Story of L

by Debra Hyde

  A vague awareness returned when sheets lifted, letting the air of room temperature slip in against her, and weight shifted into bed alongside her. Cassandra. Scent told L so.

  Arms gathered her up, pulled her close, but sleepiness clung heavily to L and kept her rag-doll limp. No matter. Lips kissed her, full, tender, and encouraging. She parted for the tongue, her own showing enough signs of life to, if not beckon, at least welcome. A hand wandered to her ass and pushed, forcing her against a body soft and lush, against a crushing swell of breasts.

  The sweet kiss left her lips and explored elsewhere, seeking her nape. The wandering hand slipped lower, brushing over terrain still ripe. Fingers lingered there as the lips reached the crook of L's neck. Together, they probed.

  L shuddered, moaned, and wakefulness seared her. She grasped the back of Cassandra's hand, rocked against her mistress's fingers, alive and ripe.

  Cassandra cupped L between the legs. “This is mine,” she declared, her words whispering against L's skin. “I own this.” And she made manifest the claim by squeezing L's mons until it hurt.

  “Yes!” L confirmed, breathless pants her only means of response. “Yes!”

  “You're mine.”

  One finger circled her clit while others lighted against her slit. She tested her, seeing where reaction lay. L revealed all in small gasps and shivering jolts.

  “Oh yes,” cajoled Cassandra. “You're mine, all right.”

  Cassandra returned to exploring L with her lips, kissing and nipping her way to L's breasts. Smaller than her own, pert but mature, their nipples hard at first touch. Cassandra engulfed a nipple, ravishing it as her fingers began working in earnest.

  Ignited, L clenched Cassandra, fingers in the woman's hair, a hand pressed against her back. She rose to the rhythm that eddied her clit, hips in motion, bucking with every surge, striving ever higher. Sensation drove her on—Cassandra nipping and teasing her nipples in equal due, her stray fingers clutching at L's cunt, throwing it into throbs that begged for release. Heavy want welled there, wide and aching. L could not resist its demands.

  “Fuck me,” she begged. “Oh God, fuck me.”

  She arched her back, letting her body beg in ways that words could not. She pushed her cunt against Cassandra's teasing fingers, its lips parting and nearing sucking them into her.

  “Please, ma'am, please!”

  Cassandra let off a nipple and laughed. “Why should I?”

  L moaned. “Because I haven't been fucked since that night.”

  Her reason sounded like a weak-kneed confession.

  “Didn't Reese fuck you? I told him to.” Cassandra's words were edged with harshness. She took L by the chin and forced her gaze. “When I send you to my bed, when we're alone here, you are to look at me. Now, didn't Reese fuck you?”

  “Yes.” L shuddered as a throb racked her.

  “Did he fail at his assignment? Was he inadequate? I ordered him to work you over good and hard.” Cassandra's question probed for truth as well as egged L along.

  “No, but…”

  “But what?”

  “He wasn't you!”

  Cassandra pealed with laughter, obviously delighted to discover that L's lust and longing centered wholly on her, pleased that a surrogate could not be a substitute, however capable he might be.

  But L could not sense any of this. She lay captive, waiting to see how Cassandra would act upon her confession.

  Fingers were her reward. They slipped into her, two to start. They worked her depth, fucking her at a tempo that ensured fingertips would brush the rough washboard of her G-spot. Every stroke made L tremble, overwhelmed her, an aftereffect of the TENS unit.

  But L didn't care. She had been made a sponge and a sponge she remained, soaking up every sensation no matter how overstimulating.

  A third finger slipped in, filling her. The fucking stopped, but the fingers pressed against her G-spot. The thumb returned to work, circling and coaxing, its demand unmistakable.

  “Come for me, L,” Cassandra encouraged.

  Fingers flexed against her washboard, sending her into another spasm, this time bucking and gasping at the sheer audacity of it all.

  Cassandra's mouth brushed over L's, whispering, “You're mine.”

  Then she took L in a vast, consumptive kiss, devouring her with her lips and her claim.

  L swam, intoxicated by the taking, by its power and its completeness. Succumbing, she did what was commanded of her. She came.

  Chapter Ten: Asunder

  L woke to Cassandra's full embrace: arms around her torso, a hand upon her breast, another body, a soft fortress against her. Hazily, she remembered falling asleep, exhausted, wrung dry, Cassandra satisfied that she had laid claim through the only avenue left to her: pure, unadorned sex.

  Finally, L mused. Every week of waiting, every hoop jumped, all compensated for by the intimacy of lying in bed, entwined with the woman she loved.

  Love? But you hardly know her!

  But what I do know of her is exactly what I need, L told the countering thoughts. And what I give her is exactly what she needs.

  Besides, love's found less a foundation than that, she argued.

  Enveloped in a satisfaction she had rarely encountered in life, L closed her eyes to savor the moment, but a knock at the door ended that idea. Cassandra roused and, stretching, pulled away from L.

  “Come.”

  Reese opened the door, stood at its threshold, and cited the time.

  “Already? Damn,” Cassandra responded. “Ten minutes, then we'll be ready.”

  “Yes ma'am.”

  “Ready?” L rolled over, gazing at Cassandra, fighting the urge to travel her mistress's body anew.

  “An evening out, something Cur insists he can't do without. His duty is to spoil me, you know.”

  A sweet, thankful smile played at Cassandra's lips as she spoke, yet her gaze told L that it was aimed at her, not a reflection of Cur's longstanding loyalty. Such gentle radiance, and L couldn't help but lower her eyes before it. But even this, Cassandra appreciated.

  “You are a balm to me,” she revealed. “You have no idea how alive you've made me feel.”

  L hoped her eyes would convey the same, but Cassandra continued talking, as if what she intended to say needed telling at precisely this moment.

  “Have you noticed that few older women come to Hippolyte's? That its women are largely Gen-X, post-boomer—what do demographers call it?”

  A rhetorical question, clearly.

  “Being older in the scene…” Cassandra trailed off for a moment, searching for a way to voice what needed saying. “Older, familiar faces, women you've known for decades, fall away. People you struggled with, bonded with—or sometimes fought with—gone. Younger faces appear out of nowhere, women comfortable in their dyke skin, so damn well-adjusted for ones so young that you…”

  Her words trailed again. Cassandra fell briefly into a morose silence. Because what she said next seemed to nearly choke her.

  “You start to feel invisible.”

  She gazed at L, brought a hand to L's cheek, and stroked it.

  “You age out.”

  L took Cassandra's hand in her own and kissed it devotedly. Cassandra smiled weakly.

  “All you once were becomes shrouded all but forgotten. All that you reveled in during your callous youth comes for naught. Who remembers the entourage? The glamour? The wild worshipping of the crowd and the equally wild jealousy of your fellow tops? No one. Because the young faces barely know about those times and when they manage to look at me, they don't see a luminary. Hell, some of them look at me like I'm their mother, invading their bedroom.”

  “But people know who you are,” L countered.

  “Not like they used to,” Cassandra said, shaking her head. “Then time catches up to you. Glory and position cannot sustain you. They become part of a facade that you constructed, a fake outer shell that attracted the curious but, like a fortress, allowed you to hid
e within it.

  “Then, one day, you wake up and discover you've dead-ended yourself. Your peers already know what you've just figured out. They've already let life take them elsewhere. And those who take their place have no appreciation for your history of notoriety and intrigue.”

  Cassandra looked neither wistful nor saddened as she shared her thoughts. She spoke with a certain pragmatic acceptance and L realized that Cassandra had already reconciled herself to her changing circumstances.

  Still, she spoke generously of “the younger generation.”

  “They might have it right, you know. There's something to be said for fuck buddies, soul mates, and those crazy poly-configurations. Maybe that's better than our old way, our ‘cult of the self.’”

  Taking L by the hand, she drew L's arm to her and caressed her mark. Another woman might have forced herself into Cassandra's arms, but the intimacy of that touch stunned L and paralyzed her into submissive passivity. Her heart, however, welled.

  Cassandra pulled L's wrist to her lips and kissed the tattoo. “That's why you've become so important to me,” she confessed. “So necessary.”

  The words and gesture struck L as stunningly profound. And rich in sudden insight: Cassandra had not acted as the remote dominant she had imagined during the weeks leading up to this moment. Sure, she had relied on a haughty stoicism during those weeks of trial and tribulation, but Cassandra had longed for L every bit as much as L had ached for her. Had Cassandra's anticipation matched L's as well? Had she had to rein in her own impulses—force herself into a restrained patience—until L had completed that final task?

  Then another realization: here, in this bed, they had not played. They had made love. Here, the facade fell away. Oh, Cassandra had led the way—clearly she defaulted toward dominance—but she had insisted on something deeper and deeply genuine.

  She had insisted on intimacy.

  Cassandra gazed into L's eyes and stroked her cheek, bearing a look of deeply profound gratefulness. She drew L to her and gently kissed her, letting it linger until a knock came upon the door.

  Midmorning play and early-afternoon sex. If L thought those thrills were enough for one busy day, she was sorely mistaken. Reese led her from Cassandra's bed to the bathroom near her cell, told her to shower and clean up again. “Don't bother fussing with your hair,” he added. “We'll see to that.” A few minutes after shower's end, he returned, coming up behind her while she stood before the mirror, toweling her wet hair.

  She glimpsed him—a split second's worth—before she looked away. She felt like a deer, reacting too slow against a predator.

  A hard, fierce swat met her ass, pushing her up against the sink. Stinging pain jolted her, forcing a hard lump into her throat.

  Avert your eyes at the first sound of footsteps, she cautioned herself.

  Reese had finally caught her off guard. He said nothing, just motioned her to follow him, haughty pleasure radiating from him. L could not begrudge him this success.

  He led her to one of the empty cells where, to her surprise, Cur's two girls awaited her amid a smattering of beauty shop fixtures. Her eyes lowered, the room's details eluded her, but Reese motioned her into a chair and told the girls to “go to it.” Sitting, she had enough peripheral sight to see hairdressing items, makeup, and, if trivia served her right, a small table of nail care items.

  All of it spelled high femme.

  “They'll attend to you,” Reese explained. “If they need you to look up, do so. It won't be a rule violation. But it will be their violation if they do anything more than primp you.”

  He turned to them. “Right. girls?”

  Reluctantly, they agreed.

  “Okay, then. Make her gorgeous,” Reese told them, leaving.

  A second out of earshot, and L found herself in the lions’ den.

  “Fuck you,” one of the girls hurled in Reese's direction. The other roughly dragged a comb through L's hair, complaining. “Primp her! Fuck that—we'll pimp her out. God damn Cassandra, taking all our fun away.”

  L swallowed, confused and intimidated. Just what had she walked into? If she assumed the obvious, they were frustrated that they couldn't have at her, but rarely one to assume, L stayed quiet, hoping they would reveal themselves as they groomed her.

  While one worked on her hair, the other sank onto a stool and started a pedicure. L had no idea what went into such an activity; she had never considered lovely toes a necessity. But she knew Cur's Pedi Girl wasn't likely to enlighten her any when she threw up her hands and complained, “What the hell am I supposed to do with these? Just look at them!”

  L did, literally. So? They were toes. Ordinary, human toes.

  The hair girl looked over L's shoulder and down at her feet. “Yeah, I see what you mean.” Her tone, although far less disgusted, was anything but complimentary. “Hey, just do the basics. They've given us, what? An hour, hour and a half?”

  Pedi Girl snorted and picked up an emery board. L half-expected to hear a cutting slight come from the girl, but Pedi took her frustrations out on L's toenails instead. Hair girl treated L's hair likewise.

  The fuss of feminization should have sent L into the headspace of objectification, that strange netherworld where identity and awareness fade into obscurity, but as the girls carried on with their angry work, L felt like she'd stepped into a snake pit instead. They treated her like an imposition, their resentment clear and unmistakable.

  The girls’ acrimony only grew as, with curlers in L's short hair and toes done, they moved to makeup and—a shock to L's inner tomboy—a manicure that included nail extensions. L panged with woe, sorry that Cassandra was being cheated of the psychodrama that should have come with this transformation.

  Eyes open, mouth shut, she told herself. Find out what this is all about.

  The girls fumed, tight-lipped for quite some time, but when they finally bumped into one another one time too many, Pedi Girl blurted, “God damn it! It was supposed to be our night out. He promised!”

  “Yeah, well—that was before she showed up,” Hair Girl answered drily.

  “That bitch!” Pedi Girl shook with indignation, barely able to put a nail in place.

  “Calm down,” Hair Girl advised. “Daddy Walston is ours. She'll see.”

  Her words chilled L and whatever personal discomfort and humiliation L felt vanished. Something greater was at stake here: Cassandra had opposition. And if L was any judge of it, soon to be open opposition. A clearer warning, L couldn't imagine.

  Privy to this new enmity, L returned to her cell at Reese's lead, stifling her rattled emotions in the wake of Cassandra's now apparent adversaries. Let them think her a plaything, a dolt into her own headspace, a bimbo—Cassandra's bimbo. Better that than revealing how thoroughly she sensed their shared intent.

  But once she crossed into her cell, she let down her guard. Barely glancing at the high femme outfit and heels that awaited her, she turned to Reese and dared to stare him in the eye, pouring every iota of shocked concern into her gaze as possible. Forget demure—damn the rule.

  Reading her, Reese went to the door and shut it. “Tell me,” he said, his voice low and conspiratorial.

  At that moment, L knew he and Cassandra expected something like this. “They hate Cassandra,” she revealed, her volume matching his. “They want Cur for their own.” She paused, searching for a single word to describe them. “They're usurpers,” she claimed. She didn't care if she sounded melodramatic.

  Reese nodded. “We were expecting trouble.” He nodded to her clothing and instructed L to dress, but as he opened the door to leave, he turned and nodded at her, clearly pleased with her effort.

  Taken from her quarters, L followed Reese, her steps made dainty by Cassandra's choice of stack-heeled sandals. Memories of seeing a geisha in a film trotting modestly in her geta came to her. Did her gait look like that? It certainly felt like it. But without a passing mirror, she had no way to confirm it.

  The tight waist cinche
r that hugged underneath her dress further accentuated her demeanor, forcing her upright, its restriction permitting no slouching. She had to admit, she liked its unyielding snugness. She could easily understand why so many in the scene adopted its use.

  Reese returned L to the library where Cassandra and Cur had greeted her earlier in the day. This time, Cassandra rose from a settee, a gasp escaping her lips. She stood agog, marveling at L. L, of course, barely glimpsed Cassandra's reaction. Her eyes flitted upward but once, then fell to floor. She wanted badly to bask in Cassandra's approval, to see the grin upon her face and the corners of her eyes creased with pleasure. She ached to see the joy her transformed appearance brought to her mistress.

  But rules were rules. And as it was, she was fortunate to catch enough of a glimpse to know that Cassandra was dressed in a men's suit.

  So I will be the femme tonight. The only femme.

  “Isn't she gorgeous, Cur?” Cassandra cooed.

  “Indeed,” he replied. “My girls did well by her.”

  “And I hope to reward them for their effort,” Cassandra replied.

  “I'd like that. Thank you, madam.”

  Cur sounded genuinely grateful and L got the distinct impression that an olive branch had passed between them. More so when Cur added, “Here, let me take care of L's wrap for you.”

  “Not yet,” Cassandra imposed. “I have something to give L first.”

  L fought the instinct to look at Cassandra—amazing how embedded looking another person in the eyes is—but she kept her eyes to the ground. Still, the struggle was great enough to make her whimper and ball her hands into fists. The tension had to go somewhere.

  Cassandra came to her and placed her hand upon L's heart. And came away wet.

  An alcohol wipe, disinfecting her, just above the swell of her breast. Which could mean only one thing: Cassandra intended to break skin. L gulped and closed her eyes. Would she feel a knife against her skin or a needle's puncture? Either way, she was about to become marked property.

  “It will be temporary,” Cassandra explained. “Just for tonight.” A pause and then, “You may decline.”