Andrew Vachss - Only Child

“You know that woman, Lana something, the one up in the Northwest somewhere?” Cyn asked me, stroking Rejji’s hair.

“Never heard of her.”

“She was a branded slave in a power-exchange group. That’s supposed to be an all-consent thing, right? Exchange . Like me and Rejji do, our pact. You know how it ended up there? The ‘masters,’ they finally couldn’t get it up for consent. So they kidnapped and raped some college girls, visiting here from Japan. They figured Japanese girls, they’d be natural submissives. And this woman, she was right there with them. Helping out.”

“So they were morons as well as freaks. What’s your point?”

“It can spring back on itself,” Cyn said. “If you can’t control being in control, it can amp over. Master the master.”

“That’s not just for sex,” I said.

Rejji looked up from Cyn’s lap, turned her head toward me. “Power power power,” she said, barely whispering the words.

Sleep sneered at me. My mind was so hard on Vonni that I felt a stabbing pain behind my eyes. I tried to drift—sometimes that worked.

I wondered if I was really looking at the same kind of overlap Cyn had been talking about. Where the truth was.

Power power power.

I’d walked Candy on a leash. Listened to her wet-whisper how she’d do whatever I told her to; whatever it took. Candy took a lot. Mostly people’s lives. Candy would be whatever she thought you wanted her to be. She used the roles like a deranged Doberman I’d known once. He hated other dogs; I never knew why. His trademark was to pretend to be injured or crippled. So they’d come close.

Belle liked to be spanked. She also liked driving getaway cars, brawling, and revenge. She was about as submissive as a pit bull on angel dust. But she could take it, all right. The last thing she took was a hail of police bullets meant for me. I told her I loved her only that one time, just before she went over.

Fancy dished it out, in full costume. Her sister, Charm, took it. Fancy held the whip, but Charm held the handle. Tricks and games, but not fun ones—the roots were too twisted.

Strega would do anything for me. A lot of women say things like that. The way Strega meant it scared me as much as it drew me.

Gem would say, “Yes, master,” slyly, expecting a smack on the bottom as a response. But she’d been her own boss since she was a baby. She’d had to be—her childhood had been the Khmer Rouge, hunting and haunting.

Belle and Candy were dead and gone. If there’s anything to the Bible, they’d gone in opposite directions.

Fancy was just gone, leaving Charm just dead. I didn’t know where Strega was, but that wouldn’t stop her if she wanted to see me.

One way or another, women always left me. They didn’t all die. Sometimes, when whatever brought us together was done, so were we.

Gem didn’t end like that. I’d left her. In Portland. I told her I couldn’t send for her until I knew how it would be for me back home. And now I wondered if I would ever know.

Or if she’d still be there when I did.

Who’d want one of those “true submissives” that inadequates are always trolling for, anyway? “Every man wants to spank a domme,” Michelle had told me years ago, winking as if she knew something more than she was saying. And maybe there’s some truth in that. At least it would be special. Just for you. A person, not a role.

I like spike heels and seamed stockings. On some women. If their legs are too thin, the seams don’t look erotic; they look like huge varicose veins.

I like bratty, sometimes. Hate bitchy, all across the board.

I knew a girl, years ago. She’d spent years as a slave to some guy, wearing the collar, living the life. When he told her he was “moving on,” she Swiss-cheesed him with his own custom-made shotgun. Stupid bastard died because he’d never learned the first rule of survival when your girlfriend’s a borderline: abandonment is a capital offense.

If the only way you can make it work is with a woman who lets you tie her up, that’s one thing. But if the only women you can get are those who’d let anybody tie them up, then who’s the one in bondage?

No matter what any chump thought he was buying from their Internet business, Cyn and Rejji were true partners. And the bond between them didn’t come in leather.

Ifound the house easily enough; it looked like it had been the first one in the neighborhood to surrender.

The woman was expecting me. Short and stocky, dressed in an orange jumpsuit that looked like it was on loan from the county jail. She opened the huge white floor-standing freezer and took out a plastic bag that was sealed crooked at the top. Not a Ziploc, one of those do-it-yourself jobs they sell on infomercials.

The woman laid the bag on a fake-wood chopping block, and sliced open the top with a Ginsu knife. She poured the contents onto a sheet of imitation Saran Wrap, folded it over lightly, then tossed it in a grungy gray microwave. When the oven beeped, she opened the door, unfolded the wrap, and rolled some of whatever was in there into a cigarette. She lit the confection with a Zippo lighter sporting the Harley-Davidson logo. “Very collectible,” she assured me.

“My man? Rodney? Did you know he used to be with another woman? But when he lost his arm in that motorcycle accident, she up and left him.”

“Because he had to go on disability?” I played along.

“Nah. Because he couldn’t applaud with only one hand,” the woman said, cracking herself up.

“That’s a good one,” I told her. “And that’s the kind of material you did for Vision?”

“Yep! The way he explained it, we’d both get what we want. I’d get an audition tape I could send around to the clubs. And he’d get White Trash Wanda on tape before I get famous. You have any idea of what tapes of Roseanne before she made it would be worth?”

“A lot, no doubt about it,” I said, paying the freight. “So how do you get in touch with Vision?”

“Oh, I don’t,” she said loftily. “As soon as he’s finished with the editing, he’s going to bring it by.”

“Did you ever wonder how we knew where to find you that first time?” Cyn asked me that night.

“I do work,” I said. “People—some people—know.”

“There’s plenty of men who...I mean, when that...happened to us, we could have gotten ourselves a—”

“You could have gotten yourselves in a worse jackpot, and you knew it,” I said. “You wanted a man for hire, a professional. Someone who does his work, gets paid, and gets gone.”

“That’s why you did it, for the money?”

“Why else?”

“We’re doing all...this, with you, now, aren’t we? And we’re getting paid, too, sure. But the money’s not that great. And we’re not making anything out of our business while we’re helping you.”

“What are you saying?”

“Just what we heard—that you take money, but certain kinds of stuff you like doing. Just like us.”

“What difference? As long as I get it done.”

“I...don’t know,” she said. “I’m not sure. Rejji and I, we love to play. And getting paid for it, that’s perfect. I always thought, if we didn’t love it, maybe we wouldn’t do it so well on camera, understand?”

“Sure.”

“Except that’s not...Well, what I mean, I see now, it wouldn’t matter. If Rejji didn’t like it, there’d be a buyer for that . That was what Gresham...”

“You say that name too much,” I told her. “Isn’t that what you told Rejji when I first came to see you?”

“This is different,” she said, brushing aside what was in her way. “You, you’re doing this for that girl, no matter what you say. The way you’re doing it, it’s like the way you were when we...”