Page 59 of A Long Con

“Artsy Dodger,” Royal said warmly. “We got you the best item yet.”

Bouncing on the balls of my feet like an excited kid, I kept repeating “What is it? What is it?” Twinkletoes took one side of the tarp, my partner the other. Twinkletoes just wanted to rip it off, but Royal wanted the slow reveal. A . . . chair?

I felt the quilted black leather. Real. The shell was of laminated wood and I ran my hand along it. No splinters. I smelled the wood. Real. There was even a matching ottoman,

“Isn’t this the perfect Mad Men chair?” cried Twinkletoes, fluffing the tarp like a bedsheet.

Royal whipped off the rest of it and flung his portion to Twinkletoes. “An Eames chair!”

“An Eames chair!” I gaped. Eames was famous for his chairs. “Real?”

Royal shrugged. “As far as we could tell. We didn’t pay the big bucks, though. You know. The circles I run in.” Admitting this didn’t erase the smile from his face.

“Fuck me raw,” I breathed. “This’ll be perfect in the family room to watch TV in.”

“Exactly my thoughts,” said Royal, and we carried it inside.

After depositing the chair in the nearly-empty family room, I told Royal, “I’ll be right back.” I passed by Twinkletoes, telling him I needed something out of his truck. I’d seen a roll of that flat nylon webbing tape for strapping things down. Grabbing it, I hoped to hell I wouldn’t see Fremont demanding I do his oil.

Peeking around the corner, I tossed my head to indicate the master bedroom. We’d turned my childhood bedroom into an artist’s studio, instead taking over my mother’s room for sleeping. Once it was empty, we had to visit Scandinavian Designs to get the proper midcentury furnishings. There were already a couple pulleys on the ceiling, and I dragged the curtains closed so none of my “workers” in the backyard would see. We already had a St. Andrew’s Cross on order.

I brandished the tape in front of Royal, wiggling my eyebrows.

“A little bondage?” Berkeley asked me.

My heart surged. We’d discussed it a few times, and he knew I was very eager to try. “Kinbaku?”

“Why not? I just have to ask you. What’re your hard limits?”

I frowned. “Hard limits?”

“Yeah, like no golden showers, that sort of thing.”

I grinned. “Okay. No golden showers. What’re you doing with that tape?”

“I’ll go easy on you. Take off your cut. I don’t want to mess it up.”

I did as I was bidden, proud of the collar I still wore. I kicked off my boots, too, assuming he’d want that, as he fiddled with the roll of tape.

“You’re gonna be my rope bottom,” he said. “It’s a kink of mine. Take off everything and sit on the bed.”

I knew he was planning to use the overhead pulley. My cock was already at half-mast when I sat.

I asked, “Do you get into rope-space? Fall into some kind of trance? I expect a Japanese stringed instrument to play any second.” I halfway chuckled, because damn it, I was nervous. I was the one who felt no fear, but Berkeley now controlled my life in his hands. He stripped down to his boxer briefs.

He said, “I guess you could call it a sort of a trance. When I was wrapped up, I felt secure in a weird way. The compression of the ropes felt comfortable, like the person was protecting me or embracing me. I think being bound and restricted leads you to turn your thoughts more inward, which I think leads to rope-space.”

Berkeley brought both of my arms around the small of my back. He fiddled around, binding me.

“How did you become interested in bondage?” It might help take my mind off what he was doing.

“I’ll tell you. I was a little older, a senior in high school.”

“At Frank Sinatra’s School?”

“Right.” He straddled me as he made a few wraps around my torso and under my arms. “Well, one day we were in the locker room. Hate to sound corny but there you have it. About six of us were getting ready in our street clothes, but one guy, actually his name was Sam, he’d only stripped down to his jock. He was a good-looking ginger.” He yanked the tape down over my ribcage to make my nipples protrude. When he licked his fingers and tweaked my nipples, I gasped and sat bolt upright. He made a few more cinches under my arms to hold the chest bindings.

“Go on!” I growled.