The room was bright in the afternoon sun. A tape of soft guitar music played gently over hidden speakers. Under the window was a wide divan draped in satin covers and traditional bolsters used by the French in place of pillows. The floor was covered by a thick, soft carpet, rich red, catching the feel and texture of the mahogany and the furniture. And Cullen had to admire the woman.
She sat on the side of the divan. Even sitting, she was erect, but relaxed. Her legs were crossed elegantly. A hint of a smile played at the sides of her wide mouth. She looked directly at Cullen and held his gaze when he looked back at her. He saw the dark at the centres of her eyes, but what stirred him most was the clear, white vastness that filled the space between her well-shaped lids, and the long, thick eyelashes, soft and luxuriant in their lack of makeup. Her face was angular, not pretty, but attractive in its honesty and character. Her jaw was set firmly and her whole face lay comfortably framed in the thick mass of soft shining auburn hair, tumbling in curls and waves down to the long nape of her neck.
“Ah ha,” said Gustav.
His voice was low and it sounded as if there was a catch in his throat. Cullen turned to him, but the Frenchman only had eyes for the woman. He stared at her, unblinking, with a vacant grin on his face. Cullen looked at the woman again, then back to Gustav. Gustav became aware of Cullen’s attention and caught himself. He swallowed, scowled, smiled, then swallowed again. He started to speak, but stopped to lick his lips.
“Elaine,” he said, and swallowed once more, giving an angry frown to Cullen, showing his displeasure at being seen to be under the spell of the woman’s attractiveness. And Cullen could understand that. For he had never seen a woman so attractive — not beautiful in the conventional sense of the word, and certainly not pretty. But she had a slim voluptuousness to her whole being, from the rich hair on her head, to the broad, slightly bony shoulders, the narrow waist, the wide hips pressing against the red satin dress, the long thighs emerging from the high slit, all the way to the slender ankles and her long, broad bare feet.
The woman watched Cullen as he appraised her. Aware of his appreciation, she showed her enjoyment, but naturally, without affectation or self-consciousness. Their mutual evaluation gave Gustav time to gather himself and continue his introduction. He reverted to his earlier self, but Cullen had seen the crack in the facade. Even if it was hidden now, it had been there, plain for anyone with half an interest to see it.
“Elaine.” Gustav addressed the girl. “This is the man I was telling you about. An Irish Patriot.”
He pushed more humour into his features as he spoke.
“Steven Cullen is his name. He has something for us too.”
He placed his arms around Cullen’s shoulders in a gesture more patronizing than friendly.
“He is our friend, so be nice. Ca va?”
He looked down at Cullen, glanced at the woman offhandedly, just to let everyone know that his apparent request was a command, then finished his address with a calm but peremptory directive.
“Now Steven, you give the stuff to Elaine.” He looked at Elaine. “You. You do your stuff.”
Cullen felt the big arm drop away from him, felt the chill of doubt and apprehension in his blood, but moved forward and placed his bag on the end of the bed on which the woman was sitting. It was only when he was closer to her that he noticed the step to the bed.
All that section was on a raised dais. His eyes were level with her shoulders, so that she looked slightly down at him. Though her lips had never parted since he’d seen her, her whole face seemed to be gently smiling.
He turned his attention to the bag, unzipped the side pockets and lobbed the two packets to the bed beside her. She twisted slightly to them. Cullen watched her breasts move independently under the light, sheer material. Her shoulder moved, stretching the slender arm out, the long manicured fingers paused over the first parcel, then descended on it slowly, caressing the parcel, its contents, its promise. He was beginning to get an idea of what Elaine was doing there, of what she was going to do with the drugs, what she was going to do to herself. He looked quickly and anxiously to Gustav. The big Frenchman gave him a flashing leer and turned to the girl again.
“Now. There you are. Hurry up.”
He spoke in French, but Cullen could catch the gist of his order.
Chapter Twelve
The woman’s fingers were exceptionally long, Cullen noticed, and with a long and well-shaped thumb fastened around the parcel. With mechanical precision she turned and placed the package on the low table beside the bed. She moved on to a soft, satin stool in front of the table and bent over the parcel. Neither of the men could see what she was doing. Cullen moved to the right to get a better view, and felt a sharp tug on his arm. He opened his mouth in quiet protest as Gustav’s fingers squeezed his bicep.
“Watch,” hissed the Frenchman, and let Cullen’s arm go, assuming his grip, his voice, and his intent were enough to ensure obedience.
But Cullen’s mind was open and full of curiosity. His heart was beginning to race with an excitement he’d rarely felt before. The combination of the woman’s beauty and her obvious connection with the sinister substance she was unwrapping gave him a hidden delight that he was going to see something he would not normally see. To him the woman seemed intelligent. Any users he had seen before were usually mindless with need. They were rough and urgent in their haste for a fix. He’d only seen one man actually take a fix before. It had been a demonstration of total indifference to any sense of degradation. The compulsion was complete.
This woman was not indifferent. Nor was she oblivious to her audience. Cullen had moved back behind Gustav, around to the far side of the bed, opposite the table at which she sat. She turned her head to him, the smile still in the face, but with a luminosity in the dark eyes which made them dance. He wondered if she really saw him, or was merely aware of him as an onlooker to the ritual she was about to perform.
The last time he had seen the man shoot into his vein, it had sickened and alarmed him. Now he felt no fear. No revulsion. Just an exquisite fascination.
He wondered how long she had been at it. She seemed expert. The packet was placed squarely on the table in front of her. She bent her head slightly over it, sniffed as if trying to will a delicious aroma to her senses, and sat straight again, eyes closed, breathing deeply. Cullen could see she was playing a part. It was a performance — not just for him and Gustav, but for herself. She was in her own world now, but not in the way most users might be, urgently fumbling to their own oblivion. She seemed in control.
From a small drawer in the table, she took a long handle with a thin, short blade on the end of it. Her long fingers poised the knife over the parcel and inserted the blade between the brown sellotape binding and the parcel’s outer layer. Deftly she moved the blade effortlessly through the tape. Elaine peeled off the top layer, leaving a thinner layer underneath. Her hands were steady, her breathing light. She sat straight and dignified. She looked like a woman opening a present of a jewel. She was no less elegant.
With the same sureness as before, she slid the blade into the binding, slipping it smoothly through the tape. She placed the knife on the table. With delicate strength, she opened the second layer of binding so that the cellophane-wrapped powder lay in the centre of it. She lifted the packet, slid out the two layers of wrapping and swept them off the top of the table to the floor. Her movements were slightly quicker now, but no less sure, as if the whole operation was gaining in momentum with her own excitement. Without pausing, her finger felt the powder through the clear cellophane wrapping. She rolled the parcel in her hands, studying it, devouring it with her eyes, so that the thing became the focal point of her concentration.
She replaced it on the table, her left hand moving back to the knife. She placed the blade to the joint of the taped packet and slipped it with simple dexterity along the top, making a short, neat slit. The cellophane split like an open wound. She leaned over the cut, sniff
ed and smiled lightly. Cullen watched the narrow blade dip into the compressed powder, rupture it in a sliver, and come out again steadily and gently before her eyes. For a long moment, she just looked, then slowly she moved the knife to her face. Her mouth opened and her tongue protruded. The tip of her tongue touched the blade and the powder was gone. In a single, sure motion, the blade dipped to the deadly packet again. This time there was more powder on the edge. There was no waiting. The hand moved up and the tongue flicked out with an instinctive sensitivity to the noxious essence. She placed the knife beside the open packet, swallowed and breathed deeply. She seemed no different. She stood, turned slowly, and for the first time, Cullen could see her whole figure outlined through the sheer dress. She looked at Gustav and nodded once, gravely.
“C’est bon.”
She could have been commending a plate of sauced foot, thought Cullen. He looked at Gustav. The big Frenchman moved his head, as if in understanding.
“The other,” was all he said.
Gustav’s attention was directed solely to the girl. He was watching her eyes. He never blinked, so close was his observation. Elaine reseated herself at the table, carefully shifted the opened packet onto the windowsill and, with undiminished dexterity, went through the same procedure with the closed parcel.
Cullen noticed that she was slightly faster with this one. When it came time for tasting, there was a lack of the sharpness and precision which she had earlier in her movements. From this packet she took two dips as well, but the amounts of powder were larger and the movement was slightly careless rather than casually accurate.
Without standing, she nodded and said,
“Bon.”
Her voice was higher, tighter. This time, when she turned to Gustav, Cullen could see the dilation of her pupils. The knife was moving again to the packet.
Gustav tersely whispered,
“Enough!”
The knife stopped, but Elaine had turned and, with the speed of the cunning, dipped the extended forefinger of her right hand into the soft powder.
Gustav moved fast. He was behind her in two steps. Cullen was surprised at the speed of a man so big. The Frenchman’s arms moved around the girl, carefully avoiding the opened parcel, and pinned her arms to her body. He lifted her and stepped back from the table.
She gave a low grunt.
“Please,” she whispered loudly. “Please!”
The Frenchman held her tightly. Her feet moved above the ground, but she made no move to kick him or to free herself from his grasp. Her head began to move from side to side.
“Please!” she said again, “Please! Now!”
Gustav looked at Cullen.
“Steven, get the parcels off there. Put them on the far side.”
He nodded to a high bureau at the front of the room.
Elaine whimpered. Her features did not change. Her head moved from side to side and backwards and forwards. The thick hair tumbled down in her face. She grunted again.
“Please,” she said once more.
Gustav held her tighter. Cullen could see his eyes dancing. He was holding her to his chest, his broad shoulders lying against the wall so that Elaine was pressed down along his body. It was not just her feet moving anymore. Her legs were doing a slow, undulating dance, rubbing against her captor’s thighs and abdomen.
Carefully, one at a time, Cullen moved the cut packets to the bureau on the wall behind the door. He turned to Gustav and Elaine to see what was happening next.
Elaine was struggling, but not, it seemed, to free herself. Her hands were running over her own thighs, across her abdomen, over her breasts and down again. Her eyes opened and closed, watching Cullen watch her. The slit in her skirt now fully exposed one thigh. Elaine moved, rotated her leg in a steady motion between the large, solid thighs of Gustav. Her eyes flashed from Cullen’s to the table behind him. She moved her tongue and her whole face yearned to him. She whispered, her voice hoarse and low, the sound coining from the depth other throat, “Please.”
“More now,” she said, and the words were pitifully whined.
Gustav’s knees were supporting her fully from under the arch formed by her undulating pelvis. One of the manicured hands rubbed the flat, firm abdomen. The other moved below and lifted her skirt. Her legs, long, bare and arching, spread widely; her toes stretched down and supported her lightly against Gustav.
Through the light material of her underwear, Cullen could see the dark bush marking the top of her inner thighs. He looked to her eyes again. The smile was now in her face. Everywhere. Her mouth, cheeks, eyes were illuminated with life and longing and invitation. The man behind her was moving. Cullen could see the big knees and hips shift and rotate to the movements of the woman.
She whispered to Cullen. He wasn’t sure what he’d heard. Her hands were at the front of her underwear, twisting, dividing with her fingers, in and out, stroking. He leaned forward.
“What?”
“Anything,” he heard, quiet and hoarse and urgent.
Her eyes flicked closed, then opened, moving to the packets behind him. Such was her desire that he could see her whole intention in her eyes alone.
“Anything you want,” she said softly. “I will give you anything.”
Though Cullen could hear her words and see what she was doing, for her hands were now wholly occupied with the area between her thighs, he wondered vaguely how she could relate what she was doing with herself and to Gustav, to whom she seemed oblivious, to him, who was on the far side of the room. Her hands delved deeper. Her hips rotated in a circular motion that gave her captor alternating weight and freedom from her body. It was then that Cullen moved his eyes to Gustav. The man was gone, drifting off into some distant, erotic land of his own, leaving the world and present surroundings far behind.
For the first time Gustav spoke.
“Yes,” he said, “give me everything.”
Both of them were only dimly aware of Cullen, and then not as a presence, but simply as a kind of echoing figure at whom the woman could speak. The two of them moved forward, still moving, still touching, shifting their bodies in the freedom of their needs, until they reached the large bed.
They both began to bend. Gustav’s arms still held her, still accommodated her moves to his and her hands began to roll the small, white underwear down along her thighs. With one arm around her waist, Gustav fingered his jeans free with expertise and speed. The woman leaned forward, her arms reaching onto the bed until her elbows supported her. Her eyes were still fixed on him, but Cullen could see that he was only an object in her clouded vision. Her real vision was what was going on inside, to her brain and to her body. She was inside herself. A low moan came from deep within her. Her hands moved back behind her. Gustav leaned back to give her room. Her legs moved onto the bed so that she was kneeling, swaying, her head upon her arms.
Cullen could see the urgency in Gustav’s face, the total attention to his fervid imagination. He had a smile on his face, half surprised, half delighted, a contortion of wonder made by the muscles as they played his features into a twist of leering, dominating lust.
The flickering of Elaine’s eyes caught Cullen’s attention. They were open again, watching, glazed and dim, unfocused but seeing all. Somehow he could see the girl was associating him with what she was doing. It was Cullen’s face and his body that her drugged conception was feeling, not the Frenchman behind her, smirking over her exposed and expectant archway. Gustav’s legs were spread to give him balance and to accommodate his designs on the moving body in front of him. His eyes were bright, unblinking. As he moved on the moaning woman, his jeans and shirt open, his large, hairy stomach and the perfect curve of the woman’s rump meeting, Cullen felt his own feet move. He walked dazedly as the voices of the man and the woman rose in the union of their bodies.
Cullen felt his hand on the door handle, saw the blue, moving sea as he opened the door, tasted the fresh tang of the sea air, heard a gull cry. He closed the door to th
e rhythmic creaking of the bed behind him. A shout, low, but distinct, came from the room. A cry of passion, ecstasy, abandon. He moved to the rail at the edge of the boat. Something thudded to the floor in the cabin. Then came another thud, a cry, a man’s voice, a long moan, a shrill shout from the woman. Then silence.
He held the rail in both hands, listening. For a long while he heard just the hum of the engine, the wash of the sea and the odd gull’s cry. Then, he heard murmurings of conversation in the cabin. They were talking, back to life. Perhaps, thought Cullen, she’s asking for another snort of the powder. Maybe he’ll give it to her. He stood, wondering at the difference of it. Then he began to understand. Here was a different world. Not what he had seen, or previously believed in, but supposed existed from the odd story and his own imagination. He thought about what he’d seen, not as an erotic or shocking experience, but as a symbol of the things neither good nor bad, but different, to which he had now committed himself. His other life was over. Completely. There had been a time once when he could have turned, gone back to simple everyday fishing, perhaps having a family, worrying about rent and enough money for beers, or shoes, or a snazzy suit to go to the summer dances. But not now. Now he was not only on the run from his own police, and those of England and the Continent, but from others too. For there were people in Ireland who would want the money, or some of it anyway. And that was all he had now. The money and his own sit and whatever ability he had to adjust to his new life. From now on, it was his only existence. He nodded to himself, felt a grim determination, and breathed deeply of the fresh air swimming around him in eddies of salt spray and light wind.
He was standing like that when he heard the door open behind him. He knew it was Marcel. Marcel, he thought. He found himself acknowledging the Frenchman by his Christian name. That was different. He felt no enmity toward the man. And he knew why. He was of the same ilk as Marcel now. The self-deception was gone. Marcel. Gustav. Call him what you like. Call him a cunt. So are you. Cullen laughed to himself and turned to look at the big fellow. He could see that Marcel was watching, waiting to see Cullen’s reaction to his indecent performance with the woman. Marcel’s eyes were hard, aggressive, prepared for the censure, ready to repel it. But Cullen was still laughing at his own joke and what Marcel saw was a smiling, understanding face. The Frenchman relaxed and smiled.
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