Chapter 13

- Renee

The Rage sat halfway down a block that most people walked past without a second glance, wedged between a laundromat and a tattoo parlor that had been "coming soon" for two years. No sign out front, just a matte black door with a peeling sticker of a snarling wolf that someone had slapped on there years ago and nobody had bothered to remove. Inside, the walls were exposed brick covered in layers of band posters and graffiti tags, some of them genuinely good, most of them not. The lighting was red and low, coming from strips along the ceiling that turned everyone's skin the same shade of bruised cherry. A long bar ran the length of the left wall, scarred wood with brass rail, backed by shelves of bottles that glowed like stained glass under the lights. The sound system was loud enough to feel in your teeth but not so loud you couldn't talk, which was the whole point. Thursday nights they ran drum and bass. Fridays were industrial and darkwave. Saturdays were a coin flip between whoever DJ Bump had booked and whatever genre he felt like lying about on the flyer. Tonight was a Friday, and the speakers were pushing out something heavy and electronic that vibrated through the floor and up into my boots.

I'd been coming here since I moved to the city. Five years of Fridays, give or take. I knew which bathroom stall had a broken lock, which corner of the dance floor had the worst sound bleed, and which bartender would pour heavy if you tipped well on the first round. It was my place. Not in any official sense, but in the way a cat owns a particular windowsill. I showed up, I settled in, and everyone understood the arrangement.

I leaned against the bar with my elbows back, a whiskey sour sweating in my right hand, and let myself just look. The dance floor was maybe half full, bodies moving in that unselfconscious way people only managed after the second or third drink. A girl near the DJ booth caught my attention first. Tall, Southeast Asian, with cropped hair and a mesh top over a sports bra that left very little to the imagination. She had great shoulders. Swimmer's shoulders. I watched the way they rolled as she moved to the beat, the muscles shifting under skin that looked almost liquid in the red light. She turned slightly, and her eyes found mine across the room. Something in her posture loosened. She held my gaze for a beat, intrigued, tilted her chin up just slightly, and went back to dancing.

I took a sip of my drink and let my eyes wander.

Two girls at a high table near the wall. One was a redhead in a leather jacket, the other a curvy brunette in a low-cut top, both nursing cocktails and leaning into each other's space the way close friends or new lovers did. The brunette noticed me watching and nudged the redhead. They both looked over. The redhead raised her glass a fraction of an inch in my direction, a small, acknowledging gesture. The brunette pointed a finger at herself, then at the redhead, then at me, raising an eyebrow in genuine curiosity.

I could have any of them. The thought moved through me the way a good drink does, warm and steady, settling into my limbs. Not as a fantasy or a power trip. Just a fact, the same way I knew I could walk behind the bar and pour my own drink if I felt like it. I probably wouldn't, because Kira made better cocktails than I did. But I could.

God, it felt good.

"You look like the cat that ate the canary." Kira set a fresh napkin on the bar in front of me and leaned her hip against the counter. She was in her late twenties, Japanese-American, with a sharp undercut and the rest of her black hair swept to one side in a wave that she was always tucking behind her ear. Compact build, strong forearms from years of shaking drinks and hauling ice, a sleeve tattoo of koi fish swimming up her left arm that disappeared under her rolled-up flannel. She had this way of looking at people like she was deciding whether to card them or kick them out, even when she was smiling. "Another one?"

"I'm good." I rattled the ice in my glass. "For now."

"Uh huh." She wiped down the bar with practiced efficiency, her eyes flicking up to mine. "So, when did that happen?"

"When did what happen?"

She gestured vaguely at me with the rag. "Don't play coy with me, Callahan. When'd you become an Owner?"

I grinned, swirling my drink. "Couple days ago. Fell into it, honestly."

"Fell into it," Kira repeated, one eyebrow climbing. "Sure."

"What, you want the origin story? Bitten by a radioactive Oliver Moore?"

She snorted, tossing the rag over her shoulder. "I'll pass." She reached for a bottle of bourbon to refill a regular's order down the bar, then paused, looking back at me. "You're staring at me different tonight. Don't think I didn't notice it."

I was. I'd always looked at Kira. She was exactly my type, compact and capable with that quiet toughness, and I'd spent plenty of Friday nights appreciating the view from this exact barstool. But I'd kept it to the polite side of obvious, the way you do with someone you see every week and don't want to make uncomfortable. Tonight I'd let my eyes trace the line of her collarbone, the way her flannel pulled across her chest when she reached for the top shelf, the curve of her ass in those black jeans, without any of the usual self-editing.

"Maybe," I said, not bothering to deny it.

Kira poured the bourbon, slid it down the bar to the waiting hand, and turned back to me. She braced both hands on the edge of the counter and studied me for a second. "Look, I know you've had a thing for me for a while. You're not subtle."

"Never claimed to be."

"I'm straight, Renee."

"Ah! Another one!"

She chewed her lower lip for a second, something working behind her eyes. Then she shrugged, a small, uncomplicated motion. "You want to fuck me tonight? I can do that. You're my Owner now, so." She said it the way she'd say you want me to open a tab, already reaching for the next task before the current one was finished.

"Kira." I laughed, shaking my head. "Tonight, anything's on the table."

She tucked her hair behind her ear and grabbed a pint glass from the rack. "Alright. Offer stands whenever. No big deal either way."

She moved down the bar to take another order, and I watched her go, letting my eyes linger on the way she moved, quick and efficient, weaving between bottles and glasses like she'd been born back there. The koi fish on her arm rippled under the red light as she shook a cocktail, and I thought about what it would feel like to trace those fish with my tongue, from her wrist all the way up to where the ink disappeared under the flannel.

I finished my drink, set the glass on the bar, and turned back to the crowd. The dancer with the swimmer's shoulders was staring at me again.

I pushed off the bar and let the music pull me forward. The bass was doing something filthy, all sub-frequency and snare hits that landed right behind the sternum, and my body picked it up before my brain did. My hips found the rhythm first, then my shoulders, and by the time I'd crossed half the distance to the dance floor I was moving with it, rolling through the crowd with my hands loose at my sides and my boots hitting the sticky floor in time. People parted, some because they saw me coming, some because I just moved like I expected them to.

A blonde by the speakers. Too thin, too twitchy, jaw working in that way that meant she was three drinks past fun. Pass. A pair of girls grinding on each other near a support column, one in a crop top and the other in something sparkly that caught the red light. The crop top girl had a great ass, but neither of them noticed me, and I wasn't in the mood to interrupt something that looked like it was already heading somewhere. A stocky girl with box braids and combat boots, standing at the edge of the floor and bobbing her head. Cute, but not tonight.

Then I saw her. Early twenties, maybe twenty-two, standing with a guy who had his arm draped over her shoulder in that loose, half-possessive way. She had dark curly hair that fell past her shoulders and a face that was all soft curves, round cheeks, wide brown eyes, the kind of face that made you think of words like "innocent" even when nothing about the situation called for it. But what stopped me was her chest. She was wearing a simple black tank top, and her breasts were straining against the fabric in a way that was almost hypnotic, heavy and natural, the kind that moved when she laughed and she was laughing right now at something the guy was saying. They had their own gravity.

I changed course and walked straight to her. Grabbed her upper arm, not rough, but firm. The way you'd grab someone you were taking somewhere.

"Hey!" She twisted toward me, her brow furrowing, her free hand coming up like she was about to push me off. "What the hell—"

She looked at my face. Then down at my hand on her arm. Then back at my face. Something shifted behind her eyes. The resistance bled out of her arm.

"Oh," she said, quieter now. "Okay."

The guy's arm slid off her shoulder as I pulled her a step away from him. He looked at me, then at her, confusion writing itself across his face. "Babe? What's going on?"

"She's an Owner, Danny," said another girl standing next to them, a shorter one with glasses who'd been watching the whole thing. She said it the way someone says "she's the manager," like it explained everything and also wasn't their problem.

Danny's mouth opened, then closed. His jaw tightened. He looked at me, and I could see the irritation sitting right there on the surface, the instinct to say something, to pull his girlfriend back. But it just sat there. He shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels.

"Right," he said, flatly. "Cool."

I was already moving. The curly-haired girl followed half a step behind me, her hand hanging at her side, looking back once at Danny with an expression that was more puzzled than concerned.

The next one was closer to the center of the floor. I'd spotted her earlier without realizing I was cataloging. Dark skin, close-cropped natural hair, angular jaw, and a mouth that made me want to bite something. Full lips, perfectly shaped, the kind that looked good wrapped around the rim of a glass and would look even better wrapped around other things. She was dancing with a small group, moving with a lazy, unhurried rhythm.

I tapped her shoulder. She turned, eyebrows pulling together, scanning me up and down. She was taller than I expected, nearly my height in her platform boots. Her eyes landed on mine and stayed there, and one eyebrow climbed slowly upward.

I didn't say anything. Just tilted my head toward where I was going and smirked.

She held my gaze for another beat. Then she shrugged, said something to her friend that I couldn't hear over the music, and fell into step beside me.

The swimmer, my original target, was watching all of this from her spot near the DJ booth. Up close she was even better than from across the room. Sharp cheekbones, dark eyes under heavy lids, that mesh top doing absolutely nothing to hide the lean muscle underneath. She'd stopped dancing. Her arms were crossed loosely, and she was tracking my approach with the focused attention of someone reading a situation and deciding where she fit in it. Her eyes moved from me to the curly-haired girl, to the girl with the mouth, and back to me.

I stopped in front of her and raised an eyebrow.

She uncrossed her arms, tucked her thumbs into the waistband of her jeans, and stepped forward without a word.

There was a curved booth in the back corner, one of those deep semicircular ones with cracked vinyl seats, tucked behind a half-wall that gave it a pocket of relative quiet. It was empty. I slid in first, settling into the center of the curve, and the three of them arranged themselves around me. The swimmer took the spot to my left, leaning back with one arm along the top of the booth, her knee angled toward mine. The girl with the mouth sat to my right, her posture straight, her eyes still carrying that evaluating look. The curly-haired girl hesitated for a second before sitting on the end, her hands clasped in her lap, those magnificent breasts rising and falling with each breath as she looked around the table like she was trying to figure out the rules of a game nobody had explained to her.

The girl with the cute mouth spoke first. She had her phone out, checking the time with a quick flick of her thumb, her jaw set in that way people got when they were calculating how much of their evening they were about to lose.

"So are we gonna fuck?" she asked, looking at me with flat, practical eyes. "I've got a 6 AM shift. If we're doing this, I need to know how long it's gonna take so I can figure out if I'm getting any sleep tonight."

"I actually have—" the curly-haired girl started, pulling at the hem of her tank top.

"I'm gonna stop you right there," I said, my voice dropping into something harder. She closed her mouth. "I'm not doing that."

The swimmer tilted her head, her arm still stretched along the back of the booth. "Not doing what?"

I looked at each of them in turn. "Negotiating. Scheduling. Acting like I pulled you over here because I care about your spin classes or your roommate's birthday." I leaned forward, my elbows on my knees. "You're toys. That's what you are. I picked you off the floor because I liked the way you looked, and that's the beginning and end of what matters here."

The curly-haired girl's lips parted. The swimmer's eyebrows rose a fraction. The girl with the mouth set her phone face-down on the table, and I could see the beginning of a response forming behind her teeth.

I didn't give it time to land.

"You three. Stop caring about anything except making me happy. Find that pleasing me is the only thing that matters to you, your only purpose."

It hit them like a wave. The curly-haired girl's posture shifted instantly, her clasped hands unclenching, her whole body angling toward me. "What do you need?" she asked, her brown eyes wide and earnest. "Tell me what you want, I'll do anything."

"How can I help?" the swimmer asked at almost the same time, leaning forward, her hand landing on my knee. "Whatever you want. Seriously, anything."

"Just say the word," the girl with the mouth added, scooting closer on the vinyl, her earlier irritation replaced by something bright and hungry. "I'm yours. Use me however—"

I sighed. Too much. Like three golden retrievers who'd just heard the word "walk." It was giving me a headache.

"Stop. All three of you, lose your free will. Find that my words are your will. Don't think, don't decide, don't act, unless I tell you to. Have my words be the only thing that... animates you."

Silence.

All three of them went still at the same time, like someone had pulled their batteries out. The curly-haired girl's hand froze mid-reach. The swimmer's fingers stayed on my knee but stopped moving, her eyes open and staring at nothing in particular. The girl with the mouth sat perfectly upright, her lips slightly parted, her gaze fixed on a point somewhere past my shoulder. They breathed. They blinked. But there was nobody home behind any of those eyes. Three beautiful mannequins arranged around me in a cracked vinyl booth.

"Better," I murmured.

I cracked my neck and settled deeper into the seat. "Strip. All of you. Everything off."

They came alive like puppets on strings. The swimmer's hands went to the hem of her mesh top, pulling it over her head in one smooth motion, revealing the sports bra underneath, which followed a second later. Her torso was exactly what I'd imagined, lean and defined, small breasts sitting high on her chest, her dark skin gleaming under the red lights. She stood to push her jeans down her hips, stepping out of them with the unselfconscious ease of someone undressing in their own bedroom, folding each piece neatly on the seat. The curly-haired girl tugged her tank top over her head, and those breasts spilled free, heavy and round, dark nipples stiffening in the cool air. She unzipped her skirt and let it pool at her feet, stepping out of it in plain white underwear that she slid down her thighs a moment later. The girl with the mouth unbuttoned her shirt methodically, one button at a time, then unclasped her bra and added it to the pile, her angular body all sharp lines and smooth dark skin, a small silver barbell glinting in her left nipple. Each of them moved with purpose, efficient and natural.

I took my time with my boots. Unlaced the left one slowly, pulled it off, set it on the floor. Then the right. I peeled off my socks, flexed my toes, and swung my bare feet up onto the table, crossing my ankles. The wood was sticky with old drink rings, but I didn't care. I leaned back and let my eyes travel across all that skin on display. The swimmer's abs. The curly-haired girl's impossible chest. The barbell catching the light every time the girl with the mouth breathed.

"You," I said, looking at the swimmer. "Massage my feet."

She blinked once, and life flooded back into her face. She shifted forward, her dark eyes focused and present, and took my left foot in both hands. Her thumbs pressed into the arch with exactly the right amount of pressure, firm and deliberate, working the tension out with the same athletic precision she'd brought to the dance floor. Her fingers were strong. I groaned softly, watching the muscles in her shoulders flex as she worked.

"You," I said to the curly-haired girl. "Get behind me. I want to lean on those." I aimed at her chest with my chin. "Make sure to be comfortable."

She climbed over the back of the booth to settle in behind me. I leaned back and felt her breasts press against the back of my head, warm and impossibly soft. I reached up with one hand and squeezed, feeling the weight of her, my fingers sinking into the pliant flesh. She didn't react beyond adjusting her position, cradling my head against her chest like the world's most obscene pillow.

I let out a long, satisfied breath, the swimmer's thumbs digging into the ball of my foot while the curly-haired girl's heartbeat pulsed steady and slow against the back of my skull.

"And you," I said, turning my head toward the girl with the mouth. "Right here. Next to me."

She slid along the booth until her bare thigh pressed against mine. I reached over, cupped her jaw, and pulled her face to mine. "Kiss me."

Her lips were as good as I'd imagined. Full and soft, yielding instantly when I pressed into them, her mouth opening for me without hesitation. I kissed her slowly, tasting cheap vodka and something sweet underneath, my tongue tracing the curve of her lower lip before pushing deeper. She kissed back with a quiet competence that made my stomach tighten, her hand resting on my thigh, her mouth moving against mine like she'd been doing this her whole life.

"Renee?"

I broke the kiss. The girl with the mouth went still the instant my lips left hers, her eyes glazing over, hands settling in her lap like a doll placed back on a shelf. I turned toward the voice.

My friend Patrick stood at the edge of the booth, a beer in one hand and an expression on his face like he'd walked into the wrong movie. He was wearing his usual uniform: scuffed leather jacket over a faded Bauhaus shirt, dark jeans with a chain hanging from the belt loop, and boots that had seen better decades. His hair was buzzed short on the sides with the top grown out and pushed back, streaked with early grey that he'd earned honestly. A scar on his chin from a bar fight he'd never tell the same story about twice. He looked like the kind of guy who'd been kicked out of a band for being too difficult, which, knowing Patrick, was probably accurate.

"You're late," I said.

"Yeah, sorry, I—" His eyes were on the girls. All three of them. Naked. Arranged around me like furniture. His mouth stayed open for a second longer than his sentence required. He blinked, looked at the swimmer's bare back as she sat motionless with my foot still in her hands, then at the curly-haired girl's chest pressed against the back of my head, then at the girl with the pretty mouth sitting blank-eyed beside me. He swiveled his head toward the rest of the bar, scanning the room. A few guys at a nearby table were staring, one of them with his drink frozen halfway to his mouth, but nobody was getting up. Nobody was calling anyone. Word had gotten around fast.

Patrick turned back to me. "What the hell is going on?"

"I'm an Owner."

His whole body relaxed. The tension dropped out of his shoulders, the furrow in his brow smoothed, and he let out a short, surprised laugh. "Oh. Shit, okay. That tracks." He gestured at the booth with his beer. "Can I sit?"

I waved him in, reaching up behind me with my free hand to give the curly-haired girl's breast another lazy squeeze. The flesh yielded under my fingers, warm and heavy, her heartbeat thumping steadily against my palm. Patrick slid into the booth on the far end, giving the motionless girl with the mouth a wide berth, the way you'd scoot around a stranger's bag on a subway seat.

"So," he said, settling in and taking a pull from his beer, "do you have your friend Oliver Moore to thank for this? Or is this some separate cosmic fuckery?"

"Oliver, yeah." I adjusted my head against the curly-haired girl's chest, finding the comfortable spot between her breasts. "Promoted me."

The truth was obviously more complicated than that. Oliver still had no idea I still had my ownership. I'd tell him eventually. Maybe next time we'd meet. There was no rush. It wasn't like I was stepping on his toes. The man had voluntarily neutered himself anyway. He wouldn't mind what wouldn't affect him, would he?

Patrick was staring at the girls again, his eyes traveling across skin and curves with the helpless magnetism of a straight man confronted with three naked women at arm's length. He caught himself and cleared his throat.

"So who are they?"

I shrugged. "Picked them off the dance floor. They were cute."

"Do they have names?"

I scratched the back of my head, then laughed. I pointed at the swimmer, still frozen with my foot cradled in her strong hands. "This one's Kneader." I looked at the girl beside me, her full lips slightly parted, staring at nothing. I paused, considering. "Mouthpiece." Then I jerked my thumb over my shoulder at the warm softness behind my head. "And this one's obviously Pillow."

Patrick laughed. He leaned forward and gave a little wave to the three of them. "Nice to meet you, ladies."

Nothing. Three pairs of empty eyes. Three bodies breathing and blinking and doing absolutely nothing else.

"I took away their free will," I said. "They didn't need it anyway." I tilted my head. "Girls? Did you get that you have new names, now? Nod if you did."

The three of them nodded in unison, smooth and automatic. Patrick shook his head, grinning.

"Man, you're lucky. I wouldn't mind being an Owner." He grinned, tapping his beer against the table. "Maybe I should start hanging out with Oliver Moore. Or maybe I should hand with you more?"

I smiled, slow and easy, and swept my hand toward the dance floor. "I can be generous for my friends. Pick a girl."

His eyebrows shot up. He looked at me, then at the crowd, then back at me. The excitement was obvious, a brightness in his eyes that he was trying and failing to play cool about. He stood up from the booth, but his boots stayed planted on the sticky floor. He hovered there, hands at his sides, suddenly looking like a kid who'd been told he could have anything in the candy store and had no idea where to start.

"What do I… how should I go about it?"

I sighed. "Just pick one you like and tell her her Owner wants to have a word. She'll come." I rattled my empty glass at him. "And bring me a drink on your way back."

He nodded, tugged his jacket straight, and headed toward the dance floor with the cautious determination of a man approaching a task he'd never rehearsed for. I watched him disappear into the crowd, then leaned my head back against Pillow's chest and closed my eyes, letting Kneader's idle hands warm my feet while the bass pulsed through the booth and into my bones.

Patrick came back about five minutes later with a drink in one hand and a girl trailing a couple steps behind him. She was mid-twenties, petite, with a pixie cut dyed silver and a septum ring that caught the red light. She had on a cropped band tee, something I didn't recognize, and high-waisted black pants that sat snug on narrow hips. Pretty in a sharp, elfin kind of way, with big grey eyes that were currently doing a lot of work trying to figure out what she'd walked into.

Those eyes landed on the three naked women arranged around me and stayed there for a beat too long. Then they found me.

"Hi. I'm Tessa." She tucked a strand of silver hair behind her ear. "He said you wanted to talk to me? Do you want to, like…" She glanced at the girls again. "Have sex with me, or…?"

"You're for him, not for me," I said, tilting my head toward Patrick.

Tessa looked at Patrick. Really looked at him, for what was clearly the first time. Her eyes traveled over the scuffed leather jacket, the Bauhaus shirt, the chain on the belt loop, the grey in his hair. Her lips pressed together in a thin line that she probably thought was subtle. It wasn't.

"Oh," she said. "Cool."

She shifted her weight to one foot and crossed her arms, her shoulders drawing up toward her ears. "So, I actually came here with some friends tonight, and we were planning on heading to another spot around midnight, so I'm not sure how long I can really—"

"No, totally," Patrick said, his neck flushing red above his jacket collar. "If you've got plans, that's—"

"Patrick." I gave him a look. He shut up. I turned to Tessa. "Until you wake up tomorrow, be genuinely happy to do anything Patrick tells you to do."

Tessa's mouth opened, then closed. She blinked a few times, rapidly, like she was trying to clear something from her vision. Her arms uncrossed slowly, fingers flexing at her sides. She looked at Patrick again, and this time her expression was different. Not the instant puppydog eagerness I'd gotten from the three girls before I'd wiped them clean. Something more complicated. Her brow was still slightly furrowed, and she kept touching her septum ring, turning it back and forth.

"Okay…" she said, drawing the word out. Her eyes stayed on Patrick, darting between his face and his hands and the beer he was holding. There was something cautious in the way she was studying him now, like she was waiting for instructions she wasn't sure she wanted but knew she'd enjoy following.

Patrick rubbed the back of his neck. "Look, it's fine, you really don't have to—"

"Tell her to sit with us," I said.

He looked at me, then at Tessa. He cleared his throat. "Sit with us."

Tessa sat. Dropped right onto the vinyl like her legs had decided before her brain caught up. She blinked, looked down at herself on the seat, then let out a short, bewildered laugh.

"That's… weird," she said slowly. She settled into the booth, her shoulders dropping, the tension in her jaw loosening. She turned the septum ring again. "I'm… happy to be sitting here. Like, actually happy. Not pretending." She looked at Patrick with wide eyes, half nervous, half fascinated. "That's really weird."

Patrick was staring at her. His beer was forgotten in his hand, tilted at an angle that was going to spill if he wasn't careful. His eyes traced the line of her neck, the exposed strip of stomach between her cropped tee and her waistband, the way her thigh pressed against the vinyl. He swallowed hard.

"You know, for a guy who once pinned me against a bathroom wall at a house party, you're being awfully delicate about this," I said, giving him a look over the top of my glass.

Patrick's flush deepened, but he grinned despite himself. Tessa glanced between us, her grey eyes narrowing slightly, a flicker of concern crossing her face. But it was competing with something else. She kept shifting in her seat, this dreamy half-smile tugging at the corner of her mouth every few seconds, like the simple act of sitting in a nightclub booth because some guy told her to was giving her a low-grade contact high she couldn't quite explain to herself.

"Nobody's going to give us trouble," I said, gesturing lazily at the bar. "I'm playing with my toys. Who cares?"

Patrick looked around one more time. The guys at the nearby table had gone back to their drinks. Kira was serving someone at the far end of the bar without so much as a glance in our direction. The music thumped on. The world kept turning.

Something clicked behind his eyes. His posture changed, the hunch in his shoulders straightening out, his jaw setting in a way I recognized. There he was.

He turned to Tessa and looked at her properly. Let his eyes drag down from her face to her collarbones to the strip of pale stomach below her cropped tee. Tessa's half-smile faltered.

"Oh no," she said quietly.

"Blow me," Patrick said.

Tessa's face split into a grin so wide and sudden it startled even her. She laughed, a bright, disbelieving sound, her hand coming up to cover her mouth. "Oh my god," she said through her fingers, already sliding off the booth and onto her knees. "I actually want to. That's so fucked up." She was still laughing as her hands went to his belt, shaking her head at herself, her silver hair catching the red light as she worked his zipper down. "I'm genuinely excited about this."

Patrick's head fell back against the vinyl.

I watched for a moment, amused. There was something entertaining about seeing Patrick on the receiving end of enthusiastic compliance for once. The man had never lacked confidence with women, but he'd also never had such direct control before. He usually had to fight for every inch, to tame the brats he was drawn to, especially me. Since Oliver had messed with my sexuality, I'd been happy to explore my submissive side with men, but I was still a control freak at heart.

I looked down at Kneader, still frozen with my foot in her hands. "Help me with my pants."

She blinked. Life rushed back into her face, her dark eyes focusing, her swimmer's shoulders squaring. She set my foot down gently and reached for my belt with steady, capable hands, unbuckling it and working the button and zipper with the same methodical efficiency she'd brought to the foot massage. I lifted my hips and she tugged my jeans down my legs, folding them and setting them aside. My underwear followed, black cotton joining the pile.

I settled back against Pillow's chest, the cool air of the bar hitting my bare thighs. I turned to Mouthpiece, sitting empty-eyed beside me. "Lick my pussy."

Those perfect lips parted. She slid off the seat and knelt between my legs, her hands settling on my inner thighs, spreading them apart with a gentle firmness. Her mouth found me without hesitation, her tongue pressing flat and warm against me before curling upward in a slow stroke that made my breath catch. I'd been right about that mouth. Worth every bit of the walk across the dance floor.

I closed my eyes. Let Pillow's heartbeat thump against the back of my skull. Let Kneader's hands find my calves and resume their work. Let Mouthpiece do what she was made for. The bass from the speakers vibrated through the booth and into my spine, mixing with the warm, wet rhythm between my legs until everything blurred into one long, rolling wave of sensation.

I floated there for a while. Minutes, maybe. Long enough for the tension in my lower back to dissolve, for my breathing to deepen, for the edges of the club to go soft and distant.

I opened my eyes.

Patrick was looking at me. His head was still tilted back, his lips parted, one hand resting on the back of Tessa's bobbing silver head. Our eyes met across the booth and we both burst out laughing at the same time, the absurdity of it crashing over us like a wave. Two friends getting head in a nightclub booth surrounded by naked women and terrible lighting.

"You know," I said, a little breathless as Mouthpiece did something clever with her tongue, "I'm usually the one on that side of the equation with you."

Patrick snorted, his laugh catching in his throat as Tessa did something that made his hips jerk. "Yeah, and the last time you were, you turned back into a lesbian halfway through and almost threw up on my dick."

"That was your fault," I shot back, jabbing a finger at him. "Who leaves the TV on during a blowjob? You absolute animal."

Patrick wheezed, which made Tessa pull back in confusion, which made him groan, which made us both laugh harder. My stomach muscles clenched around the laughter and Mouthpiece paused between my legs, waiting, her chin glistening.

"Keep going," He told her, and she did, her smile doubling in size as she went back down.

Mouthpiece was building me up slowly. Too slowly. She had the enthusiasm and the instinct, her tongue finding the right spots, her lips sealing around my clit with just enough pressure, but there was a hesitation in her rhythm that gave her away. She'd never done this before. Or if she had, it hadn't been with any regularity. She was figuring it out in real time, reading my breathing, adjusting when I tensed, backing off when I relaxed. Smart girl. She'd learn.

I threaded my fingers into her close-cropped hair and tilted my hips, guiding her without words. She adapted, her tongue flattening and pressing harder, and the warmth in my belly tightened another notch.

"How you doing over there?" I asked Patrick, my voice slightly thicker than I would have liked.

He took a second to respond. His eyes were half-closed, his jaw slack, one hand still resting on the back of Tessa's silver head as it bobbed steadily in his lap. He blinked like someone surfacing from underwater, his gaze swimming before it found me.

"Huh?" He swallowed. "Yeah. Good. Great." He exhaled hard through his nose. "Got fired on Tuesday."

"What?"

"Fired. Tuesday." He winced as Tessa did something that required his full attention for a moment. "My… fuck… my manager. Sandra Pruitt. Stupid bitch called me into her office at four thirty on a Tuesday, who does that, and told me my 'attitude was incompatible with the team's collaborative culture.'" He did air quotes with one hand, the other still tangled in Tessa's hair. "Collaborative culture. I've been carrying that department for eight months. I redesigned their entire inventory system from scratch because the old one was held together with duct tape and prayers, and she fires me because I told her in a meeting that her quarterly projections were bullshit. Which they were. They missed target by thirty percent the next month."

"Sounds like Sandra Pruitt needs a visit," I said, shifting my hips as Mouthpiece found a better angle.

"I hope she gets hit by a bus." He said it with the casual venom of someone who'd been rehearsing the line. "No. Something worse. I hope she gets a paper cut every single day for the rest of her life. Right between her fingers."

"Paper cuts," I repeated, my breathing getting shorter. "That's your ceiling for vengeance?"

"I'm brainstorming. I've had a rough week."

"She's one of my toys, you know." I pressed Mouthpiece's head closer, grinding against her mouth. "I could make her life hell for you. Walk on burning coals. Eat glass. Make her stand barefoot on Legos for an hour. Whatever you want."

Patrick shook his head, then lost his train of thought for a few seconds as his hips rolled forward. "No," he managed. "No, that's… that's amateur hour. Direct pain is boring. It's just stimulus. Your body adapts, goes into shock, eventually you go numb."

"So what's better than—" A wave of heat rolled through me and I bit down on my lip, hard. "Than making someone physically suffer?"

"Tantalus," Patrick said, his voice strained but suddenly animated in the way it always got when he latched onto an idea. "King who pissed off the gods. Stuck in a pool of water under a fruit tree for all eternity. Every time he reaches for the fruit, the branches pull away. Every time he bends to drink, the water recedes. He can see it. Smell it. Feel how close it is." Patrick's hand tightened in Tessa's hair and his breath hitched. "That's real torture. You let someone believe they can get what they want. Let them feel it right there, right at their fingertips. And then you make sure it slips away. Every single time. Over and over. Forever."

I nodded, half-listening, half-drowning. Mouthpiece had finally found her groove, her tongue working in tight, consistent circles that were pulling me toward the edge like a riptide. Pillow's heartbeat thumped against the back of my skull. Kneader's hands had moved to my calves, her thumbs pressing into the muscle, and the combined sensation of all three of them working on me at once was almost too much.

"That's pretty fucked up," I breathed.

"That's the point. You don't break someone with a hammer. You break them with hope."

The wave crested. My thighs clamped around Mouthpiece's head and my back arched against Pillow's chest, my hand fisting in Mouthpiece's hair as the orgasm tore through me in long, shuddering pulses. I heard myself groan, low and raw, the sound swallowed by the bass pumping from the speakers. Mouthpiece kept her mouth on me through all of it, steady and obedient, her tongue slowing as the aftershocks rippled out.

Patrick followed maybe ten seconds later, his head slamming back against the vinyl, his hips bucking up hard. Tessa's cheeks hollowed as she took it, her eyes squeezed shut, her small hands braced on his thighs.

Then she pulled off.

Her mouth stayed open, her face scrunching. She sat back on her heels, lips pressed together, cheeks puffed slightly, staring at the floor with the expression of someone who'd just bitten into a grape and found it was something else entirely.

"Gross," she muttered through closed lips, clearly trying to figure out what to do with what was in her mouth.

"Mouthpiece," I said, still catching my breath. "Kiss her. Share what she's got."

Tessa's eyes went wide. "Wait—"

Patrick laughed, breathless and flushed, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand. "Kiss her back, Tessa."

Tessa's protest died in her throat. Mouthpiece rose from between my legs, her chin still wet, and crossed the short distance to where Tessa knelt. She cupped Tessa's face in both hands and pressed their mouths together. Tessa made a small, muffled sound of surprise, and then her body softened. Her eyes fluttered shut, her hands came up to grip Mouthpiece's wrists, and she kissed back with the desperate enthusiasm of someone following an order that felt inexplicably wonderful. Their mouths worked against each other, wet and open, tongues sliding together. Tessa whimpered into it, tilting her head to deepen the kiss, pulling Mouthpiece closer by the wrists.

Patrick stared, his spent cock still out, his mouth hanging open.

I winked at him.

Then I leaned forward, touched Mouthpiece's shoulder, and pulled her gently away from Tessa. Those perfect lips were swollen and glistening, her dark eyes empty and waiting.

"Kiss me," I told her.

She turned to me and her mouth met mine. She tasted like Patrick and like me, salt and musk layered over the cheap vodka from earlier, and I kissed her slowly, savoring every part of it. Her lips were impossibly soft, yielding and warm, moving against mine with the same dedicated precision she'd brought to everything else tonight. I cupped the back of her head and held her there, feeling the heat of her naked body close to mine, the smoothness of her dark skin under my fingertips. She was gorgeous. She was mine. And Patrick was watching, his eyes tracking every movement of our mouths, and I could feel his attention like a hand on my skin.

I broke the kiss. Mouthpiece went still, settling back into her blank, waiting state. I licked my lips and leaned back against Pillow's chest.

"So," I said, looking at Patrick as he tucked himself back into his jeans with clumsy hands. "You got enough left in you for the original plan tonight?"

He looked at me, then at Tessa still kneeling on the floor with a dazed grin, then at Kneader motionless at my feet, then at Mouthpiece blank-eyed beside me, then at Pillow's breasts cradling my head.

"The original plan," he said slowly, "did not involve four extra girls."

"Are you really going to complain about the change of plans?"

He looked at me for a long moment. Then he grinned, reached for his beer, and drained the rest of it in one long swallow.

"Not even a little bit."

---

Hey there! This was chapter 13 of 4 Billion Toys 2. I'll be posting chapters here regularly, but if you want early access to the next chapters, feel free to support me on Patreon!

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