The Velvet Rope Club – Part 1: Undercover

The club did not have a sign. It had a door, a velvet rope and a doorman who checked Zara's name against a list on a clipboard without once looking at her face.

"Guest of?" he asked.

"A friend," she said, which was true, in a sense. Her friend was the editor who had sent her here with a notebook, a fake name and a deadline.

Inside, the air was warm and smelled of cedar and cold champagne. The lights were low and amber. People moved slowly through the rooms, talking quietly, and nobody was shouting or rushing. Zara had expected chaos, or a theatre of cruelty. Instead the room felt like a library.

On the wall by the entrance, a laminated card listed the house rules. She read them twice.

Consent is asked for, clearly and out loud. Consent can be withdrawn at any moment, by anyone, for any reason. Safe words are respected without question. Nobody is touched without a yes.

She wrote it down, pen moving fast, the way she wrote everything when she was nervous.

"Our rules are dull, I'm afraid," said a voice behind her. "People come here expecting something more dramatic."

She turned. The man standing there was tall and broad-shouldered, in a dark shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. He had close-cropped hair going silver at the temples and a calm, watchful face.

"I'm sure they're not dull," Zara said. "They're thorough."

"That's a polite word." He smiled, slightly. "I'm Damian. I run the place."

"Lena," she said, using the name on her forged membership card. Her heart was thumping faster than she liked. Journalists were not supposed to fluster.

"Lena. Welcome." He looked at her notebook, not at her. "You're writing a piece?"

She froze. "What makes you think that?"

"You're the only one here who's read the rules out loud," Damian said. "Everybody else just nods. Please, don't be alarmed. I like honesty more than I like secrets."

She should have walked out. Instead she heard herself say, "Yes. I'm a journalist. I'm supposed to be writing about whether places like this are dangerous."

"And?"

"And I don't know yet."

He nodded, as if that were the most reasonable answer in the world.

"Then let me show you the rooms," he said. "You can ask me anything. I'll answer honestly. And if you'd rather I didn't, you only have to say so."

She followed him through the amber light. The first room was full of low leather sofas and quiet couples talking. The second had a long table where people were writing on index cards and passing them around. In the third, a woman was calmly explaining to a younger man why he had to ask before he touched her. He nodded, flushed, and asked. She said yes.

"Consent is the job," Damian said, very quietly, close to Zara's ear. "Everything else is just what we enjoy."

She turned to look at him. His eyes were steady and very dark. She felt something tighten low in her body that she had not planned for, and she took a deliberate step back.

"You're flirting with a reporter," she said.

"I'm flirting with Lena," Damian said. "Whoever she turns out to be."

Zara laughed despite herself, and wrote one more line in her notebook. Under it, in smaller letters, she added a second line: He asked my name before I asked his.

She didn't know yet whether that would make the story, or whether it would make her the story.