by Roxy Harte
“No,” a man says with a slight accent. “Try again?”
Frankie? Gorgeous, incredible, charismatic, once-upon-a-time-I-would-have-died-for-one-more-mind-bending-fuck Frankie? Hell, Frankie, as in the other lifetime Frankie better known as Master, Frankie?
More precisely the Master I’d deserted in order to marry the Professor.
“Cassiopeia?”
“Please don’t call me that, Frankie. That was a long time ago.”
“Time hasn’t changed the way I feel about you.”
I am stunned into silence. Is this a cruel joke? After almost twenty years, he decides it is time to get even with me for leaving him? Is he that sadistic? I don’t answer. Once I was bound to this man…heart, mind, body and soul. Bound more tightly by emotion and need than I could ever have been bound by any physical means…rope, steel, leather…and so it was only greater emotion and need that could tear us apart. My biological clock. I can feel the emotion behind the tick-tock, tick-tock as if it was only yesterday.
He announces, “I saw Paulette.”
Ah, Paulette. That explains everything. Mutual friend from the old days, big-mouthed gossip then, bigger-mouthed gossip now…and running with the same crowd. “So how is Paulette?”
“You should know. You had lunch with her last week.”
Ouch, terse. Swallowing, I decide silence is the best way to handle this very strange flash from my past life.
“You and John divorced?”
“Yes,” I whisper, wondering if this conversation could get any stranger. Hell, could this day get any weirder? John. I rarely even think about him. Sad, since I once really liked him. He’d guaranteed an intelligent gene pool for making babies and over our almost two decades of marriage we’d shared two-point-five kids (two of our own and one of his from a previous marriage who stayed with us summers), a dog and a vacation home on the lake. We never grew beyond liking each other though.
“Paulette showed me pictures of Briana and Elizabeth.”
I close my eyes, imagining Frankie holding the wallet-sized pictures of my daughters.
“They’re beautiful. They look so much like you.” He sighs over the phone.
I laugh. Yes, they do resemble me a lot…when I was younger…much younger. “They look a lot like I did. You’re right about that.” I wonder what else Paulette shared.
“Are they having a good time in Europe?”
Ah hell, Paulette. Is nothing sacred between friends anymore?
“Too much fun by my barometer.”
“Yes, Paulette said you’d changed.”
What?
“So you’re single for the summer. Any wild, crazy plans for you?”
Snorting, I wonder where on earth this more-peculiar-by-the-second phone conversation is leading. At forty-five I find my wild single life is defined by what brand of ice cream is on sale. Like my plans for this evening for example—wild, as in a quart of double-brownie death-by-decadence triple-fudge ice cream, and single, as in sharing said decadence with Jay Leno at midnight. “What do you want, Frankie?”
“Did you open my gift yet?”
“Yes. I can’t imagine what you were thinking.” I catch my reflection in the mirror and, tucking a stray curl, look a little harder…sucking in, standing taller. I suck in more, holding my breath.
“I was thinking it’s your birthday. You are divorced. And you are still mine. I want you home. Now.”
The breath I’d been holding comes out in a forced rush, my stomach popping back out the two inches I’d almost hidden.
“Come to me, Cassiopeia,” Frankie commands and it is as days of old. The memories return in a crazed rush—me kneeling at his feet, wearing his collar…me, pulling a pony cart at the Slave Games. Holy mother, that wasn’t me. Really. It’s my memory but it couldn’t have been me. I inhale, exhale, dots forming behind my eyes, phone shaking uncontrollably in my hand.
“Now. Cassiopeia. Come to me, now.”
Beep. Beep.
It’s a full second before I realize my call waiting is desperately trying to gain my attention. “Frankie, I couldn’t. It’s been nineteen years.” Beep. Beep.
“Can you hold a minute, please? I have to take this…it’s my daughter…one of my daughters.”
“Go, go,” he insists. “I’ll wait.” I’ve been waiting twenty years, what’s another moment? My mind says the unsaid as I switch over to the other line.
“Hello?”
“Hi-ya, Mommy. It’s Breeeeeee. We’re back in the hotel room all safe and sound, so you can stop worrying now.”
I hear Ells in the background, “Safe and sound. Love you.”
“Just ignore Ellie. She’s way too hap-py. She thinks she’s in lo-ove.”
“What?” I exclaim, really ready to get on the next flight to Amsterdam.
“Don’t worry, Grandpa wouldn’t let him come in the room. Besides, he’s an art history major minoring in education. What a loser. It’ll never last, so no worries.”
Art history major? Education? Oh hell, she’s falling for a young version of her father? What was I thinking, letting them go off to Europe without me? “Tell her no dating while she’s on foreign soil.”
“Grandpa already told her that.”
“Let me talk to your grandfather.”
“Can’t. He went to bed with Grandma.” Bree giggles. “Did Ellie tell you about the French maid costume? Oh my god. It was hil-ar-i-ous on the hanger…you should see it on Grandma.”
I hear Ells hiss in the background, “Let me talk.”
“Wait, Ellie. Gosh,” Bree tells her sister, then to me says, “I’m gonna go to bed now. I love you.”
I smile. “I love you too, baby. Good night.”
“It’s me,” Ells tells me, having taken over the phone and relays to her sister, “Mom said she loves you,” before coming back to me. “Mom? Bree says she loves you too, and I love you. I miss you.”
“I miss you too.” Tears fill my eyes and I wipe them hastily away.
“We are officially safe and sound in our hotel room. So stop worrying.”
“Okay, I’ll try.”
“No. Promise,” she insists. “I want you to have fun this summer. Get out and meet some people. Meet a man. You deserve to be happy again.”
I smile, my face screwing up as I try not to cry, thinking how grown-up she actually sounds over the phone.
“I am happy,” I insist.
“Yeah, yeah,” she mocks. “Don’t be mad at us about today, okay? We were just blowing off a little steam. You know we’re good kids, right?”
I assure her, “Yes, baby, I know you’re good kids.”
“Okay. Just so you know. I love you.”
“I love you too.” I wipe more tears away, trying not to sob out loud because my chest is aching so much with missing them. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Yep. Just like we promised. You will hear our happy, safe and sound voices every day. So you won’t have to worry.”
“I’ll worry anyway,” I promise.
“’Kay, Mommy. Good night.”
Click.
“Good night, baby.”
“It’s me.”
Oh hell, I think to myself, hearing Frankie’s voice. Shaking my head, I try to wake myself up from the dream I’m having. It’s too surreal hearing my daughters’ voices from so far away seeming so much as if they are in the next room, and then Frankie’s voice filling my brain in the very next sentence. I gasp, “Frankie.”
“Come to me.”
I shake my head, finally finding my voice to say, “That isn’t possible.”
It’s been too long. I’m not the same woman, even if you are still the same man.
But two decades hasn’t been enough time to forget the thrill in the pit of my stomach every time I’ve caught a whiff of leather over the years, not enough time to quell the instant wetness that coated the inside of my thighs the second I heard the timbre of his commanding voice, and definitely not long enough
to still the pounding of my heart as it tries to leap through my ribs at the mere thought of being held in his arms once more, post-flogging. What am I thinking? That I can just rush off to meet him as in the good old days? The key word here being old…as in I am old, used up, done. Not to mention twenty pounds heavier if the mirror and my jeans size are to be believed.
“Anything is possible, Cassiopeia, if you are willing.”
“Please, Frankie, I haven’t been called Cassiopeia in a very long time. We were kids then, playing a kids’ game. You can’t really expect me to meet you just like that, can you? I have responsibilities.”
“It was never a game, Charlotte. I’m sorry you thought it was.”
Click.
The dial tone buzzes in my head several seconds before I realize he hung up on me. And he called me Charlotte. Frankie has never, ever called me Charlotte. Damn. Damn. Damn.
Chapter Two
The bustier fits, as in fits like a glove. It seems custom-made just for me. I don’t know why I had to try it on again. Maybe because it’s my birthday, and I can’t stop thinking about the birthdays I shared with Him. Or maybe because sitting on my bed eating spoonfuls of ice cream I couldn’t concentrate on Jay Leno’s jokes because I kept smelling His aftershave. And a quick peek under the bed revealed that yes, he’d sprinkled his aftershave on the tissue paper.
So just to prove to myself the impossibility of going to him, I bravely pulled the sinfully soft, heavily boned garment from its packaging…to prove to myself I am not that girl anymore. But then I buried my nose in his scent…and then I was naked, sliding into the velvet bustier and matching thong. Big mistake. I wasn’t expecting to think I looked good—ridiculous maybe, but not enticing…
Yet, standing in front of the full-length closet mirror, I see myself. Maybe for the first time in two decades. I am a very erotic creature.
I’ve still got it!
Yes, I’m forty-five, but with the bustier, my figure is almost as good as when I was twenty-five…unbelievable but true. Yes, I’ve filled out a bit, curvier but luscious now in a way I never was then. I touch my pushed-up breasts, appreciating the way the soft fabric feels against my skin. The memory of who I once was, what I once was tumbles from the dark closet in my brain that has held those thoughts checked for so long.
I was the sex slave of Master François Rene de Hart.
I was loved, beloved, cherished. Collared. Owned.
Lying across my bed, I close my eyes, remembering a night Master was in a playful mood.
“Touch yourself.”
Without any self-consciousness, I did, sliding my fingers through my wet folds. I’d lingered over my clit, rubbing, teasing. He’d watched…every tantalizing swirl of my fingers, back and forth…he’d watched and he’d encouraged me, “Taste yourself.”
Without missing a stroke, I’d lowered my left hand to dip a finger inside my wet pussy while the fingers of my right hand kept up their erotic dance over my ultrasensitive clit. With thick cream evident on my fingertips, I’d lifted them to my mouth, sticking my tongue out to lick and swirl, tasting before pushing my fingers deep into my mouth to suck.
Without embarrassment, I’d touched myself, tasted myself and had the orgasm of my life while he watched.
Was I too hasty in denying him tonight?
Smoothing my hand over my midriff, I feel the softness of the velvet, the sharpness of the boning. I slide my hand lower to touch myself, feeling my own slickness and, for a brief second, it feels incredible, but then I realize what I’m doing and I feel absolutely ridiculous. What am I thinking? After almost twenty years, the girl he called Cassiopeia is a stranger to me. He too is a stranger. I have no idea where he’s been, what he’s been doing or who he’s been doing it with.
I tell my girls all the time, “You have to be careful. It’s a dangerous world. In my day sex couldn’t kill you—now it can. Get to know the boys you date and don’t rush into anything. Find out their history.”
Yes, they roll their eyes and make jokes. “Could you please fill out your complete history of sexual partners and note when and if you ever contracted any sexual diseases? Yeah, Mom, that’ll go over real well. You must really want us to stay virgins the rest of our lives.”
I don’t. I just want them safe. I don’t want them to fall into promiscuity as I did in college. I close my eyes, knowing Frankie had saved me from myself by convincing me to be his slave. I suddenly wish I hadn’t been so eager to dismiss him, though not for sex, not for Master/slave games, but to catch up. We could have met for coffee and chatted about our lives since the last time we saw each other, and maybe our sexual histories would have come up. Just in case we decided we might want to revisit the past…just a little.
I know my side would have been a very limited addition to the conversation. “Let’s see, there was John Phillips, no STDs, not even so much as a cold sore.”
Rather remarkable really, considering John’s promiscuity with the coeds.
It suddenly occurs to me that what I’ve been preaching to my daughters applies to me. Technically, by having sex with John, knowing he was having sex with others, I’d slept with all of his partners…I could have a sexually transmitted disease and not even know it. Ewww.
I pick up the phone and call John.
“Hello?” He sounds sleepy.
I look at the bedside alarm clock. One a.m. Yes, he’s been asleep for hours. Well, too bad, this is important. “Did you catch any STDs while we were still married?”
“What? Who is this? Charlotte, is that you?”
“Yes, John, I know there are a hundred other woman who might potentially call you at one a.m. No, let me revise, I know there are a lot of girls out there who might—”
“Hey, I take offense to that.”
“You shouldn’t, the truth is the truth. You’ve slept with a lot of young girls—”
“They’ve all been of age.”
“And I want to know if any of them ever gave you an STD while we were married?”
“You called me at one o’clock in the morning to talk about STDs?”
“Answer the question, John.”
“Why do you want to know?” he asks suspiciously.
“Oh my god,” I say, “You did! What did you bring home, John? Gonorrhea, Syphilis?” I jump out of bed, pacing, feeling dirty even though we’ve been divorced a year and stopped having sex three or four years before that. Dirtier because now I am thinking about this the way I should have been thinking about it all along…
“God, no, Charlotte. I never brought anything home. Why are you asking now? Are you sick? Is there something wrong?”
For a moment the concern I hear in his voice is a comfort. Once we were very comfortable together. Once we were friends enough that even though we didn’t love each other the way a husband and wife should, we could at least comfort each other. “No, John. I’m fine. I only wanted to know because I might start dating again and I needed to know I was safe.”
The silence coming from the other end of the phone is deafening, followed by a very terse, “You know they have STD testing now. You could have gone to the University clinic for free and had every test known to man run and I could still be sleeping.”
“I wanted to hear it from your mouth first, John.” I match his harsh tone, realizing we can’t even be friends anymore. “I’ll still have the tests done, but I wanted to hear you say I wouldn’t need to worry about the results.”
Hanging up, I breathe a huge sigh of relief. We might not be friends anymore, but I still trust him, even though I have absolutely no reason to believe a single word he says. I resolve to call the clinic first thing in the morning, even though the Pap smear I had done three months ago was fine.
I scroll through my received call list, my thumb poised to redial the only number I don’t recognize. I press, it dials, Frankie answers. “Oui?”
His French accent stirs something deep within my core…memory, desire, need. It was always so. Just heari
ng his voice fuels my lust for him.
“I want to know your sexual history, I want a clean bill of health stating you are STD-free, and I want to catch up over coffee. My god, Frankie, you call after almost two decades and just expect me to pour myself into a velvet bustier and march over to your house?”
He laughs and then he says, “Oui, j’attends cela.”
He expects that? “Well, you can just get over yourself. It’s a different world than it was twenty years ago.”
He sighs. “Tomorrow is Saturday. Meet me at Brahm’s.”
* * * * *
As I open the door, a small bell tinkles and I am transported back in time. I inhale the scent of freshly baked pastries and fresh brewed German coffee. Brahm’s Café hasn’t changed in twenty years—not the wallpaper, not the artwork, not the tables and chairs. As I cross the room to meet Frankie, it seems nothing has changed at all. From a dozen paces I feel the connection between us sizzle and I am drawn to him.
I stop walking though I am still paces away from him, fighting uselessly against his tug as I realize I am still his…heart, mind, body…and if I didn’t know better, soul, because it seems whatever chemistry we once shared hasn’t diminished at all. He is still gorgeous, his eyes sparkle as brightly blue as they ever did before and their allure is unmarred by the fine lines that appear when he smiles at me. His long, dark hair is still held in a ponytail at the nape of his neck, though the dark-brown hair is noticeably peppered with gray.
His dark-brown eyes are solemn as he stands and pulls out a chair.
I sit.
We are so formal with each other. We were always so formal. I never had with Frankie the relaxed mornings at the breakfast table sharing sections of newspaper as John and I did. Our mornings were structured. I knelt at his feet until I was bidden to do a task. I never wore clothing in the house, only my collar.
I try to imagine going home with Frankie…to stay…calling the house we once shared home. And then my daughters vault into the mental picture, bouncing and laughing…and I am at Frankie’s feet. Naked. God. No. I can’t do this to them.