-4-
Tara
The numbness from the ice on my mosquito bite had worn off, as had the distraction of the guy going down on me, so my ankle itched again. I twisted against the straps, frustrated I couldn’t get to do what I wanted, which was ironic. It was precisely why I came to the club, week after week.
To surrender. Being under someone else’s control was where I thrived.
What was going on out in the hall? It was always hard to tell when I was on the table, because time seemed to suspend beneath the blindfold, but Regan and the guy had been gone awhile. Definitely longer than a minute.
In my three years at the club, I’d only had a guy pulled from the room once. He didn’t have the funds in his account to match his bid, and after some renegotiation, he’d been let back in. Was that what was going to happen? I hoped so. The man tonight knew how to eat pussy, and I wanted him to finish what he’d started.
I couldn’t hear anything from the hall once Regan had ushered the guy out and shut the door behind them. The rooms were soundproofed. I never heard moans or screams from the other rooms while the club was operating. While the idea sounded sexy to me, I could understand it didn’t appeal to everyone.
Most of the men who came here wanted to feel like they were the center of the universe. It was all about him and how amazing he was at fucking the nearly faceless girl on the table.
Too bad it was hardly ever true.
The door opened with a whoosh and high heels tapped across the floor toward me. “Tara, you okay?”
We used fake names around the clients, so the fact Regan had said my real name was a bad sign.
“I’m fine.” Except for the stupid mosquito bite. Christ, I was never going outside again. “What’s going on?”
Fingers latched onto the end of my wrist strap and tugged the Velcro open with a loud ripping sound. “The guy wasn’t who he said he was. Julius threw him out.”
I lay motionless in surprise as Regan undid my other restraint. No, my body screamed. The anticipation for the orgasm still buzzed in my system, leaving me edgy. “The deal’s off?”
“Yeah.” She slipped the blindfold up onto my forehead, and I blinked rapidly against the light to bring her gorgeous face into view. Her smile was coy as she leaned in and whispered in my ear. “But there’s good news. You’ll come over later tonight, and Silas and I can finish what he started.”
She didn’t touch me, other than her soft breath rolling over my skin, because she never did when we were at the club, but energy ran along my nerves like static electricity. All from the authoritative tone of her command, and the promise of pleasure.
“Yes, Mistress,” I whispered back.
No one knew about us at the club. Not that they’d judge us, but because it wasn’t their business. Also, as soon as she and her boyfriend Silas had become my doms, their first order was that we kept what we did secret. Regan was the best sales assistant here, and I assumed she didn’t want people thinking she played favorites.
I sat up on the table and tucked my legs beneath me as she went to the hook on the back of the door and pulled down the silk robe hanging there. My disappointment vanished that the customer with the great tongue was gone and was immediately replaced with excitement.
It had been weeks since Regan, Silas, and I had gotten to play together. We didn’t scene on the nights I took clients, and business had been steady. The plus side was all the work made it easier now to go a night without making a sale.
She handed me the robe as her gaze lingered over me, and I felt flushed. With men, it was different. I was a beautiful woman, and they were hardwired to respond to that. Their appreciative stares gave me power and confidence. But with Regan? It caught me off guard. Like a thrilling, unexpected drop on a rollercoaster.
She left me breathless.
“I’ve got another appointment at midnight,” she said, meaning another deal she’d try to negotiate for one of the other girls. “I’ll text you when I’m done.”
I slipped on the robe and climbed down off the table, grinning. “I can’t wait.”
My upstairs neighbors were loud, but it wasn’t their fault. I heard them when they were screwing, or fighting, or just putting away groceries in the kitchen, thanks to the thin walls and creaky old floor overhead. We’d seen each other several times in the hallway or by the mailbox, but never officially met. It didn’t really matter since I knew everything about Brad and Hector.
As I came in my front door, the chandelier over my dining room table rattled. Heavy, deliberate footsteps stomped out, moving from the kitchen, to the bedroom, and back out into the living room.
Uh oh. Hector’s pissed about something.
I set down my purse, fished out my phone, and put on some music to mask the argument brewing upstairs. They were a handsome couple, but theirs was a volatile love. I stepped out of my heels and carried my phone into my bedroom, heading straight for the journal in my nightstand drawer.
The habit had developed way back when I started at the blindfold club. I’d needed to keep track of how many clients I was seeing and how much money they’d bid, because once I got a few regulars, I needed to make sure the offers stayed consistent. If I took one too low, I’d doom myself to that new price point.
I jotted down extra details too, although I wasn’t sure why. It felt good to put it all down on paper. Some nights I’d end up with pages and pages of notes. I wrote down everything, even who I thought they might be, since a lot of politicians and celebrities had memberships.
I grabbed the black journal and a pen and flopped down on my unmade bed. I scribbled the date at the top of the page and put down the original price of fifteen hundred, then scrawled beneath it how the deal had been called off.
In the apartment above, Hector’s stomp-fest continued, matching the tempo of the music I was listening to while I wrote. My pen scratched across the blue-lined paper, filling the page with all the details I could remember from the night. How the man had hesitated at first. How he’d used the ice. And of course, how his mouth brought me to the brink of an orgasm.
Damn, couldn’t Julius have waited ten more seconds before pulling the deal? Or had Regan pushed for it? The woman did love to delay my pleasure.
Thoughts of her and Silas had me hurrying along. Her text could come any minute, and I needed to get ready. I finished my notes, tucked the journal back into its spot, and hustled over to my dresser.
My lingerie drawer was comical. On the left side, it was sports bras and shapewear and the ugly-ass underwear I wore when I knew no one was going to see it. On the right it was all lace and straps and mesh.
I stared at my options as I shimmied out of the red, low-cut dress I’d worn to the club. Even though the clients never saw our clothes, we girls dressed to impress. What better way to feel sexy before a night of dirty, raunchy sex?
The raspberry colored bra and panty set was my favorite, but . . . hadn’t I worn it last time I’d gone over to Regan’s place? It’d been so long, I wasn’t sure. Instead, I grabbed the bra that was sapphire blue satin beneath black lace.
As I dressed, my gaze drifted over to the full-length mirror on my wall, and up to the envelope taped to the glass, the words ‘FILL ME OUT’ scrawled in black marker on the front. Inside was the application to audition for Dance Dreams, which was at least ten pages long.
I could pick up complicated choreography in minutes, not to mention wrangle an eight-inch dick, but this application? It was daunting.
Crap, I needed to stop ignoring the paperwork and just do it. I’d already picked my audition music, ‘The Scientist’ by Coldplay, assuming I’d make it that far in the process. Most people didn’t get a solo performance—they were cut in the group round. I told myself I wasn’t allowed to start choreographing the routine, the part I was most looking forward to, until I’d finished my least favorite part.
Tomorrow. I’d reward myself when it was done and would book some practice space at my best friend Elena’s dance studio.
My gaze dropped from the envelope to the mirror and, as I’d been trained to do for years, I scrutinized my posture and lines. I worked very hard and had a killer figure, but . . . would my twenty-eight-year-old body be able to compete with the dancers in high school and college? I pushed the question out of my mind. Negative thinking wasn’t going to help.
My phone chimed with an incoming text message.
Regan: I’m leaving the club now.
I stared at my reflection, all wrapped in satin and lace, and wondered how long I’d have this lingerie on. My cheeks warmed in excitement. Hopefully, not long at all.
Tara: On my way.