The Dom Project (24 page)

Hi Robin, it’s Therese! I don’t know if you remember me, but I’m John’s friend. We exchanged usernames at the Los Feliz party. Hope you’re doing well!

I’ll cut straight to the chase. I have a friend visiting from the world caning capital: London. Interested in playing at my place? I can personally vouch for him. He’s a great guy looking for someone who can match his pace and knows what she’s in for. And isn’t a brat, preferably (unlike Yours Truly). I figured after seeing you in action you’d be good for it. There wouldn’t be any sex involved, unless you want to take it someplace else. If you and John are exclusive, never mind, but I thought I’d offer. If not, maybe I’ll see you next week at Miss Kitty’s?

Consideration lead to rapid decision lead to Robin walking into a high-rise apartment not much different from her own, wearing a caning-friendly outfit of a knee-length loose skirt with no panty hose. Maybe this was exactly what she needed to get closure and cap off The Dom Project—a genuine experience with another dom to see if all she’d learned with John over the last month and a half could be applied elsewhere. Low emotional involvement, low risk, endorphin rush.

And maybe, in Therese, a new friend. She needed one of those right about now.

“Hi, Robin! It’s so nice to talk without those stupid masks on.” Therese hugged her, showed her to the couch, then introduced her to Ian from London. Robin had carefully kept her mind blank when imagining him, and she refused to be either disappointed or excited meeting him in the flesh. He was late middle-aged, white, sandy-haired and had faded tattooed eyeliner. The aging rock star look didn’t fit him too badly.

They chatted for awhile, everything civilized, a nice current of tension under the surface.

“I’m going through a rough patch at work right now,” Robin said. “Lots of stress. So when Therese messaged me, well...”

“That’s going to be the last thing on your mind when I’m done with you.” Robin had to admit Ian’s accent gave the line a bit of sex appeal. “Ready for a go?”

She nodded.

They agreed on words, limits, and then it was off to the bedroom, a pleasant floating feeling already rising in her with each step. Yes, she could do this. Go on without John, find others to fulfill her needs.

It was easy. She didn’t even have to look in his eyes. Ian had her keep her head bowed, and then when she bent over the bed, she closed her eyes entirely. The only thing that mattered was her own body. Her own pain, as the first strikes landed. Ian’s strokes were even and firm. He paused for a long time between each one, measured and even, so that she knew when the next was coming. So different from John’s more complex, mischievous rhythms... But for now she let Ian’s discipline and steadiness become her own. Let his slower, predictable rhythm lull her down deeper into her body, into the quiet shameless place she so needed to find.

When they were done, and she pulled her skirt back down over her tender flesh, a sense of victory accompanied the fading pain. She did end up lying under a blanket, one that Therese provided for her, resting on the bed as her heartbeat gently coasted to its normal speed.

“Therese! There’s a sex dude in a pizza delivery uniform for you,” someone yelled through the door.

“My roommate,” muttered Therese while rolling her eyes. “I guess the pizza’s here already. Would you like some, Robin?”

Robin sat up, wincing a little. Ian walked over, but she raised her hand palm out and shook her head. “I’m fine, thanks.” She slipped on her shoes. “I’d better get home.”

She was determined not to think about anything on the car ride back, other than the fact that she’d walked out of there. Walked...not ran. That was important. Finally, once she’d showered and lotioned her backside and curled up on the couch in a bathrobe, she allowed herself space to think. And then wished she hadn’t, because the tears started flowing, aching hot and uncontrollable.

John would have known she hated pizza. John would have rubbed lotion on her with his skillful hands.

All her joy was tied up in John. Would he be angry at her, for doing what she did? Or would he understand, and approve? She understood herself a little bit more after tonight, but more than anything, she wanted to understand
him
, and what he felt for her.

Pick up the phone and call him.

She couldn’t. Not yet. She was still a mess.

She sent him a text instead, laboring over it for an agonizingly long time.

Hope you’re Okay.
Sorry about earlier email.
Can we talk tomorrow?
Miss you.

“I really do,” she whispered out loud, and went to wipe away her tears.

* * *

The small room in the Respiratory Acute Care Unit had two beds, but Al was alone for now, propped up into a seated position and working on a crossword puzzle. When he saw John, he waved and gave him a thumbs-up sign.

“Hey there,” John said. “I got you a get-well present. Can you talk?”

Al shook his head, and the tube coming from his mask made a slithering, scraping sound against the side of the bed. He picked up a notepad, wrote on it, beckoned John over to the bedside chair, then showed it to him.

Hi Johnson.
What you got?

“An awesome gay erotic graphic novel,” John said. “Here it is. I put a stealth dust jacket on it so it looks like a book about trains.”

Al took the book with a raised eyebrow and a smile, then turned to his notebook again.

Here for your lady friend
,
right?

“Yeah.” Had Robin’s deal with him gone through already? Would she still have called John if it had?

Wasting your time.
Collection’s already sold.
Even if it hadn’t
,
no gay comic would make up for what UCLA offered.

John’s anger pounded at the inside of his ribs, sickening him. The Mareau collection had meant so much to Robin, had drawn Robin to him, and now it was
gone
.

The ache in his right hand reminded him of the futility of rage, and anyway, he couldn’t blame a dying man for hurting Robin. She was a professional. She could handle it. But God, he wanted to be there for her now.

Al held up the pad again.
Sorry.
I
was tired.
They had a good case.

“So it was about the money after all.”

I
don’t need it.
I’ll move to the hospice soon.
But I’ve got a kid from a while back.
She’s got health problems too.

“My turn to say sorry.” John leaned back in his seat and exhaled deeply, the last of his rage fading away. “You have to do what you think is right. And I guess in a few years we’ll all be able to see those photos, and there’ll be essays and books written on them. People are going to remember her—well, I’m not sure if it’s exactly the way she wanted to be remembered, but it’ll be...full. Rich.”

Al nodded and wrote again.
I
think it’s what she would have wanted.
Can’t know for sure.

“Yeah. I read that part of the one letter where she says she couldn’t bear to destroy—wait a second.” He put his elbows on his knees and stared intensely into Al’s ruined, red-rimmed eyes. “Do you know what memento she was talking about?”

Al shook his head, and then closed his papery eyelids. John noticed that the hand holding the pencil was trembling. It was probably time for him to leave.

“Do you know who her old patron is that she mentioned? And do you want me to get a nurse for you?”

Al wrote on a fresh sheet, tugged it weakly off the pad and passed it to John. A name:
Martin Tannhauser
.

“Thanks,” John said. “And if you get moved, I’ll stop by and see if you want more train books, okay?”

Al might have smiled behind his mask, but John couldn’t tell for sure.

Chapter Fourteen

“Saylor University Library Special Collections,” Robin mumbled robotically into the phone.
Please let this not be about the Mareau collection
.

“Hey, sweetheart.”

She froze in her seat, mouth half-open. Just those two words so close together, like the pain of the stroke twinned with the pain of the stroke’s release. She wanted him.
Now
.

“Are you going to talk to me?” John asked. He didn’t sound angry, or desperate, or pitying. But there was something undeniable in the way he asked the question, and she was terrified of answering, of giving him the honesty he deserved.

Her voice came out husky and strained. “Yes.”

“Good.”

“I need to see you. To talk to you,” she said, speaking slowly so that she wouldn’t stammer. “It’s hard on the phone.” It would be so much easier to talk with his arms around her. She hugged her elbows to her chest.

“It’s hard for me too. I heard about the collection, and the first thing I thought was that I want to be there for you. Seems stupid to let my brother’s asshole behavior get in the way of that. Not that you’re stupid. But stay with me, okay?”

“Okay.” Even as she said that, she realized it wasn’t about his brother anymore. It wasn’t about the collection. It went beyond pain and pleasure, even shame, down into raw need, down to the marrow of her bones.

“I know about the collection because I talked to Al. He gave me the name of the man that Irina trusted with the memento. And I got to thinking...why would she have talked about destroying it, unless it was some kind of record, like the negatives? So I looked up the name, Martin Tannhauser. He was a movie producer back in the 1930s. I figured you could track down what happened to his estate when he died.”

“Oh my God.” She’d been entranced by the sound of his voice, but now the meaning of his words started to sink in. A lost
film
? “If this is real...why hasn’t anyone followed up on it?”

“I don’t know. Al isn’t in the best of shape right now, but maybe he told them too. We’ve got to move fast if you think we can track this thing down.”

“
We
.” She closed her eyes and smiled. “I like the sound of that. All right, I’m going to start running searches and checking estate sales and auction records. Where are you?”

“Driving from the hospital. I told my boss I’m going to be late due to a family emergency. Not exactly a lie, right? You
are
family?”

“For better or for worse,” Robin quipped back, trying to downplay the flutter she felt at his words.

“I’m on my way back to Saylor, but call me if you need me to divert course. And if I see anyone from UCLA on the freeway, I’ll shoot out their tires because it’s on like Mad Max, baby. Signing out.”

He left her laughing—good, pure, giddy laughter that shook her so hard she had to steady her fingers on the keyboard.

The library had access to all the premium databases, and she was very good at searching them. Martin Tannhauser was a figure on the fringes of celebrity, known more for the company he kept than for his work. He’d been an active member of several professional organizations. Praised for his film collection and his charity work. Faintly notorious for his private screening room and parties involving a shadier set. He’d probably bankrolled stag films, but retired into obscurity long before pornography became more mainstream.

His wife had died in 1965. He followed her in 1985. The house, by then worth millions, stayed under the Tannhauser name and passed to his son Gregory Tannhauser, who died in 2011.

That was when she found the estate records.

Fingers shaking again, but this time for an entirely different reason, she dialed John’s number.

“Get to Burbank,” she told him. “There’s an auction house there. They have a box full of 16-millimeter film reels that didn’t sell at auction to a film library, and I just bought them online for half of reserve. Ready for the address?”

“Hell yeah. And Robin? I’m going to tell you right now. I want you back. I want
everything
.” His voice was still calm, conversational.

She dug her heels into the floor and pressed her knees together, preserving the intense feeling.

Soon
.

* * *

John cleared a screening space in the basement storage room, pushing carts and shouldering shelves. Letting some of the tension out with a bit of heavy lifting and basic problem solving. Anything but staring at Robin, dressed in her daytime skirt suit and heels, the image of immaculate professional poise. He couldn’t stop thinking about winding her hair in his fist, the needy sounds she’d make as he edged her heels apart with the steel toe of his boot...

Not yet.
Jesus.
They still had three massive cardboard boxes of unlabeled film reels to go through. He wheeled the massive steel Eiki projector into position and began to thread the first reel.

Robin was watching him. He knew she liked his hands. He thought about that as he flicked levers and slotted the little metal teeth into the head leader holes. The ancient cellulose ran slick under his fingertips and smelled faintly of camphor.

What was she thinking about now? Maybe wondering if any of their boxes contained the mysterious memento. Maybe processing what he’d said to her before he’d hung up the phone.
I
want you back.
I
want everything.
Hadn’t he told Andy he’d have taken just being friends?

If that was what Robin chose. And she hadn’t. He’d told her what he wanted—
everything
—and she hadn’t refused.

In fact, she hadn’t said anything at all since they’d met up. She’d quietly listened to his tales of picking up the massive boxes, then followed him down to the basement without a word of question or complaint. Said nothing when he’d locked the door behind them. He could almost make himself believe that her silence was a yes. Not just a yes, a patient,
submissive
yes. His doll.