Jade Swift has always wanted a man to fall madly in love with him and make him his own. He wants to be mastered by a man who adores him. When he meets Marcus Wynterbourne, an older, wealthy, dominant man with a passion for the whip, it is love at first sight.
Marcus is a politician who is homosexual in a time when men like him could go to prison for two years of hard labour. He is trying to live as freely as he can in 1885 when his sexuality is not tolerated, and his association with the beautiful Jade leads to rampant speculation. Hurt by a past betrayal, and unable to accept Jade's loyalty because of his flirtatious nature, Marcus casts Jade out of his house.
The young man loves his Master and wants only to please him. He wants to return to his Master's protection and to the circle of disciplined love he has built around himself in his Master's mansion. Jade is determined he will do what he must to win his Master's trust and restore his Master's reputation amongst those who would ruin him, Jade uses his wiles his to teach the men who would betray his Master a lesson they would not forget.
