Even though I couldn’t make out his eyes, I could feel his stare sliding down my body, lingering on my tank top and the girlish skin beneath. “Julie,” he said, lifting off his mask. Running a hand through his mess of blond hair, he raised an eyebrow. “You’d make good prey.”
“Quit it, Rupe.” My brother was now maskless.
“Want to play?” Rupe asked me.
Henry’s voice grew cool. “I said get the fuck away from her.”
Rupe didn’t move a muscle.
I told him, “I’d be useless with a sword.”
As Rupe walked toward me, calm behind his tan, he extended his sword and let the tip hover below my jaw. “You need a man to teach you some good British steel.” I was so afraid and aroused, and afraid of being aroused, that I could hear my every heartbeat and feel my every breath. Although I longed for that sword tip to trace every part of me, I still knew the threat of it.
Henry pressed a hand onto Rupe’s shoulder. “Drop the sword or I swear, you’ll regret it.”
Though I knew my brother was protecting me, I willed Rupe not to weaken.
Rupe gave a sly smile, lowering the metal between my teenage breasts, letting it dwell for a perfect second there. Again, I willed him to slice through the silk of my camisole and press that blade to my naked skin. In my fantasies, I believed I’d always wanted to be fucked, but now I saw it wasn’t so. The danger that quivered at the end of Rupe’s blade made me ache for a lancing—trusting him, not trusting him, and wanting to trust him, were all part of becoming a woman, and this moment made my past imaginings seem foolish.
But Rupe backed down and Henry marched me toward the living room where Mr. Linden was talking to our parents about the state of the government.
“Julie saw us thrusting and parrying,” said my brother. “It’s no game for a girl.”
“I was just looking,” I protested, but my father still lectured me. I was forced to sit on an upright chair, saying, “Please,” and “Thank you,” while my arousal simmered inside me. I told myself it wouldn’t be long until I saw Rupe again, but I didn’t realize I’d caused a rift that night, one that had been growing for months. Rupe thought he was all-powerful, and Henry wouldn’t take it, and it seemed I was the final straw. After this strange and stunning evening, the boys would stop speaking, and I’d have to suffer three hungry years before meeting Rupe again.
Years later, after I’d just turned twenty-one, I returned from university for the summer and found a mustard-colored envelope addressed to me. It was an invitation to Rupe’s twenty-fourth birthday party the following weekend. At the bottom of the invite, Rupe had scrawled: “It seems a shame that you and I should be torn apart by your brother’s stubbornness. Come to my party, Julie. I’ll teach you some serious swordplay.” Running a fingertip across the writing, I felt lightheaded. I was ready, and I wanted this.
Days passed. My expectations grew. All I could think of was being controlled at the tip of Rupe’s sword. The invite said this was a costume party with a historical theme, so I tried outfit after outfit, eventually settling on a silky gold dress held up by thin straps that I longed for him to sever. On the night itself, I donned low heels and also planted tissue flowers in my hair. Then I caught a taxi to the old English hotel. In the half-timbered lobby, I passed two women in Elizabethan ruffs and a wartime butler in a bowler hat, his arm draped round a muscular god. Helen of Troy was arguing with a nymph, and three Flower Fairy children chased each other, screeching.
Mrs. Linden stopped me in the doorway, dressed as Cleopatra. “I know you, dear, don’t I? You’re Ralph and Tina’s girl.” She handed me a glass of wine and began grilling me about the rift between Rupe and Henry. As I gave vague answers, I felt a hand on the small of my back and smelt a dry cologne that made my pussy flood. It was Rupe, gently flicking one of the flowers in my hair. “You’re Ophelia, of course. Clever girl. If I see another Helen of Troy I’ll slit someone’s throat.”
As Mrs. Linden chided him for saying such a thing, I surveyed her son. He’d hardly changed since that night in the cellar, though his golden hair was now loosely curled and floppier than it used to be. His collarless shirt fell open, unbuttoned, exposing his super-smooth chest, and a silver cross hung from a chain against his tanned skin. His sword, in its sheath, was hanging at his side. Hell, how I burned for him then!
“Remember this?” Rupe asked, pressing my fingers onto the hilt of his sword. I let myself explore the heavy steel—a gesture that felt as personal as sliding a hand between his thighs.
“Who are you meant to be?” I asked him.
“Romeo in exile.” In my ear, he added, “We have similar literary tastes.”
I felt a deep, low burn.
“Rupert, dear,” said Mrs. Linden. “The Worcesters were asking after you.”
“Well,” said Rupe, weaving an arm through mine. “Let’s not disappoint them.”
Rupe led me through a high-beamed hall, which was filled with clowns, queens, gladiators and fairies. A long oak table stretched down the center of the room, laden with voluptuous food: sumptuous cheeses, deviled eggs, peaches stuffed with ricotta.
“Are we going to talk to the Worcesters?” I asked.
He raised an eyebrow. “We’ve more pressing matters at hand.” When I stared at him, he added, “Darling, I’ve been waiting for you to turn twenty-one. I may be a rogue, but I’m a gentleman first and foremost.”
At this moment, we were assailed by a Marilyn Monroe, who purred flirtatiously at Rupe and gave me sour little looks. “Rupe’s a devil,” she told me. “The things he does to a girl.”
“Julie’s about to find out,” said Rupe.
I nudged him. How rude! But Marilyn was marching angrily away.
After that, there was a powdered aunt dressed like an opera singer, asking him why he wasn’t studying law like his father and then a Pierrot and Pierrette who were clearly old friends. Everyone wanted to talk to Rupe. I was so desperate for a shafting, I almost begged him to take me right there.
When he finally managed to break us away, Rupe gestured toward a door. “That’s where we’re heading. Make eye contact with no one.” He explained that a member of his fencing club worked at this hotel. “It’s a storeroom, apparently. I have a key.” I flushed at his directness. As we strode toward our destination, he ran a hand across my ass, making me tingle and gasp. “No underwear,” he said. “You have grown up. I’ll teach you a lesson, you Shakespearean whore.”
“What if I don’t want to?” I asked.
“Then I’m nothing but a fool.”
At the approach of a couple of men in tuxedos, Rupe told me, “Here’s how we get rid of them,” and with that, he grasped my face and kissed me, long and hard, with his hands grazing my hardening nipples. He pressed his stiffness against my belly, and I felt myself turning crazily wet as his lips slid hungrily over mine. Pulling away at last, he took me by the wrist with a roughness that made me giddy and dragged me through the crowds toward the storeroom door.
The room we entered was shadowy, though the moonlight from outside lent an eerie glow. As my eyes adjusted, I made out a Roman statue, a pile of stacked chairs and an antique table. The velvety curtains were tied open with cord, and next to them was a suit of armor, the mottled bronze gleaming in the milky light. Rupe explained that this was where the staff kept the props for feasts and balls. We stared at each other. Slowly, he drew his sword from its sheath until I saw the flash of its steel, and he held its naked metal between us, the blade pointing at the ceiling. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” he said.
I was too aroused to speak.
“If you want me to stop at any time, call me by my full name—Rupert.”
“Okay.”
“Shall we play?” he asked.
“God, yes.”
The smile that sprang to his lips was so sweet and genuine it took my breath away.
With a swipe of the gleaming blade, he cut through a curtain cord, which fell to the floor; this h
e used to bind my wrists behind me before backing me toward the table. The presence of the sword, now fully sheathed at his side, seemed to electrify the air. Standing mere feet away from me, he slid the blade free, brandishing it before lowering its point to my throat. Thirsty and afraid, I arched backward, but the point moved with me—a mere inch from my skin. “I could cut you,” he said, on the edge of a snarl. I didn’t need to look down to know his sex would be hard. He raised my chin with the tip of his sword and I felt the sharp, cool steel. Quivering, I knew that it wouldn’t take much to make me come.
“You’re all mine,” he said.
I told him I was, though even as I spoke the words, a part of me wasn’t sure.
Suddenly, cheering rose from outside the room. “Rupe? Where’s Rupe? Time to cut the cake!”
The edge of Rupe’s grin twitched as he told me he wouldn’t be long, and I guessed he was enjoying this opportunity to torment me. Turning toward the door, he slid his sword into its sheath; as he left the room, the door slamming behind him, I glanced down at my vulnerable flesh and ached with pure arousal. I had no proof that he’d ever return.
I’d never trusted like this.
At the window, the curtain was only half closed and the moonlight spilled across the Roman statue, a bust of a boy in an ivy crown with vacant eyes. I burned as I remembered Rupe’s sword slicing through the darkness, and I dreamed of the steel pressed onto my sex as I rubbed against it, wet.
At last the door opened again, and Rupe walked toward me, after closing the door behind him. “How’s my little captive?”
I shivered with longing. Then came the swish and glint of metal as he unsheathed the weapon with a flourish. Wielding it in front of him with the tip pointing upward, he took a step toward me. “Spread your knees.”
Slowly, I did as he said.
He moved closer, the sword still held between us, close enough that I could smell his scent. With a glare, he told me, “Lick it.”
My pussy flooded.
I leaned in just a little and pressed the tip of my tongue to the cold steel. “Do it like you mean it,” he said. So, staring up through wanton eyes, I rolled out my tongue like a dirty girl and licked the metal, thirstily, without once breaking our stare. The sword tasted metallic, as if I’d cut my mouth, and the thought made me wetter. “Christ,” he whispered, leaning into the moonlight, his pupils inky with lust. “Seeing you like that…who’s controlling whom?”
With that, he lowered his weapon and caught my jaw in the cup of his hand. I trembled, feeling his breath on my face. “I’ve never been so hard,” he said. “What do you think of that?” I did and said nothing, until he kissed me roughly; but though I melted into him, he pulled away, stepping back into the shadows. He held out the sword so the tip trembled beneath my chin, the half-light glinting off it. Who’d have thought the threat of harm could arouse me like this?
“See how easily I could take you?” he said.
In a flash, he sliced the sword through the air, sweeping the point so close that I caught my breath. He ran it past my collarbone and down between my breasts, ripping through the thin material of my dress. The satin fell open like the skin of a languid fruit, leaving the inner edges of my breasts exposed. I glanced down as he explored my bareness, his sword point hovering as it cast a black shadow, and seeing the blade so close to my flesh made me whimper. “You’re exquisite,” he said on a dry smile, raising my chin with the tip of the blade. His pupils swelled, devouring each iris. Still, he watched.
“Ready?” he whispered, at last.
“Please.”
There was utter silence, like the calm before the fight. Then, a blast of action: the silvery rush of the sword swiping downward so close to my flesh that I felt the wisp of air. Before I knew it, my satin dress was slithering down me like snakeskin—he’d snipped through the straps, making the dress pool round my hips, caressing my skin as it fell. I let out a cry of amazement, and oh, how my sex ached! I glanced down at my nakedness, which made me so vulnerable, especially with my wrists tied behind me like this. He cupped each breast with his free hand, grazing a thumb across my nipples. I wanted to cover myself, and yet I met his pressure, my knees parting as if urging him closer. Soon he’d be filling my aching depths, and I’d grasp him inside me, crying out…yet when he swayed toward me, it was to press his lips to mine, kissing me, fondling my hair. “I know what you want,” he whispered, pulling away.
Sweeping my skirt up my thighs, he slid one arm around my waist before pressing the flat of the steel against my naked slit. I gasped at the feel of the cold, firm pressure; all I longed for was to rub and grind. “If you move too much,” he whispered, “what will happen?”
“I’ll b-be hurt.”
That’s when I heard him unzipping with his free hand.
He pulled the sword away, stepped between my thighs and grasped me round the waist. Finding my slit with the tip of his sex, he lunged, filling me to the hilt. I cried out, falling backward, but he’d got me round the waist. Now he was inside me, I assumed he’d simply drop the sword, but instead he raised it and plunged it down so fiercely that it pierced the table with an almighty thump. When he let go, the steel was hard and quivering. “Fuck me,” I begged.
“Not yet.”
He cupped my breast and bit into my neck as if I were a peach. Then, letting out a moan, he suddenly started thrusting, and I gasped with relief as he possessed my body, fucking me so hard the table rocked and the sword thrummed beside us. My body grew limp with pleasure, and once he’d slipped the cord from my wrists and planted my fist on the hilt of that sword, he began lunging so relentlessly that my climax rolled through me, moonlight glancing off the sword and blinding me, while our cries filled the room.
Afterward, I kissed him, running my fingers through his hair. He asked me if he’d hurt me, and I said, “Exquisitely so.” He rested his forehead against mine and told me I was beautiful then he held me close for a long, long time. “I’m so sorry,” he murmured. “I destroyed your beautiful dress.”
I laughed. “You sound so demure.”
“All men with swords are demure, deep down.” He kissed me again, his mouth sinking onto mine, then he whispered, “I’ll find you some clothes.”
When we finally returned to the dwindling party, I was wearing an old-style gown with puffy sleeves, which Rupe had found in the box of costumes. The remaining guests glanced across, giggling, and I felt myself flush. Rupe’s mother rushed up, inspecting me crossly, before asking Rupe, “Where on earth have you been?”
“I’m taking Julie out for some real food. We’re fucking starving.”
“Language,” his mother gasped. “And what about your guests?”
But he was already slipping his arm around my waist and walking us from the room.
On our way through the lobby, I asked him why he’d been sulky with his mother. He told me she’d insisted on the party, even though it was the last thing he wanted.
“And you didn’t want to offend her?” I asked.
“I didn’t have the balls.”
“Well, now you’re twenty-four,” I said, “you seem to have grown a pair.”
“Words to live by.” As I rested my head on his shoulder, he told me, “It isn’t the birthday that gave me the guts. It’s you, sweet girl.”
I smiled.
It seemed we’d both gained a little good British steel.
PARTING WAYS
Tenille Brown
Maggie could have easily gone right, but she had gone left, instead.
It had been an unconscious decision until now, when she stood at Derek’s door, fist paused in midknock.
She had never shown up in the middle of the night before. Of course, she had never needed it this badly before either.
Had Maggie chosen to go right, she would have ended up at Jim’s. Asshole Jim. Lying Jim. Simple Jim who had ended their relationship via text message three hours ago.
So, Maggie had followed the sign that seemed
to flash like a neon light—CHARLOTTE, 150 MILES—and come to Derek instead.
It was late, just shy of midnight when she parked her car beside his, but time hadn’t been a factor in Maggie’s decision. Her fatigue hadn’t either. She could have gotten here with her eyes closed and she knew it.
Maggie wanted to tell Derek about the breakup. She wanted to hold her phone up in front of his face and show him that, yes, Jim had actually been that shifty. And it wasn’t that the information would matter to Derek one way or the other. It wasn’t even that the breakup was that notable.
It was the afterward that Maggie looked forward to. She knew that after she told Derek about it, after he teased her and they laughed, he would instinctively reach out to pull Maggie to him. He would squeeze her tight around the waist, push her bangs from her face and kiss her on the forehead.
Derek would, as second nature, begin to replace that feeling that Maggie had foolishly become accustomed to with Jim, if only for tonight. Maggie never considered herself the type to need reassurance, but if only for a second she was feeling a little insecure, Derek would fix it.
Then, Maggie could go home first thing in the morning, her dignity again intact, her worth instantly reaffirmed, thanks to good old, reliable Derek.
Derek was someone who had always been there, like a landmark or monument. His number had never changed. He had lived in the same condo for the last eleven years. He drove the same beat-up old Mustang that he talked about as if it were brand new.
Derek was Maggie’s…
Friend? Lover? Sometimes boyfriend?
If there was a word for all those things wrapped in one, then Maggie supposed Derek was it. It was mostly convenient, this thing between the two of them, as convenient as someone could be to a person who lived across state lines.
Now Maggie was here, in a T-shirt, jeans and ponytail, standing outside his condo door, having crossed that line, and ready to cross a few more.
She knocked quickly and waited, clearing her throat.
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