I wasn’t.
…probably.
Chapter Four: Just to See
By the time I actually stepped inside Club Temptation, I already knew I was in over my head.
From the outside it had looked normal, clean and understated, the kind of place you could walk past without thinking twice about it. Inside was something else entirely. The whole room felt charged, like everyone in it already knew exactly what they wanted and wasn’t even trying to hide it. The bar was packed, the dance floor was full, and people weren’t just dancing so much as touching, hands sliding over hips and waists, mouths brushing ears, bodies pressed close like half the room was already on its way to fucking.
There were people in lingerie and fetish gear mixed in with people dressed almost normally, lace and leather and collars that definitely were not accessories, and every time I looked in a new direction I caught somebody making out in a corner or grinding against someone who might not have been the same person they walked in with. I felt like I’d stepped into a wave of sexual energy so thick it was almost physical, and I had no idea what to do with myself in the middle of it.
“It can feel like a lot at first,” Lilly said beside me, easy and unbothered. “Don’t worry. I’ll stay with you until you find your footing.”
She had been the hostess who greeted me at the front, and the second I admitted I was new, she attached herself to me with the kind of calm, practiced friendliness that made everything feel more normal than it should have. She had walked me through the rules, offered me a locker, and spoken in a tone that suggested people did this all the time without having a full internal breakdown halfway through the decision.
I had declined the locker.
I didn't have anything on me but my keys. I’d left my phone back at the apartment. Cause the last thing I needed was my dad somehow tracking me to a sex club. He would lose his shit.
Before I could stop myself, I scanned the room again, trying not to look like I was looking for Jonas. I still had no plan for what I was supposed to do if I found him.
“Tell me what you’re into,” Lilly said, glancing around with me. “We can decide where to start.”
Into? Me? Apparently older men with secret fetishes. I almost laughed at myself, but instead I gave her the safest version of the truth I could manage. “I don’t really know yet. I mean, I’m curious about BDSM, maybe watching, maybe just getting a feel for the place before jumping into anything.”
It felt lame the second it came out of my mouth, but she didn’t look thrown at all.
“That’s fine,” she said. “Voyeur spaces are a good place to start if you want privacy. You can hang back, watch, and get a feel for things without being pulled into anything.”
I nodded, then glanced farther into the club. “And what about everything else?”
“The free play rooms are open,” she said, matter of fact, “but I wouldn’t recommend starting there if you aren’t sure what you want yet."
Neither of those sounded great. I was not ready to walk in on people having sex, and I was definitely not ready to see him doing it. The second that thought hit, everything in me tightened up, because no, absolutely not, I did not need to picture Jonas with his hands on somebody in one of those rooms, and I definitely did not need the ugly little twist in my chest that came right after. Jealousy. Which was insane. He was not mine, had never been mine, and I had no claim on him at all, so what exactly was I jealous of? The idea still sat there anyway, hot and mean and impossible to ignore, and the more I tried to shove it down, the more annoyed I got that it was there in the first place.
"We’re also running demonstrations downstairs in the dungeon tonight. Orientation nights keep those above clothes, so it’s more educational than anything else.” Lilly said sensing my hesitation.
That sounded safer, although safe had become a pretty flexible word the second I walked through the door.
“So the dungeon is just… BDSM stuff, no sex?” I asked.
She gave me a small smile. “Tonight, yes.”
I let out a breath. “Okay. I think that sounds better.”
“The dungeon, then?” Lilly asked.
I nodded. “Yeah. Let’s start there.”
She smiled again. “This way.”
We moved through the space together, past the bar, past the music, toward a quieter hallway that felt like a shift the second we stepped into it. The noise dropped, the lighting softened, and something about the air itself felt different, heavier, more focused.
She led me down a set of stairs, and the first thing I noticed when we stepped into the dungeon was how organized it was.
Not chaotic. Not dark and wild like I had pictured. Structured.
Curtains divided the room into sections, two rows of small setups on either side, each one spaced out like its own stage. In the middle, a line of low couches ran the length of the room, giving people a place to sit and watch without being in the middle of anything.