Cast a Lover's Spell

by Claire Thompson

  Instead he tilted his head, saying softly, “You’re afraid to hurt me. You needn’t be, darling. I’m glad you feel safe enough to tell me no.” Anne, looking down at her hands, didn’t respond. After some moments Paul said softly, “As long as you’re waiting for me when I get back, that’s all I ask.”

  ~*~

  Paul leaned back in his first-class seat by the window, stretching his long legs. He was glad the seat beside him was empty as he wasn’t in the mood for cross-Atlantic chatter. That seat should have been occupied by Anne—beautiful, delicate, delicious Anne. Damn, it was his own fault she wasn’t. He should have been more sensitive to her need for some distance in the relationship. Just because he couldn’t get enough of her didn’t mean she felt the same way toward him. He’d pushed himself on her, ignoring the need to go slowly. He knew even his last request might well have been too much to ask. It might simply be too soon for Anne to learn to love again.

  “Excuse me, sir, would you care for the filet mignon or the chicken Marsala this evening?” Paul glanced up at the flight attendant, a pretty blonde with large blue eyes smiling down at him. Her breasts were very large, he noticed, the blow-up balloon variety mortal women had begun sporting in the last thirty years or so that confounded Paul. Who would want to implant balloons into their body? He understood the rationale—the desperate desire to be found appealing, but it made him sad. He imagined she probably had looked a good deal better with her natural A or B cup breasts or whatever she’d had before.

  Misinterpreting his gaze on her purchased perfection, the woman’s smile turned sly, her eyes narrowing as she allowed the tip of a very pink tongue to glide over her lower lip in what was meant to be a seductive gesture. Paul didn’t have to peek into her mind to know the thoughts there.

  “I’ll have the filet mignon, very rare,” he replied, not responding to her sexual subtext. Without invitation the woman slid into the vacant seat beside Paul, lightly touching his thigh with a well-manicured fingertip.

  “Are you enjoying the flight, sir? We have a stopover in Paris, the crew that is. I’m very familiar with the city, if you’d like a tour. A very personal tour…” Lightly she squeezed Paul’s thigh, moving closer so one plastic breast grazed his arm.

  Paul sat up straighter, pulling away. He was used to women making a move on him—it was a price he had to pay for his very good looks, usually a price he didn’t mind paying, he had to admit. But not today. This strange new feeling—this yearning melancholy—was something he needed to work through, to try to understand. It should have been Anne’s hand touching his thigh, a lover’s touch. Anne’s soft lovely breast teasing him, the round little nipples hidden beneath her blouse, waiting for him and him alone…

  “My name’s Stephanie,” the flight attendant added. “I’ll be serving you for the duration of the flight, in whatever way you need.” Again the pink tongue revealed itself. Paul looked over at the girl. She couldn’t be much more than twenty-five. Her heart was probably intact, not yet moved by real passion, not yet scratched by a love unrequited. Though just a month ago Paul might have availed himself of her charms, today his heart was firmly in the thrall of another.

  “Thank you, Stephanie. A glass of orange juice would do nicely about now.” Paul caught the petulant flash of annoyance that flitted over the young woman’s features, though it was only for an instant. Gracefully she stood, smoothing her short skirt over her slender thighs.

  With a radiant smile she leaned forward, pressing her breasts to show her cleavage to advantage. “Yes, sir. I’ll be right back with your juice and a nice plump pillow in case you’d like to take a nap before dinner.”

  Ten hours later Paul fell back gratefully against the pile of down pillows on the king-size bed in his Paris hotel, imagining for the moment Anne was beside him. The flight had been uneventful and on time. With nothing to declare, he’d breezed through customs at the airport. Paris was beautiful this time of year. How he would have loved to see Anne’s expression as she saw the city for the first time—the flowers blooming everywhere, the famous sights, the romantic cafés. They could have shared piping-hot buttery croissants and café au lait as they watched the boats sail by on the Canal St. Martin…

  Stop it, you idiot. Paul knew he was mooning like a lovesick boy. Really she had done him a favor. She was right too, and he knew it. They were moving too fast. Anne was just coming out of mourning, she needed time to adjust to someone new. He had been unfair in seeking to monopolize her every moment. He had pushed her away—frightened her with his intensity. Like the horses he used to train—he’d failed to read the signs of her skittishness. By the time he’d realized, she’d bolted.

  No, this week was just what they needed, what he needed. A chance to get his own head on straight. To give himself some space to figure out just what the hell he was doing. Away from her hypnotically beautiful eyes, away from the sweet curve of her breast, the sighs of pleasure when he stroked her, the intoxicating scent of her sex—away from Anne he could regain his bearings. Recall he was a warlock, impervious to love, most especially the love of a mere mortal.

  Yes, he would enjoy his week alone. He would take a stroll down the boulevard in the morning to the café on the corner that advertised fresh crêpes d’orange. He would attend his auctions, see what Paris had to offer. For now he would sleep, dreaming of no one.

  ~*~

  “Ah, Mr. Windsor. What a pleasant surprise to see you again.” Paul looked up from his second cup of very strong, quite delicious coffee. He was reading Le Monde, the French newspaper of record, and thus took a moment to switch back to English in his head. It was Stephanie the flight attendant, looking even younger now in low-cut blue jeans and a tight top that barely covered her substantial bosom. A little jewel glimmered at her bellybutton.

  “Please, call me Paul,” he said, rising politely.

  “Paul then. We’re staying at the same hotel.” She pointed to the large pink marble building. “I saw you this morning. May I?” She pointed to the empty chair at the table and Paul could hardly refuse. As they both sat she observed, “I see you’re reading Le Monde. Très impressive, monsieur.” Her accent was excellent.

  “Not really,” Paul answered. “I used to live in Paris, a number of years ago.” Seventy years ago actually, though he didn’t tell her that.

  Stephanie smiled. “So my offer of a guided tour obviously won’t be necessary. Perhaps you could show me something of the city. Something off the beaten path. I love to learn new things about a place. I’ve been here over forty times but each time I learn something new. J’adore Paris. I’ve got a three-day layover and not a thing to do.” She put her hand on his thigh. “If you had time, that is. I don’t want to be a nuisance.”

  Why not? He had no one else he wanted to see. Anne was half a world away. Perhaps the love he thought he felt for Anne was mere infatuation. That would be a good thing really. Why give his heart to someone he was sure to lose, if not to her own fickle youth, then to mortal death, here in the blink of an eye? Surely it was better to return to his more familiar ways, enjoying the attentions of many women, letting them adore him, lust for him, spread their legs for him? This Stephanie, why not start with her? If the desire was there, wouldn’t this be proof what he had thought he shared with Anne was nothing more than a passing fancy however intense it might have seemed?

  Stephanie was watching him, he realized. Paul smiled at her, his face now a mask of pleasant inscrutability. She smiled back, a blaze of white teeth against red painted lips. He slipped into the young woman’s mind. To his surprise he saw she really was interested in learning more about the city. She was bored and lonely and had a genuine fascination with Paris. Though just beneath this he detected her sexual desire toward him. He couldn’t suppress the slight smile as he noted she thought of him as an “older man”—though he presented as a man in his mid-thirties. To her he supposed that was old—for these mortals with their truncated sense of time that was already a third or more of his
life over.

  As Stephanie turned her blue-eyed gaze soulfully upon him, Paul could feel her sexual desire overtake her interest in sightseeing. Jesus, you’re hot. He thought for a moment she’d spoken out loud but no, the thought was merely pressing in her mind. She was imagining the two of them naked in a hot tub, drinking Champagne, their heads back in laughter. He was lifting her onto his lap, lowering her onto his no-doubt erect shaft. He really had to stop this eavesdropping—it wasn’t a gentlemanly thing to do. Stephanie smiled, drawing a finger along his leg. He didn’t stop her.

  “What’re you thinking?” he asked innocently.

  Her candor took him by surprise. “I’m thinking how good it’s going to feel when you fuck me.”

  ~*~

  “Maybe a nice hot bath.” Anne knew she had to do something. Sitting staring at the wall just wasn’t going to cut it. The thought of slipping into the warm water, closing her eyes, forgetting everything…why not? She’d just sent away the best thing to ever happen to her. She’d told the most incredible man she’d ever known she needed “space”, whatever the fuck that meant.

  No. She would not take a bath. She would not slide back into that old life, the life of a depressed widow, behaving as if she were eighty-two instead of thirty-two. And she hadn’t sent Paul away, not forever. She had just declined his invitation to join him in Paris for a week.

  Though she hadn’t admitted it to Paul and it certainly hadn’t been the deciding factor in her refusal to go with him, Anne was afraid to fly. Even though she understood the physics of it, just the thought of being that high up with only the wind to keep those tons of steel aloft made her jittery. Though she’d been forced to take the occasional business trip, she had white-knuckled it the whole way, irrationally convinced they would never make it. Yet somehow she’d always been delivered safely to her destination.

  Now, if she were to be involved with the cosmopolitan warlock, he would probably expect her to jet around the world with him on a regular basis. Maybe he could give her a magic potion to alleviate her anxiety.

  If he still wanted her when he came back, that is. Anne sighed. She knew she had taken a risk in refusing him. Paris was full of beautiful available women, eager to attach themselves to the dashing warlock. He might compare them to her, growing weary in his mind of her hesitation and her reservations—of her American prudery, Anne thought bitterly.

  She knew that wasn’t fair. Paul had been nothing but gracious, nothing but loving toward her. It wasn’t his fault she’d been frightened by the depth of their connection. It wasn’t his fault she’d never been with a man who could unlock her passions. Paul had found a sensuality in her she didn’t know she possessed, didn’t believe existed. While it was wild and exhilarating, it was also frightening. It was the most powerful experience of her life, yet she never felt more vulnerable or exposed as when Paul made love to her. Sometimes she longed to retreat back to the safety of being alone. Or to being with someone like Greg—someone who wouldn’t press her sensual envelope, to use Paul’s words, someone who wouldn’t expect so much from her in terms of sexual honesty.

  Greg had been content to take what he wanted, believing her when she said she needed nothing more. Back then she hadn’t. Back then Anne had been closed as tight as a rosebud, all potential. Now she was in bloom, to continue the metaphor, open and eager for Paul’s sensual sunlight. It was frightening to want someone so much—to need him.

  Yes, she finally acknowledged, it was good he would be gone for this week. It would give them both some perspective. It would give her a chance to regroup, to batten down the hatches that had come unhinged around her heart. In the meantime, she’d practice the spells he’d begun to teach her. Along with the incantation to render someone immobile, he’d given her a spell book less flowery than Clara de Absinthe’s but more practical. He had written it himself for another mortal a century before, he’d told her. None of the included spells and potions required genuine magic to perform, though a few of them did require oils and herbs with magic properties only a witch or warlock could create. The bulk of the items, mostly herbs, flowers and plants, could be found in a marketplace and she only needed a stove and iron pot to concoct the brews.

  She was especially interested in the truth powder, a mixture of herbs and magical oils that was to be blended in precise proportions and cooked down to a powder. He said she’d know she’d gotten it right if the powder, once thoroughly dry, was a very pale lavender. Any other color meant the results could be suspect.

  The powder was tasteless and dissolved easily in liquid. When imbibed by the unsuspecting subject, it compelled the person to be completely honest for a period of thirty to sixty minutes, depending upon the strength of the brew. She could think of any number of glib self-satisfied people she and Greg had used to work with, people she would love to serve some truth tea. She would demand the truth about their business dealings, their sense of ethics, their attitude toward women in the workplace and beyond—the list was endless.

  Not that she would actually follow through. She had no desire, she realized, to see any of the people who had comprised her world back then. Just the same, she had decided to try her hand at the concoction, to see what came of it. One never knew when a packet of truth powder might come in handy.

  Anne dressed in a light cotton sundress as summer had made an early debut, today warm and humid. She wrote a list of things she would need for the powder, copying them carefully from Paul’s angular, neat script. She didn’t know where to find the magical oils necessary to complete the potion but Paul had given her several small bottles, each meticulously labeled as to their contents and properties.

  Though it was only nine o’clock, the sun was already high and warm, making Anne glad she’d dressed accordingly. She didn’t notice the tall man moving back into the shadows along the side of her building as she walked down the stairs of her stoop and along the sidewalk toward the open-air market several blocks away.

  But he had noticed her. In fact, he only had eyes for her.

  ~*~

  “What have I done? What am I doing?” Paul looked down at the blonde head bobbing between his thighs. Her mouth was warm, the lips gliding over his cock as she cupped his balls. Her long nails were poking into his flesh, distracting him. She glanced coyly up at him, drawing her tongue seductively along his shaft in a display clearly designed to arouse him. Then down she went again, moving her head rapidly like a piston, no nuance, no subtlety, but plenty of tongue and practiced moans he knew were also designed to excite him.

  He should never have succumbed to her charms at the café. It had disarmed him when she’d admitted she wanted him to fuck her. In a moment of self-pity, he’d decided why not? Why not have a fling with this pretty young girl? She would take his mind off Anne, at least for a moment. He’d allowed her to lead him back to the hotel, to her room where she’d stripped for him, doing a sexy dance as she pulled each item from her hard over-tan body, tossing it toward him with a flourish.

  He knew before they began it was a mistake, but as he watched her undulating, naked and yearning, he let thoughts slide away from his mind. His cock took over, rising to greet the girl as she knelt in front of him, unzipping his pants and taking his semierect member in her hands. She’d pulled him to the unmade bed by his cock, pressing him to sit down against the sheets before kneeling between his thighs. She hardly seemed real—little more than a fantasy and someone else’s fantasy at that.

  How foolish this was—letting this poor girl seduce him when he knew his heart was a thousand miles away. It was unfair to Stephanie, unfair to himself, unfair to Anne. I’m no better than any mortal man, letting myself be led by my cock instead of my nobler instincts. What an ass I am.

  For though he’d wanted to pretend it was a relief Anne had sent him away, inside he had to admit at last it had cut him to the quick. He tried to remind himself Anne had simply expressed her honest need to take a breather, to make sense of their tumultuous love affair withou
t the distraction of her lover to confuse her. She hadn’t said it was over—only that she needed time.

  Stephanie drew up beside him in the large hotel bed. She lay on her back, her breasts defying gravity. She crossed her arms beneath them, her face a pout of angry disappointment. Paul realized he’d lost his erection, so distracted by his musings he’d forgotten to focus on the frenzied attentions of his would-be lover.

  Leaning up on an elbow, he said gently, “I’m sorry, Stephanie. I must be tired. I’m not used to transatlantic flying like you are. Must be jet lag.”

  “Yeah whatever.” Old fart. Figures I picked a dud. Probably a closet fag. Paul startled to hear her thoughts, thoughts he hadn’t meant to listen for. He couldn’t help the small smile at her words. If she only knew how old he really was. Poor girl—he couldn’t take offense at her silent rebuke. He knew the sort of woman she was—someone who derived her sense of self-worth almost entirely from her appearance and ability to seduce a man. He’d committed the ultimate sin by failing to be properly impressed by her beauty or properly aroused by her attentions.

  Gently he moved a tendril of her blonde hair from her cheek. She turned her head away. “Stephanie, look at me.” She turned toward him with a petulant frown as he locked her in his gaze, sending a magical message into her brain. All at once she smiled, the crease of irritation smoothing from between her brows, her expression softening.

  “I’m so sleepy,” she announced, stretching lavishly as he pulled the covers up over her. “I could sleep the entire day.” She closed her eyes with a dreamy sigh of contentment. She would sleep the entire day and when she awoke, she would not remember Paul Windsor. She would not remember he had been on her shift on the flight. She would not remember seeing him that morning at the café. She would not remember failing to seduce him with her limited charms. She would simply wake, feeling rested and refreshed, ready to enjoy the Paris nightlife without a care in the world.