JC led Colleen out to the beach front section of the restaurant. She paused to kick off her shoes and grabbed them with one hand as JC helped her down into the sand holding the other. She smiled politely at him but inside was repressing the urge to squee with abandon as his skin finally made contact with her own.

They walked for a few moments in relative silence, him still holding her hand and making sure she didn’t fall due to the unevenness of the ground. Colleen couldn’t figure out if he was just being courteous or this was a move but either way she’d be masterbating with that hand tonight just because he touched it.

Once they reached the smoothness of the actual surf, JC piped up. “So...do you think we should talk about…” his voice trailed off, motioning with his hand for her to finish.

“That the guy behind you kept stabbing his sushi with his chopsticks to eat it?”

“Wait, what?!” JC exclaimed and then practically doubled over with laughter. “How did you not mention this at all during dinner?”

“There wasn’t really a place to interject with “Hey, turn around and check out this idiot”.”

JC finished up his fit of giggles. “I feel like we do need to talk about that but not what I meant.”

“Ok, where do you want to start?”

JC looked down at the sand. “That’s just it. I don’t even know what to ask or say. I’ve never had this conversation with someone that I don’t have to explain every little detail to.”

“No offense but shouldn’t the fact you can skip over parts make this easier?”

“You’d think but weirdly no. Plus,” JC hesitated, “I still haven’t heard back from Mistress Raina so I’m not even sure we should be doing this.”

“Oh shit, that’s right!” Colleen reacted. “Uh, I hate to tell you this but Raina got suspended for two weeks for sending you to my office without my knowing. You won’t be hearing from her for a bit.”

JC’s mouth hung open for a moment before releasing Colleen’s hand and beginning to pace back and forth in the sand. “Fuck!” he shouted into the salty air.

“Hey, JC, you aren’t blaming yourself for this, are you?” Colleen quickly questioned him.

“I mean, how can I not? I came to her with this sob story and she tried to help me out and I fucked it all up.”

Colleen walked over to JC. “You didn’t fuck up at all, she did.” JC’s eyes narrowed and Colleen called him out on it. “I get it, you trust her and her judgment implicitly but can you try to remove yourself from the situation for just a moment and realize, however well meaning on her end, that she found my personal information and gave it out to someone without my knowledge or consent? How would you feel if she had someone show up at your door unannounced? What if your writing partner was there? Or even just some friends hanging out? How would you feel when the most private part of your life is suddenly threatened to be exposed?”

JC’s face softened. “I….I’m sorry I put you in that position.”

“You didn’t, she did. You were just….following orders.”

“Still, I feel responsible. I made you upset, I made her upset….”

Colleen grabbed JC by the shoulder and forced him to look at her. “JC, this is not your fault. It is Raina’s and Raina’s alone. I am angry at her, not at you. If I was angry at you, I wouldn’t have contacted you last night or agreed to dinner tonight. Understood?”

JC nodded. This was the first glimpse of the ferocity Colleen had in her that made her such a great lawyer. Her job was literally to convince people that her viewpoint was right. JC almost wanted to see her in action because this side of her was kinda hot.

Colleen let go of JC, satisfied that he had agreed and adjusted her dress. JC piped up, “Is it ok if I ask you what else you and Mistress Raina spoke about? I get I’m probably not supposed to know everything but any insight you can give me I think might help at this point.”

“JC, when it affects your life, you deserve to know all the information. Basically, Raina alluded to some shit that went down previously with you two and now she knew why and wanted to help you out. Apparently she and Mistress Piper have been plotting to play love connection with us for some time, just Raina pulled the trigger without consulting anyone. If she had just asked everyone, this wouldn’t have snowballed like it did.”

“Wait, the two of them wanted us to date?!” JC asked in shocked confusion.

“Ok, well don’t act so appalled by the idea,” Colleen chuckled. “Mistress Piper said the original intent was to get us together at the club for a session. I don’t know if it was for just some play or more than that.” Colleen lied about the last part; she knew perfectly why but figured explaining to JC they knew she wanted to fuck him would not go over well.

“How would that even work?” JC wondered aloud.

“I’ve been trying to figure that out myself,” Colleen admitted. “At the club, I get but actually dating...I don’t know how that would really work, ummmm, intimately.”

JC’s eyes went wide. “Wow, ok,” he got out, feeling a bit awkward Colleen had actually verbalized it. JC wasn’t willing to admit out loud that he’d already thought about it. As he fell asleep the late night before, he had imagined Colleen in her pink latex dress crawling up the bed with that same little smile she had when they first met. He was strapped to the bed, unable to touch her, feeling her tongue lick….

“I mean, not in pornagraphic detail,” Colleen lied, trying to ease some of the panic on JC’s face. “Again, if it’s at the club, we’d be told what to do so I can see that working on some weird level. But in real life? It’s nice to have someone to talk to about all this, even if we both keep tap dancing around actually talking about it, but if we are both more submissive in nature, I’m truly not sure how that would play out. Not that I’m not open to trying to figure it out, mind you,” Colleen added with a small laugh.

Their eyes met as the moonlight shone down on them. “Ok, you’re right, we do keep skirting the issue,” JC admitted. “It’s just, as much as I want to talk about everything, it feels weird to lay out all my dirty secrets to someone I just met.”

“Same, but if it makes you feel any better, I can whip up a standard NDA we can sign and I’ll have it notarized on Monday.”

JC laughed, “No, I don’t think we need to go that far.” The two stood in silence for a moment. “Ok,” JC breathed, “ladies first.”

Colleen narrowed her eyes at JC but smiled nonetheless. “Sexism at work again. We could have just done Rock Paper Scissors,” she chuckled. “Alright, what do you want to know?”

“Why did you say you pay to forget what you do there?” JC quickly asked, the statement having played over and over in his mind since the moment she uttered it.

“Oh, so now we wanna be forward when it’s me on the hook,”Colleen ribbed him. “It’s a complicated answer.”

“Pretty sure neither of us would be going there if our desires were simple,” JC concluded.

“Fair enough. Ok, so, I wasn’t lying. I went there with the intention of helping with my stress but I obviously knew on some level going to a dominatrix was going to have some….sexual implications. But I was desperate for some relief so I took the chance.”

“I’m guessing since you’ve stuck around, it was worth it.”

“Absolutely. When Mistress Piper and I first met, we agreed to 5 sessions only to see how things went and we’d re-evaluate after. From day one, she put me right at ease, just from her demeanor alone and that night I slept better than I had in weeks. Soon I felt comfortable telling her in detail the issues I was having but as the sessions went on, suddenly I was telling her about my desires and fantasies and next thing I knew, the two kind of got intertwined.”

“How so?”

“I’ve always had these, I don’t know, weird ideas that turned me on. I mean, not grotesquely weird; nothing involving kids or animals or bodily fluids.” Colleen quickly stated.

JC laughed, “Yeah, that’s a good line in the sand to establish early.”

Colleen continued, “I mean, so many people have that one thing that turns them on that they know probably shouldn’t because it’s not “traditional” but they can’t really explain it. Shit, that’s pretty much what kink is but I had never put the two together. Mistress Piper got me to finally pinpoint all these things I’ve liked over the years and figure out what it really is.”

The silence hung between them as the waves crept ever closer to their feet. JC didn’t want to pressure her to say more than she was comfortable with but he was completely intrigued to hear what she was going to say next.

“Fuck, you’re right, this is harder,” Colleen exclaimed, covering her face quickly to compose herself. “I don’t think I’ve ever come right out and said it to anyone but her. I’ve tried to start explaining it to guys but I never get very far before they assume either I’m nuts or they actually know what I want without all the information.”

“I don’t want to force you to discuss it if you aren’t…”

“No no no,” Colleen cut him off. “You’re fine. It’s like pulling off a band aid, right? As scary as this is, it’s probably good to put all our shit out on the table before we get further invested.” Colleen was trying hard to convince herself she was right, however. While at the end of the day it was true, she wished she could at least kiss JC before having this conversation in case it went south.

“I like...not thinking. I don’t know how else to explain it. My life is go go go all the time, I have to be on top of every latest law change and procedure and have 15 different solutions to one problem at the drop of a hat. I love my job, don’t get me wrong, but when I have time for myself, I imagine someone else having all the answers.”

“So, you like playing dumb?” JC questioned, trying to understand what exactly Colleen meant.

“No, not exactly. I’m not trying to be a “bimbo”. It’s not like if you’d ask me what 1 plus 1 equals and I say 7. It’s like you asking me that and I just say I don’t know because just the act of thinking is too much. I….want to be told what to think.”

JC stared at Colleen, trying to take all this information in. He understood liking being told what to do but what to think was a bit outside his kink parameters. “Are you saying you want to be like a mindless sex doll?”

“I think, yes? Maybe?” Colleen sheepishly admitted. “I am a woman who likes to be in control of every situation I am in. I’ve literally been taught how to command a room and steer a conversation. I can’t even begin to tell you how freeing it is to be somewhere that allows me to let all my defenses down so that someone else can take the reins for once.”

“That I can relate to,” JC chimed in. “Ok, I’m getting there but I still don’t understand how the not remembering part comes in.”

“It’s not that I don’t remember at all but that it just takes a while to remember. Like a dream that vanished as soon as you wake up in the morning but then a part flashes back to you in the middle of the day. When I get done a session, my full concentration is on getting home safely, then I generally fall right asleep when I get in bed so by morning time, I’m back to my same routine and I don’t have time to process everything that happened until later.”

The breeze had picked up slightly and Colleen rubbed her shoulders to warm up. “I have a jacket in my car,” JC said. “Do you want me to go grab it for you?”

“No, I’m ok. Thank you though,” Colleen replied quietly. The truth was the chill running through her was only partly due to the weather. She had just shared something incredibly intimate with a man she had thought about doing those exact same fantasies with for longer than she could remember, certainly longer than she could even begin to put words to those feelings. The whole experience still seemed surreal and she was trying hard not to focus on the fact that she may have completely blown her one shot with him.

JC watched Colleen as she stared out at the ocean. He didn’t know what to say. He wasn’t even sure how to feel about what she had just said. He certainly didn’t judge her for discovering this part of herself and he definitely understood people not being receptive to such frank and honest discussions about sex. He’d been on the giving end of that talk too many times to know his silence was actually making it worse.

“I wasn’t lying either. I had heard about the club from a friend and he hooked me up with the information. It was an interest but definitely not something I thought I needed, just a good opportunity to try out something different. I wasn’t attached to anybody at the time so I thought it would be just some harmless fun. I definitely underestimated how I’d feel about the experience.”

“How so?” Colleen asked, turning towards him.

“I mean, it’s really kind of the same thing as you, I guess,” JC realized as he spoke. “There were always these fleeting thoughts of different things I thought were hot but that first night with Mistress Raina, it’s like the flood gates opened. I realized this sexual component that had been missing with all my previous girlfriends.”

“Which was?”

“Control. I was famous, they weren’t. Not that I necessarily wanted to date someone famous, I mean that everything was always left for me to decide. Dates revolved around my schedule, when I started making actual money, I was paying for anything remotely fancy. If I wanted to see them, I could just fly them to wherever I was. There wasn’t a balance so when Mistress Raina showed me what it was like to not be the one in control, I fell down the rabbit hole hard.”

“How long did it take you to find the balance?”

JC chuckled and scratched the back of his neck. “Unfortunately I’m the wrong guy to answer that cuz I still haven’t figured it out. At first I was just scared to tell the girls I was with cuz I didn’t know who I could trust to keep my secrets. Then I fell in love and finally confided in someone and when she found someone else, she blabbed it to anyone that would listen.”

Colleen had a theory who JC was talking about but refused to ask. Instead, she made a mental note to see if her firm did any business with L’Oreal on Monday.

“After that, I dated around a lot, or rather slept around. I just wasn’t ready for another serious commitment to someone who might weaponize my fetishes against me again. So I kept it casual. Some girls I told, some I didn’t. I’ve even taken women I was interested in to the club to meet Mistress Raina but it still just seemed like a game to them all. Like they could just play Little Miss Dominatrix once in a while and that would work. It never worked.”

“So, is it like a lifestyle thing for you? Do you want to be….owned?” Colleen asked trepidatiously.

“No, nothing that extreme. It’s definitely just a “bedroom activity”,” JC clarified, complete with air quotes. “I guess what I’m saying is no one has ever taken it seriously. What I like isn’t just for the sake of being weird or different or alt or whatever you want to call it. It’s not for shock value; I’ve come to terms with it just being a part of what makes me me and I just wish I could find someone who would accept that.”

Colleen gave JC a small smile. “I can definitely understand that.” Silence filled the air once more as Colleen debated her next question. JC seemed resistant to share previously what he and Raina do but since she had just opened up to him, she was hoping he might be a little more receptive this time around.

“So what happened in that first meeting that flipped the switch for you?” she asked.

“Mistress Raina and I talked briefly about what I was looking for and I honestly didn’t really know, I just ruled some of the more extreme things out. She gave me a safe word and told me to strip down to my boxers. I did and she led me to the back of the room. She had these...restraints on the wall. She grabbed a wrist and quickly pinned it to the wall. She locked this padded leather cuff around it nice and secure, not too tight but snug for sure. She did the same to the other one and walked away. I had no idea what I was supposed to do so I just stood there for a while. She was doing something on the other side of the room, which I know now was nothing as she was just biding time, so I tugged to see if I could get free. I couldn’t, I could barely move more than a couple inches. Yet I pulled again, then again. The more I struggled, the tighter the cuffs felt, the more I knew this woman was going to do whatever she wanted to me and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. And I wanted it. I wanted her to have that control over me. By the time she came back over to me, I was practically begging her to touch me. She never did that night, except to eventually let me go. She just teased me for what seemed like hours with all the promises of what we could do together, how if I was good, I’d get to worship her next time. It was pretty much all I could think about until I could finally get back there a few months later and she certainly kept her promise.”

Colleen let JC’s story play through her head. Sure, she’d thought a bunch of times about being the one to take the lead and seduce him but never to this extreme. All those times he said in interviews he liked a woman who was confident and aggressive, is this what he was really trying to say?

“Thank you for trusting me with that story,” Colleen told him sincerely.

“I haven’t told it in a long time. It actually felt kinda good to share.” They both smiled at each other, feeling more at ease. “So what do we do now?” JC asked.

“Pretty sure we walk along the beach some more and then kiss under the moonlight,” Colleen tried to deliver as a joke but was a hundred percent honest.

JC’s smile grew bigger at her boldness. “Not really what I meant but that sounds like a pretty good idea.” JC grabbed Colleen’s hand once more as the two started along the beachfront again. “I mean, this is a...unique situation, to say the least. Do we just keep talking or are we supposed to go to the club together or…”

“Do you honestly not know or are you waiting for Raina to tell you?”

“Can the answer be both?” JC asked shyly.

“You know, for someone who claims his kinks are just a “bedroom activity”, you sure do let your Mistress run a good part of your life.”

“It’s been a weird couple days.”

“You don’t say?” Colleen teased sarcastically, tilting her head to the side in mock confusion. “Look, JC, we are doing everything backwards. Normally, you meet the person, you go on a couple dates and when it gets serious enough, you start working in the sexual wants.”

“Which is normally where it all falls apart.”

“Exactly. We are getting the awkward conversation out of the way early and can know straight away if that’s something we, at bare minimum, are cool with. Are you….did I freak you out?”

“No, I’m not freaked out. I’m confused. Kind of intrigued….I don’t know. I’m not trying to put you on the spot but I think I need more information. As I said, my buddy had a session with Piper that did not go well so I’ve just never really trusted her.”

“So that’s where we go from here. Let’s talk more about it. Let’s just say this develops into something; it’s important to understand what each of us likes and why. And if it doesn’t, think of it as practice for the next time we have to have this conversation.”

JC grasped Colleen’s hand a little tighter. “Did I freak you out?”

“No, not at all. You gave me a lot of ideas but definitely not freaked out.”

JC quickly turned in the sand toward Colleen, making her body crash into his as she elicited a small scream of surprise. He held her close as he smiled down at her. “I think we reached the part where we kiss,” JC whispered.

“I believe you are right,” Colleen whispered back. And just like that, the kiss Colleen had imagined nearly every night came to fruition as JC lowered his head for their lips to meet.

Colleen worked hard to restrain her lust and let him take the lead. He was gentle at first, just like any good initial kiss should be. His lips caressed her own, concentrating more on her bottom lip, just slightly sucking at it. Soon she felt his tongue lick over her lip and proceed into her mouth, deepening their kiss.

JC’s one hand found the small of Colleen’s back while the other reached up to smooth away her hair from their faces as it whipped around softly in the breeze. Colleen moaned into JC’s mouth, her hand nearly trembling as it snaked up his arm, slowly grazed his neck and nestled firmly in his curls. She let her fingers play through his hair and felt herself growing wet thinking about tugging at them nice and hard. They felt so soft and right….

Colleen reluctantly slowed down their kiss, knowing if they went much longer, her restraint would completely crumble. JC followed, loosening his grip slightly on her waist and returning to his soft, eager kisses. He eventually pulled back, his smile just as big as previously, the moonlight dancing in his eyes, making them as blue as the ocean they were next to, exactly the color she had imagined the night before. 

“I have to say, I think this was pretty successful for a spur of the moment date,” JC stated.

Words were hard for Colleen at the moment. “Yeah...definitely,” she responded, a bit more breathlessly than she would have liked him to see. “We’re off to a good start.”

JC felt very pleased as they made their way back up the sand to the parking lot. This was definitely not how he’d seen his night going but was rather happy how it had turned out. He felt a little less unburdened from all his troubles over the past few weeks, thankful to feel like something good was happening. He wanted to tread slowly however. He was still trying to recover from his latest breakup and as much as part of him wanted to explore every little facet of Colleen’s body and kinky mind, he knew he wasn’t ready to emotionally invest just yet. He was thankful for the newfound interest and definitely wanted to see where this could be headed.

Colleen threw back on her shoes as they reached the gravel and they both continued to their cars. Once they reached her car, JC grabbed both her hands in his. “Thank you for a very unexpected evening.”

“Likewise,” Colleen smiled back. This time she was the one to step forward and tilt her head upward to kiss him. She intentionally left it light, her lips barely pressing against his, refusing to let herself get carried away. She’d waited this long, she could pace herself.

They both pulled away grinning at each other. “Okay, I’m gonna go,” Colleen finally said with a laugh. “Maybe I’ll give you a call sometime next week? I think my schedule is light on Wednesday thus far.”

“Yeah, please do. I, uh, I’d definitely like to continue our conversation.”

“Me too,” Colleen said with a wink as she got in her car. JC stood there as she backed out of her parking spot and they both waved goodbye as she drove off.

Colleen waited until she made the turn out of the parking lot and onto the street before releasing the ear piercing scream of excitement she had been holding in. She had kissed Joshua Scott Chasez….and it was GOOD! If a semi plowed into her on the 405 on the way home, she honestly would’ve been fine if that kiss was one of the last moments of her life. It was perfect. He was perfect. Life could not get any better than in this moment.

Oh, but it could, Colleen realized as she drove. It wasn’t just the kiss or the evening or even the conversation; it was the hopefulness of something good starting to blossom. She had only ever let her fantasies about JC get so far, a few drinks, some mind blowing sex. She never envisioned an actual future with him. Now though, she didn’t know. It was still so early in but she loved talking to him, she loved the way he made her feel and she knew she could kiss those lips forever.

Colleen let out another scream as she zipped onto the highway and turned on her radio full blast as she rolled her windows down and let her voice ring out.

“But I can feel it take hold, I can feel you take control, Of who I am and all I’ve ever known, Loving you’s the antidote, Golden”

“Damn, that kid is good,” JC thought to himself as he flipped through the radio stations on his way to the not great but open 24/7 supermarket for his long forgotten groceries. He just needed a few staples to tide him over until he could shop properly.

As he roamed the aisles, his mind kept slipping back to his evening with Colleen. When he had first contacted her on his drive, he didn’t even think about it as a date, he just wanted to get to know her a little better. He certainly did though. That conversation on the beach, he was obsessively dissecting it. She had been perfectly forthcoming, which was so refreshing, yet he knew there was more to her fetishes than she let on, or maybe that she even realized yet. JC knew from his own end of things that they had barely scratched the surface and he wanted to learn everything he could. He didn’t have the faintest idea where this could be heading but even if it was solely acting out some of their fantasies together, he was in.

JC went to the self checkout with his few items and was surprised to find he had absentmindedly picked up a bottle of wine. He examined it and saw it was the same Riesling Colleen had ordered at dinner that night. JC couldn’t help but laugh as he proceeded to purchase the wine along with his other items. “That girl has already  invaded my brain,” JC mused as he grabbed his bags. As he headed to his car, he quickly pulled out his phone and tapped the voice recording icon. That thought wasn’t a half bad lyric, needed some tweaking though, but he wanted to remember it. It was the first spark of creativity he’d had in a long time and he smiled knowing Colleen had inspired it.