Valerie Ch. 02

Chapter Two

Exploration

Monday morning, 5:00. Valerie's alarm went off with its usual irritating buzzing, like the back up alarm on a truck. Reaching over, she turned her light on and then turned off the alarm. She had to train herself to do it in that order so as not to oversleep. Forcing her protesting body up, she stumbled to the shower and began the preparations for the first day in another week at work. As she lathered up, she remembered Charles and his consummate skill at using his hands for a far more enjoyable purpose. It was only an act of will that kept her from masturbating in the shower. She'd learned long ago that if she allowed any slack time in her morning routine, she'd use more than was there.

An hour later, she was dressed in a conservative business suit and driving to the offices of Branford and Gashune Advertising Agency. The 45 minute drive allowed her an opportunity to plan her information gathering strategy. The big question was whether to start with the lifestyle or with Charles himself. She didn't feel that she could entrust either mission to her staff, so she would have to do the research herself when she had time. Fortunately, with the Hopkins account just finished, she would likely have some free time available. By the time she pulled into the parking garage, she'd decided that the first searches should be on the lifestyle itself. Was what Charles and Sally introduced her to this last weekend normal for such an abnormal activity?

Entering her office on the fifth floor, she greeted her secretary, "Good morning, June, any messages over the weekend?"

"Just two, Ms. Burbon. Mr. Dansig left a message saying, 'Good job on the Hopkins account,' and Francine Traline emailed and requested a lunch appointment. She didn't say what about."

"Very good. Call Francine back and set up a lunch at 12:30 at Dutch's. I'll be doing some personal research, since I seem to have nothing pressing."

"Yes, ma'am."

Valerie entered her office and found that June has been as efficient as ever. Her computer was booted up, the coffee made and the bowl of kisses refilled. Sitting down, she logged onto her account on the computer and considered what search parameters to use. Not knowing much about the subject of what went on Saturday night (not even what it was called), she tried searching under, "sex games." Not surprisingly, the search came back with 3,490,000 hits. A quick scan of the first 20 or so, showed a lot of porn sites, but nothing that stood out.

"Obviously, I need to refine things a bit. Maybe, 'slave,' will do the job. That's kind of what I was pretending to be," she thought to herself. After so refining the search, it was narrowed down to a mere 558,000 hits. "Still too many," she thought. Looking at a few of the first page of results, she noticed some potential key words, a couple which seemed perfect. Typing in, "domination and submission," brought it down to 180,000. Many of these seemed geared towards female domination, so she specified male domination. The site count dropped to 122,000, still quite high. Finally realizing what she really was looking for, she added, "instructions," and narrowed down to 2,610 hits.

Without much more to go on, she decided to look closer at some of the hits. The first dozen or so were porn sites specializing in something called BDSM. They seemed to be geared towards tying people up in some pretty elaborate ways and inflicting various sorts of pain on them. Most seemed to have women as the only bound subjects (subject to both female and male tormentors), though one had only men bound and at the mercy of women. A couple were gay themed and she bypassed them. On her 23^rd site, she hit pay dirt. The site was called informedconsent.com. It seemed to be some kind of scholarly article on the lifestyle of BDSM. The whole thing seemed to be a consensual activity where the involved people would play roles where the level of relative control was skewed by choice. She got the impression that there were as many ways to play the game as there were people who played it. Tracing some of the embedded links, she saw that there were disagreements within the community itself about what was acceptable, with some willing to engage in scenes without safe words or in a lifestyle that was not based in scenes of specific duration, but in a 24/7 ongoing master/slave relationship. The variety of ways to play, even within the safe and sane limits seemed immense. In some ways, she was experiencing information overload. She was relieved to find that there was a somewhat logical explanation, apart from Charles', of her weird pain/pleasure confusion Saturday night.

Seeing it was getting close to 11:30, she was preparing to shut down her search when she noticed a link to the top 100 books on BDSM. Scanning through it, the one that caught her attention was something called The Loving Dominant by John Warren. "Loving," she thought, "can love be part of such a strange relationship? This might be worth checking out." She clicked on the Amazon.com link and saw near universally great reviews, using phrases like "taught us how to keep the love in" and "a must for anyone new to the lifestyle." She ordered a copy of the paperback and paid extra for rush shipping. She was just getting off the net when June buzzed her.

"Ms. Burbon, you're meeting with Mrs. Traline is in 45 minutes."

"Thank you, June; I'll be out in a minute."

Valerie left her office and gave June some instructions before heading out, "June, I expect that someone will have something for me to do before today is out. This is Monday, after all. Send me a text if anything comes up before I get back."

"Yes, ma'am."

She walked to Dutch's, a popular soup and sandwich shop about 15 minutes from the office. The lunch rush was just starting to roll in, but she was able to find a table without difficulty. Francine was only five minutes behind her.

"Hi, Francine. To what do I owe the pleasure?" she asked of her old friend.

"Afternoon, Val. I was hoping to get your advice on something."

"Of course you can. What's up?"

"Harv wants me to go up to his cabin with him this weekend. I'm pretty sure he's going to try to push the relationship further, physically. I'm tempted, but not sure if it's such a good idea."

"Francine, you know what I would do. Harv is a hunk and I'd love to be in your predicament. But I'm not you. You've had your reasons for not getting physical with him, even if you haven't told me what they are. If those reasons have not changed, then you should probably not go against them. How do you feel about it when you let yourself think about sex with him?"

"I would love to go to bed with him. It's just that I'm afraid of how it will turn out. There are things he doesn't know about me that will probably come out during sex that I don't think he'll like. I don't want to lose him, but I'm afraid that we've reached the point where anything I do or don't do will drive him away."

"I'm not sure how having sex with someone, who both loves you and wants to have sex with you, could drive him away. Just what kind of deep dark secrets could you have? Are you an axe murderer hiding out from the police?"

Francine laughed at that, but it was a nervous laugh that had Val wondering just what her friend was so afraid of. Clearly, Francine was not ready to talk about it yet and Valerie moved the conversation to other more mundane topics, to her friend's visible relief. They finished their lunch and returned to their respective offices.

June was just getting off the phone when Val returned and was informed that she had a new client and that she had scheduled a meeting with him in an hour. The rest of her workday was spent getting to know the client and his needs. Once he was gone, she spent considerable time planning the approach she would use and the outside resources that would be needed.

Leaving work at 5:15, she drove home and ate a light dinner for one. Settling down at her computer, she began to plan a search strategy on Charles. Staying light for the evening, she googled his name. He came up with well over 1000 hits on the name. Some could be ignored, clearly being about other people, not all of which seemed real. It seemed he was the fourth in his family to carry his specific name. The family had never been what she would call rich, at least not until he started working in the financial field. There were several articles in Forbes and The Wall Street Journal about his seemingly unerring instinct for investment. He was one of those rare brokers who had a reputation for treating his clients with a true fiduciary relationship. Several instances were noted of his taking a financial loss in order to protect his client's interests. Clearly, if she were contemplating trusting him with her money, she would have no qualms. But she was thinking about trusting him with something much more valuable than her retirement funds.

There seemed to be a dearth of information relating to his private life. The articles she found all had him declining to answer any questions about his relationships or private life. There were two reports of him suing scandal sheets successfully for invasion of privacy. His extreme attempts to protect his privacy were ruled as overriding the presumption of being in the public eye. No one had ever, it seemed, managed to get a member of his household staff to tell all, at least not that made the internet.

Val was pleased with her initial finds. This BDSM lifestyle was unusual, but not necessarily dangerous. The man she was attracted to and wanting to entrust with her safety had a reputation for protecting those who did trust him, at least in financial matters. What she needed now was more information about the less public part of his life and an idea of what practicing dominants and submissives actually did. It was a toss up as to which would be harder to find out about.

By now it was getting late and she decided to head to bed. She found that she was restless and feeling increasingly horny. Thinking about Charles for so long had aroused her and she needed some relief. She got one of her favorite toys out and began to caress herself. She ran the buzzing plastic penis over her breasts and tummy. The stimulation sent a tingle through her body causing her nipples to go erect and her pussy to lubricate. She thought about the mind blowing orgasms she had over the weekend. The memories reinforced the feelings and drove her to higher levels of arousal.

She moved the vibrator down to her pussy and used it to caress her lips, sliding it in the juices she was producing. Her body trembled in anticipation. She avoided her clit for now, wanting to prolong the pleasure. The empty feeling in her cunt grew, as little jolts of excitement pulsed through her body. When she could stand it no longer, she plunged the vibrator into herself, letting the pulsations in the device rouse her even more.

She couldn't help but picture herself bound to that bed, gagged and blindfolded, at the mercy of the automated stimulation from that night. Just thinking about it brought her to the edge of orgasm. Then a thought hit her and she pulled the vibrator away with a cry. She forced herself to back off and let the arousal die down, just like what happened Friday night. It was the repeated highs and lows that built the intensity of the orgasm. She wanted to try to tease herself, though she wasn't sure how long she could pull it off.

After five minutes of frustration, dying away to mild arousal, she put the vibrator back into her pussy. Holding her legs spread out and her hands above her head, she basked in the wondrous sensations building up in her body again. She tried to force herself not to move, but as the relentless vibrations continued; she couldn't help but writhe and moan at her impending orgasm. When she felt on the verge, she reached down and yanked the vibrator out again.

Crying in disbelief at what she as doing, she writhed is renewed frustration as the orgasm let her push it away from her. In her mind, she could hear Charles ordering her to not touch herself, to let her arousal die down. She moaned out loud, "Please, let me cum. I'll do anything, just let me cum."

Her thoughts seemed to take a life of their own. Her mind's ear heard him order her to lick Sally's pussy to orgasm. She felt repulsed that she would go there in her own fantasy life, especially after she felt desperate enough to picture herself tentatively licking Sally's pussy lips. Valerie imagined that Sally's taste was not much different from her own, actually somewhat pleasant. She could see Sally beginning to writhe as Val licked with increasing vigorousness. As she imagined Sally bursting into orgasm, she plunged the vibrator back into her cunt. Desperately, she plunged the vibrating cock in and out of her cunt. She reached new heights in arousal for masturbating (though nowhere near Friday) and was moaning loudly, writhing on the bed. Stopping again never entered her mind, lost as she was in the excitement that was cresting in her body. When the orgasm hit, she screamed out loud, reveling in the waves of pleasure that poured over her. As she came down, she thought to herself, "That was great! I need to be careful about the screaming though. The last thing I need is for someone to come on down to see if I'm safe when I'm in the throes of an orgasm. Could I gag myself?" She was deciding that she would have to look into a new toy when sleep overcame her, sending her to dream land.

********

She had no opportunity to continue her explorations at work on Tuesday as she was elbow deep in the tasks associated with the latest account. She was ready to go home and relax by 5:00, but recalled that she wanted to check into some new toys. She was sure that she could not find things like restraints and gags at Wal-Mart! She would have to look online to find a store that would carry what she was looking for, but would not be inherently dangerous. Valerie's idea of what kind of people would frequent the average downtown porn shop was not very flattering.

Stopping at an internet café, she picked up a latte and went to a small table in a corner so no one could see what she was doing. More experienced at finding stores online, it did not take her long to have a search list to peruse. There were a lot of sites that were online only. Something in the back of her head told her that many, if not most, of these would be predatory, if not in safety, then in price. One hit did show promise. A place called Castle Superstore actually had pictures of the storefront and some of the displays inside. "This most definitely does not look seedy. Well lit, open display floor and no sign of those private booths I've heard about. Those could just be not shown, I guess. It's worth at least going by and checking out." She thought to herself.

She was just getting ready to shut down her connection when she noticed the hit three below Castle. It was a web site that seemed to offer connections between adults seeking other adults for sex play of all kinds. Curiosity struck and she clicked onto the site. The home page had the usual warning that it was an adult site and requested that minors go elsewhere. Once past this non-secure security page, she found a page that allowed people to search for a particular type of… what could only be called kink. When she realized that she had been staring at the page for several minutes, she shook herself and looked again, trying to be more analytical.

There were things she had never dreamed of, let alone heard of. There were maybe four dozen initial parameters that could be selected. In addition to the expected categories of lesbian, gay male, BDSM, big breasts, well endowed and the like, there were odd ones (to her mind) like enemas, menstruation, scat (whatever that was), water sports (why was the icon yellow in color?). She clicked on the BDSM radio button and hit search. The next page asked for additional parameters such as gender dominating gender, bondage, punishment, humiliation, slave rapes, blood sports (that sounded unpleasant and dangerous) and some that she had no idea what they might be. Playing out the search, she punched the buttons for bondage, light pain, male dominating female and orgasm denial.

The result of this was 145 hits, each seeming to be an ad for someone seeking one or more partners for sex games involving men dominating women and one or more of the other parameters she selected. Most were actually from women seeking men to subject them to domination of one or more types. A few were from men looking for submissive women willing to engage in certain types of play. All were using handles instead of real names. "My God!" she wondered, "how do any of these people know whether these advertisers are safe to play with?" She tried to click on one of the men's ads and got a screen that informed her that as a guest to the site, she could view the ads and respond to them, but she would have to join to see any profiles and access histories. Of course, one month's subscription was a mere $9.95, billed to any convenient credit card. So for free, she could blindly respond to an ad and take her chances. "That will be the day," She snorted under her breath. She returned to the homepage of the site and bookmarked it for later review. "I'm going to have to try the curious selection. It sounds like it's for those who have not tried something but would like to."

Packing up, she headed to the car and drove out to the location of the Castle store. The last thing she expected was to find herself in a decent looking neighborhood with the store adjacent to a chain drug store and a fast food joint. "The area's safe enough," she muttered under her breath. Parking in the lot that had only four other vehicles, she entered the store. Just like the photos online, it was well lit. It was a little unnerving that the first sight was a naked blow up doll, but she had to admit, it got her attention. "It's not like you don't know what the store sells when you come in."

There were a couple of women behind a counter that was centrally located and a few patrons, all male, wandering near the videos and magazines. "Welcome to Castle Superstore. Is there something we can help you find?" one of the women said in greeting.

Thinking a moment, she decided to go ahead and ask. That it was another woman helped. "Yes, you can. Do you have anything like gags and such?

"Yes, they're right over here." The lady, wearing tight black leather pants, a t-shirt one size too small, and several visible piercings, led her to the right side of the store. "Do you know what kind you're looking for? Ball? Penis? Something more exotic?"

"I'm not sure what I'm looking for. I'm kind of new at this whole thing. Do you have any suggestions?"

"If you're a novice at bondage play, I would suggest a ball gag." She took one down from the wall display and showed it to Valerie. "The strap is adjustable, allowing for personalized snugness. The ball is made from a firm foam rubber that will not leave flakes in your or your partner's mouth. The strap on this model is well anchored and should not come loose inadvertently, no matter how hard it's bitten down on. Does this look like something you're interested in?"

"Kind of. Do you have one that has a breathing hole in the ball?"

"We don't have any that come that way, though it's easy enough to bore yourself. If that's your plan, I suggest a solid rubber one. The foam inside will tend to shed once drilled, possibly causing a gagging reaction in the middle of play. Unless the person to be gagged has a breathing problem or your play involves potentially plugging the nose, it should not really be necessary."