The Cult of the Black Virgin

by Serena Janes

  But he didn’t loosen his grip. “Yes, my lovely Joanna—we’ve both been guilty of living for the moment. But I want more. I want a future with you. I don’t know what kind—it’s too early to say. But I have to know that you’re not going to disappear on me the day after tomorrow.”

  “But what else can I do? I have a life to get back to. And I can’t hurt James.”

  “Yes—I know you’re thinking of more than yourself. I have concerns of my own. My son is called Daniel. I am the center of his universe. And my lover’s name is Simone. She wants to marry me.”

  Jo stopped struggling.

  He let go of her hands, climbed off her, and pulled his shorts back on. She remained on her back, stunned, thinking. Now that he’d spoken their names, his child and lover seemed more real. From his sitting position, he looked down on her.

  “Whatever you might think, I’m no fool. Impulsive—yes. Passionate—also yes. But not foolish. I know my own mind. And heart. Since meeting you I’ve been good for nothing. I can’t sleep, I can’t take pleasure in my regular day’s work. All I can think about is being with you, naked. Making love to you. Fucking you. Whatever you want to call it.

  “Last night was hell for me, knowing you were in the next room. Knowing I couldn’t see you, or touch you. And knowing you’d be leaving in a few days. I was too disturbed for sleep. Too aroused. And because I wasn’t alone, I wasn’t free to relieve myself. So I lay there, like a schoolboy, waiting for Duncan to fall asleep. Waiting for a release.

  “I contemplated breaking into your room, dragging you outside, taking you for myself. I’m not a violent man, but these are the crazy thoughts I’ve been having.”

  She stared at him, eyes huge.

  He smiled grimly and touched her face. “Will you understand? I don’t want to go home on Monday. I can’t see Simone while I’m like this. She’ll know right away that I’m not with her. She’ll know I’m changed. I don’t want to hurt her any more than you want to hurt your lover. And my son—what can I say?” He opened his hands in a touching gesture, pain showing on his face.

  “I love Daniel more than I can begin to tell you. But I can’t bear the idea of never seeing you again. I have to be with you—do you understand? Say that you do!”

  He stroked her face again, tenderly. She was so moved by his words that she could barely breathe.

  She was beginning to understand. He was forcing her to look at the consequences of indulging in her little fantasies. Her lies, their game, had life-altering consequences. And not just for her. She’d cheated on James, she’d deceived the other walkers—and she just at that moment realized she’d been lying to herself. This was no game of harmless flirtation. Nor was it love. This was lust, and this lust business was a dirty, dangerous business. It was no longer fun, no longer a jewel, except perhaps a blood diamond.

  Yes—they were in lust. That much was clear. And it seemed they couldn’t go backwards, and pretend it hadn’t happened. Nor could they go forward. Lust was not something to base lives on.

  Because she knew, from experience, that lust was a temporary condition, one that could make her behave as if she were insane. But what she hadn’t known until now was that it could make her this crazy. This helpless. She’d let Luc take over her will. She’d given herself over, in more than body, to her lover.

  And now look what’s happened!

  She was reminded of how years earlier she’d fallen in lust with another student, a younger man, who still lived at home with his parents. She’d been so out of her mind with longing for him that she seriously contemplated driving out to his family’s home one night to pitch a tent in the yard, outside his bedroom window. She wanted to sleep there, near him. She couldn’t remember afterwards where that compelling desire had come from. But she’d been so crazy for him that she went out into the dark one night and howled at the moon like a dog. The howling hurt her throat, but it felt right, at the time. In retrospect, it was ridiculous. Luckily that insanity lasted only a few months. And nothing but her pride was hurt, in the end.

  This was a very different situation. Now she was a grown-up. A career woman. Not only did she love James, she loved his parents, too. She was particularly close to James’ mother, Susan. Susan would be as devastated as James if she left, Jo knew. Life would be poorer for having lost James’ family, not to mention the man himself.

  And her career! A rewarding and exciting position as assistant editor had seemed more of a gift than a job. She’d been thrilled to get it, and was proud of what she’d accomplished in the short time she’d been with the magazine. Gradually, she was writing more feature articles, getting her photographs and drawings published, and enjoying the magazine’s respectable increase in circulation since she had joined the editorial team.

  What about her friends and family? Her father, in particular, would be very disappointed in her. She’d spent all of her life trying to please him. How could she stop now? How could she just leave everyone and everything she knew and loved? And her beloved dog, Sammy. This wasn’t a question of having a miserable or even just a dull life and wanting change. This was a situation in which she was being asked to sacrifice an enormously rich life. For what, exactly? How could she weigh her rich and ordered life against the newfound joy of her French lover? It was impossible. This was not a decision she could make with her head. Her head hurt right now.

  When she was lucid, Jo was no gambler. Now she was out of her mind with longing, maybe even love—she couldn’t discount that, really—and faced with the most difficult decision of her life. If she ran off with Luc, she would lose everything she had.

  For what? Sex? No—it’s far more than that. Isn’t it?

  But she couldn’t answer her own questions.

  Luc interrupted her feeble attempts. “I want you to come with me on Monday—to Nice. My family has a summer house there. We can be together, swim naked in the sea, make love all day and all night. Or we can go further—into Italy. Anywhere you want. It won’t matter where, but say you’ll come with me to a place where we can be alone together. I must have you with me!”

  His voice was insistent, his expression earnest. He bent to her lips and kissed them slowly, using his tongue for a deeper kiss. The kiss was so sweet that she let it overpower her. She wanted to swallow him.

  As her body softened towards him, something inside her cried, Stop!

  Forcing herself to shake him off, she sat up. “How could we do something like that? It’s completely impractical! How would we live? We have responsibilities. We have jobs.”

  The banality of her words struck her as she spoke them, but she couldn’t stop. She knew she could give up her career, her home, for a chance of happiness with Luc. But there was a person she couldn’t so easily give up. Someone she couldn’t bear to hurt.

  “It will kill James if I leave him,” she said, finally, shakily, looking away into the trees. He was the only reason she hadn’t agreed immediately. She loved him. Still.

  “Mais oui. I understand. Tell him you have no choice, that we’re in love, and we must be together. Isn’t that the truth, Joanna? We’re in love with each other—what else can I call this insanity? I love you—I must, for I can’t explain what I’m doing otherwise. Can you say that you love me? Tell me the truth.”

  She looked into his eyes—blazing with the force of his words—yet showing fear, too.

  If love meant risking her future husband, home, livelihood, friends, social and parental acceptance, all the components of her ordered little life, as she had most certainly been doing these past few days, then Jo had to acknowledge that maybe she was in love with Luc.

  But how is that different from lust?

  She thought for a moment, knowing that the rest of her life would be determined by the words she chose to speak next.

  She held his gaze as she replied with measured words. “Is it love? I don’t know what it is I feel for you, Luc. It’s more than love, it’s worse than love. It’s so strong that I can’t t
hink at all. I’ve never felt anything like this, ever. It’s as if I’m drugged, and powerless to do anything but open myself to you and beg you to come inside. And then I just want to hold you there, deep inside me, as long as I can. That’s all I want, and it will be enough. For today.”

  She paused. Then, she added, looking back into the trees, “And then I’ll want you tomorrow, too. I know I will. And the day after that. But this desire isn’t enough to get us through to a future, is it? It’s completely irrational, and I’m afraid of it. I’m afraid of us.”

  Her voice was trembling. It was true—she felt as if she were going crazy. Changing from a person with a working brain into a mass of quivering fleshy feelings. Although her senses had never been so sharp, at the same time she was afraid her brain had never been a bigger bowl of mush. And, although she didn’t know exactly what it was she’d just said, again, somehow she knew it was true. She was speaking from her heart.

  As she spoke, Jo was hit again with an almost painful desire to have Luc’s child. It was not just the sex that she had come to know and enjoy that she wanted now. It was capital S Sex, the one described in the old fashioned medical book from an ancient era. The loving act that didn’t end until her and Luc’s child was brought into the world, and she nursed it with milk from her own breasts.

  And now that she’d met the right man, her perfect fit, she was willing to break all of the rules in her world to have this kind of sex.

  This, then, was the age-old conflict of nature and the world playing out inside her own body. Lust for Luc was fighting everything the world told her to live by—laws, customs, morals. Yet it was no contest. Biological necessity vanquished them all. Any law men could write to attempt control of her body was a pathetic joke. Impossible to enforce. Jo thought again of the Black Virgins found scattered all over the world. Now there was no doubt in her mind that they depicted the very subversive forces that were driving her away from the tidy little life waiting for her back home and into Luc’s arms.

  So this is the way the World works, this is the way the World works. We really are at the mercy of our animal selves. It’s all in nature’s grand plan, isn’t it? To reproduce ourselves, want to or not. How can I even pretend to fight this?

  She let her body go limp. Luc wrapped her in his large warm arms, and kissed her deeply. She responded strongly, wanting to move into him.

  He held her tightly and said, “I’m ready to risk everything in my life for a chance to have you for myself. Even if we can’t plan more than one day at a time. Is that irrational, as you say? Crazy?”

  She nodded.

  “So it is. And how long will this insanity last?” he asked, shrugging in response to his own question.

  She shrugged, too, and her eyes began to fill with tears. It was as if they were both victims of some sort of natural disaster, both unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time when they met at the bar of the Hotel Deux Rivieres.

  He kissed her again, more forcefully, this time, and she responded with equal passion. Her stomach began its quivering little flips as she felt herself passing from weepy emotion and scattered, ineffective thought into pure sensation. They began to make love in a way that was different from the other times—this was colored by the force of their words and the seriousness of their decisions. Her fear and confusion slowly gave way to the demands of her body, as Luc began to stroke her, kiss her neck, breathe close to her ear, fill her with his heat and scent and taste.

  Although the air was very warm, her skin shivered in anticipation of his touches. He stroked every part of her body, and followed each stroke with a kiss as sweet and loving as any he had given her.

  Then he untied the bandana from around his neck.

  She trembled with anticipation.

  “Get on you hands and knees for me,” he ordered breathily.

  Not afraid of him, or herself, any longer, she thrilled to the tone in his voice and rolled onto her stomach, pushing up onto all fours. He removed his shorts and knelt behind her, stroking and kissing her body, murmuring.

  “Spread your legs a little more for me, will you, Joanna?” He moved his face down to where he could kiss her most private places. And he slid his tongue gently, ever so gently and sweetly, over her quivering vulva until she cried out a little. She was very excited. The past days’ fantasies were catching up to her and threatening to carry her immediately away on a wave of orgasm. He stopped then, and moved his mouth up to the base of her spine, caressing with his lips and tongue each point along her backbone, up to her neck. He rubbed her breasts, pinching and pulling her nipples gently, telling her how beautiful she was when she was excited like this, how they were not anywhere near finished with each other, how they had so much more to give each other, didn’t she agree, and how splendidly they could make love to each other every day. If only they could be together. They had to be together.

  Ever so slowly, he moved his mouth back down to where she was swollen and quivering. She opened her legs wider, and thrust her hips as close to him as she could. He ran his tongue along the most sensitive parts of her lips, around and near-but-not-quite-tasting her engorged clitoris. She moaned and arched her back, pressing herself further into his face. He placed his tongue, then, into the opening of her vagina, the source of the juice that told him she was ready. He flicked his tongue into her, lightly. Twice, three times. A moan escaped from deep in her chest.

  It felt outrageously delicious to be exposed like this, on her hands and knees like an animal, in the light of midday. But she was so quickly aroused she was afraid it would be over too soon. When she felt herself about to be carried into the sea she had dissolved into only two nights ago, she pulled away, gasping. “Oh Luc…I’m going to come already.”

  He let her rest for a moment, then began again to make love to her engorged lips and folds. His tongue felt hot and exquisite. It was hard and soft at the same time, in just the right places. She thought of the Salon des Femmes. Giant swollen cunts all over the walls, hanging from the ceiling. Dripping. When she began to moan again, he stopped.

  He raised himself over her, and with one hand dangled the bandana in front of her face.

  “Do you trust me, Joanna?” There was a hint of warning in his voice.

  She felt a small shock, too far gone to think at all.

  “Yes,” she managed in a small voice.

  “Will you let me blindfold you?”

  “Yes.”

  She could handle that.

  He began caressing her back again, her thighs.

  “Alright. Will you let me tie your wrists?”

  “Yes.”

  She wasn’t afraid, although she’d never allowed anyone to do such a thing before. His hands were making her crazy.

  “Will you let me tie this around your neck?”

  She should have been frightened now. But she wasn’t.

  “Yes.”

  He lifted her hair, kissed her shoulders, and knotted the bandana securely around her neck.

  She was well aware of what he was doing. Now she belonged to him. She’d just given him permission to do whatever he wished to her. And she still wasn’t afraid. Instead, she was so high she thought she’d faint.

  She heard the ripping sound of a condom wrapper as he moved behind her. A moment later she let out a squeal of surprise as he plunged into her.

  Although they were not face-to-face, a new level of intimacy and trust was established here. Intimacy, because he was so deep inside her—she felt she’d never been so completely filled by a man—and trust, because she was vulnerable in this position. He was a large man, and very strong.

  Dimly, somewhere in her clouded mind she knew that all he had to do was pull on the cloth collar around her neck to humiliate or hurt her. But instead of fear, she began to feel more deeply aroused through the trust she offered her lover. She gave it willingly. Joyfully.

  He began to move. Very slowly he pushed and withdrew and pushed and withdrew until she felt he
rself being carried away from herself, her indecisions, her fears. When she cried out, when her pleasure grew too great, he stopped to let it subside. But then she wanted more. Gasping, she wriggled and squirmed and pushed and pulled her body as he teased her towards and let her pull her own way back from her climax.

  Through his strength, he was in control, and she could do nothing but feel. She was so excited she felt on the verge of losing consciousness. But no, instead of a faint it was the beginning of an orgasm, as he slowly kept withdrawing and pushing into her again, and again.

  “Luc, oh my God! More—please, now!” Her voice was half strangled.

  But instead of giving her what she needed, he pulled out of her completely.

  In a low, rough voice he demanded, almost spitting the words at her, “What do you want now, Joanna? What is it you want from me now?”

  She whimpered in mixed fear and incredulity. What kind of game was this? But she had to keep playing. The inside of her body was roiling and expanding in the beginning of its ecstasy. Her hips were locked in a position that spread her as wide open as possible. Her body was willing him further inside. She felt the walls of her vagina beginning to suck, trying to pull him into her.

  “Please!” She was so short of breath she could barely get the words out. “Please don’t stop! Fuck me. Please, Luc.”

  “Oh yes. I’ll fuck you, my love, but only if you say you’ll come with me. Say it!”

  He pushed part way back into her body then stopped, ready to either withdraw or thrust again.

  She could scarcely believe what was happening to her. It was blackmail—she gasped at the intensity of her need for him to finish the job.

  If he didn’t finish, she would die.

  She was losing this game—yes, she was the loser—and she didn’t care. The bastard! He knew how to control her expertly. He knew exactly what she wanted. No one knew how to fuck her better than this man did. She swooned at her longing and in fear he would stop.