Beautiful Creatures

by Lulu Taylor

  The meal had been quite something, a chaotic series of odd-tasting dishes, from the instant soup they’d started with to the watery roast lamb and the pavlova that tasted of dust. Everything appeared after very long intervals and was almost stone cold by the time it got to the table. As the housekeeper had left early that day, Iseult had done the cooking herself, but the quality of the food didn’t matter when they were all having so much fun. It didn’t make any difference to them if the pudding didn’t arrive until 2 a.m. – what did they have to get up for in the morning except more amusement?

  Octavia looked down the table at Roddy Wildblood. He seemed more cheerful and talkative than she’d ever seen him, talking loudly to the boy next to him – Piers, she thought his name was – and laughing his odd ratcheting laugh when he was amused. He scared her a little, with his brooding personality and the aura of discontent that surrounded him, but Iseult had told her that was simply a result of his being so driven and wanting success so desperately.

  ‘He’s a pussy cat underneath!’ she declared. ‘A sweet, darling little bundle of loveliness. You’ll see.’

  Octavia could not quite see that, but she was prepared to be converted to Roddy’s charms. She knew that the next day she was supposed to be with him in the solarium as he created the wedding dress for the finale of the show, now only a few weeks away, and she was nervous about it.

  ‘Come on,’ cried Iseult, pushing away her coffee cup and lighting a long slim cigar. ‘Games! Who wants to play games?’

  There was a general cheer, and she ordered the table to be cleared. Everyone picked up plates, dishes and cutlery and hurried through to the kitchen, dumping them all on the large scrubbed pine table in the middle of the room. Back in the dining room, Iseult had turned off the lamps, leaving only the flickering candelabra on the table to provide any light.

  ‘First, secrets,’ she said. ‘And then …’

  They went round the table and each person had to tell something about themselves that they’d never told before, or that they thought the others could never guess. Jasmine’s secret was that she had had drug-fuelled sex with a man engaged to a minor member of a European royal family. Everyone shrieked and then spent ages trying to guess the royal’s identity but Jasmine refused to say. Ferdy said that he had once spent £5,000 on his father’s credit card, hiring hookers for a stag party, and his father had never noticed. Octavia wondered what on earth she could say. When they got to her, she said, ‘I don’t have any secrets. I was never allowed any.’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Iseult barked. ‘Everyone’s got secrets. Come on, you must have something.’

  She racked her brain, trying to think of something. Brandon? No, too adolescent and silly. Besides, she didn’t want them all laughing at it. My whole life is a ridiculous secret, she thought.

  ‘I know a secret you can tell us,’ Roddy said suddenly. He leant forward. His face looked rather frightening in the candlelight. ‘Why don’t you tell us how much money you’ve got?’

  ‘Oh …’ She felt herself flush, her face getting hotter and redder.

  ‘That’s a good one, Roddy,’ Iseult said, staring at Octavia. ‘That’s the kind of secret people least want to share, isn’t it? Sex, drugs, nudity, puking … no problem. My current account? I don’t think so. Will you tell us, Octavia?’

  ‘My … my inheritance is …’ She faltered over the words, though she hardly knew why. ‘I don’t think I can say …’

  ‘Don’t pretend you don’t know,’ Roddy said sharply.

  ‘Perhaps she doesn’t,’ Iseult countered. ‘I’m sure I never know how much I’ve got. I only know it’s not much. So, Octavia … less than twenty million or more?’

  Octavia opened her mouth but said nothing.

  ‘All right, more.’ Iseult laughed. ‘Oh, dear, this is terribly vulgar after all. I’m feeling very uncomfortable, so goodness knows how Octavia is feeling! Come on, let’s leave it at more than twenty mill, and let the poor girl be. Now – Rosie. It’s your turn. You can tell us anything as long as it doesn’t include the words “heroin” or “cocaine”. Or, in fact, anything drugs-related because it’s just too dull.’

  More bottles of champagne were opened, and then Roddy called for whisky, and the meal ended with the girls stripping down to their knickers and being wrapped in tartan rugs by him so that they seemed to be wearing couture dresses, then they did a fashion show down the dining table, strutting their stuff as they stepped over pepper pots and salt dishes.

  ‘Move the candles!’ squealed Iseult, laughing wildly. ‘Or you’ll set light to yourselves!’

  The candelabra were whisked away and the boys applauded as the girls pouted and posed, Ferdy clapping extra loud and whistling when he caught Octavia’s eye.

  ‘Now, hide and seek!’ cried Iseult. ‘Off you all go, darlings, into the darkness, and I shall hunt you down.’

  As soon as they were out in the garden, Octavia felt herself clasped around the waist. She turned to see Ferdy, his face close to hers.

  ‘Alone at last,’ he said. ‘I haven’t been able to take my eyes off you all evening.’

  She giggled. ‘I’ve noticed.’

  ‘You’re gorgeous. I fancy you like mad. Kiss me.’ He pushed his face towards her.

  At last, she thought, a little delirious with alcohol, the dissipated atmosphere in the house and the lust that had been churning inside her since that afternoon. She didn’t need another invitation. The next moment his lips were devouring hers, his tongue pressing urgently into her mouth.

  They stumbled about together, kissing passionately, then he pulled away, grinned at her and took her by the hand. ‘Come with me,’ he whispered naughtily. She went with him, giggling, and he led her into a small sitting room, lit only by the moonlight that came pouring through the large windows. He pulled her over to the sofa and they fell down on it, kissing, his hands going up under her top and rubbing at her breasts.

  ‘We can’t stay here,’ she panted. ‘They might come in!’

  He groaned and then said, ‘They’ll never come in here.’

  ‘They might, it’s hide and seek.’

  ‘All right.’ He jumped up and pushed the sofa away from the wall, then slung some cushions down behind it. ‘There!’ he said proudly, and they slid over the back of the sofa and on to their newly made bed. There was very little room, so as soon as they lay down they were pressed up against each other. Ferdy’s hands were pushing up Octavia’s skirt now and fumbling around her knickers, which were already damp with her arousal.

  She unbuttoned his jeans, wanting only to feel at last what it would be like to have a man inside her. She remembered how it was with Brandon, this hot, stomach-melting lust and the fierce desire to be joined to someone, and she knew she wanted to have Ferdy right now, and to hell with the consequences. She pushed his jeans down and then his boxers, revealing his cock standing up and pressed hard against his stomach, already pulsing with desire. It wasn’t like Brandon’s, she noticed with surprise. Were they all different then? Somehow she’d thought they’d all look the same, but Brandon’s had had a smooth dome-like top while Ferdy had loose skin around the tip, skin she could pull back and forth. He moaned when she did that and scrabbled to pull her knickers down.

  The alcohol in her bloodstream made her fearless and she pushed them down herself, wriggling until they slipped off entirely. Now she was naked from the waist down, her tee-shirt pushed up under her arms. She hooked one leg over Ferdy’s hips and he grasped his cock in one hand, directing it to the mouth of her pussy. Their open mouths joined together in another wild kiss as he found her entrance and pushed in with a strong thrust. She gasped as she felt herself open to let him in. It was tight, but deliciously so, a strange sensation of being expanded and filled with warmth as Ferdy’s hard penis moved further up her passage. She expected it to hurt, but no pain followed. Perhaps Brandon’s busy fingers had prepared her well. Instead she felt the delightful sense of completion that she’d been hop
ing for all those summers ago, and as Ferdy was engulfed in her to the root of his cock, she felt his pubic bone press against her bud, sending marvellous tingles all over her. He began to thrust into her. The tight space they were wedged into meant that his body continually exerted pressure on her clitoris as they fucked, and the combination of the hot cock in her pussy and the pressure on her bud was almost overwhelming. She began to gasp.

  ‘Ooooh, fuuuuck,’ murmured Ferdy, panting hard in her ear, his thrusting getting stronger.

  ‘Ohhh,’ she gasped. ‘Yes … that’s right, Ferdy … please don’t stop …’

  He pushed in faster and faster and she threw back her head as the pleasure mounted in her, rolling out from her groin and building in intensity until suddenly, almost to her astonishment, she was possessed by a fierce tidal wave of sensation, the culmination of all the wonderful things she had experienced so far. She felt as though she were turning inside the tidal wave over and over, lost in a roar of lovely noise.

  ‘Oh! Oh,’ cried Octavia. She squeezed her eyes shut and a long moan came from deep within her.

  ‘Crackerjack!’ cried Ferdy, and he came too.

  22

  ‘Hello, Otto, it’s … it’s Flora,’ she said into the phone, trying not to sound as nervous as she felt. ‘We met up in the bar at Claridge’s yesterday.’

  ‘Of course. The beautiful Flora. Does this mean that you’ve decided to join me today?’

  She could hear the hope in his voice.

  ‘Y-y-yes,’ she said as firmly as she could.

  ‘That’s marvellous,’ he said, obviously delighted. ‘Why don’t we meet somewhere central after lunch, and go on from there?’

  ‘That’s a good idea,’ she said, and they arranged a place to rendezvous.

  ‘Well done,’ Vicky said approvingly when Flora came to report her success. ‘Steve will take you when you’re ready.’

  After a light lunch, Flora went upstairs and dressed. She wore a denim button-through skirt and flat boots, with a slim-line cashmere jumper and a blazer, which she thought would be right for walking in the autumn sunshine. Vicky pronounced the outfit perfect, and very soon it was time to go.

  Otto was waiting for her near Trafalgar Square, looking quite different out of his formal business suit. He wore jeans, a dark jacket, Timberland boots, and a red cotton shirt over a tee-shirt. He was also carrying a camera and a guidebook.

  ‘My tourist credentials,’ he said with a grin as she approached.

  ‘I think we’re going to need those,’ Flora laughed. ‘I haven’t the foggiest idea where anything is. Where do you want to start?’

  Otto looked about. ‘We seem to be in the heart of things, don’t we? What’s that building there?’ He started flicking through his guidebook.

  ‘That’s the National Gallery,’ Flora said. ‘I know that much. Shall we go and have a look?’

  They went first to the Sainsbury Wing, and walked through galleries of religious art, admiring the medieval paintings that were thick with gold and bright colours.

  ‘These baby Jesuses are all so funny,’ whispered Otto, his eyes bright. ‘Most of them are not babies at all, just fat little men. That one over there is also rather green.’

  He was right, and Flora giggled as she looked at the serene-faced Madonnas holding their naked ‘babies’.

  ‘But some are wonderful,’ she murmured as she saw a stunningly beautiful Mary holding a heartbreakingly innocent-looking child.

  ‘The real masters,’ Otto said, nodding. ‘Come, let’s see something else.’

  They wandered through the galleries and into the main building, stopping to look at whatever took their fancy, eventually arriving in front of Holbein’s The Ambassadors. Otto showed her how to stand at the side of the painting so that the optical illusion painted so skilfully at the front fell into place and she could see the skull that appeared, at the feet of the Tudor nobleman.

  ‘How brilliant!’ she declared.

  Otto nodded. ‘The anamorphic perspective. A Renaissance invention.’

  ‘But why did he put a skull there?’ Flora wondered.

  ‘A memento mori, perhaps. You know, a reminder that we are all mortal. Or just to show he could.’ Otto smiled at her. ‘Let’s go and get some tea. It’s four o’clock. Don’t you English drink tea at four?’

  They went to the gallery café and had tea and scones. Afterwards, they walked across Trafalgar Square and down Whitehall until they came to Parliament Square, dominated by Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament on one side, and Westminster Abbey in all its magnificence on the other.

  ‘Shall we go inside and have a look?’ Flora asked, looking at the great church. ‘Lots of famous people are buried here.’

  Otto looked at his watch. ‘It’s already too late, I fear. The Abbey will be closed to visitors by now. It’s after six o’clock.’

  ‘Is it?’ she said, surprised. The afternoon felt as though it had just begun for her.

  ‘And I must leave you now. I have a business dinner tonight.’ Otto smiled at her, his brown eyes soft. ‘You have been charming company.’

  ‘So have you,’ Flora said. She felt happy for the first time since she had stopped painting.

  ‘Then, perhaps tomorrow?’ he suggested tentatively. ‘I have one more day before I return to Germany. I have so enjoyed myself.’

  ‘Yes, yes.’ Flora smiled back at him. ‘I’d love to.’

  The following day they set out earlier. The weather was fine and bright, perfect for sightseeing. They went to the Abbey first thing and then walked across Westminster Bridge and wandered along the South Bank towards Tower Bridge, passing Tate Modern and the Globe Theatre as they went. Flora didn’t mind the crowds or feel lost while she was with Otto.

  At lunchtime, Otto insisted that they go to Fortnum’s in a taxi, where he bought them some picnic food. They went to Hyde Park to eat it. In the afternoon they went in a boat on the Serpentine, Otto rowing them, and then to the Mandarin Oriental on the Knightsbridge side of the park for tea.

  ‘I’ve had a marvellous time,’ Flora said, her eyes sparkling, as they sat in the hotel lounge sipping Earl Grey.

  ‘So have I,’ Otto replied. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed a trip to London more.’ They looked at each other, smiling, and she felt a flush creeping into her cheeks.

  ‘I have to leave tomorrow but I’ll be coming back to London next week,’ he said softly. ‘I wonder, would you allow me to take you out for dinner?’

  She felt her insides flip. She knew what he was really asking. They had spent two pleasant days together as friends, laughing and enjoying one another’s company. She had never been friends with a man before; had been frightened at the idea. But Otto was so comfortable to be with, she found it very easy to talk to him about anything inconsequential that crossed her mind. They had not exchanged life histories but had talked about the things around them, both of them finding everything equally new and exciting.

  But dinner out together … That was a date. That meant romance, didn’t it?

  Otto was looking worried. ‘Have I spoiled things, Flora? I hope not.’

  ‘No, of course you haven’t.’ She thought for just an instant longer then said decisively, ‘Yes, I’d love to come out for dinner with you. I really would.’

  ‘Oh, my goodness!’ Vicky laughed as she looked at Flora, who had come waltzing into the sitting room and thrown herself down on one of the sofas. ‘Look at you.’

  ‘Look at me … what?’ Flora asked, grinning.

  ‘Well.’ Vicky gave her a knowing sideways glance. ‘I’m getting romance vibes. Huge romance vibes. Don’t tell me that the Baron has stolen your heart away …’

  Flora blushed scarlet. ‘Don’t be so silly,’ she said quickly.

  ‘That’s a shame.’ Vicky idly turned the page of the newspaper she was reading. ‘I thought he was excellent romantic material.’

  ‘Mmm.’ There was a pause and then Flora sat up straight. ‘Vicky, can
we go shopping tomorrow? You’re right, I really don’t have anything in my wardrobe. I think I need to sort it out.’

  ‘Do you now?’ Vicky laughed again, then saw Flora’s expression. She held up one hand. ‘Sorry, sorry … I’m not really laughing at you, I’m just happy that you seem so much better than you were. Spending time with Otto has obviously worked wonders. Yes, let’s go shopping. I’d love it.’

  Flora sat back again, thinking about her happy days spent wandering about town with Otto. I wish Octavia were here to share it, she thought forlornly. But her sister was still away, due back the next day. I’m dying to tell her everything … Flora hugged her secret to herself. Am I in love? Could this be the beginning of something?

  It was just too exciting. As soon as her sister returned, it would be time for a proper bedtime chat.

  23

  I wish I had a helicopter, thought Octavia. Perhaps I’ll get one. How much are they?

  But she needed one now, because she was bone tired and all she wanted was to be at home, sleeping in her own bed, recovering from the madness at Mabbes. A helicopter would get her back in minutes.

  It had been exciting, that was for sure. She’d achieved one of her goals, which was to become well and truly experienced at sex. There was a long way to go, no doubt about that, but she’d made a good start. An orgasm with a man, she thought, pleased with herself, feeling a tingle of arousal at the memory. And not just one.

  Steve had driven the Mercedes all the way to Mabbes to pick her up, and now they were gliding back along the M3, effortlessly overtaking every other car on the road. She was curled up on the back seat, watching the vehicles as they disappeared in the wake of the powerful Merc, wondering about the lives of their occupants, where they were going and why. In the darkness, on the soft leather, she hovered between being awake and asleep, replaying the most vivid moments of the weekend.