Chapter 3: The Woman Who Knew Him
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The week passes in a blur of small decisions that feel enormous.
What do you wear to dinner with your lover's ex—the one who lived with him, who knew him before you, who was his center for three years? What do you say? How do you sit across from someone who once owned the space you now occupy?
I try on four outfits on Saturday afternoon. Karabo watches from my bed, offering commentary like a fashion critic with no filter.
"Too fancy. You look like you're going to a funeral."
"Too casual. You look like you're going to Checkers."
"The black one. But with the red shoes. Show her you're not scared."
I stare at my thirteen-year-old. "Where did you learn to be this wise?"
"TikTok." She shrugs. "Also, I watch you. You're not scared of anything, Mom. Even when you should be."
Out of the mouths of babes.
---
The restaurant is in Melville—one of those places with exposed brick and fairy lights and a wine list longer than the Bible. Master V reserved a table on the patio, where the autumn air carries the last warmth of the day. I still think of him as Master V, even now. Even after everything. Especially after everything.
I arrive first. On purpose. I want to be seated when she walks in. I want to watch her see me.
He slides into the chair beside me, takes my hand. He's wearing a charcoal blazer, no tie, and the kind of cologne that makes my knees weak even after all this time.
"Nervous?" he asks.
"No."
He raises an eyebrow.
"Terrified," I admit. "But not nervous. There's a difference."
His thumb traces circles on my palm. "You have nothing to fear, Lethabo."
"I'm not afraid of her. I'm afraid of what she represents. Three years, Daddy. She lived with you."
"And she left." His voice is quiet, steady. "She chose to leave. You choose to stay, every day. That's not nothing."
Before I can answer, she arrives.
---
Lomile is beautiful. Of course she is. I'd prepared myself for beautiful. What I hadn't prepared for was the way she moves—like water, like she belongs everywhere and nowhere at once. She's wearing a simple green dress, heels that cost more than my grocery budget, and an expression I can't quite read.
But it's not longing in her eyes when she looks at him. It's something else. Something hungrier.
Her eyes find Master V first. Then me.
"Lethabo." She says my name like she's tasting it. "I've heard so much about you."
"All terrible, I hope."
She laughs—a real laugh, surprised out of her. "Actually, all good. Motjatjo sings your praises."
So they've talked. Of course they've talked. Motjatjo, the bridge between every shore.
We sit. Wine arrives. Small talk fills the spaces—the weather, the restaurant, the ridiculous price of avocados these days. Normal conversation between women who are anything but normal to each other.
Then Lomile sets down her glass and looks at Master V directly.
"I need to feel it again."
The words land like stones in still water.
Master V's expression doesn't change. "Explain."
"Not here." She glances around the restaurant. "But I came back because—" She exhales. "My husband is a good man. A Dominant in his own way. But he's not you. He never will be you. And I've spent three years pretending that what I had with you didn't shape every cell of my body."
I sit frozen, watching this woman bare herself across the table.
"I'm not here to take you from her," Lomile continues, looking at me now. "I'm here because I need my Master. Just once. Just enough to remember who I am."
The word lands. My Master. Present tense. Like no time has passed at all.
Master V is silent for a long moment. When he speaks, his voice is calm—the voice I know, the voice that commands my body without touching it.
"You're married, Lomile. To a Dom."
"Yes."
"And he knows you're here?"
"He knows everything. He's the one who suggested it."
I choke on my wine.
Lomile turns to me fully. "My husband and I have an arrangement. We always have. He's my life partner, my equal, my everything in the outside world. But inside—" She glances at Master V. "Inside, I belong to someone else. I always have. Vincent is the only man who ever truly owned me. And I need to feel that again. Just once."
I should be angry. I should be threatened. Instead, I'm curious.
"What would this look like?" I hear myself ask.
Master V's hand finds mine under the table. Squeezes once.
"Lomile and her husband would come to the clubhouse," he says quietly. "Next weekend. A place far from here, far from prying eyes. I would dominate them both—her, and him through her. And you would be there."
My heart stops. "Me?"
"You." He looks at me, and in his eyes I see something I've never seen before. Not vulnerability—he doesn't do vulnerable. But offering. He's offering me something. "You wouldn't be a spectator, Lethabo. You'd be... present. Watching. Learning. Understanding."
"Understanding what?"
"Who I am. Who I was with her. Who I am with you." He pauses. "And at the end of it, you'd have a choice. About whether this—all of this—is something you can live with."
The silence stretches.
Lomile watches me. There's no malice in her eyes, no competition. Just honesty. Raw and terrifying.
"I'm not asking to take him," she says. "I'm asking to borrow him. One weekend. To remember. And then I'll go back to Cape Town, back to my husband, back to my life. And you'll have him exactly as you do now."
"Except I'll know," I say slowly. "I'll know what happened. I'll have watched."
"Yes."
I should say no. I should protect myself, protect my girls, protect the life I've built.
But I am Lethabo Mokoena. I raised two daughters alone. I knelt for a man and found myself on the floor. I am not afraid of ex-girlfriends and weekend arrangements and the complicated truth of loving someone whose history doesn't end just because I arrived.
"Next weekend," I hear myself say. "I'll be there."
Master V's hand tightens on mine. Lomile's eyes close briefly, relief washing over her face.
"Thank you," she whispers.
---
The rest of dinner passes in a blur. Lighter conversation, somehow. Once the truth is on the table, once the arrangement is made, the tension dissolves. Lomile tells me about Cape Town, about her husband, about the life they've built. She's smart and funny and not at all what I expected.
By the time we say goodbye, I don't hate her.
I don't even dislike her.
I understand her.
---
In the car, driving home, I stare out the window at the passing lights.
"You should be angry," Master V says quietly.
"I'm not."
"Why?"
I turn to look at him. "Because she didn't lie. Because she told the truth, even when it cost her. Because—" I hesitate. "Because I get it."
"Get what?"
"The need. The hunger. The way your body remembers someone even after your mind has moved on." I reach for his hand. "I'm not her, Daddy. I'll never be her. But I understand why she came back."
He's quiet for a long moment.
"I don't love her," he says finally. "Not the way I did. But she was important. She shaped me, just like Mitchell did. And part of me—" He stops.
"Part of you what?"
"Part of me needs to give her this. One last time. So we can both finally let go."
I squeeze his hand. "Then we give it to her."
He looks at me, and in his eyes I see something I've rarely seen: gratitude. Real, raw gratitude.
"You're extraordinary, Lethabo Mokoena."
"No." I smile. "I'm just a woman who knows what she signed up for. You never promised me ordinary, Daddy. You promised me you. And this—" I gesture at everything, nothing, the whole complicated mess. "This is you. I take all of you, or I take none."
He pulls the car over. Turns to me.
"I don't kneel," he says quietly. "I never will. Not for you, not for anyone. That's not who I am."
"I know."
"But I choose you, Lethabo. Every day, I choose you. And that's bigger than kneeling. That's bigger than anything I've ever given anyone."
I lean across the console and kiss him.
"Take me home, Master V," I whisper against his lips. "And then show me what next weekend will look like. I need to prepare."
His eyes darken.
"Yes, Sir," I add, just to watch him react.
He does. God, he does.
We get home tonight I get punished I get teased but I am not allowed any orgasm not once, I am furious inside yet some how I am still in need what ever this man tells me to do I will do. Later when I have given up and could no longer feel my legs sure to being baron numb due to all these orgasms denial. He looks me ninthw I and says come my lil one, God I cum so hard from just a command and now I know even if he was to use Motjatjo and told me to watch I would do it t gladly . I pass out from that orgasm.
Later, much later, I lie in his arms and stare at my bedroom ceiling. The girls are asleep down the hall. The house is quiet. And my mind is racing.
"Master V?"
"Mm."
"Next weekend... will I only watch? Or will I—" I can't finish the sentence.
He turns, looks at me. "What do you want?"
"I don't know. I've never—" I swallow. "I've never watched you with someone else."
"And?"
"And I don't know if I'm strong enough."
He cups my face. "You're the strongest woman I know, Lethabo. Stronger than Mitchell. Stronger than Lomile. Stronger than any sub who's ever knelt for me. Because you don't kneel out of weakness. You kneel out of choice. Every single time."
Tears prick my eyes.
"Next weekend, you'll watch. That's all. You'll watch, and you'll learn, and you'll understand. And then—" He kisses my forehead. "Then you'll come home with me, and you'll know exactly who I am. All of me. The past and the present. And you'll decide if the future still fits."
"It will," I whisper. "It always will."
He holds me tighter.
And for the first time all week, I sleep.