There are some problems that neither superpowers nor a PhD will help you solve. Time management is one of them.

I hadn’t fought crime as the superheroine Argent in months, so those duties weren’t part of the problem. But my life as Alexis Ames, PhD, was spiraling out of control. I still managed to teach classes, but hadn’t attended a committee meeting or done a lick of research in weeks.

Much of my time was spent doing private tutoring for the Chloros Neraida Sorority. While I started each session with the best of intentions of awakening their young minds to the joys of literature, each time I ended up worshiping their young bodies with the joys of cunnilingus. I told myself that I was using experimental reinforcement techniques to help the girls learn, but such naked rationalizations were wearing thin. The truth was that the sorority president, Mistress Treasure Tartarus, was simply too beautiful to resist. I would go to any length to fulfill her slightest whim. (Not least so I might have the hope of kissing her again, and possibly even cumming, which she hadn’t permitted me to do in months.)

More demanding than all of that were my office hours. Every minute seemed filled with non-students looking for a personal demonstration of my non-standard tutoring methods. Rather than explain my pedagogical paradigm, I just offered up my body to their ravenous sexual desires. My office had become a place for blowjobs more than books, fucking more than philosophizing, and giving head much more than using my head. As soon as one pearl-level member of Club Absinthe finished with me, another one appeared. They couldn’t have been more regular if their appointments were scheduled via a website on the dark web!

At least once a week I had my private appointment with Dean Dickinson. His secretary logged it as “oral review,” which was accurate in a way. We were both focused on our oral capacities: the Dean lectured me while I sucked him off.

Of course, between all these exertions I needed to keep myself looking as beautiful as ever. My stylist was happy to see me weekly rather than every few months. She’d helped me grow my hair from a sensible bob to a lush mane that reached the middle of my back. We’d also lightened the color from my natural honey-blonde to a bright platinum. Weekly mani-pedi, waxing twice a week, a daily cleansing and moisturizing regime, plus touching up my make-up between sexual sessions kept me continually busy. Every moment was committed to pleasing someone as a Pearl Girl or shaping myself into a better, more pleasure-giving Pearl Girl. My entire look—honestly, my entire life—centered around the beautiful string of pearls that never left my neck, reminding me of my responsibilities. I was more devoted to it than I ever had been to stopping supervillains.

With all that, when Dean Dickinson told me that I would be attending the Trustee’s Ball on his arm, I knew I needed help. I had nothing elegant enough for the occasion. Besides, the rest of my wardrobe was getting stale (or stained with droplets proving what a good Pearl Girl I was). Without the time to pick out something myself, I’d need to hire a personal shopper.

Looking online for someone with a sense of taste, I came across a number of recommendations for a woman named Crystal Creese. Her services were expensive, but the testimonials of satisfied customers couldn’t be ignored. Contacting her via text, she asked a very thorough set of questions about my preferences. Crystal said she wouldn’t take me on as a client unless she could meet me in person and review my closet to deeply understand my fashion sense. I scheduled a meeting at my penthouse at the same time as the next faculty meeting. Skipping was frowned upon, but I was certain Doctor Kerry would speak highly of my assets.

When the day arrived, I was ten minutes late meeting Crystal. I was still touching up my lipstick from this morning’s office hours when I walked into the lobby. Crystal Creese wore a stunning charcoal-grey pantsuit with a red silk blouse beneath. She was shorter than I was, about the same height as my lover—no, former lover—Yvonne. Her jet-black hair and clear skin also matched Yvonne. But her hair was shaved close on one side and curved down to her jawline on the other. Both her nose and eyebrow were pierced. The punkish, butch look was one I had never been particularly fond of, but somehow Crystal made it striking.

“I’m so sorry I’m late, Crystal. Thank you for coming,” I stammered, putting out my hand.

She shook my hand with a firm grip. “Please call me ‘Ms. Creese.’ I’m a professional consultant, Dr. Ames. My time is valuable. I was just about to leave.”

“Thank you for waiting. I really need any help you can offer, Ms. Creese. Won’t you come up?” I pushed the elevator button.

Ms. Creese nodded. She didn’t make small talk on the elevator ride and every time I looked at her, I couldn’t quite find the right words. Hardly fitting for a literature professor!

Inside my penthouse, she raised her eyebrow at the pile of untended mail near the entrance. I stammered an explanation, “I’ve been busy. That’s why I need your help, Ms. Creese.”

“I can see that, Dr. Ames. Show me your closet.”

I led her back to my bedroom. Several boxes in the corner still held the clothes I’d judged unworthy when I first received my pearl necklace from a student. Had it only been a few months ago? It felt like another lifetime. “Um, I’ve been meaning to donate those but I haven’t found the time.”

Ms. Creese surveyed the whole room before approaching the walk-in closet. “I’ll need a few moments to take this all in. Go get me some tea, Dr. Ames.”

I didn’t like her tone. And I didn’t like leaving a stranger alone in my bedroom. My Argent costume was secured behind a secret panel in the wall, so I wasn’t worried about that, but my jewelry box sat open on the dresser. “I think I’d rather stay with you, Ms. Creese, if you don’t—“

She turned her head to look at me and I gasped. For the first time, I caught sight of her ear hidden beneath her dark hair. It was pierced in a dozen places from the lobe all the way around the edge of the cartilage.

Every piercing held a perfectly round pearl earring.

“Dr. Ames, I need some privacy to do my work, and some tea to focus my mind. I must insist.”

My mouth was dry. My pussy was wet. I nodded and retreated to the kitchen. My mind was spinning with questions. What were the chances of hiring a pearl-level member of Club Absinthe as my personal shopper? Why hadn’t she recognized me as a Pearl Girl right away? How could someone so different from the other women I’d been with find a way to be so sexy?

As I made two cups of tea, I thought perhaps even pearl-level members had to have lives outside of Club Absinthe and the carnal delights it offered. Ms. Creese obviously knew what she wanted better than I did. It would be best for me to just follow her lead.

Ms. Creese had been alone in my bedroom at least twenty minutes by the time I returned with two steaming mugs of tea. Hearing me enter, she pushed close one of my dresser drawers and turned to face me. She cocked an eyebrow and smirked. I realized it was the first time she’d looked directly at me, and the hunger in her gaze made me feel vulnerable, despite my superpowers.

“I have your tea, Ms. Creese.”

“My clients call me ‘Ms. Creese.’ But I think we’re going to be closer than that, Alexis. Much closer. I’ve learned a lot about you from your space here. Rooms never lie.”

“Will you be able to help me …?” I wasn’t sure what to call her. “Please?”

“Oh, yes, Alexis. I’m going to help to give you exactly what you want.” She licked her shiny red lips. “First, I need measurements. Come over here.”

Putting down the tea, I closed the distance between us. From a pocket, she produced a measuring tape. “Arms at your sides, Alexis. Shoulders back. Head straight.”

I posed as she asked and Crystal started measuring my body. Just the act of standing how she commanded me put a flutter in my belly and a slickness between my legs. It wasn’t as intense as the buzzing of my pearls usually was, but I was only letting her treat me like a mannequin, not a sex doll—at least not yet.

“That’s all the measurements I can get this way, Alexis. But I need more. Take off your dress.”

In another life, I would have asked what she needed to measure without my dress. In this one, I stripped off my dress and laid it across the bed. “Yes, ma’am.”

She walked around me, her eyes taking in the black lace of my bra, panties, garter belt and stockings. “Call me ‘Crystal’. Arms straight out to your sides.”

“Yes, Crystal.”

She looped the measuring tape around my waist, then moved it up to the underside of my breasts. “Good, Alexis. Arms straight up.”

“Yes, Crystal.”

Moving the measuring tape higher, she tightened it right across my breasts. My nipples pulsed with pleasure, straining against the tape.

“Good, Alexis. Arms behind your back. Cross your wrists.”

“Yes, Crystal.”

Sliding the measuring tape off my chest, she brought it to my wrists. “I learned all about you from this room, Alexis. I know what you like to do in here.” Looping the measuring tape across my wrists, she pulled it tight. I gasped. The measuring tape wasn’t strong enough to hold a normal woman, let alone a superheroine, but I knew I’d never be strong enough to want to escape.

“What did you learn, Crystal?”

“I learned that you’re like a lot of rich bitches I work for, Alexis. You like to strut your wealth and power out in the world. Your beautiful clothing. Your expensive jewels. Your fancy penthouse.” Walking over to my dresser, she opened a drawer and pulled out a leather flogger. “But in your bedroom, you’d rather kneel than strut. You’d rather wear your leather cuffs and feel the sting of the whip and beg your mistress to sink her strap-on in your needy cunt. Isn’t that right, Alexis?”

It wasn’t quite. I’d planned to use the bondage toys with Yvonne, to explore her interest in submission. But with a pearl-level member taunting me with my secrets, how else could I answer? “Yes, Mistress Crystal.”

Swishing the flogger in the air, she sauntered over. Looking up at me, she seemed so much more powerful that she felt taller. “You want me to use this on you, don’t you, Alexis?”

“Yes, Mistress Crystal.”

She let loose a barrage of light slaps all over my breasts and belly. My breath caught in my throat.

“You want me to kiss away the sting. Don’t you, Alexis?”

“Yes, please, Mistress Crystal.”

As she ran her tongue over the red marks on my skin, I realized why Mistress Crystal hadn’t just asked for my services as a Pearl Girl. This whole scenario of seduction and bondage was what she wanted from me. She was carefully asking for consent for every move she made to fulfill her fantasy of transgressing her professional boundaries with a client. Her desires were far more nuanced than the other pearl-level members I had serviced. As she unfastened my bra and sucked my nipple between her lips, I realized her sexual talents were far more nuanced as well.

“Mmmm. You’re enjoying this so much because you’re a naughty girl, aren’t you, Alexis? You want to get spanked, don’t you?”

“Ooooh, yes, Mistress Crystal.”

She bent me over my bed and rained down pleasure-pain on my thighs, on my ass, on my pussy. I could hear the wet sound of the leather striking the drenched silk of my panties.

“These stings need something bigger to take the pain away. You want me to give you that strap-on you have in your dresser, don’t you, Alexis?”

“Yes, Mistress Crystal. Please, Mistress Crystal.”

I squirmed with the after-stings of her flogging and the anticipation of what was to come. Watching Mistress Crystal adjust the straps meant for me to better fit her broader hips made me realize how long it had been since a partner had troubled themselves to make me feel good. In another lifetime, Yvonne had tended to my needs without humiliation or mockery. Why had I let her slip away from—?

Mistress Crystal sank my black silicone strap-on into my dripping pussy and my thoughts cut off. There was so much pleasure that I had no room for anything else. As she rocked her hips against mine, all I could do was feel the pleasure she inflicted upon my helpless body. Between her alternating between squeezing my breasts and flogging my ass as she fucked me, Mistress Crystal was driving me closer to climax than I’d been in months. I could taste it building in the base of my stomach.

“You want to cum for me now, don’t you, Alexis?”

“Yes—NO! No, Mistress Crystal. I can’t. I want to, but I can’t.”

She stopped instantly. “What’s wrong? Did I hurt you?”

“No, Mistress Crystal. I … I have another mistress who forbade me from cumming. But I want it so bad.”

She laughed. “Oh! You’re a denial slut, too? I didn’t pick that up from your room. But I can work with it.” Pulling the strap-on out of me, Mistress Crystal peeled it off her hips. Laying back on my bed and spreading her naked thighs, she said, “I bet you want to take that frustration and pour it into eating me out. Don’t you, Alexis?”

“Yes, Mistress Crystal!” This was more like what I was used to!

I lunged forward and buried my face between her thighs. The measuring tape had come loose from my wrists at some point, but that just meant I could use my fingers as well as my tongue to please Mistress Crystal. Before long, she let out a high, keening wail as she clutched my head and held it against her crotch. Twice more, I brought her climax before she begged me to stop.

She drew me up and I cuddled into her side. Resting my head on her big, soft breast, I could hear the flutter of her heartbeat. My skills had made it beat so fast. Smiling up at her, I said, “I hope you enjoyed your pearl-level membership benefits, Mistress Crystal.”

“Pearl-level what?” She wrinkled her brow in confusion. “Oh! You mean my pearl earrings. They’re kind of a joke.”

My belly clenched in doubt. “A joke? What do you mean?”

“Oh, when I was younger, everyone would get me crystal jewelry as gifts. Because of my name. One time I got so fed up with it I told all my friends and family that I had a pearl of wisdom for them: The best way to get their ass kicked was to give me one more piece of crystal jewelry! Since then, they’ve only gotten me pearl jewelry. I like it better. It’s kinda retro, enhances my overall look, and proves that people listen to me.”

I had listened to her. As I basked in her warmth I realized how much I had listened to her, letting her “seduce” me into sex within an hour of meeting her. She wasn’t even a pearl-level member! I hadn’t done this because of my duties as a Pearl Girl. I’d done this because … I couldn’t quite finish the thought.

I’d done this because being a Pearl Girl had changed who I was. Instead of the dominant wearing the strap-on, or the academic seeking truth, or the superheroine soaring through the sky, I was now the submissive slut crawling on her knees, begging that my orgasms be denied.

The most humiliating part of the whole thought was how wet it made me to realize what I had become.

—To Be Continued…