by KD Robichaux
The club was Seth’s idea. He wanted a stable job outside of our missions, since living on split commission checks made him nervous. We never knew when a job would come in, and he wanted the security of knowing he had a backup. It rubbed off on the rest of the team, so the four of us invested in the club, which is now a great success.
“What the fuck, man? Who are you talking about?” Seth asks, leaning back in his chair and pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. I point at Vi on a security monitor behind his desk as she makes her way toward the bar, my nostrils flaring. “Oh, that’s VB. She’s an author here to do research for her books. I’ve been chatting with her for over a year, bro. No big,” he says casually, waving his hand in the air before wiggling his mouse to bring his computer back to life on his desk.
I hear a menacing growl fill the room before I realize the sound is coming out of me, and Seth’s eyes meet mine. “Corb, what’s up?”
“That’s my goddamn ex-wife, bro,” I sneer, and watch as his eyes grow wide behind his lenses.
“Corbin, I swear to God, I had no idea who she was. She keeps her identity on lockdown. You’ve never shown me a picture of Vivian, so I had no idea that was—”
“VB Lowe, Seth. Vivian Lowe. Are you fucking kidding me with this?” I growl.
“Dude, it never even crossed my mind. She just contacted the club one evening, asking if there was anyone who could answer some questions about the lifestyle for her books. I thought it was pretty cool she wanted to get facts straight instead of making up her own shit, so I’ve been helping her,” he explains. “I even made sure to keep my own identity hidden, because she said she was local, and I didn’t want to risk running into her around town.”
“Well what the fuck is she doing here tonight then?” I seethe, leaning across his desk and bracing myself on my fists.
He visibly gulps. “I invited her to come watch some scenes live. I’ve been sending her videos, always with my mask on, but I thought it would be cool for her to come and see it for herself. We’re sort of like… friends,” he tells me cautiously.
“What kind of friends?” I hiss, nausea and fury making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
“Nothing like you’re thinkin’, man. She just asks questions about BDSM, and I answer them. I’ve sent her videos of scenes here in the club, and we’ve Facetimed a couple of times. I wore a mask during those too,” he conveys, and I feel my temperature skyrocket.
“You Facetimed… with my wife?” I lunge at him, but he rolls backward in his office chair just in the nick of time before my hand can clamp around his throat.
“One, your ex-wife. And two, I had no idea it was her, Corb! And nothing went on during our video chats. Just more of me answering her questions!” he yells while I pant through my rage.
“And she has no idea what you look like?” I snap.
“No! She never saw anything of my face, and I always wore my normal Dom attire. Standard long-sleeved black shirt and jeans. She wouldn’t have seen my tats.”
An idea pops into my head, scattering most of my wrath. “Give me your mask. I’m taking over from here on out,” I order, and his eyes narrow.
“What are you going to do?” he asks, sounding almost protective of Vi. It both pisses me the fuck off and cools me down. Seth is a good guy. Even though he runs a BDSM club and kills people for money, he’s still a good man with a good heart. I believe everything he’s telling me, although none of it makes me very goddamn happy.
I take a deep breath and force myself to calm. “I’ll be her contact from now on. I’ll be answering her questions and giving her this evening’s tour. Got it?”
He pushes his glasses up his nose once more, visibly deliberating over what I’m saying. And when he speaks, it takes some of the wind out of my sails. “Corb, she’s… something ain’t right with her, man. Something is broken inside that girl. There’s… there’s a sadness to her, and she’s sweet. It’s kind of shocking that she writes the stories she does for a living. It doesn’t match her at all.”
I internalize his words to chew on later. But for now, I don’t show any weakness when it comes to Vivian Brown. “Don’t let her fool you, Seth. That woman ripped my fucking heart out. Now give me your mask.”
A COUPLE OF minutes pass after the door slammed shut and reverberated through the empty club, giving my nerves just enough time to ease before a strange feeling comes over me. I shiver, looking down at my arms crossed in front of me on the bar, noticing the little hairs are standing up on top of goose flesh.
My heart thumps inside my chest and pulses inside my ears. Everything inside me is telling me to turn around and run. After taking a sip of my wine, I reach for my purse and start to stand to do just that, but when I spin around on my barstool, I gasp and drop my bag to the ground, coming face-to-face with a black leather mask.
My hand shoots to my chest as if to keep my heart from leaping out of my ribcage. My eyes instinctively drop from the dark ones staring into me from the two small slits in the mask, and when they do, I take in the body covered in a long-sleeved black shirt and dark jeans, the same outfit I’ve seen Seven wearing in all his videos, pictures, and even when we Facetimed. I let out a nervous laugh, realizing it’s my friend—or the closest thing I’ve had to one for the past year.
“Seven,” I breathe, “sorry, you startled me. You’re freaking stealthy.” I get down on my knees, gathering up everything that had scattered out of my purse, stuff it back in the bag, and zip it closed. It’s then I realize the position I’m in. Seven hadn’t stooped to help me. He’s still standing tall, feet shoulder-width apart, arms hanging at his sides, but his hands are in fists.
Still on my knees, I realize my face is level with the zipper of his pants… and what’s behind it, so I force myself to look farther up his body, taking in the bulging biceps stretching the sleeves of his black shirt within an inch of their lives, and then up to the traps sitting like bookends on either side of his neck. He’s a lot more muscular in person than he looked on my computer. But cameras have a funny way of skewing one’s perception. I also thought he’d be taller. From down here, though, as I finally look into those dark, almost menacing eyes behind that scary mask, he looks like he’s a giant executioner, ready to carry out an order of “Off with her head!”
I glance away once more, my eyes landing on his black boots, and my heart pangs.
“Spit on it, baby girl,” Corbin told me, and I looked at him, horrified. “No, really. Spit on it. Why do you think it’s called a spit shine?” He chuckled at the look on my face, the sound filling my soul with happiness.
“Just, like… hock a loogie on your boot? That just seems so… unpatriotic. Like stomping on a flag,” I said, and he threw his head back and laughed heartily.
“Like this, babe.” He took his uniform boot from my hand where I had been scrubbing it with shoe polish but unable to make it gleam the way he did. I watched as he gathered saliva in his mouth before spitting it onto the toe of the shoe, and then he took the cloth from my hand and began to make tiny, quick circles against the leather. After a few moments, the black hide began to shine.
“Holy shit,” I squeaked. “Who knew?” I smiled when his chocolaty eyes met mine and he grinned.
“I’ve got something else you can spit shine, baby girl.”
A hand reaching down in front of my face brings me out of the memory, and I blink back tears. I tuck my hair behind my ear and take his hand, and he pulls me to my feet effortlessly.
“Thanks,” I breathe. “I, uh….” I look around, not knowing what to say or do. Seven still hasn’t said a word, and I feel a lot more awkward in his presence than I thought I would. He’s always been so kind and friendly when we chat.
Finally, he speaks, and his low tone sends a shiver up my spine. “You were having a drink.” A statement, not a question.
“Um, yeah.” I glance back at my wine glass still sitting on the bar.
“Would you like to finish it
while we wait for more people to show up? I can answer any questions you have,” he offers.
“Yes. Yes, that sounds good. Thanks, Seven.” I sit back on the barstool and set my purse in the one it had originally occupied before my klutzy moment, and he takes a seat next to me. I take a sip of wine, letting the sweet, cool liquid soothe my suddenly parched throat. I hadn’t expected my reaction to meeting him in person to be like this. I mean, sure, he was sexy as hell in his videos while doing different demonstrations, but I didn’t feel a pull toward him like I do right now. Maybe it’s just being in his actual, physical presence. I couldn’t feel it through a camera. I hadn’t felt a pull like this since—
“How is the wine, V?” Seven asks, tugging me away from my dangerous line of thinking, but not quite forcefully enough for me to move on. I never let myself linger on thoughts of him.
I don’t know why I’ve suddenly thought of him twice in the last few minutes. Once I’d made it forty-eight hours without having a single memory of my ex-husband pop into my head. Once. But when I realized I hadn’t thought of Corbin Lowe for two days straight, it was like overwhelming guilt flooded every cell of my body, and I spent the next week in a depression, where all I could think about was him. It took my psychiatrist prescribing Xanax to pull me out of it. She had since retired, and I hadn’t found another therapist. Luckily I hadn’t really needed one in the past year, ever since I discovered the world of BDSM and started writing my novels. I always felt guilty talking to her anyway, because I never gave her the full truth.
“V?” Seven prompts, grasping my chin and lifting my eyes to meet his. “The wine. How is it?”
I clear my throat and pull my face away, unused to people touching me. “It’s good. Thanks. Um… so this is your club. It’s a lot bigger than what the videos made it seem. I like the atmosphere. It’s a lot… cozier than I expected.”
“We wanted it to be welcoming as well as sexy. We’d been to some… not so clean establishments, and wanted to make sure to provide our clients with only the best experiences.” His voice is low, like it always is during our chats, but in person, it has a much more pleasing tone than through my computer’s speakers. It spreads over me like soothing aloe on sunburned skin, instantly cooling and refreshing. “To get the look and feel of the place right, we did our research, touring many clubs, both low-class and high-class, throughout the States, so we’d know not only what to do, but also for sure what not to do.”
I could probably listen to him read a phone book and be completely entertained for hours. His voice does something to me, healing something inside my chest while making me ache in a much different place. His deep timbre makes my core clench, and I want him to keep talking, so I ask him, “What are some things you found that you made sure not to include in Club Alias? I could have my characters find themselves in a not-so-swanky place.” I quickly reach into my purse and pull out my small notepad and lucky pen one my favorite authors sent me along with her signed books. I always used it to jot down ideas that popped into my head for my stories.
“There was one place in Vegas we went to. When you walked in, the atmosphere just felt… dirty. And not the good kind. Not the naughty, sexy kind. But the ‘I feel like I’m going to catch something if I sit on that couch’ kind,” he says with humor, and I laugh. The noise is foreign even to my own ears. It’s been a long time since I’ve let out such a girlish sound.
I clear my throat once again, jotting down a note about what he said. “Anything else about that place?”
“Yeah. A few things. It was brightly lit. It was gaudy and looked like they bought everything during a Valentine’s Day clearance sale. Reds and mismatched pinks everywhere, from the bed coverings to the couches and benches, pillows, rugs. Even the walls were painted hot pink. It looked cheap, like the cheesy lingerie you find at Wal-Mart during the holidays. I mean, it was Vegas. There wasn’t a membership. It was geared more toward vacationers who wanted to take a walk on the wild side, be voyeurs, and have sex in front of other people. It wasn’t really for people who lived the lifestyle,” he explains, and I nod.
“I see. But your club, it’s members only, correct?”
“Supposed to be,” he tells me, and the way he says it makes me think he’s talking about me being here, which doesn’t make sense. He’s the one who invited me here. He must see the uncomfortable look on my face, because he adds, “But sometimes we allow special guests. If we know someone from out of town who is in the lifestyle and would otherwise be members here if they lived nearby, then they can pay for a pass. Also, once every three months, we open the doors for new members. It’s only during this time that we go through the application process, since it’s so extensive. It’s would be too time-consuming and difficult to leave that open all the time. It takes the whole team to establish whether a person is a good fit or not.”
“Team?” I prompt, my head tilting to the side as I bite my lip.
He shifts in his seat, looking away from me for a moment to take a breath before exhaling. When he faces me once more, his tone is darker, less forthcoming than he was just moments ago. “Yes. There is a team of us. Each one has a different job to take care of behind the scenes.”
It seems I’ve touched upon a subject he’s not comfortable sharing about, so I move on. “Okay, so what are some of the things you did want to include in Club Alias that you discovered elsewhere?”
“There was a club in California we went to, and we liked the setup. The main room was a circle, like this one, so if you stood in the center, you could see into every playroom. What we did differently is add the booths to give the illusion of privacy without adding doors. You have to be on the other side of the booths to see into the playrooms, instead of being able to from the dance floor,” he tells me, nudging his hooded head toward the empty space between us and the bar on the other side of the room.
When I glance to where he indicated, I see a few more people have taken up some of the booths around the dance floor. I hadn’t even noticed, completely enthralled with what Seven was saying. God, he hadn’t affected me this way during our FaceTime calls. Nor while I was watching the many demonstration videos he sent me, and I had seen him do everything from a simple flogging to gagging and roughly fucking women against St. Andrew’s Crosses. Yes, I’d been turned on. The same as I would be while watching pornography. But it was nothing compared to the rapt attention Seven stole from me with his physical presence.
“Umm… w-what—” I bite my lip and take a breath, trying to calm the hurricane of feelings swirling inside me. “—what is the application process?” I finally get out, looking back down at my notepad to nervously start doodling along the perforated edge. The question is more out of my own curiosity than it is to go in one of my books.
The air around me grows thicker as Seven leans closer to me, and suddenly, I can’t breathe. I feel more than see his dark eyes take in every inch of my face, as if he’s reading each micro-expression like a large-print book. Somehow I know he sees right through my question, yet he answers anyway. “First, one may only start the application process by knowing an established member, someone who will vouch for the person’s character. That member is their sponsor who is responsible for them during the six-month probationary period. That just gets them in the front door. Next, there is a background check, for obvious reasons. Then, since we are in the world of sadism and masochism, they must see our psychologist for no less than a month, one session per week, to ensure we aren’t letting in someone with ill intentions. After one month, if our psychologist approves, then they are allowed into the club as a prospect. If he isn’t sure after the four sessions, he may continue sessions until he makes a decision. Usually, though, he can tell within the first month whether or not a person is hiding anything. It may seem over the top, but safety is our first and foremost priority.”
I’ve completely forgotten my notepad as I take in his every word. The way he’s responding to my question, it sounds more like he’s giving me instru
ctions, telling me what I should do, rather than just explaining rules a person would need to follow in order to get in.
I tuck my hair behind my ear and glance away from the mask. His voice makes me want to see the man speaking to me, find out what face belongs to the low timbre. But I know the rules. It was one of the first I ever asked Seven, when he’d sent me photos of the men all wearing leather masks that covered their whole face, the kind one pulls over his entire head like a hood. Most of the women seemed to prefer smaller, daintier masks, just surrounding their eyes. A few women didn’t wear masks at all. Seven had explained the expense of club membership, and the type of people who could afford such a hefty sum were the same people who wouldn’t want anyone to know their identity outside a BDSM club: doctors, lawyers, some of the high-ranking military. He also told me the women who weren’t wearing masks were openly in the lifestyle, so they didn’t feel the need to keep their identities hidden.
I’m pulled from my thoughts as Seven gently taps upward beneath my chin, effectively gaining my eyes. He must have noticed my automatic reaction to pull away last time he touched me, and tried a different approach. His notice and care to not make me uncomfortable did even more to warm me toward him.
“Anything else you’d like to ask? A lot more people will be coming in soon, so now will most likely be your last chance for the night, before the demonstrations begin in the playrooms. There’s no talking allowed once a scene begins,” he explains.
I think for a moment, and finally come up with one last thing, wanting to clarify his last response. “The timeline of membership, just so I… ya know, get it right in my story. Say the next opportunity to join is…?” I draw out the last word, prompting him to fill in the rest.
He pauses for a few seconds. Deciding whether to tell me the truth? “In three days, actually.”