Crook & Flail

by Maira Isabel Pita

  She tosses her hair back away from her face and glances at him. His back is to the gas lamps so she can’t see his expression but she doesn’t need to. She feels his full attention concentrated on the pale, shapely length of her legs as her husband exposes them, slowly raising her dress and tossing it casually over her back. She is wearing a white lace thong, so nothing mars the smooth curve of her bottom, which is both soft and firm.

  “You see.” Her husband sounds as though he is politely settling a discussion, using her body and its compliance to his slightest word and gesture as evidence.

  “I see,” Ian replies quietly.

  Richard laughs beneath his breath as he squeezes her ass approvingly and painfully.

  She moans beneath his hard grip. She doesn’t understand what is going on and she doesn’t care that she doesn’t understand—she just wants it to go on…

  “She’ll do whatever I say,” Richard continues. “She’ll let me fuck her right here in front of you if that’s what I want. She likes being watched while she’s fucked and I like watching her while she’s fucked.”

  It doesn’t matter to her that he’s lying. At that moment she sincerely believes him. He is doing this to make Ian buy their story but it disturbs her that she is starting to buy it herself. She feels exposed in more ways than one when Richard slips her panties down her legs just as slowly and deliberately as he raised her dress. She steps out of them helpfully, like a whore she thinks, ashamed. Yet she is unable to stop herself from gracefully following the mysterious choreography of her nature. But she isn’t acting alone, she is responding to his lead, so why should she feel bad about herself? She is obeying him, as she always does, paradoxically being a good girl as she behaves like a very bad girl.

  She doesn’t look at Ian again but she is completely aware of him. And as he watches her submit to her husband’s desires, she realizes this is what she wants. This is all she wants. Consequences don’t matter. All that matters is her submission to Richard’s will, the profound pleasure she takes in it only intensified by another man observing her willingness to do anything he says.

  It is a definite reward for her compliance when Richard thrusts two fingers up into her ready, yielding pussy. She makes a small breathless sound, her long hair falling forward on just one side of her face so that Ian has a clear view of her profile as well as her body. She is enjoying Richard’s fingers thrusting deep into her cunt, probing her as if searching for something, but it is Ian’s invisibly penetrating stare that is really turning her on. The idea of one man finger-fucking her while another man looks on excites her mind so much that her body can’t help but respond.

  “Mm, Lucia, my love, you always got nice and wet for your Master, but lately you’re the Nile in flood.”

  Ian makes a sound that could be amusement or desire. She would like to think it is desire and the possibility turns her on so much her pussy feels almost painfully deep. But then she forgets it as Richard pulls out and stabs a finger up into her anus, remorselessly pointing out all her weaknesses to the other man as he comments, “She likes it up the ass just as much.”

  Despite his slightly disdainful tone, she senses that he approves of her perfect passivity and she wants so much more of him than just his idly exploring finger. Moaning, she tightens her grip on the railing and, bending her arms a little more, arches her back as much as she can, pushing her ass up into his palm. She’ll take him anywhere he wants to give it to her. But the only thing that fills her is despair as he removes his finger and simply rests his warm hands lightly on her ass again. This frustrates her so much she nearly straightens up and lowers her dress so he can’t continue humiliating her. A proud part of her wants to do this but the rest of her doesn’t move a muscle. She is tense with need yet also growing more and more exquisitely languid by the second as she surrenders her body to his will. And it makes her submission even more meaningful that apparently what he intends is to tease her and not fulfill the need he is building in her. Yet if she submitted to him with the knowledge that she would receive pleasure from it every time, it wouldn’t mean anything because she would only be serving herself.

  This realization affects her like a penetration and she gasps from the power of the insight. She has always loved him but in that moment her respect and need for him climax into a feeling of worship that makes her knees weak. After that she waits almost peacefully for him to decide whether or not he is going to bury himself inside.

  He lets go of her and she lets out a soft cry as he gives her ass a hard smack. The sensation of her burning cheeks is delicious, caressed by the cool breeze coming from the water.

  “Stand up straight and lower your skirt, Lucia, but leave your panties on the deck. That way our handsome reporter will have all the evidence he needs.”

  Disappointment and desire cleave her soul in half but she obeys her husband and her Master, careful not to look at the other man while she does so.

  “She’s very obedient,” Ian agrees in a tight voice. “Thanks for the show.”

  She stands as close to Richard as she possibly can without touching him, afraid to do so, but now she can’t resist looking over at Ian.

  His hands are thrust deep into his pockets and his legs are planted firmly on the deck, as if he isn’t going anywhere.

  Richard slips her arm in his and starts walking in the direction of their cabin. “You’ve got your story,” he says. “Good night.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Sistrum sails past Tell el-Amarna, the desolate site where, for some inexplicable reason, the heretic pharaoh Akhenaten chose to build his new capital. After his death, when Egypt promptly returned to the old religion, the city was torn down and every trace of Akhenaten’s monotheistic ideas destroyed. Consequently, there is nothing left to see now except painfully empty desert.

  Always having disliked what, in her opinion, is the degenerate artistic style Akhenaten initiated, Lucia is not sorry to leave Tell el-Amarna behind. Feeling slightly hungover, she is glad to just stay on the boat and relax.

  The sun is at its zenith, beating down on both sides of the deck, when she spreads herself out on one of the chairs in front of their cabin, into which she can beat a hasty retreat should she spot Ellen approaching.

  There is no cool, caressing breeze today and it is not very peaceful on the Sistrum’s gleaming deck. The hot orange light behind her closed eyelids is alive with the steady drone of the engines and the occasional high-pitched buzz of a mosquito. She might be listening to a cosmic generator, a reminder that the sun is not immortal, that it will burn out in the end and take the entire solar system with it like an ancient king buried with all his nobles.

  She is drifting off, her brain sinking into a more fluid realm of perception like a fish slipping off its hook, when the sound of footsteps speeds up her heartbeat and causes her to surface abruptly. She clutches the arms of the chair and prepares to flee. Then she observes that it is Ian walking toward her, smiling as he studies the shapely pyramid of her bent leg.

  She takes off her sunglasses to better appreciate the stunning view of his fiery hair flowing into a black button-down shirt tucked into ivory Dockers.

  “Hello,” he says.

  “Hello.”

  “Where’s your husband?” he asks bluntly.

  “Inside, writing. He doesn’t enjoy lying out in the sun like a stupid lizard on a rock, as he puts it.”

  “He seems to have a firm opinion on everything.”

  She laughs. “That’s the understatement of the millennium.”

  “Mind if I join you?”

  “Not at all.”

  He perches on the edge of the chair beside hers.

  “You should be happy,” she tells him, turning her face up toward the sun and closing her eyes again. “You got what you wanted.”

  “Not everything.”

  She suppresses a smile as she squints over at the substantial rays of his hair. “Really, what more do you want?”

  He reac
hes for his heart. “I want you,” he slips a micro cassette recorder out of his shirt pocket, “your perspective. I know what Mark thinks and I know what Richard says but I don’t know how you feel, Lucia.”

  “I feel great, Ian.”

  “You look great,” he agrees fervently.

  “Thanks, you’re not so bad yourself.” In fact, she can’t take her eyes off him.

  He presses a button and asks casually, “So it’s true that your husband enjoys watching you with other men.”

  “Turn that thing off, please.”

  He holds her eyes. “Which one?”

  She smiles. “The one in your hand.”

  He doesn’t return her smile as he switches off the recorder.

  “If you want me to talk to you, Ian, you’ll just have to remember what I say.”

  “Fine.” He drops the instrument back into his pocket and exchanges it for a battered pack of cigarettes.

  “But I really don’t have anything to say,” she teases.

  “I don’t believe that.” Rising, he thrusts a hand into his pants pocket, finds some matches and sits down again. “Okay,” he has no problem lighting the cigarette in the hot, motionless air, “I’m ready.” He blows an impressive stream of smoke toward the river.

  “Ready for what?” The thought is nibbling at the back of her mind that she will miss looking at him when he gets off the boat, which he undoubtedly will when they reach Luxor.

  “Anything.” He stares into her eyes as boldly as a gardener thrusting his spade into the earth to see what turns up.

  “Anything?” she repeats, buying time. The soil of her feelings is so rich with desire and so fertile with fantasies, she knows it is a dangerous thing to open herself up to someone, especially an attractive man, if she doesn’t want something to happen between them.

  He blows smoke over her head, waiting.

  “The Egyptians often depicted the soul as a bird with a human head,” she begins in a detached voice. “Which, to pursue the image, makes our thoughts a juicy, writhing confusion of worms. All of us have thoughts we’re ashamed of, impulses we would never act on and yet which a part of us thrives on. I mean, if we’re not honest with ourselves inside it’s like a bird starving itself to death because it thinks bugs and worms are disgusting. Acknowledging our hungers is, paradoxically, the only way to nourish and master ourselves, body and soul.”

  “Interesting.” Looking down, he blows a thoughtful stream of smoke between his legs. “But now get to the point.” He looks straight into her eyes again. “Do you indulge all your impulses? Does your husband?”

  “No, we’re not swingers, if that’s what you’re thinking. A bunch of people crowded into some ugly living room fucking each other like worms in a jar is, in my opinion, the death of real desire. There’s no mystery in it.”

  “But…?”

  “But what?”

  He glances up at the sky. “Let’s pull this conversation back down to earth.” His eyes narrow like a cat’s as he takes a hard drag. “Stop talking in metaphors.” The cigarette’s burning end is the same color as his hair, a striking contrast to the cool black space of his shirt.

  “You wanted to know how I feel, didn’t you, Ian? Well, very often the only way I can understand my emotions is by way of metaphors and analogies. If I didn’t have poetic images with which to contain them I think I’d implode from how intensely I experience everything and from how much…desire I feel.” She can’t manage to come up with another, safer, word.

  “Then it’s true?”

  “What?”

  “That Mark was just a big, juicy worm you fed on before flying back to your cozy little nest with Richard?”

  “No…I mean, yes, but it wasn’t as cold-blooded as you make it sound.”

  He gets up and tosses the cigarette overboard. “You’re lying.” He sounds pleased. “You believed Richard was dead,” he resumes his seat, “just like the rest of the world, and you fell in love with Mark. But it turned out you were married to Dracula and he’s had his teeth in you for so long you imagine you like sleeping in the dirt with him. Yet lying in your kinky coffin at night you dream about Mark.”

  She smiles at him, impressed with the limberness of his mind. “You’re confusing my husband with his work, Ian. He’s not evil and he’s suffered a lot. He was entitled to his privacy.”

  “Don’t you mean ‘we’ were entitled to our privacy? Look, Lucia, I can find out where he was staying while he recovered and whether or not you were there with him. You know I can. So why lie to me?”

  “I don’t think we should continue this conversation.”

  “Because Richard will be angry with you?”

  “Haven’t you heard the expression ‘where angels fear to tread’?”

  He gets up again. “Okay,” he thrusts his hands into his pockets and looks down at her, “I’ll give you more time.”

  A protest perches on her lips and flutters away on her pulse as she stares up into his eyes, desperately wanting to understand the truth herself, but Richard has spun such an intense web around her heart with the threads of death and resurrection that he has more power over her than ever before.

  “I’m not just doing this for the story, Lucia. Mark cares about you and he’s a friend of mine. But even if he wasn’t…” His mouth hardens as he swallows the rest of the thought.

  “I appreciate your concern, Ian.” It pleases her to think she can keep him on the boat if she really wants to. “Did you give Mark my message?”

  “Yes. Are you sorry?”

  The sudden pressure in her chest prevents her from answering right away.

  “Don’t worry, he didn’t believe you meant it. He’s hopelessly smitten.”

  “Or he’s broke and really needs my money.”

  “Do me a favor and don’t insult my friends, please.”

  “I’m sorry, Ian.”

  “You’ve got to stop hiding behind the idea that Mark just wants you for your money, Lucia.” He reaches for his cigarettes again. “If you’re going to forget about him, at least do it for the right reasons.” He strikes a match. “See you later.” He tosses it behind him as he turns away, leaving her with a pungent whiff of sulfur.

  * * * * *

  Abydos. Seti I. Pure power. Other pharaohs contributed to the beautiful temple but for Lucia, who spent countless hours as a little girl pouring over picture books of Egypt, it will always be Seti’s temple.

  The Sistrum docks and its wonderfully spoiled, relaxed passengers disembark. All but one. Richard’s back is bothering him and he is deep in the final chapter of a new book he began in the hospital so he has decided to remain onboard. She begged him to come with her, extolling the virtues of this site over all others but to no avail. He couldn’t have cared less that the temple still possesses its original roof and that the reliefs carved into its walls and columns are some of the finest in Egypt.

  “You’re going to make me go all by myself?” she demands.

  “I’m sure Ellen will be delighted to listen to you describe how handsome Seti was.”

  “That’s not even funny!”

  “And Ian will be there with his gun.”

  “I hate you.”

  “Mm, yes, I love how much you hate me. It’s your fault my back hurts this morning.”

  “Oh is it?”

  “Yes, it is. It’s your fault for having such a sweet, welcoming little hole. God knows how I lived without it for so long.”

  “I missed you too, Richard.”

  “Let go of me and get out of here. I’m trying to write and you’ll miss the bus to your precious temple.”

  She is the last to board the decades-old vehicle.

  “Oh,” Ellen exclaims from her front row seat, “Isn’t Richard coming with you?”

  “Not today, sorry.”

  Smiling, Ian cocks his head at the empty seat beside his in the back of the bus.

  Lucia sits gratefully down beside him. “You keep saving my life.”


  “I can think of worse things to do with my time. So your husband’s staying on board?”

  “Yes.”

  “Working on another best seller?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you like to hear something funny?”

  “Please.”

  “I’ve read all his books. There’s some pretty kinky shit in there.”

  “And you love it.”

  “Lucia…”

  “Yes?”

  He looks out the window. “Never mind.”

  * * * * *

  Other small groups of tourists are milling around in the temple’s outer courtyard.

  “Let’s start at the end,” Ian suggests. “And work our way out against traffic.”

  “Excellent idea.” She leads the way, wishing Doug was beside her now. Yet Ian’s company is much more stimulating if not as enlightening. He follows just behind her. His hands are tucked into the pockets of dark green khakis that bring out his eyes, his hair as softly brilliant as fire reflected in snow against a white shirt.

  This is the first roofed temple Lucia has been in and the thick stone provides a natural form of air conditioning that makes her regret wearing only tight khaki shorts and a form-fitting black tank-top.

  Arcane scenes of transformation envelop them in an evocative silence.

  “My God,” she whispers reverently.

  “You mean gods,” Ian corrects her mildly.

  Inside a broad doorway, where Seti I is depicted on either side of her, she cannot resist stopping again to admire his broad shoulders, slender waist and powerfully long legs. Dressed in a sage green shirt with a golden sash and a long white loincloth, Seti offers a libation to a goddess wearing a skin-tight red and black dress.