Chapter 8

"Good to see everybody," the balding little man said. Brad had the impression the club owner was barely restraining himself from rubbing his hands together in glee. He had that look about him.

"So... you're all thinking of joining our little community here behind the green door."

He laughed at his own joke. The club's name was "The Green Door," a not-so-subtle hint of mysterious goings-on that took place within. This was an "on premise" club, meaning the club owners allowed sex to take place within its walls.

Brad shifted restlessly in his seat. The churning in his stomach would not go away, no matter how hard he tried to pacify it. This wasn't something he wanted to do... but he saw no alternative. Ashley shot a brief glance at her husband.

"My wife keeps after me to stop trying to make jokes," the little man said in a resigned tone.

"So, okay, let's get going... we like to bring prospective new members in for a talk like this before your first visit to... clear the air, so to speak. We don't want folks to be surprised by anything the first time they visit the Green Door, and we don't want there to be any misconceptions about what the lifestyle is actually about." He looked all around to make eye contact with each of the six new "prospective members."

"The first thing you need to know," he said, "is that "no" means NO... period... end of discussion. No one will force any of you ladies to do anything you don't want to do. When you tell a man or a couple you don't want to play, they will leave you alone or they get to leave and they won't be invited back anytime soon, I gar-on-tee that," he told them.

"What about men?" Brad interjected quietly when the man would have gone on.

"I beg your pardon?"

"What about men?" Brad repeated patiently. "If I don't want to... play... with a woman who gets in my face... I can't tell her "no" like a woman could tell a man?"

The club owner looked at Brad strangely for a moment. "Well... of course," he said finally.

"Just checking," Brad assured him. "From the way you said it, it seemed like only the ladies had that option... glad to know I was mistaken."

After a second close inspection, the proprietor decided to laugh it off. He chuckled as he was responding to a good joke.

"No... not at all, Mr. uh... Rogers," he said, peering at a typed list through thick glasses.

He chuckled again. "'Course... like I always say... this lifestyle is a woman's theme park," he joked. "Us guys are just along for the ride."

"Indeed?" Brad said delicately. "And why would you say that?"

For the first time, Ashley reached out to take his hand and hold it tightly. She knew that tone. Brad was not happy and might explode if provoked badly enough.

"Well..." the other man said, "women have the ability to... accept far more offers in a short time frame, if you know what I mean. Men can only do it so many times and the pumps run dry, right?"

Brad's eyes narrowed to slits.

"Is that right?" he asked flatly.

"Well... sure," the little man replied, "and there are a lot of unattached males in the club too, you know." he added. "The women in our club have them to turn to any time, and they frequently need to... we men just can't keep up with them, now can we young fella?"

"Unattached males?" Brad asked slowly. "You let single males in... in here?"

The man nodded slowly, almost unbelievingly. Surely Mr. Rogers knew a little about how things worked in a swingers club.

"Well... to be fair," the owner said quickly, "there are also a number of unattached single females in our membership also."

"But not nearly as many as there are single males and these women are, more often than not, looking for an... encounter... with another woman and not necessarily a man, right?" Brad shot back.

The other man nodded reluctantly.

"I've heard couples should set up "rules" that apply only to them... that they should talk and resolve issues that might be hurtful to one or the other before they get too far down this road. Is that right, sir?" Brad asked, apparently changing the topic.

When the other man nodded, Brad continued, "So... if I was a smart married man, I'd work out a rule with my wife that everything we did, we'd do as a couple... and only with other couples, wouldn't I?" he remarked.

"Certainly," the club owner replied. He spoke quickly, eager to leave this subject behind.

"Now, we have a few more things to go over. We want to talk about "Theme Nights," alcohol... and regretfully, we'll have to go over our drug policy too. We have a very strict policy on drugs... we will not tolerate any drugs on the premises at all." He looked around at his captive audience.

"All rightie, then," he remarked. "At this rate, we'll be done in no time a' tall. K... we got all the STD test results back and everything looks fine with all of you." The owner folded his hands together on the desk in front of him.

"By now you know we are the only club we know of that requires periodic HIV testing. In fact, you'll have to have a valid, recent test on file in our office... and from our doctor... to be allowed entrance to the club." He waited. "Are there any comments about that... any complaints?"

The club owner glanced at Brad apprehensively. When Brad's amusement showed in his eyes, the owner looked away.

"Okay, parking privileges while here at the club..."

Walking to the car after the orientation meeting, Ashley let her husband see she was irritated. Her stalking pace was a message she intended him to read.

"You could have waited 'til we got out to be a jerk," Ashley remarked tightly. "You..."

Brad spun around and dragged her to a stop by grabbing both her wrists and stopping her momentum cold in the space between two heartbeats.

"You're still my wife," he told her coldly. "I'm letting you get away with a lot of things... I'm even following you into this swinging thing even though I'm pretty sure it's a mistake... but, woman, you better hear this.

"Here are a couple of rules we will be living by... come hell or high water. First, any sex we get into here or at those house parties "Old Fat and Baldy" in there talked about will be sex we do as a couple. Understand?

"Second, if I find you've been messing around with single guys in the club or meeting them outside in spite of telling me you won't, you'll be looking for your fourth husband because I'll divorce your ass quicker'n you can whistle Dixie, you hear me, wife?"

He'd carefully stuffed both hands in his pockets when he began talking. A faint trembling marked Brad's intensity. It was what his body did when he was using every bit of his self-control not to be physical.

"Third," he added, as the idea occurred to him, "if you lie to me about one God-damned thing from this point on, your ass is grass then too. You better get that through your skull and live by it, Ashley... I won't say it again.

"I know that was three things," he said after a moment of deep breaths. He snorted. "So sue me," he said flatly. He turned and marched off to find their car.

On the way home, Ashley agreed to the first two nonnegotiable rules he'd put to her and paid lip service to the third. She supposed he just threw that in for "shits and grins" as he said sometimes. The other two were things she had to address and they were serious. She said she'd have agreed anyway... he didn't have to be so mean.

Privately, she wasn't so sure about the idea they had to do everything as a couple. It meant she wouldn't be free to roam a club to find new, unknown men to have that first breathless, incredibly exciting sexual experience with. That thrill would be limited to men she and her husband met, essentially, standing side by side. She'd had much greater independence when she and Scott, her second husband, had been in the lifestyle. She'd roamed... and so had he.

Early December—

"Okay..." Brad sighed as he turned off the ignition. He'd selected a parking place far from entrance to "the Green Door." He wasn't ready for this, he didn't want to do it, but he was going to do it. He'd promised

"We're okay with the rules?" he asked Ashley while staring straight ahead. "And we're not going to do anything tonight... no making out, no playing with body parts... and no sex... this is just to scout things out and get comfortable, right?"

"Absolutely," Ashley said quickly, doing her best to reassure her husband. She'd sensed a withdrawal in Brad as the week had wound down. Brad was clearly dreading tonight's first visit to the club and she needed to be as understanding and supportive as possible.

"You've got the "safe" word, right?" she asked. "Either one of us begins to feel uncomfortable or pressured... all we have to do is say it and we both get up and leave... no ifs, ands, or buts about it, honey." She smiled reassuringly at Brad when he glanced worriedly at her.

An hour later, Brad was beginning to relax. Ashley hadn't left his side the whole time while they'd walked hand-in-hand around on a tour of the place. Even when she had to go, she'd made him escort her to the restroom's outer door and wait for her. When he had to, she waited nearby for him to come out. When he popped out, she was alone and smiling sweetly at him.

They found a table near a small dance floor and ordered drinks. Brad had a diet coke with a squeeze of lemon because he was driving. Ashley asked for a white wine... the house wine was good enough.

Brad watched the dancers carefully. The women were dressed more sexily than he'd seen in the city's nightclubs... no doubt about it. They danced with each other, touching, kissing, and openly fondling the men they were with, and other women too. More than a few breasts were brazenly exposed, more than one hand dove beneath a skirt to explore what lay concealed there.