Closer and Closer Read online

  “Yeah, it’s pretty regular at this point. But I have my end under control, anyway. Those guys in the Main are all FNGs, trying to keep up, there’s nothing going on that I need to cover from my team’s angle.”

  “Our team.”

  “Of course. Our team.”

  “So I need your presence there. Thanks. I’ll let Steve know.” I looked at him, once again smiling. Patient. Neutral. You’ve only worked here eight months, Dirtbag.

  His chin rose, giving me a clear view of his flared nostrils. “Thanks, Erin. You take care of that for me. Appreciate it.”

  Damn. I didn’t move, didn’t let my expression falter, didn’t allow my mind to register anything past the wide, beige mental firewall I imagined descending when he did this. Across the surface, in white, sans serif: neutral.

  “Oh, Alan?” I glanced toward the opening of my cube, where he would hopefully depart in seconds. “By the way, fucking new guy—FNG? It’s derogatory. I realize you’re still acclimating to ThinkMine culture, but we really stress that every team member has something to offer, even if it’s day one with us. And even if they’re not a guy. It’s a core value. Important.”

  So there. Dirtbag.

  “Rah rah,” he said. As he rounded the twill-wrapped wall divider I heard him cough. And under it, “Fucking cunt.”

  It was going to be a long week.

  “Don’t forget to hop on that call for me, okay, Alan?” I said to the wall. Another longer burst of coughing was my only answer. A few seconds after, whispers and a trio of hearty laughs. Biting the inside of my cheek, I focused hard on the monitor I connected to my laptop in the office.

  Some people never left the back of the school bus.

  The day continued in the same pattern: Alan evading the responsibilities he deemed beneath him, me devoting too much of my time checking after him instead of working with my other team members. And because it was Monday, and because I’d been eye-shamed by Alan for daring to wear a pencil skirt, and because I had left a gorgeous, tall, warm man on the front steps of his cabin—a cabin: a real mountain cabin—before I drove myself and my pencil skirt to work, my personal cell chimed at three, interrupting me as I got to a critical line of code that would fix the final hiccoughs from last night’s errors.

  And of course it was Danielle.

  “You never called me back yesterday,” she said over a stiff wind and music I couldn’t name. But I could see her easily—hair blowing around her face, big sunglasses perched on her nose as she chatted. She was probably on her way through downtown Yountville with the top of Mom’s ancient yellow VW Bug pulled down, headed toward the restaurant where she was currently apprenticing as a sommelier—this year’s dream job.

  She was so different from me. Everything about Danielle was always in motion, swift, erratic.

  “I was busy. I’m sorry.”

  “You never blow me off. Where were you?”

  “Nowhere,” I said, purposely and slowly. I regretted it immediately.

  “Don’t lie to me, Pudge,” she squealed, her voice reverberated in my ears. “Have a birthday hookup with that Iranian guy?”

  “Indian. Ardhi’s Indian, Dani.” I went quiet and purposely left her with her assumptions. It was too soon to talk about Walt. And once she started asking questions, my sister didn’t stop until she exhausted her curiosity, something I couldn’t risk at work. But she also loved to talk about herself. “Did you go out Saturday night?”

  “Why do you think I didn’t call you until last night?” Once she laughed, the dread of discovery faded, relaxing my throat enough to carry on a conversation. I listened to her for the next half-hour and clicked around the net, looking at low-carb diets. And Danielle, in usual form, was distracted with her own story.

  The secluded bends and curves of Lake Arden Way saw more than its fair share of sedate European sedans, but a classic convertible like Roxanne, screaming red with a top in a rich tan the color of a show-jumper’s saddle, got attention Walt didn’t care for. He looked like a tourist, or worse, one of the half-timers who kept buying up big stretches of the Blue Ridge to park their cabin-castles on. And, because Roxanne the Mercedes was all of those things—and Lu’s grandmother’s favorite car, left to her favorite, black sheep granddaughter—he was too nervy to drive like the regular residents of Grayson County.

  Signaling with many extra yards of fair warning to the stealthy black BMW coupe prowling behind him, Walt swung Roxanne between the riverstone pillars that marked the private drive to Tate’s house. A sprawling lodge with deep porches and thick leaded glass windows, the place was set a half-mile from Lake Arden Way, through a meandering drive landscaped over a hundred years ago to look like nature intended each long-branched hemlock and lichen-spotted granite boulder to be exactly where they were.

  The road was lit with weathered copper lamps, long rectangles composed of the same leaded glass squares that topped each window of the house. Ten years before, when he and Lu had driven up for the first time to visit Tate simply as friends, she fawned in a very un-Lu way over those lamps, gawping and babbling about a Scottish guy by the name of Mackintosh. It was an actual architect fangirl moment.

  He got it. It was a nice house. Nice land, nice access to one of the prettiest, most unspoiled lakes in the Blue Ridge. All held by Tate and a few other private homeowners. No water-skiers or jet-skis, please. Very rich folk gone rustic. Which, to Walt, was always the only real selfish perk of being one of Tate’s best friends—a single, secret thrill.

  Wouldn’t some of these snobs fall over and shit themselves if they found out about the kinky clubhouse right under their noses?

  Thanks to Tate’s ingenuity and his long-gone bachelor uncle’s wise investments, the house and most of its original landhold had stayed in the Jernigan family. The Enclave was an unknown gem from the gilded age that had seen another of the East Coast industrial barons, this one called Vanderbilt, come down to western North Carolina to build a mountain home. The Jernigans’ lakeside home was nothing like Biltmore in scale, but the heels of both owners’ families had crossed the floors of their respective owners’ houses during their summer retreats to the Blue Ridge.

  A century later, once or twice a month, on Saturday afternoon, a number of cars with license plates from North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, South Carolina, and even Georgia came down Lake Arden Way, causing no trouble and raising no reason for suspicion. They turned between those same riverstone and copper-lanterned pillars. Between seventy-five and a hundred and fifty might arrive, depending on the guest list, and park their cars in a few discreet alleys tucked into the landscape. They would come up the stone path to Tate’s house and enjoy a nice dinner and maybe a walk on the paths of the disheveled but comfortable old gardens before heading downstairs to be tied to a piece of custom dungeon furniture and spending the rest of the evening in luxurious, carnal torment.

  Or doing the tormenting.

  Walt smiled to himself for a half-second over what he knew went on in the lodge’s former basement kitchen and old servants’ quarters tucked under the Enclave house main floors. Then the thought of Erin collided with his lazy inventorying. In the smaller, back playroom. Past the whip lane and the primal-play pit. The smooth, natural cherry Saint Andrew’s cross—one of Walt’s favorite pieces of equipment—with Erin’s pale wrists and ankles roped to it. Her hair twisted on top of her head and messy because he’d made it that way. A few escapee silvery-blond pieces falling around the white silk covering her eyes. The tension and release he gave to her, playing her body with his hands, making her squirm against the crossed rails as her lips curved in the same lush O she made when she came hard above him. Whining and digging her nails into his shoulders as he pushed deeper into her and made her come again.

  Slowing the Mercedes, Walt cranked the anemic late-seventies a/c. He’d masturbated more in the past three days than he had in the past two months. His own hand was a damn poor substitute for the feel of Erin’s long, nimble fingers stroking
his cock.

  When he rounded the final curve to the house, he caught sight of Lu’s Range Rover parked beside Tommy Blackwell’s well-maintained but modest black truck. A few more vehicles belonging to other local members were parked around the drive. And right under the covered side entrance was Paul’s giant white SUV, nearly blocking the entire span of orchard stone steps. It was just the thing Walt needed to kill his latest, Erin-inspired hard-on.

  Paul never showed up on time, sending Claire ahead to help Tate organize the house. On nights like this, the two could handle things. For parties, they often worked with a core group of service-oriented slaves and submissives under her guidance. When Walt passed Paul’s Escalade, the engine was ticking down, still cooling from the drive up from Callahan.

  Good. They probably had already started.

  He came in through the side entrance, a set of double doors that opened into a mudroom and wide corridor that ended in the kitchen—one of the house’s few modern renovations.

  “Oh hey, Ranger.” Paul’s most recent secondary partner, a girl called Powderpuff who had no fondness for vanilla clothes, was perched on the long, granite-topped island. She was actually working a shiny, red Blow Pop around her equally red and shiny lips. Her teeth had been stained pink for her efforts.

  “Hey there,” he said. As she started to snake down from the island, Walt waved to her. “I’m late, aren’t I? Shit. Hey, see you later.”

  Before her platform boots could hit the floor, Walt turned the corner and crossed the central hallway. He slid into the big front room and parked himself behind Tommy and his wife, Alex. Before his eyes connected completely with Lu’s, he looked down and made a show of shuffling around, reaching between his legs to adjust the dining chair where he sat. From the corner of his eye, he still caught her sticking her tongue out at him.

  “Sir?” Eyes down, Claire’s head tilted toward Paul, waiting. He grunted his consent, never one to waste his words on his wife, and she went on. “Thank you, Sir. I’ve met someone I’d like to put forward. She came to CPEP last week and I’ve known her for a few months. Her name is Er—”

  “That computer girl wants to be a sub?”

  Walt’s head bobbed up in time to see Paul watching his girl with little interest. He looked like a damn gray-headed vulture, sneering down at her with his bushy eyebrows and puffed-up professor attitude.

  She’s interested in submission, not becoming a sandwich, asshole.

  Lately, Claire’s shoulders climbed to her ears every time Paul opened his mouth, a contrast to the soft smile she still gave the man she called her Master. The hope and desperation in it made Walt clench his jaw, which was probably smarter than punching Paul’s.

  “Yes, Sir.” Claire paused, waiting for Paul’s input, tethered to his whims. This wasn’t about their dynamic; it was his damn show for the others.

  “Het fem submissive, right? Reboot? Erin?” Lucy suddenly looked more interested than she had in six months of guardian meetings. The cocky smile she tossed in Walt’s direction was a bit overdone, even for Lu. “You know her, Wanda?”

  “Know who? Erin?” He remembered her long legs, her upturned, round ass as she untied and retied her shoelace. The surprise whiff of her perfume on his shirt Monday morning when he undressed after she dropped him at home. “Yeah, I’ve met her once or twice.”

  “Oh have you, now? After Saturday night at the club?” Lu chuckled to herself and stood, blowing a kiss at Walt in response to his raised middle finger. “Your ears are turning red as a fox’s ass, Wanda.”

  “Oh, Wally!” Claire shifted on her knees so Lucy could pass by, beaming up at him.

  Rubbing his hand over his face, Walt groaned. Now Claire was going to fuss over him like he was her little pet. He eyed the door, grunting to himself when he saw Tate was between him and a clean exit.

  “So that’s three votes in favor, yes?” When Tate wanted to, he could pull out the child of privilege routine and cast attitude around better than a Park Avenue heiress. Walt thanked him silently, swearing he’d buy the man a twelve-pack of Diet Sprite. It was the least he could do, since Tate had stopped drinking bourbon two years ago. “Paul, your girl available for mentoring a new submissive?”

  Claire’s head inclined toward her Master, waiting.

  “Sure.” Paul shrugged without a glance in Claire’s direction. “I’ve hardly interacted with her, but they seem to know each other already.”

  “Great.” Tate nodded toward Claire with a reserved smile. “Thank you, Claire.”

  And that was that. Erin would be invited up to The Enclave. Barely as a guest of Paul’s, but under his slave’s guidance. The rest of the meeting was unremarkable, and finished minutes later. Walt moved around a few clusters of people, heading for the kitchen.

  He poured himself a glass of tea and pretended to study the contents of Tate’s fridge as Paul and Tommy passed through. Times like this were the worst for missing Brady. And his girl Hailey. Even Holly, before her demons turned on her. If she accepted the invitation, Erin, simply by virtue of her newness, made the balance of personalities and power dynamics change well before she would arrive at Tate’s house. Really, before she even knew she’d been invited.

  There were stories she would want to hear, maybe a few he’d want to tell her too. Burying his best friend Brady. Standing beside his wife Hailey as she took the flag from the honor guard, how her hands shook around the deep blue edges, even though she wore her own Dress Blues and still kept her chin high as her tears spilled down her cheeks. And Holly. And the dark winter last year, after he’d returned from seeing Hailey in San Diego.

  He’d made that trip at his best friend’s request—his last request. It was supposed to bring closure to Hailey, and to Walt too. Instead, he came back to North Carolina after New Year’s Day more edgy and bitter than ever, struggling with the realities of his life and age, his lifestyle.

  Walt stared into the bright light glaring directly into his eyes from the back of the fridge.

  Bright light. Sun.

  Glaring into his eyes as Lu chatted his ear off about her New Year’s trip to Atlanta with Tate, the enormous dungeon just opened there in an old meatpacking factory. His body a concert of muscle aches and stiff joints after making himself into a damn contortionist, flying coach all the way home from California to see to Hailey. His last duty to Brady, his best friend, his brother, and one-time savior, too.

  Lucy glared at him. “Wanda, are you even listening—” The Rover’s wheels screamed as they locked, sending the big SUV fishtailing across the highway. The vehicle came to a hard stop, throwing Lucy into Walt’s aching body. “The hell?”

  In front of them, a huge flatbed had swung from a clearing in Callahan Paper’s woodland management area. A few miles back into the forest, it adjoined a backcountry area of the park. There was talk the Callahan family had sold off a big parcel of their land, but apparently the sale was no rumor. In the week Walt had been gone, trees had been cleared. A gravel drive was put down. And a high, razor wire-topped fence spanned the clearing.

  CONSTRUCTION SITE

  SEE FOREMAN FOR ADMITTANCE

  THINKMINE INC.

  ThinkMine, her work—a server farm, she called it. Before he knew Erin was coming, there she was.

  “I’ll be damned.” Walt muttered to the ever-present case of Diet Sprite, and the remains of cold cut trays and jars of fancy condiments Claire put together for the social hour before the meeting. He stood up, fast. Too fast to clear the stainless steel edge above his head. Behind him, Lu, Tate and Claire howled.

  Damned, indeed. He scowled at the three, rubbing his head.

  “Oooh, sweetie, that looked bad,” Claire said, crossing to him. “Bend down. Let me see if you broke the skin.”

  “Like you could crack that thick skull.” Lucy snorted. “So, Wanda…you have something to tell us?”

  Claire huffed. “Oh, leave him alone, Lucy.”

  Assured he’d not damaged himself—or Tate�
�s high-end refrigerator—Claire helped herself to a bottle of water and brought out cans of soda for Tate and Lu. She and Lu opened their beverages and drank.

  Walt leaned into the cool granite countertop behind him and did the same with his tea.

  Silence.

  “Damn, would somebody say something?” Tate crumpled the aluminum can in his hand and cracked open another one. “Why the hell are we all standing around, watchin’ each other breathe?”

  “Wanda got lucky.” Lucy’s eyes never moved. She watched him closely, smirking as she lifted the can to her lips.

  “Well, thank God. That grumpy-bear bullshit of his was hell on my mood.” Tate folded his arms across his chest and looked between Walt and Lu and Claire. “What? So Walt got laid. Walt used to get laid a lot, if y’all remember.”

  “No, Tate…he met a girl.” Claire smiled—no, hell, she was beaming at him like he’d just walked on his hind legs for her.

  “I’ve got to get out of here before this one tries to teach me to sit up and beg.” Walt stepped around Claire, still grinning up at him like he was her new puppy, and shook Tate’s outstretched hand as he passed him. “See you, man. And Louis, thanks for the loaner. I’ll have it back to you by next weekend.”

  “Just keep Roxanne until you can get a new truck. That one you’ve had since we graduated from college is headed for the junkyard. If it was a kid, you’d be buying it a prom dress.”

  “I’ll have it back to you next weekend. Tommy’s already ordered the clutch.” The screen door closed behind him with a heavy crack. He wasn’t surprised when he heard the hinges squeak again.

  “Wally?” Claire jogged after him, alone, it sounded, from the soft slap of her bare feet on the old orchard stone path. “Walt?”

  He couldn’t walk away from Claire. Tate, probably. Lucy, definitely. But Claire wasn’t following him to ride his ass about Erin. She probably wanted to talk, which was worse. He shoved his hands in his pockets and paused by one of the old rose arbors.