His To CONTROL

CHAPTER 5 - JAMERSON

The contract is barely a fortnight old when Remi's possessiveness turns suffocating.

Before that night, the arrangement appears almost enviable.

Remi pursues Angel for a month with unusual patience. He attends performances without entering the dressing area. He books dinners around rehearsals rather than expecting rehearsals to move. Inside Cross, their scenes are intense, but every report reaching the management desk records clear negotiation and careful aftercare.

I see Angel change beneath his attention. She becomes more alert when he enters a room, as if her body recognises him before her mind does. She also looks happier. More certain. The development quiets my concern.

Their first contract is conservative by Remi's standards. Limited hours. No control over her employment or residence. No permanent marks. Either can terminate immediately. Angel retains her own contraception and medical decisions.

"You approve?" Remi asks after I read it.

"My approval is irrelevant."

"It has never stopped you before."

"She has meaningful exit terms."

"She won't use them."

The certainty sounds romantic if one is determined not to hear the warning.

I stand beside him on the mezzanine at Cross, mineral water untouched in my hand, while Angel performs beneath the amber lights. She moves with the same disciplined grace that first drew his attention. The audience responds exactly as audiences are supposed to respond.

Remi watches them instead of her.

Every lingering gaze tightens his jaw.

"Look at them," he mutters. "Gawking at what belongs to me."

"She is an artist. You meet her while she is doing this."

"That was before she wore my collar."

"The collar changes your agreement. It does not rewrite her identity."

He leaves before I finish.

I follow him down the spiral staircase, uneasy enough to ignore the meeting waiting on my calendar. By the time I reach the backstage corridor, Remi has Angel against the panelled wall, his hands locked around her upper arms.

Her robe is closed, but her face is exposed in a way nakedness never achieves.

"I won't tolerate it," he says. "Your performance career is over."

"Joshua, please. My stage fees pay my rent. I have loans. I love performing."

"I will replace every pound. Rent, costumes, bills. You perform for me behind locked doors."

Angel looks past him and sees me.

Shame enters her expression.

I should intervene immediately.

Instead, I tell myself they are negotiating.

"It's my independence," she says.

"Agree, or we end this tonight."

The pause is long enough to make the coercion unmistakable.

"And," Remi adds quietly, "I make certain no respectable West End venue books you again."

"Remi." My voice stops him from leaning closer. "That is not a choice."

He turns his head. "This is private."

"You made it public when you brought it into a club corridor."

Angel pulls her robe tighter. "I need a moment."

Remi releases her, but only after letting his fingers slide slowly down her arms. The gesture looks tender from a distance. Up close, it reads as a reminder.

"Of course," he says. "Take five minutes."

He walks towards his suite without checking whether she follows.

She does.

The following morning, an amended contract reaches my desk because Cross requires a second founding partner to approve financial arrangements involving resident staff.

The document is technically careful. Angel receives a monthly allowance matching her average performance earnings. Remi covers her rent, clothing and living expenses. Three months of payments survive termination.

On paper, it resembles protection.

In practice, he is replacing every independent income stream with himself.

I call him.

"The non-interference clause needs strengthening."

"She has agreed to stop dancing."

"That doesn't give you control over future employment."

"She won't need employment."

"Need is not the issue."

He exhales, impatient. "Add whatever language lets you sleep, Summers. She wants this."

"Does she?"

"Ask her."

I do.

Angel sits across from me in Cross's private library, blonde hair tied back and brown eyes fixed on the contract. Remi is not present because I insist upon speaking to her alone.

"If you refuse," I say, "your position at Cross remains available."

"Joshua says it would be humiliating for him."

"I am asking what you want."

Her fingers tighten around the pages.

"I want him."

It is not the same answer.

I point out the termination payment, the employment clause and her right to withdraw from the submission agreement at any time. She nods. She signs.

I approve the financial component because refusing would remove the few protections I can still enforce.

That is the explanation I give myself.

The next time I see Angel alone, I ask whether Remi has honoured the first payment. Her expression closes before she answers.

"Yes. Everything arrives on time."

"And the decision to stop performing?"

"We discussed it."

"That is not what I asked."

She looks towards the corridor leading to his suite. "I chose him."

It is still not the same answer.

"You can choose him and refuse a condition."

"You don't understand what it is like to have someone like Joshua focus on you."

Perhaps I do. Remi's attention has always made people feel selected from a crowd. The danger is how quickly selection becomes isolation.

"If you need the original contract restored, contact me directly."

She gives a humourless smile. "And what happens when he asks how I persuaded his best friend to take my side?"

"Safety does not have sides."

"Everything has sides when rich men disagree."

She walks away before I can answer.

Within a week, Angel disappears from the performance roster. When she comes to Cross, she walks behind Remi wearing a braided leather leash. The visual satisfies him. I can see it in the relaxed set of his shoulders.

She smiles when spoken to.

She stops laughing.

Cross staff notice the change, though nobody files a complaint. Remi remains charming in public and meticulous during recorded scenes. If Angel arrives subdued, people call it subspace. If she leaves early, they assume he is protecting her privacy.

The vocabulary of our world provides cover for anything people prefer not to examine.

I review their consent records more often than my role requires. Nothing on paper supports my unease. Angel signs every check-in. Remi follows every documented protocol.

I let documentation overrule observation.

"You're watching us again," Remi says one evening.

"I'm watching her."

His grey eyes cool. "Be careful."

"Is that a warning?"

"A reminder that your concern can become intrusion. Find your own submissive."

I’ve tried.

Over the previous year, Cross's matching service has introduced me to women whose experience, limits and preferences align with mine. They are intelligent and attractive. Some are eager to accommodate the demands of a wealthy chief executive. That eagerness is often the problem.

Two later accept employment at Cross. Another forms a successful arrangement with a different patron. Each ending is respectful.

None leaves me wanting more.

I do not want someone who performs submission because she thinks compliance is the route to my attention. I want an equal whose surrender costs something: a woman with her own ambition, boundaries and voice. If she kneels, I want the choice to remain visible in the act.

Remi calls that romantic nonsense.

"You're shopping for a revelation," he says over whisky in his suite.

"I'm not shopping."

"That is why you never take anyone home."

"Neither do you."

"Angel has a home. I pay for it."

The casual claim unsettles me.

"And if she no longer wants you to?"

He looks genuinely confused by the question. "Why wouldn't she?"

There is the danger I keep refusing to name.

Remi does not think of himself as cruel. He believes his attention improves the object receiving it. Money solves inconvenience. Authority removes uncertainty. Desire justifies persistence.

I recognise parts of that belief because my own family taught me similar lessons in cleaner language.

The difference, I tell myself, is that I understand restraint.

Months later, when I meet Sydney Ryan, I will discover how fragile that certainty is.

For now, I sign documents, watch Angel grow quieter and convince myself the rules of Cross will protect her if Remi ever goes too far.

I helped write those rules.

It is easier to trust paper than challenge my oldest friend.