Seduce: A Cariad Romance Three Book Bundle (Cariad Collections)

by Stein, Charlotte

  Imogen pushed her packet of cigarettes around the bar top, then she glanced at her watch. ‘Who the fuck said I was angry at the world?’

  ‘You didn’t have to, it’s written all over your face.’ His voice was soft and kind and maybe concerned. ‘It’s either that or you’re scared shitless of something.’

  Imogen bit her lip. He was astute and his eyes seemed to look deep inside her, she sat back on her stool and uncrossed her legs.

  ‘Whoever this guy is, who’s causing so much hassle, it looks like he’s not showing,’ Michael said jokingly. Then his gaze drifted to her legs. ‘You remind me of my mother. She had great legs like yours, all the guys looked at her legs. My father thought legs were ten times more erotic than breasts.’

  ‘Is that the only reason you came over to talk to me? Because my sexy silk stocking legs reminded you of your mother and made you horny?’ Imogen stated acerbically.

  ‘No, no,’ Michael stuttered. ‘Of course not. Shit, I always put my foot in it with ladies.’

  ‘Cut to the chase,’ she said, spurred on by the wicked sex devil inside her. ‘You want to fuck me, so say so. Why don’t we go outside and I’ll take off these damn silk stockings and you’ll see these legs are not as perfect and so much of a wet dream as you think. Perhaps you fancy fucking me up against the wall?’

  Imogen couldn’t help herself; she was being deliberately provocative for some reason. The tender stirring, the need for physical comfort was making her run off at the mouth. It wasn’t like her, not like her at all. ‘Perhaps, you want to watch me pull them on and off very slowly and then fuck me in them. Is that it, huh? Or, maybe you’d like to see me stripped naked and just dressed in the hose? It’s hardly surprising since I make my living from these fucking legs.’

  Michael grinned at her. ‘Boy, hold on a moment. Who rattled your cage?’

  Imogen was about to say, “You did! You walked too close and you put your face right up to the bars and despite the fact I fluttered my wings a little in warning, you persisted and now I’ve struck out and pecked you with my sharp beak”. Instead, she sipped her drink without tasting it and a warm fizz began between her legs as she stared at his sensitive cunt-sucking mouth.

  ‘Let me get you another?’ Michael raised his finger and Larry, like magic, placed another cocktail in front of her. ‘I just offered to buy you a drink. Nothing more, I didn’t want to pick you up and I sure as hell don’t care a shit what you’re doing here.’

  Imogen glanced at his Rolex watch and his fine pair of opal cufflinks and then glanced away; she’d done with being impressed. She’d grown up around affluence and when her mother had made it big she’d seen many fine things. Once a week her mother had taken her to the Ritz and they’d dined in sumptuous luxury eating off small plates with tiny forks while a quartet played in the corner. That was one of the things she had liked about Louis, she had been easily impressed then and Louis had the best of everything. He may have come from the slums in Chicago, but when he made it big in steel he’d indulged himself in every possible way: fine wine and restaurants; clothes and fancy shoes. It didn’t take her long, though, to find out that money couldn’t buy love.

  She supposed she was becoming the perfect facsimile of what her mother had once been. What was it Mama’s lover, Herr Cleef, had said about Marianne? It had been like looking at a flawless diamond. Outwardly, it was scintillating and perfect, but examine it closely enough and you saw a glimmer of something fascinatingly dirty. Not the kind of dirt which marred the exterior to any great degree. But, just the slightest trace, rendering the overall effect more exciting. Yes, Mama had possessed classical sophistication, however, despite what she wanted you to believe, she had the innate air of a whore about her in the way she prostituted the legs and the silk stockings and Imogen knew you couldn’t shake breeding off. You could pretend to be anything you wanted to be, but class clung to you and when she got down to it, all her mother’s good breeding and instruction could not change what she was. You couldn’t paint over the small flaw, the black spot of sex which made you behave in a certain way and got you in trouble. Her mother had craved sex and prostituted her legs and got in trouble because of it and now Imogen did the same thing.

  For an instant she thought of sex, and she felt herself become juicy and fluid and perhaps a little reckless in how she was thinking. Suddenly, she was craving the touch of a hand and finger, but more than that she craved a voice which said, ‘I love you.’

  Tomorrow, as soon as she got up, she would go down to the studio and she’d practice her dance exercises in front of the bar and the large mirror and work some of this dangerous energy out of her before she did something stupid. Twice a week she went to a dance class, run to Nazi perfection by Karl, an instructor of the old regime – the regime of sweat and hard work – who made the dance girls struggle so hard to keep limber they were mentally and physically exhausted afterwards. Karl was tough and he looked tough, he had very short blond hair and a face like a crunched up paper bag. The girls said he never spoke to them and if he did he could be gruff and frightening, but he liked Imogen because he could tell she hid a dark secret and the secret made her work harder than most. With his slightly sadistic smile he strolled back and forth shouting his orders, but it was always with a teasing look. ‘Come along, Imogen, too much butterkuchen makes you lazy.’

  ‘I’m not trying to pick you up,’ Michael said, challenging her with his dark gaze. ‘I realise what you’re thinking. You think I’m a sleaze bucket and I’m trying to come on to you, but I’m not. I want to talk to you and get beneath that prickly skin of yours.’

  ‘You’re too close.’ Imogen laughed, pushing him away gently with her hand. ‘So close, you’re seducing my legs. Do you generally get this personal with a woman you don’t know?’

  ‘No,’ Michael said shrewdly. ‘Of course not. What kind of a man, do you think I am?’

  ‘Well you’re a man and that’s enough.’ She kept rippling her fingers up and down the stem of her glass. ‘And you keep staring at me. In particular you insist on staring at my legs? Do you see anything there to interest you?’

  ‘Oh, I can see I’m going to have to be honest. Yes, I do. I never saw such a fabulous pair of legs and I’ve seen a few in my time. Your legs are pure fantasy but I bet millions of guys tell you that?’

  ‘These legs are certainly not fantasy. They’re a very real pair of legs. Jesus, you’re just the same as other men, aren’t you? Always staring at the legs or the tits. What is it with guys?’

  ‘You prostitute them. That’s why,’ Michael commented. ‘It’s hard not to stare when a woman with an outstanding sexual attribute’s thrusting it in your face. You must realise you have something there? Some tool of sexual seduction. Hell, it’s worse than a bare breast. A pair of silk stockings is far more sexual than a bare breast could ever be.’

  Imogen gave a snort of laugher. ‘You know that’s just what someone else once said to me and he was a bastard.’ This was a dangerous conversation so it was convenient that at that precise moment a man entered the bar and Imogen experienced a pulse of alarm. Her whole body stiffened and her lips began to tremble. Today, she speculated, had not been a good day at all and now it was going to be made a whole lot worse by Gunter.

  Michael peered first at Imogen and next at the man who he could see had created a flutter around her and a discernible disturbance in the quiet pool of her reflection. Michael watched her lips tighten. She blinked once or twice and then she muttered under her breath, ‘Shit, here comes trouble again.’

  Gunter was like a missile in the way he homed in on Imogen. He was a large bear of a man with a pock-marked face and a small scar above his top lip. He possessed a savage, twisted expression as if he was extremely angry. Imogen didn’t shrink back, but she turned very pale and began fiddling with the clip on her purse. Gunter’s arm came out and, grabbing Imogen by the wrist, he tried to pull her off her stool. ‘You little whore, Imogen. I’ve been searching everywhe
re for you, do you think I have time for this? I guess I should have looked here first. Found the vixen in her lair.’

  ‘You’re hurting me,’ Imogen said, trying to pull her arm away. But, Gunter had locked on to it like a bull terrier and he was not about to let go.

  ‘I ought to smack you. You cunt broad,’ he said, raising his hand to slap her as his eyes flashed maliciously. ‘You can’t simply walk out like that. I booked you for a private party and you let me down. You made me look a real dickhead.’

  ‘Fuck off,’ Imogen retorted tightly. Her heart was pounding and she felt giddy. ‘You don’t own me. I just agreed to dance for your shitty little party, that’s all. But you didn’t warn me, huh. You didn’t warn me about the arsehole with the wandering hands. The slimeball went and put his hand on my cunt and I’d had enough.’

  ‘What do you expect? You’re nothing but a two-bit whore and you do nothing but provoke.’

  Immediately, Michael was on his feet. With one hand he gripped Gunter by the scruff of the neck and with the other he twisted the man’s arm up between his shoulder blades. ‘Whoa, hold on a minute, buster. Didn’t anyone ever tell you? You never raise a hand to a lady.’

  ‘And who do you think you are?’ Gunter replied, his lips parting in a watery grin. ‘You want me to knock your block off, because I will!’

  ‘You’re welcome to try,’ Michael said. ‘But you’ll be hearing from my attorney if you do. Do you know who I am? I’m Michael Levenstein?’ Michael rarely pulled rank but he felt a glow of satisfaction as he watched the man fold like a stack of cards.

  ‘Well OK, buster. Perhaps I overreacted a little. But Imogen, she ain’t no lady, and the both of us had an agreement. I paid her a small fortune for a private dance after her show.’

  Reaching in his wallet, Michael extracted a wad of German marks and he pushed them into Gunter’s jacket pocket. ‘Here’s what she owes you plus a bit of interest on the investment. Now you can go out and buy a more accommodating whore.’

  Gunter stared uncertainly at Michael, his eyes roving over him, from the tips of his two tone shoes to the top of his head, and then he shrugged. ‘Well, all I can say is good luck, buster. ’Cause you’re gonna need it.’

  Imogen shivered as she watched Gunter leave the bar, and then, tugging on her jacket, she slithered off the stool and picked her purse up off the counter. When she stood up, she was of average height but her legs were spectacular and disproportionately longer than her body. She was all leg and silk stockings and nothing much else. She was an erotic fantasy.

  ‘Thank you,’ Imogen said. ‘I could have handled it, though. I have to handle it, since my little whore world is full of nothing but pervy arseholes like him. It’s the nature of what I do. I’m a dancer and by now you’d think I’d have learnt a lesson or two about the kind of company I keep, wouldn’t you? But that’s just it, I don’t learn and I can’t be fussy.’ Raising her skirt she caressed her thigh before letting the fabric drop. ‘Silk stockings cost big bucks and what are you staring at?’ She placed her hands on her hips and waved her hand dismissively. ‘Yeah, yeah. I know what you’re going to say. I asked for it, I shouldn’t have lowered myself to dance for a slimeball like Gunter. But I’m nothing special and I have to put bread on the table.’ And then she stretched out one of her gorgeous legs and moved it this way and that. ‘Since I have this, it makes sense to sell it.’

  ‘It strikes me,’ Michael commented. ‘A woman with your class ought to watch who she’s associating with. So, you’re not a whore. But you prostitute your art, which is the art of wearing fine silk stockings. I don’t know which is worse. A straightforward whore plying her body, or a whore of the silk stocking.’

  ‘But you can afford to be fussy, Mr Michael Levenstein.’ She leaned so close to Michael her breath stroked his cheek. ‘I know who you are, you big shot. Only last month I saw your big shot attorney papa, in a fancy magazine, hey he’s standing for senator isn’t he? So, I wonder, do you have a secret too? Why do you work for a cosmetics company when you could be rolling in dough?’

  Michael laughed. ‘Sure, you got me there.’ He was straightening his tie. ‘But, it’s like this. ‘I’ve got reasons to be doing what I’m doing and I hazard a guess you’ve got reasons to be doing what you’re doing. I’m also not my father.’

  ‘You!’ She poked Michael in the breastbone. ‘You’re an argumentative pig and you think you have a clever way with words. But I like you. So, what the hell, I was lucky to be born with a gift, I have terrific legs and I’m a good dancer. Well.’ She drew herself up to her full height placing her hands on her hips. ‘In this world it’s often not enough just to have a gift. Now, if I was only a little more beautiful or a bit taller. Or, for instance, I’d been born into social advantage, things wouldn’t be this way. I’d be touring the world dancing like all the famous dancers or maybe like my mama, I’d be a fashion model and I’d model good hose.’ She fluttered her eyelashes as once again she saucily extended a splendid leg. ‘But that’s another story. Instead, I prostitute the legs as you say and I do it with class and I know how to wear a pair of good silk stockings. Men can’t take their eyes off my stockings.’ She drew her skirt up higher still, revealing the gorgeous hand made lace seams of her silk hose and a pair of dainty black satin suspenders and with a flick of her fingers she slid a card out of the top of one of her stockings and presented it to Michael with a flourish. ‘You see, I really am a dancer. I work for a decent burlesque club in one of the better parts of town.’ She did a toe tap on the floor, the silk stockings rippling like the surface of a glassy lake. Before moving her skirt this way and that she performed a number of sexy balletic movements with her leg. ‘But, it’s no ordinary show.’

  Hooking her heel behind Michael’s pants leg she ran her foot up the inside of his thigh before rocking back on her heels and laughing. ‘I’ve scandalised you, haven’t I? You don’t know what to make of me? Now, here’s what I think you should do. I think you should come and see me dance. All you have to do is show the card and say you’re a friend of Imogen’s and they’ll sit you in the front row. Then you’ll see what a prostitution of the leg’s truly about.’

  Leaning forward, she brushed his lips with a butterfly kiss, she couldn’t resist it. He looked so naïve, so fabulously sexy standing there with his tie askew and his messy blond hair flopping over his eyes. ‘Although you don’t think I do, I actually appreciate your kindness, Mr Levenstein.’

  Imogen’s heart had slowed down to a tick tock and she felt pleasantly warm and giddy as she looked into his face. She wanted to touch him and she did. She wanted to feel that warm male flesh and she wanted to fondle his tight nipples. She’d always liked a man’s nipples. Her hands slid under his jacket and caressed his hips. Michael was spellbound.

  ‘I’ll see you there, won’t I, Mr Levenstein?’ And she flashed him a smile. ‘You’ll come and watch me, won’t you?’ Then brushing his cheek with her lips, Imogen vanished between the tables.

  Chapter Three

  When he got back to his hotel room Michael would be alarmed to find one of Imogen’s silk stockings hanging from the inside pocket of his jacket. He’d take it out and sit and stare at it for a moment, unsure exactly what kind of message the gesture was meant to convey. She’d hidden it when she kissed him, since there was no other way the limp piece of silk could have come to be there. Earlier Imogen had taken off an old laddered hose and taking a new one, which she carried in her purse, she’d changed it. Because she liked Michael and she wanted him to think about her, she’d then cleverly placed the old hose in his pocket. That was one of the things about working in the kind of club she worked in, she rubbed shoulders with a lot of different people and one of them was a two-bit magician who had taught her a useful trick or two about hands in pockets.

  Michael would rub the stocking and stretch it across his fingers. Only hours before, the stocking had been fondling and kissing her skin like a glove, massaging her moist intimate places and
held in suspense above the throbbing woman part of her. When he held it to his nose it was laced with the odour of sweet cologne and an even sweeter musky feminine scent. The unique sex scent of Imogen. She had done it to deliberately provoke him and she’d succeeded, because she knew what he’d do with the silk stocking. Filled with a wild fetishistic urge, Michael would wrap it around his hand and, stripping out of his clothes, massage his entire naked body and then his dick with it, before folding the silk stocking over his cock and ejaculating into it.

  The next day he’d discover he was noticing women and the hose they wore as if it had become an addiction with him. Most women didn’t wear their hose in the way Imogen did, though. It was as if Imogen had honed his perception for silk stocking prostitution to perfection and spoilt the seduction possibilities of hose for the majority of the rest of the world’s female population.

  Chapter Four

  The club was dark and intimate, but unlike many Berlin strip clubs it possessed an element of class and sophistication. On a darkened stage, a procession of burlesque dancers appeared and disappeared from behind a heavy red brocade curtain, each dancer seeming to have a unique themed routine to do with her body or an item of clothing because that was what the Blue Palm Club did, it specialised in unique beauties.

  Michael was thrilled by the performances and found he was clapping each girl with evident enjoyment. One girl prostituted her breasts in a number of scintillating costumes and fringed sparkling tassels, while another prostituted her exceptional butt.

  When Imogen eventually appeared as the star turn, she was wearing a black tie and tails and she did a routine, which involved the use of a long silver topped cane, a top hat and a straight backed, elegant chair. The tails had been specially tailored to ride up her thighs and a longer than normal vent opened and closed to provide tantalising glances of her miniscule black panties, suspenders and her seamed black silk stockings. Her complicated dance routine was a symphony of erotic improvisation, involving a number of sexy dances around the carefully positioned chair on which Imogen posed to great effect and to much adulation and hand clapping.