Lost in a Night

The gentle piano music and the cacophony of the background restaurant conversation seemed to fade into inconsequential as I look across the table at her. Her teardrop face accentuated by the flickering candle that sat in the middle of the table. Her deep brown eyes glistening despite the dim lights of the intimate venue.

"To us," I offer raising my glass of Prosecco towards her.

"To us," Tilly my wife of exactly twelve months offers with out pause as she raises her own glass and gently clinks it to mine, "Happy anniversary...thank you... thank you for everything... even now I don't think you know how much I love you."

Her broad smile speaks more than any words could for her. The same words I find hard to find myself at times, such is the nature intensity of my love for her. She is my everything. As I watch her take a sip of cool crisp drink my mind wanders on the last twelve months and the almost two years that had proceeded that. Tilly was, and always had been, my personification of perfect. A reciprocated love to the extent they I could not have imagined or asked for anything more from our relationship, or our marriage.

Life had, by our own choice, become so much different over the last twelve months of marriage alone. Life develops and alters for everyone, for Tilly and I it was to the point whereby we had not completely ostracised ourselves from a friends and social circles but in the contentment of one another's company we had slipped away to the fringes. The pair of us blissfully happy in one another's company alone. Meeting up less and less so with our circle of friends who largely led carefree, single life existences.

"I'll grab the bill shall I" I offer slipping my hand into my jacket pocket for my wallet.

"Yes," Tilly responds her eye line barely breaking from mine, "Are we going to find a bar for a drink or two... or just grab a taxi?"

"A taxi home sounds a good idea," I offer with a little smirk to the corner of my lips.

"Sure," she nods a devilish smirk crossing her own lips "You do realise I'm a sure thing, don't you?"

"I do now," I offer on a grin, "I wasn't a hundred percent certain your favourite restaurant was enough to secure the deal."

Tilly simply drains the glass of Prosecco whilst sat across the table from me, glancing to the silver bracelet sat around her delicate slender wrist as she sets down the long stemmed glass.

"The jewellery already got you between my legs tonight," Tilly offers the statement rather crassly, her grin now infectious as she presses her chair back and rises from the table. "Shall we?"

Taking her lead, my heart racing and my mind wandering on the prospects of the remainder of our anniversary, I rise myself and set my napkin down on the table.

"Let's," I offer casting my eye over my wife's incredible slender form that is clad in a satin royal blue dress that sits just above her knee.

Fifteen minutes later Tilly nestles up against me shivering as we queue for a taxi. As I cast my eye along the queue ahead of us, I anticipate at least another four fares between us and salvation from the biting freezing wind. Feeling Tilly wrap herself around my right arm a little tighter, her frame trembling despite her leather jacket, worn now under my suit jacket. I do not complain against the frosty night air, stoically I endure the elements for her. Even if I silently plead for a procession of available cabs to pull up and offer salvation and carriage home.

"Next date night... I wanna go there..." Tilly offers.

Without need to follow her eye-line I glance back across the street. The queue of revellers stretching, despite the winter conditions, along the front of the building and around its corner. Red neon lights above the main glass doors reflect on the dark wet pavement.

"I've heard all sorts of rumours," I offer sincerely.

"So have I," Tilly offers her teeth chattering a little, "Let's find out for ourselves...live a little."

Punctuating her words she squeezes my arm, playfully, insistingly. I have no genuine objection to her request. The recently opened venue I am sure cannot be anywhere near as raucous and debauched as its burgeoning reputation suggested.

As I look up across the front of the building, I surmise that good marketing and careful PR are probably as responsible as any word of mouth.

"A date night at the Dark Star then" I offer as my prayers are answered and five taxis pull into the taxi rank in unison.

*********

Three months later I cast my eye around the reasonably busy venue. I had expected so much more, more in terms of the decor and the basic layout of the city's most notorious venue. Theres a total lack of atmosphere in the cavernous dark room even as music blares from speaker stacks and lurid bright lights strobe around the venue.

It is also quiet, no where near as many patrons as I had anticipated. That being said it is still early, a little after nine thirty and we had deliberately arrived punctual on recommendation of the online reviews which heavily suggested pre ten o'clock arrival to ensure guaranteed entrance at the weekend. The queue that had built steadily behind us had been testimony to a wise decision on my behalf following research.

At my side Tilly beams, her head turning left to right before she looks back over her shoulder at everything we have already passed.

"This place is amazing," she offers with an enthusiasm I cannot share at this point of the night as we approach the vast main bar with a dance floor to our left.

"Oh my god I wanna dance tonight... I so wanna dance tonight," she excitedly continues.

"Drinks first," I dryly offer as we find space at the marble topped bar. "Maybe lots of drinks if you want to get me dancing."

Five minutes later as I take a sip of my pint of lager, I am regretting such a proclamation with little short of shrapnel in coins received back from a twenty pound note handed to the pretty faced barmaid with dark curly hair for the two drinks we receive.

My gaze casts to my left as I watch Tilly take a sip of the murky yellow cocktail of choice, a Disaronno Sour. Turning her back to the bar she feasts on the spectacle of the venue that by my own admission has grown far busier even since we entered. My concentration is not on the venue though but on my wife.

The strapless short black dress that clings to her body accompanied only by silver ankle strap high heels is new, at least I have certainly never seen it before. It accentuates and elevates her frame and displays her long toned legs perfectly as it sits across her mid thigh. Mahogany brown hair is scraped back off her face, into a ponytail. Her face is made up slightly more heavily than normal, her eyes shaded darker than usual, and her lips painted with a dark red glossy effect lipstick.

Sensing my gaze, she looks across her exposed right shoulder towards me, a smirk come smile crossing her lips as she deliberately coyly looks at me. "What?" Tilly offers feigning innocence.

"Just appreciating how beautiful you are?" I sincerely offer.

The slight blush that instantly crosses her cheeks, noticeable even in the dim light of the club, is instantly endearing. My comment not meant or required in any kind of over flattery, just intended on the love that I have for her.

"So, you'll chaperone me into the dance floor then" Tilly gently teases.

"I'll need a few more of these before you get me dancing," I prudishly offer taking a sip from the expensive pint of lager whilst wondering just how expensive the night out will prove to be.

**********

A little after one in the morning I find myself pressing through the same hoards waiting to enter the Gents toilets as I had stood among only moments earlier.

The club is insanely busy, I cannot look left or right without witnessing a general level of debauchery I find fascinating and distasteful in equal measure. That around an hour ago there had been a live sex show much to the pleasure of a baying crowd speaks volumes for the reputation both Tilly and I had heard of but until tonight not quite believed. Openly unashamedly many of the patrons around me openly consume narcotics. How the establishment expects to uphold let alone maintain its operating licence is beyond me.

Making my way back towards Tilly who I had left at the far end of the bar I park such thoughts. The constant dance music reverberates around the venue. The queue at the bar five or six patrons deep. It is why I am glad on simple enough conversation to have inadvertently fallen into the company of the owner of the establishment. Under pleasant enough discussion we had then soon found ourselves escorted into the private members area of the bar at his invitation. He has barely left our side since.

The complimentary drinks and the subsequent amount of free alcohol I had consumed blurs my mind a little, my steps a little hesitant as I head back towards Tilly who is locked in conversation with our host and seemingly newfound best friend.

Pausing at a distance as I watch Tilly laugh out loud throwing her head back on a comment made into her ear as her left hand falls upon his right forearm. There was a rough charm to our host, yet at the same time there was something I could not quite put my finger on. A side to him that he hid well beneath the finely tailored suit he wore. Standing still in the relative darkness I casually observe for a moment even as I watch while he presses something into Tilly's hand.

Tilly looks up at the dark haired male then back to her hand, there is a reticence to her expression, an uncertainty that almost alters her body language at once. I watch her shake her head a little as she takes half a step back, a distance he soon closes. Tilly brings her hand up before her eye-line inspecting whatever it is he has handed her. A slight grin passing her lips but still she shakes her head gently from side to side on a negative reaction.

I find myself inexplicably rooted to the spot as I watch what plays out, Tilly laughs once more at a comment made before she looks past him into the club, possibly searching for me. She turns her head along the bar as he plucks the mystery item from her grip. As she turns back towards him, he presses his fingers to her lips. There is the briefest of pauses before she lets her mouth slip open and our host places two fingers slowly over her tongue as his left hand slips over her hip.

I watch her gaze fix on him as she closes her mouth on a sip of her champagne, and she immediately swallows down whatever he has offered to her.

My mind racing, yet still I remain rooted to the spot as the clientele of the nightclub push past and by me. My assumption being she has taken a tablet, a drug of some description but I know Tilly I know that is not her style, it never has been, so far as I am aware. Eventually I find my feet; I press forward my eyes only on my wife eager to address whatever it is she has taken as I watch her captivated by his conversation even as I approach. Tilly eventually looks up in my direction.

"You took your time," she offers as I step to her side noting his hand leave her hip without any genuine urgency.

"Mister Hughes club has many redeeming features..." I state not sure I agree with my own sentiment whilst deliberately slipping my arm around Tilly's back and pulling her into my embrace, "...the queue for Gents not being one of them."

I catch my hosts eye his deep brooding glare set on Tilly alters, softens a little as he turns towards me.

"Everyone's a critic" he rather like abruptly responds with a raise of a brow.

**********

My head is unbelievably fuzzy, I glance down at the tumbler in my hand and the dark strong liquid contained within the tumbler as I rise unsteadily to my feet from the single seat chair.

My third or possibly fourth glass of brandy since arriving at the admittedly luxuriously decorated penthouse apartment. Whatever Logan Hughes backstory, he was either of considerable wealth or credit card loaded excruciating debt. Looking out across the views afforded by the floor to ceiling windows I feel my nausea triggered on contemplation of the height despite the stunning view across the cities high rise buildings.

Turning to find Tilly I spot her through my hazy vision rising to stand before him, I concentrate hard as she takes to her feet inexplicably from a knelt position as he also rises from a seated position on the sofa and the pair of them hurriedly stand before a bank of black leather sofas, he leans forward and obviously states something into her ear, as she glances back at me with a smile.

Setting down my glass on a tall side table by the window I approach Tilly from behind, crossing the space between her and I. My mind clutching at our own hushed conversation in the back of the silver Mercedes taxi around an hour ago. 'We're in control...' Tilly had confidently assured me whispering into my ear, '...let's just abuse his hospitality a little longer.' Her hushed words in response to my enquiring just exactly what it was that we were doing by entertaining the notion of accompanying Logan Hughes back to his apartment from his club.

Tilly looks back at me as I step behind her, the thumb of her right hand wiping over her lower lip. The gloss of her lipstick noticeably now faded. I concentrate on her dusky framed eyes. Her pearlescent black pupils like deep dark pools fix on me. Her demeanour and expression sultry, a behaviour the likes of which I have never seen before.

"Logan wants to play a game," Tilly whispers softly.

"A game?" I state through the confusion that wracks my mind.

"A little trust exercise," he offers with a level of clarity to his own voice, despite his own heavy consumption of alcohol. He soon loses interest in me offering flash of a grin towards Tilly as he looks back to her, "Nothing too taxing."

I feel Tilly lean back against me her frame rising and falling on deep breaths as she looks up at him. A silence grips the room, a million questions fill my mind, but I struggle and fail to vocalise any of them.

"We'll use my little box of tricks," I hear Logan Hughes offer as he turns and crouches over a dark wooden box sat in the middle of a large low glass coffee table. Flipping the hinged lid of the box up. As he does so I cannot see the contents but watch him take one item and slip it into a rear pocket of his dark suit trousers. My mind attempting furiously to unravel what I may or may not have seen as he plucks a second item and stands back before Tilly and I place my hands upon her hips.

"Hold still," he simply commands as I watch him take the length of black material and stretch it between his hands.

"Um... yeah... Ok," Tilly softly yet nervously chuckles.

Falling silent she simply does as he suggests. Her hands extended to her sides she reaches them slightly back and gently grips my upper thighs as I watch him press the length of material over the bridge of her eyes and across her eyes, I feel her fingers tense a little as they grip my thighs, but she does not protest or attempt to stop him.

"Logan?" Tilly breathlessly offers.

Moments later a tight knot is fastened across the backs of her of Tilly's head her long dark hair I now realise falls to her shoulders, no longer tied back as it had been at the club.

"Good girl," I hear him offer on words that seem to echo through my mind.

I feel her right hand pulled away from my hip, a metal ratcheting sound fills the room, puncturing my consciousness as I start to zone out under the intoxication that washes over my mind and body. The ratchet sound immediately akin to nails dragged down a blackboard. A sound I am certain I recognise but that I cannot place. The matter not helped due to the fact that I cannot see beyond the top of Tilly's head from how close she stands to me. Therefore, I cannot see what he does as he presses up close to her, invading her space. Her slender frame sandwiched between the two of us as she turns her head to her left a little. Mere seconds later her left hand is taken from its gentle grip over me and the ratchet sound fills the silence once more.

"Trust me... trust us?" I hear Logan Hughes state to her as he steps back a pace.

"Oh... Ok" Tilly utters.

My hands slip from Tilly's hips as I try to shake off the darkening haze that grips my drunken mind, the apartment lurching at times uncontrollably around me. I concentrate hard to focus on what's transpiring.

"Todd... Todd..." I hear my own name spoken but on a gruff unfamiliar voice, "...Todd."

In a moment of clarity, I realise it is him who speaks to me from barely just in front of me. As I concentrate his face distorts, his features briefly soft and then demonic as they shift until I find focus.

"Atta boy Todd..." he states "...back in the room."

As I concentrate, he looks towards me fixing me with his gaze.

"The zip... the zip on the back of her dress... do you wanna do the honours?"

My brain processes what is being requested, as for the briefest of moments I forget Tilly's existence even as she stands in such close proximity between us.

"When you're ready," he presses sarcastically.

Placing my left hand on Tilly's shoulder I feel her tense ever so slightly against my touch. Inexplicably my right hand plucks the silver zipper from between the folds of black material. Tugging gently at the zipper it gives with minimal protest, slipping down Tilly's back with ease to reveal pale skin.

The zip runs from her neck to the hem of the garments skirt, I bend my knees as I lower the zipper further my hand leaving her shoulder as my fingers trace down her spine causing her to shiver. Guiding the zip down past her ass to reveal her pert buttocks. A realisation dawning on me that she wears no underwear beneath the tight, short strapless dress. The zip snags a little as it reaches the base of the dress, using both hands I pull the dress apart.

As I rise the dress falls, crumpling discarded in a heap before her feet. Standing at my full height once more I focus my vision on our host, his eyes falling over my wife's exposed body.

"You think she trusts us?" he offers, talking about Tilly as if she does not exist let alone stands naked between us, as though the blindfold wrapped tightly around her head nullifies our existence.

I am mute my addled brain hears him but does not compute what he asks. I nod, I feel my head subtly inexplicably nod, not once but twice.

"Then let's take her to the bedroom," he offers his right hand taking the top of Tillys left arm in a gentle grip as he draws alongside of her.

Standing there dumbfounded as he begins to lead her away from me. Watching as with minimal coercion he leads her through the apartment, and she obediently places one foot in front of the other. The strike of her ankle strap heels click-clacks on the hard wooden floor of the apartment as she is led away from me. 'Where is he taking my wife?'

My mind cartwheels I stand alone hearing the sound of her heels fade soon after the pair of them disappear from my line of sight. My consciousness snapped by a dull pain ruminating in the pit of my stomach. I feel bile rising, causing me to dry heave on the anxiety that now lances through both my stomach and my mind as I furiously try to process what's transpiring.

Stumbling I step forward, following the direction Tilly had traversed. Pushing open double doors, he looks back at me with a dark grin. On a wide bed Tilly kneels before him, as he steps aside, I see the steel cuffs that sit enclosed over her ankles as his hand presses over the back of her neck and she lower her upper body towards jet black sheets by just the suggestion of the press of his hand across the back of her neck. Struggling to clear my mind of the crippling disorientating fog. My focus back on the cuffs around her ankles noticing the length of chain linking the cuffs that drape across the surface of the bed behind her.