Snippet Sunday: MERCY

I’ve been on a real performance kick lately. I’ve been attending some local live performances, dug out my old ballet tapes, and even started a new book set in the ballet world called Waking Kiss.

I don’t know what it is about the arts and performance that moves me so much, but I know that since the very beginning I’ve wanted to write about performers and their struggles with life and love. I guess in a way performance and BDSM go perfectly together, since both of them involve a lot of boundary-pushing and physical struggle.

If you’ve read Mercy, you know that pain is a big part of Lucy’s relationship with Matthew. Sometimes she really enjoys the pain he deals her in a masochistic sense, but other times, it’s real emotional pain tearing her apart…and him too, of course. More than anything, I think Mercy was my ode to masochism in all its psychological complexity. Like many masochists, Lucy has trouble admitting that she wants and enjoys pain.

Today I’ll share a snippet from the coffee shop scene which is a particular favorite of a friend of mine. This is a scene where no physical sex takes place, but the mental back and forth is nearly as intimate. Will Matthew convince Lucy to give sado-masochism a whirl with him? (Spoiler: he does!)

     “Lucy, what do you think is happening here?”

     “I really don’t know. I wish I did!”

     “I think you do know, but I’ll play along. What did you think of me? How do you feel around me?”

     “I… I…”

     “Think first, and then tell me the truth.”

     “You scare me.”

     “Why do I scare you?”

     I looked down at my hands, swallowed hard. “Because of how you make me feel.”

     “How do I make you feel?”

     I shook my head. I couldn’t admit it, never.

     “Answer me,” he pressed. “We won’t get anywhere until you talk to me. Just say it.”

     “I…you… You make me… I want you to… I want…”

     My voice trailed off, my face on fire. I want you to be an animal. I want you to eat me alive.

     “Can’t you say it?” he asked. “I’ll tell you, Lucy, since you seem unable to form the words.” He paused and looked right at me. “You want me to master you. You want me to rough you up a little, don’t you?”

     I bit my lip. I had no idea what to answer to that. Again, I felt dangerously close to tears, even after all the tears I’d already shed. I brought my cup to my lips and drank the coffee to assuage the tightness in my throat.

     “Your fiancé, he didn’t understand, did he? What you like. What you need.”

     “I don’t understand either.”

     “You will,” he said.

Oh man, I have such an abiding crush on Matthew, and he’s definitely my most-talked-about Dom. I have tried to reproduce him but I fear he may be one of a kind. There’s something about the way he’s both teacher and tormentor to Lucy that is very affecting to me.

Mercy has a reputation as a “hardcore” book, but I think it offers a lot of compelling emotional content too. If you haven’t read it, you might want to give it a try. To me, it’s a very sweet book about two people who desperately love each other. Click the cover below for buy links and a blurb!