Radclyffe & Stacia Seaman - Romantic Interludes 2 - Secrets

by Radclyffe;Stacia Seaman

  And so today when the door swung open ever so slowly, instead of a woman’s voice, I was annoyed to hear the incessant and rhythmic pounding of repair work taking place inside the boutique, a constant hammering. I nearly turned to leave.

  However, moments later, the work stopped and I, the woman referred to in society columns as “the golden-haired wife of New Orleans’s wealthiest banker,” shyly entered the shop. Having braved this new world only on the insistence of others, and having been told what to expect, I was surprised by Madame Broussard’s slightly breathless greeting.

  “Bonjour, Madame Le Doux. Je ne penser que vous n’arriverais jamais.” How did this woman I had never met, in a shop I had never entered, know my name? I would have left had it not been for the look in Madame Broussard’s eyes—a hypnotic expression.

  Madame excused herself from a customer for whom she was pinning a gorgeous train at the waist and, leaving the final touches to her assistant, swept across the room, her dress trailing the floor, and extended her hand.

  “Please stay.” She seemed to know that if she did not get a grip on me and block my path to the door, I would take wing like a frightened bird.

  “So you look for something to—je ne sais quoi—enhance your already beautiful form.” The way her eyes covered my body made me blush with pride. As if I’d been assessed and found to be desirable and, for some reason, that was pleasing—perhaps because Madame was a professional appraiser, having once chosen women’s assets as a mainstay of her business success. And so to be deemed beautiful by Madame was a far greater compliment than could be paid by a mere friend, for the value of the former was virtually bankable.

  “Yes. Uh, I’m going on a… I apologize. As you seem to know, I’m Emma LeDoux, Maxmillian LeDoux’s wife, and we’re going on a cruise and I want him to feel…” I want him to feel…interested? Feel sexual? Feel damned near anything. For my husband was a bit like an automated teller. If you fingered the right buttons, he mechanically delivered exactly the amount you expected.

  “To feel”—the lilt encouraged me to complete my sentence and then she finished it for me—“young again. He focuses on erection, she on affection. Most often the issue.” Madame angled her right arm at a doorway, brushing aside thickly beaded curtains that jangled as I entered through them and found myself in a completely mirrored room about the size of two normal dressing rooms.

  “Ghastly.” My eyes moved furtively from one mirrored angle of my body to the next, not approving of myself as I sucked in my stomach, pulled my shoulders back, and lifted my eyebrows to pull the lines from my facial expression.

  Madame reached over and took my chin gently in her hand and turned my face to her.

  “I will look at the mirror, you will look at me.” Her voice was kind and I let out my breath. “A woman must love herself, without regard to convention.” She winked at me and I blushed.

  Madame appraised my figure as if deciding whether or not to purchase me, and prism-like images reflected in my peripheral vision: her eyes moved down my still-narrow waist to larger hips and back to my firm thighs. She stepped back and stared at my breasts. All the while I kept my eyes on the thick head of hair hypnotically bobbing around me, moving in, pulling back, until finally, Madame looked up and caught me by surprise with her completely captivating smile.

  “Like a sinful dessert, you are.” She disappeared through the beaded curtain, leaving me grinning at myself in the mirror, sucking in my breath and making cheerful bargains with my psyche about how much, if anything, I would ever eat again. I would now rather be a sinful dessert than eat one.

  The curtain rattled again and Madame entered with several thin silk pieces of material over her arm. Without asking, she unbuttoned the small pearl-like clasps on the front of my sweater as I reached up to help but wasn’t quick enough to accomplish what Madame had already done, the sweater falling open to reveal my bra. And for some unknown reason I began to question the quality of my bra—was it snow white or had it been inadvertently washed with darker clothing, giving it a gray cast? Did it look new?

  “Tournez-vouz, s’il vous plaît.” Madame pivoted me in the right direction and as I twirled, Madame unsnapped my bra and it fell into my hands. What timing that took! How many women she must have undressed! My back to Madame, I felt the silk fall over my head and drape around my shoulders. I turned to face her as Madame’s hand slid over the pink silk front and cupped my left breast, startling me. “That is the fit we want, I think. Seductive, and yet it will still be comfortable in case you want to sleep in it.” She beamed as if she’d just invented sleep.

  I angled my body to look at myself, just as Madame took a white braided satin rope and looped it over my head, catching under my breasts and hoisting them slightly. Then she swiftly drew the rope up and back, holding me up against her chest, her chin on my shoulder, both of us looking into the mirror that looked back at us.

  “We are a charming duo, are we not?” She laughed.

  A little thrill rippled across my body, and I couldn’t be sure if the satin rope or the sensual look in Madame’s experienced eyes was caressing me.

  She seemed frozen, as if caught in some thought she wished had not interrupted her consciousness. Suddenly letting loose of the rope, she swept her hands across my breasts in collecting and coiling it, and I shivered, then smiled and tried to make light of the moment.

  “This is a bit like bondage for the banker’s bride.”

  “Bondage?” She made eye contact for the first time. “Bound by love is for me more satisfying than bound by shackles.” She glanced at my chest. “It’s cold? I’m sorry. Fini, alors. I will have the braid sewn to the garment and, if it suits you, perhaps you will come back next week and we will try it on to be certainement.”

  “We leave on our cruise in ten days.” My voice grew softer.

  “And this beautiful garment will leave with you, I promise.”

  I smiled at her charming accent and Madame flashed her beautiful smile in return. “Merci, mon ami.” I tried out my French and she laughed.

  “So you are French at heart. That beautiful body and gorgeous mouth, but of course. Your husband should count himself lucky. A banker with such a prize.” Her emphasis on the word “banker” seemed to dismiss the entire financial community as unable to recognize value.

  Madame exited the small dressing room and I felt weak. The power of this woman was palpable. No doubt she could command kings and courtesans. Why, with that power, was she here in this little shop on the Rue de LaSalle?

  When I left the dressing room, Madame was nowhere to be seen. Her assistant stood nearby and I approached the young woman.

  “Madame is such an interesting woman. Have you worked for her long?” I asked.

  “I was a client at one time.” When I looked surprised, she said, “I believed in her talent and wanted to be around her. She’s like the pied piper. You will see.”

  *

  All week I thought of her. That vibrant red hair, the elegant way she drifted into a room, her refined hand gestures, and her gaze that made me feel there was no one else on earth, her focus so complete. Like a Raphaelian angel, she had blessed me and made me feel good about my body again.

  Of late, Max had put me in doubt, suggesting I might want to hire a personal trainer or go to Europe to one of the spas. Never criticizing me really, just drawing attention to places where women’s bodies could be overhauled like a Corvette, perhaps like re-stuffed upholstery and a new paint job.

  By day Max kept himself buried in electronic ledgers and financial pro formas. He no longer smiled, thus robbing me of his nicest physical attribute. Romance was a nocturnal event scheduled much like a haircut and lasting far less time. I saw myself as diminished in his affection, no longer a partner or mate but more like a paid performer who had to prove to him that he’d purchased the best seat in the house.

  But Madame Broussard was on my horizon and I couldn’t wait for the days to pass. With each twenty-four-hour per
iod, I became happier and giddier. Ironically, Max noticed and inquired as to my source of good humor. I said merely that I’d made up my mind to be happy and that alone had made me so. My response obviously not interesting enough to warrant further conversation, he shrugged and left the room.

  I had a secret that made me happy: Madame Broussard, who knew what beauty was, had pronounced me beautiful. And once named, my beauty seemed unquestionable even to myself.

  My hairdresser frosted my hair to even more golden highlights and I had a manicure. I took my husband’s advice and went to the spa for a facial and massage. And on the morning I arrived at Madame Broussard’s, I stood taller, my shoulders back and my head high. Madame, upon hearing the tinkle of the bell at the door, glanced up, and I thought her head snapped toward me just a few degrees before she caught herself.

  “Madame LeDoux, vous êtes exquisite,” she purred, in a tone that implied she did not greet everyone like this. She never looked up from the fitting taking place on a woman whom I immediately envied for Madame’s fingers playing along her bodice. Looking into the mirror over the woman’s shoulder, nearly as she had done with me, Madame spoke to her reflection, saying it now looked perfect, and then she directed her next remark to another young assistant, obviously having needed help from more experienced hands. “Be sure it drapes exactly so.” Her hand made a swooping gesture as she stepped away and the assistant took over.

  I stood like a trembling fawn awaiting instruction from Madame Broussard. Draped in purple velvet that dove down to her breastbone revealing just the interior edges of large and firmly supported breasts, she came forward and extended her hand in greeting. “You are back. My great fortune.”

  Without thinking, I kissed her on each cheek, noting that she smelled wonderful and wanting to know what tantalizing perfume she wore. Perhaps it would help me as well with my love interests, and I suddenly wondered if Madame had slept with many men or merely managed their affairs.

  Her arm swept to the side, indicating another dressing room, and on the way, Madame signaled yet another assistant, ordering, “Madame LeDoux’s apparel.” The woman nodded and disappeared.

  Inside the dressing room were two brocaded Napoleon chairs, across a table supporting a carafe and elegant crystal glasses, and at one end of the room a three-way mirror. The clothing hooks on the wall appeared to be vestal virgins, their urns extended to hold the padded hangers.

  “Ah, the mirror,” I teased, drawing back.

  “The way you look, you should welcome the mirror. But for those who don’t, we drink first.” She smiled and I laughed lightly. “You are too beautiful to need it but for loosening your inhibitions…and your tongue. Claret?”

  I tensed at her tone and nodded that I would take the drink. Madame poured it expertly, never spilling a drop, and then toasted.

  “To all the men who’ve paid the price for all the priceless women.” Madame downed her drink and I laughed again, following suit. As Madame refilled our glasses I was feeling warm from the wine, and emboldened.

  “How is it that a woman of your charms and business acumen is here on the Rue de LaSalle dealing in lingerie?”

  “I deal in dreams. Lingerie is merely the transporter. Some women use silk and lace to attract a mate, others to keep him, and some simply to make themselves feel better about who they are and what they do. What are your dreams?”

  From anyone else, I might have thought that question impertinent, but then I had started it, hadn’t I, asking why she was dealing in panties and corsets?

  “Like everyone else, I guess, I want to be loved and desired.”

  “And Messer LeDoux does that for you.” She stated it like a question deserted in the air.

  “To the best of his ability,” I said, as if no one could try harder than my husband.

  Her eyes trailed across my drink glass to the overly large diamond that lolled its gleaming head on my ring finger, too drunkenly expensive to hold itself upright. “And he is a man who provides a comfort of sorts.”

  “Of sorts,” I echoed.

  “And so today, we improve your arsenal of weapons to further invade his heart.” She stood up as if she knew that there would be a knock at the door, and at just that moment, there was. Her assistant arrived and hung the negligee on the vestal virgin, dimming the overhead chandelier upon her exit.

  The door had no sooner shut than I stood in the dim light and dropped the dress I was wearing in one swift zippered movement, standing only in panties and hose, comfortable in the half-light. She froze as she had that first time. Perhaps she thought I sensed something in her look, because she said softly, “Close your eyes.” At my puzzled expression, she continued, “Let me make it happen for you and then you will tell me if I have succeeded.”

  I stood still, hearing the rustling of her gown, which I recollected as being far too dressy for daytime and yet seeming to suit her royal personage. I had little time to contemplate the sound of her clothing as she stood in front of me slipping the garment over my head, and I struggled to remember to keep my eyes shut. The energy field between us was electrical, as if wired from her shock of red hair.

  “No peeking.”

  Her hands smoothed the silk across my body, starting at the shoulder and running directly over my chest, and my face flushed as my breasts responded to her touch. But her hands moved on to my waist where they clutched me slightly, then to my hips. Now she was behind me and the rope pulled back and tightened and hooked, and one more time her hands traveled all over me, smoothing things out, and I was so aroused I felt I might lose my balance. She seemed to know and steadied me.

  “You may open your eyes now.”

  In the mirror, the image was glorious. She had enhanced every curve and covered every blemish. I felt like a princess.

  “It’s exquisite. You’re masterful,” I said, twirling in the negligee and giggling over how elegant it made me feel. “Merci, mon amour!” I whirled and hugged her, realizing as I did so, that I’d used the wrong noun and thanked her as my lover. She pulled back and raised an eyebrow, giving me a seductive smirk. European, I thought. Expressive and emotional.

  “So we are fini. Our time together is unfortunately over until you need something more from me.”

  “I do,” I said suddenly.

  She cocked her head in inquiry and I struggled to say what I needed. “Pants, perhaps, with a jacket, something I could wear on deck but then at the captain’s table.”

  “I specialize in lingerie, and besides, you leave in only a few days.”

  “I could come every day if need be. I would really appreciate it if you would attempt it.”

  “You are a persuasive woman.” Her eyes traveled over my body, taking in everything she had created. “I have memorized your size and it will take only one more fitting once we select the fabric. You will come with me to the fabric room?”

  I said that I would and hurried to put my dress back on and followed her out the door like a schoolgirl.

  “Giselle, please handle my next client.” The assistant seemed anxious to obey and pleased to have been asked. Madame swept past her and we entered through a set of double doors at the far end of the shop. Before me stretched a glorious array of fabrics: every texture, color, pattern, and I realized that this small shop was just the front of a very large enterprise that Madame controlled. As we approached, several workers gave way and in doing so asked if they might assist. She thanked them but dismissed them with a hand gesture and they disappeared from sight. She slowed then, to allow me to fall in alongside her.

  “Linen wrinkles, but its texture is comforting. Much more inviting than brocade. Of course, we could do something in Egyptian cotton.” Her fingers ran along the bolts of cloth as she spoke, and I found myself following her fingers rather than looking at the material, and wondered why she was so hypnotic. I was aware in the distance several women sat at drafting tables apparently sketching clothing.

  “You show?”

  “Providing ide
as for famous designers. My label invisible, if you will. They get the press and I get the money. Not unlike other businesses in which I’ve been involved.” She grinned mischievously. “So what do you think?”

  My head was swirling. I simply wanted to talk to her. Know her. “You pick the fabric and do the design. You’re the expert. And instead of spending an hour in here, we could go somewhere and…sit and talk, perhaps. I would pay you. I apologize. I didn’t mean that like it sounded. I meant we’re not friends, so why would you waste an hour with me otherwise—”

  She placed her hand on my arm. “Please. Let’s go to my office and have tea.” She moved ahead of me farther into the warehouse. Through another set of doors we entered an impeccably designed and decorated office. She quickly offered me a seat on the couch and poured tea. And where did tea come from? Is it always sitting there waiting for her? I felt I was on a movie set and a prop master was seeing to her every need.

  Answering my unvoiced thoughts, she said, “I am a woman accustomed to satisfying needs instantly and expertly. Therefore, I have high expectations that my own needs be satisfied. My staff knows that the correct wine, tea, food must be in the exact place at all times.” She smiled at me.

  “Would you tell me about your other business? The one everyone speaks of?”

  “That was a long time ago. Satisfied customers, isn’t that what everyone wants? Mine were simply satisfied more quickly and at a higher price.”

  “It’s rumored that a prince was so enamored of you that he killed himself because you would only sleep with him once.”

  “Yes, I’ve heard that repeated.” Her noncommittal response made me smile. “After I made money, I slept with no one. It was the very thing that drove me to make money quickly. An empty bed was my reward. But you, your bed is not empty.” The way in which she carefully spoke the words seemed to caution me that I was a married woman.

  “I know you’re busy,” I said, stirring from the couch. “You’re sure the pants will fit me? We haven’t measured.”