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Wednesday, July 23rd
Natalie dropped into the comfortable chair in Teri’s living room and moaned with relief. God, she was tired.
“Here.” She dragged her eyes open far enough to see her friend standing by her chair, holding out a glass of white wine. “You look like you can use this.”
Just home from her salon, Teri wore black cropped tights and a black-and-white patterned tunic, her dark hair swept up on her head in a messy up-do that suited her perfectly. Her cherry red nails and glowing skin were the only color in her ensemble. If Nat had the energy, she’d hate the brunette for looking that good after a full day’s work.
Natalie took the glass. “Thank you.” She took a drink of the cool, faintly sweet wine and sighed deeply. “For a woman who’s spent the entire freakin’ week in a bar, I’m suffering a severe dry spell.”
The towel she’d wrapped around her head slipped, and she reached up to pull it off and comb her fingers through her damp hair. She was clean now, thanks to a long shower, and cool, thanks to Teri’s air-conditioning and her sleeveless cocoa wrap top and white short shorts, but she’d spent the day sweating as she worked alongside the cleaning crew she’d hired, the college-aged daughter of one of Teri’s clients and two of her friends, who were earning money to go on a mission trip to Mexico.
“How are the kids doing?” Teri asked. “Marquita has a color touch-up tomorrow, and she’ll want to know.”
“They’re absolutely wonderful,” Nat said. “Hard workers. And they’re funny and sweet. Remind me of us when we were in school, only nicer. Okay, and we never worked that hard either.”
She’d waited tables in college, but she sure hadn’t gone on any mission trips. Looking back, she wasn’t sure she’d even darkened the door of a church, except Christmas Eve with her family.
Teri laughed. “We were nice. Just in a naughty way.”
Nat sipped her wine and fluffed her drying hair with her other hand. “Yeah, like the time we smuggled the flasks into the basketball game by hiding them in our bras. My idea, I know.”
“And the old lady behind us in the bleachers smelled it as soon as we opened up, so we handed it off to the guys in front of us.”
“Hey, they were cute,” Natalie grinned. “It was all worth it. You dated the redhead for the rest of the winter.”
“Gunther,” Teri said with a faraway look in her eyes. “He had good hands, that boy.”
“I went out with the dark-haired one, Joel, once.” Natalie shuddered. “His kisses—gross.”
Teri laughed. “Shot down by wet lips.” Her expression turned sly. “I bet Mase is a good kisser, hmm?”
Natalie felt her entire body flush with heat as she remembered in graphic detail what a fabulous kisser Mase was ... and the other things he could do with his mouth.
“Yeah,” she mumbled into her wine glass. “He was okay.”
Teri crossed her legs, twining one ankle around the other and gave Nat a penitent look. “Oh, shoot. I’m sorry, honey. That was totally tactless, right?”
Natalie smiled crookedly. “Oh, don’t be silly. From the looks of it, Dave is pretty good with those lips himself.”
“Dave is a great kisser,” Teri agreed. “I mean, world class ... but I’ve always wondered what it would be like with facial hair. Mase totally rocks that ‘stache and goatee. Too bad he’s not a keeper.”
Yeah, hard to keep a man when he disappeared in the dead of night, even if his kisses and other moves had been so far above merely ‘okay’ that she couldn’t stop remembering every moment of their time together.
Natalie drained her wine glass and ignored the hot, jagged ball of hurt inside her chest. What was wrong with her, that he hadn’t even tried for more? “Guess I’m not a keeper, either.”
“Hey, it’s not you, sistah,” Teri disagreed with an emphatic shake of her head. “I pumped Dave on the subject. He says Mase doesn’t really date—not serially at any rate. So at least you got one great night out of him. Some guys, that’s all you can expect. Then you move on.”
“Right,” Natalie mumbled. She’d move on ... with the rest of her life. “The only people I want to find right now are bar staff.”
“Did you get a good response to your ads on the job sites?” Teri asked.
“Well, I got a lot of responses, let’s put it that way. Nice having the larger metro area to pull from. But only about ten percent of them look promising. Why anyone would think babysitting qualifies them to work in a bar, I don’t get.”
Teri laughed. “Hey, a person’s gotta start somewhere. How many people do you need to hire?”
“Four to begin with. I need a good bartender and three cocktail waitresses. I can bartend too, so if one of the cocktail waitresses is willing to split duties, that will be perfect.”
She’d put two waitresses on shift on Friday and Saturday evenings, and one on the other nights the bar was open. And if she could find a good bartender, he or she could help train the others. Natalie wanted things done her way, but she wouldn’t have time or energy to train staff from the ground up and open the bar at the same time.
At least now that she had her loan, she could afford to hire that many people. Her spirits lifted as she thought of the credit balance waiting for her. After being turned down by her first bank, she’d tried the credit union, and been accepted, even complimented on her business plan. Now all she had to do was succeed so she could pay them back, and not have to auction off the bar and all its contents before she headed for that accountant job Teri had urged her to find.
She took a deep breath and blew it out.
“What about advertising?” Teri asked.
“That’s my next big hurdle,” Nat agreed. “I have calls in to two local web designers to talk about building a website. River Ridge has the weekly paper and there were Chamber and tourist publications to try and get space in—paper and online. I’ll advertise in the Vancouver and Portland pubs too, but I want Rambles to be seen as a big part of the local bar scene in River Ridge.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Teri rose. “You want some chicken avocado salad for supper? I picked some up from the deli, and some French baguette.”
Natalie gave her a look of gratitude. “That sounds wonderful. You are such a good friend.”
Teri winked at her. “I know. That’s why you love me.”
Natalie raised her glass in a toast. “I totally do.” Friendship, the kind of love that was safe and steady. Not the kind of fiery, ballooning rush that sent a woman sailing high and then dropped her, shot down by disappointment.
Okay, not going there. She rose and followed her friend into the galley kitchen, just as immaculate and modern as the rest of the condo. Guilt wormed its way into her mind. Teri’s place was nice because she’d earned it, just as she had earned her privacy.
“I need to start looking for a place of my own.” Nat took silverware from the drawer and set it out on the small table.
Teri brought their salads, on beds of baby greens and garnished with cherry tomatoes, to the table. She went back for the bread and olive oil.
“Hey,” she said. “I told you, no hurry. I really like having you here. It feels like we catch up a little more every evening, you know?”
Nat did know. “I just don’t want to outstay my welcome.”
On the other hand, she wasn’t excited about moving into some apartment, only to move again when she found a place to buy. She intended to end up in a home of her own. Natalie’s mom had never owned a home, unable to pay the mortgage and raise two daughters on a secretarial paycheck, so Nat and Lara had grown up in rentals.
Nat and Tony hadn’t gotten around to owning, instead renting a place in River Ridge. Natalie was not moving back there, though. She shuddered at the thought of meeting Tony’s old friends, or even worse, his conquests in the grocery store or on the street every day.
Rambles was on the southern edge of River Ridge and the people she met in the bar would be there purposefully, not randomly. Sure, she’d have to go into town once in a while, but she’d keep it to a minimum until the bar had been open long enough people thought of her as Rambles’ owner, not the center of old scandal.
Once the bar was a success, she’d look for a house in Salmon Creek, a suburb of Vancouver north of Teri’s place. It was a nice area with lots of trees and good grocery stores, and would give her only a twenty minute or so commute to the bar.
“Eh,” Teri said. “You do your own dishes and we don’t have to share a bathroom. Works for me. And you have more than enough on your plate for now.”
Her smile said her real reasons lay in affection, so Natalie ate her salad, grateful she didn’t have to add apartment hunting to her to-do list.
She still had to contact suppliers, find the best local breweries and a host of other details. Fortunately, Rambles’ liquor license hadn’t had time to lapse, and all the glassware and other supplies had been left behind, intact.
That left the bazillion perishable supplies to lay in, ads to buy and the website to revamp. This, she intended to hire out. She was good with spreadsheets and business programs, but the creative side of computer use was not her thing.
They were just finishing their salads when Teri’s phone rang. “That better not be my sister,” Teri muttered, picking it up. She made a sound of delight. “It’s Daisy.”
Natalie rose and took their plates to the dishwasher as Teri answered the call. “Hi, Daise. What’s up? Uh-huh. Great, come on over.”
“My friend Daisy’s in the neighborhood,” Teri told Nat. “They came up to have dinner at a new Mexican restaurant. Now Dack wants to look at a building site up here, so he’s dropping her off to chat while he does that. He’s a contractor.”
In a moment, the doorbell chimed. Nat stared as a gorgeous, elfin blonde in an emerald halter dress with a short skirt walked in the door, beaming at Teri over the decorative wine bag she carried. The two women hugged.
Nat cast a furtive look toward her bedroom, wondering if she could slide away and apply some makeup, maybe fix her hair before they noticed she was gone. With damp, tangled hair and bare face, she definitely felt like the plain sistah in the house.
She knew how to fix herself up and make the most of her looks. She looked pretty darn good when she did so, but this evening she’d been too tired to bother. It just figured she’d end up side by side with two glam chicks who could pose for a fashion display.
“Come in, come in,” Teri caroled, “and meet one of my best friends from college.”
Daisy might have a perfect figure, a huge diamond on her hand and look fabulous with short, short, platinum blonde hair that would make Nat look like a shorn orphan, but you couldn’t not like her, Nat soon discovered.
She greeted Nat like a long lost friend, and she and Teri included her in the conversation. In a short time, the three of them were curled up in Teri’s sitting room, fresh glasses of wine in their hands, laughing together.
Nat did excuse herself to comb her hair and put on some mascara, olive shadow and under-eye concealer to perk up her eyes, but their bubbly guest was so delighted to meet her that Nat forgot any qualms she’d had about her casual appearance.
“Show me that ring,” Teri said.
Daisy held out her left hand, beaming. “We’re getting married next spring. Dack wanted to do it next month, if you can believe that. My mom about went through the roof. She said her girls are getting married at St. O’s with a reception at their country club and that means reserving months ahead. And winter is too rainy, so next April it is.”
“Congratulations,” Nat said, and took another drink of wine. Daisy was effervescent with happiness. Maybe she’d be one of the fortunate for whom marriage worked out. It had to work out for some people, or the institution would disappear, right? Or perhaps it was merely a testament to the eternal, bull-headed optimism of the human race.
Nat took another drink of wine.
Daisy kicked off her platform sandals and curled her legs onto the sofa across from Nat. “So you just moved back to the area?” she asked.
Natalie explained about Rambles.
“Which I think she should sell and make a killing,” Teri put in.
Daisy, to her credit, merely smiled.
“I’m not selling,” Natalie said firmly. “I can run it and make it work. Heck, by the time we closed, I was doing most of the work anyway.”
“Let us know when you open,” Daisy said. “We’ll come up and give you our business. I’ll bring my best girls and their guys, too.”
“I know your friend Carlie is with one of Dack’s friends,” Teri said, “But I thought Sara was divorced.”
Daisy smiled secretively, her green eyes twinkling. “She is. But then she met Trace ... and Kai.”
Teri stared, wine glass halfway to her open mouth. Nat was pretty sure she had the same look on her face.
“She’s with two guys?” Teri asked. “Or, is Kai a ... woman?”
“Oh-hh, no,” Daisy said. “He’s a Hawaiian hottie. And Trace is a tall, lean blond. They are so sweet together. And gorgeous.” She fanned herself.
“Wow,” Natalie blurted. “I couldn’t even manage one man. Can’t imagine keeping two happy.”
“Just takes the right people to make it work, I guess,” Daisy said serenely.
“Holy shit. This calls for more wine.” Teri hurried to the kitchen, returning with the bottle of chardonnay. She refilled their glasses and sat, eyeing Daisy. “So would you accept someone else into your thing with Dack?”
“Oh, hell no,” Daisy said instantly. “Neither would Dack. I mean, all men fantasize about a three-way with two attractive women ...”
“Oh, yeah,” Teri said, rolling her eyes. Natalie nodded. This was true.
“But relationship-wise, Dack and I are definitely one-on-one,” Daisy finished, with as much certainty as if she’d just confirmed the sun would come up in the morning.
Must be nice. Natalie took a long drink of wine, trying to drown the memory of strong hands holding her and hazel eyes boring into hers, as if the man to whom they belonged wanted to own her exclusively. Yeah, for just long enough to nail her three times. Then he hadn’t even said goodbye.
Without asking, Teri refilled her glass again. Nat felt a little fuzzy, but what the heck—she didn’t have to do anything else except pour herself into bed ... alone. In the morning her head was going to hurt, but tonight she was enjoying some much needed girl time.
Teri’s phone rang again. This time she made a sour face at it. “Sorry, I have to take this. My little sis is going through major drama with her baby daddy. Be back soon ... I hope.”
She bore her phone into her bedroom and closed the door.
“So you’re single, huh?” Daisy asked Nat, her expression warm and interested.
Nat nodded, slouching down in her chair and swinging one leg. “Widowed. But don’t bother feeling sorry for me. He was a cheating asshole. I’d already left him when he got drunk—at our bar—and drove his truck into the river.”
Daisy winced. “I’m so sorry, though. That’s rough, no matter how you parted.”
“Right,” agreed Nat. “I cried for weeks. But I was mourning the guy I married, you know? Not the guy who’d lost interest in me, to the point he was using our business to hook up with other women. Bastard.”
Her voice slurred on the last word. She was a teensy bit sloshed, but who the heck cared? It was an anomaly for her, not a habit. And she’d had a tough week.
“You’ll meet another guy,” Daisy said knowingly. “You’re gorgeous. And there are plenty of good men around here. Just gotta find them.”
“I found someone ... at least I thought I did.”
“Uh-oh,” Daisy said. “What happened?”
Nat traced an invisible pattern on the sofa with her finger. “We met at a party ... had one great night. He was so hot.”
“Oooh, details,” Daisy urged eagerly. “Hot, how?”
“As in mega hot. As in ... he told me what to do and—and spanked me. And I loved it.”
She heard a gasp, and looked up. Teri stood behind the sofa, phone still in hand. Both she and Daisy were staring at Nat with identical wide-eyed looks.
“You did that with—” Teri began and then made a zipping motion across her lips, giving Nat an apologetic look.
Natalie squeezed her eyes shut, her face burning. “Sorry,” she mumbled. “TMI, right? I’m so bent.”
Daisy giggled, the sound infectious. “Are you kidding?” she asked. “Honey, you’re not bent. Just a little kinked. Listen, Dack and I are into D/s too.”
It was Nat and Teri’s turn to stare “You are?” they chorused.
Daisy nodded, blushing now as well. “Uh-huh. We love it. I know other guys who like it, too.”
“Huh. Well, maybe I should meet them,” Nat said. “Although, I guess maybe I’m not any good at it, ‘cause the one time I tried it, he bolted in the middle of the night.”
Daisy mimed brushing him away with a grand gesture and droplets of wine flew from her glass.
“Oops,” she said, lifting the glass carefully to her lips to drain it. “Sorry. Anyway, forget him. You don’t have to be ‘good at it’. You just have to be with someone you trust, someone who turns you on, and likes what you like. There are, um, clubs for people who like D/s, you know. And BDSM.”
“I know,” Nat said wistfully. “I’ve read about that. But ... I don’t know if I wanna do that with random guys, you know?”
Teri came around to sit again, nodding emphatically. “Right. That can be risky.”
“Oh, yeah,” Daisy agreed fervently. “I know. Dack is the only man I want touching me ... well, except for playing a little bit.”
A shiver of excitement rushed over Nat’s skin. Playing a little bit? What did that mean?
Daisy poured the last of the wine from the bottle into their glasses, dividing it with narrow-eyed care. Then she peered at Nat over her glass. “So, what’s this guy’s name? I won’t tell anyone, pinky swear.”
Nat sighed woefully. “Mase. His name is Mase.”
Daisy dropped her wine glass. It landed on the carpet, splashing white wine over Nat’s bare toes. She gasped at the shock of the wet and then bent to swipe at it with her cocktail napkin.
“Oh, shit. I’m so sorry,” Daisy cried.
Teri popped up again. “I’ll go get the carpet cleaner.” She hurried into the kitchen.
“So, what does this Mase look like?” Daisy asked Nat, her voice urgent.
Nat looked up to find the blonde nose to nose with her, her green eyes wide.
“Well, he’s really hot. Built, you know? With this sexy ‘stache and goatee. And beautiful eyes.” Realizing she was rhapsodizing about a guy who’d done her and dumped her, Nat closed her mouth.
“Right,” Daisy said, nodding like a bobble-head doll, her eyes sparkling. “He sounds ... great. And you liked what you did together?”
Natalie’s face heated and she found herself snickering. “Yup. Including doing it on a back porch at Teri’s boyfriend’s house, with a house full of people. We almost got caught.”
“So, was that exciting, or horrible?”
Nat squirmed. “It made it ... even more exciting. Like I said, I’m bent.”
“No, you’re not,” Daisy assured her. “Or if you are, so am I. So who cares?”
Teri came back and dropped to her knees between them, dabbing at her carpet with a towel. “Okay, so I caught the part about the porch. What else did I miss?”
“Not much,” Nat said dryly. “I think I’ve exposed all my secrets here.”
“Among friends,” Daisy assured her.
Teri looked up at Nat, pausing in her scrubbing to nod. “What she said. There is nothing wrong with liking a few thrills, so just stop thinking that.”
“Yeah,” Daisy added. “A lot of professionals and execs are into kink, as well as all kinds of other people. And some of them are into hard kink, so no worries on your part about a little D/s, hon.”
Teri gave Nat a speculative look. “In fact,” she said, “Maybe you just need to start thinking like a guy, you know? Have fun and walk away.”
“True,” Daisy said. “In fact ... maybe you should come and try Club 3 out ... as my guest.”
Teri rose and hurried back toward the kitchen. “More wine, ladies. She’s gonna need it.”
Several moments later, Nat had to agree. She sat, her mind whirling with shock and excitement—mostly shock—at what Daisy had just confided, under a promise of strict confidentiality, of course.
The club to which Daisy and Dack belonged was a fetish club, a place where people could safely and consensually indulge in sexual practices on which the general public might frown.
Nat took another sip of her fresh wine and stared into the clear depths. “Wow,” she breathed. “I ... I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you’ll visit,” Teri suggested.
Nat’s cheeks burned. “So you wouldn’t think it’s weird?”
Teri cocked her head. “Hon, of course not. It’s a big world out there, full of lots of different people, with different needs. What the hell, as long as you’re not hurting anyone else, or yourself, why not do what you wanna do?”
Daisy chuckled. “No one promises their soul to Satan to get in the door, I promise.”
“I didn’t mean that,” Natalie assured her instantly, her face flaming. “I think it’s great that it’s there and that you and Dack can ... y’know, do your thing there. But honestly? I just ... don’t know if I could ... uh, do that.” Perform sexual acts in such a place herself.
Daisy nodded. “I get it, hon. I really do. It took a special guy, Dack, to get me to walk into the club. But I wouldn’t trade what we have there for anything. In a crazy way, it feels like our second home ... or bedroom, anyway.”
She cleared her throat. “And there are some other great guys at the club, too. Hot and sweet, and ... well, hot. Everyone has to be tested regularly for, you know, STIs. They do background checks to keep out weirdoes. And it’s classy—in a sexy way, of course.”
Nat ran her fingers up and down the cool, slick sides of her glass. “I’m sure there are great guys there. I just don’t know if I really want to get involved with anyone right now. You know, with opening my bar and all.” And trying to get Mase out of her head.
Although maybe more great sex was just the way to erase him from her memory banks. Sex with a different guy ... or even guys. Okay, no to that last bit. She was not interested in ménage.
“That’s the point, isn’t it?” Teri asked. “That you don’t have to get involved? Just go, have a good old time and say ‘Sayonara, lover’.” She mimed waving goodbye.
Daisy nodded. “If that’s what you want.” She picked up her phone and waved it at Nat. “Listen, give me your phone number, and I’ll call you so you’ll have mine. Then if you wanna talk some more ... or come give it a try, you can call me.”
“Okay. Thanks, Daisy.”
Daisy had just finished entering Nat’s info when the doorbell rang. “That’ll be Dack. Thanks for the wine and girl talk, both of you.”
When the bubbly blonde was gone, Nat turned to Teri. “So ... wow.”
Teri patted her knee. “Well, right, but stop worrying so much. You’ve got so much stress right now with opening the bar, maybe Daisy’s club might be a place you could blow off some steam once in a while.”
“Would you go there?” Nat asked.
Teri giggled. “Um, no. Dave burns up the sheets, but I do not see him darkening the doors of a fetish club.” She leaned forward. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t.”
Natalie hid her blazing cheeks behind her glass as she took another drink. “I appreciate your friendship, but pimping goes above and beyond, don’tcha think?”
Teri smacked her shin with the back of her hand. “Hey. Enough out of you.”
Natalie snickered and rubbed her shin. Then she set her wine glass aside and yawned deeply as exhaustion hit her like a heavy blanket. “Okay, time for this girl to get to bed.”
Any more wine and she’d end up imagining herself at this club with her favorite fantasy partner lately, Mase, doing some of the things they’d done together and more.
Right. Tipsy or sober, she was gonna imagine herself with Mase, as she did every night, usually with her vibrator in hand.
Long after she’d gone to bed, though, Nat lay awake. Because what if Daisy and Teri were right? What if this Club 3 was just the place for Nat to get more of what she’d had with Mase, minus the disappointment of waking without him?
If she couldn’t get him out of her head, she was going to go crazy as Cassidy. She needed to take action. Maybe Club 3 was the place to do that.
She gazed at the pattern of summer moonlight on the wall of Teri’s guestroom and imagined herself smiling and blowing a kiss to a man who’d just fulfilled her sexual fantasies. And then, when the man—who mysteriously assumed Mase’s face—begged her to stay, she would toss her head and walk away.
She smiled to herself. Yeah, that part she liked best of all.