Prompt: They say true love conquers all. Let's face it though some obstacles to true love can seem pretty insurmountable. We want you to tell us the story of lovers reunited. What obstacle did they have to overcome to rekindle their love? How did they find their way into each other's arms for their happily ever after?

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The heels of her black thigh high boots clicked menacingly as she slowly strode across the Italian marble floors. An inferno roared in the monstrous fireplace, the light dancing across the cathedral ceilings and catching in the diamonds lining the choker around her neck. Torches lit parts of the large luxuriously furnished room, but the corners remained dark, intentionally.

She had arrived.

Her willing volunteers rested, bound, strategically around the room. She circled the room at a languid pace inspecting each victim and marveling that she had found every one of them after all this time. In a past life, she had denied herself their pleasure, so long ago the memories were difficult to distinguish from dreams. Tonight she would indulge herself, but first, she would make them beg.

"I let you go before," she purred after her first languid lap around the room, "but none of you will that lucky tonight."

She stopped and relined on her side upon a decadent bed in the middle of the room. The cool sheets brushed softly against her skin. She gazed deeply into the eyes of the large German man stripped down to his boxers and restrained to all four iron bedposts with silk scarves. He seemed slightly nervous. She hadn't taken his virginity when he was nineteen, but she would take something from him tonight. A corner of her mouth twisted into a wry smile remembering how he had begged years ago after an unfortunate translational misunderstanding. She looked forward to a repeat performance. Wiser now, she had utilized Google Translate to gain his consent for this kinky party. He watched her slowly run her hand across the cleavage age had granted her, down her leather bustier, and across the full sensual hips she hadn't possessed as a girl.

She stood and walked over to the carpenter she had kissed almost three decades ago in the wee hours of the morning in a basement nightclub in Dublin. She remembered the boy's warmth and softness. He didn't look so soft anymore, but he still wore a low fringe of hair that rode above his beautiful wide-set eyes. He had said nothing in Dublin and said nothing now. A large c-clamp seemed fitting to secure his bare chest against a bookcase. It didn't hurt him as long as he didn't move.

The urologist from Krakow stood bound and gagged as he would remain. She had no intention of hearing him speak. He was a pompous ass. He had begged pathetically to no avail. His anatomy held some unexplored interest however, so she invited him to the party. He looked scared, as he should be.

The Buddhist vegan lawyer, though already clearly aroused, seemed more on edge than she had expected. He was a master of mediation already twenty years ago. After two dates he confessed he never wanted children. At thirty that was not an option, and so she cut it off, though it hurt. With a devilish sneer, she thought about what painful pleasures she might inflict tonight.  

She reached the oldest man in the room, the one she planned to save for last. The fire reflected brightly in the glass eye of this heavy-set, mature gentleman, the eye which had so intrigued long ago. As a very young woman, she had toppled this much, much older man backward onto his bed locked in a kiss. She shuttered from the memory of his powerful and unexpected sensuality. His experienced hands roved across her fully clothed body scaring her with the promise of something she wasn't prepared for. When she jerked anxiously away, those hands released her easily, as if she blew away a feather, without protest, without judgment. She ran away and he never asked her back to his room again. Those hands, those marvelous hands she never forgot, rested at ease now chained to the wall. His good eye showed no fear. She knew he would never beg, but it didn't mean she wouldn't try.

The sharp crack of her whip electrified the air. 

"Let the games begin."

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