Stronghold (Stronghold 1)

by Angel, Golden

  "What I do with all my leftovers, leave them out for when the guys come home." Angel smiled smugly. During the past year she’d picked up on the perfect way to try out her recipes without gaining a hundred pounds. Bake when the guys weren’t home, eat what she wanted while it was still warm from the oven, and feed the rest to the human garbage disposals that she lived with.

  "This is the perfect pick-me-up food. Mmmmmm. Oooooo that’s good." Leigh let out a moan better suited to sex than food. They'd both been doing that all morning. Fortunately the weather was way too cold in January for the windows to be open so the neighbors couldn’t hear them; they’d probably think there was an orgy going on. Of course that just made her think of all the incredibly sexy, authoritative men that she'd met last night. Maybe one in particular. Just thinking about the way Adam's eyes had seemed to burrow into her, demanding all of her secrets, made her insides clench.

  "What's that look for?" Leigh asked, her own eyes looking rather demanding. They'd known each other for long enough that she could read Angel like a book. She sat up, looking excited. “You got all far away and dreamy looking. It's about a guy, isn't it?"

  Angel moaned and picked up a pillow, burying her face in it for a moment. Her friend knew her way too well. "I met a guy yes, and he's super-hot and incredibly sexy and no I'm not seeing him again. I just met him at a club."

  "When?"

  She hesitated. "Last night."

  "I thought you were staying in last night." Leigh was looking at her expectantly. Angel felt like burying her face in the pillow again. Even though they were seated on opposite sides of the couch she knew that Leigh wasn't going to give this a rest, and if Angel took too long about answering she'd find Leigh invading her side of the couch and probably poking her with her finger. First came the begging though. "Come on Angel, I need to live vicariously through my single friends. It will make me feel better and distract me from all my woes." She gave Angel a comically miserable face with her lower lip pouted out, but Angel could still see the real hurt that was in her friend's eyes, the desire to forget about her problems with Michael.

  "Okay but you can't tell anyone."

  Leigh rolled her eyes. "You know I won't."

  "I know, but I'm just saying. Like, seriously. This is kind of embarrassing."

  "You? Embarrassed about something?" Leigh raised one of her eyebrows, looking surprised. "This must be good."

  Angel stuck her tongue out at her friend. But it was true, she was rarely embarrassed about anything anymore. Too much time as a nerd and a klutz growing up and she'd become immune to the feeling. "Um... so do you know what BDSM is?"

  "Yes..." It was obvious from the way Leigh dragged out the word and her tone of voice that she wasn’t really sure where Angel was going with this. “We’ve talked about it before, remember? Stop stalling.”

  "Well I went to a BDSM club last night."

  Well that got Leigh's attention. She just about shot up like a rocket and bounced closer to Angel on the couch, her eyes alight with interest and curiosity. "No way! Wait... alone?"

  "Yeah, don't worry. I was pretending to be a Domme so no one messed with me."

  "Domme?" Leigh knew what the word meant but she obviously wanted it explicitly spelled out since it was now a word pertaining to her best friend and she wanted to make sure she wasn't misinterpreting.

  "As in Dominatrix. Woman with a whip. That kind of thing."

  Leigh's brow furrowed. "Wait, pretending to be?"

  "Yeah. I'm not. Dominant, that is. But I didn't want to put myself in a dangerous situation so I pretended to be for a night at this club that just opened up down in Virginia. I just wanted to see what a club was like before I put myself out there."

  "So you're going to go back as a... as a submissive?" Now Leigh just looked confused. Not her fault. The entire situation was a little confusing to Angel too. At least, her feelings were confused. If only she could go back as a submissive and see Adam again, but she didn't think he'd appreciate the deception. And, to be honest, she would hate to have to face up to it. Honesty was a big deal for her and yet she was doing something that was inherently dishonest. It bugged the crap out of her and she didn't really want to have to admit it to anyone. Telling Leigh was a little bit different, of course. They'd been friends for so long and out of all of her friends Leigh was probably the only one who could keep it entirely a secret and who wouldn't judge her. Plus she knew some of the terminology thanks to the new BDSM book craze. Leigh was nothing if not an avid reader, not at all surprising since she was an English teacher.

  "No, not back there. There's a club in DC that I want to go to, called Stronghold. But I didn't want to start out there because I was too scared to go into a fetish club for the first time as a submissive. I don’t know what I’m doing, I don’t have anyone to go with and there are too many bad things that can happen." It was one of the first things she taught women who took her self-defense classes – one of the best defenses is not putting yourself in a dangerous situation. Ideally women would be safe no matter where they were, but the truth of the matter was that they weren’t and the best defense was a good offense and that meant not recognizing bad situations and avoiding them.

  "I can get that," said Leigh, nodding her understanding. "Especially alone. Why didn't you call me?"

  "You can't come," said Angel immediately, looking at her friend aghast. "Michael would flip out! Not to mention that it's not something you're interested in... Is it?"

  Her friend hesitated and then shrugged. "I probably could be if Michael was. I like it when he ties my hands to the bed but we haven't really done anything other than that. It's fun to read about though. But you're right, he wouldn't want me there." She sighed and then brightened again. "So tell me about the guy."

  "There was actually a whole group of guys," Angel said, keeping her tone casual. She knew that Leigh wouldn't entirely buy it, she was the one person who almost always managed to see through any of Angel's acts. "They were all very attractive. Very alpha-male. And very friendly. It almost made me wish that I had gone there as a submissive."

  "But you can't go back there as a submissive cuz then they'd know you were lying. That sucks."

  "Yeah," Angel shrugged. "But there will be other Doms at Stronghold." Would any of them have the surprising attraction for her that Adam did? She hoped so. Otherwise she was really going to regret this plan. But she found herself not wanting to tell Leigh about her attraction to the one man in particular, because it wasn't something that could ever lead somewhere. After all he must live somewhere down in Virginia to be at Chained rather than at Stronghold and she'd lied to him. The former might not be a huge deal but the latter probably was.

  "Good. Well I'm glad that you're getting out there and looking."

  Angel just had to laugh. All of her friends were always trying to hook her up with guys, not that she really felt like she needed it. None of her relationships had worked out because she hadn't been admitting what she truly needed. Now she was finally admitting to what she wanted and she was going to get it. Going to Chained had just been the first step.

  For the rest of the afternoon she and Leigh finally managed to stop eating the caramel butter bars (they were slightly easier to resist once they had cooled a little but only slightly), finished the fourth season of The Tudors and she told Leigh all about Chained. By the time she left, Leigh was in a much better mood and feeling much more optimistic about her relationship and life in general. Angel was feeling a lot better too. The impromptu girl time had definitely been something they both needed.

  Smiling to herself, she cleaned up the kitchen, left the bars out for the guys just in case they came home while she was up in her bedroom, and went to study her lines.

  ******

  Despite the busyness of his work week, a certain hazel-eyed Domme kept popping up in Adam's thoughts. He owned his own temp agency that also did head hunting for people who preferred to hire immediately and it had been getting busier and busier
lately thanks to a recent hire of his friend Justin to handle social media marketing. For the first few days he would push the image of Angela aside - was that her real name or was she one of the ones who had assumed a name for the club? - and find something to distract himself with. Then on Wednesday he found himself looking up the play The Rivals online. The description of the character of Lydia made him grin. He could definitely see Angela playing a part like that; bouncy, seductive, a little manipulative in a comedic and enticing way, and overly dramatic, the queen of all she surveyed. Telling himself he’d just been curious about the play, he turned his mind back to work.

  During his lunch break on Thursday he searched the internet to see what community theaters in the area were doing a production of The Rivals. There weren't any in Virginia, but there was one in Maryland. Not too far away from him actually, by a group called The County Players. The theater they performed at was only about a twenty minute drive from his house and the show opened in two weeks. Interesting. So what was Angela doing performing in a community theater show an hour and twenty minutes away from Chained? Did people travel that far to do community theater? Or maybe she was just traveling that far in order to be in the particular show? It looked like there were plenty of other options for her to perform at if she lived near Chained that were much, much closer.

  So why was she in a show up here?

  Frowning he grabbed his cell phone and pulled up Rick on his contact list.

  "Hey Adam, what's up?"

  "Are you going back to Chained this weekend?" Adam hated talking on the phone so his friends knew not to bother with small talk when he called and he knew Rick wouldn’t be surprised by a more cordial greeting.

  "I was thinking about heading up to Stronghold actually, why? Wanted to see if you could run into Mistress Angela again?" Rick emphasized Angela's title a little, as if reminding his friend that he needed to give up on this. They'd talked about it Saturday night when he'd gone back to Rick's place and even though his friend agreed that Angela might have submissive tendencies that she wasn't aware of, he thought that Adam needed to let her explore and come to that conclusion on her own without outside interference. After all with all of his experience and his naturally dominant personality, it was possible that he could end up pushing her into something that she didn't actually want just because it was what he wanted.

  "Maybe." He decided not to tell Rick about his internet searches. Somehow it seemed a little too much like stalking. Seemed? Keep telling yourself that. "I won't push her Rick, I promise. I just want to see if she's there again. And maybe there will be other available subs this weekend."

  Rick chuckled. "You don't believe that any more than I do. Alright man, I'll take one for the team. Just watching you moon over a Domme is worth it in entertainment value and it'll save me some gas money."

  "Thanks," said Adam dryly. "I'll see you Saturday. Nine p.m.?"

  "Works for me. See you then."

  Adam snapped his phone shut.

  "Was that about the Domme Chris told me about?" Justin drawled from the doorway of Adam's office. He was leaning against the frame, arms crossed over the broad expanse of his chest. While Adam and Rick looked alike enough superficially because of their hair and build, Chris and Justin really did look like they could be brothers or possibly even twins. Even their facial features were somewhat similar, and the more time they'd spent together in their threesome relationship with Jessica the more their behaviors had rubbed off on each other as well. Two years ago Justin might not have even asked that question, and if he had it wouldn't have been with amusement in his eyes or the slight teasing note in his voice. Although he was glad to see his friend more relaxed, thanks to Chris and Jessica's influence, Adam rather missed those days sometimes. Like now.

  "Yes." There was no point in denying it, Rick would just tell on him anyway. Sometimes their group of friends could be as bad as teenage girls when it came to gossip, sad to say. "What do you need?"

  Fortunately Justin retained most of the “get down to business” aspects of his personality. Chris would never have let the subject go that easy, but Justin just walked forward into the office to stand by his desk. One of the reasons he and Adam got along so well was because neither of them minced words. Whatever Justin needed he obviously didn't think it was going to take a long discussion because he didn't sit down.

  "I'm going to need some help soon," he said. "Everything's expanding so quickly that I'm going to start running behind eventually with everything that needs to get done. Especially since Linda's going to need some maternity leave soon." Linda was Adam's main marketing person (as well as wearing several other hats), she worked closely with Justin, and while the original plan had been for him to pick up the slack while she was out, the truth was the entire department was getting busier the more successful the company became. Adam also wanted to open up the possibility of consulting services in the near future and that was going to need a whole new marketing angle.

  "Okay," he said. "Talk to Victor and let him know what you need. If we're really lucky maybe one of our temps will be interested, otherwise he can start the ball rolling on looking." It wouldn't take him long, he was one of the most efficient HR people Adam had ever met.

  "Thanks." Justin turned to go and then stopped once he got to the doorway again. "Maybe I'll come down with you on Saturday and bring Jessica."

  "Chris told me he didn't think you would be interested."

  "In Chained? No. In meeting Mistress Angela? Absolutely. I bet Olivia will want to come too."

  Adam growled at him but Justin just laughed and walked away. Maybe he should rethink Saturday. He’d finally decided that he wanted a serious relationship. Ready for commitment. He should be out looking for a sub who was interested in that too. But he knew he wouldn’t. The mystery of Mistress Angela was bugging him too much at the moment.

  *******

  “Saturday?” Angel asked, feeling her heart sinking.

  “Please, please, you have to,” begged Leigh. “I know it’s last minute, but I can’t be there alone. I can’t. Michael’s acting so weird lately and I’m likely to fall apart if I don’t have a friend there to keep me sane.”

  Angel groaned. It was Thursday morning and her plans for returning to Chained on Saturday again were falling apart. So much for her secret hopes of seeing Master Grouchy. Now she was the grouchy one. Leigh had called her during one of her classes, which she never did, and Angel had answered her cell phone thinking that it must be some kind of emergency. Well, according to Leigh it was.

  Some big benefit dinner was happening on Saturday and Leigh was attending with Michael of course. They were supposed to be going with another couple, one of Michael’s friends from college who was a former reality television star and his wife. Unfortunately his wife had just been diagnosed with mono and wasn’t going to be making any kind of public appearances for a while. Owen needed a date and Leigh needed a back-up friend.

  “I hope he’s okay with the fact that I’ve never seen his stupid show,” she muttered, feeling a large amount of resentment towards a man she’d never met. Not that Adam had said he’d be back at Chained this Saturday. But people tended to follow habits. Maybe this was fate’s way of telling her that she needed to stay away from that group of men. It was probably for the best. After all it wasn’t as if she could actually pursue the guy. He thought she was a Domme and she hadn’t given herself much wiggle room there.

  “I’m sure it will be fine,” said Leigh, excited now that she had her victim well ensnared. “Thank you, thank you so much. You won’t-”

  “Please don’t say I won’t regret this,” interrupted Angel, although she had a smile on her face. “We both know that’s probably not true.”

  Not only would she be missing out on seeing sexy dominant men, she was going to be paired up with someone who actually wanted to put part of their personal life out on television. Ugh. She would never understand the appeal to that.

  “He’s a nice guy,
I promise.”

  “You owe me. Email me the details, I’ve got to get back to my class.”

  Not the best way to finish out her class, her concentration was completely shot. Fortunately by the time Leigh had called the women were already practicing the hits that Angel had showed them, taking turns back and forth with their pads. The room echoed with the word “NO!” being shouted over and over again.

  “Yell it as loud as you can, every time,” Angel reminded Priscilla, one of the women who often got so into hitting the pads as hard as she could that she would forget to yell, before moving on to watch the next pair.

  Her mind kept wandering though; she still wanted to go back to Chained. At least one more time before she turned around and went to Stronghold. So she’d go on Friday instead. Next weekend her show opened and if she went Chained she’d have to stay until two in the morning to make the drive worth it.

  Sighing she reminded herself that she hadn’t wanted to run into Mr. Grouchy again anyway. Right?

  “More from the waist, Nicole, right now you’re punching from your shoulder, you need to get your whole body into it.”

  Maybe it was best she couldn’t go on Saturday again, she mused as she watched Grace attack the pads Bridget was holding with renewed fervor. If the same Doms were there then maybe she could consider it fate and force herself to tell the truth. If she didn’t then she’d know that she should just keep with her original plan of moving on to Stronghold. Leaving it up to fate, as it were.

  **********

  Friday night at Chained wasn't as bad as last Saturday night. It was worse. There were no major interruptions to the evening, thank goodness, the Dungeon Monitors didn't need to do anything than walk around and keep an eye on things, but none of the group she'd met last Saturday were there either. She wandered around and watched the various scenes, even met a few other Doms and Dommes who were very nice although none of them were as friendly as Chris, Andrew, Rick and Mr. Grouchy. As she explored she found herself feeling disappointed rather than interested. Bored rather than intrigued. The only big difference between this week and last week was that there was no Mr. Grouchy. She found herself sitting back at the table she'd sat at with him last week when everything had seemed shiny and new, despite the gaudiness of the club, and thinking about Adam. Master Adam.