The Scarlet Letter Scandal (29 page)

To Kris, Jojo, Connie, Mindie, Meg, and my other mermaid friends out there (yeah, I have sea glass friends on the Internet,
don’t judge me
): I love you guys. We share a common bond of low-tide love for broken glass that washes up on beaches, which takes a special kind of person and
we are special
. Glad we are picking up the pieces together.

To anyone who supported my first novel
The Scarlet Letter Society
: I’ll always remember that and I’m thankful you were there for me. Much appreciated!

Thanks to all the members of my amazing family; I am so grateful for your love and I love you right back.

Special thanks to my husband, Bob, my life’s true love and best friend, and our four loving, sweet children, Sarah, Molly, Faith, and Bobby. I love you guys more than I could ever put on a page. Sorry if my books are embarrassing in front of your friends. Thanks for being my team and the heart of my world.

Mary T. McCarthy has been a professional journalist for over twenty years for newspapers (
The Philadelphia Inquirer, Baltimore Sun, Washington Post
), magazines (
Chesapeake Family, What’s Up Eastern Shore, Chesapeake Life
) and the Internet, where she’s Senior Editor at SpliceToday.com.
The Scarlet Letter Scandal
is her second novel. Her first novel,
The Scarlet Letter Society
, reached #4 on the Amazon.com Erotic Romance bestseller list, atop
Fifty Shades of Grey
. Her third novel,
The Scarlet Letter Storm
, will be released in May 2016. Mary lives with her family on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Find her online at
marytmccarthy.com
, on Twitter
@marymac
, or on Instagram
@marytmccarthy
.

“Z
oom in on her red lipstick and the ball gag,” said Jo.

“Who doesn’t love a good lipstick-and-ball-gag shot?” asked Zarina with a laugh.

The two women sat in a small glass room perched above the filming set floor. The old building had once served as a seafood warehouse, with thousands of pounds of crabs and oysters moving through these walls each year on Matthew’s Island, tucked away in the Chesapeake Bay on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Now, the property had a sign outside reading “VXD Enterprises.” Shellfish still came and went from these parts, but not from this building anymore.

Vixenden.club was a high-end sexy fantasy website for women, secretly owned and operated by schoolteacher Jo Bird and coffee shop owner Zarina Harandi, unbeknownst to most of the people in their lives.

The producer next to them gave a thumbs-up, and the director below made an “okay” hand gesture signifying he’d received the message from the studio. The screen in the studio reflected the change: the scarlet-red lipstick-clad mouth of the actress now glistened in the shot, perched as it was around a specially ordered black rubber ball gag. The original red ball gag hadn’t looked good in any of the combinations with red lipstick, so Jo ordered the scene to be shot again. The close-up was going to be used as the main image for the short film.

“Are you happy with it?” asked Zarina, pointing toward the screen. She knew how much effort had gone into the shot.

“Yeah, I think there is just enough glitter in that deeper shade of red,” said Jo, concentrating on the image before her. “Let me see the still.”

The producer paused the shot, and Jo nodded. Only Zarina noticed the simultaneous exhales of the producer, the director, the makeup artist, and the photographer. Even the actresses on the set breathed quiet sighs of relief—
that crazy OCD bitch finally had the shot she wanted.

“Pause the action and send in the photog,” the producer said into his headset microphone. The director said “
copy that
” with the slightest hint of relief in his voice as the auburn-haired photographer made her way onto the set to capture the image that would be used on the website’s main page.

“We should toast to that!” said Zarina. “This is going to be our biggest hit yet.”

“It’s a good feeling,” said Jo. “Taking our tiny company from a crazy idea in a writing class to this secret online empire!”

The second line on the sign outside the door to VXD Enterprises read “Photography ~ Graphic Arts ~ Web Design” and most islanders had ignored the comings and goings from the building. The owner had been happy to lease the empty building. Locals figured some chicken-necker weekenders with more money than brains had set up some kind of fancy Internet business; they really couldn’t care less. Though the seafood business wasn’t what it used to be, hard-working watermen and their families continued season after season to bring in the shellfish for which the region was known internationally.

“The lighting is so perfect,” said Zarina, looking at the small screen on the camera handed to her and Jo by the photographer. “The way the sun comes through those wooden slats—you could never capture that with electric lighting.”

“Fantastic,” said Jo. “Let’s work it up with a title.”

“
Tara’s Secret
,” said Zarina. “Wait until the website members see this one!”

Vixenden.club was an exclusive, members-only website for women. Its creators took great care to avoid the use of the word “pornography,” which had negative connotations of male-dominated, anti-feminist ’80s VHS tapes in seedy video stores. Those days were over. This brand of sex for women was on an entirely different level. This was highly specialized, professionally produced erotica for the web: steamy short stories, artfully filmed short movies, and galleries of provocative, sexy images designed for powerful, sexy, discriminating women who were willing to pay.

“We are on track to double our members from half a million to a cool million,” said Jo. “And then it looks like my days as a schoolteacher are over. Besides, if any of the island mommies figured out that their kid’s elementary school teacher was moonlighting as an online sex empire goddess, they might object.”

“True!” said Zarina, laughing. “I think people who know me as the friendly neighborhood coffee shop owner would be a little shocked, too. My mom the college professor, for instance. Though I honestly don’t think she’d mind. Especially if she knew I was starting to make money.”

“What does your husband have to say?” asked Jo, who, at thirty-four, vowed to be perpetually single.

“Stanley couldn’t be more laid back,” said Zarina. “He calls himself a ‘product tester’ and always offers to check out our new stuff first! I just wish the hours at Zoomdweebies weren’t so long so I could be here on the island more—but having an Internet business works out.”

“I’m at the point where I hate going across that drawbridge at all,” said Jo. “The phone signal on the island is terrible, but I think I’ll be sad when the new cell tower starts working. I didn’t want to talk to anyone on the phone that badly anyway.”

“Definitely has its charms,” said Zarina. “Something to be said for unplugging. Though there is some irony in the fact that we started an Internet company on an island where there’s hardly enough bandwidth for four people to play Words With Friends at the same time. Ha! Well, for now I’m headed up the road.”

“I’m having lunch with Eva,” said Jo. “Do you think it would be cool to talk to her about VXD Enterprises? We could really use a legal opinion on our expansion.”

“I think it’d be great,” said Zarina. “She will be totally cool with it, and a great help—and besides, I keep worrying she’s going to see my car on the island and wonder what I’m doing here!”

Zarina gathered her purse and keys and walked past a wall where crops, whips, switches, handcuffs, blindfolds, ropes, spreader bars, and other BDSM tools were neatly arranged on hooks and shelves. A chain and black leather sling in the corner was a bit more hardcore than the typical suburban “sex swing” from a toy party that usually ended up as a plant holder. The film set was busy and she was sure to remain quiet as she passed the dominatrix and her submissive; the two women were readying themselves for the next scene. Girl-on-girl BDSM was hot on the website right now. As the site’s statistician and web traffic analyst, Zarina made recommendations to Jo about what stories and film clips were getting the most hits. As the more creative director, Jo, who was a world-class dominatrix herself, seemed to have good instincts when it came to knowing what women wanted to see in both the straight and gay portions of the Vixenden.club world.

Their site was meant to bridge a gap in the online world of sex. Needless to say, there was tons of porn available for those who wanted it. But for the more “vanilla” set, there wasn’t much in the way of classier, more subtle arousal. That’s where Jo and Zarina’s site came into play: curate some of the better sexy content from around the web, screen out the hardcore, tacky, or overly violent stuff, and produce original material that was just what couples needed to start off a hot night at home after the kids went to bed.

As she got into her car, Zarina smiled thinking about Jo’s schoolteacher comment. Would the parents be surprised “Miss Jo” ran a sexy website? Sure. But they’d be even more shocked if they saw her in full pro-domme costume, starring in one of her own videos.

“That’s a wrap, ladies,” said Kevin, the thirty-something director of the video, and the actresses headed for the changing rooms. He walked up the steps to the studio and entered. The producer, Dara, removed her headset, exchanged a few words with Kevin and their executive producer, Jo, and headed off to her job at the local radio station in nearby Easton.

“Were you happy with today’s work?” asked Kevin. He absentmindedly ran a hand across his close-cropped silver-white hair. At fifty, he was retired from his job as a pilot for the Naval Academy, but the military haircut had remained for his unexpected second career in erotic film directing.

“How dare you announce that scene was a wrap without checking with me?” asked Jo, angrily pulling her jet-black medium-length hair into a ponytail. She narrowed her steely blue-gray eyes.

“I beg forgiveness, Empress Josephine,” said Kevin, lowering his hazel-green eyes.

“You know what this means,” said Jo, unbuttoning her white linen blouse to reveal a contrasting black leather bra. Kevin had already noticed it through the fabric, and his body was reflecting his arousal.