Only Child (26 page)

• • •

"W
hich one is the paddling tape?" I asked Michelle.
"They're all labeled, honey. With Post-its. I've got the master list here." She ran her finger down a column, said, "It's number four."
I carried it over to the workbench the Mole had put together. Flicked on the gooseneck halogen, picked up the magnifying glass, double-checking.
"NV," I said.
"What does that tell us?" Michelle asked.
"I don't know yet, girl. We need to sort them first."
It took longer than I'd have thought, rechecking the tiny little brands. When we were done, we had one high stack, and one short one. And one orphan.
CV: The dogfights, the NHB contest, the jump-in tapes . . .
NV: The swastika spray-painters, a girl trying on blue jeans in a booth, the sorority paddling . . .
FV: Just one. Vonni. Running.

• • •

"W
e tanked," Terry said, walking into the suite, disconsolate.
"Burke didn't," Michelle said brightly.
"What'd you crack, Jack?"
"I'm not sure," I told the Prof. "Where's Cyn and Rej?"
"I'll get them," Terry volunteered, ignoring his mother's look.

• • •

"T
hose codes must mean something," I told them. "And Cyn and Rej may have given us a roadmap."
Rejji ducked her head, modestly. Cyn crossed her long legs, displaying the pronounced flex-line on her thigh.
"The NV and the CV ones, they look alike, right?" I said. "Real. Like someone snuck a camera into whatever was going on. Only what this Kori told us, the NV one— the one she did, anyway— it was a scam. A production, all right, but not the one the players thought it was. And one of them, Kori, she was in on it from the beginning. An acting job. For
her,
not for the rest, no matter what they thought. If we assume all the NV ones are the same game, then one of the spray-painters was in on it with Vision, but the others thought they were making a movie. Acting."
"Or maybe they didn't know at all," Cyn said thoughtfully.
"But what would be in it for—?" Michelle asked.
"For Kori, it was doing something she wanted to do, any-way," I said, as Cyn nodded agreement. "
And
getting paid for it.
Plus
believing that she was the only one doing the
real
acting. That's a big-hit trifecta. It could be the same for the play-Nazis, if one of them
wasn't
playing. Let's say he wants to be the leader of some 'white power' crew, but he doesn't have what it takes to pull that off. Vision tells them that they're
acting,
okay? Auditioning for the movies. But the guy, the one who's in on it, he gets to
be
what he wants, if only for a little while. Just like Kori did. And the tape is the proof."
"That young woman. The one trying on the dungarees. She was alone, mahn," Clarence pointed out.
"I think I have that one scoped, too," I said. "None of these loops have titles, or credits. I don't know whether we're seeing the whole thing, or just some snip out of the middle. But it
could
have been a deal where the script is supposed to be some girls playing a trick on their friend, sticking a little camera in their pocketbook, so they made a tape of her changing. Then they post it on the Internet or something."
"If that was the script, then which one would be the actor?"
"Not the one we saw," Cyn said. "Not the girl pulling her pants down, the one
taping
it. I'll bet there was more to it. The stripper
knows
it's a 'movie,' so she takes her pants off while 'acting' like she
doesn't
know she's being taped. But the one doing the taping, she's doing the
real
acting, because her job is to
get
those pants off. Same as with Kori, see?"
"Huh!" I said as it hit me.
Cyn put her arms over her head, stretched luxuriously. "I just
look
like this," she said. "It's not all I know."
"Tell him!" Michelle applauded.
"But what do they get from this, mahn?" Clarence asked me. "The tape would be the same if the girl was acting or not, yes? All the cameraman wants is to see her pants come down."
"No," I said, "he wants more than that. I'm just not sure what."

• • •

"I
got it! I got it!" Terry said, running over to the VCR and hitting "Pause."
"What do you have?" the Mole asked.
" 'CV.' I know what it stands for. All those tapes, they weren't acting, right? They were just real things, that the guy taped.
Cinéma vérité!
"
"What's that?" I asked him.
"Just what's on those tapes, Burke. Like Frederick Wiseman did in
Titicut Follies
."
"Terry, I got no idea who . . ."
"No, listen to me," the kid said, all worked up. "
Cinéma vérité
just means, like, super-realistic. You watch it, you don't know if it's a documentary or a story. That's what all that stuff was like, right? The pit bulls and the fighting and stuff?"
"Yeah . . ."
"And 'CV'? Come on!"
"I am certain he is correct," the Mole said.
"When's the last time
you
watched a movie?" Michelle said to him. "But he is
so
right," she said to us.
"Okay . . . But, if the CV stuff is real, and the NV stuff is acting, at least for
some
of the players, what's FV?" I asked the room. "Because that's the only one Vonni's in."
Nobody said anything.

• • •

"I
never heard of them," Wolfe told me.
Rain slanted across the windshield of her battered old Audi. Bruiser was lying across the back seat, a thick blot of darkness in the shadow.
"I'm not looking for their reps," I told her. "What I need is their location."
"So you can . . . ?"
"Ask them some questions."
"I know who you're doing this work for, remember?"
"I'd never ask you to put someone on the spot."
"
Ask
me? No, you wouldn't do that. What you're offering to do here is
pay
me."
"If I was doing it so I could take them out, you're the last person I'd bring into it," I told her, truthfully.
"And why's that? Because you respect me so much?"
"You know that's true," I said, ignoring her tone. What I didn't say was the other truth— if I used Wolfe to bird-dog a hit, I knew exactly how she'd pay me back.

• • •

"Y
ou think it's someone from our world?" Cyn asked me that night.
"Your
work
world?"
"Yes. Power power power."
"I don't see how, Cyn."
"There's those who say violent porn causes people to . . ."
"That's not your world."
"No, no; I didn't mean me and Rejji, the way we play. But . . . you know about our Internet business?"
"No."
"The deal is, we live together— which is the truth— and I own her— which is true— and if you're a subscriber— we take credit cards, checks, and money orders— you can dial up our daily channel and watch me discipline her. If you're a
premium
subscriber, you can tell me how you want her disciplined, and watch it on a private channel.
"It's simple enough. We seeded the ground with a few pictures. I have a special boudoir chair I punish Rej in. It kind of makes her lean way forward. . . ."
Rejji got up off the floor, walked over, and sat on a straight chair so she was facing backwards, her legs positioned outside the rungs. She turned her head to the side, arched her back deeply so her bottom protruded over the edge.
"See?" Cyn said. "That's a good example. And there's plenty of others. Always a market for
le vice anglais
. Me birching her, topless, that was our best seller."
"You making any money?"
"Look at her," Cyn said pridefully. "We're making a ton."
"Nothing illegal about it, either," I complimented her. "If you can skate under the IRS, you're golden."
"We're a small business," she said, smiling. "We even have a pension plan. And health insurance."
"Okay, but what does this have to do with . . . ?"
"Burke, if you saw some of the 'requests' we get, you'd lose your lunch."
"People have weird tastes."
"Some of them want me to
hurt
her. I don't mean make her cry, Burke. I mean—"
"Yeah, but . . ."
"But
what
? Do you understand what I'm really talking about?"
"Yeah. And I
don't
think whoever asks for stuff like that got the idea from you spanking your girlfriend."
"Come here!" Cyn said to Rejji. The dark-haired girl slid off the chair and crawled over to where we were sitting on the couch.
"Tell him," Cyn ordered her.
Rejji put her head in Cyn's lap. The blonde girl patted her. Gently, comforting.
"That's how it started. Before we were on the Net. With Gresham. She wanted to do it to me herself," Rejji said softly. "Hurt me for real. She . . . she terrified us. And when we wouldn't go along, that's when she—"
"I know," I said. "And it's all over now. But this thing . . . with Vonni, it doesn't scan for me like S&M gone ballistic."
"You know that woman, Lana something, the one up in the Northwest somewhere?" Cyn asked me, stroking Rejji's hair.
"Never heard of her."
"She was a branded slave in a power-exchange group. That's supposed to be an all-consent thing, right?
Exchange
. Like me and Rejji do, our pact. You know how it ended up there? The 'masters,' they finally couldn't get it up for consent. So they kidnapped and raped some college girls, visiting here from Japan. They figured Japanese girls, they'd be natural submissives. And this woman, she was right there with them. Helping out."
"So they were morons as well as freaks. What's your point?"
"It can spring back on itself," Cyn said. "If you can't control
being
in control, it can amp over. Master the master."
"That's not just for sex," I said.
Rejji looked up from Cyn's lap, turned her head toward me. "Power power power," she said, barely whispering the words.

• • •

S
leep sneered at me. My mind was so hard on Vonni that I felt a stabbing pain behind my eyes. I tried to drift— sometimes that worked.
I wondered if I was really looking at the same kind of overlap Cyn had been talking about. Where the truth was.
Power power power.
I'd walked Candy on a leash. Listened to her wet-whisper how she'd do whatever I told her to; whatever it took. Candy took a lot. Mostly people's lives. Candy would be whatever she thought you wanted her to be. She used the roles like a deranged Doberman I'd known once. He hated other dogs; I never knew why. His trademark was to pretend to be injured or crippled. So they'd come close.
Belle liked to be spanked. She also liked driving getaway cars, brawling, and revenge. She was about as submissive as a pit bull on angel dust. But she could take it, all right. The last thing she took was a hail of police bullets meant for me. I told her I loved her only that one time, just before she went over.
Fancy dished it out, in full costume. Her sister, Charm, took it. Fancy held the whip, but Charm held the handle. Tricks and games, but not fun ones— the roots were too twisted.
Strega would do anything for me. A lot of women say things like that. The way Strega meant it scared me as much as it drew me.
Gem would say, "Yes, master," slyly, expecting a smack on the bottom as a response. But she'd been her own boss since she was a baby. She'd had to be— her childhood had been the Khmer Rouge, hunting and haunting.
Belle and Candy were dead and gone. If there's anything to the Bible, they'd gone in opposite directions.
Fancy was just gone, leaving Charm just dead. I didn't know where Strega was, but that wouldn't stop her if she wanted to see me.
One way or another, women always left me. They didn't all die. Sometimes, when whatever brought us together was done, so were we.
Gem didn't end like that. I'd left her. In Portland. I told her I couldn't send for her until I knew how it would be for me back home. And now I wondered if I would ever know.
Or if she'd still be there when I did.
Who'd
want
one of those "true submissives" that inadequates are always trolling for, anyway? "Every man wants to spank a domme," Michelle had told me years ago, winking as if she knew something more than she was saying. And maybe there's some truth in that. At least it would be special. Just for you. A person, not a role.
I like spike heels and seamed stockings. On
some
women. If their legs are too thin, the seams don't look erotic; they look like huge varicose veins.
I like bratty, sometimes. Hate bitchy, all across the board.
I knew a girl, years ago. She'd spent years as a slave to some guy, wearing the collar, living the life. When he told her he was "moving on," she Swiss-cheesed him with his own custom-made shotgun. Stupid bastard died because he'd never learned the first rule of survival when your girlfriend's a borderline: abandonment is a capital offense.
If the only way you can make it work is with a woman who lets you tie her up, that's one thing. But if the only women you can get are those who'd let
anybody
tie them up, then who's the one in bondage?
No matter what any chump thought he was buying from their Internet business, Cyn and Rejji were true partners. And the bond between them didn't come in leather.