Welcome to Hyacinth Lane

Part One: The Welcome Basket

The thing about being twenty-four and broke is that pride becomes a luxury you simply can't afford.

Alex Prescott and Ryan Baxter had been best mates since sixth form – the kind of friendship built on shared Xbox sessions, cheap lager, and a mutual understanding that the world owed them something it had no intention of paying. Both were solidly average in every measurable way: average height, average build, average careers that paid barely enough to cover rent in a flatshare with three other blokes and a bathroom that smelled permanently of damp.

So when the estate agent's listing popped up on Ryan's phone – 3-bed detached, Hyacinth Lane, priced to sell, perfect for first-time buyers – they'd laughed at first. Then they'd done the maths. Then they'd done the maths again.

"If we split everything fifty-fifty," Ryan had said, squinting at his phone calculator like it might betray him, "we can actually… afford this?"

And they could. Just barely. The mortgage was, absurdly, less than what they'd been paying in London rent combined. The house itself was a neat, white-painted three-bedroom with a front garden and a driveway and all those suburban things that felt like they belonged to a different generation. The kind of house their parents might have bought in the nineties.

The street was something else entirely.

Hyacinth Lane curved in a gentle crescent – twelve houses arranged in a perfect arc, each one immaculate, each garden manicured to magazine-cover precision. The lawns were impossibly green. The hedges were impossibly neat. Every driveway had at least one high-end car – Audis, BMWs, a pearl-white Range Rover – and the flower beds erupted in colour that seemed too vivid, too saturated, like someone had turned the contrast up on reality.

"Bit Stepford, innit?" Alex had muttered on moving day, hauling a box of mismatched kitchen things up the path.

He had no idea.

They'd been in the house for exactly four days – four days of unpacking boxes, arguing about where the sofa should go, and subsisting on takeaways – when Alex's phone rang on a Tuesday morning.

Ryan had already left for work. Alex was in bed, because Alex's job at the digital marketing firm didn't require him to be in the office until ten, and he intended to exploit every minute of that grace period.

"Alex? It's Karen from HR."

The conversation lasted three minutes and twelve seconds. Restructuring. Redundancy. Immediate effect. A month's pay in lieu of notice.

Alex sat on the edge of the unmade bed in his boxers and stared at his phone like it had bitten him. Four days in a new house. A mortgage to pay. And now – nothing.

Fuck.

He was still sitting there twenty minutes later, spiralling quietly through the five stages of grief (he'd reached bargaining – maybe he could freelance? Did people still need SEO?) when the doorbell rang.

Alex pulled on joggers and a wrinkled t-shirt and padded downstairs, expecting Amazon. Expecting the postman. Expecting anything other than what was actually standing on his doorstep.

Three women. Three extraordinary women.

The one in front was tall – maybe five-ten in her heels, which were nude patent Louboutins with the red sole catching the morning light. She had honey-blonde hair blown out to a perfect voluminous wave, a face that was all cheekbones and full lips, and a body wrapped in a fitted cream silk blouse tucked into high-waisted black cigarette trousers. A gold chain glinted at her throat. She looked like she'd been styled for a magazine shoot and then just… decided to stay that way permanently.

"Hi!" she said, and her smile was blinding and not entirely warm. "You must be one of the new boys. I'm Victoria. Victoria Blake."

The woman to her left was a petite, curvaceous redhead in a bottle-green wrap dress that clung to every considerable curve. Her waist was impossibly small, her breasts impossibly full, and her green eyes were lined with a perfect cat-eye flick. She held a large wicker basket in her manicured hands.

"Amber," she said. "Amber Collins. Number seven."

The third woman was perhaps the most striking of all – a statuesque brunette with dark, glossy hair that fell past her shoulders, wearing a figure-hugging charcoal pencil skirt and a black satin blouse. Her lips were painted a deep berry red. She looked Alex up and down with undisguised appraisal, one sculpted eyebrow rising slightly.

"Sasha Whitmore," she said. "Number three. You look like you've had a morning."

"I just got fired," Alex heard himself say, and immediately wanted to slam the door shut and crawl back to bed. Why had he said that? To three strangers? Three insanely beautiful strangers who looked like they'd wandered off the set of a reality show about rich housewives?

But Victoria Blake's smile only widened. It curled at the corners like a cat's.

"Oh darling," she said. "How perfect."

---

They were in his kitchen before Alex could properly object. Victoria sat at the kitchen island like she owned it, crossing her long legs and surveying the room with the politely disgusted expression of someone who had never seen an IKEA mug in their life. Amber set the wicker basket on the counter with a soft thud. Sasha leaned against the worktop and watched Alex with those dark, amused eyes.

"We do this for every new arrival," Victoria explained, gesturing to the basket. "Welcome to Hyacinth Lane. It's a tradition. A gift from the wives."

"The wives?" Alex asked, filling the kettle because he was British and panicking.

"The wives," Victoria repeated, and the word seemed to have a specific weight when she said it. A capital W. "Every household on Hyacinth Lane runs the same way, darling. There's a husband and there's a wife. The husband works. He earns. He provides. And the wife…" She paused and examined her perfect almond-shaped nails – nude gel, Alex noticed, with a tiny crystal on each ring finger. "The wife runs things. The house. The husband. The social calendar. Everything that actually matters."

Amber giggled, a bright, tinkling sound. "The husbands think they're in charge because they bring home the money. Bless them."

"They're very well trained," Sasha added, swirling a finger along the edge of the countertop. Her voice was low and smoky. "They go to work, they come home, they do as they're told. They're happier for it, honestly. Simpler."

Alex blinked. He was holding the kettle and had forgotten what he was doing with it.

"Right," he said slowly. "That's, er… that's nice for you. But Ryan and I aren't – we're just mates. We bought the house together. There's no husband and wife situation here."

The three women exchanged a look. It was a very specific kind of look – the kind that said oh, sweetie without a single word.

Victoria uncrossed and recrossed her legs. The silk of her trousers whispered.

"You've just lost your job, Alex," she said, and her voice was gentle now, almost tender, in a way that felt less like kindness and more like a hand closing softly around something. "And Ryan – what does he do?"

"He's in finance. Analyst at–"

"Finance," Victoria repeated, nodding with satisfaction. "Perfect. So Ryan works. Ryan earns. And you…" She tilted her head. "You'll be at home. Running the house. Keeping things in order. Making sure everything is just so when your man walks through the door."

"He's not my–"

"And in return," Victoria continued, as if Alex hadn't spoken, "you'll have everything you need. Time. Freedom. Purpose. Power." Her blue eyes locked onto his. "The wives of Hyacinth Lane don't scrub floors, darling. We have people for that. We manage. We socialise. We look spectacular. And we make absolutely certain that our husbands know who's really in charge."

Amber leaned forward, her cleavage shifting dramatically in the wrap dress. "It's the best life you can imagine, honestly. I haven't worked a day in four years. Marcus earns six figures and he brings me a coffee in bed every morning. I spend my afternoons at the gym and my evenings doing whatever – and whoever – I like."

She said that last part with a wink that was distinctly filthy.

Sasha smirked. "James knows better than to question where I've been. He just runs my bath, pours my wine, and waits for instructions."

Alex laughed. He actually laughed, because this was absurd. Three glamorous women standing in his kitchen telling him he was going to be a housewife?

"I appreciate the welcome wagon," he said, "but I'm a bloke. I'm going to find another job. This is all very–"

"You'll settle in," Victoria said, standing smoothly. She smoothed her blouse and picked up a tiny designer handbag from the counter. "They always do."

"The basket is for you," Amber said, tapping the wicker with a coral-painted nail. "There's a him section and a her section. You'll know which one calls to you."

"Tuesday is wine morning," Sasha said, pushing off the counter. "Ten o'clock, my place. Number three. Don't be late."

And then they were gone, leaving behind a cloud of expensive perfume and the lingering sensation that something very strange had just happened.

---

Alex stared at the basket.

It sat on the kitchen counter, large and neatly arranged, wrapped in cellophane with a cream ribbon. He could see two distinct sections inside, each labelled with an embossed tag. HIS on the left. HERS on the right.

He should have gone straight for the HIS section. Obviously. He should have grabbed whatever was in there – aftershave, probably, or beer, or one of those boring grooming sets – and chucked the rest.

But he didn't.

His eyes kept drifting right.

The HERS section was… beautiful. There was no other word for it. Through the cellophane he could see blush-pink packaging, gold lettering, glass bottles that caught the light. It looked luxurious in a way that made his fingers itch.

Don't be weird about this.

He unwrapped the basket. The HIS section contained a nice but unremarkable set – a branded shower gel, a razor, some socks. Fine. Normal. He set it aside.

Then he looked at the HERS section, and something in his chest did a tiny, inexplicable flip.

A jar of face moisturiser in rose-gold packaging – the kind that cost sixty or seventy quid. A set of makeup in a sleek black case. A bottle of perfume – Lancôme, warm and floral even through the sealed cap. A set of sheer black stockings, still in their packaging. And lingerie – a matching set in midnight black, lace and silk, delicate as a whisper. A bra and knickers that looked like they cost more than his entire wardrobe.

Alex picked up the moisturiser. The jar was heavy, satisfying in his hand. The label read Hydra-Luxe Renewal Crème – Collagen & Rosehip.

This is stupid. This isn't for you. Put it back.

He unscrewed the lid. The cream inside was white and thick, and the smell that rose from it was extraordinary – rose and something deeper, something almost narcotic. Sweet but not cloying. Rich.

He dabbed a little on the back of his hand. It was cool and silky, absorbing instantly, leaving his skin feeling – God, actually feeling amazing. Soft and smooth in a way his skin had never felt.

It's just moisturiser. Blokes use moisturiser. It's 2026, for fuck's sake.

He applied it to his face. Forehead, cheeks, chin, neck. Working it in with both hands, the way he'd seen women do in adverts. The sensation was almost obscenely good – tingling and cooling and warming all at once. When he looked in the hallway mirror, his skin seemed to glow. The slight redness around his nose was gone. His pores looked smaller. He looked… better.

He looked at the rest of the HERS section again. Then he carefully, deliberately, placed it all back in the basket and put the basket on the top shelf of the hallway cupboard.

Where he wouldn't see it.

Where he wouldn't think about it.

Right.

---

Ryan came home at seven-fifteen, earlier than usual, practically bouncing through the front door.

"Mate. Mate. You're not going to believe this."

Alex was on the sofa, job-hunting on his laptop, having accomplished precisely nothing all day. He looked up. Ryan was grinning in a way that made his whole face look different – younger, almost puppyish.

"Remember my boss's boss? Whitfield? The one who's been in that role for like ten years?"

"The miserable one?"

"He resigned. Today. Out of nowhere. Just walked in this morning and quit. And they offered me his position. His position, Alex. Senior analyst. Three times my salary."

Alex's mouth opened. "Three times–"

"I know! I literally don't understand it. I've been there eighteen months. There are people who've been there a decade. But apparently I 'demonstrated the right qualities in the interview process' or something. I barely remember an interview process. It just– it happened."

Alex felt something complicated move through him. Relief – massive, flooding relief, because the mortgage was suddenly not a catastrophe. Gratitude. And something else, something he couldn't name, something that sat in his stomach like warm honey.

"That's amazing, mate," he said. "Seriously. That's incredible."

"It means I can cover the mortgage," Ryan said, throwing his bag on the armchair (Alex frowned at that – they'd literally just moved in, could he not put his things away properly?). "Like, easily. You don't need to stress about the job thing. Take your time, yeah? Find something good."

He can cover the mortgage. He'll earn the money. And you'll be at home.

The thought arrived uninvited and Alex dismissed it immediately. But it left a warm little afterglow.

"Listen, I haven't eaten," Alex said, standing. "I'll make dinner. There's stuff in the fridge."

"You don't have to–"

"Mate, you just got promoted to a job that's going to pay for this house. The least I can do is make a spag bol."

He cooked. And it wasn't – it wasn't domestic, exactly. It wasn't what those women had been talking about. He was just being practical. Being a good housemate. He even tidied the kitchen while the pasta boiled, wiping down the surfaces (which needed it, honestly, Ryan was a pig) and putting dishes away.

When they sat down to eat, Ryan looked at him across the table with a strange expression.

"What?"

"Nothing. You just look… different. Good different. Have you done something?"

Alex's hand went involuntarily to his cheek. His skin. The moisturiser.

"Just had a shower," he muttered. "Tired."

"No, it's – you look really well. Your skin's like…" Ryan squinted, searching for the word, and then gave up. "Dunno. Glowy."

"Piss off."

But later, after Ryan had gone to bed, Alex stood in the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror. And Ryan was right. His skin did look different. The dark circles under his eyes seemed lighter. His complexion was clearer, more even. Almost luminous.

He looked at the bathroom shelf where he'd placed the jar of moisturiser (he'd retrieved it from the cupboard, just the moisturiser, nothing else).

He applied another layer before bed. Just because his skin was dry. Just because it felt good.

No other reason.

---

Part Two: Settling In

The changes didn't happen all at once.

They crept. They insinuated. Like water finding the cracks in stone, seeping in slowly until the whole structure was something new.

Day one, Alex cleaned the house. Not because the women had told him to – or not only because of that – but because the place was genuinely disgusting. Two men in their mid-twenties who'd never properly looked after a home had turned it into a landfill site in under a week. Boxes everywhere, clothes on the floor, takeaway containers colonising every surface.

He started in the kitchen and worked his way through every room. By the time Ryan got home – later now, the new job demanded longer hours – the house was transformed. Surfaces gleaming, cushions arranged, everything in its place.

"Bloody hell," Ryan said, looking around. "You've been busy."

"Someone has to be," Alex replied, and he heard the sharpness in his own voice and was surprised by it. "You left your cereal bowl in the sink with milk still in it. That attracts ants."

"Sorry, mum."

"Don't be a dick. Just rinse your bowl."

Ryan blinked, looking slightly thrown. Alex had never spoken to him like that before. But he also didn't argue. He just nodded and said "yeah, fair enough."

Good.

Alex used the moisturiser every morning and every evening. His skin responded like parched earth to rain – absorbing, softening, blooming. Within three days the change was visible enough that he caught himself staring. His pores had practically disappeared. His skin was smooth and taut, with a golden undertone he'd never had before. He looked… expensive. Like someone who had facials and drank green juice, not someone who'd been eating Pot Noodles and doom-scrolling Indeed for job postings.

(He'd stopped looking at job postings. He wasn't sure when, exactly. It just seemed less urgent now.)

On Wednesday, he went to Sasha Whitmore's house for wine morning.

He nearly didn't go. He stood in the hallway for ten minutes arguing with himself, wearing his nicest jeans and a polo shirt, feeling absurd. But something pulled him. Curiosity, maybe. Or the memory of Victoria Blake's eyes and the cool certainty in her voice.

You'll know which one calls to you.

Sasha's house was number three, a detached four-bedroom that had been decorated with the kind of aggressive good taste that cost a fortune. Everything was grey and cream and gold, with fresh flowers on every surface and artwork on the walls that probably cost more than Alex's car.

The wives were already there – Victoria, Amber, Sasha, and two others he hadn't met. Tiffany Price from number nine, a petite blonde with enormous blue eyes and a body that defied physics – tiny waist, outrageous curves, all wrapped in a tight white ribbed dress. And Brooke Harrington from number eleven, a long-legged auburn beauty in leather trousers and a silk camisole who looked like she modelled for a living (she didn't – she did nothing for a living, which was apparently the point).

They were drinking Sancerre at ten in the morning and they were delighted to see him.

"Sit, sit," Sasha said, pouring him a glass. "Tell us everything. How are you settling in?"

Alex took the wine and sat in a grey velvet armchair that was obscenely comfortable and told them he was fine, the house was fine, everything was fine.

"And Ryan?" Victoria asked, sipping her wine. "Working hard?"

"He's barely home. The new job's intense."

"Mmm. That's how it starts." Victoria smiled that cat-smile again. "They get the promotion, the salary, the corner office. They think they're king of the world. But who's running the kingdom while they're gone?"

"You should see Marcus's face when he comes home and I've rearranged the furniture," Amber said with a giggle. "He doesn't dare say a word."

"James once tried to change the thermostat," Sasha said. "Once."

"What happened?" Alex asked.

Sasha sipped her wine. "I locked the bedroom door for three weeks."

The women laughed. Alex laughed too. And somewhere between the second and third glass of Sancerre, something shifted. He wasn't laughing at them anymore. He was laughing with them. He understood the joke. The joke was that men were simple creatures who needed to be managed, and the women who managed them were the ones with the real power.

"You've got incredible skin," Tiffany said, leaning forward and peering at him. "Seriously. What are you using?"

"Just some moisturiser from the welcome basket."

The wives exchanged a look. That look again. The oh, sweetie look that was also somehow the good girl look.

"Isn't it divine?" Amber said. "I use it every day. You should try the night cream too. It's in the basket – the black jar."

"I didn't see a–"

"Check again, darling," Victoria said. "Sometimes you miss things the first time."

---

He checked when he got home. There was a black jar in the basket that he absolutely had not seen before. There were, in fact, several items he didn't remember – a toner, a serum, an exfoliating scrub. All in the same rose-gold packaging.

Alex used them all.

He also noticed, for the first time, that his polo shirt felt wrong. Not wrong as in uncomfortable – wrong as in boring. Shapeless and plain and cheap. He looked at himself in the bedroom mirror and frowned. The shirt did nothing for his newly luminous skin. It hung off him like a sack. He looked like a boy, and boys were–

Boring. Boys are boring.

The thought was foreign, electric. Alex blinked at his reflection.

Where did that come from?

He pushed it away. But it left a residue, like perfume on fabric.

The next morning, when Sasha texted the group chat (he was in a group chat with the wives now, when had that happened?) asking if anyone wanted to come over, Alex found himself standing in front of his wardrobe, dissatisfied. Everything he owned was dull. Jeans and t-shirts and hoodies in grey and navy and black. Not a single thing that spoke.

He thought of the husbands. He'd seen a few of them by now – leaving for work in the mornings, arriving home in the evenings. They were uniformly handsome in a clean-cut, non-threatening way, always in well-fitted suits, always carrying expensive briefcases. But even their casual clothes were a cut above – tailored chinos, cashmere jumpers, slim-fit shirts in pale blue and white.

He thought of something else too, though he tried not to. He thought of the wives. How Sasha's satin blouse had caught the light, that liquid shimmer. How Victoria's silk trousers had whispered when she crossed her legs. How Brooke's leather trousers had clung to every line of her body like they'd been painted on.

You don't want to dress like the husbands.

He pressed his lips together.

You want to dress like–

He went to Sasha's.

"I need clothes," he said, standing in her hallway, embarrassed and defiant. "I don't own anything decent."

Sasha studied him, that slow appraising look. Then she smiled.

"James is about your size. Come with me."

She led him to a walk-in wardrobe that was divided precisely down the middle – one half was Sasha's, a cathedral of silk and cashmere and designer labels; the other was James's, orderly rows of expensive menswear.

"Take whatever you want," Sasha said. "He has far too many clothes. I buy them for him; he doesn't even notice what's missing."

Alex left with an armful. Not jeans and t-shirts – tailored trousers in charcoal and navy, slim-cut chinos, a white satin shirt that he told himself was just fashionable, a pale grey cashmere sweater, a pair of dark fitted trousers that sat snugly on his hips.

He wore the satin shirt that evening. Unbuttoned one button more than he normally would. The fabric was cool and liquid against his skin, sliding with every movement. When he looked in the mirror, the cream-white satin against his golden skin was–

Beautiful.

Mmmmmh…

He filed his nails that night. Not for any particular reason. His nails were just ragged and ugly and that seemed – wrong, now. He found a nail file in the bathroom cabinet (had that always been there?) and shaped each nail into a neat oval. When he was done, his hands looked different. Elegant. Cared for.

He poured himself a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. He'd never been much of a wine drinker before – lager and cider were more his speed – but Amber had brought round a case of New Zealand Sauv Blanc and it was cold and crisp and sharp and it made him feel like a certain kind of person.

Ryan came home at nine, exhausted, tie loosened.

"There's dinner in the oven," Alex said from the sofa, not looking up from his phone. "Chicken and roasted vegetables. And I've meal-prepped your lunches for the week."

"You– what?"

"Your lunches. For work. I made five. They're in the fridge, labelled."

Ryan stood in the doorway, staring. Alex was curled on the sofa in the satin shirt and charcoal trousers, bare feet tucked under him, wine glass in one hand, nails gleaming in the lamplight. The house was immaculate. Something smelled incredible from the kitchen, and also – also from Alex, something warm and floral that Ryan couldn't place.

"Mate," Ryan said slowly, "where did you get that shirt?"

"Borrowed it. Do you like it?"

The question was casual. The look Alex gave him over the rim of the wine glass was not. It was a look that expected a specific answer.

"Yeah," Ryan said. "It's nice."

"Good. Now go eat. And tomorrow, I want you to go to the gym before work. You've been eating rubbish and it's showing."

"I haven't been–"

"Ryan." Alex's voice was quiet but firm, and it carried a new edge – something cool and sure and faintly amused. "Don't argue with me. I've planned your meals. I've found a gym nearby. You'll go three mornings a week. It's not up for discussion."

Ryan opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.

"Yeah," he said. "Okay."

He went to eat his dinner. Alex sipped his wine and smiled.

Good boy.

---

Part Three: The Becoming

It happened in layers, like sediment.

First the skin. The moisturiser – and now the full skincare routine, morning and evening, a ritual that took twenty minutes and felt like worship – had transformed Alex's complexion into something almost porcelain. Smooth, dewy, golden. His cheekbones seemed sharper, his lips fuller, his jaw slightly softer. He looked in the mirror and saw someone who was starting to be beautiful.

Then the body. He'd started working out – the wives all worked out, it was practically religion on Hyacinth Lane – and his body responded in ways that didn't quite make sense. He was losing weight, yes, but not evenly. His waist was narrowing dramatically, pulling in like someone was cinching an invisible corset. His stomach flattened to a taut plane. But his hips – his hips were widening. A softness gathered there, and at his thighs, a rounded fullness that filled out the tailored trousers in new ways. His legs looked longer. Shapelier.

And his chest.

He noticed it in the shower one morning, ten days in. A puffiness around his nipples that hadn't been there before. A sensitivity. When the hot water hit them, he gasped – a sharp little intake of breath, almost feminine – and his hands went to his chest instinctively, cupping, and the feeling of his own hands on that tender, swelling flesh was–

"Ohhh…"

He stood there for a long moment, water streaming, hands on his chest, feeling the new weight of it. Small still. Barely noticeable under clothes. But there. Undeniably there.

He should have been afraid. He should have been panicking, calling a doctor, demanding to know what was happening to his body.

Instead, he thought: I should get a better bra.

The thought arrived perfectly formed, matter-of-fact, like it had always been waiting for him.

He opened the hallway cupboard. The lingerie from the welcome basket – the midnight-black set, lace and silk – was still in its packaging. He took it out with hands that trembled slightly. The bra was an A-cup, delicate, with thin straps and a scalloped lace edge. The knickers were a matching thong, almost weightless.

He put them on in his bedroom with the door locked, even though Ryan was at work.

The bra fitted. Perfectly. Like it had been tailored for his exact, newly changed proportions. The silk sat against his tender nipples and the sensation was–

"Mmmmmh… fuck."

–exquisite. The thong slipped on like a whisper, the thin band settling between his rounding cheeks like it was always meant to be there. He stood in front of the full-length mirror and what he saw was not a man wearing lingerie. It was a body that was becoming, caught between states, already more one thing than the other.

He dressed over the top of it. The slim charcoal trousers. The white satin shirt. But underneath, against his skin, the lingerie sat like a secret, like a promise, and every movement reminded him it was there.

He went to wine morning with the wives wearing lingerie under his clothes and he felt more himself than he had in years.

---

Weeks passed. The transformation accelerated.

Alex bought lycra – high-waisted leggings in black, tight-fitting gym tops. He worked out daily now, not the way men worked out, not with heavy iron and grunting, but the way the wives worked out: hip thrusts, glute bridges, squats, Pilates, resistance bands. Building curves. Sculpting a body that was remaking itself with eager cooperation, as if it had been waiting for permission.

His hair grew. Not just longer – thicker, glossier, the mousy brown darkening to a rich, warm brunette. It now fell past his ears in a way that framed his face, and his face itself was changing, feminising, the jaw narrowing, the cheekbones lifting, the lips swelling to a natural pout. His eyes seemed larger, darker, framed by lashes that were getting ridiculous.

He was getting shorter. Not dramatically – an inch, maybe two – but enough that the world seemed slightly different, and enough that he now looked up at Ryan, which felt – which felt right, somehow, in a way that had nothing to do with submission and everything to do with the particular power of a woman looking up at a man and knowing she owned him completely.

He'd rearranged the house three times. The living room was now arranged around the largest sofa – his spot, with the best view of the TV and the most cushions. The master bedroom was his bedroom, redecorated in soft greys and whites, with new bedding (Egyptian cotton, because anything else was an insult to skin this good) and a vanity table he'd bought online. Ryan had been moved to the second bedroom without discussion.

"This is my house," Alex murmured to himself sometimes, walking through rooms he'd cleaned and styled and scented with Jo Malone candles. Not in a loud way. In a quiet, certain way. A finger on his lip, head tilted, a slow smirk. "Mine."

He'd developed habits. The finger-on-lip thing was one. A way of pausing, considering, that was less about thought and more about performance – a small, feminine gesture that signalled I am deciding your fate. The smirk was another – not a smile, never quite a smile, but a private curl of the lips that said I know something you don't.

And the comments. Oh, the comments.

"You look tired, Ryan. Have you been sleeping?"

"I cleaned the bathroom. Again. You'd think someone who earns six figures could manage not to leave toothpaste in the sink."

"I bought new towels. The old ones were embarrassing. Don't ask how much they cost."

"Is that what you're wearing?"

Each one was delivered lightly, casually, with a sweetness that only barely masked the razor underneath. Passive-aggressive was an art form and Alex was discovering he was a natural. The wives were teaching him – in group chats, over wine, during long afternoons spent at each other's houses – how to wield softness like a weapon.

"Never shout," Victoria told him, painting his nails pale pink one Tuesday afternoon (he didn't object; the colour was pretty and his nails were long enough now to warrant it). "Shouting is what men do. We don't shout, darling. We suggest. We imply. We make them feel it."

"The trick," Sasha said, "is to make him believe every good thing in his life comes from you. Because it does. You chose this house. You manage this house. You manage him. Without you, he's nothing."

"And he needs to know that," Amber added, inspecting her own flawless manicure. "Not in his head. In his bones."

"And when he forgets," Brooke said with a lazy smile, "you remind him. Not with words. With absence. You withdraw. You go cold. And he'll do anything to get you back."

Alex absorbed it all like scripture.

---

Meanwhile, Ryan worked.

He worked harder than he'd ever worked in his life. The promotion had been a gift, but it came with expectations – longer hours, higher pressure, the constant awareness that he was the youngest person in every meeting and needed to prove himself worthy. He left the house at seven and came home at eight, sometimes nine, and when he came home the house was perfect and dinner was waiting and Alex was…

Alex was different.

Ryan noticed it the way you notice the tide – not the moment-by-moment creep but the sudden realisation that the water is much higher than it was. One day Alex was his mate, a normal bloke in joggers, and then suddenly – when had this happened? – Alex was someone else entirely. Someone with glossy brown hair and luminous skin and a body that moved differently, sat differently, occupied space differently. Someone who wore satin and filed their nails and drank wine and gave Ryan orders in a quiet, firm voice that Ryan obeyed before his brain caught up.

He'd started going to the gym because Alex told him to. He ate what Alex prepared because Alex told him to. He came home and put his shoes on the rack and hung up his coat and asked if there was anything Alex needed, because that was just – that was just how things were now.

The worst part – the most confusing, terrifying, secretly thrilling part – was the looking.

It started small. Noticing that Alex's shirt clung differently now, the satin hugging a shape that hadn't been there before. Noticing the curve of Alex's hip as he stood at the kitchen counter, the way his trousers fit snugly over an ass that was fuller and rounder than any man's had a right to be. Noticing the way Alex crossed his legs on the sofa – both legs tucked to one side, elegantly, a woman's pose – and how the movement revealed the outline of something beneath the fabric that made Ryan's mouth go dry.

He's your mate. He's a bloke. Stop looking.

But he couldn't stop looking. Because what he was seeing was becoming, undeniably and impossibly, female. The swelling at Alex's chest was no longer subtle – it was a visible curve beneath the satin, a genuine shape, and Ryan sometimes caught Alex adjusting, lifting, touching himself there with a casual intimacy that made Ryan's blood run hot.

Alex's face was beautiful. There was no male word for what it had become – handsome didn't apply, good-looking was an insult. It was beautiful, sharp-soft, with dark eyes and a full mouth and cheekbones that caught shadows. Alex's body was a curve drawn by someone who understood desire – narrow waist, flared hips, round ass, breasts that were growing week by week, legs that went on and on.

And Ryan was getting hard. Looking at his friend. His housemate. His – whatever Alex was becoming.

He hated himself for it. And he couldn't stop.

---

The evening it broke was a Thursday.

Ryan came home late, stressed, a deal gone sideways, his boss breathing down his neck. He slammed the front door harder than he meant to and strode into the living room—

And stopped.

Alex was on the sofa. But not the Alex Ryan had been holding in his mind – not the joggers-and-t-shirt Alex, the normal Alex, the mate he'd known since school.

This Alex was wearing a black silk robe, loosely belted, falling open just enough to reveal a long V of golden skin from throat to sternum. Beneath the robe: the unmistakable outline of lingerie. A bra. Lace. And lower, sheer black stockings encased long, toned legs that were crossed at the ankle, feet arched in black patent stiletto heels. The heels were high – four inches at least – and they made Alex's legs look endless.

Alex's face was lightly made up. Mascara. A touch of lip gloss. Cheekbones highlighted. Dark hair falling in a glossy curtain.

He was holding a glass of red wine in one hand. The other hand rested on his thigh, fingers splayed, nails painted a deep burgundy.

He looked up at Ryan and smiled. That smile. The slow, feline curl.

"You're home," Alex said. His voice had changed too – softer, slightly higher, with a purring quality that vibrated somewhere behind Ryan's ribs. "Long day?"

Ryan's brain short-circuited. Every thought collided and cancelled each other out, leaving only a hot, buzzing static. His eyes moved without permission – from the heels up the stockings to the silk robe to the lace beneath to the face that was so fucking beautiful it made his chest hurt.

Then the static resolved into something he recognised: anger.

"What the fuck is this?"

He was shouting. He could hear himself shouting and couldn't stop.

"What the fuck are you doing, Alex? Why are you dressed like– what is happening? Do you realise how insane this is? I'm at work – I'm at work all day, killing myself, and you're sitting here in a robe and stockings drinking wine? How is this fair? How is any of this fair?"

Alex didn't flinch. Didn't move. Just watched Ryan with those dark, newly enormous eyes, the wine glass tilted gently, the smirk never leaving those glossy lips.

Ryan ran out of words. He was breathing hard, standing in the middle of the living room, fists clenched, face red. The silence that followed was thick and heavy and charged.

Alex uncrossed his legs. Slowly. Deliberately. The stockings whispered against each other – that sound, that sound – and the robe parted another inch, revealing the lace edge of a bra cupping a full, swelling breast.

"You're right," Alex said softly. "You're absolutely right, baby. You've been working so hard. And I've been neglecting you."

He set the wine glass down. Rose from the sofa in one fluid, graceful movement – the heels adding height, adding presence – and walked towards Ryan with a slow, swaying gait that was pure female. Each step clicked on the hardwood floor. The silk robe whispered. The stockings whispered. Everything about Alex whispered now.

He stopped in front of Ryan. Close. Close enough that Ryan could smell him – perfume, warm and floral and dark, the Lancôme from the basket, and underneath it something else, something biological, something that was making Ryan's hindbrain light up like a Christmas tree.

Alex placed one hand on Ryan's chest. The burgundy nails were vivid against Ryan's white shirt. His palm was warm. His touch was light but absolute.

"Let me take care of you," Alex whispered.

His other hand slid down. Over Ryan's stomach. Over his belt. Over the bulge in his trousers that Ryan hadn't noticed, or hadn't wanted to notice, but which was suddenly, undeniably, ragingly there.

"Alex– I–"

"Shhh."

One elegant hand. Burgundy nails. Warm, soft fingers unzipping, reaching in, finding him. Ryan's cock was hard – harder than he could remember being, diamond-hard, aching – and when Alex's hand closed around it the sound that came out of Ryan's mouth was not a word but something broken and desperate and grateful.

Alex stroked. Slow at first, then firmer, finding a rhythm that was effortlessly expert, as if this knowledge had always been there, waiting. His dark eyes stayed locked on Ryan's face, watching every micro-expression, every twitch, cataloguing and storing and enjoying. The smirk had softened to something almost tender – almost, but not quite, because tenderness implied equality and this was not that. This was control. This was a demonstration.

I can give you this. I can take it away.

Ryan came in under three minutes. He came so hard his vision whited out, knees buckling, a noise torn from him that was half sob and half groan, and Alex caught it all in his hand and then stepped back, calm, composed, that smirk returning as he plucked a tissue from the box on the side table and cleaned himself off.

"Better?" Alex asked.

Ryan couldn't speak. He stood there, trousers undone, cock softening, the shame and the pleasure and the confusion crashing through him in waves.

"Good." Alex patted his cheek. A gentle, proprietary pat. "Now go have a shower. Dinner's in half an hour."

He turned and walked back to the sofa, robe swishing, heels clicking, and picked up his wine glass like nothing had happened.

Ryan went upstairs and stood in the shower and tried to understand what he had just allowed his best friend to do to him.

He couldn't understand it. But his body still hummed with the aftershock of the best orgasm he'd ever had, and beneath the shame was something that terrified him in its simplicity:

He wanted it to happen again.

---

Part Four: Lexi

Alex threw out all of his male clothes on a Saturday morning.

Ryan woke to the sound of the front door opening and closing, opening and closing, and came downstairs to find black bin bags lined up on the driveway and the hallway closet stripped bare.

"What are you–"

"I don't need them anymore," Alex said breezily, hauling another bag. "They don't fit. They don't suit me. They're ugly."

This was objectively true. Alex's body had changed so dramatically that nothing from his old wardrobe came close to fitting. His waist was twenty-four inches. His hips were thirty-eight. His breasts – there was no pretending anymore, no euphemism – were a full C-cup, round and firm and sitting high on his chest with the perky defiance of youth. He was five-foot-five, having lost five inches of height somewhere in the last month, and every inch that had left his frame had been redistributed into curves that made Ryan's brain malfunction.

His face was devastating. The feminisation was complete – high cheekbones, full lips, a small straight nose, dark doe eyes framed by thick lashes. His skin was flawless, a warm golden tan that looked natural but was maintained by an arsenal of products. His hair was a rich chocolate brown, falling past his shoulders in glossy waves.

He looked like a model. A Victoria's Secret model who'd been designed by committee to embody every male fantasy about brunettes.

"I'm going shopping," Alex announced, pulling on a pair of high-waisted leather leggings (Sasha's – borrowed, never returned) and a cropped white top that displayed a band of taut, tanned midriff. "I need everything. Dresses. Skirts. Blouses. Lingerie. Good lingerie, not just the one set."

"With what money?" Ryan asked, and immediately regretted it.

Alex turned to him. The look was patient and pitying, the way you'd look at a slow child.

"With your money, baby. Obviously."

He picked up Ryan's wallet from the hallway table, extracted the credit card, and slipped it into a small designer clutch bag (a gift from Victoria, who was curating Alex's accessories like a personal stylist).

"I'll be back by four. There's a salad in the fridge for your lunch. Don't eat anything else."

He left. Heels clicking on the driveway, leather leggings catching the light, hips swaying in that devastating way that made the curtains twitch all up and down Hyacinth Lane.

He came back with twelve bags. Zara. Reiss. AllSaints. And three from Agent Provocateur, which were the smallest bags but would prove to be the most consequential.

Over the following days, Alex's wardrobe materialised like a fever dream. Bodycon dresses in black, red, emerald. Satin blouses in cream and blush. Pencil skirts that clung to his hips. Fitted blazers with nipped waists. Stockings – sheer, seamed, patterned – in quantities that filled an entire drawer. Heels in every height and colour. Lingerie that ranged from elegant to obscene.

And he wore it all. Every day. The joggers-and-t-shirt era was over so completely it might never have existed. Alex now dressed the way the wives dressed – every outfit considered, coordinated, designed to display and weaponise a body that was becoming more outrageously female by the day.

His dick was shrinking.

He noticed it in the shower – noticed it and felt nothing but relief. It had been average before; now it was small, retreating, as if his body was allocating resources elsewhere. His breasts were the beneficiary – growing still, pushing past a C and heading somewhere more dramatic, round and firm and heavy enough to bounce. His ass had become a genuine showpiece, high and round and prominent, the kind that made fabric work for its living.

He was becoming, in every physical particular, a woman.

And his mind – his mind had stopped fighting.

There had been a struggle. In the early days, in the quiet moments, a voice had spoken up – Alex's old voice, the real Alex, the bloke from London who watched football and drank pints and had never once in his life considered wearing stockings.

This isn't you. This is insane. You need to stop. You need to see a doctor. You need to get off this street before–

But the voice was getting quieter. Fainter. Drowned out by a new voice – a purring, confident, wicked voice that spoke with absolute certainty and felt like warm honey and tasted like power.

This IS you, baby. This is who you were always supposed to be. Don't you feel it? Don't you feel how RIGHT this is? How good it feels to be beautiful? To be in control? To have him wrapped around your little finger?

You don't want to go back. You couldn't even if you tried. And you don't want to try.

You want MORE.

One morning, Alex woke up and the old voice was gone. Just – gone. Silence where it used to be. And in its place, filling every corner of his mind, was someone new.

She lay in bed – her bed, in her room, in her house – and stretched, feeling the silk sheets slide over her body. Her body. Long legs, wide hips, narrow waist, full breasts, soft skin. Hers.

She smiled. It was not a nice smile.

Hi, gorgeous.

"I'm Lexi," she said aloud, testing it, tasting it. The name felt like slipping on the perfect pair of heels – elevated, sharper, lethal. "Lexi."

Lexi got up. Lexi put on a black lace bra and matching thong. Lexi did her full face – foundation, contour, highlight, smoky eye, nude lip, mascara that made her already-ridiculous lashes weapons-grade. Lexi blow-dried her hair until it fell in perfect bouncy waves. Lexi spritzed perfume on her wrists, her neck, behind her ears, between her breasts.

Lexi put on a fitted black dress and heels and walked downstairs and made Ryan breakfast.

"Morning, baby," she said, and her voice was like silk drawn over a blade.

Ryan looked up from his phone and for a moment something flickered across his face – recognition, maybe, of the person she used to be, the friend, the mate, the him. But it was gone in an instant, replaced by the dazed, hungry look that was becoming his default expression.

"Morning," he said. "You look… incredible."

"I know."

She slid a plate of eggs in front of him and then, as he ate, she stood behind his chair and ran her fingers through his hair – slowly, possessively – and leaned down to whisper in his ear.

"I'm going to start giving you blowjobs before work. Every morning. To motivate you."

Ryan choked on his eggs.

"What–"

"You heard me." Her lips brushed his earlobe. Her breath was warm. "You've been so stressed, baby. So tense. You need release. And I want to give it to you."

She started the next morning. Ryan sat on the edge of his bed, still half-asleep, and Lexi knelt between his legs in a silk camisole and nothing else, dark hair spilling over her shoulders, and took him in her mouth with a confidence and skill that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at once.

She was good at it. Obscenely good. She used her tongue and her hands and her lips and the vibration of little moans that she may or may not have been faking, and Ryan came in five minutes, gripping the bedsheets, gasping her name – her new name, the name he'd accepted without question because questioning things was no longer something Ryan did.

"Good boy," she murmured, wiping her lip with one finger. "Now go to work. Make money."

He went. He always went now. Like a wind-up toy, pointed towards the door each morning, key turned, marching off to generate the income that fuelled Lexi's life.

---

Lexi hired a gardener. His name was Jake – six-two, broad-shouldered, tanned, with the kind of jawline that could cut glass. He showed up twice a week to tend the garden that Lexi had zero interest in tending herself, and she watched him from the kitchen window while drinking her morning coffee, lower lip caught between her teeth, one freshly manicured hand resting on her hip.

She also hired a cleaner. Hannah, a quiet, efficient woman who came three mornings a week and made the house sparkle while Lexi lounged on the sofa in her robe.

Lexi's days now followed a pattern that would have been unrecognisable to the person she used to be:

Morning: Wake at eight. Blowjob or handjob for Ryan (alternating, keeping him guessing). Shower. Full skincare routine. Full face of makeup. Get dressed in something devastating.

Late morning: Gym. An hour of targeted exercise – glutes, abs, legs – in outfits that made every man in the gym stare and every woman bristle.

Afternoon: Wine with the wives. Shopping. Salon appointments – nails, hair, lash extensions, facials. Or simply lying on the sofa in expensive loungewear, watching reality TV and scrolling designer websites on Ryan's credit card.

Evening: Maybe cook. Maybe not. Maybe let Ryan cook (he was learning). Maybe order something expensive. Either way, an evening of being worshipped, of having Ryan bring her drinks and rub her feet and ask if there was anything she needed.

She'd become one of them. Completely. The wives of Hyacinth Lane had absorbed her into their circle like a missing piece slotting into place, and Lexi found that this – the wine mornings, the bitchy gossip, the casual cruelty towards their husbands – was her natural habitat.

"I've started edging him," Tiffany reported one Tuesday, daintily sipping Champagne. "I bring him to the brink and then stop. He practically cries. It's divine."

"James hasn't cum in three weeks," Sasha said with a satisfied smile. "I told him he can have an orgasm when he finishes repainting the spare room. He's been at it every weekend."

"Marcus washes my car every Saturday in nothing but his boxers," Amber said. "The neighbours can see. He knows they can see. He does it anyway because I told him to."

They turned to Lexi.

"And how's Ryan?"

Lexi examined her nails – long acrylics now, coffin-shaped, a deep red. She smirked.

"Desperate. Completely desperate. I give him just enough to keep him loyal but never enough to satisfy him. He looks at me like I'm the only source of water in a desert." She paused, the smirk widening. "I caught him crying in the bathroom last night. Crying because I wore a bodycon dress to dinner and he wanted me so badly he couldn't handle it."

"Awww," the wives chorused, in a tone that was entirely mockery.

"He wants to fuck me," Lexi continued. "He's dying to fuck me. But I won't let him."

"Of course not," Victoria said. "Not yet."

"Not until he earns it," Sasha agreed.

"Not until he puts a ring on it," Brooke said, and raised her glass, and the others raised theirs, and Lexi raised hers, and they all drank to the beautiful, inevitable future.

---

One morning, Lexi woke up and something was different.

She was naked under the sheets – she slept naked now, enjoying the feel of Egyptian cotton against bare skin – and as she stretched, her hand moved between her legs and found–

Nothing.

No. Not nothing. Something else. Something new.

She threw back the covers and looked down and her breath caught in her throat. Where a diminished cock had been – barely more than a nub in recent weeks – there was now a neat, smooth, perfectly formed pussy. Pink and soft and hers. Labia, clit, everything, as if it had always been there, as if her body had finally finished correcting a decades-long error.

She touched it. Gently. Exploratively. And the sensation that jolted through her – electric, radiating, overwhelming – made her gasp and then moan and then press her thighs together and moan again.

"Ohhh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh my God. Yes. Yes."

She lay there for ten minutes, exploring, every nerve ending new and hyper-sensitive and screaming with pleasure, fingers sliding through wet heat that was hers, hers, her body responding with an enthusiasm that was almost comical, hips lifting, back arching, a series of small orgasms rippling through her in waves that left her breathless and grinning.

She was a woman.

She was fully, completely, irrevocably a woman.

Lexi climbed out of bed and stood naked before the full-length mirror and looked at what she was and felt a surge of power so intense it was almost spiritual.

She was stunning. Five-five, toned and curved in all the right places, with a body that could weaponise a paper bag. Large, firm breasts – D-cup, round, sitting perfectly with the gravity-defying arrogance of youth. A narrow waist that flared into wide, rolling hips. An ass that was round and high and obscene. Long, toned legs. Smooth, tanned, flawless skin. A beautiful, wicked face with dark eyes and full lips and cheekbones that could start wars.

She was twenty-four years old and she was the hottest woman she had ever seen.

She blew herself a kiss in the mirror.

Then she went downstairs and gave Ryan the most mind-melting blowjob of his life and told him, between his gasps, that she had a surprise for him.

"What surprise?" he panted.

She pulled back. Wiped her lip. Smiled up at him – that smile, the one that had once belonged to someone else, that now belonged entirely and exclusively to Lexi.

"You want to fuck me, don't you, baby?"

His eyes went wide. Desperate. Agonised.

"God, yes. Lexi, please. I can't– I've been going crazy, I need–"

"Then you know what you have to do."

She stood. Smoothed her hair. Walked to the door in nothing but a silk robe and heels, turned, and looked at him over her shoulder.

"Put a ring on it, baby."

---

Part Five: Mrs. Baxter

The ring was a three-carat diamond on a platinum band. Ryan spent two months' salary on it, which was exactly what Lexi told him to spend, because she'd done her research (Victoria had coached her on this specifically) and anything less than two months was an insult.

He proposed on a Saturday evening, on one knee in the living room, the ring in a blue Tiffany box, hands shaking. Lexi made him wait exactly seven seconds before saying yes – long enough for the terror to fully bloom, not so long that he might pass out.

The wedding was three months later. Small, elegant, at the registry office in town, followed by a reception at the house. All the wives came, in their most spectacular outfits, with their well-trained husbands in tow. Ryan wore a simple navy suit. Lexi wore a fitted white dress that left absolutely nothing to the imagination – low-cut, figure-hugging, with a slit that ran to mid-thigh. She wore white stilettos and white lace lingerie underneath and her hair was curled and pinned with small white flowers and she looked like a fallen angel.

Victoria was her maid of honour. Victoria, who had known from the first moment, standing on Alex's doorstep with the welcome basket, exactly what would happen. Because it always happened on Hyacinth Lane. The street took care of its own.

At the reception, while Ryan was talking to Sasha's husband James (a conversation that consisted mainly of James telling Ryan how to iron shirts and how to accept that his wife would make all decisions of consequence), Victoria pulled Lexi aside.

"How does it feel?" Victoria asked, Champagne flute in hand, eyes gleaming.

Lexi looked at her ring. The diamond caught the light, fractured it, scattered tiny rainbows across her skin.

"Like I was born for this," she said.

Victoria kissed her cheek. "Welcome to the club, darling. For real this time."

---

Married life suited Lexi the way couture suits a supermodel – perfectly, inevitably, as if the concept had been invented specifically for her.

Ryan was exactly like the other husbands now. Devoted, compliant, faintly bewildered, working himself to the bone to fund a lifestyle he was not permitted to enjoy. He woke at six, went to the gym (Lexi's orders), went to work (Lexi's orders), came home at seven (Lexi's orders), made dinner (Lexi's orders if she couldn't be bothered to cook, which was increasingly often), and spent his evenings doing whatever Lexi required – foot rubs, household tasks, listening to her talk about her day with an expression of attentive interest that he'd learned, through painful trial and error, was the only acceptable response.

He was allowed to fuck her. Occasionally. On her terms, in her preferred positions, for as long as she dictated. He was, despite everything, grateful for it. The sex was incredible – Lexi's body was a weapon of mass destruction and she wielded it with expert precision – but it was always, always clear who was in charge. She came first, usually several times. He came when she allowed it. Sometimes she didn't allow it, and he went to bed with an ache in his balls and a devotion in his eyes that bordered on religious.

And then there was the matter of Lexi's… extracurricular activities.

It started with the gardener.

Jake. Six-two, broad-shouldered, tanned. He'd been maintaining the garden for months, and Lexi had been maintaining eye contact for almost as long. Lingering looks over the rim of a coffee cup. A slow bite of the lower lip as she watched him haul bags of compost. One time she'd bent over in front of the kitchen window in a pair of tiny shorts and a crop top and watched his reflection nearly walk into a hedge.

The first time they fucked, Ryan was at work.

Lexi invited Jake inside for water. She was wearing a black silk robe – no bra, no underwear – and when she reached up to get a glass from the top shelf, the robe rode up to reveal the lower curve of her ass, and Jake's restraint, which had been admirable, finally shattered.

He took her on the kitchen counter. Lexi wrapped her stockinged legs around his waist and pulled him in and the sound she made when he entered her was loud enough to be heard from the garden.

He was big. Properly big. The kind of big that made her eyes roll back and her nails – those long, red acrylics – dig into his shoulders hard enough to leave marks. He fucked her hard and deep and Lexi came three times and when it was over she lay on the counter with her robe pooled beneath her, panting, glowing, and thought: this is what I deserve.

She didn't tell Ryan. She didn't need to. Not yet.

---

It was a Wednesday when the kitchen island was christened.

Ryan was at work. The plumber – a muscular, blue-eyed man named Brad, who had been called to fix a supposedly leaking tap that Lexi may or may not have broken on purpose – was behind her, and Lexi was bent forward over the cool marble surface, cheek pressed against the stone, hands gripping the far edge, and God, he was good.

"Harder," she breathed. "Mmmmmh… harder."

Brad obliged. He gripped her hips – those wide, magnificent hips – and drove into her with a force that made the island shake and Lexi's toes curl inside her heels (she'd kept the heels on; she always kept the heels on) and her moans fill the kitchen like music.

She came with a scream that she muffled against her own forearm, her whole body clenching, and Brad followed moments later, and then they separated, and Lexi straightened up and smoothed her hair and adjusted her dress (a tight red bodycon, hitched up around her waist) and smiled at him in a way that was equal parts satisfaction and dismissal.

"Thanks for fixing the tap," she said.

Brad blinked. "I didn't actually–"

"The door's that way."

He left. Lexi cleaned up, poured herself a glass of Sancerre, and went to sit on the sofa.

She was there twenty minutes later when the doorbell rang. A delivery driver – young, slightly nervous – holding a stack of boxes.

"Mrs. Baxter?"

"That's me."

She signed for them and carried them inside, stacking them on the kitchen island (which she wiped first, for obvious reasons). New shoes. A cashmere throw for the sofa. A set of Jo Malone candles. And a small, discreet package from a specialist online retailer that she'd been waiting for.

Lexi opened it and held up its contents, turning them in the light.

A chastity cage. Stainless steel, polished to a mirror shine, compact and secure and inescapable. She'd measured Ryan while he slept – carefully, clinically – and ordered the perfect size. It came with two keys on a delicate chain.

Lexi fastened the chain around her neck, the keys nestling between her breasts, and smiled.

"Oh, baby," she murmured to the empty house. "You have no idea what's coming."

She thought about how it would go. The conversation. The look on his face – the shock, the resistance, the inevitable surrender. She'd wait until after dinner. She'd wear something devastating – the black lace bodysuit, maybe, with the sheer panels. She'd pour him wine. She'd sit in his lap and run her nails down his chest and explain, very softly, very sweetly, that his cock belonged to her now. That his orgasms belonged to her now. That if he wanted access to her body – this body that he worshipped, that he worked sixty hours a week to adorn and maintain – he would accept this final gift of her control.

He would cry. He would beg. And then he would say yes, because Ryan always said yes now, because saying yes to Lexi was the only script he had left.

And then the real fun would begin.

She thought about Jake. His hands on her hips. His cock inside her. She thought about doing that in the bedroom – their bedroom – with Ryan in the corner, caged and aching, watching another man do what he was no longer permitted to do. Watching Lexi moan and writhe and cum on someone else's cock. Watching her bite her lip and look over at him and smile.

"Fuck, that's hot," she whispered, pressing her thighs together, feeling the residual buzz of the afternoon.

She texted Jake.

Come by tomorrow. Same time. I have a surprise for you.

Then she texted the group chat.

Girls. It's happening. Cage arrived. 🔐💋

The responses came instantly.

Victoria: FINALLY. Welcome to the next level, babe.

Sasha: Ryan is going to LOSE it. I want every detail.

Amber: Marcus cried for a full hour when I locked him. Then he thanked me. 😂

Brooke: I'm so proud of you. Our little Lexi, all grown up.

Tiffany: The corner thing is INCREDIBLE btw. You'll never go back.

Lexi grinned, legs tucked beneath her on the sofa, wine in hand, phone in the other, keys glinting between her tits. This was her life. This magnificent, decadent, wickedly perfect life on Hyacinth Lane, where the wives ran everything and the husbands existed to serve and the houses were beautiful and the gardens were perfect and the power – God, the power – was intoxicating.

Speaking of which.

There was a new couple moving in this weekend. Number twelve, the last house on the crescent, had been empty for months. But the SOLD sign had gone up last week, and the wives had been gathering intelligence.

Two boys. Mid-twenties. Friends buying together.

Just like she and Ryan had been.

Just like he had been, a lifetime ago, when he was someone called Alex who wore joggers and didn't own moisturiser and thought he was going to get another marketing job.

Lexi stood and walked to the kitchen, heels clicking, hips swaying, the silk of her dress whispering against her stockings. She opened the cupboard where she kept the supplies – the wicker baskets, the cellophane, the ribbon – and began to assemble.

The moisturiser went in first. Rose-gold jar, full of magic. Then the skincare set. Then the perfume. Then the stockings. Then the lingerie – a matching set in midnight black, lace and silk, size small.

She divided the basket. HIS on one side. HERS on the other.

She tied the ribbon and stepped back and admired her work.

"Welcome to Hyacinth Lane, boys," she purred, running a hand over the basket's edge, nails glinting like blood in the afternoon light.

She took a sip of wine. Leaned against the counter. Crossed her ankles, one heel over the other.

It's the best place you'll ever live.

---

THE END