The Mistress and the Mouse: Honeymoon Blues

by JJ Giles

  “You’ve brought us all back together again. Something we couldn’t do for ourselves.”

  “So what do Abernathys do?”

  A curious smile lit his face. “Actually, darling, I have spoken to Bryant. He rather liked the idea of Ladies’ Night in the tower dungeon. But there’s a condition.”

  “And that would be?”

  “No dominant women. Only submissive females.”

  A broad smile etched her features with delight.

  “Of course, there’s the annual trips to Colorado for skiing and elk hunting...”

  “Those are men-only affairs?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose we could make an exception. In March, we all haul it down to St. Maarten for the Abernathy Invitational Golf Tournament.”

  “Oh, this is exciting. It means I have to cut back on some work, though.”

  “Honey, that’s up to you. You certainly don’t have to work. Alex and I have agreed to pay the bills around here, since you refuse to take rent. And your very generous donation of a hundred acres for the business was very much appreciated.”

  “Brian and I both are very happy that you’re all here.”

  “And Cherry isn’t buggin’ you?”

  “Cherry’s wonderful. I’ve never been real close with a woman.”

  “That’s because you know what women are capable of, and you’re very protective of your men. But you don’t feel threatened by his sister. You don’t have to feel threatened by anyone. We love you.”

  “That’s hard for me to comprehend.”

  “I know. By the way, I asked Bryant to spend the night tonight.”

  She shrugged. “I won’t be here. He’s moving in, too?”

  “He might.”

  “But you know what? I have a terrible feeling about something.”

  “I’ll believe whatever you tell me because you red-haired witches are psychic, I know that.”

  “Something tells me Cheryl isn’t going to be left out of this.”

  “Honey, I knew that. And I’m going owe JD Rockingham for it.”

  * * * *

  Cheryl Abernathy had to rent a limo...how demeaning! That car dropped her at 1138 Hideaway Hill, the mansion across the street from where she once lived. Wearing a new gown, her make-up perfect, she strolled up the walk and rang the bell.

  “Whose there?” through the intercom.

  “Just little ol’ me,” she hissed.

  “Fucking bitch,” he whispered. “I’m not taking you to that wedding.”

  “Oh, but darling, you are,” she cooed. “Can I speak to Helena, please? I’m sure she’d love to hear about all those rotten things you and I enjoy together.”

  His eyes narrowed as he studied her a moment. Why the hell did she have to be his problem now? Jerry said he would have her dropped off at JD’s, and damned if he didn’t. Time for a payback.

  “Go get in the car.” Aggravated, he slammed the door in her face.

  * * * *

  Nervously, Alex stood before the mirror making the final adjustments, hopelessly excited about his family and their life together. Jerry seemed all too comfortable to have him around again. Jerry was even allowing him to attend the wedding as the mother of the groom, wearing this formal Abernathy original. Jerry was a new man, a man reborn, it seemed, and Alex smiled into the mirror as he retouched the mascara.

  A soft knock on the door was followed by Jerry standing inside the room. The very sight of him took Alex’s breath, but it was the way Jerry stared so wantonly, the way his dark eyes flared a little, that made Alex shiver.

  “You...are a handsome creature,” Jerry gasped.

  Alex turned, the lamé gown flowing over his narrow hips like a soft breeze. “Our son...” he whispered wistfully.

  “Yes,” Jerry said softly. “Our son. I can’t thank you enough for that.”

  “Oh, Jerry.” He met Jerry halfway and fell into his arms. “This is the happiest day of my life.”

  Jerry embraced him a little tighter and then let go. “Since Brian mentioned the villa, I can’t help but be haunted by the worst day of our lives.”

  Alex tightened at the thought of it. Gently, he pulled Jerry in the direction of the settee and settled him into it. Quite properly, Alex sat close, his hand on Jerry’s thigh. “That was thirty-seven years ago, Jerry.”

  “You’d think I could get over it by now, wouldn’t you?”

  “I never will.” Nervously, he grabbed for a cigarette and fumbled with the lighter until Jerry took the lighter from him to help. “I hated that man. I still hate that man.”

  Jerry merely stared at the soft yellow carpet carved into a pattern of vines and leaves.

  “You almost died,” Alex gasped. Tears began to drip over a flawless make-up job. “Jerry, there was no reason for it. There can’t be a reason for it.”

  “He was our father.” Tenderly, his hand raised to stroke Alex’s jaw, reveling in the softness of the skin. For the first time in thirty-seven years, Jerry admitted, “He found me...in our bed...making love to you.”

  Alex quivered to hear such tender words from the only man he ever truly loved. “And then he jerked you out of bed, raped you and beat you within an inch of your life. You don’t know what that did to me to have to watch him murder you. My God, your skull was fractured. Thirteen broken bones, your liver detached, you lost a kidney! And then I went to the hospital and he had security at the fucking door. I couldn’t get near you. I couldn’t get into the hospital much less to your room. And then he put you in a hospital plane and took you out of Italy and left me there. I hate that motherfucker. You almost died.”

  Ah, the bitter frailties of human existence. “I did die that day. Jerry Abernathy died, and what you see now rose from the ashes to live Jerome Abernathy’s life.”

  “This is not your fault. Everyone was afraid of him. They had cause to be. There isn’t a soul in this world who cared for him. Not even our mother. Jerry, he murdered our mother. Too many babies too close together and she was too weak to give birth again. Died before Gerald was completely born. That day you’re thinking of was not your fault.”

  “Do you mean that, Alex?” Still, Jerry was unable to look at him. “You really don’t blame me?”

  “No,” Alex gasped. “I was hoping that when he died, things between you and I could be rectified...”

  Quickly, Jerry turned. “You mean that sincerely?”

  “Jerry, I’ve waited for you for thirty-seven years. I’m waiting for you still.”

  Jerry’s arm wound around Alex waist and pulled him close. “I don’t deserve you.”

  “Stop. Just stop. That man is going to haunt us the rest of our lives, we know that. And after what he did to us, he drew the blade out by putting that bitch in between us. She raped me, knowing she would get knocked up, and he paid her for it. Only to divide us further, he made you raise my son.”

  “It’s not entirely his fault.”

  “Goddamnit, it is. He told you to love her so you loved her. Put up with her for thirty fucking five years. It’s insane. What the hell was the problem with us being so hopelessly in love anyway?”

  “We’re brothers...twins, maybe?”

  “Bullshit. The love we shared was the kind the poets write anthems about. I like to think we were once upon a time legendary lovers and we returned to this plane to love again. Undivided. Joined at the heart.”

  Wistfully, Jerry smiled. “Wouldn’t that be something! Romeo and Juliet, Anthony and Cleopatra. Isolde and Tristan, Arthur and Guenivere returned as Alex and Jerry.” For a long moment, he held Alex’s hand to his lips. Yet he let go and rose from the settee. Toward the window he moved where guests were already arrived and chatted amidst the foxglove around the fountain. “Can you forgive me?”

  “Oh, Jerry.” Alex ran to him. Like a candle melts to the flame, he wrapped around Jerry. “Honey, this is not your fault. I hope that old miser is hovering near now. I hope he can witness this day from his vantage in hell. It was
not your fault. You died, Jerry. He murdered you. And I’ll forever be grateful to Morgan for breathing a little life back into you. For restoring you. For giving you the courage to face me again, to remember what once we shared and not be ashamed of it any longer.”

  Jerry’s heart suddenly felt as if it might burst holding Alex in his arms. He had spent the better part of his life miserable without this man. “I care for her very much. I’m in love with her, too.”

  Alex stood back a little and stared directly into Jerry, little rivulets of mascara dripping down his cheeks. “Too?”

  “Yes. Yes, Alex.” Jerry’s lips brushed over his. “Yes.” Wantonly, he devoured the man in his arms with uninhibited passion.

  Alex fell into breathless rapture as his heart pounded and his stomach convulsed to the feel of Jerry’s passionate insistence. Jerry’s embrace was every bit as firm and debilitating as always it was. But they had been little more than children then, and Alex had always wondered if it wasn’t merely a childhood fantasy, one that was embellished, enriched every time it was remembered.

  But this was no fantasy. This was what Alex remembered so well and cried out in the night for. This was all he ever desired, the feel of Jerry’s lips on his, Jerry’s tongue exploring his mouth, just Jerry coming into him and seizing him with love.

  Only at length did Jerry release Alex with few fervent kisses. He peered into those soft brown eyes dripping with black mascara. “I have missed you so desperately.”

  “Jerry. I’ve waited for you to come back to me for so long. I was determined to die waiting only for you. But I have something to tell you.”

  “What?”

  “When the villa came to you and I as an inheritance, I knew you wouldn’t go there. I went there often because it was the last place...”

  Jerry nodded, deeply affected by Alex’s love.

  “I had the entire thing gutted and redesigned. It’s completely new except for the exterior, and Brian is going to redesign the gardens soon. I threw the mattress soaked with your blood out the window and set it on fire. But everything there is different now. You won’t recognize it. You won’t have to remember it or relive it ever again. I very much hope you’ll enjoy the master suite, not the same room mom and dad used to use.”

  A deep sigh escaped as once again he took Alex in his arms. “God, I love you,” he whispered. His kisses were a profusion of that love spilling from his heart.

  “And you and I and our baby and his wife can be together now. How generous Morgan is to accept us into her life.”

  “Yes. You don’t know how I’ve missed you.”

  “I think I do, and I know the tortured life you’ve lived and prayed everyday that somehow it would come to an end. Ironically, it took Cheryl to push you over the edge of sanity. Gratefully, Morgan was at the bottom to break your fall.”

  With a little laugh, Jerry whispered, “Yeah. I was just about to explode when Brian forced her into my life. And all the errors of my life are put right now.”

  Alex smiled. “They are. And we can go to the villa Monday and you’ll see it for yourself. The last of your demons are cast back to hell.”

  Gratefully, Jerry nodded and fell back to the bed. Alex descended gracefully between Jerry’s knees and clutched to his legs. “And you’re okay?”

  “Today is turning out to be the first day of the rest of our lives.”

  “Yes...yes, I think so. And Monday, we’re off on our honeymoon.”

  So swelled with happiness, Alex laughed. Yet it was cut short by a pernicious laughter echoing up the stone wall of the estate and spilling through the window. “Oh, God, don’t tell me!” He leapt from his knees and peered out. “Your fucking sister showed up with her oh-so-special professional tennis-playing whore on her arm.”

  Jerry huffed and went to the window. “I think today she can be your sister.”

  “Fuck her. I even called her to tell her it would be a rather drab affair, nothing at all to get excited about. I should have went with my instincts and trashed the invitation Brian addressed to her.”

  But Jerry only stared, her resemblance to their father uncanny...and frightening. “She’s so much like Dad.”

  “Yes, she is. It wouldn’t surprise me to know he’s inhabited her body just to continue to torture us.”

  The very thought made Jerry’s blood congeal, even as he clung to Alex. But he only drew in a deep breath to cure the ache in his heart. “We’ll have her thrown out if need be. I’ve got fifty security agents on the job.”

  “Do it now before she has a chance to screw everything up.”

  “I oughta let Morgan have at her. But speaking of Morgan...”

  Alex glanced at the clock. “Yes. I need to go do something with this.” His hands twirled in front of his face, knowing he looked like a clown caught in a rainstorm. “And then go get our bride ready.”

  “But your first and last dance is mine.”

  With that, Alex burst into tears again. Jerry helped him to the bathroom, and sat him in the chair before the mirror. “I’ll help Brian. You get Morgan ready.”

  * * * *

  Morgan paced her bedroom wearing only the stockings, garter belt and shoes Alex sent earlier, cute little platforms of royal blue leather tied around her ankles. Her nails were lacquered in shimmering pearl. But she could do nothing more than pace until she heard the rap on the door.

  To see the stateliest woman she ever laid eyes on, she swore, “St. Genevieve.” But it wasn’t a woman at all. “You’re beautiful.” The soft brown ringlets of a wig were pulled back in diamond clasps with matching earrings. A diamond tennis bracelet and rings decorating each hand, the nails painted the same silver as the dress.

  “No, darling. You’re beautiful. I’ve achieved the status of matronly,” Alex said softly. “Now...let’s get you dressed.”

  She peered across the room at her new mother-in-law. “I’m getting married.”

  “Yes, you are, Precious. What you’ve done for my son and my brother I’ll be eternally grateful for.” Tears began to well again, but Alex forced them back. Still he was flustered, hearing that pernicious laughter ring in his ears, knowing Jerry was now confronting the very incarnation of evil. “Come.” Gently, he led her to the bathroom.

  She sat as still as she possibly could while he finished her make-up. While he took the scissors and clipped the stray strands about her face, letting it fall seductively in layers from her jaw line to her chest, curving in a little. And then he led her back to the bedroom where her dress had been delivered.

  Alex unzipped the garment bag. “You know Brian has been telling me about you for years, dear. I felt like I already knew you. All I needed was your sizes to make this for you.”

  “I’m so excited! Please.”

  Broadly, Alex smiled, his lips shimmering in the softest shade of rose. She hurried to the bed to see the zipper opened even further. Her breath stopped to see the plastic laid back to expose it. Her expression frozen in near shock, she merely stared.

  “Do you love it?”

  Uncontrollably her hands shook as her fingers wobbled aimlessly. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  “When you take it off today, we’ll have it cleaned and displayed in the peach room downstairs on a mannequin I’m having made.”

  “I’ll never take it off.”

  Quite delighted, Alex picked up the hangar and pushed the plastic away from it to expose the entire dress.

  “It’s incredible.”

  “I felt that royal blue was just perfect for our bride to set her off perfectly. Cream colors would make you look like a ghost.”

  “Of course.” But it was the acceptance of who she was, what she was in the dress that made her shiver. “I can’t believe it.”

  “Brian suggested this and I had to agree. So come...come come come!”

  She advanced unable to tear her eyes away from it. She bent low to let it slip over her head. Very gently, Alex slipped the bronzed serpentine chains ov
er her shoulders, the only straps on this gown, and she watched in the mirror as he reached into the bodice and lifted her bare breasts into it.

  “Alex.” She was ready to faint.

  But he only laughed and moved behind her to lace the bodice as he would one of her corsets.

  The thin sheered leather gathered horizontally in soft folds around her torso, yet plunged to the center of her body, directing the viewer’s attention between her legs. The leather that lay over her breasts was delicately embroidered in matching thread, twining around her breasts, the tiniest of vines and leaves ending in a flourish of petals cut out in the center, leaving tiny holes to reveal the flush of her skin. The skirt of the softest leather was a little fuller, freer around her hips, yet flared at the bottom to swirl with her movements and thin enough to hang in the same soft folds as the gown.

  “Do you love it?”

  She gasped. “I’m the most beautiful woman in the world right now.”

  He smiled and went for the gloves.

  It was the same sheered leather, and they weren’t exactly gloves. A single loop wrapped around her middle finger and the piece that lay over her hand was of the same embroidery and cutwork as the bodice of this gown. Quickly, he laced those all the way to her elbows.

  “Oh, God,” she whispered as she held to her stomach.

  “You gonna throw up?”

  “I’m not sure. You don’t know what this means to me.”

  “We love you.” Tenderly, he kissed her cheek. “And by the way...what makes you think I wouldn’t take this opportunity to show off my talents to my wicked family?”

  “I’ve just never seen anything like it.”

  “Now...we’ll get rid of this fifteen-foot train after the pictures and dinner and leave you with only this pretty little fantail for dancing. And should it get a little chilly tonight, I added this little bolero...” He held up the jacket and let her stare. It was the same gorgeous leather, embroidered and pierced, designed only to cover her shoulders and arms and leave her mountainous breasts to the fore. The long sleeves ended in scallops with a piercing in the very center of each.