“Well done,” the Red Lady sighed to Alaric as his knees loosened underneath him and he fell forward, grabbing onto the table for support as shook and gasped and tried to catch his breath.
There was a rustle of silk moving behind him.
“Put your clothes back on. You’ll come back tomorrow at sunset.”
Alaric heaved himself up off the table and retrieved his clothes. The Red Lady watched him put them back on with considerably more interest than she had shown when he first undressed. No further instructions seemed to be forthcoming, and Alaric hurried toward the door.
“Alaric?” She called. He froze.
“You’ll call me Anisette.”
Chapter Two
Jane, or Anisette for now, looked over the tent, assuring herself that the scene was set. The candles were lit. Rose and clove smoke permeated the air. Her makeup had been attended to, and she had picked out a different dress and mask for the night: the dress with the high collar and the mask in the same shape as a flickering flame, with the licks of it tucked back into her chestnut hair.
She took a pair of elbow length, red silk gloves out of the bottom drawer of her vanity and pulled one on. She stopped, reconsidered, and slid it back off. She laid both gloves over the corner of the box in the center of the room, then placed herself carefully in front of the candles, so that she would cast a shadow on the tent wall as the dark rose outside.
She wondered if maybe it was a little too much, if it would scare Alaric off. His type often didn’t return at all. The blushing innocents who took one night with her and were too embarrassed, or too afraid for their souls to return, or simply found themselves able to enjoy the other tents in The Row as they hadn’t been able to before. A lot of pirates disappeared in the night.
It would be a shame if he didn’t come back at least once more though, she thought. She had only picked him because he was handsome and looked like he had money. She hadn’t expected him to have so much potential, and it had been such a long time since she had found a man worth even a second thought, let alone a second night.
The depressing dearth of worthwhile men was only one of the reasons she was ready to retire again. She had attempted to live a Lady’s life after the carnival had moved out of London. She had moved to Cambridgeshire, rented a beautiful home, and tried to pass herself off as a rich young widow, but hadn’t been able to stand the neighbor’s whispers. She had the money, but not the blood or standing, to be part of good society. No matter how expensive her dresses were, or how elegantly arranged her hair was, or how well educated or well spoken she was, every time one of her upper crust neighbors had found out she was absent a husband, she had been able to see the gears turning behind their eyes as every one of them reach the same conclusion.
Whore.
“Anisette?” A hushed voice called from the flap.
“Come in, Alaric.”
The young pirate stepped inside. His shoulders were hunched a little, and he grasped his felt hat between his hands. He cast a nervous glance at the statue as he passed it and another at the front wall of the tent before turning to face her. Jane could see the realization he may have had an audience last night slide across his face.
He had cleaned himself up for tonight. The light dusting of beard had been shaved and he had washed the ash blond hair that fell to his shoulders. The light layer of grime on his hands and face was gone, his fresh pink skin making his hazel eyes shine out of his face. He had even changed into clean clothes. With a bit of a hair trimming he would look utterly presentable. She could actually imagine him in a bowler and suit.
Jane smiled at him. There would be a reward for that.
“Why did you return?” she asked, perhaps a little more coyly than she usually would have with one of her men.
Alaric looked hurt for a moment, as though he expected her to kick him back out. He bit his lip. “Because you told me, too.”
It sounded rehearsed. That was not what she wanted to hear.
“You’re only following an order?” she prompted.
“I wanted to see you again.”
“Why?”
Alaric’s gaze had sunk down to the floor again. His jaw seemed to work for a second, like he couldn’t decide if he were admitting this to her or to himself.
“I wanted…I’d never…I wanted to feel like that again.”
Jane could see where his trousers were already stretching forward.
“You will.”
She grabbed the brim of the hat he held between his hands. He let it go, and she dropped it to the floor. She opened his waistcoat and began to pop his shirt buttons, one by one, expertly avoiding even an accidental brush with his skin. She could hear his breath straining as she pulled the hanks of his shirt to either side, revealing his broad chest, muscular in a way she could tell was a recent change. Had he come to her only a few months ago he probably would have been skinny, mostly neck and elbows and knees. No wonder he hadn’t had a woman before. She pinched either side of his shirt between her fingers and ran her hands down, wondered what had turned him pirate.
She leaned closer and worked open the buttons on his trousers. He smelled like harsh soap, punctuated by clean sweat and a hint of gin.
Stepping behind him, she took a moment to appreciate his broad shoulders before sliding his waistcoat and shirt down over his strong arms and letting them drop to the floor.
“What are you going to make me do tonight?” he asked tremulously as she stepped back in front of him.
“You won’t speak tonight,” she told him. His Adam’s apple bobbed, and Jane took a moment to revel in his reaction to her. She had been careful with him the night before, after his whispered confession he was practically a virgin, but now that he had come back, it was time to see if all his potential could be channeled. Time to enjoy him a little more.
“Lie down,” she ordered, waving her hand over the box in the center of the room. His eyes flickered toward the front wall of the tent again. The candles were actually placed too high and too far back to have even cast a decipherable shadow of him undressing, but he didn’t need to know that tonight. Alaric lay down, rolling his head to face her. Jane gave him an approving smile, which he echoed.
She fetched the chair from her vanity and carried it over to the box. Alaric’s wide, intent eyes watched her as she set it down on his left side, level with his waist. She walked to the end of the box and untied his boots, tugged them off, and finished undressing him. Taking off his socks without touching his skin nearly presented a problem, but Jane was able to peel them down from the top and pull them off.
“I trust you know where we’re starting?”
Alaric nodded, and took himself in hand, sliding his fist slowly over his cock.
Jane sat down in her vanity chair and watched as Alaric touched himself, reacquainting herself with his little quirks: the way his legs trembled when he was frustrated, the twitch in his bottom lip when he sent a little jolt of pleasure through himself.
“Harder.”
Alaric’s hips wriggled as he obeyed. Jane put him through his paces for a little while, mostly for her own enjoyment, and only partially to bring him toward the edge. He had been hard enough just from walking back in the door that there wasn’t much need to tease him like she had last night. However, since he was so endearingly compliant, and a good tease was clearly what he had come back for, Jane indulged him.
“Slower.”
She looked from the small kick of his knee back up at his face and realized he was staring at her, holding vigil for any kind of reaction.
“Stop.”
She reached her arm out over his body, lowering it carefully, bringing it down just low enough to tickle the light spray of golden hair across his chest, but not making contact with his skin. He moaned quietly, hands shaking at his sides.
“Hush, Alaric,” she whispered, loving the way he stared at her hand with wide eyes as her hand traveled over his body, never quite making contact. She fluttered it above his chest
, past his groin, over his thighs and back up. Close enough she could feel the heat radiating off of his body.
“Do you want me to touch you, Alaric?”
“Ye–” he began, and suddenly shut his mouth.
Oh yes, he was definitely earning a reward.
“Close your eyes.”
Jane grabbed the gloves which still hung from the side of the box, pulling them on slowly as she watched Alaric’s chest rise and fall with shallow breaths.
He gasped as she slid a silk-clad forefinger over his strong cheek. She continued down his face, over his parted lips, down his sinewy neck, and down the pronounced groove between his chest and stomach muscles. She stopped at his navel, circling it before tracing over his hip bone and down his leg. Every part of him was firm, muscular. Trembling with desire.
His chest heaved even harder, but silently, as she slipped back up his inner thigh. She could feel the muscles there straining against her finger tip. His leg kicked out as she ran her finger between his balls, up the underside of his shaft and left it resting against his slit. His legs quaked.
“Do you want me to touch you, Alaric?” Jane repeated.
He nodded furiously, and she slid her first deliberately down his shaft. His hands dropped down the sides of the box, gripping the edges desperately.
Jane decided to allow it. It had been too long since she had been able to enjoy watching a man enjoy her.
The common whores had begun taking leaves from her…specialist’s book in recent years. Men who had been whipped or spanked or tied up in other tents in The Row would sometimes come to her looking for the next level of punishment. Jane would take their money, and they would take their licks, but there was no craft in it. There was nothing she could do to make them hers. A man who only wanted to be hit could only be hit harder, and could always find someone else to abuse him.
But a man like Alaric, panting, pretty Alaric, with the red in his face beginning to flow from his cheeks down his neck and heaving chest, the sweat shimmering across the muscles in his torso as she gripped him harder, could be molded into a revelation. A devotee.
He pulled his bottom lip into his mouth, a pale line shining underneath where his teeth were clamped down hard on his skin. His cock jumped in her hand, and she sped up her strokes. A shiver ran over his entire body, then another. His hips rocked up. His cock spasmed again and she let go. He made a choked sound, a barely contained protest as his hips continued to writhe.
“You’re already improving,” Jane commented. “Do your fellow pirates know about what happened in China?”
Alaric, his breath hissing through gritted teeth, nodded.
“Do they know what happened last night?”
He shook his head fervently.
“Hmm.” Jane offered, taking his balls in her hand, massaging them gently, then increasing the pressure. Alaric’s arms rose from the surface of the wood.
“Put them down or I’ll tie you,” she warned.
He dropped his arms immediately, but didn’t quite manage to hide another swallowed moan. She filed that information away for future use and fisted his cock again, languidly. His already ragged breathing grew harsher.
“You’ll come when I tell you to, and not before. Just like last night.”
He bit his lip harder, clenched his eyes tighter, and his whole body went rigid before he nodded. His head rocked as though he was having trouble remembering how to operate his muscles.
“Just like always,” Jane whispered. She ran her gloved hand over him, methodically increasing her speed, rhythmically changing her pressure until Alaric’s knuckles grew whiter and whiter at the sides of the box. A small whimper escaped him.
“Come, Alaric,” she murmured. “Come now.”
He burst like a firework, throwing his head back against the box. A loud thunk and a muffled scream rang out into the heavy silence of the tent as Jane stroked him, not stopping until she had pulled the last of his orgasm from him.
Alaric lay gasping on the box with his eyes clenched shut and his arms shaking. Jane appreciatively took in the sheen of sweat over his body, the damp hair matted against his forehead, and the slight tremor in his relaxing arms.
She pulled her gloves off, dragging the silk over his fading erection, causing a few more spasms to rock his hips, before dropping the gloves onto his chest and looking back up to his face.
His eyes had fallen open, and he was watching her, a soft smile on his face and a look in his eyes that she hadn’t seen in ages. A look of adoration. She resisted the urge to clear her throat.
“You’ve done very well,” she announced. “You’ve earned your voice back.”
His sweet grin widened. “I’d reckon your skin is just as soft as silk,” he said, his voice husky and satisfied.
“At the rate you’re going you may find out.”
He was desperate for that. Every line of his body was screaming it out to her. His hand lifted momentarily from the edge of the box before he forced it back down. Just the thought Jane might allow him to touch her had him ready to go again.
It gave her an idea. She stood and walked to her vanity, catching Alaric’s eyes in the mirror before bending down to open a drawer and pulling out a small, silver scissors. Alaric’s eyes locked onto it, and his cock, still half hard, began to sink, returning to flaccid.
“What are you-”
“Hush, Alaric,” she whispered, sitting back down next to him. She lifted a glove off of his chest, set the scissors to the seam and cut upwards. She cut the hand of the glove off, and cut the arm into four strips.
“Did you think about me today, Alaric?” she asked.
“All day,” he answered.
“Tonight and tomorrow, you aren’t going to be able to think about anything but me.” She drug a strip of ribbon down his stomach and underneath his balls, then slipped the other glove back on and flipped his cock onto his stomach. She grabbed the other ribbons and wove them around his cock.
He hissed as she pulled them tight.
“Did you like your reward tonight?”
“Yes, Anisette,” he murmured. She loved the way he said the name. She hadn’t used that one in months because men so often fumbled over it, but it sounded so sexy when he whispered it like that.
“When you come back tomorrow night, with this still wrapped around your cock, you’ll be rewarded again. Would you like that?”
“Yes, Anisette.”
She wove the ribbon back down over the inner layer and tied the ends of the ribbons together, letting them hang down in a little fringe from the complicated pattern that enclosed Alaric’s cock. She squeezed her bare hand around the ribbon, eliciting one more moan from him.
“Get dressed.”
She watched him dress. The way his calf muscles moved as he walked. The way he winced as he pulled his trousers up over his cock. The way the gold in his pockets tinkled. When he was fully clothed, he stood in front of her, waiting.
“You may go now, Alaric.”
He took a step, as though about to turn, but whirled back around and grabbed her gloved hand. He kissed it, a rushed touch of lips to silk, and ran from the tent.
Jane sat, stunned, for a moment, watching the tent flap swing back into place, then touched the back of her hand to her cheek.
She cleared her throat and yanked the come covered glove off.
No. She would not pull this school girl crap over a man who had yet to prove whether or not he was of any use. Jane didn’t need some ridiculous little crush. She needed to maintain the independence, indeed dominance, she had worked so hard to get in a world where her gender denied her any power over her own life. And sadly, if she wanted to finally leave behind the carnivals and brothels, she needed a man. But she would have her life on her terms, she would have sex on her terms, and she would have that man on her terms.
Jane picked the scissors back up and cut the other glove to shreds, furious with the world for making her work this hard to find her own little corner o
f existence. She ran away from home to avoid being married off to the first horrible, rich, old man that had made a formal proposal to her father. She became a seamstress at a bordello in order to feed herself, and she became a courtesan in order to become rich. Illyria, neé Gertrude, the courtesan who taught Jane most of her tricks: how to be worshipped, served, how to make a man pay you to make him do what you wanted, had married a baron. Illyria was throwing lavish garden parties in a huge manor in the country. Another of the girls from the bordello, Anastasia, neé Patty, had simply packed up her riches, moved to France, and opened a tea shop whose off color reputation raked in throngs of tourists.
And Jane was puttering around the country searching for a man she could keep at heel. It was entirely unfair that the world had changed without warning, and Jane had found herself seeking someone she shouldn’t even need.
She had been too careful with Alaric. He’d had a chance to ease into this, and tomorrow night he would actually have to be tested.
She shouldn’t care so much about whether or not he passed.
****
This was torture, Alaric thought as he tried to walk even more slowly back to the ship. The inside layer of silk tight around his cock was like Anisette holding him in a gentle, teasing grip. The looser outside layer slid up against the head of his cock with every step he took, in the way she had slid her hands over him. How was he supposed to spend the entire night and the entire day like this? Imagining her delicate, silk draped hands on him, without being able to put his hands on himself? The only thing that had kept him from being as desperate for her tonight was taking himself over this morning, and again before going to see her.
“Buck!”
Shit.
“Buck!” Thomas came running up out of the pub and stumbled to a stop in front of Alaric. “Buck, you’ve got to lend a friend a couple quid.”
“For what, Thomas?” Alaric asked, trying and failing to keep the breathiness out of his voice.
“Amelia has just been telling me about a few of the finer points of… a French… technique.”
The Promise of Silk Page 3
