I spent the afternoon in my suite trying to focus on anything other than the fact that in thirty hours, I would be in a room alone with Meric Solvang-Lykke, surrendering control in ways I could only theoretically imagine.
The Session Guidelines had been clinical. Precise. But they'd also been vague where it mattered most. Physical restraint. Sensory deprivation. Psychological boundary testing. What did that actually mean? What would he do? What would he ask me to do?
And why was the not-knowing so unbearably arousing?
I was pacing—three steps to the window, turn, three steps to the door, repeat—when the intercom on the wall beeped.
I froze.
It beeped again.
I crossed to it slowly and pressed the button. "Yes?"
"Dr. Kaelen." Meric's voice, low and controlled, filled the small room. "I'd like to speak with you. The Quiet Suite. Twenty minutes."
My pulse kicked up immediately. "Is something wrong?" I asked with a voice I couldn't tell if it was cracking.
"No. But there are clarifications we should address before tomorrow evening. If you're willing." He supplied calmly.
If I'm willing? Everything seemed conditional. Every interaction was a choice I had to make consciously, repeatedly.
"I'll be there," I said.
"Vigdis will escort you."
The intercom clicked off.
I stood there for a full ten seconds, staring at the speaker, before my brain caught up with my body. Twenty minutes. I needed to—what? Change? I was already dressed. Compose myself? Impossible. Prepare questions? I didn't even know what to ask.
I walked to the mirror above the desk.
The woman staring back at me looked nervous. Good. She should be.
I pulled my hair into a neater ponytail, smoothed my sweater, and tried to slow my breathing. This was just a conversation. A pre-session consultation. Perfectly normal, perfectly professional.
Except nothing about this felt professional.
The way his voice had sounded through the intercom—measured, calm, but with something underneath it, something that suggested he knew exactly what hearing him would do to me—that wasn't professional. That was calculated.
And I was walking directly into it.
Vigdis appeared at my door exactly twenty minutes later.
"Ready?" she asked.
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
She led me through the East Wing and stopped at the boundary doors. This time, she pressed her palm to the biometric panel, and they slid open with a soft hiss.
"This way," she said.
The Observation Wing was different in daylight. Less austere, somehow. The floor-to-ceiling windows revealed the full expanse of the fjord, the water gunmetal gray under overcast skies. We passed several closed doors—administrative offices, I assumed—and stopped at one marked simply with a small brass plaque: Quiet Suite.
Vigdis knocked once, then opened the door without waiting for a response.
"Dr. Kaelen," she announced, then stepped aside.
I walked in.
The Quiet Suite was nothing like Meric's office. Where that space had been minimal and formal, this one was... softer. Still elegant, still controlled, but designed for comfort rather than distance. A low sofa in charcoal gray. Two armchairs. A fireplace that wasn't lit. Bookshelves lining one wall. Another wall of windows, overlooking the water.
And Meric, standing near the window, hands in his pockets, watching me.