Mona Lisa Darkening m-4

by Sunny

  He sauntered up to us and air kissed first Melvin, then Dontaine, who stood up to greet him. I stood as well as Dontaine introduced me to Antoine.

  Instead of shaking my hand, he kissed it. "A pleasure, mademoiselle." His eyes shifted to Dontaine. "And a real challenge, as you said. Yes, yes." He gave me that same scrutinizing look that Melvin had given me, but this one didn't stop at my neck, it continued all the way down to my feet. "Wonderful, wonderful," he said, eyes traveling back up to my face. "You have begun the process, my dear Melvin. Now I will finish it."

  "You will?" My voice was careful. Not angry, exactly, just careful.

  "Oui, oui. Just put yourself in my hands and all will be fabulous." He beamed at me. I didn't beam back. I just looked at Dontaine. Demanded an explanation.

  "Antoine is an exclusive dresser."

  "A dresser?" I asked. I'd never heard of the term.

  "Oui," Antoine said, nodding proudly. "I dress the rich and famous in our fair city, those fortunate enough to have my services."

  Not a shy one, our Antoine.

  "He's also a very talented makeup artist," Dontaine continued.

  Antoine fluttered his long mascaraed lashes up at Dontaine. "You flatter me, cher!"

  One look at Dontaine's beautiful, pleading green eyes and all the resistance went out of me. I nodded, giving my permission. Why the hell not? I was here. Antoine was here. I'd had my hair and nails done, why not makeup and clothes? I wasn't entirely pleased at how Dontaine had sprung it on me, bit by sneaky bit, but truthfully, had he tried to ask me ahead of time, I would have likely flat-out said no.

  "What would you like me to do?" I asked.

  "Just sit. Sit and put yourself in my hands," said Antoine.

  I sat. Another seat, a high one, was brought out, along with a table tray for Antoine. He laid out a huge makeup box on the table, filled with all brand-new items.

  "First, cleansing." Antoine, talked me through the entire process while the video camera blinked red at me. Then face cream was applied. He choose a foundation, the lightest one, smearing it all over my face and neck with a triangular sponge. Ick. I sat through everything he did with a stony, unsmiling expression that must have been perfect for all he did, because he didn't ask me to change it, not until it came time to apply the lipstick.

  "Open your mouth a little. That's it," he murmured, penciling in the outline, then filling in the rest of my lip color with a tiny brush.

  Eye shadow was simply closing my eyes. Eyeliner was a "Look up" and "Look down." The most uncomfortable part was curling my eyelashes, and then gluing on a set of false eyelashes. It took about thirty blinks to get used to the odd feeling of my eyes after they were applied. I shot Dontaine a glare that said, I cannot believe I'm letting them put this shit on me!

  Dontaine smiled soothingly, serenely back at me. Easy for him to do. He wasn't getting his face painted or eyelashes glued on him. Crap! I wondered how many times I'd have to scrub my face to get all this stuff off me.

  With hair and face done, I was whisked into a back office where an entire rack of clothing hung. Even more clothes had been draped over two chairs.

  "I am not trying all those clothes on," I said, flatly balking.

  "No, no, of course not," Antoine soothed, his tone distracted as he flipped through the thick rack of clothes. "I brought extra sizes just in case Dontaine's guess was off, but it isn't. Here, try this on." He thrust gold slacks and a light green oriental silk shirt into my hands, and closed the door behind him.

  I changed, grumbling a bit, but only a tiny bit. It could have been much worse, like one of the long formal gowns I saw hanging on the rack.

  When I opened the door and walked out of the room, the men froze. A look flashed in Dontaine's eyes, something I couldn't read. Something that made me wish suddenly for a mirror so that I could see what he saw.

  Antoine clapped his hands and trilled, "Perfect!" Then added, "Well, almost. Shoes. All you need now is shoes. Sneakers so do not go with that outfit." Going to the clothing rack, he unzipped the plastic end section, revealing eight sets of shoes sitting neatly in layered cubbies. He grabbed the ones in the third cubby, delicate ivory ballet slippers, and handed them to me. "Try these."

  There was nowhere to sit. Dontaine solved the dilemma by kneeling. "Allow me."

  I opened my mouth to say, "Don't be silly, I can put on my own shoes," but closed my mouth, the words unsaid, at that look again in his eyes. It was as if he bespelled me, but he didn't, not really. He just looked at me that way, and I allowed him to unlace the sneaker, slip it off, and lift my right foot onto his thigh. He slid his hand slowly up the pant leg until he touched my bare skin. He made the gesture of removing my sock and cradling my bare foot in his hand more intimate than it should have been. In a graceful, chivalrous gesture that made me feel a bit like Cinderella, he slid the slipper onto my foot. A perfect fit.

  He lifted my other foot to his thigh, and my hands went to his shoulders for balance. The slight buzz of touching him made my hands tingle. He bared my other foot, cupped it in his hand, then the cool satin lining of the other shoe slid over my skin.

  "Perfect," Dontaine murmured, looking up at me.

  "What's perfect?"

  "You." He stood up and drew me down the hallway. "Come see what I see."

  Antoine was waiting for us back in the salon; he'd slipped away without my noticing. I froze as I looked beyond him and caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror.

  A stranger looked back at me, and she was beautiful. Strikingly so, like a model. The makeup had been boldly applied, with no attempt at being subtle. Dark eye shadow and heavily smudged liner brought out my eyes, heightened their exotic slant. The long fake eyelashes — that did not look fake at all — made my eyes appear deep, stunning pools of mystery. Blush carved out my high cheekbones, and red lipstick made my mouth fuller, poutier. My hair was full and wild, wisping in artful layers about my face instead of hanging straight and heavy. The color, though, was the biggest change. My dark hair had been lightened to a deep shining bronze, and streaked with blond and gold highlights, a color theme echoed by my clothes.

  Under Tersa's lightly applied makeup, I had been pretty. In NetherHell, I had been lovely in a delicate, flawless-skin kind of way. Now, in these clothes, with this bold, unsubtle makeup, I was drop-dead gorgeous. Sensual and sophisticated. Like one of those women that appeared in glossy ads.

  "Wow! I don't know what to say."

  Others didn't have that problem.

  "Stunning," said Melvin.

  "Beautiful," oohed the salon girls.

  "Divine," cooed Antoine. "Devastatingly divine."

  "You guys are miracle workers," I said.

  Melvin and Antoine didn't argue with me. Just nodded their heads in preening agreement.

  I still couldn't believe what I saw, what they'd made me. I touched a hand to my face to make sure that divine reflection was really me.

  Antoine pushed a tissue into my hand. "No touching, cher. Wipe your fingers, that's a good girl. You don't want to get any makeup smeared on your clothes." Sitting me back in the chair, he turned the video camera back on and proceeded to give detailed instructions on how to remove the makeup, pointing out different bottles of cleansers to use for each part of my face — eyes, lips, and lastly skin.

  "I don't think I'll be able to remember everything," I said, overwhelmed.

  "That's why we're videotaping this, cher" Antoine popped the DVD out of the camcorder, slid it into a clear plastic case, and handed it to me like a precious gift. "For you, along with everything here in this case." He gestured to the large makeup box.

  "You're giving me all this stuff? That has to be over five hundred dollars' worth of products in there."

  "Try a thousand," Antoine said lightly.

  I gulped. "I couldn't possibly take it. It would be a waste to give it to me. Even with the videotape, I doubt I'll be able to do what you guys did."

  "I'll help you learn," Dontaine sai
d. "Just take it and say thank you." That look again in his eyes.

  I said thank you, hugged Antoine and Melvin, and allowed Dontaine to usher me out into the car in a near daze. Antoine and an assistant followed us out, both of them loaded with an armful of clothes, which they laid out on the backseat.

  "What's that?" I asked, twisting around to look.

  "Some outfits to go with your glamorous new look," said Antoine, winking. "Also some shoes in this bag, and hair care products from Melvin in the other. Ta ta, darling. We'll see you in a month."

  "A month?" I said.

  "Yes, of course. Your roots will need touching up by then." He threw me a bright smile and closed the door.

  "My roots?" I asked as we pulled onto the road, waving to a beaming Antoine.

  "He meant the roots of your hair, the darker portion of your hair as it grows out."

  "You mean I have to do this every month?" I must have sounded as horrified as I felt because Dontaine flashed me a smile.

  "Not the whole procedure you went through today. Just some dye along the roots of your hair once a month."

  Maintenance — that was a whole other concept I wasn't ready to deal with yet. I was still trying to wrap my mind around the amazing transformation. I flipped down the mirror and gazed at my reflection. "I can't believe that's me," I mused. "It's not, really. It's the clothes, the painted hair and painted face."

  "Most beautiful people do not look the way they do without a lot of help," Dontaine observed beside me.

  "You look stunningly handsome without any help from makeup."

  "But my hair has a good cut and style, and I wear clothes that were carefully selected to complement my coloring and build. Without all that effort and attention to detail, I would be much more common looking."

  "That's hard to believe."

  "Believe me. It is far easier to look bad than it is to look good. Effort must be put into looking good, for everyone. With only one change, a bad haircut, a handsome actor can be transformed into a cold and unattractive killer, like in the movies. I considered," he said, glancing at me, "letting you see me in an unflattering light, but could not bring myself to do so."

  "Vain, Dontaine?" I said, teasing softly.

  "Utterly. With my suit already so untenable, I could not bring myself to willingly give up the few advantages I have."

  "It's not a contest or a competition, Dontaine."

  "Is it not? Of the men you have chosen, one is the ruler of Hell. The other two are Warrior Lords."

  "Amber and Gryphon were not Warrior Lords when I met them," I pointed out.

  He looked surprised, as if that had not occurred to him before. "I stand corrected," he said thoughtfully. "However, to return to my original point, how much effort it takes to look your best does not matter so much as the final result — what you can become. Even with the same exact treatment you just had, many women still would be able to look the way you do now. The bone structure, flawless skin, slender build — you already possessed all that. The makeup and clothes and hair simply drew out your natural beauty, made it more visible to others."

  "But I don't look like this every day."

  "The important thing is that you can."

  He parked the car and came around to open the door for me.

  "Where are we going now?" I asked.

  "To have dinner. I told Rosemary that we would be dining out tonight." He offered his arm and I took it. And with that one gesture, I suddenly felt nervous and self-conscious, like I was going out on a date.

  We drew looks as we walked down the street. How could we not with Dontaine by my side. But this time, it wasn't just women who gazed at us, it was also men. And most of the looks, not all but most of them, were for me and not my gorgeous-looking companion. For the first time in my life, I drew looks. Registered on men's radar — human men — in a way I never had before.

  "They are finally seeing you the way we have always seen you," Dontaine murmured.

  "I always looked this beautiful to you?"

  "Yes. We can perceive you with senses other than our eyes."

  "I know all Queens emit aphidy." A substance similar to pheromones. A thought occurred to me. "Do I still have that? Aphidy?" I asked, and saw the answer in his eyes.

  My aphidy was gone, another Monère part of me lost. "Then why?" I asked, feeling shaken, confused, lost. "Why on God's earth do you still want me?"

  I poised to run from him, faced with yet another devastating piece of me gone. But he was there, so fast, his hands gently grasping my arms, holding me still, not letting me turn from him. His face was tense, harsh, his eyes burning.

  "Because you offer something even rarer than power or aphidy. You offer something that few other Queens offer — love. You bestow love on all you take under your care. And intimate love to only a few. I saw it once in your eyes for me, and I want to see it again. I need to, as much as I need to breathe air. Mona Lisa, this one thing — love — you have still to give. Do not deny me. Not when my soul needs you, cries out for you."

  My heart was pounding in my chest, adrenaline flashing through my system. Fight or flight. Flee… or embrace the need I saw before me. And the man who held such yearning need.

  Love, he said. The one thing I had left to give. The one thing I still denied him and what he so obviously craved. Had I been that selfish, that blind? Had I been so frightened of losing this new love, of having it ripped from me by death the same way Gryphon had been taken from me, that I pushed it away in the name of unselfishness, when all the while it had been done for the most selfish reason of all? To keep me safe, to keep me protected from loss?

  I'd told Dontaine that he was too handsome and I too plain. He had transformed me into something beautiful, striking.

  And when I thought I had nothing left to give a man, he told me I still had the most precious thing of all — love.

  A man, handsome, loyal, and strong, with a face and body that dazzled the eye, stood before me, wanting me, needing me. And I wanted him, too, in turn but was too cowardly to grab what was being so freely offered to me — love in turn.

  Are you going to be a fool and push him away from you yet again? Do you need to lose him, too, before you realize how much you should have treasured him instead?

  No! I cried within. "No," I said, and watched as his face fell. "I'm through running away… when all this time I should have been running to you."

  I murmured his name with aching need, with naked want, feeling all the adrenaline flooding my system shift down a new, more urgent path. Watched his face shift from despair into painful hope.

  "What are you saying?" he asked roughly.

  "I'm saying yes." And kissed him. Kissed him with love and need. Plastered myself against him and felt an answering tremor pass from that strong body to mine. Felt him stir, grow hard and firm against me.

  His hands gripped me, held me away. "Yes?" he asked, his dark green eyes shining almost jewel bright. His mouth was smeared red by my lipstick, like a primitive mark of ownership.

  "Yes," I answered.

  He turned and pulled me down the street at a pace so quick it was almost a run.

  "Where are we going?" I asked.

  "To the nearest room."

  I laughed. Said breathlessly, "Sounds good to me. You have my lipstick on your lips."

  He smiled sharply at me, not faltering in his speedy pace. "Good. When we're through, I want it smeared all over my body." His words, the intent look in his eyes, weakened my knees.

  We flew past people who turned to stare at us, and I didn't care. We whipped down two blocks, three. Turned a corner and stopped at the first doorway. Key in hand, he quickly opened the door and pulled me inside, up a flight a stairs.

  "This isn't a hotel" I said.

  "No, an apartment building. One of ours." Then he was opening a second door and pulling me inside a room. Before the door closed, he had my back against the wall, his body pressed to mine. He groaned at the contact, that hard, strong
body shuddering as I wrapped my legs around him and adjusted our bodies so that his hardness notched against my softness.

  "Condom," I gasped.

  He lifted my left leg higher and pulled something out of his back pocket. "Got one," he muttered and set me back down on the floor so he could undress me.

  A terrible thought came to me as he pulled off my shirt. "Maybe I'm completely human now. Maybe we're too different in chemistry to find pleasure together."

  His hard body plastered me to the wall again, his hips, his hardness grinding into me. "Does this feel like no pleasure?" he growled, nipping at my lips.

  A sweet feeling of need, of building pleasure rippled through me at that lovely thrust and swivel of his talented hips. "Okay, guess you're right."

  I pressed him away, and his weight shifted back, not because of my strength… no, I was vividly aware of how little there was of that… but because it was my desire and he was not yet entirely certain if I had changed my mind. He stepped back hesitantly, and I tackled his shirt, the reason I'd needed the room, unbuttoning it with swift, hasty speed, pushing it off him.

  "Oh, my," I said, looking at the treasure I had unearthed. I moved my hands, my lips, over the lovely expanse of his torso, branded red kisses across the white skin of his chest, and felt his hesitancy melt away. My hands moved to the waistband of his trousers.

  "Me, first," he said, and tugged down my dress pants. Easy to do with the elastic-banded waist. Underwear came off next, then my shoes, one foot then the next. Moving in a blur of speed, he draped my pants and top neatly over a chair, and returned to me, kneeling and pressing his mouth to me before I knew what he intended. A swirl of his tongue against my shaved nether lips had me crying out in shock, in weeping pleasure. Then the electric buzz of his tongue licking there over the little bud he had searched out. The sensation of him, of his touch, had me screaming and jerking in a quick, explosive climax.