Corrupting Power
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Brewster's Brood - Part Eight
🕑 Added 2022-01-29 10:10:20 +0000 UTCMax Brewster – 3/7/2017 – Tuesday – 7:04 pm
It was just a few minutes after seven when Max woke up from his nap, Jenny still curled up alongside of him, her arm draped over his side, both of his hands snuggled beneath the pillow under his head. Despite the fact that he'd slept, he didn't feel all that rested.
The number of people he'd encountered in the last day was almost unbelievable. Sure, he had loads of people coming to the truck when he was working, but the point of contact with those people was so brief, so sudden and so shallow, and it wasn't deep and meaningful.
It bothered him a little bit how much his sexual life was starting to feel like yet another service transaction, and the lack of deeper connection was so unlike him. Over the last day, he didn't even recognize who he was.
As scary and weird as it was, he also couldn't help but admit that it was a bit liberating, to get some physical gratification without deeper emotional connections, to indulge the part of his life that he never really spent much time with.
It wasn't as though Max had set about his life looking to spend it solo, but after a handful of truly bad breakups, he'd just stopped making the effort to try and connect with new people and had doubled down on his work. Meeting women was much easier when he was younger and constantly out and about engaged in social activities with loads of downtime, but the last several years especially, he'd been all about the work life, trying to get himself back on track with where he felt like his life was supposed to be, and that left so little time for meeting people.
His physical releases had settled down into a rhythm of twice-a-week masturbation sessions and not a whole lot else, but now he'd gone from a thirsty man in a desert to a drowning man in an ocean, and it was giving him sexual whiplash.
Somewhere in the middle had to be a balance he could learn to live with, but for the time being, it seemed like trying to put the brakes on things was a futile endeavor, like Wile E. Coyote trying to put his feet down to slow things up and only burning his legs off.
Max realized he was going to be off balance for a while, but he remembered back when he was first trying to learn how to drive on snow and ice, for a trip up to Lake Tahoe where he'd first learned how to snowboard. 'If you feel your vehicle starting to skid,' he'd been told, 'turn into the skid, and it will help you course correct.' It was such a counter-intuitive lesson, but one he'd found of great use, not only then but at other times in his life.
That was what he was going to have to do here.
He was going to have to turn into the skid.
Max decided that if he leaned into the lifestyle a little bit, he could regain some of his control in terms of the direction, while he was trying to figure out a way to reduce the momentum. So far, nobody had asked him to do anything he was completely uncomfortable with sexually, and that had to be a good start for him. When someone asked him to do something that went too far, he felt sure he could tell them no, although he wasn't entirely sure what 'too far' really was in this context. Drinking blood or something, he suspected.
He was also smart enough to recognize that whatever else was going on, the club was trying to move the goalposts on him. He'd done the same thing when trying to get people to eat spicy food. When Frankie had complained that one of Max's recipes was too spicy, Max had started Frankie on a low-level spice dish and steadily introducing him to newer and slightly spicier things. Within a month, Frankie had come back to the same dish and had accused Max of reducing the heat, to Max's amusement, as the dish hadn't changed at all.
The club was doing that to him, just in terms of his sexual mores. The idea of having sex with someone he never spoke with? That might've been a dealbreaker if he hadn't just come from having sex with three different women the night before, but the club was cultivating a more relaxed attitude within him, something he was going to have to keep a close eye on, to make sure that it didn't get too out of hand, because he didn't want to show up to the club one day and think that human sacrifice was just another thing to give a try to.
Cults and adventures were a fine line apart.
He slipped out of bed without waking Jenny, grabbed his cell phone from the nightstand and stepped out onto the balcony, closing the door behind him. The balcony faced away from the house, so he couldn't see into the back yard or the front, although he could hear the sounds of people hanging out at the pool. The sun was almost entirely hidden behind the hills at this point, only the most marginal sliver of orange light peeking over the top of them. He tapped his phone to wake it, then called Frankie. His friend answered almost immediately.
“How's the sex club?”
“Jesus, Frankie,” Max sighed. “What the hell have I gotten myself into?”
“Bitch, I don't want to hear a single word of complaint from you. You've got gorgeous women throwing themselves at you left and right, so whatever problems you think you have, they aren't real problems and you can forget about them.”
“My problem Frankie is that I've got too many gorgeous women throwing themselves at me!”
“Max. MAX. Fucking listen to yourself, man,” Frankie laughed. “Do you realize, do you have any idea how fucking stupid you sound right now? There's no such thing as too many beautiful women, okay? Not unless you're gay and based on the noises I heard from Michelle last night, I don't think that's possible. If you are, it's okay, and you can tell me, man.”
“No, Frankie, I'm not gay! What I am is confused! What I am is off balance! What I am is suspecting this whole thing is some sort of con job!”
The laughing on the other end of the phone made him feel a little silly. “Okay Max, tell me how the con works.”
That gave him pause. “I don't know, Frankie!”
“Has anybody asked you for money?”
“No! Nobody's asked me for money!”
“Shit, do you even have that much money, Max?”
“Everything I have that isn't tied up in the truck is in the savings account that I can only access every six months, specifically so I just put money in it until I can afford a new restaurant, and you know that.”
“I know I know that, but I'm asking if you remember that. So you don't have any money they could steal, you don't work for anyone they could steal something from, the food truck's not worth much without you cooking and designing the recipes for it, so lemme ask you again – what the hell do you think anyone would want to con you for? You buy the winning Powerball ticket and not tell me about it?”
“You know that ticket was bought in West Virginia, and I've never even been to West Virginia,” Max sighed. “Look, I'm just trying to make it make sense to me, Frankie. When I showed up to this sex club, there were only women here, and that just feels strange. I'd have expected a balance of men and women, but instead it's just been women, women, women...”
“You been there all day?”
“Well, I just woke up from a nap. I agreed to crash for a few hours and to see if the atmosphere would be any different tonight.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“And... is it?” Frankie asked him.
Max hesitated. “I don't know, man. Like I said, I just woke up and called you.”
“Then maybe go take a look at what the place is like at night and see if it's any different,” Frankie chuckled. “And see what it would take to get me a membership as well. I know Jenny said she could probably get me one, but I needed to see Mom and Dad today, so I couldn't come up with you.”
“Frankie, I'm pretty sure I can get you a membership to this place, if all your partners would be cool with it.”
“Hell, Marianne would probably want to get one herself. She's really into the idea of people watching us have sex, so a club where we could make that happen any time we wanted? That sounds amazing. I can convince Carly and Jessica to be okay with it, I bet.”
“You want to come up here now and see the place for yourself?”
“I'm stuck here for the rest of the night, but maybe I'll come up tomorrow or something and you can show me around.”
“I'm not going to be here tomorrow, Frankie,” Max insisted.
“Why the hell not?” his friend laughed. “You've got a membership to a private sex club, so maybe you should indulge for a while.”
“I've fucked four different women in the last twenty-four hours and been blown by a fifth, so I'd say I've done a shitload of indulging today! Shit, I've done more indulging today than I have in the last few years!”
“Consider it all making up for lost time then,” Frankie said. “The average person has sex about once every two weeks, so you're probably still dozens and dozens of fucks away from even approaching getting what you're back owed.”
“Where the hell did you get that number? Just pull it out of your ass?”
“I read it in some article online.”
“Yes, and everything you read on the internet is true,” Max sighed. “There's a well-known quote of Abraham Lincoln telling us so.”
“All I'm saying, Max, is that you're entitled to have as much sexual fun as you can handle without feeling guilty, especially since you're making it sound like nobody's bothered by it. You're not in a relationship with anyone, so what's the fucking problem?”
“The problem is... It's...” Max struggled to articulate what was bothering him. “I'm not even sure what the problem is, Frankie, but it's fucking weird, all these people I don't know wanting to have sex with me! I'm no Abercrombie & Fitch model! I'm no dude from porn! I'm not even rich! Something strange is going on, I'm fucking sure of it!”
“Right, sure, something strange. But what's it costing you right now, other than your stamina? They don't want money, they don't want government secrets... shit, has anyone asked you for anything other than to fuck them?”
Max paused for a long moment, and eventually Frankie just continued.
“See? That's what I thought! This is just the pessimist side of you, trying to project failure onto success so you don't feel let down by whatever the reality is. Wake up! This is the reality, and as it stands right now, my best friend, the one who bitches to me all the time about how he never gets hit on by pretty girls, is getting hit on by pretty girls! And is bitching about it! Are you never satisfied, sir?”
Max smirked a little bit, shaking his head. “Okay. Okay. Heard and understood. I'll give it another day and see how I feel about it tomorrow. I mean, the flood's gotta run out sooner or later.”
“Well, don't do anything to try and stop it. You, like the rest of northern California, have been in a drought for years, so let nature begin to heal, will ya? If you want, maybe pick one or two women to go after yourself and see if they say no. I'm sure there's going to be at least a couple that'll give you a pass, if you desperately feel like you need to be brought back down to earth...”
“It sounds like Jenny's up, so I'm gonna go see what the place looks like now that the evening crowd is starting to roll in.” He drew in a deep breath and then let it out. “Thanks for letting me vent a bit, Frankie. I know it all sounds crazy, but whatever's happening, I'm super not used to it, and I just needed to talk it out with someone for a little while.”
“Go forth, live your life, have all the sex to make up for your years of solitude. It's like D.L. Hughley says, 'Save a life. Fuck a weirdo.' You'll be fine, Max. Just enjoy it all and stop thinking so fucking much. Be more like me, even if it's just for a little while.”
“You mean fuck anything that says yes and not give anything a second thought?”
“I'm sorry, were you saying something?” Frankie teased. “I couldn't hear you over the sound of my own shallowness.”
“Fine fine fine. I'll go with the flow.”
“There you go. Now get out there and fuck it 'til you make it.”
Danny Garney – 3/7/2017 – Tuesday – 7:04 pm
Lord, Danny thought to himself as he and Liane rode up to the Ironwood Estates building on his motorcycle, Mrs. Churchill has gotten us into some weird shit before, but nothing even close to as crazy as this. He couldn't decide if he felt sorry for Max or envied him. Probably both.
“So this guy really doesn't know anything about what's happening to him?” his girlfriend Liane asked him over the radio in their helmets. She was sitting on the bike behind him, her long arms wrapped around his waist tightly.
“No, and remember, no talking about it either once we're inside. The women asked us to be around so that there would be more dudes on site, and while we're going to mix and mingle like it was any other party, there's probably gonna be loads of weird sex shit going on all around us, but we won't get involved. I told you when we hooked up I'm not disloyal, and I'm gonna stay that way.”
Danny felt like he'd come a long way since Mrs. Churchill found him in physical therapy some four years ago. Both of his legs had been blown off just below the knee by a landmine, and while he'd gotten fitted with prosthetics and learned how to walk again, he'd still been something of a mess. The injuries had cut short his military career in a heartbeat, and if there was one thing Danny could admit to himself, he was something of an adrenaline junkie. All of that had seemed so impossible as he'd been forced to relearn basic movements, but Mrs. Churchill had offered him a constantly changing environment, one where he'd never know exactly what he'd be doing on any given day.
He'd been in a dark place when she met him, but Mrs. Churchill had taken on her pseudonym for a reason – like Winston Churchill, she never ever ever ever gave up, and she saw potential in him that would carry him through the rest of his life. And the first day Mrs. Churchill came to talk to him, he'd also bumped into another disabled veteran who'd lost his legs at therapy. The guy had an indomitable positive attitude and Danny had asked him how he kept it up. He'd never forget what the guy had told him. “You kidding me, buddy? I came in here 5'8” and I'm walking out of here 6'2”.”
That, Danny realized, was fucking perspective.
A week later, he'd agreed to go work for Mrs. Churchill and it had been a great three years. The drifting life had made it hard to establish any real relationships but Mrs. Churchill's team had actually been working out of the Bay Area for almost a year now, the gag before this one having involved generating hype for a Silicon Valley start-up that didn't have a working product yet. Immediately after that one had wrapped, they'd begun work on this one. That had let him cultivate a real relationship with Liane, and it had been going so well, he was actually starting to consider proposing.
Liane had been a YouTuber with a channel dedicated to travel videos, as she made it a point to spend every other week visiting some place she'd never been, and that meant she was always happy to see Danny whenever she was back around in town, and it was the perfect mesh of time apart and time together.
She was the first woman he'd ever dated who was taller than him – he was 6'4” after the prosthetics had been put on, and she still had a few inches on him before she put on her heels – and he liked the feeling. He'd even taken her home to meet the folks, and when he'd started this particular gag – they called the jobs Mrs. Churchill put on 'gags' for reasons he still didn't fully understand – he'd asked her if he could tell Liane about it, and Mrs. Churchill had agreed as long as Liane kept it quiet.
“As long as she's not making YouTube videos about it, she'll give you good cover, so that's fine,” he remembered her saying.
Liane had been dumbstruck by the whole tale, and then could not stop laughing, for what felt like hours on end. So he'd brought her along to the pub trivia night where the first batch of girls was scheduled to make contact, and while she'd definitely stood out, Max's attention had been so distracted, he'd probably forgotten all about the two of them.
Danny had spent much of the day hanging out near the Ironwood Estates building, but one of the women had reached out to invite him inside of the building, saying having more men on site would give the whole thing a bit more normalcy, and so he'd left Max alone at the house for a few hours while doubling back to pick up Liane, the two of them changing into clothes more befitting a sex club, i.e. looser and more accessible. He'd also picked up one of the IWE keychains from Sunshine White, so he had everything he needed to fit in.
On the ride over, he and Liane had agreed that a look/touch yes, taste/fuck no policy would be the best while they were there, and both had agreed to try and keep their jealousies in check. Liane had suggested they portray themselves as voyeurs, people who were exclusive to each other but enjoyed watching, but had also made a point that they could both paw at other people a little bit while they were there to sell the story better.
They'd also agreed that their cover would basically be themselves, with Danny saying he was a private military contractor, but saying he was currently between gigs instead of on the job, whereas Liane's long history of YouTube content would give their story some depth, something Max could look into and find a long foundation that wouldn't shake. Danny had even gone on a few vacations with Liane over their nearly year-long relationship, so it would sell his story even harder.
He rolled the bike over to the side, shifting it onto the grass of the front yard except for the kickstand, which he leaned on a small paving stone, so the bike didn't fall over and sink into the grass. He wanted to leave as much space for cars as he could, knowing that there would be a bevy of women showing up over the next few hours, a handful having already arrived.
Danny slid his arm around his Asian Amazonian girlfriend's waist as they headed to the front door of the house, Esme meeting them there, ushering them in and to the check-in stand. “Hey Danny,” Esme said to him, having been told who he was and his place on Mrs. Churchill's team. “It's good having you here, keeping tabs on everyone,” she said with a smile. “Most of the girls have seemed fine so far, but a couple of the newest ones sound kind of cutthroat. Max should be down from his nap soon, I hope, and then we'll see if anyone rushes him right away. I hope not.”
“He seemed on edge yet?”
“Not yet,” she told him, hanging up the keys to his motorcycle on one of the hooks. “But it's early.”
“Good,” Danny told her. “It'll get to him in fits and spurts but if he's holding now, that's a good sign. We'll see how he is by the end of the week. Anyway, it cool if we go hang by the pool?”
Esme shrugged. “Do whatever you want to do, Danny. Whatever you think lets you blend in best. We've got TVs on in the lounge, and some of the girls are there, while others are at the pool.”
“How many other men on site?”
“Other than Max? Just one. Kelly's older brother Logan is hanging around in the lounge, and the girls are trying to strike a good balance between showing him some interest and not leading him on too far. That's why we wanted you here as well.”
“Yeah, okay. We'll be at the pool, and if someone could bring me a green tea, that'd be great. You want anything, babe?”
“Two green teas would be great,” Liane said, smiling as she shook Esme's hand. She leaned in to whispering, “What you're all doing is so brave and cool.”
Esme smiled and drew her hand back, hearing the sound of a door opening upstairs. “Great, I'll bring that out to you in just a little bit.” She mouthed the words “Max is up” at them, pointing to the ceiling, as she turned to head into the kitchen, while Danny and Liane headed towards the pool.
“She's cute,” Liane said to him as they walked through the lounge and towards the pool.
“They're all cute,” he replied. “That's the point.” He took a glance at Logan Coleman, sizing the guy up in a flash. He was practically a cardboard cutout of a California stereotype – giant mop of blonde unkempt curly hair, half draped Hawaiian shirt and oversized cargo shorts that were bound around his waist by a belt that was strapped on tightly. He had a five o'clock shadow, something the guy, who probably was only a year or two older than his sister, carefully cultivated to give him just the slightest hint of bad boy edge, amplified by all the tattoos the guy had on his arms and chest, including three lines of text just below his collarbone that said “Tomorrow is only a late today.” Danny had no idea what the guy thought he was conveying with that, but it seemed awful. The kid had a face that looked extremely punchable, and he was watching some stupid sitcom on one of the televisions, a few girls lingering around the couches. He spotted Dana on one, a laptop on the end table, her constantly typing something into it, and Janet Flowers on another, wringing her hands together nervously.
As they started to walk past the couches, Danny stopped for a second, leaning in to whisper to Janet. “You need to relax,” he told her. “If he sees you looking so worked up, he's gonna know something is up. Have a drink, stretch your legs and try to get out of your own head, otherwise you're gonna send up red flags left and right, okay?”
She smiled nervously up at them and nodded. “You're right. Sorry. Thank you.”
Danny and Liane walked past and out to the pool, where there were more girls lounging around on deck chairs, a couple of them swimming in the pool, a speaker playing jazz music, Charlie Parker Danny thought. He identified the girls in the pool as Diane Wilson and Yael Getschmann, with Blake Brown, Kelly Coleman and Song Min-a resting on deck chairs.
“You know, for a sex club,” Liane whispered to him as they moved to sit down on a hanging wooden swing bench, “there aren't a whole lot of people having sex here.” As soon as they were settled, she moved to slide her ass into his lap. “We should try and give off the right impression.”
“Whatever you want, babe,” he told her, as she slinked out of her leather jacket, letting it fall onto the bench behind her. She was dressed in navy capri pants and a scarlet spaghetti strap top, whereas Danny had worn a grey button up shirt and black slacks, as well as his black leather motorcycle jacket. She leaned in to kiss him hard, and used a thumb to pull one spaghetti strap off one shoulder, then the other one, sliding her top down to her waist, exposing her perky B cup tits to the cool air, grabbing his hands, placing them on them as they made out like a couple of teenagers, while some of the women looked on.
'And I'm getting paid for this,' Danny thought to himself with a grin.
Jenny Westinghouse – 3/7/2017 – Tuesday – 7:28 pm
Jenny had done her best to nap, at least a little, but she couldn't find a way to stay asleep for more than a few minutes. It was strange, but when she first heard about this whole game, she hadn't had any interest in settling down and attaching herself to Max's hip, but he'd been so lovely so far, so kind and gentle and so not what she'd thought he'd be like in reading about him.
Max was supposed to be just another mark, another person she was playing a character for, no different than the criminals she'd dealt with on a daily basis ever since she'd gotten into undercover work. It was supposed to be transactional, a guy she spent a few months with, got a kid from and got out and away from.
The last damn thing she was supposed to was catch fucking feelings for the mark.
But he was just so goddamn nice.
They were throwing woman after woman at him, and yet, he was doing everything he could to check in on all the feelings of everyone involved. He wasn't a pump-and-dump chump, and he certainly wasn't a love-them-and-leave-them man like she'd seen a lot of over the years. Cops in UC work were notoriously fickle in their non-work lives and had so many challenges in managing relationships, but she'd really tried the last few times, and each time the relationship had gone down in a massive flames, in a trainwreck of epic proportions.
And yet, this damn guy wasn't even trying to abuse all the options they were giving him. They'd introduced him to a house where he could fuck anything he saw, and they were still practically having to shove women into his lap. It wasn't that he wasn't attracted to any of the women. It was that he was trying to be kind to them and be sure that they wanted the sexual encounter with him.
Now he'd had a nap, he'd recharged his energy and they were about to throw an entire army of new pussy at him, and she didn't expect him to flinch even a little. When he'd tried to quietly sneak out onto the balcony, she'd been able to move over towards the door enough to listen in on his conversation, and while she couldn't hear the other end of the line, it was nice to hear that he wasn't quite as invincible as he had been putting forth. Of course he was having doubts and second thoughts, but she could tell from the way he was talking that Frankie was on the other end, giving him the courage to open up, to embrace the adventure and go forward with some energy.
During the time when she was supposed to be pretending to nap, she'd heard people coming in and out of the house, and she didn't know how many members of Bravo Group had shown up, but she knew there were multiples of them. It was possible (although highly unlikely) that there could be up to nineteen women down there. Her money was on somewhere between seven and ten.
When Max came back in from the balcony, she pretended to just be waking up, shooting him a soft smile as she tried to make her stretch look as genuine and catlike as possible, rubbing her eyes afterwards. “Naps are the best thing in the world,” she said in a hushed tone to him. “But we should probably see who else is at the club now that the night's come and people are off work for the day.”
“Oh, I bet lots of people are still stuck in rush hour traffic,” he said to her. “It's just a bit past seven, and usually there's still some leftover mess until almost 8 around here.”
“You're up in the hills, Max,” she teased. “There's never traffic up here, and people show up at Ironwood whenever they damn well choose to. It's basically open 24 hours a day, so whenever people get a hankering, here it is.”
She hopped out of the bed and slipped her shoes back on before stopping to look in a mirror and check that her hair hadn't gotten too messed up. Jenny didn't really care what anyone downstairs thought of her, but she needed to convince Max that she did, otherwise he was likely to grow suspicious.
It had been difficult, being by his side all day, as it meant she couldn't really get news on what all the other girls were up to, or what they had planned. She'd considered trying to check in on her cell phone while Max had been on the phone, but the idea of getting caught had put her off that idea quick.
“Might as well go take a look then, I suppose,” Max said. “I feel bad, you having to stick with me while I'm getting with other people, so if you want to take off, I wouldn't hold it against you in the slightest. Or if you see a man you want to get with when we're down there.”
“This is old hat for me, Max, but you? You need to have as much fun as you can. You're not here for a long time; you're here for a good time, and if I see you not having a good time, I'm gonna give you a push.”
“And if you do see me having a good time?”
“Well then I'm gonna watch, or if I'm really lucky, you're gonna let me take part. Shall we?”
“Let's go see what this place is all about then,” Max said, sliding his arm around her waist, as they headed out of the bedroom and into the lion's den.
Comments
Corrupting Power
Part of the fun of this story is that everything is always going to be in a constant state of flux. Max has clearly had doubts before, and they'll circle around again and again, with different results from time to time. Hilariously enough, as the writer, I know I lean towards a couple of characters, but I also know that I haven't even dreamt up over half the participants so the game's got a long, long way to go. The best part? I do know that people are going to develop favorites and then watch them change and evolve as the story does.
SP Rupert
Great chapter. I'm glad you were able to bring forth some of your audience concerns so soon in the story. One of the things I mentally knew I was going to have to prepare myself for when the story started was rooting for a specific woman or specific women to end up with Max in the end. And even though it's waaaaaaaaaay too early in the story to go there I already have. I'm going to have to pull up and just enjoy the story instead. We'll see how my lady/ladies end up in the end. So good on you for laying out the characters in a manner that made me start to root for one/some. PS - I'm deliberately being vague because I don't want to show you my hand on preferences too early.
Kaywye
Okay. So you want to know what I like most about this chapter? The fact that Max isn't just accepting this. The fact that his brain is sending him a whole lot of (justified) red flags, even if he can't exactly put a finger on why yet. Odds are 50/50 that he will either stop listening to those warnings or that they will continue to grow. I'm here to figure out which it will be. Good work!
