Of the twenty that remained, Allyson asked each about their experience in BDSM and made her selections on that basis.
Now that she had her twelve, she sat them down to go through terms, conditions, expectations, wages and so on.
She was halfway through her spiel when a breathless woman appeared at the door.
‘Oh God, am I too late? The tube broke down just outside Kilburn. Seriously, am I too late?’
Allyson looked at her, unsmiling, and said, ‘’Fraid so.’
‘Shit,’ said the girl. Then she turned around to leave.
That bum, in its tight, tight skirt. It seemed to quiver without even being touched.
‘Hang on a sec,’ said Allyson. ‘Come here.’
She sashayed over – actual sashaying, which Allyson had
never seen before. She was Betty Boop and Bettie Page in a devastating merger.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Emma Frayne.’
‘And how long have you lived in London, Emma Frayne?’
‘All my life.’
‘So you know what the tubes are like.’
She shrugged, peeking out from under her dark fringe with just the perfect blend of defiance and meekness.
‘Come on. You know. Don’t you?’
‘Yes, but—’ She made no further attempt to excuse herself.
‘So you could have set off a bit earlier. There’s plenty of coffee places nearby, where you can get a drink and read the paper, if you’re too early. You’re just irresponsible, that’s all.’
‘I’m not!’
‘Admit it. Say, “Yes, ma’am, I’m irresponsible.”’
The other girls hung on this little scene like breathless limpets.
A change came over Emma’s eyes, from genuine wariness to something like relief.
She knows what this is.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ she said in a mousy little voice. ‘I’m irresponsible.’
‘And what do irresponsible girls deserve?’
Emma swallowed. The room was full of people. There were bouncers as well, and bar staff, preparing for the late-afternoon opening.
‘They deserve to be spanked, ma’am.’
‘That’s right, they do. I’d say bend over but that skirt’s so tight, you’d probably split the seams.’
‘It has a lot of stretch in it, ma’am.’
‘Does it now? All the same, perhaps you’d better take it off.’
Emma stared, and looked quickly around at the dozen pairs of saucer eyes surrounding her.
‘They’ve all done it,’ Allyson reassured her. ‘You’d have seen it if you’d got here on time. Quite a sight it was, too.’
Emma put her fingers on her red plastic belt and rested them there for a moment of indecision before unbuckling with determination and dropping it to the floor.
‘No, pick it up and give it here,’ ordered Allyson, holding out her hand.
Emma handed over the belt, which Allyson stroked absently, watching the unzipping that followed.
The skirt had to be eased slowly and carefully over Emma’s hips and down her thighs. Allyson noted with pleasure the triangle of leopard print satin revealed, plus the black suspender straps that held up lace-topped sheer stockings. Thousands of percentage points better than some of the grubby, cotton granny pants she’d seen this afternoon.
‘Good,’ she said, once Emma had stepped out of the skirt and stood in silk pussy-bow blouse, high heels and underwear. ‘Now, turn around.’
She was wearing a thong – she had little option given the tightness of her skirt. Allyson held in a breath, her gaze roving slowly over the twin white globes, not wanting to rush this visual treat. Firm as peaches, round as snooker balls, pale as moons. Oh, what she could do to them!
‘Now, Emma, I’m going to ask you to bend over with your hands flat on the stage. Can you do that for me?’
The other twelve girls, sitting on the stage, whispered and rustled, thrilled. Emma was going to get spanked, and she would have to face them while it happened.
Emma obeyed without question.
Allyson, looking at her lowered spine and her thrust-out
buttocks, was excited beyond words. This perfect girl could have walked out or demanded to know if the job was still available. Instead, she had offered herself up, without demur, for a public spanking. She was a dream come true.
‘Tell me, Emma,’ said Allyson, once the power of speech had returned. ‘Have you been spanked before?’
‘Yes, ma’am, lots of times.’
Allyson stepped up behind her. Her hands were attracted like magnets to Emma’s rump but she kept them clenched at her sides until the time came.
‘Who spanks you usually?’
‘Boyfriends. Girlfriends. Everyone. Somehow everyone always wants to spank me.’
‘Because you’re a bad girl?’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘You have boyfriends and girlfriends?’
‘Lots of both, ma’am.’
‘So you’re a bit of a slut, would you say?’
‘Everyone says so, ma’am.’
‘Fuck me.’ Allyson couldn’t help herself. She was so swollen and hot with arousal she thought her face must be neon-pink. ‘You little whore.’ But the words were a caress, and Emma wiggled her bottom as if delighted to hear it.
‘Oh, I don’t charge,’ said Emma. ‘I just love fucking.’
‘You’re going to get it,’ said Allyson, and she laid the first smack hard on Emma’s right cheek. It wobbled in exactly the way Allyson had expected it to, and it picked up pink traces of her palm straight away.
She spanked hard and put her arm into it, but Emma demonstrated nothing but pleasure, her moans low and throaty, her bottom pushed out to beg for more.
‘You need it,’ Allyson said as she worked on, watching the
colour grow and deepen. ‘You need it every day. I’ll have you in my office, bent over the desk, every day before you go out there for the men.’
‘Yes,’ hissed Emma. ‘Yes.’
‘Look at her, girls,’ grunted Allyson. ‘Look at her, taking it in front of everyone. She loves it. She fucking loves it. Don’t you?’
‘Yes, ma’am, ohhh, yes.’
Allyson carried on until her palm stung and then she finished off with a few smart strokes of the doubled-over plastic belt.
Emma’s legs were starting to buckle, but she still hadn’t let out a single cry of pain by the time her bottom was bright red in its entirety.
‘You’re quite something,’ panted Allyson. ‘Get into my office and stand in the corner. The rest of you, go home. I’ll see some of you tomorrow.’
Allyson paused to get her head back together and pour herself a measure of whisky. The barman, she noticed, had an erection.
‘Great show,’ he commented.
‘You can keep your mitts off and all,’ she said sharply.
‘That girl ain’t for the likes of you.’
‘She’s something special.’
‘Yeah. She is.’
Emma was in the corner and had taken the liberty of putting her hands on her head to complete the effect. Her beautiful bottom glowed out into the room like a beacon.
‘My lucky thirteen,’ said Allyson softly, shutting the door and putting down her glass. ‘You ain’t easily fazed, are you, sweetheart?’
‘No, ma’am.’
‘So tell me about yourself.’
‘Shall I stay in the corner?’
‘No, come out. Come and sit down. If you can.’
Emma’s roguish grin combined beautifully with the two spots of colour on her cheeks as she came out of the corner to sit on the opposite side of Allyson’s desk.
‘Not much to tell,’ she said. Allyson noted that she sat down without any trouble at all. She was an old hand at this, it seemed.
‘Go on, though. I’m interested.’
‘I’m just a pretty ordinary girl from Kilburn. Convent-educated. Not especially clever. Got into drama and theatre at school, made it into RADA, did well there, but the money was a problem. It’s just me and mum, see, and she works as a cleaner. I decided to take a more unconventional route. I’ve been doing burlesque and I’ve made a few spanking movies over the past year.’
‘Who with? I’ll have to check them out.’
‘Burning Blush.’
‘Ah, yeah, I’ve heard of them. So you want to be a star, do you?’
‘I don’t care about that. I care about acting.’
‘Right. And were you acting, just then?’
Emma held Allyson’s eyes.
She knows I want her. She knows she could run rings round me. Careful here, girl.
Allyson resisted the nervous desire to light a cigarette. She wanted her breath to be fresh for Emma, when they kissed.
‘No,’ said Emma. ‘I wasn’t acting out there.’
‘Right. Because, you know, I don’t know many girls who would’ve done that. Even the girls who work here. I don’t think many of them would’ve just gone over to that stage,
took off their skirt and bent over in front of everyone, for a total stranger. That’s pretty special, Emma. Are you sure you hadn’t put yourself in role, inside your head?’
Emma shook her head. ‘I don’t think so. I do this kind of thing all the time. I’m kinky. I love it. I love an audience too.’
‘We must know people in common.’
‘D’you know Sofia von Keppel? Severe Sofia, they call her.’
‘The pro-domme? Yeah. We’re good mates. I can’t believe our paths haven’t crossed before, Emma.’
She shrugged.
‘London’s a big place. I’ve just split with Sofia, as it goes. Amicable. I’m looking for something more exclusive at this time in my life. Fed up with being one of a stable of submissives.’
Of all the spanking clubs in all the world
…
‘Are you gay? Or bi?’
‘I’m a bit of everything, Allyson.’
You’re a bit of everything I’ve ever wanted.
Allyson cleared her throat. ‘So. I’m just putting this out there, you can take it or leave it …’ She stopped. How was she going to phrase this? ‘First of all, the job’s yours. Obviously. I wanted twelve, but, like I said, you’re my lucky thirteen.’
‘That’s great. I love the idea of this place. It was one of your customers that mentioned the ad to me, as it goes. Peregrine Sands?’
‘Oh, Mr Sands, yes. He’s got an eye for a good performance.’
‘He keeps promising he’ll have a word with some of his director mates for me, but nothing’s come up yet.’
‘Well, when the big spanking musical gets written …’
They laughed and Allyson’s heart surged.
‘I don’t know him that well,’ Emma confessed. ‘Just met
him at a fetish party the other week. I got a caning and some career advice. Not bad.’
‘It turned me on,’ blurted Allyson, no longer able to maintain the brittle chit-chat. ‘What I did to you. I’m usually able to detach but you had an effect on me.’
Emma bit her lip and for an agonising moment Allyson thought she was going to get up and leave.
‘I thought I ought to be honest with you from the start,’ gabbled Allyson, filling the gap. ‘I don’t want to be like some creepy boss trying to use their power to get you into bed. I don’t want to be like that. So I’m telling you upfront. That’s all. You don’t have to say or do anything about it. But if you ever …’
She broke off, desperate for something to do with her hands, opened and shut the drawer, picked up the cigarette packet and then dropped it again.
‘It turned me on, too,’ said Emma quietly.
‘Yeah?’
Allyson slammed the drawer shut for a final time and leant forward.
‘Of course. I mean, I’m a sub, aren’t I? But there was more to it than that. You’re such a natural. And you’re – oh God, don’t take this the wrong way – but after Sofia, you’re a breath of fresh air, because you aren’t this polished, icy beauty type of person. You’re a little bit rough around the edges. You’re real.’
Allyson wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry.
Rough around the edges!
But Emma was right, of course. Allyson would never win any beauty contests, nor was she one for pouring herself into skintight latex. But she had the attitude and she had the imagination and, when it came down to it, that was what mattered.
‘Come out for dinner with me,’ she said. ‘It can lead somewhere or it can lead nowhere. It’s up to you. But if you want to give it a go …’
‘I think I do. Thanks. Is tonight good for you?’
‘It’ll have to be late.’
‘Late’s good.’
‘Midnight in Chinatown?’
‘You romantic, you.’
The midnight rendezvous in Chinatown went well. They laughed so much the other diners constantly looked over at them and then, oh glory, there was footsie under the table, something Allyson had never before experienced.
When Emma went to pour her third glass of wine, Allyson put her hand over the glass and shook her head.
‘You’re keeping a clear head, my girl,’ she said.
‘Oh? And what for?’
‘What do you think?’
‘I can’t imagine, ma’am. Why don’t you take me outside and tell me there?’
Allyson couldn’t pay the bill fast enough.
Outside, on the wet street, she took Emma into a side alley where they kissed, menthol and nicotine and soy sauce and chilli, until the rain drove them to seek shelter.
In Allyson’s Soho flat, they spent the night discovering each other, granting pleasure, sometimes pain, using nothing more than their hands and mouths, until the sun came up.
‘I’m your bitch, if you want me,’ said Emma.
Allyson had never heard anything more romantic.
‘I want to own you,’ she said. ‘I’ll rent you to the customers, but at the end of the day you’re mine.’
‘Oh yes,’ said Emma, shutting her eyes in rapture. ‘Rent me out. Pimp me. Use me like your whore. I’m yours.’
It seemed too good to be true and, in those early days, Allyson could never quite shake a fear that it was all an act by a girl on the make.
But, no matter what exalted company she bared her bottom for, she always came back to Allyson, and her heart was open to nobody else.
After getting spanked at the club she’d go up to Allyson’s flat and put on her harness and wait, sometimes for hours, until her mistress was free.
Then there would be such nights, of strap-ons and dildos, of butt plugs and buzzers, and clamps and paddles, of lubricants and gels, and massage oils and everything. Most of all, their two bodies, working together, complementing each other, and inside them, their two hearts, beating in rhythm.
She loved Emma and she was as sure as she could be that Emma loved her. Sometimes she feared that Peregrine would have that oft-mentioned word with one of his friends and her love would be taken from her and put in an altogether brighter spotlight. But Peregrine either lied about it, or failed to convince the directors, and Emma stayed at the club.