‘Hose her down every ten minutes until she’s released,’ ordered the baron as he and Cassandra walked away. ‘I’m sure Giovanni and Françoise would like to have a turn. You should make sure you don’t neglect her other entrance either. I’m sure she’s equally warm there.’
‘I’m sure she is,’ agreed Rupert, dropping the hosepipe on the cobbles in order to go inside and tell the others what they were to do. He left the unfortunate Nicola to dry in the sun while her exhausted body awaited the next onslaught.
Once inside the chateau the baron caught hold of Cassandra’s hand and drew her up the main staircase and along the gallery to his own room, the one place where total privacy was assured. As soon as they were inside the door he turned to her, his eyes gleaming. ‘Take off your clothes,’ he said huskily.
Cassandra slipped out of her linen skirt and blouse. She had no underwear on and he drank in the sight of her; her long shapely legs, the slender yet feminine body, the perfect posture and in her eyes that same disconcerting look of detachment.
‘What did your Italian lover say to you outside?’ he asked abruptly.
‘He told me that he loved me,’ she responded calmly.
‘And what else? The conversation lasted too long for that to have been all.’
‘He asked me to go away with him,’ replied Cassandra.
For one brief moment the baron looked surprised. ‘Away from here? He wants you to live with him in Italy?’
‘Yes. Is that so strange?’
‘But you’re mine!’ He sounded amazed at Giovanni’s suggestion.
‘At the moment I’m yours. I think Giovanni understands your little game, and was offering me an escape route.’
The baron relaxed. ‘You mean, he offered you somewhere to go if I ask you to leave!’
She shook her head. ‘No, he wants me to leave you of my own free will, but if I won’t then he’ll take me should you tire of me.’
‘Do you want to leave?’ he asked softly, running a finger slowly down the valley between her breasts and tracing delicate patterns over her sides and stomach as he removed his own clothes.
‘No.’
‘Is that what you told him?’
‘I told him that should I ever leave here I would go to him.’
‘To him?’ Now the baron seemed genuinely incredulous. ‘He’s only a boy; he can’t even make love in a way that would satisfy you for very long. I’ve tutored you too well for a boy to keep you happy.’
‘Perhaps there’s more to life than perfect sex,’ she responded.
He stepped closer to her and began to kiss her mouth, letting his tongue slide in around the insides of her cheeks before easing it past her teeth and invading every part of her there.
Cassandra loved to kiss him. To her it seemed a more personal act than any of their sexual experiments, and she felt herself relax against his chest as her tongue responded by pressing into his mouth and their lips ground fiercely against each other.
When they finally drew apart the baron continued to kiss her shoulders and the pulse beneath her ear. Then he moved behind her, lifted her heavy fall of hair and kissed the tender nape of her neck, drawing his tongue lightly over the skin so that shivers ran down her spine.
‘Sit down,’ he murmured, pushing her carefully backwards towards the high-backed armchair that he sat in to watch his home videos. When she settled back against the cushions he lifted her legs and placed them across the two arms so that she was fully open to him.
As she lay there, watching him out of her unfathomable dark eyes, he buried his head between her thighs and she felt his tongue glide upwards towards her emerging clitoris, flicking delicately against the moist tissue as he went and stroking the outspread thighs with his long fingers.
She relaxed into the pleasure. Now he was taking her clitoris between his lips and immediately her belly arched because she knew how intense her orgasms were when he did this. With a murmur of pleasure she waited and then he began to suck with almost uncanny tenderness on the bunched nerve endings while the slithering coils of excitement began to throb low down in her stomach.
She waited for him to graze the top with his teeth and trigger her final release, but instead he released the swollen nub and then held the hood back with one hand so that he could let his tongue flick against it in a remorseless tattoo that made her utter a cry of ecstasy. Her hands gripped his thick hair and her body went rigid and still with the intensity of the orgasm.
As her eyes opened and she started to look at him he knelt upright, pulled her legs off the wings of the chair and placed them round his back instead. Then, as she felt his penis stroking up and down the length of her slick channel, her arms went down and round his waist. He let his erection stimulate her clitoris again, and immediately she began to tremble on the edge of another explosive climax but before she could come he plunged into her warm welcoming opening and his hands grasped the sides of her head so that he could kiss her as deeply as he was penetrating her. Both of them climaxed in unison.
Afterwards they lay in a tangle of arms and legs in the chair while their breathing slowed and the baron’s eyes closed for a moment in total relaxation. Then, remembering that it always took Cassandra a long time to come down to earth after lovemaking, he pulled her closer to him and let his hands stroke the back of her neck and the sides of her face in an unusually tender and non-sexual gesture.
‘Is it that good with Giovanni?’ he asked lightly.
The question startled Cassandra. ‘Of course not,’ she replied softly. ‘How could it be?’ He’s young and I hardly know him.’
‘You’d miss me then, if you went away?’
‘For a time,’ she responded, knowing better than to admit to the terrible aching pain that even the thought of such a thing brought about.
‘In forty-eight hours,’ said the baron slowly, ‘the game will end. So far there has been little to make me decide one way or the other. I’ve enjoyed the novelty of having Nicola here, but as to whether or not I wish her to remain, that decision proves difficult.
‘She has a great aptitude for certain aspects of my sexuality that do not, however hard you try, appeal to you. Pain, particularly inflicting pain, turns her on. As yet she is not very good at receiving it, but I have noticed that it quickly turns to pleasure for her once she is lost in the sensations.
‘You have played your part well. You tried to advise her, to help her accept the rules and regulations here, as well as using your skill on her when requested, but you lack the killing instinct.’
Cassandra frowned. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘You could have put her off, without making it obvious, very early on. Instead you went out of your way to be fair, to assist rather than hinder her initiation.’
‘That was my role,’ she reminded him.
The baron laughed. ‘There are always ways round rules that you wish to flout. The truth is, Cassandra, that in two days’ time you will have to fight a great deal harder than you have done so far. Nicola, despite her somewhat abject performance this morning, has progressed very quickly. She no longer needs your assistance. The competition tomorrow will be a straight head to head. You are both allowed to make it more difficult for each other where possible, so bear that in mind as the evening proceeds.’
‘What’s going to happen?’ asked Cassandra, wishing that her heart wasn’t racing quite so fast because since she was lying against the baron’s naked body he would be able to feel her fear.
‘It’s a role reversal between you and Nicola and Sophie and Monique. In a couple of days’ time, when it is dinner time, you and Nicola will serve us while the maids, dressed appropriately as guests, will eat at table. Later in the evening, you and Nicola will take it in turns to submit to the sexual desires of all the dinner guests. Some, like Giovanni, will be a pleasure for you to serve. However, I think it more than likely that Monique and Sophie will take the opportunity to settle a few scores.’
‘And how
is the winner decided?’
‘The winner is the one who accepts everything and takes pleasure from everything. Any refusal, any request for a particular entertainment to be curtailed is the end of the contest.’
‘Suppose it’s a draw?’ asked Cassandra.
‘It can’t be a draw,’ he said with a smile. ‘I shall be watching you both for every second. I will know which of you truly abandoned yourself to every one of my guests’ desires and which of you pretended.’
‘We may neither of us pretend.’
The baron nuzzled his head against her breasts, less tight and swollen now but ready at even this slight touch to swell with desire. ‘Something will prove too much for one of you,’ he said confidently.
‘And you?’ asked Cassandra, her breath coming more quickly as he started to re-arouse her. ‘Does it matter to you which of us wins?’
He kissed her at the curve of her waist and felt her body start to tighten with pleasure. ‘Yes, it matters.’
‘If Nicola wins, will I ever see you again?’
The baron lifted his head and Cassandra could have sworn that his eyes were sad. ‘No, liebling, if Nicola wins you will never see me again.’
She stared at him in silence and his hands stopped roaming over her body. ‘Don’t you see, I need this kind of excitement,’ he said at last. ‘Without it, life is boring.’
‘You’d tire of her quickly,’ murmured Cassandra.
‘I know it.’
‘Then for your sake I’d better make sure she doesn’t win.’
The baron smiled. ‘What about for your sake?’
His hands were between her thighs now, his finger gently probing her front opening as he sought to locate her G-spot. Just as he found it Cassandra caught her breath, determined to give him her reply. ‘I’ll be happier with Giovanni than you will with Nicola,’ she said sweetly, and then she was lost in the whirlpool of sensations that his carefully massaging finger was producing as it pressed against her front vaginal wall and when she doubled up in an almost painfully sharp orgasm she knew that for once he was lost for words.
Even so, when Nicola was finally released from the well and after a bath and hairwash joined them all for the rest of the day, Cassandra studied her in a new light. All thoughts of pity or kindness had to be banished before the final contest because they would only play into the deceptively gentle-seeming English girl’s hands.
Nicola was the enemy, and Cassandra’s one advantage was that only she knew what lay ahead of them both in two days’ time.
Chapter Fourteen
When Cassandra went down to breakfast the following morning, she was surprised to find the baron still there. He’d been speaking of visiting his daughters in Austria for the day and was normally gone before breakfast at such times. Françoise and Rupert were reading the papers as they ate, Giovanni was deep in conversation with the baron, whilst Nicola was sitting at her place looking thoroughly miserable with a glass of pale yellow liquid in front of her.
Before Cassandra could ask what it was, Monique was standing at her elbow and placing a similar glass in front of her mistress. ‘What’s this?’ she enquired but Monique glided quickly away without answering.
‘Dieter, what’s going on?’ Cassandra asked.
He broke off from his conversation with Giovanni and smiled his most angelic smile. ‘You and Nicola are going on a forty-eight hour fast, my dear. Neither of you must have anything apart from the glasses of hot water and lemon juice that will be brought to you at regular intervals.’
‘But why? I don’t think either of us needs to slim!’ exclaimed Cassandra.
Rupert glanced up from his paper. ‘You’ve not heard of this before then?’
‘Heard of what?’ Cassandra was thoroughly puzzled. The baron frowned. ‘Ignore him, liebling. I simply wish for you two ladies to be thoroughly cleansed for the very special evening that I discussed with you last night.’
‘But I don’t see …’
‘I’m starving!’ interrupted Nicola. ‘It isn’t healthy to fast for so long. We’ll become weak and light-headed.’
‘Then you must be sure to rest a great deal,’ said the baron smoothly.
Looking at his widely-spaced eyes and the boyish way in which he was trying to push a lock of hair away from them Cassandra wondered how anyone with such angelic charm could be so extraordinarily inventive and perverse in his private life.
‘I’d better drink it down then,’ she murmured. ‘No doubt your motive will become clear in time, Dieter.’
‘It most assuredly will,’ he responded, and then turned his attention back to the Italian, leaving Nicola to continue sitting in sulky silence.
After draining her glass, Cassandra withdrew from the dining room and wandered out of the chateau, across a large meadow and around the side path to her favourite quiet spot, a narrow marble bench which overlooked the lake.
There she gazed across the water and wondered what the future held for her. After a time, Françoise joined her. ‘Young Nicola still hasn’t taken her medicine,’ she said with a smile. ‘Dieter’s getting quite annoyed!’
‘I can’t imagine what he’s up to,’ murmured Cassandra.
Françoise, who knew only too well, decided to keep silent and let the young Englishwoman find out for herself when the time came. ‘Rupert’s going to teach Nicola how to give good oral sex to a man later this morning,’ she told Cassandra. ‘Do you want to come and watch.’
Cassandra shook her head. ‘Not particularly. You can tell me how it goes. I hope for Rupert’s sake she isn’t over-enthusiastic.’
‘She’s only ever over-enthusiastic where Dieter’s concerned,’ Françoise pointed out. ‘She won’t enjoy having to learn on Rupert.’
‘Perhaps not,’ conceded Cassandra. Noticing Giovanni walking along the path towards them, Françoise rose from the bench. ‘I’ll go and watch then; it should be amusing. Anyway, I wouldn’t want to stand in the way of young love!’
‘Young what?’ asked Cassandra, but then as Giovanni raised a hand in greeting she understood what her friend meant. ‘How did you find me?’ she asked the Italian.
‘I asked Rupert where you were most likely to be. Cassandra, come away with me. Why should you have your life dominated by that man? What right has he to starve you for forty-eight hours? I would let you do anything you wished.’
‘I can do anything I wish now,’ Cassandra explained gently. ‘No one’s forcing me to stay here. If I don’t want to do as Dieter asks, then I can go. Have you considered the possibility that I wouldn’t enjoy being allowed to do anything I liked?’
Giovanni stared at her in bewilderment. ‘No, I have not. All women like freedom.’
‘Not all; some of us have special needs that I can’t possibly explain to you. It isn’t something anyone can understand if they aren’t that way themselves.’
‘You enjoy being his slave? Being bullied and tormented and …’
‘Everything I do is done because it gives me pleasure,’ said Cassandra. ‘Dieter has shown me the truth about myself – and I’m grateful to him for that – but it’s my own needs and desires that keep me here.’
‘You do love him!’ Giovanni sounded utterly disgusted.
‘I never said that,’ responded Cassandra. ‘Love is different, and quite separate from need and desire.’
‘You love him, at the moment, but in two days’ time you might not,’ he added cryptically. ‘Remember, if you change your mind I am still here for you.’
Almost before he’d finished speaking Giovanni too had left, and Cassandra remained alone wondering what it was that the others seemed to know about and which necessitated the forty-eight hour fast in advance.
The next two days dragged by. As Nicola had anticipated, both of them grew languid and light-headed with lack of food and after a time Cassandra did little except lie on a sunbed beneath a parasol, slipping off into strange half-sleeps where everything seemed unreal.
By the midd
le of the second afternoon, with only a few hours left to go before what Cassandra knew was to be the final confrontation between the two of them, she was lying on her bed. The shutters were closed against the heat of the sun and her room was agreeably cool. When the door opened she propped herself up on one elbow, knowing that it would be Monique with another glass of the dreaded lemon juice which had certainly served its purpose in thoroughly cleansing her system. To her astonishment it was the baron who entered.
He was carrying a silver tray on which was a champagne bottle and a tall fluted champagne glass. Placing that on the bedside table he pushed her gently back against the bed and ran a hand over her bare body. He started with her breasts, moulding them with the palms of his hands and then softly squeezing the small globes until he felt them expand in his hands.
After that he let his hands wander down her inward curving abdomen and when he pressed lightly against the skin he could tell that there was nothing left in Cassandra’s stomach. His fingers dug deeper into the flesh and probed gently above the pubic mound, but there wasn’t There were no signs of pressure from either her stomach or bladder and he was content.
‘Here,’ he whispered, propping her upright against the pile of pillows. ‘I think it’s time we began to add more variety to your fluid intake.’ To Cassandra’s amazement he then opened the champagne bottle, poured her a glass and placed it in her hand. ‘Drink it straight down,’ he said with a smile.
‘I’ll be horribly dizzy!’ protested Cassandra. ‘I haven’t eaten for two days.’
‘That doesn’t matter. You’ll eat later tonight. For now I want to see this bottle empty by the time I get back. Oh yes, and one other thing.’
‘What?’ she asked.
‘I must tie you up. Not tightly, but enough to ensure you don’t leave your bed. Nicola’s being restrained in the same way.’
He fastened her ankles in two of the metal rings around the bed, but left her arms free so that she could still pour herself champagne and then, with one final caress of her lower stomach he left.
Cassandra's Chateau Page 25