Might as well have been a slave contract instead of a prenup.
But there were loopholes.
He’d cheated, and he’d grown complacent. She spent six months compiling evidence she could use against him, one of the few stipulations in the prenup in her favor, even though it had been a bilateral one.
Because of how long they’d been married, there were certain…rewards that kicked in.
She kicked him out, and he had to pay the expenses for the townhouse—mortgage, insurance, taxes, utilities—everything, as long as she was living there. She would have up to three months after the divorce was final to vacate, then it would revert to his sole ownership, and she’d used every fucking second of that time.
Had come in handy when she’d lost her job.
Kelly also had to pay for her medical insurance for two years, unless she obtained better on her own.
And the car.
She smiled.
She’d received her choice of a brand new car, a four-door, fully loaded Lexus sedan, paid in full, including comp and collision insurance for two years.
Didn’t cost his family beans, she knew, because they could write it off, but it was the principle of the matter.
It was hers.
And it meant one less expense for her for now.
If she’d hung in there another two years before kicking him out and filing, she could have kept the townhouse, or had an equivalent home, size wise, purchased for her in Florida as a condition of the prenup.
She was forty.
She wasn’t giving the sonofabitch any more time from her life.
Period.
When she reached work, she parked behind the building in the reserved lot where all of the employees parked and headed inside. She made a little less working here than she had in Pennsylvania, except Florida didn’t have a state income tax, so it evened out.
And it was cheaper to live down here.
No more nasty winters to miserably weather.
It would take her a few months to save up for a place of her own, but at least she’d be able to afford one. Meanwhile, she’d enjoy being able to freely spend time with her parents, time she hadn’t had in years.
On her lunch break she took her sandwich outside and sat in the shade to scroll through Facebook on her phone. On Monday, she’d gone to the cell phone store after dropping off the rental truck so she could get a local number.
Her father had surprised her by buying her a brand new phone in the process, a belated birthday present despite the fact that they’d sent her an Amazon gift card and had taken her out to dinner during a visit in Pennsylvania a week before her birthday.
She logged into the Facebook app, updated her personal information there to reflect her divorce, changed back to her maiden name, marked her return to Sarasota, added her new phone number to her account, and adjusted her privacy settings to make sure she hadn’t overlooked anything. Since the divorce started, she had spent very little time on the site, not wanting to stir the pot or accidentally post something Kelly could have used against her in the divorce to try to strong-arm her into capitulating and giving up some of the terms in the prenup.
She’d already deleted all pictures of him from her profile, as well as unfriended and blocked him there.
She started at the top of her friends list and started deleting anyone who was related to Kelly, had been a friend of Kelly’s before she met him, or who were mutual friends with them.
There were maybe ten people in Pennsylvania she wanted to remain friends with, and all of them were former coworkers.
Once that had been accomplished, she posted a status update, set to friends-only.
FRREEEEEEDOOOOOM! Sarasota, I am back in you for good after way too damn long!
She almost immediately received a like from Rusty McElroy, an old friend of hers from her high school days. He’d been a couple of years older than her, but they’d played D&D together. Rusty’s younger brother had been a grade behind her, along with a couple of other friends she was Facebook friends with now.
Her next stop? FetLife. Once she’d known she was going to divorce Cheater McCheaporeenie, she’d deleted her account there. If he’d saved her profile URL, even if she changed her username he could still track her.
Plus all of her friends had been from up there. Not like she wanted to stay in touch with any of them, because they’d mostly been Kelly’s friends. She didn’t want to risk Kelly finding out about her new profile name.
Honey, I’m hoooome.
She created a new ID and started looking up local events. There’d be a Suncoast Society munch that Sunday evening, so she marked herself as going.
Making new friends, especially kinky ones, would go a long way to her regaining her emotional footing. To feeling like she was really back in control of her life.
She also joined their discussion group, and the one for Venture, the BDSM club in the area. She was really looking forward to getting there, getting active in the lifestyle again.
Dating.
She’d closed herself off from the kinky population back up in Pennsylvania once she’d discovered his cheating because she didn’t know who was trustworthy and who wasn’t. In her heart, she’d started planning her return move to Florida even then, having no desire to stay in Pennsylvania long-term.
It wasn’t her, it was the place. And Kelly. And bad memories.
And shitty winters.
I never should have left Florida.
Hindsight was twenty-twenty, though. Single female submissives rarely had trouble finding play partners. But she wouldn’t play with random people simply to get her maso fix. If she got involved with the munch group and started spending time at the club, she would quickly meet plenty of people who’d be able to help steer her to trustworthy Doms.
And she’d play at the club, not in private.
Since she had a couple of vibrators and knew how to use them, she would take orgasm play off the table. That alone would help weed out some predators, knowing they couldn’t get her alone for sexytime.
Only then would she think about maybe trying to date. Once she had her own place and didn’t have to worry about her parents being goofballs and embarrassing the crap out of her in front of a date.
Because she knew her dad would.
Saaaaadist.
When she returned home, she checked and found several Facebook alerts. More likes on her status update, including from some other old friends she hadn’t physically laid eyes on in years. It made her think about other people she hadn’t seen since then but who she was Facebook friends with, like Axel Lewis, who’d also been a dear friend in high school and part of their D&D group.
Scratch that, he’d been more than a friend. They’d actually dated for a few months, but she’d broken up with him before they’d done anything remotely close to reaching second base. They’d been young and kids and like most other kids at that time of life, it didn’t last.
At least they’d stayed friends. She knew he’d gotten married at one point, but didn’t know if he had any kids or not. He wasn’t very active on Facebook with posting statuses about himself. The last one was over six months earlier, and was a funny meme he’d shared about engineers changing a light bulb.
She didn’t even know where he lived, because he didn’t have that listed on his profile. He could be anywhere in the country.
Her dad walked into the living room, where she sat on the couch with Barksley on her lap as she scrolled through her Facebook feed.
“Freeeedooooom!” he yelled at the top of his lungs, scaring the crap out of her and making Barksley bark.
Then he giggled and walked into the kitchen.
As her pulse tried to slow, she called after him. “If you’re trying to scare me to death, be advised I have no life insurance policy right now.”
“Howard!” her mother yelled from the back of the house. “I’m going to spank you!”
“Promise?” he yelled back. “You keep saying
you will and you never do.”
“Aaaand I’m out.” Skye rose and headed for her bedroom with Barksley on her heels. Maybe there was a chance her kinky nature was inherited.
She did not want to find out.
Nope.
Chapter Four
Friday night, Skye had plans to eat out with her parents and friends of theirs. “Jenny’s been eager to meet you,” her mom said.
“I’m looking forward to it.” She was, really. When her mom had mentioned during one of her book club meetings that Skye was moving back down and looking for a job, Jenny had asked what Skye did for a living. It just happened Jenny had recently retired from a doctor’s office as their office manager, and they were now looking for a new billing clerk to take the place of the clerk who’d been promoted to office manager.
It’d been perfect.
So far, the job was working out great. After learning their system, it wasn’t much different than what she’d been doing for the past several years. Her coworkers were wonderful, and there were four doctors in the practice, which had recently joined up with a larger chain. Hopefully, if one of the doctors ever got popped for something, the whole practice wouldn’t close.
She hated to think like that, but having been burned once, it didn’t take Skye much to think ahead.
Jenny and her husband, Mike, were very friendly, nice people, and looked like they were only a couple of years older than her. But it didn’t take Skye more than a few minutes to feel ragingly envious of Jenny.
If they weren’t in some sort of D/s dynamic, they were sure doing a great job emulating one. Mike ordered for her—drinks and food—and Skye didn’t miss how when their food arrived Jenny waited for a subtle nod from Mike before she started eating.
And the stainless steel ankle bracelet she’d spotted the woman wearing when they arrived, complete with a tag, sure looked like a day collar if she’d ever seen one.
Except she knew she couldn’t say anything. For starters, she could be completely wrong.
Secondly, she didn’t want to out them if they were kinky.
Maybe their paths would cross eventually, if they were kinky. Meanwhile, Skye wouldn’t rock that boat.
Her parents knew she was kinky but only because she’d had that discussion with them back in college when she’d discovered BDSM. She didn’t want them seeing bruises on her and thinking that maybe she was being abused.
Turned out her parents were very open-minded. Other than a caution to be careful and use common sense, and an admonishment that she could always talk to them about anything, they hadn’t said much else to her about it.
That admonishment had been why Skye found herself tearfully confessing to her mother over the phone when she’d first thought Tightwad Adulterously was running around behind her back.
There’d been no “see we told you so’s” from them, either, even though Kelly had never endeared himself to them. All they’d done was give her tips on how to catch the fucking bastard and get the proof she’d need to trigger the clauses in the prenup and soak him for as much as possible.
On their way home, Skye stared out the window. So much had changed since she’d left Sarasota. She wished she’d been there to witness it first-hand throughout the years instead of moving.
“Did you like them, honey?” her mom asked, pulling her from her thoughts.
“Oh, yeah. They were very nice. Thanks for buying me dinner. I appreciate it.”
“Maybe they can introduce you around to some of their friends,” her mom said. “I know they’ve got this group of people they go out to dinner with a lot. Maybe they could help you meet someone.”
Skye was glad her mom couldn’t see her smile. “That’d be nice.” It’d be even nicer if they did turn out to be kinky and Skye found a way to talk about that and get hooked into a circle of friends she could relax around.
But that was wishful thinking.
“If you’d like to come to book club with me, we’d be glad to have you. Just be warned we sometimes read pretty racy stuff.”
Skye smiled again. “How racy?”
“Oh, one of the women in the group, Shayla? She researched and wrote a series on BDSM for the magazine she works for. She points us to realistic books in that genre.”
Skye nearly choked, but managed to catch herself in time. “Oh. That’s…interesting. I might take you up on that.”
And maybe find herself another easy entry into the local lifestyle scene.
On the ride home, she sent Mike and Jenny Facebook friend requests before going on FetLife to look at the RSVP list for the munch. A lot of the people seemed to have multiple friends in common. She wasn’t interested in friending anyone on there yet, until she met them in real life.
She’d already deleted ten friend requests from random dudes scattered all over the country, and blocked one douchebag from Naples who’d sent her a private message wanting her to bow before him and be his slave.
His profile picture was a dick, which she’d thought ironic, since he fucking acted like one.
After deleting the message without responding, she’d blocked him. That wasn’t unexpected, though. Wasn’t her first rodeo. She knew that would happen when she set up her new profile and she didn’t take it personally.
It was also why she didn’t friend people she hadn’t met in person.
* * * *
When her parents asked her where she was going late Sunday, Skye didn’t lie to them. “There’s a munch I’m attending. The Suncoast Society. I need to get back out there and start meeting people.”
“Kinky stuff?” her dad asked.
“Well, kinky people. The dinner’s at a restaurant.”
He looked at her mom. “Moon, why don’t you take me to events like that?”
She didn’t look up from her Kindle. “Because, Howard, you’d need a leash and a shock collar to behave, and I think they frown on that kind of stuff at those kinds of public events.”
“Argh!” Skye headed for the front door. “That’s TMI, guys!”
Her dad’s amused cackle followed her out the door.
She arrived twenty minutes early. The steakhouse had a private meeting room in the back. The hostess pointed the way, and Skye took a deep breath before heading in that direction. When she opened the door, there were already four people standing at the far end of the room. Their backs were mostly turned toward her, so she didn’t see their faces until one woman turned.
Jenny looked a little shocked to recognize her. “Skye!”
Well, glad to see my kinky radar is still in good working order.
She walked over and exchanged hugs with Jenny and Mike, and they introduced her to Loren and Ross, who were acting as hosts for the event.
“My parents know I’m here, before you ask. They know I’m kinky. And I had a strong suspicion Friday night you guys were, too.”
Mike scowled. “How?”
Skye told him, leaving Jenny smiling. “Well, your mom’s probably guessed we’re kinky. One of our other book club members is, too, and she’s who introduced us to the Suncoast Society. She’s really in the lifestyle and we read some BDSM books and she helped separate myth from truth.”
“Ah. My mom mentioned her the other night. Yeah, I end the discussions with my parents at that line. I don’t want to know the details of their love life.”
“We have a son in college. Totally understand your feelings there. We don’t want to know about his love life, either.”
They picked a table and more people started arriving.
Skye was talking to Mike and Jenny when out of the corner of her eye she saw a couple walk in. The man was really tall, which is what caught her attention. And then she looked harder.
Her eyes widened. “Rusty and Eliza!”
She didn’t realize she’d said that aloud until Mike chuckled. “Full intersection of vanilla and kinky lives—achieved.”
The couple walked over, at first focused on Mike and Jenny and apparently not recognizi
ng Skye, who sat on Jenny’s far side.
“Still can’t believe you rat bastards didn’t try to heal me,” Rusty said as Mike stood to hug him and Eliza.
“Forty-two hit points of Scorching Ray damage, dude.” But both men were smiling.
“You’re still playing D&D?” Skye asked.
Mike and Rusty both looked at her, and now Rusty’s eyebrows shot up in recognition. “Holy crap! Skye Bauer?”
She smiled, nodding as Eliza now recognized her, too, and dove in for the hug first.
“Oh, my god!” Eliza squealed. “It’s been, what, twenty years?”
“At least.”
Eliza moved aside so Rusty could lean in and hug her. “I saw your Facebook status the other day and meant to send you a private message, but got totally sidetracked. It’s great to see you.” He stepped back. “One of us,” he droned. “One of us.” Then his smile returned.
“Well,” Mike said to Skye, “at least he’s not your boss.” He pointed at where a man and woman had just walked in.
She pointed at Jenny. “No, just my mom’s book club friend and who got me my job.”
“Ooh, ouch.”
The couple walked over to say hi. “Shayla here is the other one in the book club with us,” Jenny told her.
The man, her husband Tony, arched an eyebrow. “Do we have another vanilla life crossover?”
“Yeah,” Jenny said, quickly explaining Skye’s connection.
Rusty chimed in. “We knew Skye back when we were in high school. Hey, we could totally work you into our current campaign, if you wanted to play. We’re playing 3.5.”
Eliza cleared her throat. “While I’m sure it’ll be fine, barbarian, shouldn’t you clear that with Grant and Darryl first? It is their house.”
“Oh. Yeah.” He looked around. “They’re not here yet. Please remind me to ask them.”
Skye’s eyes widened. “As in Grant and Darryl who used to play D&D with us?” This was getting better and better.
“And Susie,” Rusty added.
“What?”