When the Siren Calls

by Tom Barry

  “Welcome to the Ritz Hotel, sir. How may I serve you this evening?”

  “I may need a room for the night, what do you have available?”

  “We are very full this evening, sir. I will need to check for any non-arrivals. Were you thinking of a single room, a double room, or a suite?”

  Jay tore his fingers back and forth across his brow, instinct and habit called for the suite but he had already paid for one outrageously expensive room that evening.

  “A double.”

  “Twin beds, double, or king size, sir?”

  Jay was beginning to feel like he was at a fast food restaurant; he drew himself up to full height and spoke with stern assertiveness.

  “If the hotel is as full as you say it is, how about you just check what you’ve got, and I’ll make the decisions?”

  “As you wish, sir, just a moment please.” She tapped away at lightning speed as Jay’s eyes wandered apprehensively to the doors once more. “I can offer you a double room with a king size bed, or a penthouse suite overlooking Green Park?”

  “How much for the suite?”

  “Three thousand pounds, sir.”

  “And the double?”

  “Let me see, that would be twelve hundred pounds, sir.”

  Again, routine called for the suite but Jay had a horrible feeling, from the way Andy had been talking, that his next set of expenses might be on his own tab. The blonde glanced at her watch and back at her computer screen as if watching the last second bids of an online auction.

  “I’ll take the double.”

  Jay only just had time to arrange himself comfortably in a chair before Lucy arrived, feasting on the opulence around her with wide, hungry eyes.

  “Sorry I’m late,” she said lightly, kissing him on the cheek. “I got held up at Clapham Junction. I got your texts so I came straight here. Is there a problem?”

  Jay laughed to himself as he thought of the two concierges outside the Savoy, waiting for a blonde that would never arrive, but it was a brief and bitter sound — it was shaping up to be an expensive evening.

  “No problem,” he said with a casual wave of the hand, “I just wasn’t happy with the room in the Savoy. I think someone had been smoking cigars around the clock in it. So I thought I’d treat you to the Ritz.”

  Lucy’s eyes swept the foyer, resting on the fine jewellery outlet with approval. “The Ritz is great.”

  “I thought we’d go to dinner first, if that’s ok, maybe the Caprice next door?” Jay volunteered, physically and emotionally exhausted by the afternoon’s exertions and resigned to further five-star expense.

  Lucy shook her head apologetically. “I’m sorry, Jay; I grabbed something at the station, I was famished. So it’s not food I’m hungry for. I vote for enjoying the hotel. Maybe you can order up.”

  She bounced into the room like a child, inspecting everything with glee. Jay watched her in amusement as he lounged on the bed, only thinking to speak as she began to take her clothes off. For all her beauty and outward confidence, Jay was often struck by Lucy’s contradictions; she never sought to deny her cosmetic enhancements, and as he drooled at the perfection of her breasts, blessed with nipples he could hang his umbrella on, his mind went to the night he first asked her why she had invested in implants. “So the boys can tell the front from the back,” she had told him with endearing and self-effacing honesty.

  “We’re not going anywhere then?” he asked.

  “First things first, lover boy,” she said, wiggling off the last layer to reveal a fetish-like combination of tight red underwear and stockings.

  “Nearly ready for you now, tiger,” she purred as she delved into her bag, retrieving a large tub of plain yogurt from its depths. She glanced at Jay’s puzzled face and burst into attractive laughter. “I think you said you prefer organic?”

  Jay did not say anything as she again rummaged through her things, emerging with a set of steel handcuffs dangling tantalisingly from her fingertip. They were no novelty store toy, suggesting industrial strength, perhaps even Metropolitan police issue.

  “You going to pull a blue uniform out of that bag next?” asked Jay, greedy hope manifest in his voice.

  “Dream on, soldier,” she said with a wicked grin. “Just be thankful there’s no truncheon in here, then you’d really have something to worry about. And the ‘cuffs are for me. So you need to be working out what you’re going to do with the yogurt.”

  It was ten-thirty when Jay finally collapsed on the bed, a slippery and satisfied Lucy pressed against him. She fiddled with his watch, stroking the metal and pushing its coldness to her face.

  “It’s still early,” she said softly, pushing against his face with her nose, “are you going to show me around the hotel now? And then can we check out a club or something?”

  “What type of club do you fancy?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. One that’s difficult to get into I suppose,” she replied, sitting up abruptly with excitement. “We have plenty around here to choose from. You got any preference?”

  “I did speak to the concierge earlier,” said Jay, also now sitting up and nuzzling into her neck. “He recommended somewhere not far away. Very exclusive, very expensive.”

  “Is it one I would have heard of?”

  “Hopefully not, I asked him for somewhere a bit different, where there’s definite action, somewhere a bit racy. He said it was a fun place. A bit kinky.”

  “Kinky?” She ran her hands up his thighs again, as if the word itself aroused her.

  “Yep, that’s what he said. Do you want to give it a try? We can just check it out. If we don’t like it, we can go somewhere else.”

  “Ok, let’s give it a whirl,” she said, pulling his arms to get him up, “but if I want to leave, we leave, right?”

  Jay led Lucy down the unlit corridor of the club; she held his hand, needing to feel secure in the darkness. At the end of the corridor, illuminated by the ridges of light that outlined a door, stood Eva.

  “You must be Mr. Brooke?” she said, looking him up and down as if assessing him for the first time.

  “And you must be the lady I spoke to, Eva wasn’t it? This is my friend Lucy. We just want to have a drink and see if it is what we were expecting.”

  She nodded and led them through the door. Jay strode in and Lucy followed, squinting in the light and surveying the scene around her. Ten girls stared back at her, draped around in various levels of undress, like strange porcelain figures bathed in a soft red glow.

  “Jay, this is a knocking shop,” she whispered, looking around in astonishment.

  “Let’s give it a chance,” he replied, “I think she said the shows go on upstairs.”

  Jay led her to a sofa and a bottle of champagne arrived before them within moments, proffered by a girl in a tiny black mesh dress.

  “Did you order that, Jay?” Lucy whispered, not wanting to raise her voice.

  “No, I think it’s sort of compulsory, instead of paying at the door.”

  Lucy continued to gaze around, stealing surreptitious glances at the women arrayed all about her.

  As she did so a petite girl, perched at the centre of the bar, sought her eye contact and held it. Lucy looked away unsure what to do and the girl slipped off her stool and walked over. She wore only a bra and a wrap that barely joined around her hips. She addressed Jay, perhaps sensing Lucy’s unease.

  “Is it I ok if I give your friend a lap dance?” she asked him.

  Jay looked at Lucy. “You ok with that?”

  “Sure, babe, why not.”

  The girl turned to Lucy, her mouth pink and sugary as she spoke.

  “My name is Camila, I’m from Argentina. The first dance is free.”

  The business-like nature of her words contrasted sharply with the sensual, erotic shapes of her lips and Lucy almost laughed but, aware of Jay’s fantasises and expectations, she decided that she was going to play along.

  “Will you let me touch?” she
asked.

  “Maybe, if I like you.”

  Camila whirled, twisted and gyrated around Lucy, forming strange and alluring shapes in the air as she pushed and rubbed against her body, tantalising and pulsating against her skin. Lucy encouraged her, letting her fingertips brush against her skin as she dropped to her knees, twirling her hair around her as she buried her head in Lucy’s crotch. Lucy let out an encouraging sigh of assent and Camila rose again, looking her in the eyes as she spread her thighs across her and pushed her breasts forwards, tempting her, daring her to take them. Lucy reached out and stroked them, holding them in her hands as Jay looked on.

  Camila moaned and moved Lucy’s hands to her lean brown stomach, rubbing her crotch up and down Lucy’s thigh as she unfastened her bra. She leant forwards, circling and gyrating against Lucy, offering her breast to Lucy’s deep red lips. Lucy moved in, tentative but purposeful, one eye on Jay who smiled with satisfaction. But as she opened her mouth, Camila sprung up and refastened her bra, bobbing in a perverse curtsy as the show came to a close.

  Jay gave a brief clap of appreciation.

  “Would you like to stay for a drink, Camila?”

  “Thank you,” she said with the well-honed reflex of her trade, “a champagne, please.”

  “You still ok with this?” Jay asked as another girl, all but naked except for two strategically positioned strips of fabric, joined them on the sofa, sitting herself on the arm next to Jay.

  “I’m ok.” Lucy smiled widely as if to prove it. “It’s fun. If you want a dance, you go ahead.”

  “I’m told it gets even more fun upstairs. You up for that?”

  “I might be,” she said, as she considered her options, “but only with one girl, ok?”

  “Which girl?” he asked magnanimously.

  “You choose, big boy, you’ll be the one that’s watching.”

  His smile faded slightly but he nodded, “Let’s go upstairs and have a look around.”

  “What about Camila?” asked Lucy, feeling strangely guilty at not following through on such meticulous foreplay.

  Jay laughed. “She isn’t going anywhere, are you, Camila? Let’s just have a look upstairs.” He walked over to Eva and talked briefly with her in the corner, low and inaudible.

  She beckoned to Lucy, “Follow me.”

  At the top of the stairs Eva stopped and turned to them, her voice hushed, almost secretive.

  “You are very lucky to come now. I have a girl here who is very special, only eighteen. She is from Siberia. She has just arrived seven days ago. Very beautiful Russian girl, with the smoothest, whitest skin I have ever seen. I do not let her work downstairs, not yet, she is too precious to me. You would like to meet her?”

  “Can’t hurt to just say hello,” said Jay with a shrug, as if they were calling on a neighbour, while Lucy stood in silence behind him, happy to just let things unfold.

  Eva rapped at the door with her knuckles and opened it without waiting for a reply. The girl in the room was sat on the bed reading, her knees pulled up to her chin with blonde hair cascading down her back. She looked over and smiled but did not get up. Eva stepped back out and pulled the door until it was almost closed.

  “Like a beautiful white flower, isn’t she? Her name is Katrina, but the girls call her Rapunzel. You must be gentle with her. She may need a little coaxing. She is different from the girls downstairs. So fresh. So innocent. And she speaks only Russian.”

  “No English at all?” asked Lucy, feeling strangely sorry for her.

  “Only one word, which is yes. I think she can say yes in five languages.”

  “Not bad for seven days!” said Jay with a laugh. “I think we’d like to get to know Rapunzel a little better.”

  Eva ushered them back into the room and exchanged a few sentences with the girl in brusque Russian. The girl stood up, lithe and sylphlike and in a short pale dress; Eva walked quietly out and left them in her hands.

  The second the door was closed Lucy turned to Jay, fierce and fiery.

  “Before we go any further, I want to get the rules straight. This is just going to be a show. You can watch, but you can’t touch. Not Snow White over there, anyway.”

  “Come on, Lucy. You can’t expect me to stand here holding my hands while you get it off with Miss Siberia. Be fair.”

  Lucy was nothing if not fair. “Ok, I’m going to allow touching, but only with your hands, and only then on the outsides. No penetration, you got that? Not with your hands, or anything else. Nothing of yours goes inside her, not the mouth, not anywhere else.”Thirty-nine

  Isobel left the Savoy with a spring in her step as she and Maria emerged into the tepid warmness of the grey-blue morning, refreshed and elated by the air of peaceful contentment that had pervaded their evening together. They waited together in the Savoy courtyard for Peter’s driver, who was to pick them up and take them to Gatwick for Maria’s impending flight to Pisa. They sat in serene silence in the car and arrived with two hours to spare.

  “I’ll come in and see you off, Maria, I’m ready for a coffee anyway.”

  “Call me ten minutes before you need picking up, Ma’am,” said the driver, more than used to hanging round airports, “and I’ll see you back here.”

  They lounged together in the café, sipping coffees with one eye on the departure gate for queues.

  “So what happens next, Isobel?” asked Maria, her curiosity getting the better of her. “Can you see yourself repeating what you did yesterday when Peter is around? Have you thought about all the lies you’ll need to tell?”

  “I really don’t know,” replied her friend with a sigh. “I’m not very good at lies. But right now I don’t think I can stop seeing Jay. It’s like I’m a different person when I’m with him. The way he makes me feel…I just can’t give that up, not yet.”

  “And you think he feels the same way?”

  Isobel shook her head. “I know men are different, but yesterday he did say that what we had was something special for him, something that he couldn’t remember feeling before.”

  “You mean, he sort of said that he was actually in love with you?” Maria looked sceptical, even shocked.

  “No, of course not. I know that’s not possible. We’re not teenagers and there hasn’t been enough time. But I do believe there’s something there, something he feels with me that he isn’t feeling at home, or has felt with other women. Not for a long time at least.”

  “So he wasn’t put out that you hadn’t passed his little test with the Hollywood?” asked Maria, annoyance flickering across her face at the wrongness of her predictions.

  Isobel looked away, unable to answer.

  “Oh my god, Isobel, you didn’t?”

  “It’s not illegal!” Isobel exclaimed. “What is so wrong about me doing it?”

  “What’s wrong is that you might as well tattoo I am besotted with you on your forehead!”

  “Is doing what he wants me to do so bad, if we both like it?” asked Isobel dreamily, wanting nothing to encroach on her bliss.

  “So I suppose now he has he asked you to get a stud in your clit or something?”

  Isobel laughed, unwilling to rise to the bait. “No, Maria, he hasn’t asked me to do anything else. Nothing like that anyway.”

  “So he has asked something?” Maria latched onto her instantly, immediately knowing. Isobel hesitated, unwilling to expose herself.

  “Come on, Isobel, what hurdle has he asked you to jump over next?”

  “It’s not a hurdle or anything. He just asked me when was the last time I masturbated, that’s all.”

  “When was the last time! Quite a supposition there. Not something you can answer yes or no to, is it?”

  “Anyway, I didn’t tell him,” said Isobel, sipping her coffee to end it.

  “And he just left it at that?” asked Maria, her voice etched with disbelief. “He popped the question out there, and then forgot about it?”

  “No, he asked me if I’d ever let anyon
e watch me do it, and I told him the truth, which is no. And what he then said was that he would like to watch me do it. And if you must have the gory details, he then asked if I owned a vibrator, and I said no because I don’t, and never have.”

  “So that’s when he pulled one out of his backside?” cried Maria, cold and frenzied.

  “No, he just said it’s something he’d like to see me do, with a vibrator.”

  “Did he specify the model? A black, twelve inch corrugated monster perhaps?”

  Isobel started to answer, but Maria was no longer listening; she was staring down the concourse towards the departure gate.

  “Have I lost you at the interesting bit, Maria?”

  “Sorry. Did you say Jay shot off at six last night to catch a flight?” Maria glanced at her, her whole face blunted and saddened.

  “Yes, yes he did; he was coming straight here.”

  Isobel looked into Maria’s face, at the eyes that were looking right past her. She stood up and followed their gaze, letting out a strange, strangled squeak as she saw Jay standing alone next to the gate.

  “Something must have happened,” she blurted out with bewilderment in her eyes. “I need to speak to him.”

  Maria grabbed her friend by the arm. “No, Isobel.” It was an order, not a statement, and she pulled her close to her body.

  Isobel tried to push her away. “I must, I need to know what’s happened.”

  Maria tightened her grip. “No, Isobel, not yet. Just wait one minute.”

  The two stood there looking down the concourse; the people that milled about blurred together in Isobel’s vision, a dark rainbow of colour that swirled around the image of him alone, expectant, at the gate. He lifted his head and they followed his gaze as a long legged blonde in a black beret approached him. Isobel watched as they embraced, sharing a kiss, before linking arms and disappearing through the gate. Maria held her friend as she felt her body go weak, her grip tightening as Isobel started to shake and her tears started to flow.