4. Twyla
CHAPTER 4
Wrong. Very… very wrong.
My eyes are narrowed behind my thick-framed glasses, my face stuck in a mask of fascination and fear as I watch my new friend Crystal freefall from the ceiling in a graceful upside-down pose, then catch herself on the silver pole a mere inch before her head hits the floor.
But the fear in my expression has nothing to do with the extremely talented and professional pole-dance instructor’s safety. She’s clearly got this.
No. It’s because, apparently, I’m here in her new studio to get on one of those spinning, floor-to-ceiling, cylindrical death traps myself.
Astrid lets out a whoop and applauds, and all the sound my mind blocked out when I first realized what Doc, my sister, and Crystal expect of me today comes rushing back in, making my heart race faster than it already had been.
Come to find out, Seth had taken Crystal and her husband around to meet several people after we left the coffee shop and I went back to work yesterday. Which I didn’t know about until this morning.
After my session with Doc and before Luna and I went home, he had a quick, private discussion with Astrid in the kitchen—who I saw jump up and down excitedly before covering her mouth—while I helped my daughter gather her things in the living room. My feeling of foreboding was damn near tangible, especially when the beautiful couple approached me cautiously, like I’d choose that moment to learn how to run instead of freeze when stressed.
Astrid stood next to Doc, clearly trying to stop a grin from lifting the corners of her full, pink lips, as he told me, “Okay, Twy. It’s all set. Tomorrow morning will be your first assignment. Your sister will accompany you for moral support and accountability.”
My apprehensive stare shifted between the two of them.
“So then why does she have that evil little glint in her eye?” I asked him.
He glanced down at his wife, and she tilted her head back to peer up at him, her face a mask of pure innocence as she shrugged, then she looked down at me once again, the wickedness reappearing right back where it had been.
He swatted her on the butt, and she yelped then giggled.
“You don’t worry about her. Just go with her when she arrives to pick you up in the morning. And remember… trust me.” He didn’t break his impenetrable stare until he finally received my nod of agreement.
“So this is what I get for trusting your husband?” I murmur to Astrid as Crystal cuts off the thumping music and walks over to us.
I’m in black biker shorts that hit me mid-thigh, and a black sports bra topped with a loose T-shirt that reads, Chemistry. It’s like cooking, but don’t lick the spoon, after Astrid arrived this morning, took one look at my jeans, and told me I’d need to change into something I could work out in. I traded my bottoms and kept on the shirt, slipping my feet into tennis shoes rather than the flip-flops I had on, thinking we were going to Doc and Astrid’s beloved gym. Maybe he wanted me to take a yoga class or something to… calm my chi? Wasn’t that a thing? Weren’t yoga classes supposed to be good for centering yourself and letting go of negative feelings? I could buy that. No problem. I’d just choose a mat hidden in the back where no one could see how unathletic I am.
Seth and I moved into a house close to the other couple right before I gave birth to Luna, since our loft wasn’t big enough for the three of us, and we didn’t want to raise our baby right above a sex club. I loved living just up the street from my big sister. But as she stopped at the stop sign, instead of making a right out of our neighborhood to head toward the gym as I expected, Astrid turned left. I glanced in the back seat at Luna in her car seat, before facing the blonde menace beside me as I nervously asked, “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see” was all she said in a singsong voice.
When we parked on the street right across from Imperium Security and Club Alias, I was completely confused. And then a feeling of dread took over when Astrid hopped out of the car, opened the back door, unhooked Luna, and slammed it closed with her hip before skipping with her niece over to the sidewalk next to my door. Where I saw her point to the still-signless storefront closest to us.
And that’s when it hit me where we were going.
“Astrid Walker!” I hissed as I stepped out and closed the door, hearing the car lock. “We cannot take a baby into a strip club!” My panic made the wrong words come out, and my sister jumped on the opportunity to correct me.
“One, she’s not a baby. She’s four. And two, it’s not a strip club. It’s a workout studio. Plus, she’s not staying. She has a playdate with Corbin and Vi’s little ones up the street at the children’s discovery place so you can focus. See? There she is now.” Astrid looked over my shoulder and waved, and I turned to spot Vi walking quickly toward us on the sidewalk.
When she was near, she reached out to Luna, who immediately squealed, jumped into her arms, and pressed her cheek to Vi’s, squishing their faces she hugged her auntie so tightly. “I’ve got her, Mama. And you’ve got this. Imma hurry back though, because I don’t want to leave the kids unsupervised. Love y’all,” our best friend—and the wife of one of the other team members—assured, and then she disappeared through the door she had come from.
I looked at Astrid, my face showing my annoyance. “Does everyone know what I’m being subjected to?”
She shook her head. “Of course not. Just us girls and Doc. Because we have a plan.”
“What plan?”
“Well, it’s not fully formed yet, but part of it is to make sure you have something special to give your husband for his birthday.”
And with that, she grabbed my arm and hauled me into Crystal’s studio, who locked the frosted door behind us with a grin.
Now, as the woman stands in front of me—sans all the makeup, false eyelashes, and cleavage from yesterday and instead wearing one of those high-impact sports bras that zip up the front to her collarbones—that whole freeze thing I’m known for kicks into high gear. As sweet as Crystal is, I get the impression she has the ability to flip a switch and could suddenly become a badass drill sergeant, running this place like a boot camp if she chose to.
Much like my sweet, goofball husband, who at the drop of a hat can conjure the intimidating Dominant, Seven, who lives just beneath his always-sinfully-beautiful surface.
I wonder if Crystal has a name for that other persona I somehow sense within her.
What was your stripper name? I wonder, and when she asks, “What? Crystal isn’t stripper enough as it is?” with a laugh, I want the wooden floor to open up and swallow me as I realize I asked that question out loud.
My face goes up in flames, and I rush to apologize. “Oh my God, Crystal. I’m so sorry. I did not mean to say that. I swear, I was just thinking about how you’re so nice, but there’s something about you that tells me you could probably be a tough trainer and hurt me if you wanted to. And then I thought about how my husband—” I cut my rambling off abruptly, because no one is supposed to know that Seth Owens is Seven, owner of an exclusive BDSM club. “Uhhh… he has like… this alter ego when he’s uhh… goofing off that he’s named. And I was like, I wonder if Crystal has a name for this badass I think she’s hiding inside, and somehow that came out of my mouth as ‘stripper name.’”
She exchanges a look with Astrid, and then the two of them fall into a fit of laughter, making me feel a little nauseous I’m so humiliated.
“Honey, I believe you mean my Domme name, which you actually met me briefly by at the New Year’s party at the club. My husband—my sub—introduced me to you as Countess. I have this… blood thing.” She shrugs with a gleam in her dark eyes, and then her voice lowers and slightly deepens, taking on a sensual tone that makes me hold my breath. “You must be a very good submissive to so easily pick up on my role, which I’ve spent years perfecting the ability to hide… unless I don’t want to.”
I swallow thickly, but shockingly, I don’t blush or freeze. In fact, something about her tone is soothing, makes me feel safer in this space than I had just moments ago. And for her to compliment my instincts, going so far as to say I must be a very good submissive, heals a little piece of my broken self-confidence in that role.
Maybe I have picked up and learned more than I realize?
When I’ve discovered a lot of my anxiety has disappeared, I meet her knowing eyes and smile gratefully. “Thank you for saying that. And it’s nice to know someone from the club on the outside. That’s definitely a relief,” I tell her. “I can’t believe I didn’t recognize you. I always thought the little masks and stuff we wear there would be ineffectual if we met another member at like… the grocery store or something. No way it could be like Clark Kent and his fake glasses. Surely all those people weren’t fooled. The hero they always saw blasted all over the news and stuff, and they couldn’t tell it was him just because of a pair of glasses? Come on. But I guess….”
Crystal holds up a finger and sashays over to the table holding the Bluetooth speaker her phone is connected to. She taps and scrolls along the screen, then comes back over to show me a photo. I can tell by the decorations it was taken at the New Year’s Party right across the street.
Now knowing it’s her, I recognize Crystal’s voluptuous figure and the shape of her full lips that are painted a matte black in the photo. She’s not smiling in it, instead wearing a closed-lipped smirk that tells me my new friend might lean toward the sadistic end of the spectrum along with her “blood thing,” so her telltale little gap isn’t showing. The rest of her, from head to toe, is clad in a skin-tight, shiny latex bodysuit the likes of Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman, minus the ears. Definitely not like Halle Berry’s—her costume was almost as identity-revealing as Superman’s glasses. The only skin Crystal’s bodysuit shows is from the slits for her mouth and eyes, much tinier than either of the villain’s costumes had.
I tilt my head, look up at her and her thick braids, then back down at the photo. My face must show I’m trying to solve a puzzle, because she chuckles and asks, “What?”
I look back up from her phone, my voice full of wonder. “Halle Berry has a pixie cut. How do you fit all that hair under there?”
After she bursts out laughing, slapping her thigh and closing out her screen, she answers without truly revealing anything, “Black girl magic.”
Astrid shakes her head at me. “Plus, Halle had grown out her hair by the time she played Catwoman, sis. Remember? It was pretty long and curly during the parts she wasn’t in the suit, when she was her counterpart, Selina Kyle. And Michelle Pfeiffer too. She had all those voluminous curls I envied.” She lets out a dreamy sigh.
I nod, recalling that now but still not understanding the physics of Crystal getting all those heavy-looking braids to lie perfectly flat and secure under that tight mask.
“But bravo on not one but two DC references. I’ll have to tell Seth he needs to give his woman some kind of reward.” My sister winks, and I roll my eyes.
“He was on a mission to prove to me why Marvel is superior to DC Comics, even though I never argued or had an opinion either way.” I don’t even have time to blink before something occurs to me. “Hey, wait. Did you know Crystal from the club?” I ask Astrid.
“Of course. Neil met them in Vegas years ago. Like… before the guys opened Club Alias,” she says with a shrug, as if that explains everything.
But my mind just isn’t connecting the dots. “So… huh?”
Crystal takes pity on me. “How about I tell you the Cliff’s Notes version of my life story while we stretch, before we start our lesson?”
I nod, and she leads us over to the mat-covered floor that has six of the rotating poles seeming to sprout out of them. She tells us to each pick the pole that speaks to us, and naturally, I choose the one that’s closest to the back wall and behind my sister.
“Not that one,” comes Crystal’s authoritative voice, and I gulp. “Over here, sweet girl, where I can see and help you. This one is the one speaking to you today.” She points to the pole closest to her, at the front of the “class,” and as the sub in me senses the Domme in her once again, somehow, I follow her directive without pause, actually finding relief, feeling safer, by being closer to her instead of hiding.
But being the clearly experienced and respectful Dominant she is—Club Alias wouldn’t have allowed her to become a member otherwise—she doesn’t offer me praise the way one would in an established D/s relationship.
Firstly, that would require consent; a conversation would need to take place where I’d give her, a Domme, permission to speak to me, a sub, with authority—to give me orders, to reward or punish me, et cetera. It would be my choice, if I wanted to submit to her in any way, whether she identifies as a Dominant or not. Consent is required for everything between Dominants and submissives, right down to her calling me pet names. That one, though, I’ve always chosen to pay less attention to, since a lot of the time it’s a cultural thing to call people by terms of endearment, especially here in the South. A cultural thing I happen to adore.
Secondly, we are both in our own D/s relationships, so she’d actually have to ask my Dom’s permission to address me in her Domme persona. A Dominant could either answer yes or no right off the bat—which Seven would and has before, if it was a male—or they could choose to have a private discussion with their submissive first, to see what the sub’s opinion might be. But ultimately, it would be my Master’s decision.
But even though no conversation has taken place between any of us about consent, there’s just something about Crystal—not Countess—that makes me want to let her lead me. And it’s in no way sexual. Not even slightly. There is a certain confidence—not cockiness—and trustworthiness I sense in her that tells me I’m safe in her hands, in whatever she wants to teach me. An instinctive thing, as she pointed out when we first arrived. She might have spent years trying to perfect her ability to hide her Dominance unless she willed it to come out and play, but there are just some things, things that are soul-deep, that a person has no control over. And apparently, my instincts as a submissive have been honed enough, trained enough, or are just soul-deep enough, that I can pick up on what Crystal naturally exudes.
And it’s in this moment I realize something about this “assignment” Doc gave me.
“This isn’t about me learning how to pole dance, is it?” I ask, my voice strong, my face remaining its un-flushed temperature and color, as I look at my instructor, then my sister, and then back to Crystal. All of us are seated on the cushioned floor, each straddling our own pole, legs out straight in front of us, using the silver metal between our calves to pull ourselves into a deeper fold to stretch.
Astrid and I had followed Crystal’s instruction without her even saying a word.
The two women eye each other for a second, smile knowingly, and then turn to me.
When neither responds, I elaborate, “This is about me discovering I have learned things. I have picked up lessons along the way, without me being totally conscious of it. Isn’t it?”
Astrid is the first to speak. “Neil and I thought it was interesting that you weren’t cognizant of the little habits you’ve picked up from Seth, simple things, like referencing movie characters during conversations, when you never would’ve done that before you met him.” She shrugs. “So, he wondered if it could possibly be the same situation going on with your lack of confidence as a submissive. Like, maybe you just don’t realize how much you’ve actually learned, how much you know, about your role as a sub. I mean, it’s not like you’ve been handed a test and been graded. A teacher hasn’t returned your answers, showing the ones you got right and the ones you got wrong, confirming your knowledge or lack thereof. So how could you know if there are things you need to work on, or if you’re an ace?” She grins, leans toward me, and boops my nose with her pointer finger. “My nerdy little sis.”
I’m too stunned to swat her away.
I look at Crystal. “And you were in on this?” My voice sounds a little accusatory, even though I’m feeling quite grateful to all parties involved.
She holds up her hands in defense, shaking her head slowly. “Hey, now. When Dr. Neil Walker asks you to help him out, I don’t care how dominant you are. You do what he wants and feel honored he chose you to do it for him.”
I nod, conceding easily. “That’s fair.”
She looks me dead in the eye then, and my tummy does a little flip. “But seriously, girl. I was genuinely taken aback when he called last night—not because he called, but because of what he was calling about. What he told me about the woman he was needing my help with did not match the sub I remembered meeting on New Year’s Eve. She couldn’t have been the one I saw with her husband in their store yesterday, or the one I hung out with at the coffee shop either.”
My brow furrows, not understanding what she means, since those women were all one and the same—me.
She switches up her position on the mat, and we follow her lead almost unconsciously. She explains further without pause. “The sub I met at Club Alias—perfect classic positioning while mingling in a crowd of other Doms and subs. Slightly behind her Dom, head marginally bowed, relaxed features. I did notice your tight grip on his arm, but that could’ve always been by his order, his preference or what the two of you agreed upon in your dynamic. But when he introduced you that night, you met my eye politely and nodded but didn’t offer your hand, which is common in our community. My first impression of you was that you were a highly trained and gloriously obedient submissive who looked perfectly natural and happy in your role.”
I’m speechless, hearing her recollection of our initial introduction during the New Year’s party. I was super happy that night. I didn’t put much thought into the way I stood or acted, not at all, really. I always just feel the most comfortable right there, with my tall and strong husband leading the way, my hands around his bicep, reveling in his powerful strength I can always sense beneath the surface of his long-sleeved black Henley and light-tan skin. I try to absorb it into myself, since I’ve never been big on crowds. I’m definitely an introvert, while he is a hundred percent an exhibitionist.
We all switch the leg we’re stretching, and Crystal continues. “The wife I observed with her husband at the store yesterday looked to him for guidance and comfort with nothing but love and trust in her eyes. Like she had no doubt he’d know exactly how to make her feel better in the stressful or embarrassing situation she found herself in. And he looked at her like she was the center of his entire universe. Girl, when he wasn’t staring at you with hearts in his eyes like Cupid just shot him in the ass with an arrow, he was lookin’ like that wolf in the cartoons, with his tongue rolled out across the table, you know? Anyway, he alternated between looking like he wanted to kiss your face or make you ride his. No in between.”
My eyes widen, and my hand slaps over my mouth after I let out a very unladylike squawk. Her description had started out so sweet.
My sister, on the other hand, is on her back, knees pulled up to her chest, her hands covering her eyes, but she’s dying of laughter.
Her laugh is infectious though, and every time she tries to stop, she fails, bursting out loudly once again, which sets off my giggles, and I hear Crystal start to cackle as well, probably at us finding what she said so hilarious.
When we finally get control of ourselves, Astrid having to wipe off the tears that fell from the outer corners of her eyes to her hairline, Crystal inserts with faux haughtiness, “As I was sayin’,” before getting us back on track in her stretching routine. “There was no way that wife could possibly think her husband thought of her as anything less than absolutely perfect.”
My face warms for the first time since I accidentally asked her what her stripper name was when we first arrived here. But it’s not from embarrassment or shame or anything of the sort. It’s from the pleasurable heat that started in my chest and spread outward, from another woman telling me what she saw when my husband looked at me.
What, probably, all women see when my husband looks at me.
What all the submissives at Club Alias see…
When my Dom looks at me.