‘Oh come on, Elaine!’ Jasmine answered. ‘Wouldn’t it be wonderful, to have two fine young men fighting over you, willing to risk being injured for the sake of your favour? OK, maybe that’s not your thing, as you’re only into girls, but can’t you imagine it? What about you, Caroline?’
‘I have to admit the idea turns me on,’ Caroline answered, ‘but it’s not really very practical, is it?’
‘Why not?’ Steelhand asked. ‘We fence a little, I pink Mephistopheles in the shoulder, or perhaps the leg, and that’s that – a demonstration well made by me and a lesson well learned by him.’
‘The lesson being?’ Adam demanded.
‘That a very real difference exists between people like you and myself,’ Steelhand answered. ‘Or if you don’t even have the courage to face me you can apologise, although I might have to spank you. If you accept but fail to turn up, I’ll definitely spank you, at a club, in front of everybody, Jasmine included.’
‘Do you have to be such a bully, Mark?’ Elaine demanded.
‘Don’t worry,’ Adam assured her, ‘I’m quite capable of looking after myself, and I’m not backing down. Also, as you’re the one who’s challenging me, doesn’t that give me choice of weapons, Mark?’
‘That’s traditional,’ said Steelhand, with a shrug.
‘Good,’ Adam answered. ‘In that case, I choose pistols.’
He watched Steelhand as he spoke and thought he detected a flicker of unease before the reply came.
‘That would be a very foolish choice.’
Adam laughed.
‘What are you going to do, you fucking buffoon? Shoot me down in cold blood and spend the rest of your life in a prison cell?’
Steelhand’s face went dark with anger, but he managed to compose himself, his voice cold as he addressed Adam. ‘Very well, if that’s the way you want it, and as you seem keen on formality, no doubt you’ll allow me the choice of time and place? I suggest dawn tomorrow, on Chobham Common in Surrey.’
‘Chobham Common sounds reasonable,’ said Adam, ‘but I can’t do tomorrow. I have to go up to Oxford first thing, to see my old tutor. Besides, I have to get hold of a pair of duelling pistols.’
‘Are you taking this seriously?’ Steelhand demanded. ‘Because I am.’
‘Absolutely,’ Adam assured him in the same matter-of-fact voice, ‘but I can’t do tomorrow. I can probably pick up some pistols in Oxford, though. Thursday?’
‘Thursday at dawn,’ Steelhand responded and walked away.
Chapter Eight
‘You’re not really going to fight Mark, are you?’ Elaine asked as Adam accelerated onto the A40. ‘I thought you had more sense.’
‘I intend to be on Chobham Common on Thursday morning,’ Adam answered her, ‘and I intend to have a pair of duelling pistols with me, but he won’t be there. He’s a bully, nothing more, and the thing to do with bullies is to call their bluff.’
‘Well, he sounds serious to me,’ said Elaine. ‘Della’s already sent a text with the exact details of where we’re to meet.’
‘There’ll be some excuse, you’ll see,’ Adam assured her. ‘Anyway, down to business. This is all a bit awkward. I really should have told Dr Burling about the deal with Haardt-Biomass at the start, and definitely before the business with Pointe Verte. He’s a nice man, but he seemed very insistent on seeing me in person and it might take a lot of tact to come to an agreement with him, so I’m relying on you to exert your charm as much as your legal skills …’
He continued to talk as they drove west and north, explaining the situation and answering Elaine’s occasional questions. It was difficult to keep his mind on the task in hand, with the constant, sickening doubt that Steelhand might prove not to be bluffing after all, and worry for what might be going on in London. He’d considered inviting Jasmine to Oxford despite her capricious behaviour, although it seemed unwise when Elaine would be in her professional role. After some discussion, they’d left her at Caroline’s flat with one ankle shackled to a ring in the wall, an arrangement which had turned her on so much he’d had to fuck her in front of both girls before she’d let him leave. Caroline was under strict instructions not to let anybody in, especially not Steelhand, although it seemed unlikely he would do anything, but just the thought of him touching Jasmine was now enough to make Adam’s stomach twist in cold rage.
Only Elaine’s calm, detached manner allowed him to focus on their discussion, and by the time they reached the Oxford Ring Road they had agreed on what to do. Adam had already begun to feel nostalgia for the time he’d spent at the university and explained his choice of accommodation to her as they drove through St Clement’s.
‘Once you’ve been accepted at a college you become a member for life, unless you do something really appalling. That gives you the right to stay there, if there’s room, so we could use either of my old colleges. Newton’s modern, relatively, built in the ’30s with architecture in the best traditions of Albert Speer. St Michael’s is the real thing, built with stone from Headington Quarry in 1548, so not the oldest by any means, but undoubtedly the most beautiful. That’s where we’re staying, and here we are.’
As they crossed Magdalen Bridge the terraced houses and ordinary streets were left behind, to be replaced by the pale-gold stone of the ancient colleges, a multitude of sunlit spires set against the eggshell-blue sky.
‘Beautiful,’ Elaine said as they turned into St Michael’s. ‘It must be wonderful to be able to stay here whenever you like.’
‘Almost whenever I like,’ Adam replied. ‘Fellows and guests of fellows have priority, but it’s usually possible to get the smaller rooms. I’ve booked us one each, naturally.’
He stopped to speak to the college porters through the car park intercom and didn’t hear Elaine’s answer, then as he pulled his car into a space he saw Dr Burling himself, walking towards them along the paved cloister that led to the rear gates. Introductions were quickly made, but Adam was struck by his old tutor’s curious, almost apologetic manner, which was very different from what he’d been expecting.
‘I might as well tell you now as later,’ Dr Burling stated as they started back along the cloisters. ‘As you may remember, I was working on a book, just a piece of populist genetics designed to make the subject a little more accessible to the general public. I’ve now finished, and it’s been far more successful than I’d anticipated, mainly because it has been chosen as a GCSE text, for general science as well as biology.’
‘That sounds very positive,’ said Adam, increasingly puzzled.
‘The thing is,’ Dr Burling continued, ‘the success of the book is due in no small part to your work rather than to mine. I thought the idea of the black rose might capture the public imagination, and it has, to an extent that’s quite taken me aback. I was already beginning to feel a little guilty, but when you contacted me the other week about this business with Pointe Verte, I thought it would be best to ask you to come up and see me.’
‘Thank you,’ Adam began, ‘but …’
‘The book,’ Dr Burling went on, ‘is called The Black Rose and the Altered Eggplant, the latter from my own research, of course. The cover is illustrated with one of those beautiful photographs you took of your first successful plants. I have given you the relevant credits, naturally, but there is the question of royalties,’
‘I don’t expect a penny,’ Adam answered him. ‘Far from it. In fact, I’d assumed you wanted to talk about my deal with Haardt-Biomass and your contribution to my research.’
Dr Burling gave a somewhat self-conscious laugh, echoed by Adam, then carried on.
‘I’m sure it can all be worked out, with a little assistance from Miss McNeil, but let us set that aside for the time being. I’ve taken the liberty of booking you into the Fellows’ Common Room for lunch, and having a bottle of something you’ll remember with fondness dredged up from the cellar – the La Chapelle ’78. We’ve improved our stocks of Port as well, although they still fall shor
t of what I was used to at Corpus.’
‘I’d forgotten you were at Cambridge,’ Adam replied. ‘I don’t suppose you knew anybody called Mark Langley? Although he’d probably be a few years after your time.’
‘Mark Langley? No, not at all, I’m afraid, but I could make enquiries.’
Adam and Elaine lay in a rosy glow brought on by lunch at St Michael’s – quails’ eggs, asparagus, venison from the college’s own herd, pineapple in kirsch, and Stilton washed down with a Port older than either of them. They’d then retired to their rooms, glad of a chance to rest before their official meeting with Dr Burling, who had a tutorial in the early afternoon. The two guest rooms were side by side, three floors above the main cloisters, and looked out over the college water meadows. Elaine had gone to her own room first but quickly returned to Adam’s, to flop down in a chair while he lay flat on his bed.
‘Do they always eat like that here?’ she asked. ‘And if so, why don’t you weigh 30 stone?’
‘Hall is much less grand,’ Adam explained. ‘The Fellows’ Common Room is a bit like an exclusive restaurant, only for special occasions. That’s the thing about Oxford, and Cambridge. The stuff you read about – huge dinners, strange medieval customs, mad old scholars studying archaic and abstruse subjects – it’s all there, but only as a tiny part of the whole. Which reminds me, Oxford also has the sort of antique shops in which we should be able to find a pair of duelling pistols – or should that be a brace of duelling pistols?’
‘Neither, if you’ve got any sense,’ she answered. ‘He really is mad enough to do it, you know. When a reporter tried to bribe him to help with an exposé of Juliette’s Masque, he took the guy’s camera away and threatened to make him eat it.’
‘Threatened to,’ Adam replied. ‘That’s the thing about Steelhand, he’s all talk. He claims he’s fought two duels already, which you’d think might get noticed, but can I find anything on the net? No. The second one was supposed to be against an Italian count and in defence of a lady’s honour, but doesn’t that strike you as being a little too conveniently romantic? The man makes Baron Münchhausen seem reserved and truthful. However, given that you’re convinced I’m going to get shot on Thursday, perhaps you’d be kind enough to grant me a dying wish?’
‘Which is?’ Elaine asked cautiously.
‘I won’t ask you to get up,’ he went on, ‘not after that lunch, but it would be ever so sweet of you to unfasten your blouse so that I can admire your lovely breasts while I come.’
‘I suppose so,’ she sighed, ‘but you really are the limit. Shall I take my glasses off?’
‘No, I like you with them on. I’ll just lock the door, then.’
‘Don’t bother. I locked it when I came in. Out with your cock, then, you dirty little pervert.’
Adam complied eagerly, propping himself up to improve the view and quickly pulling his cock and balls from his fly. Elaine watched, her hands on the top button of her smart white blouse, which she tweaked open as he began to stroke himself. All she revealed was the first swell of her breasts, then a tiny piece of white lace, but his cock began to grow immediately. A second button popped open and he was given a full view of her cleavage, with each well-rounded breast cupped in white silk and edged with lace.
‘You do get excited over me, don’t you?’ she said softly as he took a grip on his now swollen shaft. I thought you might not, once you’d had me, and with little Jasmine at your beck and call.’
‘Are you crazy?’ Adam demanded. ‘You’re beautiful, and what happened at the lake just makes it easier.’
Elaine smiled and undid a third button, allowing her to pull her blouse open in such a way that the sides pushed her breasts up and together. Her nipples showed through the silk of her bra and she began to tease the little bumps, tickling each in turn with a single finger until they’d grown properly stiff. Adam slowed down a little, not wanting to waste himself too soon, although the sight of Elaine with just her bra showing would have been enough.
‘It was fun in France,’ she went on, ‘and it was sweet of you not to try and take more than I was willing to offer, which is why I chose you to be the one to take my virginity. I had to have it, you see, just to know what it was like, and … for personal reasons. You were the right man. There – I’m quite big, aren’t I?’
She unfastened her bra as she spoke, then lifted the silk cups clear of her breasts before holding them up for his inspection – two generous handfuls of soft, pink flesh topped by straining nipples. Adam nodded, entranced by the way she was playing with her breasts and also thinking of how she’d felt in his arms beside the lake in France, and beneath him, with his cock pushing into her virgin cunt.
As if responding to his thoughts, she quickly lifted her bottom and tugged up the tight, knee-length skirt of her navy blue suit to allow her to open her legs, just enough to show off the tops of her stockings, twin suspender straps stretched taut over the soft flesh of her thighs, and the bulge of her pussy beneath white silk panties.
‘Is that better?’ she asked. ‘You like to see a lot, don’t you? What is it with you men? You’re never content with the pretty bits, you always want to see it all – boobs and bums, but pussies too, every little detail. You really like to rob us of our modesty, don’t you? To have us with our legs wide apart and everything open, even if it’s only to look at, or on our hands and knees with our bottoms in the air and our cunts all bare, and our bottom- holes. Why do men love to see girl’s bottom-holes so? Is it because it’s rude?’
‘I don’t know and I don’t care,’ Adam gasped, ‘but I want to see yours, right now. Please, Elaine, I’m begging you! Sorry, but …’
She laughed and slid forward in her chair, to roll her legs high and tug her panties up over the cheeks of her bottom, showing herself off in a position every bit as rude as she’d described, her cunt on full show and her bottom-hole making an inviting star between her open cheeks. Adam was mumbling his thanks as he began to tug on his cock with full force, already at the edge of orgasm, but Elaine wasn’t finished.
‘You wanted to spank me like this, didn’t you?’ she taunted. ‘With my bottom all bare and my legs up as if I was having my nappy changed, didn’t you, you dirty little boy? Oh yes you did, Adam Tyler, you wanted to spank me just like this, like you’d put me in a nappy and decided a spanking was needed before you covered me up. It’s a good position isn’t it, Adam? A really humiliating position for the poor girl, with her pussy and bumhole both showing, and a lovely one for the boy, because …’
She broke off, laughing, as come erupted from Adam’s cock, all over his hand and all over the bed. As he’d climaxed, his head had been full of confusing pictures – of Elaine naked by the lake and Jasmine strapped down on the fucking machine with her bottom spread for entry. And there had been one last image too – strange, compelling and taken from fantasy rather than memory – of both girls in nothing but huge, white nappies, with their smacked bottom cheeks peeping out beyond the edges of the soft material. An image so perverse that, as his orgasm faded, it left an echo of shame, the first he’d experienced in some time.
‘You …’ he sighed as he cast around for something to clean himself up with. ‘You’re worse than Jasmine, sometimes.’
‘I can play the brat too,’ she answered as she tugged her panties down her legs. ‘Here, have these, they’re wet anyway and I’ve got some clean ones in my travel bag.’
Adam caught the white silk panties and began to mop up, wondering if Elaine was going to masturbate in turn, but she simply rose and walked into the bathroom, her bottom wiggling bare behind her. He blew out his breath, wondering how far things might have gone if he’d been able to hold back but sure of only one thing – that he’d have had to let her call the shots.
A glance at his watch showed that it was 20 minutes until their appointment with Dr Burling, and he entered the bathroom as soon as Elaine was finished. She went to her room for fresh panties and returned, brisk and efficient onc
e more, every inch the reserved younger lawyer. Indeed, she seemed so cool, smart and professional that it was close to impossible to imagine her showing off her bottom-hole to help a man come.
‘This is going to be a lot easier than I’d anticipated,’ she said as they reached the foot of the staircase, ‘but I need to know if you’re content with a mutual agreement that you won’t benefit from each other’s work?’
‘That seems the best choice,’ Adam agreed. ‘I don’t want to get bogged down, and I certainly don’t want any publicity.’
‘You may find you get that anyway,’ she answered, ‘but only among those interested in science, so I doubt it will be a problem. Where are we going?’
‘His rooms are in New Quad,’ Adam explained, ‘built in the seventeenth century, through here.’
He led the way through a narrow, arched passage and up a stair much like the one they were staying on, to a door of iron-bound oak on the first floor. A student was just coming out, allowing them to go straight in to where Dr Burling was seated in an armchair of worn green leather.
‘Ah, Adam, Elaine,’ he greeted them. ‘Before I forget, you asked about a Mark Langley. Well, I have your answer, and a most peculiar fellow he is, apparently. He came up in ’91, as a theology student at St Jude’s, and was sent down in almost record-breaking time.’
‘Theology?’ Adam asked in surprise.
‘So it seems, although of course that may simply have represented his best chance of getting in, as is so often the case with undergraduates. I don’t suppose for a moment it was a calling, especially as he was something of a Lothario, with some highly peculiar habits, if rumour is to be believed.’
‘Peculiar habits?’ Adam queried.
‘Oh, yes,’ Dr Burling assured them. ‘Apparently, he would stride about the town in a long, leather coat, as if he owned the place, and when he managed to persuade young ladies to come back to his rooms, he used to … ah, er … tie them up and spank them, if you’ll excuse my lack of discretion, Miss McNeil.’
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