by Jenna Barton
“Do you like arts and crafts furniture?”
“I don’t know.” I smiled up at him. “I’ve never seen this style before, but it’s beautiful. Different.”
“It’s a spindle chair. Black walnut, from the property. Carved onsite.” He passed long fingers over it, rippling the sheen of polished, dark wood. “This is from one of the original dining room suites. Found it in a back corner of the storage shed when I took over the house. Lucky to have a couple of them left. My uncle detested everything about his grandmother’s taste in decorating. I’m surprised he didn’t turn it all into firewood and replace the whole house with chrome and leather.”
“So he passed all of this down to you?” I followed him, skirting around the large chair.
“All of this, indeed.” He chuckled. “He did. For some reason, old Jackson approved of me. He was a blacker sheep than I am, as far as the family’s concerned, anyway. Probably raised nearly as many eyebrows in his day as Luce did with her people. Of course, we’re from Houston, so things are a little more relaxed so far south.”
“Oh?” I said with a weak shrug. Texas was Texas to me, a nebulous idea based on old TV shows and cartoons starring oversized roosters. “What did he do?”
“He did as I do—invested his money and indulged his interests,” Tate drawled easily. “What he was was the problem, as far as some of the Houston Jernigans were concerned. Uncle Jack was gay. And a Leatherman. And he was out, back when being gay like him was discussed in whispers as being a confirmed bachelor with a certain military bearing.”
He talked of his uncle—in truth his great-uncle—with a gentle pride as we climbed a less-ornate rear staircase. Once World War II began, Jackson Jernigan ran away from the most recent boarding school where the family had managed to place him. He joined the Navy at seventeen, lying about his age and entering as a seaman.
“Old Jack could have waited it out, I’d imagine, and if the call of the sea was really what it was about, I guess the family would have sent him up to the Naval Academy.”
“But he didn’t.”
“No. He didn’t. I didn’t get it until I was an adult and putting my own story together, but I think my family must have more than a few nonconformist genes. We’ve got a decent number of pirates, lawyers, and tropical land speculators swinging from the family tree.”
We passed a long window seat tucked under a row of the leaded-glass windows I recognized from my drive up to the house with Lucy. Before I could stop myself, I sank my hand into the olive velvet tufted cushion, sighing.
“It’s perfect.” I looked up and found Tate smiling down at me.
“Looks like your kind of spot.”
“Yes. I think it probably is.”
“Then consider it your spot at the Enclave, any time you visit,” he said, the picture of a gracious civility I’d only read about in old novels. “If you’re more comfortable here now, I can bring up your bag, maybe some tea or a snack?”
“No, it’s…I’m fine, thank you.” I gazed out the windows to the gardens below us. Stretching around the entire house, the terraces were filled with rambling flower beds spilling blooms of every color. Each level sloped down toward a grove of tall hardwoods. Past the house and the lush green treetops, a deep blue lake shimmered in the late afternoon sun. “It’s really beautiful here.”
Tate had also turned to the broad view of his home. He seemed contemplative as he scanned over the scene below us—and, when I looked more closely at him, a little sad.
“Yes, it is. A beautiful place, indeed,” he said. “I never seem to make it to this part of the house. Sometimes, all this space—” He looked to me, brightening. “Well, it’s hard to keep up with all the panoramas, isn’t it?”
I nodded, not quite able to dismiss the glimpse of resignation I’d seen a moment before.
“Erin, it’s a pleasure to have you with us.” Tate extended his hand to mine and pressed it sincerely between his. “I should find that kitten of mine before she turns hostile. Stay and enjoy the view as long as you like.”
He turned, hands in pockets, and sauntered down the hall.
I settled into “my spot”—no small undertaking, considering the Medieval contraption I still wore—and turned to the gardens again. The sun’s last rays lit the massive hardwood trees in fiery oranges and reds rivaling the scene on the lawn. Four women, their skin bare except for swaths of abstract body paint, danced in the grove below them, twirling hoops in the same shades of the sunset overhead. The “rope people,” as Walt had called them, had been at work too. Under each of the wooden scaffolds I’d noticed earlier, a lithe woman had been bound into exaggerated contortions. An approximation of a winged victory here; Eros bound there, and Psyche swaying gently from a third wooden beam. They too wore little more than body paint, shimmering in silvers and the cool, deep colors of the North Carolina night sky.
Inhaling, I stood and pressed the folds of my body back into some kind of order inside my corset. The wicked people really did have a mountain. And since I had finally found them, it was time to go look at what wicked meant at The Enclave.
I was directed to the rear of the house and a long set of terracotta-tiled stairs. As I cleared the second landing, I heard voices below me.
“—another new girl. She makes web sites or something.”
“It’s always a new girl. Those two are here for the pussy, and all you new girls make it very available, so everyone is part of that game. If you thought it was about something different, you need to grow up, Nicole.”
I stepped back, slowly, squinting between the iron railings.
“I think they’re nice.” Voices, both I recognized. From the home store in Shanesborro: It’s not Lucy.
“Nice? Okay, sure. Nice. Thanks to all of these nice people, turning my kink into a fucking tea party.” Another, unfamiliar voice huffed. “There, it’s fixed. Next time don’t rely on a satin ribbon to keep your boobs in your corset, Kelsi.”
Footsteps echoed through the stairwell, the clatter of high heels ringing over the tile steps. I froze, stunted by a thready racing memory of another new school and a new set of girls appraising me without bothering to conceal it. Like then, I couldn’t move without looking like they’d made me run away, so I started down the stairs, only taking each step once I was sure my foot was surely under me. Chin high, eyes forward. As I crossed the small vestibule and passed them, the three women stopped, the unfamiliar one at the front of their line.
“Hi, I’m Hawk’s Chalice.” She shifted a sheet of inky black hair from her shoulder and turned to me, offering her hand. “And you’re the new girl with Ranger.”
It was no inquiry; we all knew who I was. And there was no challenge from her, just a statement of fact. I accepted her hand. “Hello. I’m Erin.”
“Erin,” she repeated, nodding. “Alex. You’ve met Nicole and Kelsi? At the club in Charlotte, I heard.”
I nodded, too interested by her to glance toward the shuffling and twittering I heard going on behind her. “They saw me, yes. And I saw them. In Shanesborro, the next day.”
The twittering intensified. Would they start singing about being a Jet next?
“Good,” Alex said, smiling efficiently. “So we all know who each other is now, right?” She glanced over her shoulder. “See, girls, not that hard. This is Erin.”
Kelsi rose on her toes, peering over Alex’s shoulder. “Hey.”
Nicole, no surprise, remained silent, studying the bare white wall opposite us with serious determination.
“Nice to meet you.”
“There. Nice. We’re all nice and pleasant and have good manners.” Alex wheeled up a black nylon carry-on behind her. She stepped by me, turning as she passed. “Have a good visit.”
“I will. Thank you.” I remained in place as they walked past me, expecting Nicole to shove her shoulder against mine in a final flourish appropriate to teenage drama. Her skyscraper heels clicked as she navigated the small space.
I wa
tched them go, gritting my teeth. And though I hated myself for playing that old game of female one-upsmanship, I played over Walt’s dismissal of Nicole in my mind. Her footing at the Enclave was much more precarious than mine. If she pushed, this time I’d push back. I could. I was wanted here. With that small measure of certainty, I moved on to find him.
Once Walt lashed the cross into place and dropped a few of bags of sand over the flat base rails to steady it, he stepped back, huffing. Next time Paul came to order him or another DM around, Walt half-expected him to be snapping his fingers like a damn third-world despot.
Behind him voices and the sound of ladies’ shoes on the tile floor moved closer to the brick-topped alcove Paul had reserved. When Nicole was the first one through the curtain, it was a surprise that made complete sense after just a second’s consideration. How many girls like her had he watched move through the ranks of Tops until she was done? He squashed the urge to roll his eyes and made a final pass over the cross to make sure it was secure.
“This is going to be great,” she said, not bothering to disguise her glare at him. She made a show of putting her bag aside and sauntering over to the cross. Alex, Tommy, and Kelsi followed, blocking Walt’s exit.
He exchanged a quick hello with Tommy’s wife, Alex, who he had played with off and on through the years, and moved toward the narrow gap in the black privacy curtains that turned the space from unused wine cellar to private room.
Nicole tracked him as he moved toward the curtains, and made a show of stretching over the long, polished planks of wood. “Nobody’s ever hit me real hard with a singletail, Paul. Hey, can’t we use that lane over by the couches?”
To his credit, Paul raised his eyebrows at her and gave her a cool stare. “No. I’m using that space with my girls in a few minutes.” Standing, he stepped aside so Walt could pass. Instead of a clear exit, he caught himself just before colliding with Claire.
“Sir?” Flustered, she entered without acknowledging Walt.
Claire came to her knees beside Paul’s feet. This was always part of them, the way they were together. In a gesture Walt had seen probably hundreds of times in the years he’d known them, Paul’s hand went to Claire’s head, passing over her hair and traveling to her chin. He unsnapped the thin everyday collar she always wore and tucked it into his back pocket, then bent to his bag, bringing out a shining silver ring.
Claire’s formal collar.
He had been there, the day Claire bent her neck to Paul the first time—in this house and in front of many of the same people visiting for Solstice—and accepted his collar. The Saldinos had already been married in a nice ceremony over at Poplar Branch, in front of their families and vanilla friends, so the collaring a few weeks later seemed like another kind of partnership they agreed to, not something she gave up for him.
Everything around him was as familiar as the campground at Poplar Branch, or even the inside of his cabin, but Walt felt disconnected from the scene and people in front of him. And it should have been private. They always went off for a moment, just the two of them, and came back to the party after he’d put on her formal collar. Claire beaming, Paul looking down at his wife with pride, and no question this was a union—not just a woman executing his commands. When did she turn into an accessory for his ego-trip?
Walt took a backward step through the narrow doorway and collided with another body. He glanced over his shoulder and found Erin rising on her toes so she could peer into the room. His head snapped back to Paul and Claire in time to see him hold her formal collar before her. Claire leaned forward and pressed her lips to the glimmering silver band. She bent forward, hidden under the fall of her thick, auburn hair, and extended her neck so Paul could click her formal collar into place and secure it with a tiny lock.
Once her collar was in place, she sat back on her heels, eyes cast to her Master’s feet. Hands open, palms up, laid over her knees. And his hand came back to her chin, stroking the pale skin there in affirmation of her. Her eyes rose to his as she nestled her head into his hand, and fell shut again as she kissed his palm.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Was I…” a voice behind him said before gasping.
Erin.
Walt stepped back, blinking hard. The privacy curtain had looped over his shoulder and he was blocking the door. He turned to her, still trying to shake off the dozy-headed feeling that came from nowhere.
Nowhere. Because he’d been on the periphery of that ritual of Paul and Claire’s hundreds of times.
He smiled at Erin, and hoped it didn’t look nearly as false as he felt. “You ready for dinner?”
“Yes.” She peered up at him over the top of her glasses, that expression that always made him feel closely observed—and a little undone in the bargain. Her face broke open in a wide smile. “Did you know there’s women in body paint twirling flaming hoops in the rose garden?”
“Had no idea.”
She looped her arm through his. “You have to see them, Walt. It’s amazing. They might start singing about Mount Abora before it’s finished.”
“Yeah,” he said, and blinked hard again. He needed air and light. Out of this dark dungeon of a basement. “Right behind you, sweetheart.”
Some of the party guests were starting to make their way downstairs, looking for an open space. Erin paused by another open room.
“So this is the dungeon? Can you show it to me first?”
“Well, Tate calls it a playroom. He’s not into that darkness and brooding bullshit.”
Walt paused by a deep alcove where a wooden X similar to those I’d seen in Charlotte waited, his boots a few feet from long strips of orange and acid-yellow tape. His face hardened a little. “Now this is the whip lane. See how it’s laid out? The edges of the tape are safe. Anything inside that isn’t. When you see tape like this on the floor, be sure to look around you before you walk.”
“What is it for?” We crossed the wider room and into a corridor with a bank of doors, each opening spanned with the same black privacy curtains.
“Tate and Tommy throw whips. Me too, sometimes.”
“Whips? Like…in the movie?” I hummed a scrap of the theme music. “Whips like that?”
His face softened and he chuckled, scratching his earlobe. “Uh…well, kind of, but we’re not swinging them at ninjas or whatever those guys in black turbans were. And not bullwhips usually.”
“Saracens.” I could see the scene and characters in my mind but the correct terms…out of reach. “I think—not Sufis because they were the mystics, but Saracens…”
“I think ‘guys in black turbans’ will work for a pop quiz, Professor.” We stopped at the entrance to one of the last rooms. “Want to come inside?”
“Hm? Oh…sorry.” I shook my head to dislodge the memory and smiled up at him.
“Don’t. I never know what’s gonna come out of there. I like that. A lot.” He kissed me, settling me against his chest with more force than I expected. “You know, Tate made nearly every piece of equipment down here.”
“Really?” I glanced around us at the frame Xs and two-tiered benches. They resembled what I’d seen at Area 51—and in my occasional Internet research—only in shape and function. Each piece was much more substantial and elegantly finished from smooth, natural-stained wood. Before each piece and its possible uses could fully register, I turned away.
Walt looked down at me, smiling. “You can go look if you want to.”
“Oh. Um…”
“Or not. Whatever you’re comfortable with.”
“I want to, I’m just not sure how to do or…” Wincing, I shut my eyes at this latest new thing I was expected to understand at first real-world glance. And why wouldn’t he just show me?
“Hey,” he said, taking my hand. “It’s just some wood and bolts.”
“The hell some wood and bolts,” came a different voice—Tate, his linen shirt untucked and hanging open over his artfully distressed jeans. The woman Gala, now undressed except for a scrap
of red lace panties and her kitten ears, padded behind him. “Pardon, by the way. The curtain was open and I didn’t see y’all come in here.”
“Hey, no problem. Just showing Erin around.”
Gala slid Tate’s shirt from his shoulders. “I’ll get your bags,” she whispered as she trailed her nails across his back.
I turned to Tate, deliberately not seeing Gala’s very round backside sashaying from the room. “Walt said you made these?”
“I did.” He passed a hand over the glossy wood. “The first six months after I got sober, I took up woodworking, which Lucy always said was evidence I’m a secret masochist.”
“It’s all really beautiful.” Tucking my arms behind my back, I stepped closer to the bench he’d just admired. “It’s um…well, it doesn’t look like anything at Area 51.”
“Indeed.” Tate chuckled softly and turned to a weighty-looking X at the far end of the room, stepping in line behind Walt. As if on a string, I followed them. “No offense meant to TK, she’s got a fine place, but I suppose my aesthetic is a little different.” He stepped aside, opposite Walt. “Now I think this is your man’s favorite thing down here.”
Man? I looked around, gulping, and found Walt’s hand beside mine.
“Oh?” I reached for him and followed as he stepped closer to the large X Tate indicated.
“It was one of the first things I made once I figured out how to mill my own wood. This is black walnut and cherry, just like that nice spindle chair you were looking at upstairs. Walt and I took the trees down a couple of winters ago and as a thank you, I made a St. Andrew’s Cross that could even hold him. He is one of the best mentors we’ve got, after all.”
I turned to Walt, not bothering to hide my surprise. “Hold you?”
“Yeah,” he said, shrugging. “Mostly for the mentor group we do. We usually encourage new Tops to bottom with an experienced Top at first. Especially with the toys they’re interested in learning. It’s how I learned. And how the guys—er, people who work with me—are taught.”