by Jewel Geffen
Angela knows how to push my buttons, though, and then some. If she wants a conflict, it might not be so easy to hold back from rising to the bait. Whatever she's doing in the portrait room, it's surely been engineered to get under my skin. She expects me to do something stupid.
I'll just have to not oblige her in that, if possible.
I look back over my shoulder. Victoria is standing in the middle of the dance hall, watching the couples swirling around her. She looks heartbreakingly beautiful. For a moment I'm not sure how I could ever have thought that she was a twin to Angela, clearly there's no more than a passing resemblance. Victoria is entirely different, a finer and sweeter creature by far. I won't be leaving her long.
* * *
I stand behind the bar in the little sitting room, and I pour myself a glass of wine. I drink it down in one long go, then pour myself another, my eyes never during the entire process leaving the door across the room, the one behind which my collection of portraits resides.
I can hear her voice, Angela's. She's moaning rhythmically, occasionally letting out a yelp and a husky chuckle of sensual delight. I already know what I'm going to find behind that door, I knew it the moment I came within earshot. A part of me, perhaps, knew it from the first moment that Melody told me they were in here.
I set my glass aside and I come out from behind the bar. I take a deep breath, my hand on the doorknob, near a dozen years of my life's history flashing before my eyes as I turn it, and I step inside.
Angela is dressed – or half-dressed is perhaps more accurate – in a gown of crushed red velvet. At the moment it's pulled down to expose her full breasts as they sway gently back and forth, one of them cupped in her hands. Her elbows are resting on a little table that she must have dragged in from the sitting room. A document sits on it, uncapped pen rolling on the surface. The bottom of her dress is pushed up around her hips, exposing her rump, which is currently lifted up into the air. Her knees bent and her eyes shut, lips open. Her red panties are on the floor, still tangled around one ankle. A portly Englishman is standing behind her, his thick hands gripping her hips as he thrusts his cock into her, grunting with every push.
The eyes of my paintings gaze impassively down upon them, none more intently nor more impassively than that of Angela herself, like some grim mirror overlooking the scene.
My wife looks up when she hears the door open. Her face is flushed, cheeks red, though certainly not with shame. Her gaze is defiant – triumphant, almost. She gives a low moan of sexual satisfaction as the man behind her leans into a deep thrust, and her fingers curl around the edge of the little table.
“Antoine, dearest,” she pants, “I was hoping you would join us. You remember Victor, of course?”
Chapter Seven
I come slowly into the room, walking along the far wall with my hands in my pockets, not saying a word.
The man's panting and grunting with exertion, his face ruddy with an awful and primal sort of satisfaction as he fucks my wife. His eyes are locked on mine. His pale skin is splotchy, his nose red from too much drink. How old is Victor now? He had a decade or so on me, must be pushing fifty now, and not carrying it especially well.
This is the man my wife has chosen over me? It's baffling, really, that she would pick him, an out of shape boorish white man, over myself – cultured and obscenely wealthy, my ebony body a sculpted image of perfection. Strange...
Still, the heart wants what it wants, I suppose.
“Don't play dumb, Moreau,” the man says, his thick British accent a low growl, “speak up now. Come on, it's a party!”
“Maybe he's feeling shy?” Angela says, her lips curved wickedly.
“Not at all,” I say, looking up at one of my paintings. Maya Rabin, a pretty girl with curly hair who'd been obsessed with the idea of getting pregnant by me. She never succeed, but not for lack of trying on her part. I'd been tempted to go through with it, so intense was her ardor. “I'm simply trying to figure something out.”
“Oh yeah?” Victor says, “what's that?” He slaps Angela's rump with the flat of his hand, his crooked grin widening a little more.
I turn to look at them both, my arms crossed over my chest. “I'm trying to figure out who you think you're impressing with this tawdry little display.”
Angela cackles, wriggling her bottom against her lover. Her breasts sway from side to side.
Victor doesn't see the humor, however. He frowns deeply, his mustache bristling. “Stings, don't it, Moreau? Seeing her take my cock like a good little slut? She's been mine now as long as she was ever yours.”
I laugh softly. “That's a good point. Do be sure to watch your back, Victor, she'll be dumping you next.”
His face turns beet red. “We're getting married, you prick.”
“Ah, well if it's marriage then, you'll be fine. You know as well as I do how much respect my wife has for the institution of matrimony.”
I hadn't thought it possible, but his face gets even redder. He seems about to speak when Angela cuts him off. “Come now, boys, don't go fighting over me.”
I eye her coldly. “I'll try to restrain myself.”
It seems likely now that she came back here, at least in some part, hoping to inflame in me a sense of jealousy, and by so doing throw me off balance. Before seeing her I would have thought that entirely too likely. Now that we're in the same room, however, and she's naked in front of me like this, all I can bring myself to feel is a sense of contempt. The love I had for her is gone, all of it evaporated in an instant when I came through the door.
It's almost funny. I realize now that I've spent the last five years trying to get over her. Each one of these portraits, at least in some part, was a kind of therapy. So many hours, days, years spent pining over her. And, in the end, seeing her once again was all the cure I needed.
“Listen here, Moreau,” Victor sputters, “here's the deal: I'm going to fuck your wife, and you're going to sign that damned paper there. You understand?”
“I understand perfectly. My lawyer examined the copy you were good enough to furnish him with this morning – thank you for that, Angela. It seems that everything is in order. I'll sign it. You really needn't have troubled yourselves by coming down here and making a spectacle of yourselves.”
Victor sneers. “Your wife thought you needed to see this, just to convince you that it really was over for you. Teach you a good lesson too, while we were about it.” He grins lecherously, and reaches around to cup one of my wife's breasts in his hand, and he gives it a hard squeeze. “So tasty, even after all these years. Miss 'em, Moreau?”
I look at them both for a long moment, study the expressions on their faces: Victor's, gloating and triumphant, and Angela's, carefully guarded. Finally, it occurs to me what's really going on here. It's so simple that it's almost impossible to believe, but as soon as it comes to mind I realize that it must be true. I can't help but let out a chuckle, and shake my head at the audacity of it.
Victor's smile slips. “What you laughing about?” he demands.
I look at Angela and just grin. “Did you really think this would work?” I say.
“What's he talking about?”
Her expression, if anything, becomes even more guarded. “I don't know, Victor.”
“It's simple,” I say, and round on them, my hands clasped behind my back, “she's tired of you, Victor. You've become a bore, and she's no use left for you. She's decided she wants to come back to me.”
He scoffs. “Maybe you didn't look at those papers close enough, Moreau. This is pitiful, really. It must drive you mad seeing me fuck her like this; it's made you give leave of your senses.”
I just shake my head. “Ah, but that's the point, isn't it? She's trying to drive me mad, trying to make me react, trying to make me fight for her. No offense, Victor, but you wouldn't stand a chance if it came to that.”
He just stares at me, mouth agape and mouth twisted with growing anger.
I turn to Angel
a, who's considering me coolly, imperious in her nakedness. “That's what really upset you, isn't it? It's that I didn't come and take you back after he stole you from me. I almost did, you know. When it first happened I almost lost control. I'll bet you remember that. And now that you're tired of him, you think you can provoke it again, make me wrestle you away from him and then take you back like nothing ever happened, is that right? Well... I don't think so.”
“He's talking rubbish, Angie!” Victor blustered, “Tell him to shove it.”
She's glaring at me. “You always did think you were so damned smart.”
“It's not going to work, Angela,” I say, very calmly, “It's over between us. Really over.”
Victor's just looking back and forth between us, first at her and then at me, his eyes getting wider and wider by the second. Finally, he lets out a bellow of bovine rage and rushes at me, not even bothering to pull up his pants properly. He lunges towards me, fists raised and little white cock waggling out of his fly, and he takes a swing.
I step easily out of the way of the blow and return one of my own, a clean strike to his sternum with the flat of my palm that sends him flying back. He tumbles head over heads, slamming into the wall and smashing his head right through the portrait of Angela which was hanging there in its place of honor. He slumps to the floor with a grunt.
Angela rises, pulling her dress up over her breasts. “What do you think you're doing, Antoine!” she snaps.
“What I should have done a long time ago,” I say, and step forward to seize the pen on the table. I scribble my signature on the divorce papers and toss the pen back down to the floor. “Goodbye, Angela. If you'll excuse me, there's someone I need to go see. I trust you'll be able to let yourselves out.”
She makes a move as if to protest, but pulls back, quivering with frustration and frozen by indecision.
Without another word I turn on my heel and stride towards the door. At the last moment I look back and nod to my now-ex-wife's ruined portrait. “Oh, and you can take the picture if you like. I don't need it any longer.”
Chapter Eight
“Sorry about that. I hope I haven't missed anything too exciting.”
Victoria turns to look at me, and I can feel my heart swelling at the way her face lights up when she hears my voice.
“Missed a hell of a show, that's for sure,” Jason says, shaking his head in admiration.
They're in one of the viewing rooms with another six people – two women and four men. All eyes are glued to the screen where a certain young girl in a serving outfit is taking a pair of cocks, one in her ass and one in her pussy as she's lifted up into the air by a pair of large black men who stand one on either side of her, their hands interlocked as they lift her up and down on their huge erections. Melody Johnson's face is turned up in agonized ecstasy as they use her.
“I didn't realize the help was getting into the fray, Mr. Moreau,” one of the women says, a little grin tugging at her lips and a twinkle in her eye. “How delightful.”
I just shake my head. Well, that answers that question. “A special case, it seems.”
“Well, good for her,” one of the men says, a husband whose attention has left his own wife's exploits to watch this scene, his eyes laser-focused on the action unfolding in front of him.
“Hear, hear,” murmurs another, and the two of them clank glasses.
I slide down into the couch next to Victoria and let my arm rest behind her shoulders. For the first time since I saw Angela in my rooms, days ago now, I can feel myself relaxing. The tension has seemed to dissipate, the weight lifting off my shoulders and fading away into nothing.
Victoria leans into me slightly. I let my fingers caress her bare shoulder gently, just teasing it with the lightest of touches. I'm in no rush.
“You like watching?” I ask, my voice soft, meant for her alone.
“I never have before,” she says, blushing a little, “I'm...I mean, I'm not into that kind of thing. It's just... isn't that Melo-”
I put a finger to her lips. “We don't use names here,” I murmur. “Here, you can be anybody you want to be. The outside world doesn't follow you.”
“But... it's her, isn't it? I know her. At least, I thought I did,” she says, and laughs a little.
I chuckle back. “As did I. Sometimes people surprise you, I guess.”
“So, she's never...”
“Never before. At least not that I know of.”
Victoria smirks conspiratorially and whispers, “I wonder if she's got a boyfriend in town or not... I'll bet she's not going to tell him about this.”
“I don't imagine she will. Unless he's the sort of man who likes to hear about such things being done to his fiancé.” From what I recall of the gentleman, whom I'd seen before once or twice and been introduced to the previous year, he wasn't the sort who was going to be turned on by our little kink world here. But then, that only made it better. She hadn't been able to resist.
“His fiancé?” she whispers back, eyebrows high.
I laugh softly. “Don't sound so shocked! Remember where you are, after all. This could be just a final dalliance before tying the knot, or maybe she intends with fit him with the cuckold's horns. He wouldn't be the first to wear them by any means.”
Victoria shakes her head slowly. “It's strange... I mean, you're right. I'm here, I'm doing this... but it still seems strange, somehow. Why do we do this, what's the reason?”
I shrug. “There are any number of explanations. Evolutionary imperative... temptation of the devil... or even just plain old human contrariness. We live in a constant flux, torn between our desires and our attempts to master those desires.”
She leans back against me, gazing up at my face, her clear blue eyes wide open. “You've mastered mine,” she murmurs.
“Have I?”
She nods, very slightly. “You have. You're the only think I want.”
“Come away with me,” I say, and the words startle me. Where is this coming from? I hadn't meant to say it.
She blinks. “Come away where?”
“Anywhere. Let me take you; let me steal you away from Jason. Be mine.” The words are tumbling out in a heady rush; I feel unable to stop them. We're still talking in low hushed voices, and everyone's attention is still fixed on the screens.
“What are you talking about, Antoine?” she says, frowning slightly.
“I'm talking about leaving him,” I say.
Is that really what I want? To take Victoria for my own, to... marry her? A moment ago I'd resolved never to marry anyone every again, never to be caught in that trap the likes of which Angela had kept me so long ensnared, the one I've delighted in violating for so long. As soon as I felt her warm body against mine, however, something had changed in me, a wire sparking, lines crossing in my mind, and the desire had flooded through me, the need for her, to possess her.
I touch her cheek and lift her face to mine. I kiss her softly, still speaking, touching my lips to her between every word. “Let me... show you things... the likes of which you... couldn't imagine...”
“Antoine...”
“Don't speak... just think about it.” My hands slide down her naked back. “Make love to me.”
“Right now...?”
“Right now, right here... in front of everyone. I want you to fuck me.”
“But I...”
“Victoria.”
She casts her eyes down, blushing red. “Y-yes sir,” she whispers.
“Take off your dress,” I whisper, shifting back into the cushion.
She leans back, her slender pale hands rising to the place behind her neck where her dress meets, working at it clumsily for a moment. Her hands are shaking. I can feel her thigh against my own, can feel the heat of her body, the desire in her. She's playing at resistance, but she's been waiting for me to ask this of her since she first set foot on that ferry, and we both know it.
The clasp of her gown comes away, and the silk falls in a sile
nt tumble. Her pale and shapely breasts are exposed, round and soft, heavy C cups perfectly formed like warm teardrops. The rose pink nipples are like drops of candy, just begging to be sucked. Her hands slide up her sides to caress them, lifting them and pressing them together. Her skin is so soft and pure, I feel half-mesmerized by the sight of her breasts rubbing gently one against the other.
The others are turning their attention gradually away from the screens and towards her. Jason doesn't yet seem to have noticed, his eyes fixed upon the screen and his hand moving slightly in his pocket. He'll have something far more present to pleasure himself to shortly.
Victoria rises, standing slowly and moving a little towards the center of the little space, her hips swaying slightly up and down as she moves, sensuous and seductive in the extreme. My eyes and hers are locked together throughout, her clear blue gaze never leaving mine. Her silver dress falls from her with a whisper, sliding off her hips and down her thighs as if it had turned suddenly to sand.
She smiles slightly, and I see that she came here without panties on under the gown. More than that, she's shaved. The pale swell of her soft mound seems to glow in the diffuse light as she stands before the screen.
Standing there in front of the image of the wildly fucking young woman and given rhythm by the sensual crescendo of the symphony coming through the speakers, Victoria begins to dance.
She moves amazingly, in complete command of her body as only a trained yoga instructor and dancer can be. Her finely toned muscles and soft sweet body sway a move, undulating as she dances, her hands sliding along her flanks and over her ripe breasts.
It's a strange and enticing performance, with none of the stiff elegance of ballet, nor the crass gyrations of stripper dancing, but something different, a sinuous and breathtaking oriental sort of display. As I watch her hips and bottom move from side to side I feel my arousal building within me. My hand moves as if of its own accord to rest on my inner thigh.