He tipped the whole cup back and drank it to the last drop.
"Well. There you are. You see. Napoleon Bonaparte prefers average wine to a beautiful woman half naked in bed!"
He was flushed as he said it.
She was incensed.
"You fucking son of a bitch!"
"How dare you!"
"How dare you! You pour wine... and you offer your guest none?" She laughed. She laughed and laughed and laughed.
Fuck it. Let him kill her. Let her die now. This was all too absurd.
She felt a tap on her shoulder.
"Mademoiselle. Forgive me."
She found herself staring straight into his eyes. He was a short man's arm length away from her, and she could smell him, taste him.
He smelled of a recent bath. He smelled of lilacs and other flowery lotions. But he had been sweating lately, this hard worker and he smelled of maleness, that essential whatever of hormones or testosterone or whatever, and she was absolutely flown away on the wings of it. More than that, he was smiling. Not at all the smile of a charmer, but a genuine smile. A smile of someone who was, well, actually smiling from their heart of hearts, their soul of souls.
"Thank you," she said, simply.
She took up the cup and she put it to her mouth.
She realized then that Napoleon was watching intently.
She sipped it delicately. Tasting it.
"This tastes so much better, my First Consul, than from General Murat."
Napoleon Bonaparte looked pleased.
"Doubtless it is served in better circumstances."
"Doubtless."
She drank more.
In fact, Janice wasn't much of a wine drinker. But she'd had enough to know the difference between Thunderbird and decent French wine.
In fact, the wine of this era was closer to Thunderbird.
However, what would it benefit her to let that be known?
"It's quite nice--but as you say, my grace, there must be better available."
Napoleon nodded. "Yes, yes, just so." He clapped his hands. "But I applaud you. A woman who knows that wine in the hand is worth champagne in the bush is my kind of woman!"
She laughed.
"Are you laughing at me?"
"No. Really. I had no idea... I mean, records do not show you had wit... "
"I am not witless. Records? What are you speaking of?"
"Records. Forgive me, your grace," she said, desperately trying to come up with something to say. Then she had it! "Yes. My French fails me. What I meant are reports. Reports! Pamphlets and newspaper articles and such. There is much interest in you in the United States. Virginia is no exception, and we have very good newspapers there, that have long championed the relations of the United States of America and the Republic of France."
"Well, I am glad to hear of that, indeed, said Napoleon. "But I do know well that in the United States we have a friend." His forehead scrunched with wonderment. "But how does an emissary from the United States of America end up in the middle of the countryside, and then in the clammy hands of my own General Murat!"
"I think," she said, again gearing up her mental aptitude. "I think I must have been drugged and kidnapped at home. Then carted off to France. But I could be wrong. I have no memory. I am an amnesiac. I could be a member of some family come to France for a visit... Drugged. Lost."
"This is terrible. This, I assure you, is not the France that I wish to build."
"That is good to know. But Napoleon, if I may be so bold as to use your first name?"
"Granted."
"Napoleon. I beg you to help me. I appreciate your succor. But I also need comfort. I know that General Murat meant me to provide you sexual satisfaction."
"Yes, damn these needs. I must take breaks for them in order to work properly. But only, I assure you, with willing females!"
"Could any female not be willing to embrace Napoleon Bonaparte?"
"You must ask my wife Josephine that. There was a time..."
"Yes, and when you were just a penniless soldier. You were not so popular with the ladies as now."
He arched an eyebrow.
"You have indeed studied me."
"As I said, we in American have books. And there are already books about you. About your Corsican birth, about the way that France conquered Corsica. About your father's initial opposition to French government--but then his eager social climbing."
"Pah. My father was not so smart. It was all my mother, I assure you. My father was a weak opportunist. My mother is a saint."
"Yes, but they did provide you with a proper French military education. And then, as a soldier in the Revolution and thereafter, you served with great honor and skill. And when, rising through the ranks, you found your chance at the coastal town of Solon against the British... There your genius shone!"
"Genius? Is that what these books say?"
"President Washington himself envies your abilities."
Napoleon Bonaparte lifted back his head and laughed. It was an honest laugh and it felt good in the air. Almost friendly.
"I do see things that others do not see. Pray tell, what is your name?”
“Janice.”
“These are new times dawning, Janice. One must seize..." He grasped the air. "Seize the day as it is, not as it was! I live to fight! But to fight, one must think first. Think and know. And in my studies, I know much about what works in war--and what does not. And what will work that has never been tried, because Generals of this day are mired! Mired in the past!"
It almost came out in a blurt: What if I told you I'm not from any kind of past? That I'm from the future!
But Janice held her tongue.
Napoleon Bonaparte, however, was on a tear.
"But then, I see differently. I see differently because I believe, Janice, that I have a gift. I have a gift bestowed upon me by no less than Destiny."
Janice looked up with awe.
"So true. So very true."
Napoleon looked up at the ceiling--and beyond. He reached up and grasped at it. Held it clenched in a determined fist.
"Mine! Mine, don't you see? Mine! But not alone for me. For I will indeed make my stamp upon the world for the good of the world! And for those that come after me. My own kindred and others. Ah, Janice we come from such a dark and benighted place. It is I, Napoleon Bonaparte, and I alone, who now holds up the beacon for truth and a new world."
Janice found herself staring up with awe at the man.
Everything she had dreamed about him was true--and yet here was so much more.
"Oh, that is indeed wonderful, my grace," she said. "But can you imagine... Just imagine... How much comfort a simple hug for a poor girl like me might take from a great man like you."
"A hug?"
"Yes. Embrace? Do I have the right word?
"Hmm. A comforting embrace. Well then. I remember those from my mother."
"I need an embrace now, your grace. And yet, I am also told that the embraces I return or give are to be remembered and cherished."
Something lit up behind Bonaparte's face.
"Why not? In truth, I am feeling less amorous than affectionate."
He sat down and fell upon her--but in a friendly way, his arms enfolding her.
He squeezed.
He squeezed hard and yet harder.
She laughed and squeezed back in kind.
But she was having a hard time breathing.
"My grace, my grace--perhaps we might be more gentle. I enjoy the enthusiasm... but you are so strong!"
"Of course!" And immediately the embrace changed. Gentle! Very gentle indeed. Warm and giving... and smelling of roses and cognac and some kind of male cologne and that bath and... My God! Sheer Napoleonic musk! It was wonderful and so much, so very much more than she had ever expected.
She fell into the embrace. Surrendered to it. She felt her large breasts mashing up against his chest, looking pink and presentable and he gazed down with won
der upon them.
Suddenly, he was kissing her.
His lips were devouring her.
For some time he was kissing her lips, but then suddenly he veered downward, kissing her neck, her shoulders--and then down to the mound of her breasts.
"Oh," she said. "That's so nice. Oh."
Suddenly they were locked into a fervent, fevered embrace. His mouth seemed to want to devour her up, and she felt the hot breath of need well up from him. He moved upon her, and she rubbed his back, his smooth back with encouragement. Between her legs, she could feel him getting hard.
"Yes, yes," she said.
Suddenly, he froze. He shook his head and got off the bed, stepping away from her.
"No. No. I cannot!"
"All evidence says you can!" she said.
"You wish me--to ravish you?"
"That surely is not a violaton!"
Napoleon Bonaparte shook his head. "Something is wrong. Something is very wrong. I shall have to speak to Murat about this. In the meantime..." From his boot, he drew a small knife. Deftly and methodically he cut first the silk bond on her left arm, then to her right wrist. He took a breath, drew up the cover, to cover her nakedness, and then sliced the silk bonds for her left and right ankles. Bash, slash, cut, cut. Immediately she felt the circulation returning to her limbs, but this was no pain or pleasure in any sense. I see you have been tied up.
Oh, no. This is unseemly." Napoleon shook his head emphatically. "I sense about you something... Something more... And I am ashamed."
"Ashamed?"
"Yes. Lately, in the wake of my wife's betrayal, I have acted the libertine. This is why Murat has done what he has done. He thinks to... to procure for me. To pander!" He shook his head emphatically. "Pah."
Napoleon pounded a fist into his hand. "No. I will not abide this sort of treatment from my general. I am Napoleon Bonaparte. I am the greatest man in Europe! No. The world! I have no need of this... perversion! Of procurement. I can seek my own liaisons if I so desire."
"Pardon me, my lord. You'll understand that I'm very confused."
Confused? That wasn't the half of it? Here she was finally with her idol, the man she'd dreamed of since very shortly after puberty, the man who she somehow knew... just knew... who could fulfill her. Here she was with that man, dead for almost two centuries--alive and vital and handsome.
And this conqueror, this ruthless warrior in love and war was refusing her. Refusing to partake of something that would be so easy for him to take.
"Of course you are confused! Clearly, you have been kidnapped! Kidnapped and placed in bonds without your consent. I am writing new laws, modern laws. And does Murat even think that I might want to obey those laws myself. What a cad. A cad! I will give him a tongue lashing and more!"
"But... but... my lord!"
Napoleon put his hands to his ears. "Enough! Enough! I can stand no more."
He stared at her for one long moment.
And then she understood.
For in his dark eyes was hurt and longing and need--and an understanding.
Their eyes were locked but for one long instant...
And then Napoleon Bonaparte tore his gaze away and began stalking away.
"Good evening, Madame. I have important work to do."
And, with a swish of his coattails, the future emperor of the French clomped from the room.
For a moment, she was stuck in amazement.
She could not be mistaken. She had seen it in his eyes.
Then, from beyond the door, she heard yelling. She recognized Napoleon's voice and also General Murat's. Napoleon was furious. General Murat was defensive and conciliatory.
Finally the voices ended and there was a renewed clomping of boots, fading into the night.
For a moment, she thought she'd lost all hope.
Now, though, she knew what she'd seen in his eyes.
Fear, vulnerability--deep, deep love.
Even as she sat up, swathing the nightclothes around her thoughtfully, General Murat entered the room.
"Madame," he said, bowing courteously. "I beg your forgiveness. I have been much amiss--"
"Nonsense," she said, smiling invitingly. "This is so much fun, General Murat. And it is a shame to waste this wonderful bed and these silk bonds and this delicious time--"
She threw off her robe and stretched out, naked, before him.
"Now then," she said. "Where were we?"
Book Two: The French General
CHAPTER ONE
"Tie me up again, please, m’seur," she said demurely. "Tie me up and have your way with me."
General Murat stood at the foot of the bed, his mouth open, surprise and shock in his eyes as he stared down at her, sprawled upon the late 18th century French bed, silken ropes strewn about her like albino snakes, pink and naked and inviting.
Again, she was so grateful, not just for the shapeliness of her body, but also for the sheer beauty of her pussy.
It was a gorgeous thing indeed, a heart breaker. Tufts of downy brown pubes, groomed artfully lined upon a mons rising just so. It was no wonder that men, seeing it, could not help but want to kiss it.
And displayed, dark on the creamy white of her curves, against the startling pink of her nipples, jutting out impudently from perfect breasts--Naked, she was catnip to the male beast, simply catnip.
Janice said, "I believe your master has refused me."
"Napoleon Bonaparte is a fickle soul," sighed the general. He had changed. No longer was he wearing a monk's outfit. Instead, he wore dark breeches, black boots, a white shirt ruffled at the front. His long curly hair was disheveled. He was muscular, slim and very, very dashing, to say nothing of handsome, in a way Janice had never seen in the 21st century. He was tall.
It was amusing to think of short, short Napoleon Bonaparte shaking a fist and tearing apart this towering, powerful man. But then, Napoleon Bonaparte was driven by... by his Napoleonic complex, wasn't he?
"Well, since he doesn't want me--perhaps you do!"
"I would be a dead man if I didn't," said Murat. "But you'll have to forgive me, for my pulse is not steady for other reasons." The general went over to a table and poured wine into two glasses. Returning, he handed one to Janice while he drank from the other.
"Please. Sit down, general," said Janice. She managed to wrap herself with her robe with one hand, then patted a place beside her. "Relax. Don't think I wish you to have a heart attack?"
"I am a soldier. My heart has weathered terrible battles. Bullets will doubtless burst my heart, not women!"
She laughed. "You are funny! I do not think that Bonaparte has a sense of humor!"
It was Murat's turn to laugh.
"You are a funny one! I drugged you and dragged you in here with a hunch, but that hunch was more than true! You have been enjoying yourself! You liked being tied up, teased, and treated to watching the most perverted fornications by servants I could imagine."
"You have a limited imagination, clearly, General Murat. But come here. I remember now my name is Janice, and I remember something soothing and sweet that won't hurt a bit and relieve that wrong kind of tension the First Consul has introduced into your system."
"You remember? What do you remember?" An eyebrow raised up high on his noble brow.
"No need to fear. I won't prosecute. No... I remember... that--"
Janice stopped herself. No she couldn't tell this Frenchman the full truth.
The truth that, somehow she'd been transported back through time from the 21st century to now. That one moment she'd been an American student at the Sorbonne University in Paris enjoying life and French lovers--and the next she was in the middle of the period that she studied. Thank God she could speak French so well and had read so much French written in this period of time where she now found herself. Otherwise she'd be even more lost than she was now.
And so, she simply edited her story.
And added this and that.
"Yes. I remembe
r. I am from Martinique! I was visiting with my family. Visiting Paris, that is. And I was kidnapped."
"Kidnapped. You mean by me and my villains?"
"No. That was later. I was kidnapped by a band of... of outlaw royalty who'd managed to escape The Terror. Yes, and they... they had their way with me. And such was the devastation I suffered, I lost my memory. Soon I found myself wandering without memory. And then, brave general, you came to my rescue and I found myself here in a much better place.”
Janice patted the place beside her on the bed again. The eyebrow of the French general raised somehow even wider, but then a smile slid over his lips.
Quietly, he sat down.
"The coat, M'seur," she said. "Please take it off."
"But what if I am cold?"
"I, of the pair of us, should know if this room is cold or not."
"And--"
She laughed.
"If it is, I hardly notice."
Murat shrugged his shoulders. He took off his topcoat. It was a splendid thing, all soft wool and brocade with woven patterns throughout. Clearly very expensive and colorful, but more to the point, flashy and a bit "over the top" in an era of outrageous clothing and haberdashery. And then Janice remembered her studies in history. Murat was known as the "Dandy General". Tall and magnificent he was known as a tiger on the battlefield--and in the bedroom.
"Now then. For what purpose am I sitting, my dear."
If she bent over, it would be easy to reach around and touch his slender and muscular back. She did this, and soothingly, letting her fingernails glide just hard enough down his spine to let him know what she was about and to give him pleasure. Also, as she did this, she leaned over, allowing her robe to drape open ever so slightly to show off her young and bountiful décolletage.
"So that I might calm your nerves, general. Thusly."
A flash of pleasure appeared on Murat’s face. "Ah. That is nice."
"There are times, you see, Murat, when pain is not needed for pleasure."
"Please hold me down when you say that. Hold me hard."
A sense of humor. They spoke so much more colorfully in these times. She found herself laughing. She also found herself honestly attracted to the man.
For although Murat was clearly a man who took his pleasures in great amount--and now she remembered that often his life had indeed been a bacchanalia and that Murat was an expert in wine and enjoyed sampling it often. And, although this young general enjoyed his leisure, he also did not shirk his duties or his exercise. She could sense his body was taut and supple, and was suddenly interested in what it looked like without these clothes. She had a flash of his rump in his splendid cream pants, and it was a fine set of buttocks indeed. A familiar well of lust crept into her lower parts and then flowered up into her breasts. As those breasts were now brushing against Murat’s shirt, this was an interesting sensation indeed.
The French Affair Boxed Set Page 5
