Lloyd claps his hands with apparent delight. ‘Can’t wait for you to walk all over me in your spike-heeled thigh-high boots,’ he claims.
‘I’m not sure I believe you. But neither can I.’
‘Great. I’ve booked it for midnight. They suggest you get there half an hour beforehand to pick out your costume and select your instruments of torture and terror. I’ll see you there.’
He launches himself out of the chair, kisses me passionately until I almost fall over, then waltzes off to take his lunch break.
I sit myself down in the chair he has vacated and stare at the computer screen, a sea of meaningless figures in rectangular boxes.
It strikes me now as more than a little odd that I’ve never done anything like this before. Call myself a hussy … Yet somehow I’ve always managed to signal my desire to submit rather than dominate before the action has reached its crisis. Nobody has ever asked me to hurt them, though one man once wanted me to tie him up and tease him. That was easy enough, though, just a bit of fun.
This seems much more serious.
***
By eleven thirty I am in the giant fancy-dress wardrobe at Fetish Fantasy, being shown around by its proud mistress, Zuleika.
I have in mind something skintight and shiny, and she obliges by finding the perfect figure-hugging number in wet-look latex. Once she has talcum-powdered and trussed me into it, I peer at myself in the mirrored wall, searching for bulges of unforgiving flesh, but the rubber nips it all in, giving me a catwoman silhouette I think I might wear more often.
When I turn around and look over my shoulder at the generous swell of my bottom, I almost purr with satisfaction. Lloyd is going to love that.
But he’s going to have to be content with looking at it.
Tonight, he gets nowhere near my arse.
‘So, I think we were thinking of killer heels,’ I tell Zuleika, but she is well ahead of me. Already she has picked out the ideal pair, and she sets to work lacing me into them, threading through the hooks and eyes until I am crisscrossed to the thigh and towering on five inches of potential murder weapon. The world looks different from up here.
Zuleika grins, her eyebrows disappearing into her bright pink fringe. ‘It’s a new view, isn’t it?’ she says. ‘You look down on people.’
I’ve never been remotely statuesque, but my inner goddess peeks out now from her clamshell-tight hiding place. I can almost see her in the mirror. What else do I need to coax her further?
‘How do you want your hair? Some dommes like it in a really tight high plait or ponytail. Or you can have it loose.’
My hair isn’t really long enough to flow gloriously and luxuriantly and all that jazz, but I’m not sure the high hairline look suits me either.
‘Can I just do some kind of hairband?’
A black sparkly number pushes any errant wisps out of my face. I paint my eyes black and my lips red and grin at myself.
‘I have this urge to call everyone “darling” now,’ I tell Zuleika. ‘In a stagey drawl. Oh, daaaaaaarling, do as you’re told, sweetie, or I might have to hurt your lovely little … well, you get the picture.’
Zuleika narrows her eyes and smiles. ‘You’re missing the critical accessory,’ she says. ‘What’s it to be, Miss Whiplash? Flogger? Riding crop?’
‘Both.’
In the dungeon, I take a good look around, mentally listing the things I might want to use. I need to prepare for this scene, since it’s so foreign to me, and making a rigid plan comforts me and gives me confidence. I like the cuffs that hang from a hook in a ceiling – tick. I like the blindfold, but then he won’t get to see me as a glorious vision in latex, so no tick for that. And a strap-on … hmmm. Now, that could make an interesting finale …
There is a knock at the dungeon door, an echoing clang that makes my heart thump.
I arrange myself so that one foot is on a chair, leg bent at the knee. I hold the riding crop diagonally across my chest, tapping its leather tip over my shoulder. I thrust out my breasts and hold my chin up.
‘Enter.’
He pushes the door open slowly. I tense my cheek muscles so as not to smile when I see the look in his eyes. Is that awe? I think it might be.
‘Christ, Sophie –’
‘You’re late.’ I let the crop slice the air, loving its brutally efficient sound. ‘And you may call me “ma’am”.’
‘I’m not late,’ laughs Lloyd, checking his wristwatch. ‘It’s the witching hour, on the dot. Ma’am.’
‘I don’t care to be contradicted, boy, and neither do I like your tone.’
I point the crop at him, removing my foot from the chair and swaying as elegantly as I can on the vertiginous heels towards my quarry. I stop when the crop makes contact with his chest.
There is still some residual amusement in his expression, but it’s quickly being replaced by a kind of fascinated dread.
I move the crop up and tap the underside of his chin, once, twice, thrice. ‘You are going to learn to do as you’re told tonight, boy,’ I tell him. ‘And you can start by getting out of those ridiculous clothes.’
They aren’t really ridiculous – jeans and a dark top, suede lace-ups, dull socks – but I’m trying out the taste of belittling language on my tongue, testing it for bitterness. Besides, Lloyd deserves to suffer, doesn’t he? For being such a bastard shaggable gorgeous twatface.
He hesitates, waiting for me to retract the crop, I suppose.
‘Go on!’ My voice rings out, twenty times more confident than I feel. ‘Strip.’
I step back and slap the crop in the palm of my hand while he lifts the top over his head. The dungeon is flatteringly lit with low, flickering candle-style bulbs – not quite as atmospheric as real flame, but I guess a BDSM club needs to keep a closer eye than most on health and safety. The shadowy light casts patterns over Lloyd’s pale bare chest and gives his hair a copper shine. He isn’t meant to know that my mouth is watering, though, so I try to remain impassive while he removes shoes and socks then drops his jeans. After stepping out of them, his hands move to his underpants, but I wave the crop and shake my head.
‘No, no. I want to take those off myself. Come over here.’
He moves closer on his bare feet until we are eye to eye. It is odd to be so much taller; we are practically the same height now.
I put down the crop and rest both of my hands in their fingerless latex gloves on his hips. I curl my forefingers inside the elastic of his boxers and then let go so it snaps back lightly against his skin.
‘Why do you wear these, boy?’
‘What, pants?’
‘No, boxers. Why do you wear this style?’
‘Er, why do I wear them? Well, they’re comfortable, I suppose. Loose. I don’t feel hemmed in.’
‘Why might you feel hemmed in?’
He gives me a quizzical look. He has no idea where I’m going with this. I’m not sure I do either.
‘Well, as a man, I have certain anatomical features, which you may have noticed.’
‘You have a cock. I’ve noticed. I’ve also noticed that it seems to rule your life, boy.’
‘Said the pot to the kettle.’
‘Excuse me! I don’t have a cock and besides, that’s highly disrespectful and I’ll have to punish you for it.’ I give him my darkest frown.