Chapter Five #2
“Today’s a garden day, not a grant writing day?
” Sometimes “heading to the garden” for Blake meant actual gardening, and sometimes it meant writing at the PlantSeed offices instead of writing from home.
While the community garden was clearly one of Blake’s favorite aspects of his job, she’d come to realize that was only a fraction of what the nonprofit handled, and not even one of Blake’s main responsibilities.
Mostly, he spent his work time staring at his laptop with a puzzled line between his brows that she refused to think of as adorable, typing away at grant proposals and fundraising letters.
“Some gardening and some writing today, I think.” He ran a hand through his hair. “The board meeting’s coming up, and I need to finish my report. Andrew will be there to help.”
She smiled. “Bring me home some tikka masala?”
Blake made a big show of rolling his eyes. “I might be back late.”
“Don’t work too hard. It’s bad for you.” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, though, the Pimpernel came to mind.
If Blake was out late, then she’d have the apartment to herself for whatever private time she might enjoy with her new online research subject.
She’d spent the last few days wondering how soon was too soon to contact him again.
Here it was Wednesday and no word. Maybe she’d message him tonight.
Blake rubbed the perpetual stubble on his chin. “How about this: I’ll message you when I have a time frame. If you get hungry before then, feed yourself, like the adult you are.”
Maggie waved him off. “Fine, fine. Go have fun at work.”
“You too.”
After he left, she pushed through the last of the editing, stopping for a late lunch when she finally reached a stopping point.
Then, she switched gears to research. She’d done some noodling around on the internet over the last couple of days, seeing what she could find on the Scarlet Pimpernel.
There wasn’t much. She’d left her conversation with Chauvel thinking the Pimpernel was a notorious online figure with a scandalous reputation and scads of followers, but he seemed to be just a guy with a blog.
His books were ranked high in his categories for sales, but they weren’t bestsellers.
They had great reviews, but not enough to indicate a massive following.
He was hardly worth the money Chauvel wanted to pay her to write this article.
Maggie continued her search, settling back in on the couch and picking up where she’d left off. She had found a reference to the Pimpernel on Reddit in a thread about kink resources in the Boston area.
Check out the Scarlet Pimpernel’s website—he’s a local guy, has a page about upcoming events in the area.
That reply got some awards from other readers, and a few responders echoed the sentiment.
Yep, great advice! and I check his blog all the time, even before I check KinkLife.
Maggie was planning to visit KinkLife next, but the posts here had her curious about something else: she hadn’t seen any events listed on the Pimpernel’s blog.
To be sure, she opened a new tab and visited again.
The Reddit link led to a dead page on his site with a 404 error message.
But nothing on the internet ever really disappeared, so she checked an archive site for the Pimpernel’s blog and started heading back in time.
Eventually, she got to an archived version of the site that did have an events page.
It was last updated six months ago, two months after he started the site.
So the site had been launched with an events page, and about two months into existence, that page disappeared. She read through the last few listings.
Impact Play at the Lilac Terrace, one event read, starting at 8 p.m. on a Saturday in January. Floggers, crops, and paddles, oh my! Message me if you want to play.
She scrolled to other events. Ropes and More this weekend—always looking to get knotty with a friend, said one.
For a few events, he mentioned that he couldn’t make it but gave the event itself a shout-out.
So, at one point, he was actually making in-person play appointments with people through this website.
Sure enough, the contact page on the archived version of his site had his email address, not a generic contact form.
The text was different, too. I’m at many of the local Boston events, reach out if you want to meet up for chat or play.
The Scarlet Pimpernel was once a fixture at local kink events.
Then, he stopped attending anything. Maybe someone would remember him.
She could try to find a local event from this archive, pretend to be looking for an old friend.
Somebody might be able to … what, describe him?
Give her his name? That felt uncomfortable. She didn’t want to dox the guy.
Next, she checked KinkLife, the most prominent kink-focused social media site.
She had never considered herself kinky, although conversation with the Pimpernel had her wondering.
She set up an account with her anonymous email address and the username CuriousRose.
On her profile page, she gave the bare minimum: Age 27; Location Boston; Interested in: Just lurking.
The “interested in” options were a whole list of checkboxes: friends, romance, play partners, femdom, findom, a dominant, a submissive, a queen/king, a servant, a worshipper, DD/lg, a sugar baby, a sugar mommy/daddy, the list went on.
She was afraid to google half of what she saw in that list. She used a stock photo of a rose for her profile picture and left the “bio” portion of her profile blank.
KinkLife was comprised of separate communities, each with their own pages and feeds.
She joined a few: “New to KinkLife,” “Boston,” and “Massholes,” which was hopefully referring to the often-affectionate term for people from Massachusetts and not the actual assholes of people from Massachusetts.
(A quick glance through the group revealed no visible assholes, thank god.) Then she searched for the Scarlet Pimpernel.
There he was, with the same red S as his chat avatar.
Also, the site said he was last online three days ago, but he hadn’t posted anything in months.
She scrolled back to his last posts. She could only see three of his posts without becoming KinkLife friends.
She clicked through to read his posts, starting with the oldest.
Someone had tagged him into a thread and asked if he was going to be tying in the dungeon at the Brick Room Play Party, and he answered in the affirmative. Can’t wait. I’ll bring the ropes, you bring the patience.
The next post asked who was doing dungeon security at an event called “Hits and Giggles,” and the Pimpernel was one of the earlier responders.
It’s GretchenBoss and WiseApple at this month’s session.
I know Bruiser won’t be back—Theo issued a lifetime ban, finally, so the dungeon should be good this month.
A bunch of us are refusing to attend any events where Bruiser’s still allowed.
The final post was in another thread about a kink event back in March, where someone had asked if he was attending and looking to play. Yeah, I’ll be there! Probably my last in-person event for a while—job’s keeping me away. Send me a message if you want to meet up. No more recent posts after that.
What had happened to him back in March that made him stop attending events? The only clue was his line about his job. Maybe he had to travel for work?
Maggie leaned back on the couch and exhaled.
She had learned a bit, but not as much as she’d hoped.
She searched instead for his name as a keyword in the general chat, and she got a bunch of posts that mentioned him.
They were localized to the Boston community forums and all had the same spirit as the Reddit posts.
The Scarlet Pimpernel’s the best if you get a chance to play with him, said one.
Really good guy, said another. Everything else was similar, all extolling his virtues as a play partner.
There was little else relevant that she could find about the Scarlet Pimpernel online.
Lots about the plant: she went rabbit-holing down a few gardening websites for fun.
Blake would probably know all about it, with his botany degree and fascination with growing things.
But how was she going to explain her sudden interest?
Oh, just looking for an internet Dom, fucking strangers via text, stumbled upon some plant info.
Sure, that would go over great. Blake was a nice guy, but he wasn’t someone she’d talk to about sex.
She didn’t want to scandalize her roommate to find out more about a plant, not when she had the entire internet at her disposal.
Too bad the internet was proving useless for learning more about the Pimpernel. For all she could see, he was a great guy.
Either Chauvel knew something about him that nobody else did, or Chauvel was mistaken.
He’d said the Pimpernel had treated a woman badly.
Maggie should really talk to her. Chauvel said she’d been “changed,” which could mean anything.
Obviously, there were plenty of situations where assholes online had their fan base fooled into thinking they were good guys when they were douchebags.
That could be happening here. If Chauvel was right, she needed to proceed with caution lest she become another woman manipulated into doing things she didn’t want to do.
But she could keep her head about her, she was sure.
Next step: play with him.
Blake dug his pitchfork into the top of the tall cedar compost bin and turned the top layer of food scraps.
The methodical nature of the task soothed him, like tending his houseplants: work had to be done, each step before the next, no ambiguity in the process.
He smiled and turned over another layer.