Repressed desires, irresistible obsessions, and perception-twisting games. When lady's maid Marian Osley and footman Valentine Hobbs assume their positions at the cliff-top estate of Valor Rise, they already share a history. Raised together as paupers in a London workhouse, they escaped through games of imaginary crimes and sublime punishment. Now they've been unexpectedly reunited--in subservience to the brooding Wythe Bornholdt and his frail wife, Diana. A master and mistress with their own dark secrets. In private, Marian and Valentine return to their playful and addictive games--now tinged with BDSM. But when lecherous Wythe sees something he desires in Marian, he turns the pair's diversions violently against them. The line between servitude and bondage is drawn, and the dynamics of dominance and submission will shift in this sensually charged novel of Gothic suspense.