Page 15 of After Dark
Arlo could see that this new girl was no exception. She’d shed the wrap dress she’d been wearing at his door and was naked now, a beautifully coltish sort of thing with legs for miles and high breasts. Not Frederick’s usual type. He rarely went withnew.He preferred experienced and therefore capable of living up to his sky-high expectations and deliberately impossible demands. This one was clearly struggling with her submission, an unusual selection for a Dominant well-known for his hard hand and inability to brook the slightest disobedience.
But Arlo was in no position to question another man’s decisions when it came to women. Clearly. Or he would have turned Josette away without a second thought.
“Iris,” Frederick said, his voice harsh enough Arlo could see Josette stiffen a little in response. “It is time to cultivate stillness.”
Arlo decided he was pleased that Frederick was here tonight, of all nights. He couldn’t have planned a better welcome for his wayward submissive — well, he thought, she was technically his ex-submissive, not least because she’d so thoughtfully left her collar behind the night she’dleft — than a few rounds with Frederick’s brand of domination.
His friend made him look like a kitten in comparison. When Frederick seemed reasonably satisfied that Iris was attempting obedience, the two men retreated back across the great room, now bright from all the lights in the distance, a sweeping view of coastlines and skylines and everything the City by the Bay had to offer.
Knowing his friend preferred a clear head during a scene, as did Arlo himself, he poured them both conservative measures of bourbon. Then they both stood there, looking back across the floor at the two naked women who kneeled there so prettily, facing the opposite direction, the very picture of obedience.
Sheer perfection, Arlo thought. If he pretended he didn’t know their history.
“I had no idea you were so into ghosts,” Frederick said after a moment.
Arlo lifted his glass toward his friend. “About as much as you are into brand-new brats,” he said, and inclined his head in the direction of Iris, who was very clearly fidgeting.
“Brand-new anduntried,”Frederick corrected him. “A crucial distinction.”
“You didn’t mention she wasthisnew.” Arlo studied his friend. “Usually when you want a little submissive training it’s because you want to teach them to perfect their practice, not because they’ve never practiced before. What’s next? Virgins?” That was a joke, but the look on his friend’s face stopped him cold. He actually put his drink down. “No.”
“I find myself in a bit of a situation,” Frederick said after a moment. “I told you Kayla left.”
Arlo had never cared for Kayla, Frederick’s most recentsubmissive. He found her… sly. Everything she didlookedperfect. She was never disobedient. She begged prettily, took a hard fucking and a hard hand with the perfect mixture of tears and grit. There was just something about her that rubbed him the wrong way. She’d been with Frederick for more than a year, but he’d never seen the kind of hunger in her that was still in Josette. That he was fairly sure was in Iris, for that matter, no matter how green she was.
“You told me that you released Kayla,” Arlo said. “Which is not quite the same thing as Kayla picking up and leaving, but I think you know that.”
Frederick, who could teach lessons on how to keep an impassive face, did not look particularly impassive now. He sent a brooding sort of look down the length of the room. “I discovered she was lying. And stealing from me, to add insult to injury. When I told her we needed to talk, she clearly interpreted that correctly and took off. And on balance, I would have to say all the petty cash she could lift for my home was a small price to pay to be rid of someone who could lie that well to my face.”
“I never liked her,” Arlo said, with a shrug.
“How helpful,” Frederick murmured. “If only I could go back in time and change what happened based on an opinion you never expressed in my presence.”
“You are not open to opinions, friend,” Arlo said. He made a face. “Good riddance, then. I would call that providence, not a problem.”
“The problem is that the Club opens in two weeks,” Frederick said shortly. “You know what will be expected of me.”
Arlo did know. “Since when have you cared about the opinions of others? The answer is never, which is why Inever shared mine as it pertained to the lovely and apparently larcenous Kayla.”
“It’s really all about marketing,” Frederick said, with that brooding look on his face again. “I am fully aware of my reputation in the community, Arlo. At any other point in time, I would not care at all what anyone thought and would happily explain why it was that the woman they expected to see by my side was not there. But at the moment, I am presenting the infallible myth of Master Frederick, who can tame and correct any submissive he encounters, as a marketing scheme. For my sins.”
He nodded toward Iris, who was not doing a good job of remaining still. Arlo couldn’t help but notice that Josette was acing it, even after her hiatus. It made him hard. Better yet, it made him proud.
“Iris… fell into my lap,” Frederick muttered, and he sounded as close toaggrievedas Arlo had ever heard him. “Beggars can’t be choosers, or so I’m told, and here we are. I have two weeks to turn her into a submissive beyond reproach.”
“To clarify,” Arlo said, looking at Iris’s pretty, doomed struggle, then back to his friend, “you want me to train your virgin, untried submissive to deep throat my cock tonight, when I’m assuming you haven’t even fucked yet.”
Frederick did not confirm that. He also did not deny it.
“I do,” he said, but there was a particular gleam in his gaze that suggested to Arlo that Frederick had an interest in this girl that went far beyond the Club.
That was fascinating.
Still, he understood where his friend was coming from. Frederick had created the Club app, which connected kinky people all over the world, wherever they happened to be. There were stringent rules around medical records,weekly blood tests submission requirements or access was denied, and safety precautions were built into the software. The app was a wild hit. Not surprising, given how kinky Arlo knew people were.
Now Frederick, always a visionary, had created the first proper brick-and-mortar version, and intended to franchise it. All the same rules. All the same safeguards. But now an actual place to go to interact with people in real life.
And here in the Bay Area, particularly, the myth and legend of Master Frederick was going to bring the better part of the kink community through those doors. Hearing that a submissive had tricked him, fleeced him, and left him would tarnish that legacy.
