about this. Soon.”

That was a promise…and she couldn’t wait for the evening to wind up.