I gritted my teeth and shook his hand. I hate it when Americans drop words in an attempt to be continental. It’s phony, but for all I knew, he was a continental. Perhaps I was just spoiling for a fight with him. I walked aboard without further offense and Crow Hop said goodbye, unobtrusively vanishing in an instant.
“Would you care for a cocktail before your shower?” Joseph asked, poised like a raptor as his eyes furtively searched me for evidence of the necklace. Bad form, Joseph. Far too obvious.
I decided to go all in, right away. “Here, Joseph.” I handed the necklace over after making a show of removing it from my neck. “This one is for the lady as payment for this weekend.”
He didn’t miss a trick. “This one?” His eyes glittered with greed. Or something even more repugnant. “You mean that there, there may be other opportunities for you to spend time with Miss Delphine?” I loved his choice of words. It implied I was being canonized by fucking his mistress. I can appreciate that type of language, especially on the fly.
“Yep. I just figured we would see how it went and all, you know, this being my first time in a long time with a lady, if you know what I mean.” He both did and did not know, but he presented a knowing, conspiratorial face to me, just two guys enjoying a joke about potential mind-bending sex with an immortal hooker. You know, everyday stuff. I glanced down, gathering myself for a question, the picture of a noob.
“Joseph, what does she look like? I never even thought to ask.” Oh, how shy I could be. It made prying information and setting a mood much easier, especially when dealing with people like Joseph. He did not disappoint me.
“Miss Delphine is hard to describe. Her beauty is timeless. She is actually smaller than one would think, given her considerable presence. She is womanly, flawless, but not thin. She is an actual woman, like Venus.” Joseph delivered this opinion assuming I would be ignorant. As a veteran of multiple art history classes in which I only occasionally slept, I decided to fire back.
“I always envisioned Venusian women with antennae rather than huge breasts, but I’m a dreamer.” I indicated that he should precede me to wherever we were going. I didn’t trust him, regardless of his manners.
After a long hallway vanished behind us, we arrived at a set of doors suited for a mansion. They swung inward silently. I admit it, the stench of wealth was everywhere, and the aroma agreed with me.
“This is your personal shower room. You’ll dress elsewhere, just through there”—he glanced at a second door, equally as impressive—“to prepare for cocktail hour. Then, we’ll dress you accordingly for dinner when Miss Delphine calls.” He finished with a sniff that implied I would be fortunate to emerge from this room attired to be a ship’s mechanic, let alone a companion of his mistress.
“That will be all, Joseph,” a voice carried from behind us.
There stood Delphine, in the flesh. She dismissed him with a squint, an expression that invited no discussion, but was clothed with a sweet smile that softened her tone, but only just. He inclined his head in a near bow and silently walked past me, closing the doors with a muffled thump. We were alone, and I felt myself being measured so thoroughly that any disguise on my part was futile. Delphine would know.
She was five feet three or four, and her hair was waist length blonde of a hue that hinted at short summers and rocky Scandinavian coastlines. A simple robe covered part of her womanly shape, the remainder of her toned body visible beneath the hem. Legs that were athletic but sculpted ended where the fabric began in a taunt that was impossible to ignore. She was bronzed, by what sun I couldn’t guess, because there was not a flaw on her body that I could see. Full pink lips were drawn back in a smile that radiated danger and bubbling laughter, an unsettling blend of contrasts that many men had doubtless found endlessly thrilling. But her eyes, locked on to me with warmth and caring that was too intent to be feigned-- the eyes were beyond anything I was prepared for. Blue, but shot with greys and depth that should have been frigid, drawing me to her just as she raised her fine boned arms and offered me an embrace that I knew was the edge of a hole. A pit with a long, silent fall, full of pleasure and forgetting, crowded with the bones of men before me. Before I could muster a stand, I felt the heft of her breasts against my stomach, and her smell crowded my senses in a short but decisive seduction. I willingly lost to her sensuality, if I even fought at all. Her mouth was on mine, briefly, and she exhaled against my skin softly, a whispering caress. My body reacted so swiftly, I actually blushed. I was in deep water and tiring fast.
“To the shower. I’ll wash you myself, and then we’ll drink and eat and you can have me in every way imaginable. And some you can’t.” Her honeyed voice was muffled in my shirt but I felt every vibration of her mouth against me like a tuning fork wired to my libido.
I went with her. What else could I do?
53
Florida: Ring
I was disrobed slowly, expertly. Her awareness was keen, every touch or gesture measured. The consummate professional in a business that bridged pleasure and sexual power, she was even more erotic in the rising steam filling the cavernous shower. Stone walls surrounded us, a spatter of oranges and whites, with crystalline counterpoints that danced in the mist.
As I sat on a tiled bench, she knelt before me, removing my shoes and socks. I should have felt in command, but I didn’t. Her subtle smile robbed me of even the hint of control. Down, boy. You’ve got two days.
“What are these walls? It looks like a meteor was cut into slices and mortared in place.” I was frankly admiring.
She looked up with pleasure. “It’s a base stone from the opal mines of Coober Pedy, Australia. Dreadfully hot there, I’m told. I had it shipped in and cut on site. I rather enjoy the irregularities; they frame the remaining opal quite nicely.” Gems as tile. The mark of truly limitless money.
Rising, I shrugged out of my button-down shirt before she could continue with her exploration of my body. My knife made no sound, safely wrapped in the cotton fabric as it dropped to the floor. Thankfully, Delphine made no move to retrieve it. I hoped Joseph wouldn’t be acting as my valet, or at least until I could attempt to secret the blade somewhere else. I had the foresight to wear pants that she unzipped and dropped without ever taking her eyes from mine. Her robe slid from her shoulders, revealing round breasts with pink aureoles, full and alert. Those shadowed a flat stomach ending in a secretive mound of soft curls, shy as a maiden’s smile. We stepped into the spray together.
“The necklace is beautiful. Alive. Let me ask, Ring, do you think that I am worth the price?” Her fingers traced the line of my arm as she spoke.
“Yes. I think that you would be worth as much gold as I could carry here on my back, if need be, but I don’t think you care.” Her touch had unleashed the philosopher in me, which didn’t quite fit with my erection. She didn’t seem to mind.
“Quite right. I don’t care about how much. Quantity over quality is rarely satisfying, unless every . . . single . . . experience . . . is flawless.” She punctuated the words with her hands, pulling me to her in an invitation that was not to be denied. I lifted her small frame and drove upward into her heat, her shoulders slapping against the tile brought all the way from Australia to act as the backstop for my fuck of the century.
I could not do anything she had not seen before, nor would I try. I checked my ego at the door and concentrated on the incredible tightness of her, wrapped against my length while her heels dug into my thighs. The abandon was total. I ignored her needs with each lunge higher, higher into her, higher into the confusion and distant betrayal that I felt, but that fleeting second was a lie, driven away when she clenched down on me and I released, her tongue in my mouth without mercy. We sank against the wall as she straddled me in a sitting position, my cock still pulsing in her with the memories of every woman I had ever known, discarded now after being with her.
“Yesss. Shhhh. Again, in a moment, you’ll be ready.” Her optimism was accompanied with a kiss that
drew me out and reignited my fire even though I was already in her to the hilt. It wasn’t far enough.
“What about dinner?” I was only halfhearted in my hunger. I knew she had drawn from me, ever the predator, even as I took my pleasure, but it had not been much, because I was alert and began moving her up and down slowly, no part of me leaving her warmth.
“Dessert first.” She held my face with her hands, kissing me with lips that seared and cooled. I did not argue.
To me, Delphine was a teacher, her disciplines being Flesh and Want. The next hours were lessons in craving and how to act upon that desire with her endlessly inventive sexuality. Her brand of intimacy stretched my definition of the word. Every move turned things I had done a hundred times into something new, and I came hard enough that spots floated across my eyes not once but three times. I saw up close exactly what real power could do.
“Joseph, my things. I will get ready here for dinner,” she said to the air, her voice even and pleasant. I heard footfalls before her order was complete, and a moment later, a bustling Joseph knocked and entered the sauna conditions of my bathroom with two leather cases, which he began to distribute with robotic efficiency. Makeup, a hand mirror, perfume. A fine powder in a lapis lazuli crock, smelling of wealth. She looked at Joseph not once as he finished his work and exited. Delphine presented her back to me, a gift for my hands.
“Dry me, Ring?” It was less than an order, but more than a suggestion. I began to towel her, working toward her breasts and stomach as she purred, stretching her arms skyward with childish joy. “Very nice. You can be quite gentle when asked.” She watched me in the mirror, which had cleared enough for me to savor her form. “Tell me, lover, will you be as gentle when you use the knife you wrapped in your shirt? It’s quite an unusual blade. Old. Knives are so personal. You must be made of sterner stuff than the average killer who has sought me out through the years.”
Despite my surprise, I kept both hands moving. I was inwardly impressed with her staff, her awareness. Her savvy. After her performance in the shower, I should not have been. This was a woman with few weaknesses, least of all being threatened by my clumsy attempt to smuggle a weapon in for the kill.
“I promise to leave the knife on the floor if you’ll still have me. For dinner.” Her discovery was an opening gambit, nothing more. I was determined to stay; if not for the sex, then at least for any chance to learn something of use from our experiences. At least that was what I would tell the girls.
“Hm. Dinner. Of course. Powder me?” She turned to face me, handing over a small carved brush, electric blue. It was smoothed by time and small hands. Tilting her head back slightly, she guided my hand in long, shallow strokes across her breasts, her neck, and one playful swipe circling her navel. I began to see the value in her approach, as the intimacy of our moment was overwhelming. It was humanizing her without my consent, binding me tighter to her after a few short hours. We were pairing off, becoming bonded while she turned into the polished beauty she presented to the world.
I was transfixed. When we left my dressing room, I was clothed in more than her choice of wardrobe. I wore the possessiveness of a mate, with discomfort, although her arm through mine made me think hard about what came next. In a moment, we were seated at a table overlooking the deck and the bustle of the waterway. It seemed a different planet, that place on the other side of the smoked glass. I was glad for the feeling and reveled in her presence. I still wanted her.
“Have you an appetite?” Delphine was again the gracious hostess, no hint of my transgression to be found in her tone. Wine awaited us upon our arrival, which I sipped and found its quality confusing. I tasted sunshine, grass, and even Delphine. Her presence was light on my tongue.
“I could eat something small. I don’t want to be sluggish. Just in case.” I kept my voice neutral..
She snapped her fingers once and a waiter I had not seen before delivered two small tureens of soup, ladling a thin bone China bowl to the brim with the steaming liquid. Brown kelp swam in the clear broth along with slivers of field onions. Small snails, pulled from their yellow and black shells, lay poached in the bowl, their former homes used as decorative flourishes along the rim. It smelled like the sea and earth all at once.
She saw my question as I studied the soup. “It’s a restorative, particularly for men. A recipe I reconstructed from my childhood. I spent many days pulling those snails from the rocks, dodging the waves throwing cold spray over my head.” Her wistfulness told me that such days had been a long time ago. The soup told me that she remembered, perhaps painfully, and carried the river of time with her as a burden that was not entirely without regret.
She sipped the soup directly from the bowl, delicately inhaling with each venture close to the rim. “I was born on an island, isolated. Not even a sail on the horizon, unending waves of blue rolling past the limits of my vision. Turf greener than any I’ve seen since, crying seabirds and the ceaseless bass drum of the waves, eating my home away one grain of sand at a time. I learned patience there, Ring. I learned about how beauty in a confined space can be a powerful weapon, and how the consumption of a lesser was not just survival, but delicious.” She popped a snail in her mouth and rolled it sensually once on a very pink tongue, swallowing and winking at me. So, she could still be playful. That was good. For now.
We ate and drank in reasonable peace, although the sexual tension remained thick. As if it could dissipate around this creature, I thought as she dabbed her mouth and rose. Pushing my chair back, she deposited herself on my lap and held my glass up for me to sip. Her eyes were very bright.
She drained my remaining wine and asked, “What do you see when you look at me? At all of this?” She pointed with her chin at the opulence of the yacht. Her palms were flat on my chest and she swung a leg over to straddle me like a lover.
“I see tackiness that isn’t you. Not really your style. I see people who obey you because of what I haven’t seen, the other you that begins when the fucking ends and it’s time for business. Whatever that might be.” I was close enough to see the fine golden hairs on her neck.
“Very observant. This glorified rowboat was owned by a filthy pig who achieved sexual pleasure from rape. Of course, he won’t be doing that any more, but I couldn’t pass up the chance to undo his ghastly taste. So industrial, masculine, yet cheap. I can look at this holding or any of my other baubles and think that I’m rather secure for a former Pictish camp whore. No more being savaged from behind by stinking fighters, no more staring at the stars as they pounded away around the fire at night. I loved thinking that the black mask of the swan in the sky was flirting with me, telling me that soon, soon, he would come in me or on my leg and it would be over. Until the next time. No more squabbling over scraps like a dog with my thighs covered in blood and wondering how soon do I have to eat before I feel hands on my neck again. Now, Ring, I am the ruler. I am the force, the hammer, and I do it all wrapped within a touch that drives men to their graves willingly. I know who you are. I looked at you and sensed your lethality, your odd sense of commitment to those girls you pretend not to love. I know your type, Ring. I know every type of man; it’s my business, because if I find a man I don’t understand, it means that I am losing control of my flock. And that is something I cannot afford.” She leaned forward and brushed my lips with her fingers. “I know that your augmentations will let you survive me. I’m not even certain I can kill you. I know I don’t want to. You have . . . things, things I want. Or access to them. The necklace is a wedge, an item for me to build my access to power. And that is something I want badly enough to give you that which you cannot live without, if only you taste them once. Starting with this.” She knelt before me and freed me from my pants. I was instantly erect when my eyes connected her destination with the potential pleasure she would bring me. I was not wrong. Sensual heat bloomed on my shaft as her lips closed over me, her head moving up and down, varying speed, direction, and pressure. I could feel each whirling m
oment of her tongue as she rested at the end of each stroke. Only her eyes remained unchanged, never leaving mine, the corners wrinkling with mirth as she fed her ego from the submission on my face. I could have resisted, but it was a lie, and a weak one at that. In a moment, I began to pull away, but she placed both palms against my stomach, seizing the initiative against my flagging will. It was too much. I gave in and bucked, thinking that even in that second, she was in command as her throat worked once, then twice, my muscles going dead slack in seconds from the aftermath of my orgasm as she swallowed every drop. I felt her pulling spirit from me and I gave it willingly, just as I had given in to her mouth. Marcus had been the fortunate one. He was dead. He couldn’t know the pangs of living without possessing Delphine, but I would, and as she rose from the floor to pour more wine, I realized that nothing I would do from that point forward would be without her permission. Just as she had planned all along.
I spoke, my throat grating with dust after her attentions. “I have to sleep to recover, but before I do, what do you want? If you know the truth about the necklace, why this charade? Why give yourself to me when you don’t have to?”
She laid a hand at her throat, charmed by my stupor. “You’re not asking the right question, sweetheart. I know where you got the necklace. I know about the Baron, it’s his work as surely as if his signature was upon it. I don’t want the jewelry, I want the victory. I want you. I want anything and everything that secures my place. Hell is an upwardly mobile social club, you might say, and I’m not going to stop in the middle. I want to sit at the top. And Ring, you really are selling yourself short. What if I just enjoy fucking you? Surely you cannot argue with such a simple pleasure? Or is there guilt? Guilt for your betrayal to both lovers? Guilt at lying down with the enemy? I assure you, I am not your enemy. Would an enemy treat you as I have? Especially knowing that time with me would not kill you? Look at this, Ring”—she caressed herself lazily—“it’s all yours. For the weekend, and again in the future. Think about it. Limitless pleasure. The full exploration of my skills, my singular attention. My hands will bring you to readiness in an instant, my mouth can finish you and you will be in me at your whim. Tell me, does that sound like a threat?”
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