by Jina Bacarr
Gritting his teeth, he threw back his head. “You excite me, watching you metamorphose into a goddess, turning the tempest inside you into a thing of beauty.”
“Like this?”
I flicked my tongue up and down his hard shaft, the heat of his body arousing me with his raw scent. Ramzi considered himself more European than Egyptian and knew how much I enjoyed his muskiness. I noticed he hadn’t rubbed Cleopatra’s perfume on his skin, a slight I ignored since Egyptians used scent to anoint the body. I’d long forgiven him for seducing me with his silly game about the power of the perfume. But I couldn’t forgive Laila for her constant taunts, pressuring me to buy more ancient artifacts from tombs newly unearthed, then insisting she resell them for me at a profit. After deducting her commission, of course. I imagined her so-called artifacts were no more than stolen goods with questionable provenance or skillfully rendered fakes, though I admit to you, dear reader, the perfume box and its contents allegedly belonging to the young Egyptian queen were the most brilliantly executed fakes I’d ever seen. The detail was remarkable, so much so I kept the treasure hidden in the suite I’d taken at Shepheard’s Hotel, if only because I found the scent of Cleopatra’s perfume addictive to my occupation with sexual games. I prayed I’d never have the occasion to find out if the perfume held any real magical power to save the wearer from a violent death.
I continued my game with Ramzi on this evening as I did all evenings, inhaling his cock, letting it slide down my throat, trembling as it throbbed with energy. Licking, sucking, tasting. I didn’t stop, feeling his cock grow harder. My fingers slid below to his testicles and I felt them contract, then, before I could pull back, a fiery surge filled my mouth. I tasted his salty semen drizzling down my chin before I swallowed it. I didn’t find it unpleasant, as I had with past lovers. I have no idea why, except to say I was more occupied with watching him experiencing a most exciting orgasm. His breathing forced, his body shuddering, he yelled out, then collapsed on top of the large square pillow, the sweat from his skin discoloring the vibrant green silk with dark stains.
“My English lady is no stranger to satisfying a man,” he said, panting, then he reached out to run his fingers through my tangled hair. I smiled, half closing my eyelids and enjoying this subtle pleasure. He touched me with such tenderness, I ached to feel him crushed up against me. I pressed my nude body against his and put my arms around his neck.
“I enjoy giving you pleasure, my handsome Egyptian.” I nipped at his ear, then ran my hand up and down his flaccid cock, making him laugh. “Though I shall have to bide my time before receiving your cock.”
“I won’t keep you waiting long, my thirsty English rose.”
I stared at him and spoke in a hushed voice, my passion spilling out in breathy tones, “I hunger for you, Ramzi, as I’ve never hungered for any man.” It was true. His muscular body and raw manliness set my teeth on edge when I was with him.
He cupped my chin in his hand and gazed at me with wisdom in his eyes. “We shall never be parted, for you have given pleasure to your master and so shall you have the privilege of being with him in paradise.”
“I may have found paradise here with you, Ramzi,” I said, pulling away from him, though I felt his eyes and hot breath on me. “But no man is my master.”
He grabbed my wrist and held it firmly. “You will act as my slave if I so request it.”
“No,” I said firmly, daring to meet his gaze head-on. I didn’t try to break his hold. I wasn’t in any danger.
He raised his eyebrows. “No? Must I beat you? Crack my whip across your firm buttocks? Or would you rather I torment you with my cock?”
“I shall not complain.”
“You know what you’re asking for?” His hand dropped onto my thigh, his touch possessive.
I nodded. “You must do all those things to me, Ramzi,” I whispered, “and more.”
“Then I am your slave, beautiful English lady, for I can’t resist you.”
It was a game we played, the two of us, back and forth baiting each other with coy taunts, clever phrases. I sensed he enjoyed these moments of togetherness as much as I did, though we also participated in group-sex encounters as demanded by the business of running the Cleopatra Club; but it was these moments with Ramzi I remember with a warmth in my heart, though I shall attempt to shield you from anything unpleasant about these encounters.
Know this about my Egyptian: I never waited more than a few minutes before Ramzi became hard again, then he’d reach so deep into me, thrusting into the depths of me, I couldn’t catch my breath. He was a man of acute prowess, though not without a flair for the dramatic. Sensing when I was close to reaching my pinnacle of pleasure, he’d pull away though staying inside me, knowing he had but to thrust again and I would explode, unable to stop the exquisite orgasm rolling over me. I’d beg him to do it again and again until we collapsed in complete exhaustion, our need for raw pleasure satisfied.
He seemed to brandish a never-ending erection, abandoning himself to every sexual act I desired, he desired: I knelt before him on my hands and knees, my face crushed into the soft white coverlet while he penetrated me from the rear; we stood against a wall, my right leg wrapped around his waist while he thrust into me; I lay on my back, his cock in me, and let out a guttural moan of pleasure when he lifted my heels to the ceiling. I was under his power, transformed, my mind expanded, my need for him deepening, and I naively believed it was because I wished it. I didn’t question my dependence on him or the idealization of our sexual activities. His endurance to make love shocked me. And me, I never acted so uninhibi—
Damn. I’m nervous, scribbling down everything about Ramzi and me in such ornate prose it’s as if I’m retelling a fairy tale. Alas, dear reader, I am not, and I must make a confession. I’m sure you’re wondering where the brown stain sprawled across this page came from, soaked into the linen. It’s brandy. My hand was trembling and, in trying to steady it, I knocked over the shot glass, spilling the liqueur all over the page. I regard it as a permanency of sorts to remind me of the fierce battle going on inside me as I recount the days leading up to this time in Berlin when so much is at stake. I’ve stated here before I’m not writing a novel, though I strive to tell my story with the freshness and life writers of fiction use in their craft. I’ve painted a dashing portrait of my Egyptian prince and yes, he was as handsome and regal as I’ve written. But I’ve eliminated a key point from this story to keep you focused on the beauty and eroticism of what I did, layering my sexual experiences with delicious cream, silky and cool to the tongue. I left out something I should have told you before but didn’t. I should write of my madness in dreamlike phrases (as if nothing I did awakened me from the state of that dream until now), but it doesn’t make any sense. Frothy, silly words that mean nothing.
Oh, what’s the use. I can’t write as a novelist does, taking my neurosis and fancying it up with red ribbons and ignoring the intensity that crawls in my belly like maggots eating away at my flesh. I’ve done what I’ve done, written my story without telling you certain truths because I’m ashamed, dear reader. Ashamed of who I was then. Yes, I was arrogant, self-involved, a nymphomaniac, but it goes beyond that and it is that truth which strikes at my conscience.
I must digress here from the eroticism of my story and confess something I find so revolting, so mind bending, I retch at the thought of it. The words are ugly, no matter how I write them. Intoxicants. Cocaine, morphine.
A deep cold inhabits the walls of my flesh, making me shake uncontrollably when I think about it. My hand is shaking so much, I put down the pen, pick it up, then put it down again. Then when I least expect it, I hear his voice in my mind, his anger taking control of me and forcing me to write this admission.
I used drugs.
No, I begged him, I can’t write it, but I couldn’t stop my hand from scrawling the words in exaggerated loops and wild jagged lines. How easy it would be to ignore my digression into that netherworld, but I can
’t. I admit I indulged in using drugs during my dance-filled days in Berlin back in the late twenties, swilling champagne in my round-toe pump and inhaling the white powder. I was fortunate I was young and my body threw off its ill effects, though even now I sink into depression at times and I’m aware of bouts of paranoia that take hold of me when I least expect it because of my drug use. Time alone will reveal any physical effects I’ve yet to suffer.
God knows how low I would have fallen into the abyss of addiction had it not been for Lord Marlowe’s intervention. Yes, it’s his voice I hear in my head, pushing me forward to publicly purge myself. As I’ve stated before, he was a gentleman and a scholar and, though he loved his port, he abhorred drugs.
Disgusting rot, he called them. I know the reason why. I’ve never revealed this to anyone, but the Marlowes had their own sordid past. Lord Marlowe’s father, Charles Henry, the Ninth Viscount Marlowe and lord of the manor of Glynwyck, went mad because of his inebriety and addiction to absinthe and opium. There was quite a scandal at the time, with accusations of his lordship being responsible for the death of a pretty, young maid during one of his drunken rampages before he killed himself. Lady Anne Marlowe refused to believe her husband was capable of fostering such compulsive habits and, using the wide reach of her influence and vast fortune, she kept the story of her husband’s indiscretion out of the local sheriff’s police log and the newspapers.
What she couldn’t keep hidden from her young son, who became Lord Marlowe, my late husband, was the secret room in the family manor equipped with ankle-and-wrist restraints, chastity belts, hoods, harnesses, slaves’ collars, whips, riding crops and bamboo canes.
Lord Marlowe acquired his father’s taste for the delights of bondage, but he developed an ungodly disdain for stimulants. As a boy he knew nothing about his father’s ribald descent into the hell of drugs, but he witnessed firsthand how drugs destroyed the spirit as well as the body when he was an officer in His Majesty’s army in France during the Great War: soldiers hooked on cocaine gone crazy, jumping over barricades, others breaking down and crying, still others drunk for days and days, all slaves to this insidious disease.
If he knew about my penchant for cocaine before he married me, he never let on. I hid my secret well, securing my drugs from a trusted member of the local nobility in desperate need of cash. I never partook of the stimulant when his lordship was at home and when he was I acted coy, teasing him like a scamp with my iridescent red lipstick brightening up my chalky face, such coloring being an adverse effect of drug use.
I remember a day I shan’t forget when my game went too far. It started out innocently, though thinking back, nothing I did was innocent. I enjoyed spinning my web and entangling my prey with silk stockings and rendering him helpless with gray rings of smoke filtering through my blood-red lips.
On this day I surprised my husband in his study wearing nothing but silk stockings and red garters under the long black sable coat he bought for me in Paris. I adored that coat. Long sleeves with a mandarin-style collar, silky soft with a full sweep, I wore it day and night. Made from the pelts of nearly a hundred Russian crown sables, it cost his lordship more than thirty thousand dollars. I was afraid to breathe on the fur, so in awe was I of such luxury. The most I’d ever spent on a coat was five dollars for a cloth coat with a fake-fur collar.
Vamping him, I sashayed around his lordship’s office in our Mayfair town home, modeling the coat with a seductive sway of my shoulders, my hips, gliding across the room in my black suede high-heeled shoes with silver buckle straps. I cleared my throat to get his attention, but he didn’t look up from his work. I smiled. It was all part of our game, my seductive attitude, his calculated disinterest at what I was doing. The rules never changed. I was the pursuer, encouraging him to achieve his pleasure. He was the reluctant suitor, a man still virile at an age when for most men, the declaration of sexual potency remained pure verbiage and nothing more. I knew his lordship was capable of thrusting in and out while appearing to suffer only minor discomfort no matter where we did it.
I, on the other hand, was not fond of settling my bare arse and spreading my legs on his large ancient oak desk where his ancestors had declared war, raised taxes and turned a young housemaid over its breadth and pulled up her skirts. I was a modern girl, though I wasn’t fond of petting parties (I liked the real thing), and prided myself on irreverent behavior. I believed I was in control of the situation and, according to my plan, would induce him to follow me to our boudoir and take me on top of the light, fluffy goose-down comforter atop our bed.
I can’t fail to mention I was high at the time, having sniffed cocaine beforehand, and I was experiencing wild sexual urges coursing through me. Little fool, believing I could continue playing games and inflicting my dirty habit on my husband. No, I was about to go too far with my audacious role-playing, as you shall see, dear reader.
Smoking a cigarette, I sat on the edge of his desk, crossing my legs so he could tap his fingers on my nude thighs peeking above my silk stockings while he went over his accounts, thinking. I could see a small twitch appear at the side of his mouth. My signal. I squirmed, my sable coat opened, just a little, I uncrossed my legs, forcing him to remove his hand, then crossed them the other way. Without looking up from his ledger, he massaged my thigh, then pushing my legs apart, he inched his way under the sensual black fur until his fingers found the wet spot he loved and pushed into my most intimate of places. I inhaled then choked on the smoke from my cigarette when he plunged his fingers deeper, making me gasp at the sudden sensation. He smiled, then continued his exploration of me, lifting his thumb to trace the rise of my clit, then putting pressure on it, he rubbed it back and forth, making it burn. I gasped, not wanting him to stop as I rocked from side to side in delicious agony.
We couldn’t go any further, he said, foiling my plan. We haven’t the time, though he could see in my eyes and the way my body moved against him how much I wanted him. Invariably on this night as on most nights, we had dinner plans, a cocktail party, a picture show, someplace where Lord and Lady Marlowe were expected to mingle with highballs in their hands, lively conversation falling from their lips and bored glances. No one could know the glances exchanged between us weren’t the usual apathetic looks between titled personages too long at the fair, but looks of sheer arousal, knowing what would come later after our glasses had been emptied, the smell of alcohol lingering on our breaths, the conversation stilled.
Lord Marlowe never tired of the game, showing me his delight in stripping off my clothes in a slow, decisive manner, unbuttoning my dress, then admiring the swell of my breasts peeking over the smooth satin bodice of my slip before sliding down my straps. His moves were like playing chess. Slow, thoughtful, methodical. By the time he exposed my breasts, my nipples peaked hard and brown and begged for his touch. I’d push out my chest, biting down on my lower lip, the tension building inside me to an unbearable point. He’d flick my nipples with quick, short strokes, over and over, gently teasing me until I could bear no more. Then he’d grab my breasts and bite them at the same time, his hand reaching down between my legs, pulling, grabbing, anything to get at my wet spot and relieve my throbbing clit.
Later that evening, I neglected to remove a large platinum brooch set with emerald-cut diamonds from the single shoulder strap on my gown. In my rush to commence the act of pleasure I craved, I pricked my finger and dropped the brooch. It broke open and out spilled white powder all over the plush scarlet carpet covering the shiny parquet. Before I could scoop it up, Lord Marlowe bent down and dabbed white specks on his finger, then tasted it. I swear, his eyes bulged out, his face turned red and he nearly crushed my arm when he grabbed me. I still remember that moment, so clear is it in my mind.
“Cocaine,” was all he said.
“So?” I admitted. We were newly married, but I still retained a wildness in me he had yet to tame. “I’m not hooked.”
“Aren’t you?” He jerked my head back and pulled on
my hair, his searing gaze startling me, glaring at my telltale pallor, but I didn’t flinch. He could see through my artful makeup job. “How long have you been hiding this from me?”
I twisted in his grasp, sneering. “You knew what I was when you married me. A cabaret girl in glossy eye shadow who haunted the nightclubs, smoking, drinking—”
“I forbid you to touch that accursed drug ever again.”
“Forbid me, Lady Eve Marlowe?” I boasted, emphasizing my new title. “I can do as I wish.”
“Not in my domain. I’m your husband and you’ll act in a manner befitting your station.”
Taunting him, I said, “I imagine you’re fearful what your vapid friends would say if they found out your wife is both a commoner and an addict.”
“I don’t care what my friends think or say about us.”
Curious, I studied his face, his clear gray eyes revealing a most unusual thing to me. He was telling me the truth. He didn’t care what smart society thought about him or me. I also saw a man filled with confidence, a man willing to take control of any situation, even a wayward young wife on drugs. I realized then my husband was indeed lord of the manor. When he looked at me, I instinctively felt I should run from him, but I didn’t.
I asked, “Then why are you acting like this?”
“Because I love you, Eve Charles.”
Eve Charles, he called me. An involuntary shudder went through me. When we were in a public gathering, he always referred to me as the Lady Eve or Lady Marlowe. In private, he called me Eve, but he rarely mentioned the girl I was when he met me in Berlin.
I drew back, ashamed of my outburst, but I wasn’t ready to concede to him. Not yet. Denial is the first line of defense for an addict. In a confident voice, I said, “I can handle the drug. It’s not harmful.”
“Not harmful?” Before I could stop him, he ripped open my dress then scooped up the white powder from the rug and rubbed it all over my exposed breasts and down to my belly. I squirmed, but couldn’t escape from his large hands smearing ugly white streaks all over my nude skin.