This Is War - Chapter 8 – Clown Penis
Cole led us to a hallway at the back of the club. But before we could enter, he put his arm out to block us.
“This, ladies, is where the real Club Onyx begins. Once you cross this line and enter this hallway…” He gestured to a red line on the floor. “…The rules change.”
So it’s just a big sex hallway? I squinted to try to see into the dark hallway, but I couldn’t make out much.
Just lots of wood detailing on the walls and chandeliers hanging from the ceiling.
It looked like it was leading to a vampire lair.
I remembered when I used to think Tanner was a vampire.
When really he was just a lying trollop.
The hallways probably just led to a normal lair. Or if Chastity was right…a sex dungeon.
“Through this door, you’ll be able to live out your wildest fantasies - and some fantasies you never knew you had.” He smiled at me when he said it, as if he thought he was my wildest fantasy.
I gulped.
“But I have to warn you. It’s not for the faint of heart.”
“Raven can handle it,” said Chastity. “Which of her fantasies are you gonna fulfill first? She’s always had a thing for hot teachers.”
My face turned bright red. I had the teacher fantasy one time! And I had told her about it in confidence. How dare she betray me!
Cole’s eyes danced with amusement. “Nothing to be ashamed of. That’s actually quite a common fantasy, and definitely one that the Society can fulfill for you. If you’re lucky, maybe it’ll even happen tonight.”
I gulped. It was hard to picture Cole as a teacher, with his tattoos and his chiseled jaw. He belonged in a leather jacket, not a sweater vest. Although now that I was picturing it, I was kinda into it. Who said bad boys can’t be teachers?
“So before I leave you to your own devices, I have…”
“Wait,” I said. No! Don’t leave us! “That’s the whole tour? You showed us like…two things. And I have so many questions.”
“Such as?” asked Cole.
“How do these fantasies work? Do we make wishes through the app? Or do people just pop out and molest us? Or…?”
Cole gave me his devilish grin. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”
I glared at him. This was the most useless orientation ever. Hadn’t he ever been to a summer camp? Now they knew how to do orientations right. “Oh, okay. Thanks for being so helpful.”
“My pleasure.”
What? No! I was being sarcastic, you dumb, handsome meat tower.
“Before I go, I have a gift for each of you.” Cole pulled out three golden keys that were straight out of the 1500s. “Choose wisely.”
They all looked the same to me, so I randomly chose the one in the middle.
“What’d you get?” asked Cole.
“Uh…” How should I know?
“Flip it over.”
I did. The back was etched with an outline of some dice.
“Oh!” squealed Chastity. “I got handcuffs.”
“Interesting choices,” said Cole.
“Why?” I asked. “What do these symbols mean?”
“Oh, you’ll find out soon enough.”
“Can’t you tell us?” I asked.
“That would spoil all the fun. Not to mention it’s strictly forbidden by the Society. What happens in this hallway stays in this hallway.”
“I thought that was Vegas?”
“Vegas has nothing on Club Onyx. Good luck.” Cole gave me a wink and then left us alone at the entrance to the weird sex hallway.
“Oh my God,” said Chastity. “He was so into you.”
“You think?”
“Uh, yes. He couldn’t take his eyes off you.”
“Probably because I’m half naked.”
“I am too, and he wasn’t looking at me like that.”
Fair point. “If he was into me, then why did he leave us alone? He could have kept the tour going as long as he wanted.”
“Isn’t it obvious?” asked Chastity.
“No.”
“He’s going to go dress up as a teacher so that he can fulfill your fantasy.” She sounded so sure. “Come on.” She grabbed my arm and pulled me towards the hallway.
I yanked her back just before she crossed the threshold.
“You can’t just run into a sex hallway guns a-blazing.
You have to be careful.” I slowly edged my toe over the red line.
I half expected a giant dildo to swing down across the doorway, like one of those swinging axes that you’d see in a horror film.
But nothing happened. I peered into the hallway.
“Come on,” said Chastity. “We’ve been in this hallway before and nothing bad happened to us.”
“I mean…I ended up on stage and nearly got fucked in front of like a thousand people.”
“Exactly! This hallway is amazing.”
“You say that now, but you’ll be singing a different tune when you see all the clown penises.”
“Clown penises? I’ve never heard you talk about that fantasy before.”
Oh God. “That’s not… You know what, forget it.” If I explained that I was scared of clowns and hence their penises, she’d probably blab it to Cole. Getting attacked by a clown penis needed to be added to my list of greatest fears. Somewhere under centipedes.
Chastity walked into the hallway. No clown penises attacked her. “Are you coming?” she asked. “Or do you want me to leave you all alone in this sex club?”
Damn her. I had no choice but to follow. “Fine, I’m coming.” I joined her, and together we walked farther into the hallway.
Rap music began to shake the entire hallway as we approached the first door.
Through the archway, dozens of scantily clad women were grinding up against tuxedoed men on the dance floor.
If it had been a high school dance, the chaperones would not have not been pleased.
They were definitely not leaving room for Jesus.
“Wanna dance?” asked Chastity.
“Um…” Not really. Grinding on some sweaty stranger wasn’t at the top of my to-do list. There were probably so many germs on that dancefloor.
“Come on! You promised you’d play along!”
“I will. I just uh…” I looked down at the key in my hand. “Don’t you want to find out what this dice symbol means?”
“Uh, hell yes I do. Good call.” She dragged me deeper into the hallway.
I hoped I hadn’t just made a terrible mistake. Dancing was a known entity. But this key? There was no telling what kind of sexy horrors it would lead to.
“What do you think will be behind the handcuff door?” asked Chastity, looking at the handcuff symbol on hers.
“A sex dungeon?”
Chastity twirled a strand of hair around her finger. “My first thought was bondage too, but I also wouldn’t mind being manhandled by a hot cop.”
“Sounds romantic.”
“Right? Oh! Or maybe I’ll get thrown into a co-ed prison cell and get gangbanged by a bunch of prisoners.” She let out a squeal. “This is so exciting! What do you think your dice will be?”
“That depends. What kind of sexy things can you do with dice?”
“One time I saw this girl put one in her…”
“Hold on,” I said, stopping in front of a heavy wooden door.
It was at least ten feet tall and looked like it had been carved out of a solid block of wood.
I pointed to the tablet on the wall next to it.
The screen was all black except for the red outline of handcuffs - the same symbol as Chastity’s key. “Looks like we found your sex dungeon.”
Her eyes lit up. “Wish me luck,” she said as she stepped towards the door with her key in hand.
“Whoa whoa whoa. You’re just gonna leave me out here all alone?” Not cool.
A door creaking made me jump. I turned around to see a man smoothing his trousers as he exited a room across the hall. I caught a brief glimpse inside where women covered in gold body paint were feeding grapes to a man in a toga. Weird.
“Boo,” said Chastity.
“What?” I turned back around. Chastity had her key in the handcuff door. But the door wasn’t opening. A message scrolled across the tablet:
Session in progress.
“Lame,” said Chastity. She tried again and got the same result. “Guess we have to go find your dice room.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. There was no way I was going anywhere without her. We continued on down the hallway, checking the symbols on the doors as we went. There was a masquerade mask, an eyeball, an apple, a trident…or was it a pitchfork? Then there was the letter V. But no dice.
Chastity kept pulling me around corner after corner. Before I knew it, I was all turned around. Great. This is where I’m going to die.
I picked up my pace and tore around a corner.
“Oh my God!” I screamed as I ran into a chiseled body. The man steadied me in his strong arms.
“Sorry,” he said. “You okay?”
I took a deep breath and tried to gather my nerves.
“She’s fine,” said Chastity. “And so are you.”
The guy smiled. “You flatter me.”
“I’d like to do more than that to you.” Chastity bit her lip seductively.
“Oh you would, would you?”
She nodded.
“In that case, come to the sky box at 7 pm tomorrow night.” He handed her a key from his pocket engraved with a cloud symbol.
“It’s a date,” said Chastity. “Hey, do you know where the dice door is?”
“Try the casino room.” He gave us directions and then walked away.
“See ya tomorrow,” called Chastity.
Damn. I’d seen Chastity flirt before, but I still couldn’t believe how easy it was for her.
“Well he seemed nice,” she said.
“What the hell is a sky box?”
“No idea. But I’ll let you know when I find out tomorrow night.”
We brainstormed what the sky box might be as we followed her new boyfriend’s directions to the casino room.
We did have a few clues. I remembered them talking about the sky box during the Onyxies award ceremony we’d been bought for the last time we were here.
The sky box had won best new room. And Tanner had also looked really concerned when he’d asked me if I’d gone to the sky box.
Now I kind of wish that I had, just so I could have rubbed it in his face back then.
My guess was that the sky box was just another name for a penthouse. But Chastity thought it would be a skydiving simulation room. I was still working out the logistics of how sex in one of those things would work when we entered the casino.
It felt like we’d been transported to Vegas.
A cocktail waitress wearing an elephant mask made of mirrors offered us champagne. I took two flutes and downed them both.
“So where do you think your dice door is?” asked Chastity, looking around the room.
“Hmmm…” My first thought was craps. I was pretty sure that used dice. But the symbol wasn’t there. The roulette table was similarly disappointing.
Wait, why is that disappointing? I didn’t want to go into some weird sex room. Right?
I started to say something to Chastity, but she’d disappeared to go get some chips from the cashier. I went over to join her. And then I saw it. Next to the cashier were a bunch of safes. One of which was marked with the dice symbol.
Just a safe? That couldn’t be so bad. Unless there was a naked leprechaun stuffed in there or something. No, then it would be marked with a four-leaf clover. But if not a leprechaun, then what?
I knew it was a bad idea to open it. Everything about the Society was a bad idea. Meeting Tanner had been bad. Making wishes had been bad. It was all bad.
But as bad as it was, it was also extremely distracting. I’d only thought about not getting the promotion like five times since we’d gotten to Club Onyx, which was a major improvement compared to earlier in the day. And I’d only thought about Tanner when I thought I’d seen him…
Maybe that was the whole point. Club Onyx was an escape. It was a place to break the rules and act a little crazy. And that was exactly what I was going to do. Hell, I’d already been running around in nothing but lingerie for thirty minutes, and it hadn’t killed me. Neither would opening this safe.
Please don’t be a naked midget.
The lock clicked as I turned the key.