The security guy’s big black boots began to thud up the glass stairway, while I battled motion sickness inside his breast pocket. It seemed like we were heading back to the balcony over the pool. I furrowed my brow.

“Hey, where are you taking me?” I called out. The man didn’t reply. Instead, filling his silence, were a collection of familiar voices. Anya and her crew. My freedom was about to come to a crashing halt, before it had barely begun. My stomach dropped.

“No!” I gasped. “Not back there!”

“MISS ZARSKY,” the security man announced, “I HAVE LOCATED YOUR MISSING GUEST.”

A blunt array of tobacco-scented fingertips burst into the pocket, striking my head, and trying to snatch up the collar of my t-shirt. I ducked my head, but they got my t-shirt second try. In a heartbeat I was dangling in the cool air in front of Anya’s exclusive table, surrounded by her collection of crew members, all staring at me with silent curiosity about where I’d been.

“WOW!” said Paxton, staring at the security guy. “TALK ABOUT FINDING A NEEDLE IN A HAYSTACK!”

Anya wasn’t so optimistic.

“YEAH, IMPRESSIVE, BUT SOME PEOPLE ARE PARTYING UNDER A TIME CRUNCH,” she sniffed. “I CALLED YOU GUYS LIKE AGES AGO,” she yawned. “JERRY COULD’VE BEEN SQUISHED BY NOW.”

The security man explained:

“A HOTEL EMPLOYEE WAS CAUGHT ATTEMPTING TO LIFT HIM AND LEAVE THE PARTY.”

“AH-MAZING,” Anya scoffed, shaking her bleached hair back with supreme displeasure. “LET ME GUESS…IT WAS ONE THE FIREBIRDS, WASN’T IT?”

“WE’RE STILL INVESTIGATING WHO IT WAS EXACTLY. SHE APPEARS TO HAVE GIVEN A FALSE NAME.”

“I THINK I KNOW THE ONE; SHE HAD ‘FALSE’ WRITTEN ALL OVER. I CAN PROVIDE A PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION.” She was probably still thinking of the Firebird who gave me her number. “MANAGEMENT BETTER GO RAMBO ON HER ASS.”

Pushing aside an empty glass, Anya leaned over the table, reaching for me. Her thumb pressed my chest and her fingers pushed into my back, between my shoulders. As soon as the security man’s iron grip released my t-shirt, I whipped through the air and whumped face down on Anya’s lap with her palm flattened over me to hold me in place.

The man’s heavy, self-important footfalls stomped away down the wood panel balcony. Beneath the table, I turned my head and watched his legs departing. Then I was nudged in the side, rolled onto my back. Her marble-white abdominal wall stretched up, shadowed with faint muscle, to the underside of her décolletage, contained in the black bra-top.

With deft manipulation, her slender fingers slid my arms out of my t-shirt and, tugging and working me a little, pushed the neckhole down to my waist so my torso was exposed. She reached unthinkingly into her handbag, retrieving a drug patch, and smoothed the adhesive across my front. As the chemicals made my body go warm, fuzzy and floppy, she stretched the t-shirt back in place.

I lay on her lap for a while like a happy cat, as she fidgeted with my body parts.

Finally she spoke up:

“I’M GONNA GO FOR A LITTLE FRESH-UP SESSION IN THE LADIES’,” she said. She eyed Paxton and gave a curt nod and a small smile. “MEET YOU IN PARADISE.”

She scooped me up and took me along the balcony, down the glass stairs, to the floor below, around the outer perimeter of the pool, and under the shadow of a palm, and finally, into the glowing, marble surfaced women’s bathroom.

Shutting the both of us in a cubicle, she put me down on the toilet tank, before closing the lid and dropping down onto the seat. I was about to protest when the bathroom door swung open and a gaggle of unconcerned female voices bounced inside. I went silent.

Meanwhile, Anya peeled her fishnets down until bare thigh was showing. She impatiently snatched me up again and slapped me against her inner right thigh. With my back pressed to her long, slimline leg, she quickly rolled the hose back up. The tight, scratchy fabric stretched me out against her muscle, sealing me in place and shielding the world behind a black, criss-crossing screen.

As she stood up, her thigh muscle quivered and tensed, manipulating my posture even more, until I couldn’t move an inch. It became so firm it was like I was tied back to a boulder. Every upcoming jiggling, jolting footstep was going to be hell. My heartbeat started getting choppy and panicked sweat began breaking out against my brow. Meanwhile, her booty skirt dropped down like a theater curtain, but it was so short it ended just at the top of my head, so I could still see, albeit from butt height.

The gaggle of women departed the bathroom and it was quiet again, except for the music bleeding through the walls.

High above, Anya’s face was downturned. Giving me a seducitve look, she said in the softest whisper:

"You can fuck me if you want.”

She seemed to think I could climb her leg and enter her where she stood. Actually I could barely move an inch. I wondered to myself if I started gnawing at the fishnet, I could chew through and free myself.

"But” she considered aloud, “you better go balls in. I want to feel you inside my womb."

Now my breath came in and out tightly.

She went to leave, walking with me stuck to her thigh. I felt like someone on a rollercoaster approaching the first drop. Her right thigh muscle relaxed as it lifted and I swung through the air like a pendulum. When her foot impacted the ground, it sent a shockwave from my feet, through my body, and into my head. My eyeballs jittered and for an instant, the world went fuzzy. Then, up into the air, a wave of cool breeze as I flew forward, and –crash—another flexion of pure muscular power jackhammered through my spine. The skirt hem flapped against my brow.

With every step, the sharp sound of her tall heeled boots on the hard floor. If I wasn’t floating on a drug-induced cloud I probably would have thrown up. The leisurely stroll out of the bathroom, jiggling me to the sound of her clacking heel, carried on through a forest of smooth bare legs, while ahead, the neon-lit entrance to the Paradise Lounge loomed large.

The nightclub was bustling with people packed under a structural glass roof which the night sky showed through.

Anya spotted her crew; her pace increased as she sidled to their corner of the floor. I recoiled with every step. The opening bass line to a song rang from speakers, and there was cheering. My body jolted up and down without rest. Everywhere in sight, a sea of dancing legs belonging to an influx of vacationers: shirtless guys and girls in bikini tops. An endless parade of jiggling asses and crotches paraded back and forth in front of my face, sometimes struck by wandering spotlights and lasers.

One of Anya’s hands discreetly reached down to adjust the hose, and I groaned as it raked back and forth over my sensitive skin. I felt hopeless, like a tiny animal caught in netting. Before her hand swept away, she gave my chest a slap with the flat pad of a finger, as if to invigorate me. Then she started shaking her hips in a pulsating dance to the music, causing the entire world to rock and pivot.

Suddenly, right in view, a pair of blown up, fleshy bubbles separated by the strap of a thong-thin bikini bottom. Anya had positioned herself to playfully grind another girl. The ass became gigantic, expanding in view until it blocked everyone else out. And I was helplessly zooming straight into the dividing range. The meaty masses trampled up and down my body as her butt dragged up and down. Only once my breath had been crushed out of my chest, Anya stepped away. Back to bobbing and grinding, I was a captive prop to her provocative display until the song ended.

After the rotation of several songs, she moved off the floor to the side, and back into a bathroom to retrieve me from her stocking. Then it was up a couple of stairs to an elevated platform, where she leant against a metal railing while taking a drink. Her other arm draped across the balcony railing, with me captured in her fist, desperately peeking through her fingers  at the crowd.

The crowd all faced the front of the floor, where multi-colored lasers passed in waves over the big, elaborate DJ table. The DJ was accompanied by a couple of dancing Firebirds, although one was currently enjoying a break at the side to chat up a security guard, twirling her long, tight ponytail a little and even seeming to make him chuckle, while she threw coy glances into the crowd.

Then, as the song wound down into a transition, she sprung, barefooted, back over to the DJ, and leapt adroitly up onto the corner of the mixer table, crouching there like a tiger, competing with the mixer for the DJ’s attention and successfully speaking with him for a minute.

He took up a cordless microphone, and his voice carried over the music:

"HEADS UP HEADS UP!  EVERYBODY ON THE FLOOR YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE, SENORITA WITH A MESSAGE FOR Y'ALL."

He handed the microphone to the Firebird and she gracefully rose to her feet, curling her toes around the front edge of the table for balance, and fixed the crowd with intense, sweeping surveillance. The DJ worked over the set, bringing the music low and looping the beat as her voice rang through the microphone:

“WE GOT A PROBLEM!” her voice was an unapologetic shout. “YOU GUYS ARE DOWN THERE AND WE’RE HERE, DJS GETTING LONELY. SO I’M THINKING OF SHARING A MOMENT WITH ONE OF YOU UP HERE ON THE TABLE, WHATCHA THINK?”

The crowd hollered and cheered.

“YOU LIKE THAT? SO, ONE LUCKY PERSON FROM THE GUEST LIST, WHEN I CALL OUT YOUR NAME YOU’RE GOING TO STEP UP AND MAKE THE CROWD GO WILD WITH ME.”

The hair on the back of my neck started to stand up. The woman’s appearance was difficult to make out in the nightclub’s crazy lighting, but her voice was undeniable. It was Jennifer. She really was here.

As the music built up and got faster, the lighting started to strobe from shadow to white like a passing storm, and music beating like shockwaves of thunder.

"LOS RIVERA!" she screamed at the crowd, amping everyone up. "GET HIM UP HERE!” From where she stood, at the raised front of the floor, on the perch of the DJ booth, she took in the entire room with a cocksure glance. “GIVE ME... JERRY MOUSSEAU!"

With a snap, twin plumes of smoke burst up from either side of the booth and the Firebird let out a squeal-laugh. The people cheered and whooped.

"WHERE IS HE? I KNOW HE’S HERE TONIGHT. CAN SOMEONE…” her eyes searched the room, “…SOMEONE HAND HIM OVER ALREADY.” Her hand flexed impatiently around the microphone. “LET’S GET THIS SHOW HAPPENING. DON’T BE SHY, OR I WILL COME DOWN AND GET HIM.”

From the side of the floor, Paxton waved his arm in the air and whistled. The crowd turned to look.

Another Firebird was signalled to come over, passing through the crowd and appearing up at the metal railing. Anya briefly glowered at her, then noted a silver lining.

“GET ON THE MIC," she told me, "AND SHOUT OUT TO MY ALBUM WHILE YOU’RE UP THERE. GIVE ME SOME FREE PRESS.”

Next second I was bundled up between the Firebird’s hands, and moved in close enough to her torso to feel her body heat. The crowd parted, slowly creating an inevitable pathway up to the DJ booth.

At the front of the floor, white spotlights illuminated her from behind, turning her into a towering black shadow whose head followed me impassively, with silent, but palpable anticipation. The Firebird brought me to the DJ table, where I was lifted above the jungle of heads, offered up to Jennifer like a gift, and she slid into a fluid crouch, coiling her fingers -- glittering with sweat and pulsing with warmth -- comfortably around my body.

“PERFECT…” her voice resonated wall to wall with a thrilled buzz, “…OH, AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY,” she joked, giving me a wink. As laughter drifted around the crowd, a long, translucent-polished nail brushed my left pectoral, over the tattoo, and traced the scarline on my stomach.

Her fingertip inconspicuously slipped down the fork of my legs, giving my groin a tug, searching for an erection. She wanted to know if I was as excited to see her as she was me.

My member had stiffened as her natural pheremonal scent washed my senses, and the warmth of her hand encapsulated my obedient body. I wasn’t just happy to see her, I was bursting with relief, and the drug patch had my flesh crawling and tingling with her surrounding, sensuous touch. I wanted to melt like butter into her vanilla-scented palms.

I would have taken her face in my hands and kissed her, but all I could do was reach my hands up into the air towards her face, which – because of our comparative size difference – seemed so tantalizingly out of reach. I called up to her:

“I love you.”

My voice was lost under the wave of music. She blinked down at me inquiringly. She hadn’t heard me, but turned her head, and raised me until I was staring directly into the shadow of her ear. My ribcage was given a small squeeze between her finger and thumb to encourage me to speak again.

I leaned my head forward and said right down her ear canal:

“I want to go home with you. I love you.” My tongue felt heavy and my voice slurred. It didn’t matter, she seemed to pick up the vibrations of my voice. Her reply rang through my skull.

“WELL, I FREAKIN’ LOVE YOU RIGHT BACK.” Her voice was unaided by the mic and tremored through the noise. “BUT SCREW IT, WE CAN DO HOME LATER; I’M HAVING FUN RIGHT NOW!”

I closed my eyes and clutched her like I was about to die. The volume of her voice, the music, everything, still caused my guts to writhe with nausea, but I was somehow keeping it back. This was almost as bad as being inside the ringing echochamber of her panther ring.

Punctuating her last remark, she let out a shriek of delight, and suddenly I was being waved around in the air above her head like I was a prize she’d won. The dancefloor and the crowd twirled around and around, everyone’s faces blurred together, and the wall pulsing bass music cranked up, vibrating through my head until I felt numb.

Finally I was lowered. She held me up to her face in one hand, and her other raised the microphone to her lips. Her voice, on manic high, blasted at me:

“SHOOT THE HOUSE A REQUEST, CUTIE!” She smiled down at me, who was cringing at the volume of her voice, then she gazed out across the room. “EVERYONE GIVE IT UP FOR THE DJ! HOW’S THAT VIBE, AM I RIGHT?!”

The crowd called back, applauding and catcalling. Then the giant black ball of the microphone moved against my lips, with the crowd awaiting my response.

“Uh…”

At the sound of my tiny, amplified voice, some people in the crowd whistled and a woman shrieked.

“YOU LIKE THE DJ TO PLAY SOME ANYA ZARSKY?” Jennifer bellowed,. Now there was a slight edge in her voice.

“No!” It came out of me without thought. My voice fell hopelessly short of her self-assured, aggravated speaking volume.

Her voice came back, more aggressively this time:

“SAY THAT AGAIN – YOU LIKE ANYA ZARSKY?”

The microphone rang as the volume was turned up for my response, making my voice boom across the floor – and, it turned out later, the party’s entire speaker system, not only the nightclub, but echoing across the poolside and balcony.

“NO!”

I felt painfully embarrassed all of a sudden, and wanted to be anywhere but here.

The audience chirped with laughter, and Jen’s low smug laughter was among them, though with the microphone away from her face, her laughter was audible only to me. She muttered in a very small voice:

“Damn. Bitchslap.” And then, into the mic, her voice blasting through the glass pavilion, across the rooftop.

“YOU ALL HEARD THAT! I THINK THAT MEANS HE DOESN’T LIKE ANYA ZARSKY!” She shrieked with abandon into the mic, lifting me above her head in both hands and shaking me like a rattle:  “WOOOO!”

From the side of the floor, where the railing was, there was a stormy departure of traffic from Anya and crew.

Red light lasered out from the ceiling and threaded through the air. Then I was lowered, there was a soft, wet, sucking pressure against the back of my head. A big tongue, sweltering with lust, curled around my neck and squeezed so tight I felt its veins throbbing into my throat. Some people in the crowd whistled suggestively.

Swept up in the moment and high on energy, her warm hand gave me a tremendous squeeze, more than my little body could bear. It let up for a fraction of a second, and then her fingerpads were rapidly rubbing back and forth around my torso, rubbing it with unrestrained affection like she was trying to kindle a fire. The friction lit my body up with dazzling sensitivity. My breath started coming out in panicked bursts.

My torso was pumped with another blinding squeeze until I thought my ribcage would pop like a grape. Her thumb dug into my belly until it felt like the nail was performing surgery.

The relief at seeing her, the noise and fervor, the vigorous manual stimulation; my body couldn’t take it anymore, and my over-stressed heart was pushed to the limit, until it shrugged its usual rhythm and rushed like a spooked horse. The world unfocused and then began to flash white, and this wasn’t a laser effect.

“Jen!”

My voice came out a labored gasp and echoed inside my head, but I doubted it was actually as loud as it sounded to me. “I – can’t – breathe – please – !”

The thought crept into my mind, weirdly dislocated: I secretly resented her for it, but maybe Natalie was right, and she had duly earned her ‘I told you so’.

The world shrunk into a tunnel, and then expanded again with a snap. The crowd seemed to move at half-speed, everything was dreamlike and floating. I waved my arms like I was drowning, slapped Jen’s crushing fingers, yelled out to her, but she was blissfully trancelike, revelling in a ravishing victory dance, pulsing and shaking her hips on top of the DJ booth to an air-shaking chorus, playing the mascot for the crowd.

Her face fell upon mine as she drew me up and smiled at me, bringing me rushing in closer. I was staring into her lips, which were pulling together tightly in anticipation before she unleashed an unashamed, soul-suctioning full-face smooch.

Limp as a doll, my head was pushed back from the force. The kiss smacked wetly and ended and then I was staring into her huge eyes, now much too close and slightly concerned. She murmured something, but her voice played as an intelligible, wordless drone. She stared into my uncomprehending eyes and seemed to register my slack, ashen face.

Suddenly she was frowning, and poking my cheek. My muscles had no resistance and my head tilted back again. The adrenaline crash was kicking in and my blood pressure was plummeting. The pain radiated back and forth like a fever. This must be the joint pain the vet warned me about, but it was so bad I could scarcely move.

Jen’s face had tightened with fear. Now her lips were moving rapidly but no words, just noise. I made out my name, as if from a distance, but that distance grew unbridgeable as the world rushed away…