Temptation Castle Ch. 01

It occurred to him then that he had just been playing with Mart's page, and Theo, the other owner, had been introduced in a gallery three video. Maybe the key to the red-lit gallery called the chamber was on Theo's Web page, Ron thought.

He clicked on Theo's page. He read Theo's bio with interest. It seemed that he'd been an Olympian as well—but Theo's Olympics had ended two games before Ron's had started. Theo's page said he'd been a heavy-weight wrestler for Eastern Germany. Theo's page was devoted to the gym housed in the wing off the castle. He had clickable tags as well and the castle drawing motif in the lower right corner. He was able to open the first tag, which was marked "Jousting Floor" and included photos of the gym and of men working out. They were all stripped down to athletic shorts, although if their activity required other safety equipment, they were wearing that as well. This page also used the blinking disks tucked into the castle logo, and Ron was only able to get as far as opening the second tag, marked as "The Lists," and he had to use his registration number, TC46, to open that one. It consisted of just a display of headshots and numbers. All of the numbers were like the one he was given, but they had an M appended to them. There were maybe fifty in all. They all were of men, some perhaps as old as sixty, but all well gymed.

To get any further into Theo's galleries, one marked as "The Dungeon" and the other as "Banquet Hall," not only was a password required but the ubiquitous "photo number" was requested for "The Dungeon" and a member number for the "Banquet Hall" as well.

Ron stopped digging further into the Web site at that point, but he had to admit to himself it was because the Web site had limited his access, not because he had the fortitude to just stop doing something that was both disturbing and dangerous to his lifestyle and the decisions he had made on what he would be in life.

Over the weeks before Ron drove his wife and daughters up to Copper Lake for the first time, though, rationalization set in. He found he was returning again and again to the pages that he could open from Mart's page and that he was increasingly letting himself savor what he saw. And, the biggest rationalization of all, the effect of what he saw—and what he imagined could be in that last gallery—had gotten him a lot of gourmet breakfasts and a fully satisfied wife. Sally liked to be well-fucked, and Ron was now giving her as much of that as she could handle.

All the time he was driving Sally and the girls up to the lake, Ron was in inner turmoil. He'd stop at the Temptation Castle on the way back from dropping them off and maybe talk about having that photo made. The cowboy one. Sally clearly wanted one. But no, he couldn't do that. He was weak; the temptation was strong. It could lead to something else. The galleries were telling him that, if nothing else. But maybe that was something entirely different from having the photo made. Maybe those were other guys Mart had picked. Maybe Mart wouldn't be interested in doing that with Ron at all. But even though Mart's use of hired models was what Ron knew he should want—should take comfort in—it soured him to think that of that possibility too. So, he'd just have to drop his wife and children off and go straight back to the city—maybe use another route altogether. Maybe not even come close to Temptation Castle again.

But now, here he stood, beside the open door to the car, watching Sally and the girls saunter into the jaws of Temptation Castle. Here because Sally had said she wanted to stop and explore the shop. The decision taken completely out of Ron's hands.

Now he could say that it was Sally who wanted them to stop here—and that he was only doing so to please his wife.