Chapter 30
thirty
EMILY
Master Ten sends me a thumbs-up in response to my invitation to the Aquarium. I’m not sure if that means he’s coming or he’s just acknowledging the invitation but I’ll take it.
Queen Twitch watches me put my phone away.
We’re waiting for our food in a corner of the restaurant, at a low table with armchairs, instead of a booth or table.
When I first found Konk, I thought it was too trendy for me.
But it’s become my favorite café. No one blinks if I wear little clothes, or even fetish wear.
The waitresses all know me now and greet me by name.
They have a running joke about Daddy’s cholesterol and steer him toward healthy menu choices.
I love the setting: in a converted greenhouse.
The roof is still cloudy glass and the restaurant is full of huge, potted plants.
I like to pretend I’m off on a Victorian botany expedition to somewhere exotic like the Galapagos Islands but with smashed avocado toast and Tung Ting Oolong tea.
I’ve even dressed for it today in a pinafore printed with antique maps over a high-necked, ruffled, green blouse with butterfly trim, and thick, green-and-white striped thigh-highs. I’m in my green mermaid phase.
Daddy added wire nipple clamps before I left the house because, sigh, Daddy.
He promised to check them when I meet him at Rockefeller Plaza but didn’t promise to take them off.
Double-sigh. They keep my nipples hard and chafing against the fine cotton of the blouse. Good thing the pinafore is thick.
Queen Twitch looks as fabulous as ever, sprawled in the armchair across from me in a fitted paisley pants suit and deep purple shirt with an extravagant spill of ruffles down the front.
They’re wearing their crown atop silver-gray waves.
You’d think that would look out of place at Konk but it doesn’t.
There are yummy mummies, college-aged kids wearing shorts which it is definitely not warm enough to do, a table of drag queens, a man with a beard redder than Niall’s wearing a leather kilt and sporran, and holiday shoppers juggling their fifty million bags.
You’d have to wear a full hazmat suit to truly look out of place at Konk and even then, I think everyone would just raise a mildly-curious brow.
Twitch sips from their sunset mimosa. “How are we going to unfuck this, darling?”
“Can you tell me what’s going on with Georgie?
I’m not blind. I could see the tension between you and Mistress Maude and then when Master Bull demanded Georgie pull down his bottoms so he could see if the terms of the loan were being observed .
. . it was a lot, even from where I was standing. I could tell how angry your sir was.”
“Incandescently,” Twitch says before clamping perfect teeth on the recyclable straw of their drink.
“Sir approached Elephant’s Playground for a present for Kiki.
Someone deeply submissive. Claudia recommended Georgie.
We played together a dozen times. Georgie made Kiki so happy.
Her own pet mousie. You have no idea what it’s been like, with Kiki so sick.
Sir and I would literally do anything to make her smile. Georgie made her laugh again. Em . . .”
Twitch trails off, looking at the ceiling, eyes shimmering.
Before anything can mess up their perfect liner, they dab a finger at the corner of each eye and clear their throat.
“Anyway. I guess Georgie met Maude coincidentally at the club. They played together several times. Georgie was honest with Sir about it and Sir said it was okay as long as it didn’t affect our playtimes.
Sir hadn’t asked Georgie for exclusivity but I know he was considering it.
The next thing we knew, Maude told Sir she was considering collaring Georgie and wanted Sir to give up any prior claim on him.
Sir said no. He and Kiki were also considering collaring Georgie as Kiki’s pet.
Darling, from there it’s just become a huge old mess.
Maude and Sir can barely be in the same room without yelling at each other.
I’ve been acting as a go-between and I hate it.
I got them to agree to this loan business but it's been worse than negotiating the Treaty of Versailles. I’ve been trying to get Georgie to express a preference but all he’ll say is that he loves all of us. He’s so submissive.”
I nod along to everything Queen Twitch says.
I was there when Maude met Georgie. Georgie was helping me in the Blunts Library; Maude homed in on him like a hawk.
Maybe love at first sight isn’t a real thing but finding your perfect submissive at first sight?
I’ll buy that after seeing the way Maude and Georgie were drawn together.
I understand that Bull, Kiki, and Twitch had a prior relationship with him—and Georgie probably would like to be owned in a kinky sense—but a prior relationship doesn’t give Master Bull ownership of Georgie.
And even though it’s not fair and I shouldn’t measure relationships this way, Kiki already has a master and a sub. Maude’s alone.
“Was he okay after everything last night?” I ask.
Twitch nods. “Poor thing. He was so apologetic once he came around. He’s never had a panic attack like that before.
He said he thought he was comfortable in small spaces as a mouse.
But being in that tunnel with a predator coming for him absolutely threw him, poor cherub.
He must have apologized a thousand times to Maude, to me, to Sir.
And it hasn’t helped the situation at all.
Now Sir’s angry at Maude for putting Georgie in a situation where he panicked and Maude’s furious at Sir for humiliating Georgie in the Stocks.
” Twitch throws up their hands. “Such a shitshow.”
We both fall quiet as the waitress delivers our orders. Mulligatawny soup for me and vegan lasagna for Twitch. Once we’re eating, I ask, “Is sharing him completely out of the question?”
“It’s certainly not something Maude wants,” Twitch says between elegant bites.
“I gather she had a monogamous marriage before her husband died. Since then, it’s been casual play with the house submissives.
She never collared anyone but her husband.
If Sir won’t give up his claim, maybe Maude would accept some kind of sharing arrangement instead of losing Georgie completely but it’s definitely her last choice. ”
“And you guys?” I ask.
Twitch sighs. “If I had a dollar for every time I’ve asked Sir to just back off and let Georgie go, I could buy my own tropical island, darling.
But Kiki, oh, Emily, my Kiki. She talks about how much she loved having Georgie as a pet, how he kept her company when she felt low and how stroking his fur was the first good feeling she had after feeling nothing but nausea and dizziness for so long—” They break off and look up at the ceiling again.
“I’m afraid Sir’s going to do something rash. ”
I rub my breastbone, where a fierce ache has started. “I’m so sorry, Twitch.”
They heave a dramatic sigh. “Me too, darling, me too. I wish I had half of old Sir Winston’s negotiating power so I could find a way through this but nothing I’ve come up with has stopped those two from steaming toward a head-on collision like a pair of runaway trains.”
There has to be a compromise. “Maybe I could speak to Maude?”
“I’m not sure what you could say that hasn’t already been said but I’m not going to stop you. Anything’s better than this terrible standoff.”
I nod. “I will. I hate to ask this right now when everything’s so horrible but bad things are happening at the club—”
Twitch waves a hand. “Don’t hesitate. I’ve heard both too much and too little. Sir’s been spending time with that smarmy Drew who’s filling his ear with how Logan’s ruining submissives.” They throw their arms wide. “Do I look ruined to you?”
Grinning, I shake my head.
“Thank you. Here I am, entirely unruined, and instead of actually ruining me, Sir’s doing group scenes with MacKenzie. MacKenzie. Nothing against a good orgy but I’m making Sir get tested before he sticks any bit of him in any bit of me.”
I can’t control a snigger.
“So, please explain to me why my Sir, who has up to this point made the occasional questionable decision about playing pick-up football games but rarely about his companions or the scenes he engages in, why is my Sir doing group scenes with that cabal of usurers?”
I slap my hand over my mouth to keep from giggling too loudly. “I’m sure they’re just bankers.”
“Whatever they are, they’re unpleasant and unfashionable. White dress shirts and red power ties all around. At least have the balls to wear pink.”
“Real men do,” I agree.
“Your Daddy looks magnificent in pink. Sets off the dark hair and dark eyes and high cheekbones. You should make him wear it always.” Twitch waves a hand airily. “What is going on behind the scenes?”
“Some of the members at Blunts have been treating the house submissives really badly,” I explain.
Twitch sobers from their studied nonchalance: leaning forward and wrapping their hands around their knee. “I heard about Ten’s inexcusable gaffe with DirtyGurl.”
“That’s the least of it, I think. Daddy doesn’t want me to worry so he hasn’t told me everything but there have been bad incidents with Shannie and Annabelle. Really bad. Leaving the club bad.”
Twitch tuts. “And how are we going to fix this?”
I swallow hard. Daddy told me I could tell Twitch anything if I thought it would help.
Twitch has always been amazing with me and I trust them.
“Daddy’s going to try to get the members who have hurt the submissives kicked out of the club.
If Chairman Chess resists, Daddy’s going to move to replace him. ”
Twitch’s perfect eyebrows shoot up. “Logan’s going to take over the chair?”
I shake my head. “He’s going to nominate Mistress Maude.”