Fast and Loose Page 7

  ‘I’ll plan every detail in future,’ he said. ‘I’ve got all kinds of ideas for things I can do to you, Foxy. All kinds.’

  He reclined for a moment, his eyes shut, dreaming, then he snapped back to life.

  ‘But we’re getting ahead of ourselves,’ he said. ‘We need to get that Safeword profile sorted. Your place?’

  ‘Oh…I guess,’ I said, but I had misgivings about parading him in front of Jess and Mehra. They worked in the ad sales department, and they knew all about Tom and his reputation. They weren’t great friends with Tilda, so it might not get back to her that way, but on the other hand the Clarion was office gossip central.

  He raised an eyebrow at my obvious reluctance.

  ‘Have you got another man stashed away in there?’ he asked lightly.

  ‘No. But I’ve got two flatmates. Two flatmates who work at the Clarion and love to gossip.’

  He tilted his head to one side.

  ‘You’re ashamed of me?’

  ‘No! But I don’t want it getting back to Tilda. Not right now.’

  He gave me a long and contemplative look, then nodded slowly.

  ‘OK. I can see the reasoning. But Tilda and I were a long time ago now…’

  ‘Yes, but Tilda and I aren’t. Besides, I don’t like the whole place knowing my business.’ And I don’t want to deal with the fall-out in public when you inevitably drop me.

  ‘Nah, you’re right,’ he said. ‘We should keep this to ourselves for now. OK, we’ll go to mine then. You’d better button that blouse first. Don’t want the speed camera on Jackson Street getting an eyeful, do we?’

  He winked and I laughed, my head light with all the implications of his ‘for now’ comment. This all seemed to be going suspiciously well.

  Tom’s place was a top-floor flat in the new development by the canal.

  ‘Edgy city living,’ he said with an ironic smile, punching numbers into the keypad at the communal door. ‘A. k. a., overpriced rabbit warren overlooking an industrial estate. But it’s handy for town, so…’

  We filled the lift with the smell of chow mein from our takeaway cartons, underscored with something substantially more animal. In the elevator mirror, we looked like two ravenously hungry people who had just had sweaty jungle sex. The mirror didn’t lie, but I wished it could at least be economical with the truth. I looked an absolute sight. I wondered if he’d let me use his shower.

  But he was keen to get on with business – with the detective side of business, that is – and we ate at his computer desk, occasionally dropping noodles on the keyboard as we fabricated a Mia-alike submissive personality for the kinky social network. It would have been helpful to have Mia’s own profile – she had been a member here, after all – but it appeared to have been deleted.

  ‘What shall we call her?’ he asked, once he’d got the membership details email and opened up the profile page.

  The question of a name took us all the way through our cartons. Tom favoured names with a punning theme, reasoning that Mia herself had used one, but I didn’t think it was necessary to copy her in every respect.

  ‘I don’t think she needs to sound like a burlesque dancer,’ I argued. ‘I think the doms who frequent these sites will message any new submissive, especially if they see that she’s local. We shouldn’t overthink it.’

  ‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to look as if we’re trying too hard.’

  ‘Exactly. So it can be a bland name, and I think we should add a local angle.’

  ‘Northavon Nymph?’ suggested Tom.

  ‘Yeah…or…Northavon Neophyte. That gets the rookie angle in as well. And might appeal to the better educated types…like J, for instance.’

  ‘Neophyte.’ Tom rolled the word on his tongue. ‘God, I love subs.’

  ‘Are you talking subeditors or submissives?’ I asked with a sideways smile.

  ‘Both,’ he said. ‘OK.’ He typed our new moniker into the profile, making our fake identity concrete. It was slightly alarming to see it there in flickering Arial.

  We tried our best to simulate Mia’s profile – same age, same location, same level of education. Then it came to the part where we had to tick a long list of kinks.

  Tom looked at me. ‘I guess we’re doing this as Mia?’ he said lightly.

  ‘I guess. I know what she wrote about most often, so…’

  ‘Abrasion?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m not sure what that involves,’ I said. ‘Sandpapering the nipples, maybe? I’d leave that one blank.’

  ‘You don’t fancy it yourself?’ Tom flashed a grin. ‘I can head down to B & Q if you’re curious.’

  ‘No, that’s OK. Age Play? I don’t think so. She didn’t call J Daddy or anything like that.’

  ‘What about me? Would you call me Daddy?’

  ‘I wouldn’t,’ I said shortly, noticing the next category and blushing in advance.

  ‘Ah,’ said Tom, a happy sigh. ‘Anal Sex. Yay or nay?’

  ‘That’s a yay. From Mia,’ I added hastily.

  ‘But not from you?’

  My cheeks burned.

  ‘Uh, it’s a maybe. From me.’

  ‘Interesting.’

  Before he could continue this theme, I blurted out the next one.

  ‘Asphyxiation!’

  Tom raised an eyebrow. I shook my head.

  ‘Ball Stretching, well, that wouldn’t apply to female submissives, obviously…Bathroom Use Control? Have you ever heard of that?’

  ‘Making you cross your legs?’ surmised Tom. ‘I’m more interested in getting them uncrossed, personally.’

  ‘Mia never mentioned anything of that sort anyway. Begging? I’m guessing they don’t mean sitting on the station forecourt with a skinny dog. Put a tick. I think she liked being made to beg.’

  ‘And what Mia likes, Foxy likes too,’ said Tom teasingly.

  He wasn’t wrong, but I didn’t want to tell him that.

  ‘I’m bearing all this in mind,’ he continued. ‘Biting?’

  ‘Hmm, depends,’ I said. ‘I guess a bit of nipping, love bites or whatever. Nothing cannibalistic, though.’

  ‘Definitely,’ he agreed. ‘Blindfolding has to be a yes, though?’

  ‘Yes. I dunno about Breast Bondage, though. Is that where they tie a rope around them until they stick out and you can see all the veins?’ I grimaced.

  ‘They ought to put some gradations on this,’ said Tom. ‘Mild, moderate, all systems go.’

  ‘Quite,’ I said. ‘There are shades and tones.’

  ‘Fifty shades?’ he suggested with a wink.

  ‘More than that. Is Breath Control not the same as Asphyxia?’

  ‘Milder, by the sound of it. Still a no?’

  ‘I think so. And so is Branding!’ I exclaimed with a slight yelp at the item below.

  ‘Ouch.’ Tom drew his initial on my wrist with a fingertip. ‘Wouldn’t you?’

  ‘No, I bloody well wouldn’t. But Mia did say something once about getting a tattoo. Not the same, though, is it?’

  ‘Needles versus red-hot metal,’ mused Tom.

  ‘Jess is massively into it,’ I said. ‘She’s got them all over her back and upper arms. That’s why she always has to wear a jacket at work.’

  ‘Brandings?’

  ‘No, wise guy, tattoos.’

  ‘Ah, phew. Boot Worship, anyone?’

  I couldn’t resist a glance down at Tom’s boots. They were only a little bit dusty.

  ‘Isn’t that more a Dominatrix thing?’ I said. ‘Patent leather, six-inch heels.’

  ‘You wouldn’t kiss my boots?’

  ‘I might,’ I said, laughing with embarrassment. This conversation was too surreal. ‘Not if they were wellies, though.’

  He laughed back. ‘After a good old tramp up Golbury Hill. Delicious!’

  ‘I’m not sure about that one,’ I continued. ‘But the next is a definite tick. Bondage (mild).’

  ‘Not (heavy)?’ he asked with a ti
ny pout.

  ‘I’m not sure where mild crosses over into heavy,’ I admitted. ‘So…maybe tick both.’

  And so it went on. We rejected the irrelevant (Cock and Ball Torture), the too intense (Knife Play), the too far-out (Diapering) and the frankly frightening (Gun Play). We entered into interesting discussions about what some of them actually involved (Mummification, Pup Play) before leaving them blank.

  But those were the easy parts. Where it got difficult – and squirm-inducing – was in placing the ticks in the boxes. Because the boxes weren’t just Mia’s; they were mine too, and Tom would know it.

  It was, for example, extraordinarily hard to own up to a possible enthusiasm for Caning.

  I found myself muttering, ‘Dunno, seems a bit painful, maybe.’ But Mia had done it, and both loved and hated it, so I couldn’t leave it blank.

  For most of them, I could allay my mortification by referring to posts Mia had written on the subject, placing them at a distance from myself. But there were others that she hadn’t done yet, but was surely going to do at The Academy. Most of these revolved around public display, humiliation, shared use. I had to agree to tick them, while my scalp crawled with the knowledge that Tom’s brain must be ticking over with all this intimate information. Applying it to me.

  ‘Whipping?’ he said, ticking it without even waiting for my answer.

  ‘Writing Lines,’ I read the last in a surprised tone of voice. ‘How very erotic.’

  ‘Don’t you think so?’ He turned to me, his hands on his knees. ‘Didn’t you ever fancy a schoolteacher?’

  ‘Well, yeah, I did,’ I said, realising now that it had crossed my radar that I did find the idea quite arousing. Especially if there was a spanking before or after it. Or both. ‘OK, tick it.’

  He placed his final triumphant tick in the box and flicked his eyes back to me. They glinted with mischief.

  ‘Quite a list,’ he said.

  ‘Well, Mia tried her hand at a lot of things,’ I said, looking down at my hopelessly rucked and crumpled skirt.

  ‘And you enjoyed reading about them.’

  ‘Like I said,’ I mumbled.

  ‘Don’t be evasive,’ he said, suddenly stern. ‘Look at me, Ella.’

  Instinctively, I was aware that, when he used my name, it meant trouble.

  I looked up, feeling as if my cheeks had been slapped. They stung with the heat that had rushed into them.

  ‘We might as well be honest, don’t you think?’ he said, more gently. ‘You don’t need to pretend with me. Your list is my list, more or less, but from the opposite angle. I’m not ashamed of it. Why should you be?’

  ‘I’m not…it’s just…private.’

  ‘Not from me. You can play coy if you like, Miss Cox, but you know I can see straight through it, to what you want, what you need.’

  I took a panicky breath. ‘What I need is a shower,’ I said. My thoughts were scattered, reeling all over the place.

  There was a momentary pause, and then he said, ‘Right. I’ll drive you home then.’

  I was confused. Had I said something to offend him?

  ‘I mean…I don’t mean I want to leave. Right now. I’m just saying…’

  ‘I know what you’re just saying. Come on then. Up you get. Did you have a coat? OK.’

  He was so brisk that I couldn’t protest, or even speak, until we were back in his car.

  ‘Don’t you have a shower?’ I asked, once he’d pulled out of the car park.

  ‘What?’ He glanced at me. ‘Oh. Well, yes, I have.’

  ‘But I’m not allowed in? Or what?’

  He sighed. ‘You’d only have to put those filthy clothes back on. Besides, I have a piece to write up.’

  ‘And is that it? Only I feel like I’ve upset you in some way.’

  ‘Upset me? No. I’m not upset.’

  ‘Well…’ I floundered. What, then? But I didn’t want to sound as exasperated as I felt. Or as vulnerable or desperate.

  ‘You just didn’t seem to be in the mood. Or in the zone. Or whatever you have to be in, in order to be honest with yourself.’

  ‘What? I’m honest with myself! Of course I am.’

  ‘So why all the head-hanging and foot-shuffling over that list, then? If you aren’t comfortable with what you want, then how am I supposed to be?’

  I was caught up short. I had no idea whether he was being fair or not, but I felt unjustly accused all the same.

  ‘Tom, it’s not the easiest thing to admit, you know. Here I am, a twenty-first-century woman, independent, feminist, rah-rah-rah. I feel…well, I feel guilty about being into this kind of thing.’

  ‘You feel guilty,’ said Tom. ‘You aren’t the one who dreams of smacking a tied-up girl’s arse with a riding whip. How do you think I feel?’

  I tried an indignant response to this, but I couldn’t. It was too absurd.

  ‘Oh, God,’ I said, with a hysterical little laugh. ‘The angst of it all.’

  His lip curled. He was softening.

  ‘It’s the price we pay for our perversions,’ he said. ‘We have to live with our cognitive dissonance. You, a strong woman who likes being subjugated by men. Me, a stand-up guy who likes being cruel to girls. It’s not who the world might want us to be, but it’s who we are.’

  ‘I’ve never had to really think about it before,’ I said. ‘Because I’ve kept that part of myself hidden.’

  ‘Well, it’s out now, Foxy, for better or worse. And if you’re out, you might as well be proud. I intend to be.’

  ‘I don’t know if I can be.’

  He pulled up on the corner of my street and turned an intense gaze on me.

  ‘Listen. If you just want this to be a professional partnership, looking into whatever happened to Mia, that’s fine with me. Well, not “fine” exactly, but I’ll respect it.’

  ‘You mean…?’

  ‘I mean, I’ll leave you to your hangups and make my own Safeword account.’

  ‘But that’s not…I didn’t mean…’ My subeditor vocabulary was letting me down tonight.

  ‘You’ve done something good for me, Ella – you’ve made me see that I don’t want to suppress this side of myself for ever. I’m going to look for somebody I can explore it with.’ His eyes were like immobilising rays, pinning me to the seat. ‘I was hoping it might be you,’ he said, in a whisper now. ‘But if you aren’t ready…’

  ‘I am! I’m ready.’ The words shot out. ‘You’ve taken a bit of mumbling and muttering and turned it into something way bigger. I’m new to this – you’re new to it. Can’t you cut me some slack?’

  ‘I thought that was exactly what I wasn’t supposed to do,’ he said, his cheekbones stretching in a way that suggested he was suppressing a smile. ‘As your Dom.’

  That sounded like a commitment. It was a commitment, wasn’t it, to call yourself somebody’s Dom? But what was its social significance? Was it equal to, or greater than, calling yourself somebody’s boyfriend? Or was it nothing, just a role to play with any sub who passed your way? I needed some kind of BDSM equivalent of Emily Post; this terrain was too new and uncharted.

  ‘You know what I mean,’ I gabbled. ‘I can’t be perfect straightaway at something I’ve never done before. I need help and understanding, and I’ll do my best to offer you the same.’

  ‘Guidance?’ suggested Tom. ‘I can give you that.’

  ‘And you needn’t worry that I’ll be judging you or thinking you’re some kind of sociopath. I won’t. I’ll be too busy enjoying your terrible cruelties.’

  His smile was unforced now, and the sparkle was back in his eyes.

  ‘Ah, I’m sorry, Foxy.’ He reached over and clasped one of my hands. ‘I was being a bit oversensitive. It does happen. Just don’t tell them in the newsroom, eh?’

  ‘My lips are sealed,’ I said. ‘Or gagged, even.’

  ‘Mm, there’s an idea.’ He bent over and kissed me. ‘So, it’s still on, then?’

  ‘I want to if you
do.’

  He kissed me again, more lingeringly.

  ‘I do,’ he said.

  I take thee, Tom Crowley, to be my lawful wedded Dom.

  The words flitted through my head, making me blush worse than ever.

  ‘But I really do have that piece to sort out,’ he said apologetically. ‘Possible corruption in high places, my dear. I’m going to have to wield my sword of justice before I can get round to my cane of deviant pleasure.’

  I was too flattened by a wall of crush to answer for a moment.

  ‘Go get ’em,’ I said huskily, moving in for the kiss hat-trick.

  Chapter Five

  Later, after showering and fielding some curious questions about my dishevelment from my flatmates, I went to lie on my bed in a state of rapture for three hours.

  I was so involved in this that I forgot to check my computer until nearly midnight.

  When I did, I was startled by the number of replies my bland little message had hooked.

  Hello, I’m new to all this and looking for local kinksters, initially for friendship, maybe for fun later. If you think you can be my travel guide on this intriguing journey, please drop me a note. Respectfully yours, Northavon Neophyte.

  I was able to discount lots of them straightaway. They weren’t local enough, or they were rude and misogynistic, or they opened the batting with a photograph of their nether regions. Bad manners, if you ask me. An annoying number of them sent no more than the word ‘Hi’ or variations thereupon. I was inclined not to reply to any of these lazy bastards, but what if one of them was J?

  After filtering, I had half a dozen responses worth looking into. Four were from men, two from women. I thought that, to begin with, I would play it safe and stick to making female friends on the scene – it was likely enough that one of them might have met Mia. One of them might even be Mia. The idea excited me. It would be easy enough for her to kick over the traces of her old identity and start afresh – perhaps at J’s instigation. Perhaps she was concerned that she had given away too much identifying information online. It happened all the time.

  Mia could be right here, messaging me now!

  The temptation to reply straightaway, with a question about whether they had a blog, was strong, but I thought I’d wait until Tom had seen the fruits of our labours.