by Eden Myles
“Did you see your friends this weekend?” Robert finally asked when he’d finished his childhood story.
“You mean Malcolm and his friends? No, I stayed in to work on the accounts.”
Robert sipped his tea and raised an eyebrow at that. “Is there a problem?”
“I’m not sure, to be honest. I’d like to do a bit more work before I bring anything to you.”
Robert didn’t push. He knew that if it was important enough, I would tell him. “Very well. Lunch at one?” he said, consulting his watch. He and I usually enjoyed a long lunch on Monday to discuss our clients and our goals for the week.
“One sounds good,” I told him. “How does the Sakura sound?”
The Sakura was one of the more elegant Japanese restaurants in Lower Manhattan, but it sold food you could actually eat.
“It sounds like you, my pet,” Robert told me, setting his mug down to take my hand and brush a brief kiss just below my knuckles. “Down to earth and elegant.” He gave me a very Japanese bow before skirting off to his office.
***
Around the time I split from Brent, our firm took on a new client—Harper House, one of the “big seven,” in New York publishing. The VP, Malcolm Sloan, was an amazing businessman who’d been featured in Businessweek and the WSJ many times over. I’d considered it an honor to take him on. Not long after, he’d admitted to feeling the same way about his association with me, even going so far as to foolishly call me a phenom in the law industry. Were it anyone else, I would have said he was hitting on me, but Malcolm was gayer than Elton John.
Not long after, he’d invited me to join his little society of gentlemen at their exclusive sex club. I’d been lonely and horny at the time, and I’d never really been the quiet, shy type, so I gave him the benefit of the doubt. Three years later, I was still attending Dollhouse meetings semi-regularly. It had felt odd at first, being the only female there, but I was Malcolm’s boon, and Malcolm was powerful, both in the business world as well as the Society. He felt it was time the gentlemen accepted a woman among their ranks.
In the beginning, I’d been happy to use and be used. The meetings were held once a month, the sex tasteful, yet decadent, and the gentleman pleasant, for the most part. But I quickly learned how incredibly depressing the meet-ups could be—at least for those among us without courtesans or courtiers. It was a little bit like window-shopping when you were more than capable of affording the merchandise.
“We missed you over the weekend,” Malcolm said, lounging in the leather wing chair that sat cattycorner to my vast oak desk, one leg crossed over the other. He was shorter than me, round and completely unremarkable—and yet his presence filled my office to overflowing. He was one of the most powerful men I had ever met, but he wore his power well, like a Roman emperor with nothing to prove. How did that saying go? An iron hand in a silk glove? He sipped the tea I’d poured for him, pinning me with eyes that I swore had the laser power to burn holes through steel walls. “You should have popped round. Christian debuted his new courtier. It was a lovely performance. Very inspiring.”
He’d visited me this afternoon because of a Copyright concern he had with one of his better known authors, but that was business we could have taken care of on the phone. I knew he’d come to sniff out why I, his personal weapon in the war to liberate the Society from its more old fashioned mores, was in hiding.
“It was work,” I said, cutting him off before he could speculate me into the ground. I loved Malcolm, but he was like a terrier when he got his teeth into something. “We’re having accounting issues, Malc. I promise it was nothing personal.”
“Ah. I see.”
I slid off my glasses and gave him a surly look. He was wearing one of those I-know-what-you’re-up-to-and-I’m-trying-to-be-polite-about-it expressions that Malcolm was famous for. He shrugged innocently. “I was afraid you might be in a bit of a fugue.”
I raised an eyebrow at that. Leave it to Malcolm Sloan to use a word like fugue.
He gestured toward me with his cup and saucer. “Sometimes, if a gentleman—or a lady, in your case—remains…unattached at the Dollhouse over an extended amount of time, it can cause some unwanted anxiety.”
“You can’t be serious?” I complained, folding my glass and running a hand over my long blond corporate topknot and ponytail.
“I’ve seen it happen, Margo. When I invited my best friend Ian Sterling to join the Society, it was right after his wife died. He was with us three years and I saw the toll it took on him. Thankfully, he found a wonderful young woman to play with. It can be quite emotionally draining, watching the gentleman and their trained courtesans play, but having no partner of your own.”
I wasn’t about to admit to that. “I assure you, I’m in complete control of my emotions.”
Malcolm sighed. “May I speak plainly, Margo Faulkner?”
That teased a grin out of me. “Don’t you always, Malcolm Sloan?”
He took a sip of tea and said, “My dear, I have complete confidence in you. If I had not, I never would have extended an invitation to the Dollhouse to you.”
“But…”
“But,” he continued, raising his cup in a salute, “we gentleman are, after all, only human. And vulnerable. In fact, we are most vulnerable when we lay our hearts down at the feet of a courtesan or courtier. They see us as the strong one, Margo, the one in charge. But in reality it’s they that hold all the keys to the kingdom.”
I sighed internally, realizing his reasoning was probably right. In the beginning, I’d looked forward to Society meetings. Now I sought ways of filling my calendar up so I wouldn’t have to attend every meeting. I didn’t like the sadness—the “fugue,” as he called it—that infused me while I was there. Watching the gentlemen and their partners play only seemed to remind me that my time might never come around—and that if it did, I would be the vulnerable one. Malcolm’s observation annoyed me.
I’d grown up in the Bronx, a poor girl. When I was thirteen years old, a boy I knew from an upscale school in Chelsea asked me out on my first date. I never even stopped to question why he would be interested in a girl from the wrong side of the tracks, but after a short trip downtown in his convertible, I quickly learned. While down in the warehouse district, he and several of his rich playboy friends jumped me. They took turns raping and beating me until I was unconscious. One of the boys tried to cut my throat but either lost his nerve or had poor aim, and he’d wound up cutting my cheek instead. All of the boys had rich fathers, so none of them had ever gone to prison for their crime.
I’d kept the scar as a token of my own stupidity, and as a reminder to not give away my trust so easily. These days, I kept my relationships clean and simple, sex with no attachments. I’d given myself—really given myself—to only one man, and he had divorced me, betrayed me, and tried to take everything I owned. All I had to do was touch the scar on my cheek to remind myself not to let my own vulnerability get the better of me.
I hadn’t been the type of gal to lie down and die in that alley all those years ago, or in the courtroom when Brent tried to strip me of all I owned. I wouldn’t do it now.
I made my decision in that moment. “You know, Malcolm, you’re right. It’s time I get a courtier,” I told him. I slid my glasses back on and gave him a determined, sharklike smile. “Next month will be my debut. That I promise you.”
***
At half past noon, I carried the elegant little tray of California roll sushi in its basket into Robert’s office, kicked his door closed, and set it down on his desk, along with the bottle of sauvignon blanc I’d brought. Robert looked up from the contract he was poring over and said, “I thought we were going out to lunch?”
“I’ve decided to eat in.” I popped the cork and poured him a glass of wine, being sure to lean forward just a little so my cleavage was on display. “Join me.”
Robert sat back in his seat, observing me through his glasses. “You fascinate me, Margo,” he sai
d as I laid out a tablecloth across his cluttered desktop and set our wine glasses down, along with the tray of sushi, making a kind of improvised picnic on top of his workspace.
“Oh?”
“Never asking me, only telling me.”
“You like that about me,” I reminded him, handing him his glass of wine. “What did you call it once? My man’s mind? Besides, I want to discuss something with you in private.”
He looked me over like he was appreciating something other than my man’s mind. “The accounting issue.”
“No, I’m still working on that.” I sat down on the edge of his desk and crossed my legs. My pinstriped business suit fit me exactly, tailored to my tall, curvy form, and I wore my jacket exactly one size too small. It pushed my heavy breasts up so they peeked out the top of my open-throated dress shirt. He noticed, but he wouldn’t comment or stare too long. The thing about Robert was, he was always a gentleman.
I had never been the type to beat around the proverbial bush about anything, so I took a deep breath and said, “Robert, I want to tell you about my weekend. All my weekends. At least, the ones I’ve spent at the Dollhouse.”
For almost five minutes after I explained about the Society, and what I wanted from him, Robert Burkett sat staring at me. I thought it was possible he was waiting for a punch line, or for me to tell him I was pulling his leg. As the silence stretched out uncomfortably between us, I felt my heart beating thickly against the wall of my chest. I was surprised to find my hands sweating around the stem of my wine glass. I was frightened that he would turn me down.
Finally, when I could stand it no longer, I said, “If you need a few days to think about it, that’s fine. You don’t need to give me an answer right away.”
Robert finally blinked and said, “You’re perfectly serious about this…proposal. About being your…what is it called? A courtier?”
“Perfectly.”
“May I ask a personal question, Margo?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Why me?”
I hadn’t expected that he would ask that particular question. “You’re my…Robert.” I’d almost said soul mate. “Why wouldn’t I choose you?”
“All those young studs in the office walking about, and you choose an old horse?”
I hoped that was the beginnings of a yes. I leaned forward so I was stretched catlike atop his desk and did something I had never done with Robert before. I leaned forward and touched his cheek. I thought how it was funny that we had never touched until this moment. Not really. Not in any friendly or intimate sense. Even at Joanne’s funeral, I had held Robert’s hand briefly, but we hadn’t hugged. He hadn’t cried in front of me, though I knew he’d wanted to. “Robert, you’re a beautiful man, and you’re my best friend. I want you. I want you to be my courtier.”
I looked into Robert’s eyes and recognized the sincerity of his lust. That was good. It was almost enough to make him mine. He lifted his hand and brushed his thumb softly against the scar on my cheek, a feathery touch that sent pulses of desire throbbing through me.
I closed my eyes and clutched his hand against my face. “Sit and think on it. Tell me at the end of this week if you wish to go into this with me.” I took his hand and kissed it. Then I leaned forward and kissed his lips, sweetened with wine. “I promise there is no one else I want more than you.”
***
On Friday afternoon, at six o’clock, Robert stepped into my office and closed the door. “If we decide to do this, Margo, I’ll need to be made aware of the rules.”
I turned from my filing cabinet, caught off guard by his statement. It had been a rough week at the office. Besides the barrage of high-profile clients we’d entertained, we’d also made the uncomfortable discovery that a quarter of a million dollars of company money had gone missing. In the ensuing chaos, my proposal to Robert over lunch on Monday had been nearly forgotten—well, not forgotten, exactly. I’d spent quite a few nights with my vibrator this week, dreaming of the things I could do to him. But the crisis here at the office had been a definite buzz killer.
My heart was knocking in my throat. “Then you’ve decided.”
Robert went to sit on the edge of my desk. Unlike his, I kept mine strictly organized, control freak that I was, though I didn’t mind that Robert liked to work in what I secretly called his personal paper-storm. It was just what made Robert Robert, crunchy earthy and sweet. “I admit I have my reservations. I’m not much of an exhibitionist, I’m afraid.” He picked up my favorite coffee mug, the one I left on my desk for all to see, the one that read, Big Boss Lady in block letters. “How did you ever get to be this way, Margo?”
“What way?”
He waved the mug. “A femdom. I Wiki-ed it.”
I bit back a smile. “I was born this way, Robert. And I’m not a femdom. I’m a dominant. I’m what the Society calls a lady.”
“So what shall I call you, then? Milady?”
I closed the filing cabinet. “Yes, call me that.” The missing funds had left no trail, but at the moment, I didn’t want to concentrate on business woes. The weekend stretched ahead of us and I decided I had more important things to interest me.
Things like a certain, grey-eyed, sweet-faced angel of a man. I reached for my suit coat and said, “Why not let your lady take you to dinner, Robert? We’ll work out all the details.”
***
Over some Goan cuisine at our favorite Indian café in the West Village, I explained what I expected of Robert. He spooned prawn curry carefully into his mouth as I spoke, only interrupting me when he was unclear about something I’d said. I half expected him to laugh at me, or to tell me I was crazy, but he seemed to be taking this very seriously.
After that, we were both very open about our past sexual experiences, and we each discussed both our soft and hard limits. We reassured each other that we were clean and free of disease, that I had adequate birth control, and we were not currently involved in any other relationships. That was important to me. Some gentlemen I knew were more open-minded about such things, allowing their companion to live this whole other single’s life on the side, but I was a little old fashioned in that regard. I wanted my courtier all to myself, no other players involved.
We told very frank stories about ourselves, got to know each other all over again. I was amused to learn that Robert hadn’t had sex for the first time until he was almost twenty-six years old. It had been with an older woman and had been a disaster. I told him about my first real boyfriend in college and how he had opened my eyes to the world of BDSM. I told him about my years working as a professional domme to put myself through college. I had never told anyone that, not even Malcolm. To his credit, Robert said that was interesting, and made a joke about how much simpler sex seemed to be back in the 1970’s, when he was a young man. I didn’t discuss my attack when I was thirteen years old. Maybe one day, I thought, but not tonight. I wanted tonight special; I didn’t want it all about my emotional baggage.
We drove back to the penthouse apartment that the firm had given me when I first went to work for Robert and I invited him upstairs. Despite our close friendship, I had never had him in my loft. In fact, I had never invited anyone from work home, period, keeping both worlds separate until now. I kept the place spare and modern, decorated in a vast, white, neo-Grecian motif—I’d always had a fascination with ancient Greece—a time when pleasure and luxury meant something—and the sparseness prevented me having to do a lot of housecleaning since I didn’t employ a maid. I knew my reluctance to let anyone I didn’t know and trust into my inner sanctum was yet another symptom of my obsessive need to control my environment and protect myself, but I couldn’t help it. Just because you can see you have a problem doesn’t necessarily mean you can control it.
Robert circled the main living space with his suit coat over his arm, looking at some of the erotic photography I had collected over the years like someone perusing a normal gallery on a Sunday afternoon down in SoHo. Much had be
en shot by Malcolm—Malcolm with his potent, old fashioned eye toward his beautiful sepia men and women. I was a huge fan of Malcolm’s photography. It suddenly occurred to me that I felt very comfortable with Robert being here, seeing the things I loved, seeing inside me.
Finally, he turned to me. “They’re quite good, aren’t they?”
“I’m glad you like them.” My voice was gruff and low. Were I talking to Robert my best friend, I would have added something funny and self-deprecating like, I was afraid you might think I was perverted or something. Then we would both laugh and drink Irish coffee and discuss it. But that wasn’t the relationship I had with him just at the moment. We weren’t friends, colleagues, or even girlfriend and boyfriend. I was a lady and he was my courtier, my sexual companion.
I was wet. I wanted to take him to bed, work him, make every inch of his body mine. I realized I hadn’t felt this level of lust and excitement in years. I moved up behind him and slid my arms around his waist. I buried my face in the side of his neck and inhaled the sweet, lemony cologne he wore. I feathered kisses under his ear and slid my hand down the firm muscles of his lower belly. He was partially erect already. I squeezed the bulge in his trousers, finding it sizable. “Come to bed with me?”
“If it’s what milady wants.” His Wenglish accent made it sound delightfully medieval.
I led him to my bedroom. I had spent a great deal of time and money decorating it. The floors were black and white checked parquet, and Byzantine-style Boiserie covered the walls from floor to ceiling, carven by a talented indie artist I’d found online. Likewise, I’d had the same artist paint Romantic-style murals of gods, heroes and wars all over my ceiling. Thronos, stools, couches, footstools and klismos chairs were scattered around the vast room. Tall white columns were draped with real ivy. My Greek bedstead was vast and beautifully simple, with lion paw feet, entirely custom made, and covered in soft red velvet throw pillows.
