Manservant

by Harwood, Michael

  Usually, when I’m with a man for the first time, the sexual dynamics take time to assess. There are fundamental questions that need to be answered before any satisfaction can be guaranteed or, for that matter, expected. Is he top or bottom? What sexual proclivities does he have? Are his taboos the same as mine? Is he here to pleasure or be pleasured? The whole thing can take hours to figure out and quite often with disappointing consequences. I’ve lost count of the number of guys I’ve dragged home only to discover that we have so little in common sexually that they might as well be from a different planet.

  But with Drummond things felt different. Everything with him seemed so natural and somehow just right. I knew exactly what he wanted, and so did he. And I had a strong feeling I was going to enjoy giving it to him.

  I tugged at the collar of his shirt until a couple more buttons popped open to reveal a broad expanse of chest. I ran my fingers over every inch of it, lingering only fleetingly on his rock-hard nipples. When I did though, he gasped loudly.

  “Oh! You like that, do you?” I said, pinching one firmly and twisting it.

  “God, yes,” he moaned. “For Christ’s sake, don’t stop.”

  I reached behind his back and slid my hands down onto his arse and began to roughly knead his cheeks. I felt the muscles tense sharply and then relax as he took a deep breath before whispering into my ear.

  “Look in the bag on the table.”

  I removed my face from the crook of his neck and glanced over his shoulder. And there, carefully placed in the center of the billiards table, was the black plastic bag he had been carrying earlier.

  “So, what have we here?” I said, reaching over and grabbing it.

  As he looked on with barely concealed glee, I emptied the contents onto the table piece by piece.

  First out of the bag was a length of thick silk rope, the purpose of which was fairly obvious.

  “Hmmm, I can see that you are going to need restraining at some point,” I said.

  The next item was a small, beautifully carved wooden paddle with a short, leather-clad handle. I turned it over in my hands, and on the reverse side carved into the surface were the initials DS.

  “It’s a spanking paddle,” he said proudly.

  “Yes, I can see that. And how clever of you to have your initials put on it. That way if you leave it in a hotel room somewhere it’s more likely to be returned to you.”

  He laughed and took the paddle from me before slapping it loudly against the palm of his hand.

  “I do not intend to leave it lying around.” He smiled.

  Next was another paddle, but this one was larger and made from black leather. It was smooth and cool to the touch and obviously had more give than its wooden counterpart. I felt a thrill at the thought of the different effects the two paddles would have on Drummond’s backside.

  “We’ll definitely have some fun with these,” I said.

  I leaned in and kissed him hard on the lips before taking him firmly by the shoulders and spinning him round to face the table.

  I pushed the toys aside as he fumbled with the buckle of his trousers. Seconds later his tweeds were round his ankles, and in the flash of an eye he was bent over the table with his palms spread wide and his face pressed into the baize.

  “So, Drummond. Shall we see if these toys of yours were worth the money you paid?” I asked, picking up the wooden paddle and performing a few practice swings in the air as if I were about to play a round of golf.

  “Yes, please,” he panted.

  “In that case I want you to count the strokes. Can you do that for me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes, WHAT?” I said with my mouth close to his ear.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And just so we are clear, if you miss any or purposely miscount, I will start all over again. Am I making myself clear?”

  “Crystal,” he said breathlessly.

  I set to work and used the paddle on one cheek after the other as he kept count. I began with a moderate amount of force, but everything about Drummond’s body language told me not to hold back for long. As I increased the pressure his back arched, and he pushed up his hips to anticipate the blows. With every strike his moans became lower and more animalistic. In fact, the harder I brought the paddle down on his bare skin, the more ecstatic he became, and by the time we arrived at the twentieth stroke his cheeks were glowing.

  “Let’s see if this one is any better,” I said, teasing him gently with the tip of the leather paddle.

  On the first actual stroke he gasped sharply, and his whole body spasmed. For a second I thought it might be too much for him and paused to take stock of his reactions.

  “Twenty-two,” he said through gritted teeth.

  I was just about to carry on when I realized he had miscounted.

  “Well, well, well—turns out you can’t count after all,” I barked, seeing a shudder of excitement run through his body as I began the count all over again.

  By the time I reached twenty-five strokes I had to stop. My whole upper body was aching, and the biceps in my right arm were beginning to throb and burn as if I had just done a workout. He showed no signs of wanting me to stop, but something told me that if I didn’t we’d be here for hours.

  “I think that’s enough for today,” I said, dropping the paddle onto the table.

  He straightened up carefully before turning to face me. His eyes were half closed, and a thin smile played on his lips. He slowly pulled up his trousers and winced as the rough cloth grazed his angry red cheeks. But as he tucked in his shirt and smoothed down his hair, he said nothing to give away how he was feeling.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, placing a hand on his shoulder.

  “Okay?” He laughed. “You have no idea how very okay I am—you are quite an expert spanker, young man.” He leaned over and kissed me lightly on the lips before reaching for a cigar from the ashtray. He lit it and puffed two large smoke rings into the air. “You can leave now,” he said.

  I wasn’t sure what the protocol was for being dismissed after having spanked one’s employer, but I certainly didn’t expect to be stood down quite so quickly afterward.

  “As you wish,” I said, before leaving him to his thoughts.

  CHAPTER 16

  A few days later I was sitting at the kitchen table reading the newspaper whilst Vera opened the post.

  “Christ on a bike!” she shrieked.

  “What’s wrong?” I said, quickly getting up from the table and rushing to her side. “Has somebody died?”

  “No, it’s worse than that,” she said, sounding as if she were about to burst into tears. “Lady Shanderson is coming to stay.”

  The letter was from Lady Shanderson’s personal secretary, explaining that Lady Shanderson would be arriving the following weekend, and included a list running to two pages of what special arrangements were required for her stay.

  As Vera began to read the letter she shook her head and snorted indignantly at the list of special requests.

  “Well, that’s a new one on me—Lady Shanderson requires only pasteurized caviar from Harrods—bloody Harrods! When am I going to find time to go to Harrods? She’s obviously on one of her weird diets,” Vera huffed, sliding the letter across the table for me to read. “Last time she was here I was up half the night shucking oysters, and she brought a cheese that smelled so bad I thought something had crawled into the pantry and died. At least we don’t have to deal with that this time.”

  The list was mind-boggling. There were requests for organic spelt flour, bottles of rare glacial mineral water, fat-free goat’s milk yogurt, unsweetened soy milk, and yeast and wheat-free bagels. And then, as if that weren’t enough, on the second page there was a list of special toiletries to be ordered and placed in her bathroom prior to her arrival.

  “Anyone would think we didn’t have soap in West Sussex,” Vera said with a shake of her head. “Why can’t they ever give us more notice? This is a nightmare—and no
w I’m going to have to break the news to Gloria.”

  “What news is that?” said Gloria, entering the kitchen.

  The news of Lady Shanderson’s impending visit was broken to Gloria in the way in which one might explain to a particularly sensitive child that his or her puppy had just died. Hot sweet tea was made (good for shock, according to Vera), and I wouldn’t swear to it but I’m pretty sure Vera slipped a tot of brandy in it for good measure.

  “Well, that’s just great, isn’t it?” Gloria said as Vera rubbed her back soothingly. “I’ll never get the house ready for her in less than a week. I mean, where am I supposed to find white phalaenopsis orchids, whatever they are, around here?”

  Gloria and Vera were sent into a tailspin that threatened to last most of the day, so I made myself scarce and left them to it.

  I mean, how bad can she be? I thought as I headed for the library to tidy the newspapers and empty the wastepaper basket. She’s probably a pussycat compared to what I had to put up with at the Landseer.

  The library was in its usual state of disarray, and as I began to reassemble the Financial Times, Telegraph, and Daily Mail, I made a mental note to give Lord Shanderson a few extra strokes later that night as a reminder to tidy up after himself.

  The desk looked like it had been ransacked, as usual. There were messy piles of papers and documents all over the place, but there was one letter in full view that I couldn’t help but notice. After checking to see if anyone was hovering around in the hall, I smoothed out the thick cream vellum and began to read.

  It was handwritten, and embossed at the top was the address of the Shandersons’ London residence, Dugdale House, and it was signed, Lovingly yours, Elizabeth x.

  In it, Lady Shanderson wrote about how much she was looking forward to coming back to Castle Beadale, and although I didn’t have time to read the whole thing it did strike me as quite chatty. In fact, the whole tone of the letter struck me as most odd and not what I would have expected from someone who was widely acknowledged to be a prize bitch.

  But it was the last line that jumped out at me as being the most interesting:

  I’m so glad we have finally done what we set out to achieve.

  As I pondered the meaning of the letter I heard someone coming down the corridor and quickly put it back in where I found it.

  It had just gone 11 a.m., so the kitchen was buzzing with people congregating for their morning tea break when I got there. I was dying for a decent cup of coffee, but rather than head back to the cottage to fire up the Gaggenau I decided to stick around and see what I could find out about Lady Shanderson.

  Thankfully, things had calmed down a bit, and Vera even managed to stop fretting long enough to cut up one of her fruitcakes for elevenses.

  “So, the lady of the manor is coming for a visit, is she?” I said to no one in particular.

  “Indeed she is, so we’d all better batten down the hatches,” Vera said, pouring tea for everyone.

  “No tea for me, thanks,” I said, holding my hand up as Vera lunged toward me with the teapot.

  “I’ve got two words for you,” Vera said, banging the huge fruitcake down in the center of the table. “New. Money. It’s just not the same. They want everything yesterday, no understanding of how things are really done.”

  I began to regret asking the question, but the genie was out of the bottle now, so I pressed on.

  “Come on, Vera, she can’t be all that bad, can she?”

  “I’m not saying she is a bad person; of course I’m not. I’m just saying that she is a very demanding woman. That’s all. I’m not showing her no disrespect. Just pointing out that she’s different from us. Just a bit, you know . . . foreign in the way she goes about things.”

  “Like what?” I asked, stifling a laugh.

  “She drinks vodka at dinner. And it doesn’t get more strange than that. Even you, with your fancy London ways, have to admit that,” Kylie chipped in, causing everybody to stop and look up.

  “Is that right? Do tell me more,” I said with a smirk that instantly sent Vera’s eyes skyward.

  “You need to learn your place, young lady,” Vera barked, snatching back the slice of fruitcake she’d just put in front of Kylie. “I don’t recall anyone’s asking your opinion.”

  “Just because I don’t share them at the drop of a hat doesn’t mean I don’t have opinions,” Kylie shot back defiantly, before winking at me.

  “Do you know what, Vera, I might have a cuppa after all,” I said, inching my chair nearer to Kylie.

  After that Vera managed to skillfully steer the conversation away from Lady Shanderson, but as people began to finish their tea and get ready to go back to work I saw my opportunity to find out more.

  “Leave those,” I said to Gloria, Tom, and Vera, pointing to the dirty teacups and cake plates. “You lot look busy; Kylie and I will wash them up.”

  “That’s sweet of you, dear,” Vera said as she hurried out of the kitchen after Gloria. “Orchids! I need to talk to you about orchids.”

  “So, tell me what you know about Elizabeth Shanderson,” I said to Kylie as soon as we were alone.

  “You wash, and I’ll dry,” she said. “Then I’ll tell you what I think.”

  At first, the pair of us just stood washing the dishes, staring out across the fields in front of the kitchen window.

  “Beautiful here, isn’t it?” I said, breaking the silence.

  “Sometimes,” Kylie replied.

  “Sometimes? What’s that supposed to mean?” I said, draping the tea towel over the lid of the Aga to dry.

  I looked at Kylie now, and it was clear she was choosing her words carefully. She suddenly didn’t look like a little girl anymore. She looked more serious than before, and I felt a sudden pang of guilt for never really having taken notice of her until now.

  “What I mean is that sometimes things can get ugly around here. It might look all lovely to you, but I’ve heard them say things no husband and wife should ever say to each other,” she said.

  “Do you mean Lord and Lady Shanderson?”

  “’Course I mean them—she’s up to something I can tell.” Kylie was standing with her hands on her hips now, clearly relishing the fact that she had my full attention. “I mean, why does she never spend time with her husband? It’s not normal. It’s like they don’t even like each other. I think she’s leading a double life. And I’m not the only one who thinks that. I’ve heard Gloria and Vera talking. I swear they think I’m deaf sometimes. Or stupid.”

  “No one thinks you are stupid, Kylie,” I said. “Far from it.”

  “Anyway,” she continued, “I think she’s got someone else.”

  Poor Kylie had got it so very wrong that part of me wanted to tell her how wrong. To tell her that it was Lord Shanderson who had someone else and that that person was standing right in front of her. On the other hand, it suited me very well indeed that, so long as all suspicion lay at the feet of Lady Shanderson, her husband and I would be able to carry on with our agreement undetected.

  “And I’ll tell you what else I think. I think she’s one of those lesbians.”

  Kylie’s words took me so by surprise that I couldn’t help but let out a tiny, high-pitched laugh before clamping a hand over my mouth.

  “What on earth would make you think that?”

  She looked me slowly up and down before shaking her head. “Isn’t it obvious? If she’s not a lesbian why wouldn’t she want to be with him, like, all the time? I mean you must be able to see how handsome he is.”

  “Jesus! Would you look at the time?—I’ve got to get back to work,” I said as I pulled my jacket on and headed for the dining room to polish some silver.

  By late afternoon the fumes from the silver polish had given me a raging headache, so I decided to try and clear it with a good dose of fresh air. I headed out of the back door and kept walking until I was at the edge of the lake where I perched on a tree stump to admire the view. It really was stunning, a
nd it felt good to be alone for a while to admire it. The air was crisp and cold, and I could feel my head clear almost immediately.

  I was just about to head back to the house when my phone began to vibrate. It was a message from Maria:

  Ciao, bello! How is country living? Have you

  swapped your Gucci loafers for Wellington boots

  yet? Call me xx

  I immediately punched in her number and waited for her to pick up. Until I saw that brief message I hadn’t realized how much I was missing her.

  “Anthony, mia caro!” she said when she eventually answered. “I have missed you.”

  “Oh, God, Maria, me too,” I said, meaning every word.

  “So, tell me. Are you enjoying the work? How is Lord Shanderson treating you? Is he a slave driver?”

  Given what was going on between Lord Shanderson and me, that simple question felt incredibly loaded, and for a second I contemplated telling her everything. I was unaccustomed to keeping secrets from Maria, and in all the years I’d known her I had never lied to her, so it didn’t feel right to start now. But I instinctively knew it wasn’t the right time to drop such a bombshell. I made a snap decision to keep the facts of exactly how well my employer was treating me to myself for the time being and quickly changed the subject.

  “Maria, can ask you something?”

  “Anything, my darling, you know that.”

  “What’s the deal with Lord and Lady Shanderson? I mean, do they get on or not? I just can’t work it out.”

  The line went quiet, and for a second I thought I’d been cut off, but then I heard Maria slowly exhale, which usually meant she had sparked up a Marlboro Red and was choosing her words carefully.

  “Why would you ask such a question?” she said eventually.

  “Oh, you know, just being nosy I suppose.”

  “I’m not going to lie to you, Anthony; she can be tricky. She gets that from her mother. She’s moody too. I hear her staff have to tread on eggshells most of the time. Does she get on with her husband? Depends on how you define ‘get on,’ I suppose. Whatever their arrangement is, it seems to be working.”