Shadow Lane Volume 9: The History of Hugo Sands and other Stories of Spanking and Love. Eve Howard
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Francisco and Los Angeles but never felt attracted to the people she met at their parties and was profoundly bored by their interminable meetings. Once or twice, out of curiosity and desperation, she had answered a male dominant ad in a local paper, but was consistently disappointed.
“Who are you in town to see?” Hugo asked.
“Randy Price. You know him? He’s letting the studio I work for shoot at his estate and I’ve brought contracts for him to sign.”
“Yes, I know him. He’ll come on to you, but don’t succumb. He’s not our kind of people,” Hugo counseled.
“Hugo, this isn’t Ally McBeal. Mega millionaire clients do not come on to female lawyers old enough to remember life before pantyhose.”
“You don’t look your age,” Hugo promised her, squeezing her leg under the table. Again she blushed. Then Hugo thought, “What am I doing?” and withdrew his hand.
“So what about now?” he asked, “in a relationship?”
“No,” she said helpfully.
“Maybe you do need to place an ad.”
“How about you, Hugo?”
“Well, I couldn’t wait for you forever, so I finally did get into a relationship.”
“Would she mind your squeezing my leg under the table? Is that why you suddenly withdrew your lovely hand?”
“Yes, I suddenly remembered Laura, who is conveniently out of town for a few days, but who deserves to be mentioned.”
“Wife Laura?”
“Girlfriend. My illustrator too.”
“For how long?”
“Well, I met her five years ago, but temporarily lost her to another. It took a few years to get her back, so I’d say we’ve been together about two years.”
“Live together?”
“No. She lives up at the Cliff House. Her little sister landed the composer Anthony Newton for a lover off my introduction and he took to Laura as well.”
“Convenient,” she said.
“And rent free,” he grinned.
“Oh dear,” she frowned, sipping her cocktail.
“What?”
“I’m feeling that horrible jealous feeling again.”
“Really?” Hugo couldn’t help but be pleased that Garda still loved him. “You’re so bad. You probably haven’t had a good spanking in years.”
“Hugo, stop, you’re making me blush and I haven’t done that in years either.”
“Come visit me later. I have a great playroom.”
“I have to have dinner with Randy, but I can drop by afterwards,” she promised.
“With dark red lipstick and earrings on.”
“Just as you like, Hugo,” said Garda agreeably surprised that nothing had changed between them.
After lunch Hugo took Garda through the village on foot, stopping at a small, chic looking dress shop on Main Street. “A friend of mine owns this shop and my former-girl Friday works here,” Hugo said, ushering Garda into the smart boutique. Inside they found one small and elegantly shapely brunette in her late 20’s or possibly just 30, clad in a close fitting gray wool dress steaming the wrinkles out of some hanging suits while a second, taller and still more slender brunette, in another version of the grey wool dress, in her middle 20’s, with her hair in a shiny black French roll, stood meticulously folding cashmere sweaters behind one of the counters. Both women looked up but only the smaller one smiled.
“Hi girls. Damaris, Pamela, this is Garda Hudson.”
Garda said how do you do and shook hands with them while Hugo explained to her that Pamela, who had until recently been his own assistant at the shop, had just signed on with Damaris as a custom seamstress.
“She’s got art and fashion degrees and was wasted behind my counter,” he disclosed, smiling at Pamela, who returned the smile but faintly. “So for her own good, I let her go,” he continued.
“My good too. I love my new assistant,” said Damaris, delighted to be running her own business in Random Point with such a suitable partner. Indeed, the two women with their nipped waists, black hair and pale olive complexions might have been sisters.
“And I love my very first girlfriend in the scene,” Hugo said, squeezing Garda’s slender waist.
“Your first, Hugo?” Damaris seemed to appreciate the poignancy of this declaration much more than did Pamela and beamed with affection at the visiting redhead. “How unspeakably sweet! How long ago was that?”
“Please don’t ask,” Garda protested, responding charmingly to Damaris’ warmth.
“Years and years before I met even Marguerite,” Hugo confided, glowing in a way that made Pamela ill.
“Who is Marguerite?” asked Garda.
“She writes as Alma for my magazine.”
“Do I get to meet her too?” Garda asked.
“Luckily for Hugo, she’s in New York with Laura right now,” said Damaris impertinently.
“Yes it is, but you oughtn’t to have said so,” Hugo agreed, thumbing through a rack of cocktail dresses.
“She would have been intolerably competitive with Garda,” Damaris observed, “And it all would have ended in tears. She’s a redhead too, you see and there’s never been a second one in Random Point.”
“Girls, won’t you find me a perfect corset for this lady?”
“We just got some incredible ones in!” Damaris cried with excitement, going behind the counter to pull out a tissue packed box containing several black lace over beige nylon sewn full corselets, echoing the glory days of the Irving Klaw studios. “This small should fit Garda perfectly. Come with me, and we’ll try it on,” Damaris took Garda by the arm and led her to the lavishly appointed fitting rooms.
“You’re buying me a corset, Hugo?” Garda asked over her shoulder with a bemused grin on her face.
He winked at her as she disappeared with Damaris. Pamela folded sweaters and sulked behind the counter.
“Well,” she said, “I’m sure you hardly miss me.”
“Sweetheart, of course I miss you,” said Hugo gently, “but we couldn’t go on working together. Things had gotten out of control. And by things I mean you.”
“If I didn’t love my new boss I’d hate you now,” said Pamela. “As it is, I feel hurt and rejected! And now this, flaunting some blue-eyed redhead in front of me! Torturing me by forcing me to see her in a beautiful corset before imagining you together!”
“Pamela, I haven’t seen Garda in 22 years. She was my first submissive. She’s only in town for the weekend and she still likes me. Can you blame me for being happy?”
“Yes!”
“Pamela, you’re not being reasonable. You belong to Sloan. What you are feeling for me is some sort of mild infatuation brought on by me spanking you.”
“And fucking the daylights out of me!”
“Just that once.”
“I haven’t been able to forget it.”
“That’s why we couldn’t go on working together.”
“I thought when girls had sex with their bosses they got to keep their jobs,” said Pamela recklessly.
“You’re lucky we’re not somewhere I could