by Eden Myles
I said a silent prayer to a God I wasn’t sure I even believed in anymore that Tiberius would find his one true love in the end, someone who truly deserved him. Then I clutched the winter lilies in my arms, took a deep breath to calm my rampaging heartbeat, and started down the aisle. I was halfway there when I heard the doors of the church fly open behind me and a gust of cold snow blew into the warmth of the church, snuffing out some of the votive candles.
I stopped and turned even as the organ screeched to a halt.
Rupert and Darcy stood to either side of the tall church doors, holding them wide open while a fury of snow drifted inward. And within that white holocaust I saw the distinct, kingly shape of Tiberius Sloan on horseback, riding up the steps of the church. They had planned this! I made a gasping noise as he trotted Gunmetal right through the doors and down the aisle past me. He gave me a fierce look of both pride and concern, then clip-clopped down the cobblestones to where the vicar stood looking on in horror at how his church was being abused.
Tiberius ignored him. He turned his attention on Mr. Van Tassel, who had begun sputtering demands for an explanation for all this, but Tiberius cut him off with a barking command. Turning to the people in the pews, he narrowed his keen eyes and said, “This man, Mr. Emmett Van Tassel, is forcing Miss Lucille Van der Meer to marry his half brother Stuart as part of his scheme to take control of the Van der Meer Mill and destroy his competition. If he is allowed to see his plans to fruition, he will destroy this town and its economy…”
“That accusation is preposterous!” Mr. Van Tassel interrupted.
But Tiberius went on by saying, “After they are married, his half brother and his new bride will have a most unfortunate accident. Of that, you can be assured. Then all the assets of the mill will automatically belong to Mr. Van Tassel. He is a cur, a moneylender, and now, a murderer…”
His accusation was drowned out by the people in the pews who had begun muttering amongst themselves. I could tell they were confused, that they were having a hard time believing Tiberius’s story. I was wondering how I might convince them of the truth when Stuart spoke up suddenly, surprising me. “Mr. Sloan is right. This arrangement is a sham,” he said, stepping into the aisle. He looked at me and I saw genuine concern. “My brother asked me to specifically court Miss Van der Meer. I had nothing to do with any of this. And I don’t want anything more to do with it…!”
“Stuart, shut up and stay where you are!” Mr. Van Tassel said, and pulled a flintlock pistol from the inside of his coat pocket. Stuart, suddenly panicked at the sight of his brother’s gun, turned to race down the aisle instead. Mr. Van Tassel, his face boiling with rage, tracked Stuart’s retreat. “You ungrateful little cur!” he spat.
Tiberius lunged forward, intending to get Gunmetal between the gun and Stuart, but before he could, the giant tattooed Chinese saw what he was doing and grabbed at Tiberius’s leg, dragging him down off the horse. The gun spat smoke and fire and Stuart dropped to the floor of the church inches away from me, clawing at my hem. I gave a cry and fell too, sliding in the snow billowing in and the sudden spurt of blood from Stuart’s chest.
Everyone in the church began to panic, then. The women, and some of the men, began to race for the door. Charlotte, Darcy, Rupert and Nellie leaped forward to help me with Stuart, who was gasping and shuddering in the blood and snow on the floor. What Stuart had done was wrong, but he hardly deserved this! I helped them drag Stuart out of the aisle and away from the fleeing people, though the stain on the front of his shirt was growing exponentially larger as I watched it. I dropped down to my knees, ripped the hem from my gown, bundled in some snow, and pressed the cold compress to the wound near his clavicle to staunch the bleeding. “Oh Stuart,” I said. It wasn’t his heart, and I knew he would survive it if we were able to stop the bleeding.
I was peripherally aware of Tiberius engaging in fisticuffs with the giant Chinese. He punched the Chinese square in the jaw with such force I heard a distinct crack. The Chinese howled in pain and grabbed the front of Tiberius’s jacket and threw him into the votive table, knocking over dozens of candles. The Chinese, despite his great size, was on Tiberius in seconds, punching and jabbing at his belly, but Tiberius was a cavalryman and he knew how to fight. The two quickly became a blur of fists and grunts.
Meanwhile, Mr. Van Tassel looked at Stuart bleeding all over the floor of the church, then broke out in a panic for the door. “Rupert!” I said, and my cousin locked eyes with me and nodded once before turning and tripping up Mr. Van Tassel.
The man stumbled over him and crashed to the floor on his knees. Rupert attempted to hold him down, but he swung the butt of the empty pistol at my cousin, colliding with his jaw and knocking him to the floor—Rupert who was neither a fighter nor a very large man.
A surge of rage dragged me to my feet as I watched my cousin shudder from the blow that Mr. Van Tassel had delivered him. “Charlotte, take care of Stuart,” I said, and bolted down the aisle to where Gunmetal was clopping around excitedly and trying to eat my scattering of fallen lilies. I stopped when I saw the Chinese on his back, holding a pistol on Tiberius, who half crouch over the man.
“Is this the man you want to serve?” I yelled at the Chinese. “A man who shot his own brother?” The Chinese looked up at my words. His face showed indecision. My voice boomed with insult. “A man who has enslaved your own people?”
It was all the opportunity that Tiberius needed. He snatched the pistol away from the Chinese and struck him with it so he fell back like a huge bag of flour. Then Tiberius turned to me. “Thank you, Lucky.”
I grabbed Gunmetal’s reins. “How did you know?” I asked. “How did you know to come here?”
Tiberius stood tall and looked at me with those wise, keen eyes of his. “I’ve lain with you for months, Lucky Van der Meer. You’re my courtesan. My woman,” he said, using the words on me that I had used on him the night of the Sinterklaas celebration. “I know every part of your body. Don’t you think I know when you’re lying?” He smiled then, a little. “Beside, you agreed to marry me. You never would have gone back on that promise. You’re too stubborn.”
“And you’re a fool, Tiberius Sloan. All that poetry for an unworthy bride.”
He looked briefly mortified that I should know his secret, then his military-inspired bearing kicked in again and he blanked his expression professionally. “You are more than worth any effort, my bride.”
“Such nonsense,” I said and leaned forward to palm his cheek and kiss him ravenously, reveling in the warm familiarity of his lips. As I pulled away, I said, “Fetch a doctor for Stuart. He’s not a bad man, and he certainly deserves better than to die.” A dangerous numbness was overtaking me, the same as when I hunted a wild animal threatening my people. I thought about all the people that Mr. Van Tassel had harmed—all the people he would continue to hard, were he allowed to get away with this. I mounted Gunmetal and turned his head to the doors of the church, but Tiberius snatched at my reins.
“Where are you going?” he demanded to know.
I pulled the gun from my garter and shook off Tiberius’s hold. I loved him, trusted him, but this I had to do alone. I smiled grimly down upon my lover. “I’m going to have a little talk with Mr. Van Tassel.” And then I rode from the church.
***
My father had taught me to track, just like he had taught me how to shoot and to use a cold compress on a gunshot wound to slow the bleeding. And with the new snowfall, it wasn’t very difficult to figure out what path Mr. Van Tassel had taken. I caught up with him at the edge of town just as he stumbled into the deep woods. I forged ahead, through the snow-laden trees and drifts, hardly feeling the chill as I pursued the source of so much of my family’s misery.
The eastern part of the woods eventually brought one out to the same ravine that bordered my father’s estate. I knew it was only a matter of time, tracking, and patience before I caught up with Mr. Van Tassel as he tromped through the deep woods, knee-deep
in snow, disturbing trees, deer, and crackling endless twigs underfoot. In less than half an hour, I caught up to him at the edge of the ravine. By then, I realized my mistake.
As I broke out of the woods atop the barrel-chested Suffolk, I saw my enemy standing by the drop-off, the pistol in his hand. I knew he’d had only one shot with the flintlock, but I had no idea if he’d been able to reload while he was stumbling through the woods, and I was unwilling to find out the hard way. I had no desire to be shot, or to allow harm to Gunmetal, so I approached him carefully. I fingered my own pistol and said, “It’s over. There’s nowhere else to run, Mr. Van Tassel.” My voice was dead but strong, and it echoed across the valley.
He eyed me like some trapped and panicked reptile, the kind that might strike out at any moment. I had to remind myself that he had shot his own brother in cold blood. He could easily kill me, given the opportunity. “What will you do, girl? Take me back to town to stand trial?”
“I think that’s only fair, don’t you?”
He glanced aside at the ravine as if trying to judge whether a fall would kill him or not. The mountain was very steep and rocky on that side, and it eventually led to the muddy banks of the Nissequogue River. Over the years, several people had made the mistake of getting too close to the edge, particularly in the dark of night. No, he wouldn’t survive such a fall. Yes, he still contemplated it.
I waited for him to make his decision. When he did, I felt the little hairs on my arms stand at rigid attention. He swung around with the pistol. He aimed it for my chest. I knew then that it was loaded. But I was my father’s lucky shot, and before he’d squeezed the trigger, I had my grandfather’s gun raised and my single shot had clipped him high up in the shoulder and spun him around so his own shot went wild over the valley. Then he dropped over the edge with a scream, scratching and clawing at the ground with his fingertips.
I listened to his scrambling as he tried to find a foothold. I casually dismounted my horse and approached the edge. I felt numb, but I was shaking all over. I had never shot a man before. I looked down.
Mr. Van Tassel hung on by some rocks and roots sticking out of the frozen ground. I thought how he was so much like the fox I had shot all those months ago, a wild creature of destruction that needed to be put down for the good of all. “You shot your own brother, Mr. Van Tassel, and you destroyed my father,” I said, looking down at him and feeling almost nothing. “Your jealousy threatens the welfare of everyone in the Society. I wonder, do I save you or do I let you fall? You’ve caused so much misery…”
He kicked and struggled. Inch by inch, he slowly lost his grip. “Lucky, please…show mercy…”
Sighing, I dropped down to my haunches and reached for his hand.
He grabbed it. And then he pulled me over the edge.
I screamed too.
***
In the end what saved me were some frozen bushes that managed to snag in my skirts. They slowed my descent long enough for me to scramble up a handhold. Scratching at the frozen ground, gasping and heaving with effort, I was able to find a toehold, but even then, it was mostly the bush keeping me from sliding down the slick, rocky side of the ravine.
I gasped as I clawed at the rocks. “Why?” I managed over the howling of the winter wind.
Mr. Van Tassel made a guttural sound that was almost a laugh. “I won’t let you win, my dear. If I go, you go.”
“You really are the devil,” I said.
“Yes, yes,” Mr. Van Tassel agreed. “I really am the devil…!”
And then someone shot Mr. Van Tassel in the face. The blast of the flintlock deafened me for a moment, and the sordid stink of gunpowder burned my nose. I heard a bloody hiccup from my enemy, and then he began sliding down the mountain with increasing speed, leaving a long streak of scarlet blood in the snow.
I looked up and saw Tiberius standing at the edge of the ravine. He reached down, snagged my hand, and easily pulled me up over the edge and into his arms. “Lucky, you really are the most infuriating girl,” he complained, and kissed me.
I reached up and hooked my arms around his neck and kissed him back, sighing and shuddering with relief against him. I started muttering all kinds of excuses for my behavior, but he shushed me and gathered me against his warmth.
I was alive, I realized. And I was with the man I loved.
With a cry, I leaped into his arms and he fell back into a snow bank with a grunt. I didn’t stop there. I held him down and kissed him until he was breathless. Then I kissed him some more. He felt so good against me, beneath me. I ripped at his shirt and waistcoat and buried my face in his chest, breathing in his sweetly familiar male scent until he groaned and clutched the back of my head. I licked at his exposed nipples, then took one in my mouth and began to suck, hard.
“Lucky, what are you doing?” he asked with delight.
“I’m so happy to see you,” I cried, stopping just long enough to breathe and speak. “Do you want me to stop?”
“No, of course not.”
I immediately went back to suckling him until he grunted, then moved down his body a little ways and licked along his lower belly. I quickly undid his trousers and licked a path around his swiftly stiffening cock. I licked the underside of his shaft from the bottom to its swollen head. I licked under the head in that little spot that so often made him gasp and tremble for me. I gripped his velvety testes, rolling them delicately in my hand. Tiberius automatically bucked his hips upward. I took the head of him in my mouth and sucked rapaciously until he shivered and convulsed in my mouth. I tasted the familiar stickiness of his heat and flavor. Then I moved up his body, shifted away my undergarments, and impaled myself upon him.
It was all so sudden that we both cried out in delight. I held his eyes as I began to move upon him. He tilted his head back in the snow, all his beautiful, rich dark hair fanned out around him, and gave himself over to me completely. I gripped his shoulders and held him down as I rode him hard. I knew how much he loved this, having a woman on top.
“Come hard, Lucky,” he told me. “And come soon.”
“Yes, my love,” I told him as I swiftly worked him up to orgasm. “But only if you’ll put me upon that beautiful horse and ride me back to the church so we can be properly married.”
“Yes,” he said urgently between the biting, searing kisses I was giving him. “Oh yes. Now hurry, love. Hurry!”
“Hurry?”
“Lucky, you’re giving my bum frostbite here.”
“Oh!”
The End
Bonus Story:
TWO HUNDRED AND SEVEN YEARS LATER
Long Island, New York, 2012
The Masqued Ball was an annual and highly anticipated event at The Dollhouse.
Every year, Malcolm and his small group of board members went out of their way to make it something special, often putting thousands of dollars into decorations and catering. But in an effort to keep the Society as private as possible, no clean-up or maid service was ever employed. That was left up to the board members to do.
Not that they minded, because this, like anything else, was also a part of Jeremiah Hampton’s legacy. They could do what they wanted with his house, but their benefactor, on his deathbed, had made the Society promise they would care for the place, keep it private, and, above all, make use of it.
Sometime after the last canapé was eaten, the last bottle of champagne opened, and the last private play finished, Malcolm Sloan, Ian Sterling, Wolfgang Beck and Alexei Karenina started the process of putting the Dollhouse back to sorts, collecting dishes and glasses, resetting the furnishings, and generally securing the house. “The girls,” as Malcolm liked to call them, were encouraged to wait and relax in the anteroom with a final bottle of champagne between them. The courtesans had given the Dollhouse hours of entertainment, and he didn’t like to see them reduced to maid service.
“The girls” included Evelyn Sterling, Rachaela Lee, Devon Grayson and Daniel Collins. It was a term of endearme
nt that Devon had been trying, unsuccessfully, to break his gentleman of for years. Devon enjoyed the girls company immensely. He sat between Evelyn and Rachaela, his two favorite dolls, while they worked on fixing his manicure. Daniel took up the whole sofa opposite them, an ice bag on his head as he waited for his headache to lessen. As it turned out, Daniel wasn’t much of a drinker.
“How do you manage the vodka in your household?” Devon asked him. “I know Alexei drinks that stuff that’s filtered like a million times through dry ice or whatever. Smirnoff on steroids.”
Daniel grimaced. “I don’t touch that stuff.” He glanced over at the mess of champagne bottles on the table. “And to be honest, after tonight, I think I might become a teetotaler.”
“You have good sense, then, Daniel,” Rachaela informed him as she used a buffer to polish Devon’s nails to a luster.
“You’re such a mom,” Devon complained, grinning at her.
“Yes, I am,” she agreed wholeheartedly, and Evelyn laughed at that.
“Don’t pick on Rachaela,” Evelyn warned Devon. “I’m learning from her.”
“Me too,” Daniel piped up from beneath his ice bag. “Without her, I’d be lost.”
“Honey, you’re a perfect mom already,” Rachaela complimented Evelyn. She waved a nicely manicured hand at Daniel. “And you’ll do fine, Daniel. Stop worrying so much.”
When they met up for mid-week lunch, usually at their usual luncheon spot at Café Luna on Broadway, Evelyn sometimes brought her and Ian’s infant son with her. She propped Hunter up in a highchair so he could munch on a French fry while the girls gossiped about their various gentleman. Rachaela, who had a daughter of her own and was trying for a second child with her gentleman, Wolf, often acted like Hunter’s second mom. But lately, she’d begun encouraging Daniel to hold the baby and take care of him during their lunch date—something of a primer, she explained, since Daniel and Alexei would be adopting an infant very soon and Daniel had little to no experience in parenting, though he had plenty of enthusiasm.