How can I begin to describe the "Playroom"? As a nightmare, or a sadomasochist's dream come true?
When I strip for Francois it is always as if for the very first time-I fumble and am clumsy with buttons and zippers; and I blush, too, as his eyes travel slowly over my body. Upstairs I am the mistress of the house; I am Marina, the spoiled darling of my men. But down here with Francois I am nothing. I feel like a slave he has just purchased in the open marketplace, and must now tame. It is the same every single time.
When I am nude, and stand there waiting, he will come to me and begin to probe and handle my body until, inevitably, I begin to struggle. Then I am tied or strapped down, and the real game begins. How exquisitely he mixes pain with pleasure, so that pain in fact becomes pleasure. And even my humiliation is a willing one and further evidence of how much he is my master-lover.
I go down into the playroom willingly each time-I am never forced to do anything-my screams and pleading are part of the ritual, I suppose.
CHAPTER ONE
When I married Burden Deal I thought I was the happiest girl in the world! I had been alone for so long, in the faceless anonymity of a big city; one of a thousand or more other working girls like myself, taking my only pleasure and amusement-if you can call it that-from brief encounters and fleeting affairs. And yet, viewing myself dispassionately, I can honestly say that I am an attractive woman. My figure is good-my breasts neither too large nor too small, my legs shapely enough so that I look good in miniskirts. I have never had a child and so my stomach is still flat and firm. My face is, I suppose, quite ordinary, but it is unblemished and I don't have to use much makeup. My eyes are large and hazel, my hair coppery. But beautiful girls are a common sight in a big city, and I am merely attractive. And besides, a hurried and spectacularly unsuccessful marriage soon after my parents perished in an accident had "cured" me of men for a while.
I was an only child, and my parents adored me; I in turn adored them. Happy in my cocooned, protective existence. I had no lack of proposals as well as propositions in the small college town where we lived. I went to school and college in Woodview. I knew everybody and everybody knew me. I had been dating Tom Burnett when my parents died so unexpectedly in their automobile-run into by a drunken high school kid who escaped with cuts and minor injuries. Had my parents been alive I would never have married Tom, who was basically wild and unstable, and who married me because I would not "put out". But I was lonely, with a loneliness born of unhappiness and desperation and unpreparedness for the realities that faced me-and Tom swore that he loved me. I quit college after my second year, and spent some of the insurance money (all that my beloved, impractical parents left me) on business school, training to be a secretary so I could continue to work and help Tom through law school. The rest of the insurance money we spent on partying, which was what Tom enjoyed doing most of all.
It took less than a year for me to realize what a stupid, tragic mistake I had made. During that year I had been humiliated, used, and even mistreated (when Tom was drunk and furious at what he called my middle-class Puritanism). I finally gained the courage and the resolution to leave him when he became flagrant about his many mistresses, even inviting them to our house while I was at work. After the divorce, I pulled up roots and left Wood-view for the big city, where I settled down, as I have said, into the anonymity of being just another working girl. And then I met Burden.
We met by chance, at a party given by one of the girls I worked with, Millie Slater. Millie was married, and a born matchmaker. Burden was a distant sort of cousin of a friend of her husband-it was as vague and nebulous as that. But it brought us together, and I was lost from the moment I set eyes on him and felt his big warm hand close around mine. I stood there in my metallic green minidress (worn in a mood of daring), and heard Millie tell me that Burden lived on a very large cattle ranch in Montana-which he owned-and that he was visiting the city for a couple of weeks on vacation. What she didn't tell me was that Burden was also looking for a wife. All I could see was Burden's deep blue eyes that seemed to burn into mine, all I could hear was Burden's deep, slightly husky voice telling me that he'd been looking for me for a long time. Oh, I'd heard my share of lines before, and had become quite adept at parrying them, but when Burden told me that I believed him, because strangely, crazily, that was exactly the way that I felt about him.
After a while we left the party and went to a small Greek restaurant, where we sat and talked and talked until it was closing time. Burden wanted to know everything about me, and I found myself pouring it all out-my whole life, all that had ever happened to me; even about the men who had been my lovers after Tom. And Burden listened, and squeezed my hand comfortingly when I got upset, and told me that nothing that had happened before mattered.
The next day was Saturday, and we spent it together-walking in the park, going for a boat ride, climbing hills, talking. And Burden asked me to marry him.
"Oh, Burden-yes!" I said, without thinking. I didn't need to think, I was in love. Madly, ecstatically, and for the first time in my life. We were half lying, half sitting on the grass under a tree in a secluded corner of the park, and when Burden kissed me his hand caressed my breasts, making my nipples harden and tingle until I was shivering in spite of the heat of the day.
"Marina-Marina, I want you so!" he murmured against my mouth. "But I'm going to torture myself-and you-by waiting until we are married. I hope you are uninhibited, my love, because I must warn you that I am-completely! Will you be the same way for me?"
"If you'll be patient and teach me I'll be any way you want me to be!" I told him, meaning every word.
For the rest of the week, time went by in a blur. Burden made me resign from my job, and he took me shopping-buying me the most daring and expensive clothes. He delighted especially in buying me lingerie that made me blush-panties with no crotch, bras with cutouts for the nipples to show through. It was only then that I realized that Burden was rich. Money didn't seem to mean anything to him. He would have spent a fortune on me if I had let him, and I told him sternly that he was lucky I wasn't a gold digger.
"I've always been good at picking women and horses," he answered me teasingly, while I burned with jealousy at the thought of the other women who must have been in his life.
I remember going to a drive-in movie with Burden during that hectic week, and he insisted that I wear one of the new crotchless panties he had bought me, and its matching bra. It was a movie I had particularly wanted to see, and we had driven miles outside the city to see it. But to this day I cannot recall its plot, nor most of the characters who played in it. When Burden started to caress my nipples, sliding his hand under the loose sweater I wore over a very brief, pleated skirt, I closed my eyes and felt my breath start to come faster. How can I possibly describe the exquisite sensation of Burden's fingers as he played with my nipples? He was an artist, he was the ultimate. He played on me in a way that made all the other men who had caressed me seem rank amateurs. First his' fingers traced the pattern of my aureolas, circling my waiting, eager nipples. And then they would pounce-pushing the points inward first, and then squeezing between finger and thumb until the sensation made me weak and I found that my thighs had unconsciously fallen apart while I fought not to moan out loud with the need he was arousing in me.
Now I could feel the fingers of his other hand begin their painfully slow progress up my thighs, caressing and stroking first the outer and then the soft inner flesh, moving slowly, slowly toward my center, exploring my wetness. When I felt his fingers on my clitoris I almost screamed, so acute was my feeling. He kissed me and I moaned softly against his mouth while his hands took possession of my helpless, wanting body. His finger entered me at last and I jerked in his arms.
"How tight you are!" he marveled, kissing me deeply, his tongue boring into my mouth.
I felt a second finger slip inside me, while his thumb rasped over the unbearably tender and sensitive tip of my clitoris, making my whole body move convulsively in his embrace. I wanted him-I wanted this man inside me, filling me, bringing me to the climax I now craved more than anything else.
"Ohh-Burden, Burden I can't stand it!" I whispered huskily, pulling my mouth away from his. My whole body seemed to be on fire with need. He knew, he had to know, that I didn't want him to stop. But suddenly he stopped, leaving my body shaking, suspended in pure agony, right on the very brink, so that I moaned my protest.
"No-please don't stop, not now!"
"I thought that was what you wanted me to do-to stop. If you want me to go on, you'll have to tell me so-"
"But I did, Burden, I just did-oh, I do want you!"
"Want me to do what, Marina? You have to tell me. I want there to be no holding back between us, ever!"
I threw my arms around his neck and buried my burning face against his shoulder, still trembling and almost crying with the terrible want he had built up inside me. He was stubborn, this man, and I knew I had to say what he wanted me to say-I wanted to!
"I-I want your fingers-inside me, on my-nipples. Oh, Burden, I want you so!" As I surrendered, I felt his hot, urgent mouth crush mine, and his hands were on me again, taking possession of my hungry, waiting body.
"How good it feels to have my fingers exploring your wet, warm cunt," he whispered in my ear, and although I had never heard anyone use those expressions to me or in front of me before, coming from Burden-in his caressing voice-they seemed like love words, coming so naturally from him. His fingers moved inside me, his hands tightened and burned on my breasts, and his voice whispered in my ear, telling me to let myself go, to come for him. And feeling myself tighten like a bowstring, hearing a roaring in my ears that drowned even his voice, I could feel myself soaring, climbing to heights I'd never reached before. And then floating back down to earth again, to the reality of Burden's arms that now held me tightly against him while my body still heaved and tossed, and soft moans escaped from between my parted lips.
CHAPTER TWO
Burden and I were married in a simple civil ceremony, with only Millie and her husband to stand up for us. I had no relatives on my side, and Burden had only a brother, who was, he told me, managing their ranch and couldn't get away in any case. So we were married, and had a champagne breakfast, and drove to the quiet motel tucked away deep in the country, where Burden had reserved us a self-contained little apartment.
"We shall have an old-fashioned honeymoon," he announced, his blue eyes dancing. "We'll live in bed, with nothing to sustain us but french bread and wine and raw eggs!"
I shuddered at the raw eggs part, but Burden meant every word he said!
Raw eggs really don't taste like anything once you learn the correct way to swallow them: break them into the back of your throat, with your head tilted back. Then take a deep, long swallow of wine, and it burns going down, and you feel this marvelous lift of energy ... well, at least, that's how I felt! Burden had been true to his word and had not touched me, nor allowed me to caress him during the short days of our courtship. But on our honeymoon he more than made up for his abstinence, and after the initial shock had worn off, I loved every minute of those wonderful five days. I was an eager, willing pupil, and Burden my teacher. Positions, ways of caressing, words-he taught me everything. Between lovers, and especially between married lovers, Burden told me that there should be nothing barred and nothing secret. I learned to enjoy him taking me with the lights on, or with the sun shining through the open windows, making golden bars across our bodies. I learned to lie back on the wide bed with my legs opened to his eyes and mouth; trying to hold back my climax while his tongue probed and flicked and drove me to unutterable wildness. And I learned to caress his maleness, to take him gently in my mouth and run my tongue lovingly and slowly along the length of him-to suck the very tip of his organ and then let it slide into my mouth, all the way to the back of my throat-to swallow proudly and without retching when he came.
We explored every inch of each other's bodies, inventing new caresses, new ways of fucking, for Burden told me that this was the honest and direct way to refer to our lovemaking. I grew used to being naked, and became proud of my body as I saw it through his adoring eyes. He made me conscious of being a woman, happy to be a woman-to be his woman.
One hot, golden day we fixed ourselves a picnic lunch and went exploring in the woods above the small motel. It was all private property up there, belonging to the old man who owned the motel, and he told us with a friendly wink that we could be sure of absolute privacy there in the woods.
"There's a little stream back there, too. Used to go skinny dippin' when I was a kid," he told us, and I caught Burden's eyes and could feel my body grow warm at the thought of what we would be doing up there, soon now!
We found the stream, and impatiently taking our clothes off, we bathed in it, splashing and playing like kids. A miniature waterfall made one end of a protected little grotto, and here we made love for the first time that afternoon, with my back up against a warm, rough rock. Later, still tingling from the contrast of the warm summer air on our water-chilled bodies, we made love again on a blanket we'd spread under a tree. We were insatiable for each other's bodies, and our lovemaking this time was very slow and almost languorous as we stroked and touched and caressed each other. I kissed Burden as if I could never get enough of him, my lips and tongue sliding very slowly and gently across his body, teasing his nipples ("Don't men feel anything there?") until they stood almost as erect as mine did under his lips. And then sliding down to his navel and across the hard, flat contours of his belly and flanks until I finally reached the prize, the spot between his legs where the symbol of his manhood waited for me-that big, beautiful, hard prick of his that had been in my cunt, in my mouth, so many, countless times, but still left me craving for it. Freud must have something, with all his writing about penis envy, I thought lazily, as I started tickling him with my tongue. Only in my case it wasn't exactly envy. No, it was penis-adoration. I was glad I had a cunt, a crevice between my legs where Burden could drive that big wonderful prick so deep inside me I could feel it battering against the opening to my womb. I cupped his balls in my hands (still worshipping-ah beautiful blasphemy-feeling as if I were at Mass) and licked them, took them in my mouth and sucked very gently until I could feel him stir, and see his jealous penis throb. And then, teasingly, I let my mouth slide upward again, seeking and finding his warm lips while I rubbed the length of my body wantonly and brazenly against his, knowing I was wet again, waiting again...
He didn't disappoint me. On my back this time-he pushed me down and lifted my thighs until they were supported by his shoulders, and then he maddened my clitoris with his tongue, until, my words garbled and almost unintelligible, I was begging him to fuck me-oh, please-inside me, ram it in me! At last he let my thighs slip down, and I wrapped my legs around his neck. Screamed as he thrust inside me, swallowed up by the damp depths of me that wanted only to suck him deeper and deeper, to clamp around him, to keep him there!
His strokes were deep and slow at first, and then almost imperceptibly gathering momentum. One hand titillated my nipples, alternating between their throbbing points, while the other hand stayed under me, supporting my buttocks, pushing them upward to meet his thrusts. I could feel trickles of sweat run from my armpits, between my breasts, and I bit my lip to stop my moans while my eyes watched him disappear into me, draw out slightly, and then go back inside me. Fucking was beautiful and I wanted it to go on forever. Against my will, for
I selfishly wanted to hold back my climax for as long as possible, I found myself approaching the delicious brink, hovering there. I felt Burden's finger probe between my buttocks, and I wriggled, suddenly uncomfortable.
"Burden, darling, what-"
And then suddenly, with one cruel and almost savage movement, his finger plunged into me, so far up it seemed I could feel it all the way inside my bowels.
"Come for me now, sweetheart-come for me with my cock inside you and my finger in your tight little ass-hole!"
I heard his voice through the pounding in my ears, and I came-incredibly, seeming to last forever, my body convulsing, jerking, my own scream of pure ecstasy hanging in the air as I felt him explode hugely inside me.
Afterwards, lying in his arms, I whispered: "I didn't know-that it could feel so wild. I mean, when you drove your finger up inside me that way! I though I'd never stop coming!"
I felt his arm tighten around me as he replied: Oh yes, it's wild. Men kind of enjoy that too, you know! But you've got such a tiny tight little ass-hole, we're going to have to stretch it some before I put my cock up inside there."
"Oh, no!" My exclamation was involuntary. "Burden, you can't! I mean-it'd never fit, and I know it'll hurt."
"Have I ever hurt you yet, honey? No, we'll use vaseline, or cold cream, and I'll stretch it with my fingers first. You're going to like it even better that way, my wild little wanton. Wait and see!"
He was my husband, my love, and I knew better than to argue with him. Quite honestly I had to admit to myself that there was a kind of forbidden fascination in the thought that he meant to invade all my recesses-to make me even more completely his.
Sensualist though he was, Burden never did attempt to fuck me between the twin globes of my buttocks during our honeymoon. He said he would wait until I was ready for it. But he would play games with me-rehearsing, he called it. Made me bend over a chair or the bed while he probed into me in both places at once with the fingers of one hand, while his other hand maddened my nipples. And even this way I would, and did, come for him; muffling my screams of ecstasy in the bedsheets.
After he had brought me to climax in that fashion I would, almost invariably, kneel between the twin pillars of his legs and take him in my mouth, while his hands pressed on the back of my head and my fingers clutched at his thighs or cupped his balls as my tongue began its slow and teasing caress of his prick. How well I had learned in five short days! I was without shame, glorying in it-glorying in being loved and loving; in a form of communication between two humans that was, for once, shorn of everything but honesty and lust and pure sensuality. I learned to feel, to truly feel with every nerve and every inch of skin, to become almost mindless as the sensations took me and I let myself go. As Burden taught me, I used "honest words for honest objects"-his phrase. All the forbidden, the "dirty" words were dirty no longer, made right and beautiful by our need and desire for each other.
And so I see myself write words and phrases that are supposedly offensive; but I find no offense, no dirtiness, no evil in them. Shakespeare said that a rose by any other name still smells as sweet. And so I would talk of my lover's prick, his balls; of his fucking me, screwing me, filling my cunt and my mouth and my ass with that which I most desired-his cock.
CHAPTER THREE
The honeymoon is over, it's over, I kept thinking to myself as we drove to Montana in Burden's new pickup. The words sounded like the refrain to a song, and I wondered why I couldn't get them out of my head. For things between us were just as wild and beautiful as they had been in the days we had spent together in our little motel. I think about that endless-seeming journey, and I remember long, hot, dusty highways with the sun shimmering off the front of the pickup or hot on the back of my neck. Wheat fields and flatlands and mountains, and more roads. And nights which we spent in each other's arms in the back of the pickup, under the canvas top.
"Burden," I asked him once, suddenly frightened at the prospect of meeting his brother, "suppose Jed doesn't like me? Suppose you get tired of me, of this?" He was in me at the time.
"Honey, it's impossible for Jed not to like you, to love you. And you can be very, very sure that I'd never tire of this, as you call it! I've had many women, and I've never tried to hide the facts from you. When I was a pilot I had women in countries all over the world. You're the only one I wanted to marry-to carry off with me to share the loneliness of life at the ranch." His voice became tender and concerned.
"It is lonely, Marina. But I warned you about that, didn't I? It's you I worry about, and how you will adapt to that kind of existence; a city girl like you!"
"Burden Deal, I'm no city girl and you know it! I was born and raised in a small town, and I know enough about loneliness not to be scared of it. Besides, how could I ever be lonely when I know you're around? Even if you do have to spend some days out on a distant range, I'll know with every nerve in my body that you'll be coming home to me at night, and that's the only thing that counts."
I think that was the longest speech I had ever made to my husband, and our lovemaking, our fucking, was twice as beautiful that night.
Because the trip seemed so endless, Burden and I invented new ways, new games with which to pass the time. I had bought several cotton sun dresses for traveling; bra-dresses, they're called. And I never wore panties any more, so that I was always nude under my dress, and thankful for it too, in the heat of summer. We had not tired of each other's bodies (and knew we never would), and so, on sparsely traveled sections of road I would lift my skirt up around my waist as I sat next to Burden, my legs wide apart for the stray breezes and his knowing fingers. Sometimes I would slip the top of the dress down off my shoulders too, so that I was practically naked, and it was terribly exciting to travel that way, sometimes with my lover-husband's fingers inside me, and my hand caressing his cock as it lay against his thigh after I'd unzipped his pants, my fingers shaking with excitement. We were caught only once, and then by a trucker who appeared quite unexpectedly around a sharp bend in the road. He was on us and past us before we had time to do anything about it, and looking back in the mirror I could see that his big trailer truck swerved and almost went off the road as his mind must have registered what he had just seen! We laughed until we were weak with laughter; and then we made a "fuck stop" so we could make love.
As we came nearer and nearer to Burden's ranch, however, I found myself growing depressed. The wonderful freedom of our honeymoon was really ending now, I felt. I could go nude only in the privacy of our bedroom from now on, for where and when would we ever get the chance to make love out in the open again, with so many people around? For, in addition to Jed, his brother, Burden had told me that the big house was staffed by Mexican and Indian servants. And there would also be the ranch hands, who lived in the bunkhouse right across from the house. I was still afraid, too, that Jed might not approve of me, for it was obvious from what little Burden had told me that he loved his brother, and that they shared a rare closeness and rapport. They had even enlisted in the Air Force together, been commissioned, and had flown fighter planes until they were discharged and went back home to manage the ranch because their father was close to death.
As he had warned me, the ranch was miles from nowhere. It seemed to me that after Burden had announced that we were on his property, we covered at least another hundred miles down a rough dirt road before he said: "It's right around the next curve, baby! The old homestead." And leaned on the horn, announcing our arrival.
"Don't you worry now, everyone is going to love you. And don't worry about the loneliness either. Any time you want to go to town all you have to do is holler and I'll have one of the boys fly you down."
"Fly!! Burden, you never told me-"
My words were cut off as he leaned on the horn again. And we rounded the bend and all I could see was that enormous house-more like a Southern plantation than the ranch house I'd imagined. There was a wide stretch of beautiful green lawn all around it, and a gravel driveway leading up to the pillared porch; and around and across from it were fences, a large corral, and the low-slung bunkhouses.
I know that my eyes almost popped, and I was rendered speechless, until I felt my husband's warm hand close familiarly over my thigh and squeeze.
"This can't be it." My words came out as a flat statement. "You kept calling it the old homestead, and I imagined..."
"But this is it, honey! Shucks, it's just a little old place-my daddy just got kind of optimistic-expected to have him more than just two sons!" His voice had become an exaggerated drawl, and I could have throttled him! But there were people coming from the buildings now, and my nervousness increased, so that I had to hold onto Burden's arm. Then he stopped the pickup, and a compact-looking dark-haired man came around and opened the door for me.
"Hank Jones, my foreman," Burden introduced us as he helped me out. "Hank, this is my bride, Marina. Isn't she a beaut?"
I saw Hank nod shyly, and noticed that he was deeply tanned, like my husband, and had a craggy, interesting face.
"And this is Maria, who will act as your maid and your guide. She's been with the family since she was a little girl".
Me, with a maid? The woman Burden was introducing to me was breathtakingly beautiful, I thought, in an exotic, Spanish way; her long black hair held back from her high-cheekboned, oval face with a barrette.
"I am so happy to meet you, ma'am" she said in a soft, courteous voice. Her eyes were inscrutable, making me wonder how she really felt.
And then I felt my heart miss a beat, and I would have stumbled on the steps, if Burden had not held my arm, laughing at my shock and confusion. For the man who suddenly appeared at the top of the steps was Burden all over again! The same deep blue eyes, the same dark blonde hair worn slightly long and barely curling at the nape of the neck; the same tall, rangy body, the identical long sideburns, even the same slightly lopsided smile and the dimple in the chin.
"You're twins!" I gasped. And then, "Oh, how will I ever learn to tell you apart?"
They both burst into laughter, and then Burden picked me up and carried me up the steps and across the threshold, while Jed bent down and kissed me on the lips as we passed him.
"She's just as beautiful as you said she was, and I know I'm going to fall in love with her," Jed said solemnly, as his brother put me back on my feet again.
"We always did fall in love with the same girls, you know-I guess it's because we're identical twins," he added, almost off-handedly, while I almost groaned my dismay out loud. Did he really mean that, I wondered? It made me feel better when Burden chuckled.
"You're going to have my poor bride so confused she's going to want to fly to town right away!" He told Jed with mock disapproval. "But you can carry Marina upstairs, anyway," he added, and I found myself swept into Jed's arms and carried up a wide, curving staircase. Because of the careless way he held me I was forced to put an arm around his neck, and I could have sworn I caught a devilish glint in his eye. He was so much like Burden, he even smelled like Burden, that clean man-sweat odor mixed with the tangy citrus scent of after-shave. I was relieved when he finally put me down at the head of the stairs, and I noticed that Maria had followed us and was opening the door to a bedroom. By this time my laughing husband had joined us, and they showed me my bedroom. An enormous cavern of a room with an immense carved wooden bed in the center, pile rugs so thick my feet seemed to sink into them, and a carved wooden dresser that seemed to occupy one whole wall. Windows completely lined another wall, and thick, brocaded drapes covered them, keeping the sunlight out. In spite of my surprise and delight, I had a feeling of dismay when they told me it was my bedroom. I turned to Burden questioningly.
"You did say my bedroom, didn't you? But-" Embarrassment made me falter, but Burden understood and was quick to soothe me.
"Darling, it's merely an old family custom. Each of us has our own separate room-even my mother did when she was alive. But don't worry, you'll never have to sleep alone!" I blushed, not only at his words, but at the look in his eyes that I had come to know so well. How I wished at that moment that we were alone and my husband inside me as we lay naked on that big, cool-looking bed! But Burden was telling me that he would see that my luggage was brought upstairs, and that Maria would show me the bathroom so I could freshen up while Jed and he talked.
"As soon as you're ready, you come right on downstairs-Maria will unpack for you-and we'll have some wine and something to eat. We'll be in the study; that's the door the left when you come down into the hallway."
His eyes signaled to me that he was as hungry for me as I was for him, and I was consoled.
CHAPTER FOUR
The rest of that first day went by quickly; I cannot remember too well what I did or where I went. I know that I was taken to explore the house, and that we sat outside in the cool twilight sipping our drinks and waiting for the two silent Mexican-Indian houseboys to bring our dinner to us. And I kept feeling their eyes on me-Burden's and Jed's-and both of them seemed to be saying the same thing, or was I merely imagining it? That is what I told myself, anyway; forcing myself to make light, casual conversation, and waiting for it to be time when I could decently retire to my room and wait there for Burden to come and claim me-to take my body that was heavy and languorous with lust and longing for him.
After a long and leisurely dinner, followed by more drinks in the study, Burden caught my eye and told me that I could go up to my room any time I cared to, and Maria would help me get ready for bed. His eyes met mine steadily, sending me a message that made my knees as weak as water.
I decided to bathe again, for the day had been hot and sticky, and I luxuriated in the warm scented tub and the feel of Maria's soft, strong hands as she soaped my back (over my initial protests) and then massaged it and the back of my neck. Afterwards she held the big, fluffy towel out for me and helped me dry myself. She was quiet, and did not say anything unless I questioned her first, but her hands were gentle and capable and I felt wonderfully relaxed as I slipped into the sheerest, shortest nightgown I could find. Maria offered to brush my hair for me, and I acquiesced. Why not? Before she began to brush, however, she opened a little ornately carved box on the dresser and offered me a strange-looking brown cigarette. I looked at her questioningly, although I had already guessed what it was. Burden had told me he sometimes liked to turn on-had promised me that I would, too, at the ranch-that it would intensify every sensation. I wanted Burden so badly by now that I didn't think I needed any artificial stimulant, but he'd wanted me to try it, and I would!
"It's marijuana," she said quietly, and I took the cigarette from her and put it between my lips, watching her face as she lit a match for me. Maria was older than I-in her middle thirties, I knew, because I had asked Burden-but she did not look it. And she was so beautiful! How could any man stand to be in the same house with her and not want to have her? I wondered, as I had already wondered many times today if Burden-but no, I would not let myself think that. Whatever he had done in the past, whoever he had screwed, it was past, and I was his present. I was young, and vital, and his wife!
I smoked the cigarette as Maria brushed my hair until it crackled and shone. I had grimaced at the strange taste when I first inhaled, but after a while I got used to it. I held the smoke inside my lungs for as long as I could, as Maria advised me to. When she left, walking softly as she always did, I smoked another cigarette, wanting to be wild and abandoned for Burden when he came to me. Whereas the first cigarette had made me feel nothing, the second, after only a few puffs, made me feel as if I was floating. Everything was intensified-the quality of the light in the room, the feel of the soft nylon against my skin, even the feel of my skin itself, as I touched it.
I walked over to my bed, enjoying the feel of the soft rugs under my bare feet, and I pulled back the heavy satin spread and lay down-waiting. Smoke hung in the air, acrid and strange smelling, but I sniffed at it hungrily. Involuntarily, my hands went between my thighs, lay there. I wanted to feel myself as Burden would feel me-I wanted to know what he touched when he touched me. Strange, disconnected, and almost disembodied thoughts went through my head. Oh, Burden-hurry, hurry! I thought urgently. I looked up and saw myself suspended in the air as the big mirror in the ceiling above the bed gave me back my reflection. Tonight we would be able to watch ourselves fuck.
The door opened and Burden came in and stood looking down at me, smiling. I could feel my heart start to pound, each heartbeat sounding like a drum. And my skin was suddenly crawling with sensation, craving his touch. I heard my own voice say: "Oh-Burden!"
And I think he must have read in my eyes, in my body, arching itself upward almost supplicatingly, how much I desired him at that moment. In slow motion I saw the door close behind him and then he started to walk toward the bed. He wore no shirt, and I could see the hair of his chest glint in the light. And then he was on the bed, on me, and our bodies merged and our arms and lips entangled fiercely. I do not know at what point I lost my nightgown and he his pants, but I remember being naked, feeling his lips and his knowing, gentle fingers everywhere on my body while I in turn touched and tasted his. I remember crying out that I wanted him, begging him to fuck me, quickly, fiercely, for I felt that I could come and come a hundred times.
Having driven me to fever pitch, to sobbing and writhing with desire, he turned me over onto my belly and then piled pillows under my hips, lifting me almost to my knees.
"Hurry, Burden-oh, hurry, please!" I sobbed, needing him. He leaned over me and the fingers of one hand excited my clitoris, my yet, achingly empty cunt. He drove himself in me then, to the hilt, and the sensation was so delicious I almost swooned. I wanted to harder, faster. I pushed my hips upward toward him as he withdrew. And then, as I moaned my protest, I felt him spread the cheeks of my buttocks, and press against the rose-tipped opening that lurked there.
Before I had quite realized what was going to happen (for he had never actually fucked me that way before), he had thrust himself inside my protesting ass-hole with one long, gliding, and almost savage plunge. And at the same time he drove his fingers-at least three of them-inside my cunt. I screamed-the sensation was like nothing I had experienced before-and he rode my wildly gyrating, bucking body, only his hands on me acting as bridle and bit. The screams that tore from my throat were not all because of the intense initial pain, but also because of the intense pleasure that he was giving me. I became all sensation, all animal, and like an animal I cried and groaned and yet pushed upward against him, both fearing and dreading his inexorable thrusting into me. I know there were occasional words, from both of us-words that described our pleasure and the monstrous and beautiful act that was taking place. But words were not important and not really necessary. I came and I came and I came and then as I reached the peak I could feel him swell and seem to burst inside me, the warm flood of his come burning inside me even as his fingers reached me where I had never been reached before.
Soon after, before he lost his hardness, he put his large, beautiful prick inside my cunt and we lay there, clasped together, our heavy breathing mingling and sounding loud in the suddenly silent room.
"I'm sorry I could not help screaming," I said after a while. "Would anyone have heard, do you think?"
"No, no one. The walls and the doors are so thick you can't hear anything that is happening in the next room, or in the room above."
I thought his voice sounded in some way strange as he said those words, but I brushed the thought away as a pleasant lassitude filled my body. His body was heavy on mine, but I wanted it that way.
"Do you want to sleep, Marina? I am still wide awake and I want you again already. God, it's been a long day! I've been big and ready for you all day."
"I've wanted you too. And now I'm not a virgin anywhere at all; you've possessed every opening of my body, I belong to you. Whenever you want to take me, darling, I want you!"
"You're beautiful, Marina, as beautiful in every way as I've always dreamed a woman could be. Lie still-don't start to move yet. Don't move until you feel you have to. I'm going to fuck you again."
I lay still and felt him swell inside me, felt his very slow, very gentle movements begin. His prick was a dagger and I was its sheath. I was well oiled, he slid in and out of me easily and noiselessly. I was still lying on my belly, the pillows hopelessly disordered and scattered about by our earlier struggles. He put one arm under me and played with my nipples, bringing them to attention again, transforming them into hot, throbbing points. Soon I could not resist moving under him, and his thrusts went deeper, became faster. His thumb slid into the sore crevice between my buttocks, exciting me to more and wilder movement. It seemed that this fucking, this furrowing of me lasted for hours, both of us building up very slowly and very gradually to climax. I reached peaks at least twice before he reached his-his prick went in me both ways, once below, once above, on and on until at last he expended himself in my throbbing cunt.
We slept after that until it was almost morning, and he took me again while I was between waking and sleeping, leaving me finally after telling me I could sleep for as long as I wished-Maria would take care of all my needs when I decided to rise. I did decide to sleep longer after all, waking only when Burden came to me at noon; entering me while I slept.
"Did it hurt much-having it in the ass?" he asked me while we fucked.
"Why do you ask that now? You didn't really seem to care if it hurt or not while you were doing it last night!" I relented, seeing his worried face. "Oh, it hurt a little, but the pleasure you gave me was all the greater because of the pain before. You can do it again, if you want to."
But he fastened his fingers on my nipples as if he hadn't heard, and pounded at me so hard I thought he would go all the way up into my womb, while I locked my legs behind his back and moaned my ecstasy.
After he had left me again-to go out to a distant range-Maria ran my bath, and I soaked in the tub, enjoying the hot, scented water as it soaked into my body. I noticed, when she rolled her sleeves up to massage my back, that she had a bruise on her arm, as if someone's fingers had dug into it; and I wondered again if she had a lover and who he was. Maybe Jed-maybe that was why he too had not married before. But then-would he allow her to continue being a servant? Surely not! I decided that her lover, if she had one, was probably one of the ranch hands.
CHAPTER FIVE
After I had bathed and dressed (in a soft silk body shirt and a pair of Levis), I went downstairs to a sumptuous meal, served with wine. I ate some cold chicken and salad, and drank two glasses of the dry wine. It was hot outside, but our air conditioners hummed, keeping the house beautifully cool, and I asked Maria to take me exploring.
The house was much larger than I had thought-and I had thought it to be more of a mansion than an ordinary house. All the bedrooms were as large or larger than mine, and I learned at last that Burden and Jed had their rooms on the floor above mine, at opposite ends of the house. There were at least ten bedrooms in all, some with dressing rooms as well as baths. There were galleries and other rooms: a morning room, a library, an upstairs dining room, and even a ballroom. Before I had reached the kitchens and the servants' wing my feet were tired and I protested that I would rest now and continue my exploration of the house tomorrow.
"As you wish, ma'am," Maria replied softly, inclining her head.
She puzzled me, she was an enigma. She always called me ma'am, and yet there was nothing servile about her manner. And the way she talked showed that she had some kind of education-her grammar and diction were nearly perfect. Why, then, did she choose to stay here as a servant? I wondered again if it had something to do with a man-and if so, which man? If only her manner had not been so reserved, her face so closed, I would have endeavored to be friendly with her, encouraged her to talk to me-tell me more about this household into which I had been brought by my husband.
We were standing in the library, a big room with two walls covered with bookshelves going all the way to the ceiling. It had no windows, and on one wall, facing the door, hung a portrait in oils of Burden's father. It had been painted when he was about forty-five years old, if I judged right-a man apparently in the very prime of his manhood. His hair was slightly darker than my husband's, and he wore a beard, but I could see that the lips were the same, not too full, but sensual, with a slight curl to them and his eyes were the same shade of blue. A strong-looking, handsome man! I could almost see the muscles rippling under the shirt he was wearing in the portrait.
Forgetting Maria's presence for a minute I said out loud what I'd been thinking: "What a handsome, sexy man!" Oh yes, the last two weeks had made me aware of sex and of sex appeal. I could see it in Burden's father, too, even in this portrait.
I turned back to Maria, and for the first time I caught a flicker of-what? There had been something in her eyes, in the set of her mouth when I turned around, but it was gone now. She stood there silently, obviously waiting for me to dismiss her.
"I think I'll go upstairs again and sit in the screened sun porch. That way I can watch for my husband to come back from the range. Would you bring me some iced tea, please?"
"Yes, ma'am."
Maria certainly never said anything more than what was barely necessary, I thought almost resentfully Thoughtfully, I watched her leave the room, and then, picking out a book to read, I found my way upstairs, still wondering about her. Even under the loose clothes she wore I could tell she had a beautiful figure. Why, why was she wasting herself out here? I could not stop myself from wondering if she perhaps resented me and my coming here-if she were secretly in love with Burden or Jed. I had never questioned Burden about his past, but I knew he had one. Knowing Burden as I did, I knew there had been other women. I couldn't help wondering if Maria had been one of them. Maybe some day I would ask him, if I could do so without sounding jealous. I would never be jealous again, I had sworn to myself. My long-ago marriage to Tom had taught me what a self-destructive emotion jealousy is. No, I prided myself as believing in the new morality-do what you will, as long as you hurt no one deliberately. Jealousy couldn't force love, nor bring it back once it has left. How sophisticated and mature I had become, I believed then.
The afternoon sun was on the other side of the house, so it was just warm and very comfortable on the sun porch. I lay back on the padded chaise lounge, my book lying unopened on my lap as I watched the driveway. Soon it would be evening, and the men would be returning from work, my man among them. The lights in the bunkhouse would go on, and if we went outside we would hear, drifting faintly across to us, the sound of laughter and voices and an occasional guitar. I had a strange feeling as I lay there letting my mind wander, that
I was a part of the past as well as the present-that here, on the ranch, the "Place", as Burden and Jed referred to it, time was in some way suspended. Except for the electricity and the other modern comforts, we might have still been back at the beginning of the century. I wondered if Burden's mother had sat here like I now did, watching for her husband to ride home. I was sorry that she had died so young-she had only been forty. It would have been nice to have another woman in the house whom I could really talk to.
I thought about the evening that lay ahead; about what would take place after dinner, in my bedroom, and a slight, pleasurable shiver ran through my body. My husband was turning me into a nymphomaniac, but I didn't mind at all; I wanted to be one for him-to be able, always, to respond to his almost insatiable demands. I was glad that I was taking the Pill, because I didn't want to have children yet. Burden and I had agreed that for a few years there would be just ourselves.
I heard the pickup turn into the driveway and come roaring up to the door, stopping at what seemed like the very last minute, with a spurt of gravel; and I smiled to myself. Someone was being very obvious about announcing his arrival! I got up and walked over to the rail, leaning on it. Burden and Jed got out and both looked up as if they could sense my presence-and I couldn't tell them apart! It gave me a sudden, uneasy feeling, until I recognized the checkered shirt that Burden had been wearing when he had come to my bedroom at noon. Waving at them both, I turned and almost ran all the way downstairs. I was still a new bride, after all-some eagerness to be kissed by my husband was allowable!
The two men were still standing in the hallway talking, when I came down, and both turned to me, grinning. Without hesitation I went up to Burden and kissed him, long and thoroughly. After I'd released him he pretended to mop his brow.
"And now that you've greeted Jed, aren't you going to greet your husband?" I turned to Jed, laughing at his obvious effort to trick me.
"Uh-uh, you can't trick me this time. I recognized Burden's shirt from this afternoon."
I reached up and kissed his cheek anyway, and he put his arm around me and squeezed my waist.
"Is that why Burden decided he had to go back to the house to eat lunch?" he teased me, nuzzling my ear with his lips until I was forced to pull away, because he was so much like Burden that I-I could not help but feel some kind of response surge up in me when he did that! We walked into the study for drinks, my waist encircled by both men.
"Why do you call it the study?" I asked
Burden as I perched on one of barstools that stood against an enormous mahogany bar (it had been bought from an old boom-town saloon that was being modernized) that occupied almost an entire wall of the huge room.
Burden was busy pouring our drinks, so Jed answered me: "The old man just thought it had a nice sound to it, and his desk over there by the window provided the excuse. He used to sit here to do his accounting before he hired an accountant. And of course you might say he was a studious drinker!"
Jed's eyes twinkled at me, and I smiled back at him. His eyes went admiringly over me, lingering on my breasts, which began to tingle against my will. Did he have to be so like Burden in every way? I didn't think I would ever get used to being around the two of them together-it was too unnerving. I tore my eyes away from Jed and accepted a glass from Burden, thanking with relief. Were his eyes also looking amused?
He leaned over the bar and held his glass up. "Well-here's to us!"
Jed and I echoed the toast and we all laughed together, the awkwardness disappearing.
After he'd finished his drink, Jed went upstairs to freshen up for dinner, and I teased at Burden, begging him to let me come up to his room to watch him dress.
"Be honest, you little witch, it's really to watch me undress, isn't it? You know darned well we'll never get back down for dinner, and I happen to be hungry! I never did get time to eat lunch, as I recall!"
His teasing eyes belied the mock harshness of his voice, and I kept nagging at him, until he finally capitulated, on condition that I was, under all circumstances, to keep my hands off him.
"Until after dinner, that is," he added, the promise in his voice and his eyes making me turn warm.
Burden's bedroom (it seemed so strange to talk about his room and my room!) was on the floor above mine, but at the opposite end of the house. Jed's room, I had discovered, was directly above mine. As we walked along the carpeted passageway and had almost reached the door to Burden's room, something-some barely audible sound-made me turn my head, and I saw Maria slip into Jed's room, closing the door behind her. Was there something stealthy about her movements, or was it only because she always moved so quietly that she gave that impression? Burden had paused too, and turned his head when I turned mine, and now he tugged at my hand, pulling me on with him.
"It's only Maria. She's going to give him a back rub. I sometimes have her do the same for me."
His eyes bored into mine, faintly challenging. Well, if he was testing me, then I would pass the test! I shrugged, pretending complete unconcern.
"She is good at massaging. Did you think I'd mind?"
"I hoped you wouldn't. You're my wife, Marina, you're very special and quite perfect!" Burden drew me into his arms and kissed me long and hard before he finally released me, out of breath, to draw me into his room.
I had seen his room already, this afternoon, and so its Spartan simplicity and starkness held no surprise for me. It had the same kind of heavy, massive furnishings that mine did, but without the ornateness, the carvings, the plushiness. The floor was polished wood with just a few rugs scattered around. I sat on the edge of his bed and watched as Burden took his clothes off, carelessly dropping them to the floor. Noticing my housewifely look, he grinned at me.
"Don't worry, Maria will see that they're picked up and washed and pressed." He walked casually into the bathroom, and I heard the shower being turned on. In spite of myself I felt a pang of jealousy at the thought that Maria could come and go in this room as she pleased.
"Burden," I called, "can I come in and watch?" I thought wistfully of the days of our honeymoon when we had taken showers together, soaped each other's backs, and then made love. The soap had smarted inside me tool
Burden obviously hadn't heard me so I went to the doorway of the bathroom and watched him anyway, longing to join him under the water. He turned around and saw me and I could see that he had an erection. But being stubborn, I also knew that he would do nothing about it until he was good and ready. I was ready for him now, and quite shamelessly. In fact, I could feel the dampness between my thighs already. I sighed, still watching him, and longing for him to grab me and take me in there with him-to take me.
He stepped out of the shower, still watching me. "Pass me one of those towels, will you, honey?"
"Will you let me dry your back for you?"
"Sure, I'd love it. But remember what I told you earlier-no touching!"
It was sheer torture, drying his wide, familiar back, and not being able to put my arms around him and press my aching hot nipples against that cool flesh. But I had promised, and I would abide by that promise-even if it hurt us both! It would make tonight doubly pleasurable, of course, this forced abstinence.
I finished drying, and he turned around and kissed me lightly, then walked over to the bureau and rummaged through the drawers for something to wear.
"When you change, sweetheart, don't wear a bra under your dress." He spoke so casually that I wasn't sure at first that I had heard right. "But Burden, the servants...! "
"They aren't paid to think! You must learn not to notice them, honey. That's what well-trained servants are supposed to be like-un-noticeable."
Against my will I could feel a strange excitement rising from the pit of my stomach. It would be different, sitting there at dinner with no bra on, my nipples showing clearly. It would be something like those days we had spent on the road.
"All right, darling. I'll show you what a dutiful wife I am!" I said laughingly. It was only when I was descending the stairs on my way to the formal dining room (for we would dine indoors tonight) that I remember that Jed would dine with us too-and Jed was not one of the servants. My cheeks became warm as I imagined how his eyes would travel slowly over me as they always did. Sometimes I felt that he looked at me as possessively and as lingeringly as Burden did. They were identical twins, after all, and I had read about the strange bond that existed between such twins. I hoped that Jed would not fall in love with me too; that would be terrible!
CHAPTER SIX
Dinner that night was everything that I had hoped and dreaded it would be. I say hoped, because the look in Burden's eyes each time he looked at me gave me a glow that spread all the way inside me (yes, I did have nice breasts, and the low cut dress I had chosen showed as much of them as I dared show). And I say dreaded, because Jed looked at me in the same way! It was uncanny, sitting between the two of them and seeing their eyes travel over me in exactly the same fashion. Burden couldn't help but notice, I thought miserably; and yet he did not appear to mind in the least. I couldn't feel at ease myself until I had had several glasses of wine, and then it no longer mattered so much-I even felt flattered that I had two men hanging on my every word and being so attentive to me.
I had never felt so completely female as I felt that night, knowing, with the insight of the slightly drunk, that both men desired me. The servants dismissed, we sat in the study afterwards and had liqueurs and smoked marijuana, until, when I was ready to go upstairs, I felt my whole body had become somehow transparent and very light-I would float if I attempted walking too fast. Burden (or was it Jed?) held my arm as we walked upstairs, seeing me with (I felt) absurd formality to the door of my room, where, no doubt, Maria already awaited me.
"Stay with me-now!" I said, but he made some laughing excuse and said he would come to me very soon.
I went into my room, feeling slightly breathless, and as I had surmised, Maria had run my bath and was waiting. Silently, she helped me undress-even helped me into the tub. It smelled and felt so good! And Maria's hands that massaged me so gently and so effectively seemed to take away all the tiredness I had started to feel. I was suddenly and very acutely aware of a heightened sense of feeling. The water lapped like warm silk against my body and between my legs, and Maria's hands on the back of my neck and down along my spine made me even more aware of my body. I was almost sorry when she gently reminded me that it was time to get out of the tub. Stepping out onto the soft rug I stood still and let her towel me dry, shivering slightly as the towel passed over my breasts and tingling nipples, and between my legs, where its roughness excited my clitoris almost unbearably so that I could hardly prevent myself from moaning.
"Shall I oil your body? I will do it very lightly. There is scented oil here in the cabinet." Maria's soft voice and the suggestion she made put me in mind of books I had read about the caliphs and sultans and rajahs of the East, with their oiled and perfumed women who lived only to please them. Why not? I thought. Burden would love that!
"Why not?" I said aloud, and I felt Maria's hands on me again as I stood there with my feet slightly part, bracing myself with one hand on the doorjamb. How soft and warm and knowledgeable her hands were, as they rubbed the sweet-smelling oil into my skin, making it even more sensitive. I felt her hands everywhere on me as my skin glowed and tingled from the gentle yet firm touch. It was hard to keep still and silent when she rubbed the oil into my breasts, brushing lightly across my nipples as well. And I could not hold back a stifled gasp when her hand went between my thighs, rubbing into the soft flesh, and then upward across my lower lips and between my buttocks. I wondered as she did it whether Burden would want to go in me that way tonight, too. Another thought, fluttering like a moth, went through my mind: my skin is so sensitive and alive tonight that I could come even under Maria's hands! My cheeks burned with a mixture of horror and excitement, but the thought, which would have made me ashamed of myself earlier, did not shock me too much now, with my senses almost bursting from the wine and the marijuana.
With what sounded like a small sigh-the first sign of any emotion Maria had ever shown me, she moved away, and after carefully wiping her hands she unpinned my hair, letting it fall about my shoulders. I walked nude into the bedroom and gazed at myself in the mirror as she began to brush my hair with long strokes. My body seemed to glow with a soft sheen that made every contour a pattern of light or shade as my muscles moved. My skin seemed to ripple under the lights. The effect was fantastic, and I felt a kind of narcissistic pleasure in staring at myself, for tonight I had been rendered beautiful! My thoughts about Maria brushed aside and forgotten, I longed now for my husband and the feel of his hard male body against mine.
"That's enough, thank you," I said abruptly, and she laid the brush down and left quietly, after wishing me goodnight.
I would not wear a nightgown tonight, I thought. I would wait here, standing with the light behind me, for Burden; and if he did not come soon, I would go to him.
But he came-and within a few seconds of Maria's departure. I suppose he had been as impatient as I for the long ritual of preparation to end and for our lovemaking to begin. I heard the door open and close and he was there in the room with me.
"How beautiful, how perfect you are tonight," he said softly, standing there and looking at me.
He wore no shirt, and as I watched he let his tight white pants drop to the floor and I could see that he wanted me. We walked to each other, meeting in the middle of the room, and when he closed his arms around me, I let my body press against the length of his. I tilted my head back and felt his mouth come down on mine almost savagely while I opened my thighs and trapped his cock between them. While our tongues probed each others' mouths, my hands explored his back and he held me by the hips, sliding because of the oil, and I felt his fingers slide between my buttocks. One finger pushed its way up me, forcing its way through the puckered rosette, tilting my pelvis upward and toward him. Still holding me impaled on his finger, wriggling and moaning with the desire he had aroused in me, I felt him draw his hips back, and knowing what he wanted and wanting it myself, I guided him inside me, crying out with pleasure when he plunged in to the hilt. I found myself slightly off balance now, so that I had to cling to his neck as he stood there, legs apart to brace himself.
"Dance for me, darling" he whispered, and what followed was, I suppose, almost like a stylized dance-the kind you see performed on any dance floor to a wild, pounding beat. Guided and prodded by his finger in my ass-hole I moved my hips freely and wildly, grinding myself against him. I had ached for this all evening-being so thoroughly filled, in every way possible. I rubbed my nipples fiercely against the short blonde hairs of his chest and abandoned myself completely to feeling and being fucked. I can't remember how many times I came, but I started to swear to him that I couldn't possibly come again-it was impossible-and he laughed and took himself out of me and pushed me back onto the bed, spreading my legs. His mouth took possession of me then while his fingers teased and bruised my nipples and I started to gasp, to moan, and then to scream as his lips and tongue played with my clitoris. He held it lightly between his teeth until I implored him to stop, and then he held my lower lips apart and darted his tongue inside, while he kept the tip of one finger pressed against my swollen and inflamed clitoris. I felt the familiar lifting, gathering-together feeling that rose, and rose and rose inside me until an orgasm that was an explosion convulsed my whole body and almost blew my mind!
Completely exhausted and weak with the reaction, I felt myself turned over and placed so that my hips and upper torso lay across the bed while my feet trailed to the floor. As I lay on my belly, panting, I felt him move between my legs, felt his hand slip under me as he put his fingers into my still-throbbing cunt. Lifting me up slightly, he guided his prick up against my now-quivering and tightened crevice with his free hand.
"Try to relax your muscles, honey, or it'll hurt you" he advised me, but for some reason I found this difficult to do tonight. I could feel his hardness press like a battering ram against the too-tiny opening, and as he pressed harder and started to push inward the pain made me groan and try to pull away. But his fingers inside me held me steady and pushed me upward so that perforce I was helping him to go farther and farther inside me while I squirmed and cried out with pain.
"Oh, oh," I moaned, "I don't think I can stand any more! Darling, it hurts too much!"
"Belax, and it'll start to feel better. I'm going to fuck your ass right now whether you want it or not, you wild little bitch!" His fingers made me jerk upward again and with it he gave a fierce, stabbing plunge that drove him all the way inside me.
I was sobbing now, my fingers clawing at the spread. "Oh, don't-oh, please-don't move yet! Your prick is splitting me wide open."
Ignoring my protests I felt him withdraw slightly, then plunge downward again. Then his fingers started to move inside me, maddening me, making me writhe and arch upward of my own volition. I was impaled, I was filled, and I realized that I might as well stop protesting because like it or not I was going to be fucked in the ass, just as he had said.
Slowly, very slowly, he began to fuck me, and I helplessly allowed him to. Now that I had stopped fighting it, however, it became easier for us both, and when he put a finger against my clitoris I began to move more and more eagerly up to his prick. With the fingers of his free hand he started to tweak at my nipples, rubbing them and pulling them almost cruelly while at the same time he murmured love words to me.
"My beautiful, beautiful Marina-my wild, wanton woman! How wet your cunt feels, and how it throbs around my fingers. How tight your little ass-hole feels as it grips my cock so tightly. And your nipples are like tight, bursting little buds between my fingers. Tell me you want me, sweetheart-tell me how much you want to be fucked by me."
Sobbing and breathless I told him, and it was true. I did want to be fucked by him-any way he wanted to fuck me.
"I'm going to keep on fucking you till you come again; and when you do I'm going to come with you."
The room had started to spin around me and I could feel the perspiration that drenched our bodies as we writhed and groaned and struggled together like animals. I twisted my head and watched him lunge into my up-turned bottom, and the spinning intensified. My belly tightened and my cunt began to contract and I rubbed my clitoris even harder against his finger. "Now, darling, now!" I screamed, and with a last savage plunge he fell against me and over me as I felt his warm come spurting deep, deep inside me.
I lay in a kind of daze, even when I felt him withdraw from me. His hands touched me very gently as he lifted my limp body and laid it in the center of the bed. Then he turned me over on the deep blue satin spread, and feeling like a lifeless doll, I felt him arrange my body as I lay on my back, spreading my legs wide. I wondered if he was going to fuck me again-was he hard again already? Then his voice whispered to me: "Sleep now, honey. I'll be back in a little while with some wine and a couple of reefers that'll wake you right up, and we'll make love all night." I felt his lips brush mine and then, lying as he had left me, I fell asleep.
CHAPTER SEVEN
As the long golden summer days lengthened and grew hotter my life started to settle into a kind of pattern. Both Burden and Jed had taken to going about during the day bare from the waist up, and they had both become tanned a deep bronze, while their blonde hair, now sun-streaked, looked even lighter. In my turn, I started to sunbathe during the day until my tan matched theirs, only mine was even all over my body. There was a private sundeck at the very top of the house, and I climbed the stairs leading to it every afternoon (for I had learned to love sleeping late) and lay on a towel while Maria rubbed oil into my body. Then I would lie there and absorb the sun-bake in it-interrupted sometimes by my husband, whose desire for me, far from waning, had seemed to increase.
I discovered in myself, once Burden had awakened my sleeping senses, a vast and almost limitless sexuality. I was reminded at every turn that I was a woman, female and elemental, worshipped by man and yet being used by him too. I was petted and pampered and cosseted. I had only to mention, however casually, that I wanted or would like something, and it was given to me. If there was a particular movie I expressed a desire to see, either Burden or Jed would fly me to the nearest town where it was showing. If I saw a dress I liked in a magazine and mentioned it-I had it within a week. My manner with the servants, and with Maria, had become as casually arrogant as that of my husband and his brother. I had even discovered that on the nights when Maria would oil my body, she would continue to caress my breasts and between my legs until I was almost unbearably aroused and ready to fall upon and be fallen upon by Burden when he arrived unless I told her to stop. Some nights I wouldn't tell her to stop until the very last minute, when I was almost swooning with delight and ready to climax. For I had learned what Burden had tried to teach me from the beginning-that there is nothing like waiting, nothing like a slow, lingering torment of one's senses up to a certain point and then lingering there-so that when the final act takes place it is more pleasurable and even more wildly exciting for having been waited for.
I had also discovered in the library a sizeable collection of pornography, some of the volumes lavishly and beautifully illustrated. I pored over these books while the men were out-at first with a kind of shock and amusement at myself, and later with interest and excitement. I learned a lot, and I shared what I had learned with my husband and with my husband's brother.
Yes, Jed had become my "other" husband, and I found that he loved me and worshipped me as much as Burden did. I cannot really remember at exactly what moment I first realized that I was being regularly fucked by both men. Perhaps I had always guessed it, but preferred to remain consciously unaware of it. I could not tell them apart, at any rate, no matter how hard I tried. I still cannot! But I had gradually become aware of some kind of difference in lovemaking-they have favorite positions and modes of entrance, my two husbands. Jed will always prefer what he refers to as my "fantastically sexy ass" while Burden, more conventional, will enter me only through my cunt or my mouth.
I do remember that my nights were spent in being fucked first by one and then by the other, although I was made to believe for the longest time that it was only Burden, my husband, who had me. Then one day, as I bent over in front of my full-length mirror so that I could watch as my big, golden animal of a man jammed his prick into my ass, I said quite naturally-even casually-
"Oh, Jed-this is wild, being able to watch what you're doing to me!"
And he said, just as naturally: "How long have you known, Marina? Because I've had you from the very first night, you know, and sometimes it's been pure hell keeping my hands off you downstairs when Burden's been there too and I couldn't pretend to be him!"
I answered quite honestly: "I don't really know-I guess subconsciously I've always known-or at least known that it would happen eventually."
"Are you angry at us? Or upset? We both love you, you know. I feel like you're just as much my wife as you are Burden's."
"You're fucking my ass, aren't you?" I told him saucily. "And I'm enjoying it too. I wouldn't be if I were mad at you. And no-I'm not mad at Burden either."
"I'm glad you know-you can call my name out loud now, when I make you come! Hold me inside you-let me turn you sideways so you can see better."
He turned me and I saw our profiles now in the mirror-saw how his prick slipped so easily in and out of the cleft between my buttocks, how three fingers of one hand disappeared into my cunt, how the fingers of his other hand rubbed my nipple teasingly between them.
Later that same night Burden came to me too, and we fucked each other long and slow, each holding back from climax for as long as possible, until it became unbearable and impossible to hold back any longer. Burden is a more gentle, a slower lover than Jed, who is rough and impatient sometimes, and loves to call me a wild bitch. Burden and I talked at length that night, after we were done, and I felt that the understanding between us was deeper than ever.
Burden and Jed, I learned, were like two halfs of a whole. Ever since their birth they had been uncannily close, each feeling whatever the other was feeling. When Burden broke his leg, Jed also felt the actual, physical pain. And when Jed crash-landed his plane one day in the steamy jungles of Vietnam, Burden, who had been asleep in his bunk, knew it at once, and knew also with relief that Jed was still alive. And they had always wanted and fallen in love with the same women. Bealizing this, and determined that nothing should or would spoil their relationship, they had decided that when one married, that woman would belong to his brother also-in other words, that she would have them both as husbands. And the woman happened to be me!
It still amazes me sometimes, how easily I accepted the idea that I had two lovers instead of one-that in the space of a few hours I would be taken by both men and would give myself willingly, indeed eagerly to them both, with no sense of shame or reservation. Both men were strongly sexual and were uninhibited sensualists, and I realized early that in order to hold them I had to be the same way. And so, as I have already said, I became more than ever aware of my own body and what it could do-for the pleasure it could give me as well as the delight Burden and Jed took in it.
Outwardly we acted with a certain amount of decorum, and only Maria knew what we knew. To the foreman-who sometimes came to the house to see either Jed or Burden-and to the ranch hands, I was Burden's wife and Jed's sister-in-law-treating the latter with nothing more than affection and friendship. We were the same in front of the silent and efficient houseboys.
In spite of our new freedom with each other, however, neither brother ever made any attempt to caress or take me at the same time, except on just one occasion. We were bored that evening, having planned to fly to the nearest town for dinner until thunderstorms in the vicinity prohibited our doing so. One of us-it might even have been me!-suggested that we have an orgy. I remember that we drank a lot that night and smoked a lot, so that when we went upstairs we were all high. My nightly ritual was foregone. Maria dismissed, and I was undressed very slowly by both men. Giggling, I was led in front of the mirror and held there with my legs as far apart as I could spread them. Burden stood behind me, supporting me, with his hands on my breasts, and Jed knelt between my thighs, his tongue stabbing deeply into me while his fingers manipulated my clitoris until my whole body shuddered and trembled and I whimpered my delight. He stopped just as I was on the brink of coming and I cried my protest, but then they reversed positions so that this time it was Jed behind me and Burden's tongue and lips on my cunt while he held my aching, trembling legs apart.
The rest of the night passed in a wild blur of arms and legs and tangled bodies. I remember it in bits and pieces. Being fucked by Burden while I took Jed in my mouth. And then the other way around. And lying sideways between them while they both fucked me, front and rear. And then again I was on my knees astride Burden, his prick embedded deeply in me, and Jed was spreading the cheeks of my buttocks, driving his cock into my ass-hole so hard and so deep that I screamed and screamed. The next afternoon, when I finally woke up, my mouth still tasted of come, and I was so sore and hurt so much inside that I cried. A hot bath and a massage by Maria helped. After my bath she spread a sheet on the bed for me to lie down on while she rubbed some soothing ointment into my aching body. I noticed that her hands trembled slightly, and that her eyes seemed red, and I wondered again if she had a lover, and had quarreled with him.
Just then Burden (or was it Jed?) walked in and stood watching, and merely having his eyes on me made me warm with arousal. Maria looked questioningly at him and then at me, and some hidden signal must have passed between them, for she excused herself softly and left the room, while Burden came to sit on the bed by me, and continue my massage. I winced slightly as his fingers went between my legs.
"Marina, I hope we didn't hurt you too much! A woman can't stand too much of that kind of fucking, I know, and it won't happen again. Jed and I have an agreement. Hold still, darling, let me put some of this ointment up inside you-it won't burn."
I closed my eyes as I felt his fingers hold my lower lips apart and then go very slowly and gently up inside me.
He was right-the ointment was cool and soothing, and his touch on me was so tender and gentle that in spite of my slight feeling of discomfort I began to want him, and told him so. He however insisted that for this day at least I remain untouched-and so it was that for the first time since I had come to "The Place" I lay alone that night.
After that, as I have already said, my life took on a kind of pattern. The days passed, and the nights, and like a cat I stretched and was content. In spite of the visits to town, my real world had become the ranch-the only real inhabitants of it the people who lived there. Occasionally I would (as I still do, sometimes) look back on the naive girl that I used to be and feel pity, because my life had been so limited, so confined. Now, thanks to my husbands and to all the reading I had been doing, I felt that there were no bounds and no limits to sensuality, and that life should be lived and enjoyed to the fullest extent possible. We humans are controlled and limited by our senses, and our enjoyment comes from that which we can feel or taste or take joy in. I came to believe, too, what Burden and Jed had been taught by their father at a very early age-that to explore one's capacity to feel to its very limits, to slough off the old, rigid and confining morality, and to put in its place a new code of ethics or a way of life wherein one puts the attainment of joy first, is the only philosophy worth living by.
We had a long discussion about this philosophy one night, and I made the announcement that I had become so emancipated (if that is the right word) that nothing could or would surprise me now.
"Ah, but you're a woman, all the same, Marina" Jed said, almost teasingly. "And because you are a woman, there are things that you could not accept as easily as a man could. There is the question of jealousy, for instance. Woman-modern American woman particularly-cannot accept the fact that a man can truly love her and yet desire another woman too. In Europe, however, this idea is almost universally accepted. A man has his wife and his mistresses. And now you, for instance, my very emancipated and philosophical darling-let's take you. What would you do, how would you feel, if I told you I could desire another woman, even sleep with her, and that it would not affect my very special and very deep feelings about you at all?"
They had both turned to me and were waiting for my answer, and I could feel the color coming to my cheeks. I had the feeling, somehow, that the question Jed had just put to me was important, and that the way I answered it would be important too. I have to admit, though, that the very first feeling I can recall was one of jealousy. My men were testing me, and it was with a purpose. However, we had promised each other that we would always be completely honest during these discussions, and so I tried to answer as truthfully as I could.
"I suppose I would feel a certain amount of jealousy-to begin with, anyway. But I could accept the idea in spite of it. As long as I knew that I was loved-the other person only desired sexually-yes, I would accept it. And now, will you tell me why you are testing me? Is there another woman that you-one of you or both of you-would like to-to fuck?'"
"You've learned such a lot in the past two months, sweetheart, and you've been such an eager pupil, that Jed and I were wondering if you were ready to be promoted-to learn and even try something new and different. But we want you to be very, very honest and tell us if you are really ready-for neither of us would hurt or upset you for the world."
Burden spoke very slowly, weighing each word, and he had avoided answering my question directly, I noticed. I drained my wine glass and handed it to him to fill again. We were alone, the servants having retired for the night, and Jed suddenly leaned close to me and put his hand on my breast, kissing me so deeply, his tongue stabbing into my mouth, that I almost swooned with desire. If he had not pulled himself away abruptly, he could have lowered me to the floor and taken me right there, in front of Burden-and we both knew it.
"I'm not jealous when Jed does that to you, Marina-not just because we are twins and so unusually close, but because I know he loves you and respects you as much as I do, and because I know you love us both in the same way and to the same degree. But would you love me still if you knew I fucked another woman? Man is a hungry animal, you know! Would you still believe me if I told you afterward that it had not and could not affect or alter my love for you in the slightest? I am speaking for Jed too, of course."
"You are asking me, in other words, if I love you enough and trust your love enough, aren't you? Well, I do. I know I do. I might feel-well, upset for a little while, but I would grow to accept it as easily as I have accepted the fact that I belong to both of you."
I heard myself say the words and knew that I was committed. Deep inside, I didn't really know what I felt. But I knew I had an overwhelming curiosity to find out about the other woman-or women.
Burden kissed me gently, and then we drank our wine and smoked in silence. I pulled on my reefer and held the smoke inside me for as long as I could, so that by the time we left the study, I felt I could face anything, do anything.
We walked upstairs together, but this time, when I would have turned toward my room, Burden held my arm and urged me on, upward, toward the next floor. Jed, however, left us there, and looking back over my shoulder I saw that he was walking toward my room, and I wondered. On the next floor, Burden led me into Jed's room instead of his. But when I questioned him, puzzled, he only shook his head, smiling at me. Standing there in the center of the rather austerely furnished room, he helped me to undress, his hands caressing my body. And then, when I had almost forgotten everything but his searching, maddening hands, he pushed me, very gently, down onto the big bearskin rug that lay on the floor near the center of the room. Our bodies sought each other impatiently-we lay in the soixante-neuf position on our sides and our mouths and tongues and fingers teased each other. My hands cupped his balls, squeezing gently, while my tongue played over the tip of his penis, dipping into the little slit there; then ran down the length of that big, beautiful cock. And his tongue darted and stabbed inside me, while his fingers stroked and tweaked my clitoris until I wanted to scream with pleasure. Impatiently, I took him in my mouth and felt him thrust into the back of my throat, but I was used to this now. I felt like a sword swallower as he continued to thrust deeply. My tongue made circles against the length of him, and I wanted to taste him and swallow him as he came, for I was close, so close to the brink of delight; to that soaring, rising feeling with which my climax would begin. But then I felt him stop and withdraw himself, and although I could not help moaning my disappointment, I knew him too well to say anything. This was the way Burden love to fuck-bringing us both to the edge, and then making us wait. I lay there writhing and I felt his head move upward, kissing my breasts. His lips fastened over one nipple while he rubbed the other between his fingers.
"Ohh-Burden-please fuck me now, please don't make me wait any longer!" I couldn't stop the words from spilling out of my mouth. I reached for his prick and held it in my hand, squeezing and stroking.
At last, when I thought I would come just from his mouth and his fingers on my nipples, he lay beside me and half lifted, half pulled me on top of him. I poised myself for a long teasing moment over his erect, throbbing prick, and then swooped down, impaling myself on it with a glad cry. As soon as he was in me up to the hilt I tightened my muscles around him as I had learned to do, and heard him groan with pleasure. I leaned over him on my elbows, letting the hot points of my breasts brush against him while my buttocks moved first circularly and then up and down over him. His hands came up and clasped my twin cheeks, and I felt his finger go unhesitatingly between them to penetrate me. My movements became wilder and more unrestrained as his finger moved inside me. I knew I couldn't hold out any longer as his upward lunges came faster and went deeper inside me, and with a scream that seemed torn from my throat I felt myself come while everything swirled around me in a mad kaleidoscope of color and feeling. I felt the warm jets of his coming inside me; heard his groan as he clutched me closer to him. Our lips met and it seemed as if we fought to suck the life from each other through our hungry mouths as our bodies arched and shuddered together.
I lay there with my eyes closed, hearing our loud breathing and feeling the warm perspiration trickle down off my body onto Burden's. We still lay locked together, however, and I wanted us to stay that way. My lips were on his shoulder and I licked his salt sweat, then opened my eyes almost warily, wondering if the room had stopped spinning around us yet. It was then that I noticed that the rug had moved during our struggles and contortions, and we lay on the bare floor. But-the floor was transparent and there was a light filtering through it. I blinked my eyes, wondering if the marijuana was making me hallucinate, and the blinking helped me focus better. No, I wasn't hallucinating. My eyes widened in horrified fascination and I could feel my body go rigid in Burden's embrace.
I was looking at what could only be my bed-I recognized the satin spread. On it, another couple lay-the woman on her knees, her jet-black hair lying loose and shiny, while the man (it could only be Jed!) fucked her from behind and between her slightly spread legs. He was screwing her ass-I could see how she held herself open for him. Once again I felt as if I were learning something that I had always known. Hadn't I sensed there was some mystery about Maria? And the mirror on my ceiling-why hadn't I guessed a long time ago that it was a two-way mirror? I had read many times of such things in the books I found in the library-was it that I didn't want to let myself think that the mirror over my bed was placed there for more than one purpose? Knowing, from the stiffness of my pose and my concentration, what I was watching (hadn't he made love to me on that rug on purpose, so that I might see for myself?) Burden started to talk to me softly, explaining about Maria.
Maria, it appeared, had been born on the Place. Her mother was one of the pretty Mexican maids, her father a ranch hand who disappeared soon after she was born. She grew up with Burden and Jed and was their playmate for a long time. Then their father made arrangements for her to be sent to a convent school. The girl still spent her vacations on the ranch, however, and one day, when she returned for her vacation, she seemed to have blossomed almost overnight into a beautiful young woman. Aaron Deal had noticed it first. His wife had died, and although he had many women in the cities and in other countries too, he needed to have someone on the ranch. He chose Maria. She, flattered and actually attracted by him, let him have her. Her mother was dead by now, and he built her a little house not far from the big house. Later on, when Burden and Jed became old enough to get curious about women, it was Maria, acting on Aaron's orders, who first instructed them. In spite of her beauty and her education, she stayed on at the Place, knowing no other home, wanting no other life. She knew that someday the young men would marry, would bring their wives here, and that she would have to serve them. Even this she accepted.
Listening to what Burden was telling me and feeling him grow big in me again, I could not help feeling sorry for Maria. For she must love them. I thought I knew now the reason for her quietness, her occasional strange moods. I wondered how many nights she had lain here on this floor, mounted by one or the other of my men, knowing they watched me being fucked on the bed below. My head was reeling by now, and I didn't know what I thought-what I should think. First of all, there was the mirror-everything that had taken place on my bed had been watched. I was suddenly sure that Maria had watched that night when we had had our small orgy-the three of us. Had she been waiting up here for one of the men? And had she cried all night because no one had come to her?
Burden had stopped talking, and had started moving his hips very slowly. I looked down at his face and found it smiling at me-and then I looked through the mirror and saw Maria thrashing under Jed's driving body.
"Is-is she in love with you too?" I asked, finally, knowing it was a typical woman's question. But Burden, thank goodness, took me seriously and gave me a thoughtful answer.
"I don't know for sure, honey. I suppose so. And as for Jed and I-we-well, we like Maria, and she's a desirable woman, but-oh, hell, this sounds snobbish and very feudal but it's true all the same-she's a servant. She's not an equal and she never can be. She knows it as well as we do. It's got nothing to do with love-just expediency and pure animal lust. I mean-I feel that for you, too, but there's something deeper as well. You're my wife, the woman I picked to be the mother of my children-Jed's too. It's part of what I've been trying to explain to you-about using all our sense to the very fullest. Anything goes if it's exciting and leads us to a greater depth and scope of experience, of feeling. For instance, can you deny that you're being aroused by what you are watching down there?"
"N-no, I can't deny it. But-but I guess it'll take a little getting used to. I mean-I don't know how I'm going to act around her after this, how I'm going to feel. Do you understand?"
"Yes, I think I do. And we can cure that awkward feeling right now, if you'll just do exactly as I tell you. No questions yet, and no holding back. Do you promise?"
Almost but not quite guessing what he was proposing to do, and feeling my heart beat faster, I promised.
Burden lifted me up into his arms, and with my face against his shoulder, carried me downstairs. The door to my room was closed, but he pushed it with his foot and it swung open, almost as if they'd been expecting us. Jed and Maria were now in front of my dresser-he standing, she kneeling between his legs. Burden carried me in and when he set me on my feet I staggered and would have fallen if his arm had not gone around my waist, supporting me.
"I want you to stop thinking for a while, Marina. Just let yourself feel. Cry out, when you wish to, but don't say anything."
He held me close to him, my back against him so that I faced out, standing with my feet wide apart. One hand went between my legs, and I trembled. I saw Jed put his hand on Maria's forehead, pushing her head back gently, and then, as she still knelt there, her hair covering her face, he walked toward me. For one moment I wondered how I felt about him, and then he was kissing me, and I knew I loved him, and yes, wanted him too. I felt Jed's arms hold me, and Burden moved away-toward Maria. It almost seemed as if we were arranging ourselves in a tableau. Jed pushed me gently toward the bed until I was sitting on the edge of it. He sat next to me and lifted me onto his lap.
"Open yourself for me, darling. Go on, take it in your ass."
Silent, still trembling, I obeyed him, unable to suppress a small cry as I lowered myself onto his prick, for he was big and hard, and it still hurt a little. I noticed that Burden had lifted Maria to her feet and was playing with her breasts while he watched us. Very slowly, I lowered myself until I was sitting across Jed's thighs, with the full length of him inside me, held tightly by my protesting muscles. When he moved his thighs apart, mine spread wide, too. I felt his fingers touch my nipples-first stroking them gently, and then becoming rougher and more demanding until he was almost hurting me and I moaned as I began to move on him, almost forgetting that Burden and Maria were watching us. He had his hand between her legs, and as I watched, he prodded her gently forward. She had a beautiful body, all golden, with very dark brown nipples and black hair between her legs. Jed's fingers on my breasts were making me squirm helplessly on him, and in spite of myself, the sight of Burden and Maria was exciting-She dropped suddenly to her knees when they were only a few inches away from us, and then her soft hands were reaching upward, opening me, seconds before I felt her hair on the flesh of my inner thighs, and her tongue gliding into my depths made me cry out. Through half-closed eyes I saw Burden drop to his knees, too, behind Maria. Saw him lift her hips to meet his savage thrusts, heard her gurgle deep in her throat as she continued to lick me, her tongue moving swiftly and knowingly. I saw Burden's eyes on me, and then I closed mine and let my senses take over. I did as I had been told earlier, and stopped thinking as I started feeling-sensations so wild that I couldn't believe I was actually experiencing them. I know I writhed and jerked and sobbed while Maria's hands held my thighs and her tongue continued to stab deeply into me, while Jed's big cock filled me and jerked into me and his fingers made my nipples throb and sting. And I came-I don't know how many times-over and over again. Dimly I heard Maria cry out from somewhere below me, and then I was lifted off Jed's lap and onto the bed, and Burden was lying over me, his mouth soothing my tortured nipples and his fingers gently stroking my clitoris until I started moving my hips almost imploringly, and he entered me, lying still for a while and feeling me contract around him. I opened my eyes, and Jed and Maria were gone-no doubt to the room above, where they would watch us as he took her again. But I didn't mind any more. Burden was starting to move inside me, his prick gliding very slowly and easily in and out of me while he held me close, kissing me tenderly. We made love for a very long time, and my coming this time was slow and rising and almost peaceful-we both slept afterwards.
CHAPTER EIGHT
After that night the pattern of my life changed slightly-only to form another pattern. For now I knew all that there was to know (I thought), and there were no more secrets and no more holding back with each other. I wasn't even jealous of Maria, and as for being watched-I grew so used to it that it even gave me a tiny kind of a thrill to know I was being watched, sometimes.
As the weeks passed and the men worked longer and later hours, I even found myself turning to Maria in what was, I suppose, a tentative kind of friendship. Since she knew that I knew about her, she had learned to relax somewhat, and I had extracted more of her story from her.
She had loved Aaron Deal, she confessed-with all the fervor and passion of first love. This in spite of the fact that he had been more than twenty years older than she. When he told her to teach his sons about sex she had at first been reluctant, but had not dared to disobey him. Later, she had begun to enjoy the constant lust of the two young men, even their sometimes untutored roughness with her. When Aaron died, after a long illness, she waited eagerly for Burden and Jed to return to the ranch, and when they did, life had fallen again into the old pattern which was all that she had known.
"But-haven't you ever wanted to escape? To find a ... a husband?" I was picking my words carefully so as not to hurt her. "Haven't you ever wondered what life away from herein a city, perhaps-would be like? You're a very beautiful woman, Maria. Much more beautiful than I, really. You could be anything you wanted, you could probably capture the heart of some rich man and be spoiled for the rest of your life."
Both Burden and Jed were planning to be away till very late that night, having flown into town for a business conference with some cattle buyers, and I had persuaded Maria to join me in my room for some wine-even to smoke some pot with me. I wanted to see her relax, talk more.
Now she looked at me, and I suppose the drug made her direct.
"Do you, I mean would you, want me to leave? It would be like dying for me." Upset that she had thought such a thing, I reached forward and hugged her impulsively. "Maria, don't think such a thing! Of course I don't want you to go. I would go crazy without another woman around to talk to, and besides, Burden and Jed would miss you too. All I wondered was-whether this is really enough for you. Or whether you want more from life."
"I ask nothing more. I know I have only crumbs, but they are enough. Without them I would want only to die."
Her voice was very quiet, and she convinced me immediately. I felt a tremendous pity for her, mixed with a kind of affection. What she had would never be enough for me, but then we were two different people, brought up in such different environments. I wondered fleetingly if I too would feel the same way if I had been brought up, as Maria had, to be an instrument of pleasure for men-just that and no more. I suddenly started to think about the pleasure that she could bring me, too.
"Maria-let's take our clothes off. And then I want you to come to bed with me."
She looked at me curiously, but she did not argue. Submissive as always, she stood up and started to undress. I was wearing nothing but my most transparent negligee, and I stepped out of it and went over to the bed, lying across it and waiting-I didn't know quite yet for what. But the wine, the marijuana, and the reading I had done that afternoon had all combined to make me full of desire; heady with it. I had no need to worry about being a lesbian because I knew different, but I wanted to experiment.
Maria came to me, walking slowly, and I felt the bed give slightly as she climbed onto it. Slowly, I spread my legs apart.
"Touch me, Maria-everywhere. Pretend you are a man."
I had meant my voice to sound imperious, but it came out as a whisper. I saw her dark head bend obediently, and closed my eyes as I felt her mouth and hands on my breast. Her hands were very soft. After a while they moved down between my thighs, exciting the button of flesh there until it was hot and throbbing. Without my telling her to, she slid down my body, and I felt the softness of her breasts against me. And then her head was between my legs and her mouth was on me. I moved and cried out, and felt her tongue slide inside me.
After a while, in spite of my rising excitement, I made her stop. Burden had taught me well!
"Lie down and open your legs, Maria. I want to find out what its like to do that." My voice sounded breathless in my own ears.
For the first time, Maria protested. "No, it's not right for you to do that to me! Please-"
I pushed her back and touched her nipples curiously, teasing them between my fingers as Jed would do with mine. After a while I could hear her breathing quicken, and she caught her lower lip between her teeth.
"Open your legs!" I said again, and this time she obeyed without a word.
I put my hand down there and felt her lower lips while I bent my head to kiss her nipples. They were hard and pointed, and I pressed my tongue on them teasingly as my fingers fumbled and then found her clitoris, seized it. I felt her whole body jerk, as if she had received some kind of electric shock. It felt quite pleasant to be sucking on her nipples-almost as if I were doing it to myself! Twisting my body around I moved down, opening her lips with my fingers before I thrust very gently and tentatively between her pinkish inner lips with my tongue. The taste, I discovered, wasn't unpleasant at all-she tasted like I did, when Burden or Jed would kiss me after having gone down on me. I felt her tremble and start to moan, and it gave me a strange feeling of satisfaction to know I was having this effect on her. Remembering the picture I had seen in the book I had read only this afternoon, showing two women making love, I moved my body over hers and lowered myself gently until I felt her breasts pushing against my belly and felt her fingers open me as her tongue licked into my cunt. It was exciting, I thought, to play the man this way! To feel Maria buck and writhe under my body and because of what my tongue was doing to her. And at the same time her tongue was making me move and moan too. I caught her clitoris very gently between my teeth and heard the scream in her throat. Then she sucked mine and it was my turn. I could feel the slightly salty moisture ooze out of her cunt now, and I let my tongue go deeper inside her while I held her thighs apart. And she, on her part, delved deeper inside me too. From the movements of our bodies as they seemed to find their own rhythm, I knew we were both close to climax-were reaching it, and then spiraling downward. I rolled off Maria and lay there panting, tasting her taste as I knew she was tasting mine.
"God, that was wild!" I murmured at last.
"I-I do not think we should mention this. They will not like it that you-went down on me." Maria's soft voice sounded unhappy, and I patted her hand.
"Don't worry, I won't! Why shouldn't we keep a secret from them? If I know them, they're probably screwing some little city girl-or girls-right now!" The thought did not make me jealous in the least, I found, and I laughed lightly.
After a while we rose and took a bath together, taking turns soaping each other. Maria left soon afterwards, to wait upstairs for whomever would not have me tonight. And I lay under the covers in my big bed and slept contentedly, knowing I would be awakened soon, and fucked. For city girls or no, Burden and Jed were both insatiable when it came to that!
The days started to become almost imperceptibly shorter, and my life followed its new pattern. I spent most of my days sleeping or reading, and I also rode a lot now and swam, to keep my shape and my muscles limber. Soon it would be getting too cold to swim outdoors, but I had been promised an indoor, heated pool. There had already been men coming to inspect, and measure, and submit designs. I felt wonderfully spoiled and indulged!
The nights were wonderful too; for then my body became a finely tuned, ultra-sensitive instrument, and I was given pleasure and gave pleasure an infinite number of times. Maria and I had not repeated our experiment, although I knew that we would at the first opportunity-but I had gotten used now to having her go down on me, usually with both men watching.
I would sit, sometimes, on the Spanish-Style wood and leather chair in my bedroom, with my legs draped over the sides so that I was completely exposed like any wanton, and Maria would kneel in front of me and kiss my lower lips while I gasped and moaned, held captive by hands on my breasts and fingers that kneaded my nipples. Her tongue would go deep inside me and I would feel the pressure of her nose against my clitoris. Then, when I felt I couldn't stand anymore and had to come, she would be pushed aside gently, and one of them-either one-would pull me up against him and enter me, thrusting deeply, while the other took Maria on the floor at our feet. A few times I was thrown down on top of her nude, thrashing body, and fucked while she was being either fucked or fingered, or had a throbbing prick in her mouth.
I thought, in those days, that my sensuality and my enjoyment of sex had reached its peak-that there was nothing more to learn, nothing left unexplored.
And then Francois came to visit.
Hank had driven into town for our mail early one morning, and when he returned it was early evening and we were sitting out on the terrace sipping our drinks. Burden took the mail and started sorting through it rather lazily, and then I saw him take an airmail envelope spattered with stamps from the stack and look at it.
"I guess Francois is coming over again" he said, and glancing at Jed I saw him raise an eyebrow.
"Oh? I'd expected him sooner, to tell you the truth. Why don't you let me read his letter while you tell Marina about him."
"Yes, tell me about him. Who is Francois?"
It was all quite complicated, I thought, but it turned out that Francois was half-brother to Burden and Jed-a few years older than they-and the only other son that Aaron Deal had cared to acknowledge as being his. He had been in love with Francois's mother, apparently, and would have married her if she had agreed to leave France. But she had refused, telling him that to leave Paris would be, for her, worse than dying. They had maintained an amicable relationship, however, and Aaron had always done well by Francois. The boy was always invited to the Place for his vacations, and Aaron's wife had accepted this as graciously as she had accepted everything else. Burden and Jed felt almost as close to Francois as they felt to each other, and although I wondered why they hadn't mentioned him before, I ended up being as pleased as they that he was coming to visit. After all, he was someone new. His pictures showed him to be an extremely good-looking man, with a carefully trimmed beard and mustache and dark brown hair, worn rather long.
As I have said, I grew quite excited at the prospect of meeting someone new and different, but when I questioned Maria about Francois she would not comment. In fact, when I mentioned to her that he was coming I could have sworn that she grew pale under that maddeningly beautiful golden skin. All my teasing and coaxing had no effect on her-she would not talk about Frangois. And so, intrigued, I realized that I would have to wait and judge for myself. Secretly, I wondered if perhaps Frangois would join our orgies, and the thought gave me a perverse kind of thrill that I couldn't help. I was so conscious of my body these days; the pleasure it could give me, the power it had over men. I noticed how the ranch hands watched me sometimes, when they thought I wouldn't see. And I knew that our shy foreman, Hank Jones, blushed every time he saw me. I wondered if he had dreams and fantasies about me, and sometimes I even wondered how he would be in bed. Sometimes I would tell myself crossly that I was turning into a nymphomaniac. But what did it matter? I had two men to satisfy and be satisfied by-and Maria, with her soft hands and lips.
And, in the meantime, we prepared for Frangois. One of the big bedrooms on the same floor as mine was opened for him, and aired, with clean linens put on the bed. And we ordered more wine than usual. I found it exciting to prepare for a visitor-I suppose that in spite of myself I had begun to feel the loneliness of life at the Place, in spite of the fact that I had only to express a desire and it would be granted. I found also that I was becoming more and more intrigued by Francois, although I had never met him. For even Burden and Jed avoided most of my questions about him quite adroitly, telling me only that Francois was very rich and very sophisticated (every woman's ideal of the typical Frenchman, in fact), and that I would be sure to like me. So, on the day he was due to arrive, and Burden had gone to pick him up at the airport, I found myself trembling with nervousness. Suddenly I had begun to wonder if Francois would like me, or if he would consider me too simple and unsophisticated to belong to the family. Watching me dress-trying on one outfit after the other, Jed told me impatiently that I didn't have to worry-Francois would adore me on sight.
"Does he fall in love with the same girls as Burden and you do?" I couldn't resist asking him. But his reply was ambiguous-they all had good taste.
CHAPTER NINE
When Frangois finally arrived, I no longer felt so nervous. It was one of those lovely fall evenings when it is almost as hot as summer, and the late sun hung crimson over the horizon against a mottled sky of pale blue and gold and scarlet. I wore a long hostess dress of green brocade and had combed and brushed my hair and let it hang down over my shoulders. On my ears and at my throat I wore emeralds. I had drunk some wine already, and Jed, when I was all dressed and perfumed, had closed the door of my room and taken me with unwonted fierceness, lifting my skirts with one hand as he bent me over before my mirror. I laughed aloud, sensing that he was jealous in some way; until he turned my laughter into moans of passion with his clever fingers that thrust inside me and teased my clitoris. Afterwards we tidied ourselves and went downstairs and out onto the terrace to sip our drinks and wait for the pickup to arrive from our little private airstrip.
When I finally saw Frangois he reminded me of Montgomery Clift as Sigmund Freud, except that his beard was more closely trimmed. His eyes were so dark they were almost black, and it was impossible to read what was in them. As I had half expected, he held my hand and then kissed it; his lips seemed to burn my flesh.
"You are very beautiful-even more beautiful than I had been led to expect," he said. His English, of course was flawless, and he spoke with only the barest trace of an accent.
"Why, thank you, Frangois!" My words sounded stilted and awkward even in my own ears. It was not so much what he had said, but the way in which he had said it. And the way those dark, opaque eyes had gazed into mine ... I could not explain it; childish though it seemed, I felt that there was something almost hypnotic about those eyes.
I had not known at first how much Burden or Jed had told Frangois about our unusual relationship, but from the ease with which my two men acted that evening, especially after dinner when the servants had been dismissed, it was soon apparent to me that Francois knew everything. Our conversation was all trivial; Frangois talked about France and the changes that were taking place; about the international jet set and their fabulous parties (to which he obviously had an entree). And Burden and Jed talked about politics and the ranch and about people they all knew. Several times I thought I felt Frangois's eyes rest on me, and sometimes I glanced up in time to catch him, but his eyes were maddeningly unreadable.
We drank and we smoked, and I listened to the men talk and finally felt my eyes growing heavy. Frangois was describing in detail a kind of orgy he had taken part in at the villa of a well-known and very beautiful countess in Italy. The party had gone on for days, it seemed, turning into a general early Boman type of sex marathon. I listened, fascinated in spite of my sleepiness; recognizing the names of people I had only read about before. They had drawn lots, one-half of the people (an equal number of men and women) had been the patricians, and the other half were their slaves. And anything went, after that. The slaves had to do anything at all that the patricians ordered them to do-or suffer punishment. And the next day the roles were reversed.
Some of the things he described seemed to me outrageous and almost unbelievable. But with it all I felt the faintest stirrings of excitement and could feel that my breathing came faster. A famous movie star had been tied up, as a slave, completely exposed to the eyes of everyone, and had begged to be taken by any man or women who desired to do so. A titled millionaire, also nude, had knelt down to be fucked in the ass by a vibrator. I could hardly believe it had really happened, but here was Frangois relating it all in a slightly bored tone of voice-even his own part. When his recital was over, I forced myself to stand up, feeling slightly unsteady on my feet, for I had drunk far too much wine.
"I think it's time I went upstairs to bed, or I'll never be able to get up tomorrow! Will you excuse me?"
The men stood up, Frangois bowing very politely.
"I think I'll sit up a while yet with Frangois and listen to a few more stories," Jed announced, adding (suspiciously, I thought!): "Would you send Maria downstairs after she is through helping you, Marina?"
I nodded at him, however, showing no emotion outwardly, although I wondered to myself, why Maria? Was I piqued because Frangois would not be joining me? I had no chance to think much longer, for Burden declared that he would carry me upstairs and would act as my valet tonight-and Burden's lovemaking had never failed to excite me. I let him sweep me up in his arms and I put my own arms around his neck. Let Jed and Frangois share Maria, then! Burden would spend the night with me.
In my room we dismissed Maria, and, true to his word, Burden undressed me. When he was done, I undressed him. Frangois's stories had excited us both, and our lovemaking was exceptionally wild and passionate. I was his slave to begin with, and he my master. I knelt at his feet and took his erect prick in my mouth, ministering to it as I had learned to do, while my hands alternately cupped and stroked his balls. This time, just before he came, I jammed my finger up into his ass-hole and was rewarded by his groan of pleasure. I hadn't realized before that that could be a source of pleasure to a man, too!
"Am I still a slave, or is it my turn to be your mistress yet?" I asked Burden, still kneeling at his feet.
"Be my slave for a while longer. Go lie on the bed and open yourself for me. And then I'm going to watch while you fuck yourself with a candle."
His words gave me a strange feeling. I had never done that before. But we were playing some kind of game, and I would not chicken out. I lay on the bed as he had instructed and spread my legs wide. He walked over to my dresser and then came back to the bed with one of the fat green candles that were part of the decorative candelabrum. Without a word I took it from him, and he sat on the bed beside me.
Gingerly, because he was waiting, I inserted the candle. It felt cold and not very pleasant at first, but he put his hand on my breasts and tweaked my nipples until I began to move the candle in and out of myself. I became wet after a while and it helped. I wondered if Frangois and Jed were watching from above, and the thought gave me a kind of perverse pleasure. I could watch myself in the mirror-how lewd and wanton I looked, lying there naked and with my legs spread apart while I fucked myself. Burden suddenly caught my clitoris between his fingers and started to squeeze it gently and I could feel myself go wild. And then his hand over mine made me stop.
"That's enough for now; turn over. There, like that. Up on your knees." Still trembling and gasping for breath I obeyed him and then groaned my joy as I felt his prick ram itself fiercely all the way up inside me. My body moved up to meet his thrusts and I moved my hips almost savagely against him; wanting him, wanting more. I could hear our loud, ragged breathing echo in the room, and as I felt myself coming closer and closer to orgasm I cried out to him not to stop.
"Hold still a moment" I heard him whisper, and I felt his hand on my buttocks. I cried out again as I felt the pressure against my opening there and knew what he was going to do. He thrust downward, driving the candle in my ass at the same time his prick slammed inside me again. I screamed, I know I screamed aloud, because it hurt, and yet, mingled with the hurt there was pleasure, too-pleasure so great that I was coming right then, right there under his painful thrusts that felt red-hot inside me. He held himself inside me while my whole body convulsed and shuddered under his. And then, after I'd "rested" for a few minutes, he started all over again, but slowly this time. I could feel myself respond again to his prick, but the candle, being hard and unyielding, was quite uncomfortable and even painful when he thrust it in and out of me. For the very first time, Burden paid no heed to a request from me-he would not take the candle out of me. But his free hand went under our perspiring, slippery bodies and touched my clitoris, electrifying me. Even so I was a long time coming again, and when I did he let himself go too. With relief I felt the candle slide out of me, and his body fell over mine. I never did have my turn at making him my slave that night (it would come later, though-Burden is always fair), for we both slept exhaustedly until well into the following afternoon.
That afternoon Maria was not in attendance to give me my bath and help me dress. One of the other maids, who spoke little English, informed me that Maria was indisposed. I wondered if Frangois and Jed had both had her, and had hurt her-remembering that wild night with Burden and Jed together. Poor Maria! I was feeling slightly sore myself, but later on that afternoon I persuaded Jed to rub some soothing ointment into me. Of course he also seized his chance to put himself into me along with the ointment, but I didn't mind.
The men had decided to fly into town that night, and although they offered politely to take me along I could see that they would much rather go alone so that they could "raise all kinds of hell," as Jed put it. I dined alone and slept alone that night, and although I was past the stage of being jealous, I wished I had a man to sleep by me and hold me in his arms.
The next day I rose quite early since I had gone to sleep early the previous night. Maria was still not in evidence and I had started to worry about her when Burden told me, over breakfast, that she would be okay and would probably be able to attend me that evening. He and Jed and Frangois had arrived back at the Place just a few hours ago, but since they had played hooky the previous day, both my men had decided to stay up and go out on the range this morning. Frangois was sleeping, but they promised that he would join me for lunch. They would have their lunch on the range with the other men.
So we were being thrown together, Frangois and I. Or was it only coincidence? I could not help wondering about it, and even as I told myself that I had, after all, the freedom of choice, I found myself drifting upstairs to pick out what I would wear for lunch. I had already bathed, so I had all kinds of time on my hands. I finally chose a new pants suit, a pure silk blouse under the short, Spanish-style jacket, and nothing under the blouse. Maybe after lunch I would take off the jacket, I told myself. And then again, maybe not. I would see. Frangois intrigued me, for although I had seen his eyes on me often, I could read nothing in them-neither desire nor indifference. And he had made no move to seek me out since he had been here, although he was unfailingly polite. What would happen today? After I had put on make-up, polished my nails, and dressed-very slowly-I went down to the library to read. A stack of books lay on one of the tables-the latest Book-of-the-Month Club selections, which I had not yet sorted through before they were put away. Sitting down in my favorite chair by the window I picked out the latest
"dirty" book and started to read it, but after reading only a couple of chapters I found myself skimming through it, bored with the slowness of the action. As for the "dirty" parts, they were not really dirty at all-not if you compared them to the books I had been reading recently which were unabashedly and robustly pornographic. I was tired of euphemisms and evasions! Sex was sex and there was nothing dirty about it unless it was made so by the minds of the people engaged in it-or reading about it! So in the end I put aside the best-seller and read Frank Harris.
I became engrossed and forgot the time, and presently Frangois entered, startling me.
"So-here you are. Shall we stay here for a while before we eat? Look, I brought us something to drink-a very special liqueur I serve at all my very special parties."
He smiled at me, and I noticed that his lips were full and sensuous. He was masterful too, taking it for granted that I would want a drink before lunch.
I put my book down and smiled back at him, feeling confident in my new-found power as a woman. "That was a very nice idea, Frangois-thank you. I'm not really too hungry yet, to tell you the truth, for I was up in time for breakfast this morning. Did you have a good sleep?"
"It sufficed. And you, Marina-you look especially beautiful this afternoon. That color suits you. Here, taste my liqueur and tell me what you think." He poured some of the clear amber liquid from the crystal decanter he carried into a glass-also crystal. I sipped slowly, unable to place the taste, not sure for a moment if I like it or not. It was a mixture of tart and sweet, with the slightest bitter aftertaste. But it was strong! Two sips and I could feel a glow coursing through my veins. Yes, I like it. He refilled my glass, and filled his own, then picked up the book that I had tossed aside and glanced at it.
"You are reading Harris. But that is weak stuff. Have you read The Story of O? I think you would find it more interesting, for it is more a woman's book. And then, if I recall right, there is a very slender little volume tucked away somewhere on these shelves called The Arabian Captives. Have you looked at it yet?"
He was standing not six inches away from me, looking down at me, and his eyes seemed to burn into mine, suddenly. I wondered why I had thought them unreadable-surely there was desire there now! But he had asked me about books. I hesitated before answering, thrown into unaccustomed confusion by his eyes.
"I don't think I have read either of the books you mention-No, wait, I did read some excerpts from The Story of O in another volume. It was-somewhat startling!"
"Startling How so? It was quite beautiful, I thought-a little gem. For how much that woman loved! Apart from that, do you not believe that pain can heighten pleasure? Sometimes it prepares the body for pleasure, and sometimes it can extend and prolong pleasure. Pain and pleasure are the two sides of the same coin."
I had been sipping nervously at my drink while he spoke, and the glow seemed to spread all over my body. What was Frangois getting at, anyway? Or did it really matter? I loved the sound of his voice, so deep, and so-passionate sounding. And his body, too-it was so compart. And his hands were beautiful, long-fingered, but masculine-looking as well. I could almost imagine how those hands would feel against my skin ... I looked down and away from his eyes, and found my glass full again.
"Frangois-"
"Take off your jacket, Marina. Don't you find it hot in here? Take it off, while I find that little book for you-the one with all the pictures. They tell the whole story, you see." He had turned away from me already and was looking for the book, so sure was he that I would obey him. And, in fact, he was right-it was growing hot in here-I was almost unbearably warm already, and the jacket felt scratchy against my skin, shielded only by the thin silk of my blouse. I took the jacket off and laid it on the table, sipping at the liqueur again, this time enjoying the golden heat that moved down my throat and all the way into my stomach, making my whole body feel pleasantly tense. I was suddenly aware of the touch and texture of the silk against my skin-especially against my nipples, which had hardened and seemed to press impatiently against my blouse. It was almost transparent, I knew, but I didn't care. I watched Frangois, say him come toward me with a book in his hand, saw his eyes slide over my exposed breasts and felt them-almost physically.
"Ah, yes, it is better this way, isn't it? Come, I want you to look at these pictures with me." His voice was soft, but there was a certain timbre to it that made me shiver. I felt him stand behind my chair as he placed the book on the table in front of me, his arms on either side of me as he leaned over to turn the pages, his breath warm against my temples. I didn't really want to look at pictures. I wanted-why not admit it?-I wanted his hands to touch me, to cool my fevered skin. Confused and breathing fast, I drank more of his liqueur, and then more, as he started to turn the pages, his soft, deep voice a sort of running commentary.
The Arabian Captives was a kind of picture story-you might almost say a kind of comic strip-only these pictures were exquisitely painted and detailed. Two girls, one a blonde America (or maybe French?), and the other a Turkish or Arabian girl, are bound on escaping from the harem of a cruel sheik. But they are taken captive, and tortured. Oh, not in the literal old-fashioned sense, but in a sense just as real, beginning with their exposure and degradation. Here was a picture of the blonde, chained to a pillar, her dress torn so that one breast is exposed, her legs forced apart by ankle chains attached to rings in the floor. Her friend the Arab girl is being bound, naked, to a kind of table shaped like an inverted Y so that her legs are stretched wide apart to expose her sex, her breasts thrust tautly upward because her arms are tightly secured by means of chains at both wrists fastening them to the floor. Then, while the blonde is forced to watch, knowing it will be her turn next, the dark-haired girl is tormented by the women. With long feathers they bring her, time and time again, to the verge of climax-only to suddenly start whipping her or sticking pins in her body. Her cunt and ass are stuffed with dildoes, her clitoris held cruelly by a device that looks like a large clothes pin. One of the eunuchs has his hand up the blonde girl's skirt. He is hurting her, one can see from the look on her face. More pictures as Frangois turns the pages, telling me occasionally to look more closely at this or at that. The girls are degraded in every imaginable way, bound in every imaginable position, while their helpless bodies are tickled, beaten, or raped with a variety of objects. In the end they are handed over to the male slaves for their use. But after what they have been through, they appear to enjoy it, even though they are used by three men at a time.
At last Frangois turned the last page, closed the book, and pushed it away while I still stared, as if mesmerized, at his hands. My glass was empty, but I reached for it, almost knocking it over in my nervousness. My face burned, my whole body was hot, and my skin felt so ultra-sensitive it was as if I itched all over. I was filled with an overpowering urge to rub my body against Frangois; to beg him to take me-to fuck me-right here. For, without my knowing it those pictures had aroused me, in spite of the pain and degradation they portrayed. I felt Frangois's fingers stroke my arms, very lightly, and I swear I almost screamed.
"Will you come with me now, Marina? There is a room in this house that has been mine, my own special playroom, you might call it. I would like to show it to you now-unless you are afraid. And if you are, you must say so now. For now you understand, I think, how I like sex. I would make you mine, Marina, but with the pleasure that I give you there will be pain too. Are you coming?"
His fingers brushed across my breasts, trailed across my taut, throbbing nipples, and I cried out aloud. Yes, I would come! I would go with him and I would submit to whatever he wanted me to, because I needed to, because I had to have him satisfy the wild urges that had mounted in my body. I knew with one part of my mind that there had been something in the drink he had given me-some kind of drug or aphrodisiac, perhaps-but it was too late to care now. In this moment I belonged completely to Frangois and he could do anything with me that he pleased. He knew it too, without my having to say a word, for he took my hands and pulled me to my feet, letting me press my body against his for an instant before he started to lead me out of the room. The house was cool and dimly lit; the servants waited for the bell to summon them when we were ready to eat. But Frangois was leading me away from the dining room...
After a while I realized that we were going down a passage way that led to one of the cellars. I had expressed no desire, during my explorations of the house, to visit the cellars, for I pictured them as dank, gloomy places frequented by spiders and rats. We paused at a thick, iron-studded door, and Frangois reached in his pocket for his keys, picking out the one that would open the door to-what? Some kind of Bluebeard's chamber? I would have hung back now, suddenly afraid, but it was too late. He seized my hands again and urged me forward, flicking on a light switch as he did. We were on a carpeted, shallow stairway, walking down a room flooded with light, and I heard the door thud shut behind us.
CHAPTER TEN
How can I describe my lover's "playroom"? As a nightmare or a sadomasochist's dream come true? It contained everything one can conceive of-it still does. And everything was so bright, so luxurious-looking, with the heavily carpeted floor, the walls lined for the most part, with heavy brocade drapes. That first time, we paused at the foot of the staircase, and I felt Frangois move up against me from behind, his hands cupping my breasts for an instant before he ripped downward, tearing the thin silk shirt I wore away from my breasts. I did not-indeed, could not-protest. I leaned back against him, wanting him to touch my breasts, to take me. Why wouldn't he? The room-its crossed whips hanging on the walls, its rings in the floor and ceiling, its strange chairs with the manacles at the arms and legs-had ceased to frighten me, so great was the wave of desire that swept over me.
"Francois-" I said in a whisper, ashamed of the wealth of pleading in my voice, but unable to help myself either.
His voice was implacable as he pushed me gently away from him. "Take off the pants, Marina. And then-you see the little platform with the columns of either side of it? Go and stand on it. On other occasions I will let you choose what will be done to you, but this time, because it is the first time, I will do the choosing for you. Hurry, now! I do not like to wait."
I turned around to stare into his face, and then, as he had told me to, I began to undress. The shirt was in shreds-I only needed to pull it out where I had tucked it into my pants at the waist, and fling it aside. I fumbled clumsily with the zipper at the back, but it came undone, finally, and my slacks fell around my ankles and I stepped out of them-awkwardly, because Frangois was watching me and his eyes seemed to burn into my flesh. I had worn no panties, so I was naked now, and I wanted him so terribly I could feel the throbbing in my cunt, the dampness of desire. I would have taken a step toward him, but he frowned and motioned with his head, reminding me that there was something I was supposed to do. Oh, yes, the platform. Well, I would pose on it for him-I would make him desire me as much as I did him! It was low-no more than two feet off the ground-and padded with some kind of silky covering that felt slippery under my bare feet. Two slim columns of polished wood rose up to the ceiling on either side of it in front. It grew narrower at the back and I could see the gleam of manacles set in rings in the floor on either side. It was something like the table on which the captive girls in the Captives book had been made to lie. But I stood there for Frangois, with my legs braced apart, and instinctively I reached out to hold the pillars on either side of me. Well, if he wanted to see me this way, he should look his fill! Our eyes locked, and there was such burning passion in his that mine dropped away. But not before I had seen that he was walking toward me.
My flesh craved his touch-I could feel my skin crawling with sensation. Whatever the drug was that he had given me in his liqueur, it certainly was potent! He was standing in front of me, his head on a level with my breasts. And now, at last, I felt his hands on me, caressing my body, exploring its curves and crevices. I heard myself make small, whimpering sounds as his long, slender fingers touched gently on my throbbing clitoris, and then went exploring inside me. Swaying, I would have fallen but for his arms that stayed me.
"Lie down, Marina. It's time-you're ready. Come down here to me!" His hands steadied me, and I obeyed, aching with frustration and need. But Frangois wasn't ready yet, even if I was. For I was to be tied and manacled first, I learned, and even to this I submitted. He slid my buttocks to the very edge of the platform-after I had lain down-and then standing over me, he chained my legs-stretched so wide apart it was uncomfortable-to the columns in such a way that my buttocks were raised off the platform and all my sex was completely and mercilessly pulled apart and exposed. Then my arms were immobilized by the manacles at my wrists, and I lay there helpless. Except for my head, I could not move. And Frangois had left me ... No, there he was again, I could see him standing between my spread legs, looking down at that part of me which was open to his gaze. Fear became mixed with my blinding urgent need for release. What would he do to me? Or worse-what would he not do to me? For hadn't I been forewarned about the ways he took his pleasure? All I could cling to was his promise that I too would have pleasure.
He was touching me again, and I cried out with the lust and need that he had built up in me. I longed to jerk and move my body, but I could not. And then I realized with a kind of horror that it was not his fingers I was feeling, but something else-a feather? Very gently, his eyes catching and holding mine, he commenced to tickle me, the feather tracing patterns around my clitoris and across it, between the lips of my cunt, dipping inside, only to be quickly withdrawn to trail down to tickle the entrance of my ass-hole. And from there upward again. I could feel the perspiration start to rise and then stand in drops on my body. Moaning noises issued from my lips that I was helpless to prevent. He was maddening me! I couldn't stand it-I longed for something, anything, to be thrust inside me, to still the terrible itching he had aroused. The feather began to press harder, move faster, and in spite of the chains my hips and buttocks commenced to writhe, while I cried out to him that I couldn't stand any more-I couldn't!
"But you can, and you will, my love. You are enjoying it, aren't you? And you will be sad when I stop. Doesn't it excite you? Come, admit it!"
The feather tickled my clitoris until I screamed to him that yes! yes! it excited me, but I wanted him-inside me. And with my admission he stopped as abruptly as he had begun, leaving me sobbing aloud with frustration. Between my legs was one big, throbbing, hot itch that he had left, and I longed for something-anything-that would alleviate it.
Frangois came back again, and I begged him to do something, to please, please do something! I felt his touch on me again, saw what he held in his hand, and screamed.
"No! No, Frangois-not the whip-I couldn't."
I felt him thrust the handle inside me, and screamed again-but this time with pleasure. But he withdrew it almost immediately, leaving me sobbing with frustration and rage. And then, standing slightly away, he started to whip me across my upturned buttocks and thighs. The thongs were of wide, soft leather that stung painfully but would not leave cuts or scars (I learned that later). But this was the first time I had ever been beaten, and the pain was intense as he lashed at my soft, pampered flesh. I screamed hysterically. I begged him to stop; I cried, and then I begged some more. My buttocks seemed to be one red-hot, swollen mass; I was sure I would never be able to sit again. And then, very gently, he began to whip me between the legs. The pain was more exquisite, more intense than anything that had gone before it. Frangois was an expert. He wielded the lash almost lovingly, and so gently and carefully that the thongs only bit into the most sensitive parts of my body. My clitoris, always sensitive, was hot and throbbing and so painful I felt I would faint if the whip touched it one more time. And the lips of my cunt felt swollen and were throbbing. I screamed-over and over again-but he would not stop-
"You'll start to feel it soon, Marina; have patience, cherie!"
What was I expected to feel but this terrible, this exquisite pain that went on and on? My head was swimming-and then, suddenly and without warning, I could feel that I was going to come-that the pain was no pain at all but a kind of clarity that made me feel the most intense joy, the most exquisite pleasure that I had ever experienced.
"Oh, Frangois-Oh, don't stop! Don't-don't-" I could hear my own voice crying out to him above the noise of his breathing (why was he breathing so loud?) and then, miraculously, he flung his body over mine, his hands twisting at my nipples (and yes, that pain was good too!) as he entered me at last and I started to come and it went on and on until I couldn't believe it was really happening! I didn't finish until he had come too, and he had thrust the whip handle up between my sore cheeks.
He released me after a while, and carried me-because my legs were trembling so they would not support me-to a chair, where I sat uncomfortably while he poured a drink for me. Cognac this time, and I accepted it thankfully. He was very tender and very loving and I could hardly believe that a few minutes ago he had been whipping me while I screamed in pain and protest. But I believed it when a little later he led me around the room and showed me everything.
"Has-has Maria been down here too?" I could not stop myself from asking, and he told me that she had. So that was why she had been "indisposed," poor thing! I hoped he had not hurt her too badly, and said so. He shrugged, looking surprised. She was a servant, was she not? And of course he would not have injured her badly, but certainly he would be rougher with her than he would be with me; I would be his mistress, would I not? For he adored me. And when I looked into those dark eyes of his, they told me the same thing: he did care for me in some special way. Perhaps because I, by adoption, was now a Deal?
I felt myself grow weak as I continued to gaze into Francois's eyes-I still do, even now. What would he have me do now? For whatever it was, I would submit to it. It was if I had no choice, no will of my own.
He chained me in the center of the room, ankles and wrists attached to rings set in floor and ceiling (there were rings everywhere!).
Chains of some very light metal, with adjustable links, hung from the rings in the ceiling and were pulled just taut enough to make me uncomfortable. I balanced on the balls of my feet, which were also dragged far apart.
Neither of us spoke; it was as if we were both acting out parts in a ritual, a staged ballet. Again I was the captive, chained, and again my lover was my tormentor and my teacher. He went to a low, ornately carved cabinet and produced what I can only describe as a contraption-wide leather and carved wood and thin gold chains. The wide leather strap was belted around my waist, and he cinched it so tight I gasped audibly as I felt it cut into my flesh and shorten my breath. Two carved wooden dildoes were pushed gently but firmly inside my two lower orifices, and these were held firmly in place by an arrangement of thin gold chains which in turn were attached to the belt. A small triangular piece of leather was pressed tightly but not too uncomfortably over my clitoris. Trembling slightly, I waited for what would come next.
Frangois placed a light, round-topped table in front of me, and from the cabinet produced a porcelain jar and what looked like a sort of paintbrush. The jar, he explained, contained perfumed oil the consistency of honey. The brush was made of softest sable.
"I wish you to learn of the pleasure you can give to yourself, Marina, by your own muscular contractions. This will not be painful. It will be all pleasure, and all for you, my dearest love."
I watched him dip the brush into the oil and then felt the first brush strokes on my body. I don't think there was a spot or an inch of skin that he missed. The sensation was indescribable; again, a type of-well, if not exactly pain, then call it acute discomfort mixed with extremely pleasurable feelings. I hated it and yet I longed for it. I could feel my body itching and tingling. The whole surface of my skin seemed to glow and become so sensitive that I began to scream each time the brush approached me. Involuntarily, as I tried to twitch and cringe away from his stroking, my muscles began to contract, and I became acutely aware of the wooden dildoes inside me; of the piece of leather irritating my clitoris. The harder I contracted my muscles the more pleasurable i felt. And Frangois, knowing from the changed quality in my sobs and cries, concentrated the brush on my breasts and nipples. And so again I came and came, screaming; I was barely conscious when he let me down, holding me tenderly in his arms. And yet, after he had removed the contraption and entered me, there on the floor, I came for him again although thought I could not. There was something wildly perverse about the feeling of his fully clothed body against my naked one. My skin, still almost unbearably sensitive, welcomed each rough movement, each sensation as he rubbed his body against mine. And his hands with their long and elegant fingers found me in all my most secret and tender places. With my legs propped on his shoulders or drawn up to my chest, he fucked me in both openings-cunt and ass-and so quickly and hard that it felt as if he was fucking both places simultaneously.
We came together and lay together, his body over mine, for what seemed like hours, although it was actually only about fifteen minutes.
My legs trembled so that I could barely walk up the stairs, after Frangois had helped me into my slacks again. He had brought my jacket along, and I buttoned it very tightly, up to the neck. There were no servants around upstairs, thank goodness, and Frangois solicitously helped me to my room and said he would send me up some lunch in bed. Of course I acceded; could I do otherwise with Frangois? I was under some sort of spell; no sooner had he left me but I wanted him again-wanted anything he wished to do to me. But I had my lunch instead, and slept, sated.
When I awoke, Maria was there to help me bathe and dress for dinner, and we looked at each other silently, like conspirators. So now we shared something else-Frangois. She looked pale, and had dark circles under her eyes, and I could not help but notice the bruises that ringed her wrists when she rolled up her sleeves to soap me.
My buttocks and thighs were red flushed from the whipping I had received. I wondered if Maria also had tokens of her visit to the playroom with Frangois. I wanted to ask her, Did he make you come, too? but I didn't dare. We were friends of a sort, Maria and I, but it would be infringing on her privacy for me to ask such a question. Whatever other bruises she bore, she obviously did not wish to show them to me, or to talk how she got them-Perhaps later, after Frangois had left, we would talk about it.
I went downstairs and had dinner with the three men in my life. I was treated like a queen, as usual. Burden and Jed appeared to act quite normally, although I noticed that Jed, more outspoken and with slightly less self-control than Burden, kept darting quick glances at me, and a few times I caught him frowning. We had barely finished our first after-dinner liqueur when he asked me abruptly if I would like to take a stroll outside with him. I agreed, rather surprised. Jed had one of the servants fetch my warmest fur jacket, and he took my arm and led me outside, ignoring Burden's raised eyebrows and Francois's inscrutable smile.
We walked away from the house, across the lawns and toward the corral fence, on the other side of which were the winking lights of the bunkhouses. There was an enormous old tree at one corner of the fence, and Jed, pulling at my hand, was leading me toward it.
"Jed, what on earth is the matter with you? Jed-"
"I want you, Marina. No-I don't want to talk about it; I don't need to have my motives analyzed. I love you and I want you. Now."
Between the tree and the corral fence he bent me forward, lifting my long skirts, fumbling for a moment with his hands hard against my still-sore flesh, before he thrust himself inside me-his favorite way. There was nothing I could do about it, even if I had been of a mind to protest, which I was not. Truth to tell, I was at first amused, for I knew at last that he was furiously jealous, and unable, because of whatever unwritten agreement the three of them had, to admit it, and then quite stimulated and excited by his impulsiveness and the unusualness of being had out here in the open where any one of the cowboys from the bunkhouse might stumble upon us copulating in the darkness like alley cats. His fingers seemed to sting and burn wherever they touched me as he moved his hand roughly against my clitoris and the pouting lips of my cunt before stabbing into me with his stiff fingers. His cock had never felt so big inside me. Nor, I was sure, had he ever before penetrated me so deeply. I was holding onto the top of the corral fence to keep my balance, and I had to stifle my cries and moans against the backs of my wrists as he continued to plunge in and out of me. In spite of the fact that this opening was by now well stretched by his repeated assaults upon it, I could not help feeling a certain amount of discomfort, for he was using a kind of circular grinding motion of his hips that seemed to make him swell and feel much larger than usual.
"You're mine, you beautiful bitch, you wild woman-you're mine!" He kept mumbling fiercely in my ear, and as my excitement grew with his I thrust up and back toward him, and felt him spurt hotly inside me just seconds before I came, collapsing against the fence; hanging onto it as if my life depended upon it...
When we had recovered sufficiently to start straightening our clothes, I happened to look across the corral, and saw a dark figure move slowly toward the bunkhouse. He was silhouetted for a moment against the light as he opened the door and went in, and I recognized the foreman, Hank. Had he seen, I wondered? A queer thrill that I had learned to recognize shot through me. In a way, I almost hoped that he had. I said no word to Jed, however, and after he had kissed me tenderly and apologized for his roughness, we walked back toward the house.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Frangois's visits never last more than a week, and this one was no exception.
He explained to me that unlike Burden and Jed, he did not need to have a woman every day. "I like to think of myself as a hedonistic true gourmet of pleasure" he said to me once, his dark eyes twinkling at me. "And as such, cherie, I would not wish to have too much or get sated. No-I prefer to wait; let the need build up in me until it cannot, will not be denied. And then, only then will I let myself seize that which I have been denying myself."
"You are a stoic then, as well as an epicure; but I am not. I freely admit it. Frangois, please! No more!"
This conversation took place during my second visit to Frangois's playroom, and as before, the circumstances were uncomfortable for me. Also, as before, we were alone. I was to learn, during later visits, that Jed and Burden would never intrude on Frangois when he was with me. Burden because he is too tenderhearted I suppose, and Jed because he is jealous! So I had Frangois to myself, and he had me-oh yes, he had me! I think he has had me in almost every position possible-usually with me tied up. Some of the positions he chose were so grotesque that I cried with humiliation when he made me watch in a mirror, as he sometimes did. But I suppose that Frangois is good for me-he reminds me that I am only a woman after all, with a background of centuries of submission to the lordly male. I suppose that without Frangois's visits I should become overweeningly proud and arrogant!
I look forward to his visits, and yet I dread them too. I am always willing when I start to go with him, but by the time we reach the wide, carpeted stairway I am hanging back; begging him to let me off just this once. Of course he never does! By the time we reach the bottom of the stairs I am usually resigned, and trembling with fearful anticipation as I stand there and strip for him, feeling his eyes burn into me.
When I strip for Frangois it is always as if for the very first time. I fumble and am clumsy with buttons and zippers; and I blush, too, as his eyes travel slowly over my body. Upstairs I am the mistress of the house; I am Marina, the spoiled darling of my men. But down here with Frangois I am nothing. I feel like a slave he has just purchased in the market place, and must now tame. It is the same every single time.
When I am nude, and stand there waiting, he will come to me and begin to probe and handle my body until, inevitably, I begin to struggle. Then I am tied or strapped down, and the real game begins. How exquisitely he mixes pain with pleasure, so that pain in fact becomes pleasure. And even my humiliation is a willing one and further evidence of how much he is my master-lover. For why (as he has told me, gently explaining as one might to a child) should I mind anything at all-any position or angle my body is placed in-when it is only his eyes that see me thus? I have no answer. I go down into the playroom willingly-each time I am never forced to do anything-my screams and pleadings are part of the ritual, I suppose. If I ever said seriously to Frangois that I had had enough, that I would no longer play his games, that would be the end of it. He knows me so well that he would recognize right away that I was no longer his. For in order for him to draw pleasure from all this, the woman must be willing too. He says (ruefully) that he is not a true sadist with a woman he really cares for.
I have learned that Maria both dreads and fears him. I suppose he is sadistic with her, for she is always bruised afterwards, and I have seen bloody weals across her buttocks and thighs. But she does not have to go with him either; she only has to say no. She goes, hypnotized like a bird by a snake, perhaps. I do not think she gains much pleasure from it, though. Poor Maria! We have become even closer since Frangois, for he is one more man we have in common, and I know that she alone of all our household has experienced the same hellish delights downstairs as I. Once I went down on her when Burden and Jed had gone with Frangois to the airport, and her cunt lips were all swollen and crimson, and she screamed the whole time I was doing it, even though I was as tender as I could be, and I knew she was enjoying it.
In a way, I was glad to see Frangois leave, that first time. I was almost afraid I was turning into some sort of masochist. After the episode with Maria (it had happened almost by accident. She was giving me my bath and I made her join me in the tub) I was still restless, and strolled outside, wondering when my husbands would be back. It was a beautiful clear night-quite cold, but I was warmly clad and have never suffered from the cold too much. I strolled up to the corral fence, choosing the very spot where Jed had taken me so impetuously that night, and glancing to my left I again saw the tip of a lighted cigarette. Hank again? Perhaps this was one of his favorite spots, too. Once more I could not help but wonder if he had seen us the other night. He was so shy, and blushed so easily, that he had begun to intrigue me.
I heard the sound of a guitar from one of the bunkhouses, and a man began to sing-quite well, in fact. I leaned on the fence, and saw the cigarette still glowing.
"It's a beautiful night, isn't it?" I said, and there was a startled pause before he answered that it sure was. It was Hank. I waited, wondering if he would say anything else, or would come to stand beside me, but I guess he was too shy and too embarrassed. After a while I heard him mumble something about it being late and how he guessed he should be getting some sleep, and he left hastily, after wishing me goodnight. And I found myself even more intrigued.
When the men got back, Jed came to me first; and after our initial wild coming together I questioned him about Hank. I had found that I could be more blunt and direct with Jed than I could be with Burden.
He laughed. "Oh, Marina, I love yovi-and it's mostly because you're so wild! So you have your eye on Hank, huh? If you can manage to seduce him, honey, I say more power to you. But I ought to warn you, that guy is the shyest, most inexperienced male I have ever come across. He's a damn good foreman, and knows cattle, but he sure doesn't know anything about women. We got him drunk one night in town, and got him laid, and do you know it was his first time? He never went back for more, either-never could understand it."
"I can't understand it either. But it's not that I have any actual designs on him, you understand, but the thought intrigues me. I've been seduced and fucked all over the place, it might be fun to do a little seducing myself." I was stroking Jed's prick as I spoke, and when I felt it spring erect in my hand I laughed happily, moving down the length of his body to take it in my mouth.
"If seducing is what tickles your imagine, you're welcome to try it any time at all, baby. Especially if you start rehearsing with me-like that, yes! But I wouldn't mention it to Burden. You know he can be a little old-fashioned sometimes. Leave it to Uncle Jed, I'll provide you with an opportunity. Only-I'm going to make you pay and pay and pay-ouch!" he yelped, for I had tightened my hand over his balls.
There was no help for it, he announced later. I had to be punished for daring to almost injure one of my husbands. I felt his fingers tugging at my hair and moved my body upward across his. And then, sitting with my thighs on either side of his, I very slowly let myself down onto his prick, submissively impaling myself. Still obedient to his commands I stretched my legs forward, one at a time, until I was sitting with my ankles on either side of his neck, supporting myself with my hands. And then, as he began to play with me and probe inside me with his fingers, I moved on him until he came. And then, pulling me roughlv forward and off him-so that I now knelt over his face-he made me come with his mouth and tongue.
Jed was true to his promise, although it wasn't till spring that the opportunity came, for we settled into winter and being snowed-in and house-bound just a few weeks after our conversation.
I had thought that my days would settle into a kind of routine again, but then Frangois came back for three days quite unexpectedly. He had gone to New York after he left us the first time.
"I could not stay away from you, Marina," he said to me, smiling, and I sensed that in a way he spoke the truth. In his playroom, with me his mostly willing victim, he was an artist, but a loving one. Even when he beat me, it was with love.
Jed, still jealous, took off somewhere and did not return until the afternoon of the third day. During that time I stayed with Francois for most of the days, and spent my nights with Burden. There was a marked contrast!
Frangois would play on my body in one way, Burden in another. Each had their own brand of love. Burden was (and still is) exceptionally tender with me on the nights after Frangois, and I needed tenderness. The first day of his second visit, after we had drunk of his liqueur, Frangois led me, trembling with fear and anticipation, to his playroom. After I had stripped for him and had felt the burning probe of his fingers, he put me in "the stocks." This is a device where I sit on the very edge of a small platform, impaling myself on an artificial penis; holding myself apart for the ordeal. My legs are drawn up and pass through round holes at knee-level in the wooden structure-they dangle and I can drum them against the wood if I please. It is as if I were enclosed in a box. My neck is also fitted into a hole in a thin piece of wood so that my head is exposed and I can see what Frangois is doing. Two smaller holes on either side encase my wrists, and-voila! I am encased in wood, with only my exposed sex protruding into the room. Usually when I am in this position I get the feather; sometimes he fucks me with a dildo or a vibrator.
On this occasion, in spite of my protests, he used the feather until I was screaming and begging him to do anything else-even to whip me. I longed for the climax he wouldn't allow me.
"Fuck me!" I begged. "Use anything you wish, only fuck me-let me come!"
His eyes gleamed opaquely, and he seemed merciless. Finally, when I was almost swooning, he released me and sent me to bring him a whip from the wall. I brought it to him, my eyes begging for mercy. Then, obeying his command, I threw myself face-down on the small, high divan. The divan has a curved head, almost like a bed; it is actually an old Victorian-type ottoman. My buttocks are thrust up and my head and torso rest on the seat. My legs I kept wide apart, trailing almost to the floor, where they were attached to rings by thin chains around the ankles. My wrists were manacled behind my back. He set clamps on my nipples to keep them throbbing and erect. These clamps are like the clips on earrings; they do not pinch or hurt much, but they are uncomfortable-yet stimulating. Now my will had again been taken away from me, and I lay there mutely, feeling my buttocks quiver in spite of my resolution to be strong. I felt Frangois caress the twin mounds; heard his voice say gently that my buttocks were meant to be whipped
-they were so firm and white that the color surged into them easily. They would be crimson when he finished, he vowed.
The divan is covered with fur and it tickled my clitoris, which was still swollen and throbbing from the ministrations of the feather. I could feel it tickle the mouth of my open sex. The whip in one hand, Frangois kept me upraised and exposed, while he alternately caressed and entered me with the fingers of his other hand. Once again he brought me to the very verge of coming, so that I moaned and cried out, moving as much as I was able against my bonds, my eyes closed. And then-I should have known it, of course, and expected it-he used the whip. He used it slowly and without hurrying, and I heard my own screams and entreaties ringing in my ears as I writhed and struggled in a vain and entirely involuntary attempt to escape, somehow, from the searing, burning pain of the lash that curled around my buttocks. The tears ran from my eyes and made the divan all soggy. And then, just as I felt I would surely faint, he stopped whipping me, and his fingers began again to caress and probe into me. At the same time he moved the handle of the whip against my sore and burning buttocks, to counteract, as it were, any pleasure his fingers might give me.
Again and again the same thing: I would be brought close to climax and then given the whip until, at last, when my screams had become tortured groans and my tears blinded me, I would hear him fling the whip away so that it clattered against a table, and two stiff fingers would drive deep into my cunt and my anus at the same time, holding my buttocks still while his other hand came down again and again with all the force he could muster on my sore and tortured buttocks. It seemed to me that I burned all over-my nipples, my eyes, my throat-every part of my body. And yet once again he was making me want the pain; turning it into a wild kind of pleasure that drove me, screaming and begging him not to stop, to a climax. When my convulsions had subsided slightly, I felt his hands on me again as he began to fuck me, holding me open with his brutal, hard hands, and I came again and again before he finally burst inside me. I think I did faint then, for the next thing I clearly remember is lying on the divan, unbound again, while Frangois knelt beside me, gently caressing me.
There was no more "playing" for me that afternoon. He gave me wine, and his soft, deep voice told me how he loved me and wanted me. And when the pain was less I became drowsy as I almost always did, and he helped me upstairs to my room, where I slept, and slept and slept.
CHAPTER TWELVE
After Frangois had gone again-this time back to France-life at the Place once more settled into the routine that I had come to know and to enjoy. I suppose I have become somewhat of a philosopher. I know, certainly, that I have my own philosophy. I don't feel that anything I have done or may do is bad or wicked. It injures no one and brings us all pleasure. I'm a hedonist, yes, and I enjoy being one. I love my husbands and they love and cherish me. And as for the things we do with each other-well, they give us pleasure. A woman is capable of servicing a whole regiment in one night and taking pleasure from each man, if she is that kind of woman. I would draw the line at a regiment, I think! For me, lovemaking-fucking-has to have some kind of emotional overtone before I can enjoy it. I could not fuck a complete stranger and enjoy it unless I first knew something about him and liked something about him.
I did know Hank, and I was somehow attracted to him. Besides, now that I had received some encouragement from Jed, I was determined to seduce our shy, woman-avoiding foreman!
My opportunity came one day in the spring, after the heavy snows had almost disappeared and the sun had started shining in all its blinding and welcome splendor. I chose a weekend when I knew that both Burden and Jed would be busy with some visiting cattle buyers. I acted the spoiled wife: I wanted to go to town, this weekend. No, I couldn't wait-I didn't want to! Burden shrugged, but Jed winked at me as he innocently suggested that Hank could take me, since he was the only other person capable of handling the airplane.
"Well, that's true! And I guess we don't really need him, with both of us here. Okay, honey, you can go to town. Why don't you call the hotel right now and make reservations? Make one for Hank, too, while you're about it. And have fun!" Burden's eyes met mine and he smiled slightly. For a moment I could have sworn that he had winked at me in the same conspiratorial fashion that Jed had. Had he guessed what I had in mind? Perhaps he had; it did not really matter, for I would have told him in the end, anyway.
The next few days passed quickly while I busied myself with preparations for my visit to town, preparations which included the writing of a long shopping list. Jed teased me constantly about my proposed seduction of Hank and pretended to give me all kinds of advice on how to accomplish it. Burden still said nothing to me that proved he knew what I planned to do. But then, Burden and I have a rapport-it is almost like ESP-which lets one know what the other is thinking or planning. I made up mind that I myself would not bring up the subject until after I returned. Then, if I had been successful (and why should I not be?), I would regale him with the whole story.
At last it was Friday, and time for me to leave. Maria said shyly that she would miss me, Burden and Jed came to the little airstrip to see us off, and then at last we were airborne and I sat next to Hank, watching his strong, sensitive-looking fingers handle the delicate instruments firmly and capably.
My excuse for sitting up front was that I wanted to learn how to fly. Now, after we had leveled off, I asked questions of Hank to put him at ease, pretending that I had nothing else on my mind but finding out more about the airplane and what all the complicated-looking dials did. I guess that after a while I actually succeeded. He stopped perspiring and dropping his eyes away from mine and started talking quite naturally and seriously. From the airplane our talk drifted to cattle and then to the city we would be nearing before long. After some carefully casual questioning I discovered that Hank had obviously not seen much of the night-life it offered; he had probably divided most of his time between his hotel room and the poolroom.
I pretended that I was just a little bit nervous about being in town all by myself. "Perhaps you won't mind escorting me back to the hotel if I should happen to stay out shopping until after dark?" I ventured naively, adding, "But no-how stupid and selfish of me. You must have lots of friends you want to see! And on Saturday night I'm sure you will want to take one of your girl friends out somewhere ... I'm sure the cab drivers are all very reliable and will see that I get back to the hotel quite safely!"
This took him aback so much that I swear the plane lurched. I certainly saw his hands tighten around the stick.
"Oh, no, ma'am! I mean-I don't have any lady friends. That is, I don't have too much time for women. I like to read, and there's so much I want to learn and so little time in which to learn it! I'd be glad to be at your service any time you need me." The words came out in a rush, and I had to force back a giggle. If only he knew what kind of service I would be expecting from him! I'm sure we'd have crashed if he'd suspected what was going on in my mind. Yes, this was going to be fun-especially since Hank seemed so shy and so naive about women.
"Oh, well, I certainly won't tear you away from your books for too long! What kind of books do you enjoy reading? I love reading myself, you know. My father was a college professor, and our house was always full of books. He taught English, and I was an English major myself."
"I-I guess I don't read too many non-technical books, ma'am! Although I do like poetry. I never did get to go to college, and I always did want to be a cattleman. So I'm trying to get as much book-learning on the subject as the guys who did go to college. Guess I can learn just as much this way, and your husband and his brother have sure been helpful-telling me what books I should read, and all." It was a long speech for Hank, and it meant that at last he was thawing toward me. For the rest of the trip we talked books and poetry, and by the time we landed I felt I knew quite a lot about
Hank, while he, in turn, was I'm sure beginning to see me as a human being and an individual in my own right.
The rented car that Burden had ordered for me was waiting at the airport, and although Hank had grown quiet again, we drove in a companionable kind of silence to the hotel. After we had checked in I teasingly told Hank that his room was right next to mine.
"Burden insisted, because he knows how foolishly scared I can get when I'm on my own. I'll probably have the radio playing until quite late, because I like music; you'll tell me if it disturbs you, won't you?"
Bed in the face, he mumbled something about it not mattering-that music never disturbed him.
"Perhaps you'll join me for a drink later?" I saw his hesitation and pressed my advantage. "Oh, come on-I'll be lonely, and I hate going down and sitting in the bar by myself. If you won't join me, I won't be able to go at all."
The poor guy didn't have a chance. When I put it like that, how could he refuse?
We went up in the elevator, paused outside my door as the bellhop opened it.
"I'm just dying for a bath, and that's what I'm going to have first off. Will you meet me downstairs in about an hour and a half? Thank you, Hank. I really do appreciate your being so kind to me. I promise I won't keep you from those books for too long."
I noticed how the bellhop looked from one to the other of us, as if trying to figure us out. I touched Hank's arm lightly and felt it tremble. Turning away from him, I walked into my room, already looking forward to the evening ahead, and planning my strategy like a general.
It took me almost two hours to get bathed, dressed, and carefully made up and perfumed. But it was worth all the trouble I had taken to see the way the heads turned when I walked slowly and hesitantly into the Candlelight Bar downstairs. The bar was dimly lighted, and at first I couldn't see too well. Then Hank's tall figure loomed in front of me.
"I-I thought you might prefer sitting in one of the booths. And then I started to think that maybe you'd changed your mind..."
I put my hand on his arm and smiled up at him as if he were the only man in the room. Even in the dimness his blush was unmistakable.
"I'd love a booth, and of course I haven't changed my mind. I never do, once it's made up.
He was quite well-dressed, I noticed. His suit hadn't cost five hundred dollars, but it was well-cut and looked good on him. It also looked new, and I wondered with a pang if he'd gone out and bought it just for this occasion. I must remind Jed to see that he got a bonus to make up for it! But-Jed and Burden were at the Place and this was to be my evening and Hank's. I let him lead me to the corner booth he'd picked out, and I slid in far enough so that I'd be sitting close to him. Then, to set him at ease, I started talking again about flying, and how very complicated it all looked. I suppose it helped, because after a while (and about two drinks apiece) we were talking like old friends, and I had almost persuaded him to call me by my first name.
By this time (and after drawing him out about himself), I had decided that the only way to seduce Hank was to get him drunk enough. Having painted a picture of myself as an old married woman interested in matchmaking, I got him to confide blushingly that he thought a man should go to his marriage bed as pure as the woman he married! Of course I didn't tell him I knew about the trick that the guys had played on him some time back, but he seemed very sincere about it all and I realized that this seduction wasn't going to be as easy as I had thought. Well-it just made it more of a challenge, and I was determined to succeed. Hank, however, was going very slow on his drinks, I noticed. I suppose it was out of respect for me!
You aren't keeping up with me! That's not fair!" I pouted at him.
"Well, I-I just don't usually drink too much, you see, ma'am-I mean Marina. And I sure wouldn't want to do anything to disgrace you."
"Oh Hank, of course you're not going to disgrace me! What a ridiculous thought! But it does make me feel-well, embarrassed, when I'm the one ordering another drink every time and you're still nursing the one you had from a round before! I'm sure you can hold your liquor better than a female can. Come on! We'll be having dinner in a while, won't we?"
My blithe presumption that he would be dining with me had its effect: the man blushed more than any person I'd ever met.
The evening dragged on. I say "dragged" because Hank wasn't much of a conversationalist. I found myself talking more than I had in months and months, just to keep a conversation going while I plied him with liquor.
We had dinner in the restaurant (and bv this time I needed to eat!), and repaired to the bar again for after-dinner drinks (these too at my insistence). By this time I had discovered that Hank really didn't have much time for women, and that he had been painfully shy from the time he was a boy. Also, his family had been extremely religious-members of some fanatical sect that disapproved of everything that gave pleasure. He had begun drinking after he joined the Air Force, and only then because there hadn't been anything else to do in Vietnam. This was where he had met my two husbands.
"Don't you think about getting married some day, though?" I prodded him. "I really must find some women friends to invite down to the Place. I mean-doesn't it get boring with only men around all the time?"
He assured me hastily that it wasn't boring at all, and that he figured he had plenty of time before he started thinking about marriage.
"Well, of course you haven't really lived yet," I told him. "I do think men ought to be experienced-a woman really enjoys that, you know. I know my husband has had his share of women and I don't mind at all. I think they taught him a lot, so that he was able to teach me!"
Had I been too bold I wondered, studying Hank's reactions. But all I saw in his face was surprise.
"Is that right? I thought-well, I mean-I thought a woman would be real jealous of her husband's past."
"Not if she's a real woman," I countered swiftly, determined to press my advantage now that we had opened this interesting subject.
"A real woman is mature enough to understand, even to accept the fact that her husband might occasionally care for variety, even when they are married. As long as two people love each other and understand and accept each other as individuals, then nothing the other person does is unforgivable or unacceptable." I leaned close to Hank and looked into his eyes. "Do you think I don't know that Burden sees other women when he's away from me? Of course I know, and I don't mind! It's not taking anything away from me, you see, and it's me he comes back to. I'm the woman he loves; I'm the woman he chose to be his wife."
Dare I go further? I decided recklessly that I would-let the chips fall where they may: "In fact, Burden and I have such a good understanding and such a stable and mature relationship that he would understand and forgive if I decided I was attracted enough to another man to-to have an affair with him! Although of course it's different with a woman. A woman has to be emotionally involved as well, you see. There-now I've shocked you, I'm sure. And I didn't mean to."
Hank's eyes looked glassy and he didn't say a word for the longest time. I seized the opportunity to signal the waiter to bring us two more drinks before my silent escort could refuse.
Hank's voice sounded hoarse when he finally managed to answer me: "But-but you-I mean-you wouldn't really do something like that, would you?"
"Wouldn't I? I don't know. It would all depend on whether I had the courage of my convictions, wouldn't it?"
"I'm sure you wouldn't! And I shouldn't even be encouraging you to talk this way. Maybe we should go upstairs now-I mean, we've been drinking nearly all evening and you said earlier you wanted to get started real early in the morning. I mean-"
Poor Hank! I was really beginning to feel sorry for him, but his hesitancy and confusion only made me more determined. To add to his confusion, I pretended to be mad at his suggestion that I'd had enough to drink. I told him that if he didn't want to sit up with me he could go upstairs to bed and I would stay right here. At this point I returned the long, lingering look of a man who's been sitting on one of the bar-stools all evening with his eyes burning into me. And my look was just obvious enough so that Hank noticed. This time, I was smugly sure, the flush in his face was from anger and not embarrassment. I even say his fists clench on the table.
I put my hand out and touched his, making my voice small and disarming: "Oh Hank, please don't be mad at me? I've enjoyed this evening, and talking to you so much, I just don't want it to end quite so soon, that's all. Besides, it's still so early. You will stay with me, won't you?"
He gave in with what sounded like a groan. "You know darn well I'll stay with you! I'm not about to leave you sitting here surrounded by all those-those wolves on barstools. But can't we switch to something less strong?"
The battle won, I leaned back in my chair and shook my head at him, smiling. "No. That wouldn't be playing by the rules."
"Rules? What rules?"
"The rules I just made up, of course! The rules say we stick to what we've been drinking and the first one who feels they're getting smashed says "uncle"-and then we go upstairs. But remember, you have to play fair! No pretending! Promise?"
He was unwilling, but I did extract a promise from him in the end.
By then I was feeling the drinks a bit myself, but at least I was used to drinking all evening. Hank wasn't. Two drinks later I made up my mind that Hank had had enough. I didn't want him passing out on me, after all! Of course I knew he would be too stubborn by now to confess that he was getting smashed, so I took the initiative, as I had been doing all evening.
"Hank, I-oh, I guess I should have known better than to engage in a drinking match with a man! But I'm afraid I have to cry 'uncle'. "
"Are you sure you're feeling okay? I just knew I shouldn't have let you do it-"
I reassured him that I wasn't at the staggering stage, and I wasn't about to pass out. However, as we left the bar I seized the opportunity to hold rather tightly onto Hank's arm, telling him with a giggle that I needed some support. We took the elevator, and I leaned against him and closed my eyes, much to his alarm.
"Are you sure you're all right?" he kept asking, and I, playing my role to the hilt, merely nodded-and leaned more heavily on him.
When the elevator finally stopped at our floor, I let Hank more or less propel me out and lead me (still walking zombie-fashion) toward our rooms. Just as we approached my door, I let myself go limp, taking good care to fall against him.
To say that Hank was alarmed and upset is an understatement. The poor guy was at his wits' end!
"Marina-ma'am-oh, God, why did I let you talk me into it! Marina, maybe I better call a maid or something-"
At this point I opened one eye and sort of mumbled at him, "No-please, no. I'm okay-just wanna lie down. Please put me to bed."
"I-I-don't think I'd better. I mean, what would folks--? "
I started to cry (I can cry quite easily, when it suits me), and he was lost.
"All right-all right! Just a minute while I look for your key. Think you can stand for just a minute? Lean against me-"
The poor guy fumbled in my purse for what seemed like ages before he finally fished out the key, and then he took long minutes to get my door open. I noticed with triumph that he wasn't too steady on his feet either.
Finally we were in my room. I "accidentally" swayed, so that I bumped against the door on my way in and clicked it shut behind us. Hank attempted to look for a light switch but I protested, moaning that the light would hurt my eyes.
"Just-just carry me to bed and I'll manage," I said in what I hoped sounded like a weak little voice.
"But I-but I-"
"Don't leave me alone! I'll scream if you leave me alone! How do I know there isn't a burglar in the bedroom?" I hoped I sounded properly female and hysterical, and I guess Hank fell for it. Whether he knew it or not, he was doomed. It was just a matter of time and clever maneuvering now, and my seduction of Hank would be complete. All the drinks and all the waiting had made me hot already, and I wanted him. I wished he was more aggressive
-no, I didn't-it was fun this way, doing all the seducing myself.
I leaned against him, and felt his arms go around me, lifting me. He staggered, trying to grope his way across the living room and into my bedroom, and I hoped, fighting an impulse to giggle, that he wouldn't fall. But he made it in the end, pushed open the bedroom door with his broad shoulder and walked slowly toward my bed, with the light from the window falling across it.
I am a good strategist, I guess. Leaving nothing to chance, I had drawn the drapes before I left the room so that there would be enough light coming in through the window to see by. Hank was lowering me onto the bed, stooping over. It was now or never! I put both arms around his neck and pulled him down on top of me.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Hank's body, as it lay across mine, was hard and masculine. For an instant-before he instinctively moved away from me, I could have sworn I felt the hard bulge of his penis where it strained against his pants. I tightened my grip.
"Hank, don't go! Not yet, please! I-I don't feel good. Undress me-I feel stifled by my clothes."
"You-you don't know what you're saying, Marina!" His voice sounded ragged and uncertain, and I felt his attempts to pull away from my arms.
Promptly, I started to sob. "You think I'm a drunken tramp, don't you? You don't like me. You just stayed with me this evening because you felt it was your duty. Couldn't you like me for me?"
"That's not true! You-I've always liked you! I've always thought you were the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen! You were so far above me, and yet-"
"And yet what, Hank? Prove you like me. Kiss me. Just once, kiss me!"
I pulled his head down to mine, found his lips with my hungry, searching mouth. For an instant I felt him resist, and then, with a sound almost like a sob, he kissed me. After a few moments I let my tongue dart into his mouth, probing wetly, and felt his arms tighten around me-for he was holding me now. His body, which he had rolled to the edge of the bed in his attempt to get away from me, now seemed to move back automatically until he was lying half over me.
I arched my hips against him, again feeling the straining hardness of his sex.
He made one last attempt to stop what was now inevitable. "Marina-we can't-it's all wrong-"
"Don't, Hank. Don't say that. I want you Hank, don't leave me now. Don't you want me? Look, I'm all yours. Take me-take me now, Hank. Please?"
At last I felt his hands on me-rough and eager and untutored. And all the more exciting for that. He was fumbling at my dress, his breathing harsh.
"Rip my clothes, Hank-I don't want to wait. Tear them off me, quickly!"
I reached for his zipper, heard him gasp as I pulled it down and closed my fingers around him. And then at last I felt his hands tearing at my clothes, ripping them off my body while I twisted and turned under him to make it easier for him-and to excite him further.
At last I was naked, and I felt his hands and his lips and moaned with passion and desire. "Hank, quickly-please, please!" I heard myself pleading with him. And then, abruptly, he pulled away from me.
"Wait, just a moment-I have to take these damn clothes off-God, you're beautiful! Your body's so gold all over; it's so perfect-Just like I've imagined a hundred nights or more..." He was watching me as he tugged at his clothes, and I could have cried, my desire for him was so strong. His new suit! Of course! The poor dear! In spite of everything he had to be careful about his new clothes! It was a good thing Burden had taught me patience. I squirmed on the bed, opening my legs wide and then drawing them up. I was acting like a whore, I knew, but he, who had never had a whore, would never know the difference.
I saw him toss his clothes away, and then at last he was upon me again, touching me with those rough, hard hands that seemed to burn into my flesh. I had to warn myself to go slow with him, not to excite him too much with all the tricks I had learned-the ways I now knew so well of driving a man half-crazy.
Would he never stop kissing me? I reached between our straining bodies and touched his prick, felt it throb under my fingers, and heard him gasp aloud.
"Marina, Marina-don't do that-I won't be able to wait-for you, I mean."
"I can't wait either! Oh, Hank, hurry-please!"
I guided him inside me-knowing I was wet and ready-felt him glide inside me, become embedded in me. With a moan I clasped my legs around his back and let my tongue dart inside his mouth. We were both breathing hard now, and Hank had started his plunging in and out of me. From the pace he was going I knew he wasn't going to last very long. Well, that was all right; I was almost there myself. Each time he drove himself into my cunt I strained against him, rubbed myself against him in a circular movement that stimulated my clitoris. Our bodies slapped together, ground together as we fucked, and I could feel myself climbing, climbing, and remembered just in time where we were so that I smothered my scream against his shoulder, biting him so hard he cried out. Moments later, while I was still convulsing around him, I felt his whole body shudder with the intensity of his coming; felt him grow large inside me, and larger still until I thought sure he would split me open. At last he collapsed on top of me, his breath coming in loud, ragged gasps. He would have rolled away then, but I wouldn't let him.
"Hank, that was so good, so beautiful!" I let my hands move slowly up and down the length of his body, exploring it, while my lips moved down the side of his face, tasting his salty sweat; moving over his earlobes, down the side of his neck to his shoulder. I tasted blood where I had bitten him. "Poor baby, did I hurt you? Let me suck out the poison for you..." I sucked at the broken place on his skin and he groaned with pain.
"I don't believe this is really happening," he muttered at last. "You don't know how many times I've done this in my dreams. But I never thought-" His whole body jerked, and I had to clamp my legs tight around him so he wouldn't slip out of me.
"Never thought what? That you'd be making love to me? There's nothing wrong with it. We both wanted it, and we're going to make love again, and again, aren't we?" Daringly, now that I had him captive between my legs, I reached down to stroke his testicles, and he twitched again.
"Marina-what--? Don't do that!"
"But you like it! I can feel you getting big again inside me, so you can't tell me you don't like it. Stop thinking, Hank, and just feel! Feel how good it is to lie this way-inside me. Feel how tight I am for you!" I tightened my muscles around him and he got harder, bigger. Long months ago Burden had said those same words to me-: "Stop thinking, Marina, let yourself feel." Now it was my turn.
Hank was a good pupil-or maybe he just felt he had no more choice in the matter. I stroked his balls again, and even let my finger trail teasingly between his small, hard buttocks. Heard him gasp again.
"Oh God, Marina! You're a devil, and I'm wicked to want you-to be doing this. Weak or not, I can't help myself."
He began to move in me again, this time more slowly. After a while I made him stop, and we turned, carefully, until he was on his back, and I atop him. Now I could control my movements, control his excitement. I still caressed his balls with one hand, while I leaned teasingly over him so that my breasts dangled tantalizingly over his face.
"Do you like them?" I whispered. "Touch them, they're yours. You may even kiss them if you wish. See how my nipples strain toward you? They want your touch-"
His tongue came out and flicked over a nipple, and it was my turn to gasp. One hand came up around my shoulders to pull me down closer, and his mouth closed over my right nipple while his fingers teased the other.
"You learn fast," I whispered to him, and I began to wriggle over him. "Oooh-that's good, don't stop yet!"
His hands glided down my shoulders, slippery now with perspiration, and rested on my buttocks. I wriggled them provocatively; felt his hands tighten. Now I swung my legs backward and he released my nipple unwillingly, but kept his hand on my other breast. "Let me play the man," I said teasingly, and started to move my pelvis up and down on his erect penis.
"I must be dreaming, but I don't want it to stop," he whispered hoarsely. "You-you're unbelievable! How could I ever want another woman after you?"
He started to talk, and it was like a dam breaking. It all came out; his dreams and fantasies about me ever since he had first seen me; the day he had seen Jed take me against the corral fence. He confessed that he had almost hated Jed (or Burden-since that's who he thought it was) for treating me with such a careless sense of ownership that he would run the risk of letting anyone see what he did.
"Did you want it to be you doing it?" I teased him.
"You know darn well I did! Only I wouldn't have done it out there! I wouldn't want any eyes but mine to see you the way you are now, riding me..."
"Yes, yes, I'm riding you. Watch how you disappear inside me. Don't be afraid to watch-you like it, don't you? I'm screwing myself on you-I want you to watch me." The words spilled out of me as I watched his face and saw how much pleasure I was giving him; how he tried so hard to hold back his climax. Roughly, he pulled my head down to his, and his mouth took mine. I felt his body arch up to mine almost uncontrollably; felt his cock all the way up to my bowels. We were doing it like animals now, fucking mindlessly and fiercely, each lost in the climb to a climax.
I tore my mouth away from his and said breathlessly: "Put your finger up inside me! Yes, yes, up there-I want you to fill me there too..."
His big hands had been clutching at my writhing buttocks. He hesitated for an instant, and then I felt him obey me as our mouths met again. And his finger, which forced its way deep, deep inside me, was making me come so that I whimpered and moaned and felt my body heave with ecstasy. I felt his body arch upward, taking mine with it; felt him shudder under me; heard his groans as his climax joined mine and burst wetly inside me.
I think all we did that night was fuck and sleep, sleep and fuck. I'd wake from a fitful doze to feel his urgent hands on me again, and I'd surrender myself to him gladly. He seemed never to get enough of my body, or of his exploration of it, at first shy and tentative, and then bolder and bolder.
In the morning I called down to the desk that I wasn't to be disturbed, that I wanted my breakfast left outside my door. And I ordered enough breakfast for at least three hungry people! Hank and I consumed it all. Then we bathed in our separate rooms (for Hank insisted that he must "muss his bed up" and change clothes), and consumed each others' bodies again. By this time he had become so bold and so familiar that he made me lie in bed with my legs apart and drawn upward so he could see what I looked like "down there," as he put it.
"You're just perfect! Why, it's like another pair of pink, pouting lips-or maybe flower petals..." His finger touched me gently and I felt the familiar tingle of excitement.
"I'm clean enough to kiss, too-" I told him.
"You mean-I mean-you want me to--? "
Hank was a man of stumbling words and broken sentences, but he was my first and favorite pupil and I forgave him everything.
"Don't you want to kiss it?" I moved my legs wider apart.
"Well of course I do! It's just that I never heard-I mean, I never thought-"
"You kiss me and I'll kiss you. Bargain?"
His head bent slowly and I felt his lips, then his tongue touch me gently, nudging my cunt lips apart. My head fell back and I started to whimper softly. "Don't stop, don't stop! Oh Hank, you're driving me wild! Kiss me deeper-lick me..." My hips began their involuntary movements, and my hands clutched at his head to keep him there. I felt his tongue flick (was it accidentally?) over my clitoris, and I cried out. Immediately he moved upward and away, all concern. "What's the matter, honey? Did I hurt you?"
I moaned my disappointment. "No-oh, no! It's just that what you did just then drives me wild! Please don't stop!"
He slowly lowered his head again, and this time I swung my body around, moving him with me until he was over me, on his knees and then I took his prick in my mouth, feeling his body jerk as I did so.
"God-Marina!"
I spoke as well as I was able to with his penis in my mouth: "Go on, Hank! It's all right. It's very good this way too. You make me come with your lips and tongue and I'll make you come. Just let it come, darling!"
I was exciting him too much with my mouth and my fingers that cupped and stroked his balls for him to try to stop now. His head went down between my legs again and his mouth seemed to almost attack me, so savage was the onslaught of his lips and tongue. His body was moving above me-he plunged his cock into my mouth so hard that several times I thought I would choke, so far down my throat did he go. But by this time my excitement matched his; I wouldn't and couldn't have tried to stop him!
I sucked him, feeling almost as if I were drowning. I let my tongue play teasingly along the length of him. And then I let one finger press teasingly against his tightly closed anus, enjoying the way his buttocks jerked, as if he wanted to knock my hand away. Just then he found my clitoris again and his lips closed around it as he sucked. I went half crazy! Savagely I pushed my finger into him as he had done earlier to me. And, like me, he cried out hoarsely.
His hands fumbled, spread me wide, while his prick continued to batter against the back of my throat. Knowing I was completely helpless and at the mercy of whatever he chose to do next, I started to move my finger up and down in his convulsively tightening ass-hole. I felt one hand under my buttocks, felt his finger jammed up inside me just the way mine was inside him, and moaned. His other hand held me open so that his tongue could reach farther inside me. If I could have screamed my pleas-sure then, scream after scream would have ripped from my tortured throat, but I was past screaming. As my body tossed and struggled under him his thrusts became deeper and more savage, preventing me from making anything more than animal whimpers and groans in the back of my throat. It hurt, but I didn't want it to stop. And suddenly I felt that I was going to come-that I was going to blow up-as if there were a million particles of light whirling around in front of my eyes-as if my stomach was gathering itself into a knot so it could explode-scatter me with it. All feeling was suddenly centered in my cunt and what Hank was doing to it. Again he sucked on my clitoris savagely and hurtfully, and I screamed despite the fact that I couldn't; deep down in my throat. My fingers tightened over his balls and I felt him jet hotly into my throat, as if he would never stop coming.
I cannot remember now how we disengaged ourselves from each other, or whether I fainted then. All I know is that when I opened my eyes what seemed like eons later, we were lying side by side, still panting. And my throat ached so badly I was sure I would never to able to swallow again.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
By the time Saturday night came around, I had actually done some shoppingand Hank and I had had our first quarrel.
It began when, at about noon, I mentioned casually that I really should get up and get some shopping done. I said it lazily, not really meaning it; hoping he'd veto the idea and suggest we fuck instead.
"I don't think it's right for you to spend any more of Burden's money. I mean-"
I sat up in bed, looking down at him. "What do you mean? Burden's my husband, he-likes me to spend his money. So why shouldn't I?"
"You're surely not thinking about going back to him-after this?"
There was a wealth of hurt and chagrin in his voice, which I ignored as I sat back on my heels and began to get mad. "Really, Hank! What made you think I wasn't going back? I love Burden! We're married! Of course I'm going back-and you are too. You surely didn't think-"
"I don't know what I thought! I thought maybe you loved me, and that's why you-did what you did. And I thought maybe you'd have too much shame to go back and face him after what we've done! What kind of a woman are you, anyway?"
His face had gone red with anger, and when I reached down and slapped him, my hand left a white streak down the side of his face. "I'm a woman! A female, wanting woman-that's what kind of a woman I am. And I do love you, or I wouldn't have let you fuck me. Remember what we were talking about in the bar Friday night? Remember what I said about maturity and understanding? Well, Burden is both mature and understanding. Even if he knew what happened this weekend he wouldn't think any less of me for it-or of you either. We're man and woman, Hank. Male and female. What we did wasn't anything wrong-isn't anything we have to hide or be ashamed of. Please understand, won't you?"
He was rubbing his cheek, staring up at me as if he had never seen me before. At last he said slowly: "First you get all mad and slap my face, then you're begging me to understand. You tell me that you love your husband and you love me too, so that makes everything A-OK. And you're also trying to tell me that Burden wouldn't mind a bit that we-that I've been screwing his wife all weekend. Right?"
"I don't know that I care for the tone of voice in which you said all that," I retorted, "but yes-in essence that is what I'm trying to say."
He was shaking his head at me, his eyes traveling slowly over my body as I sat on my heels beside him in bed. Just feeling his eyes on me made me weaken so that I wanted him again. My anger gone, I leaned over him, my eyes searching his face; begging him to understand.
"Hank, please try to understand! I know it must be difficult, but if you'll let me explain..."
He caught my wrists suddenly, twisting them cruelly as he pulled me down on top of him. And then, with one swift movement, he rolled over so that I was pinned under his body. Holding me with my wrists on either side of my head he said harshly: "Explain? Explain what? There's nothing to explain, Marina. I'm a simple, dumb guy in a lot of ways, but not so dumb that I can't see it when I've been played for a sucker. Oh, yes, you don't have to shake your head at me that way! You fooled me. I thought you were a beautiful, queenly, almost virginal lady. That somehow, by some kind of miracle, you'd fallen in love with me. And you know what a man wants when he loves a woman? He wants to have her and keep her for his own. A woman wants that too. But you, baby-you're different! You showed me things in bed I hadn't even read about! You're not a lady, you're-you're a bitch, a slut!"
He put his face down close to mine and growled the last words at me. And he looked so fierce and so mad that I just couldn't help smiling at him, because I'd felt him grow hard against my thighs and knew he wanted me in spite of the things he was saying. He saw me smile and grew all red in the face and began twisting my wrists until I couldn't help but cry out. I suppose that made him feel better.
"All right, Hank," I said quietly, "so I'm a bitch and a slut in bed. But you liked me that way, didn't you? And you want me now. I'm here, quite helpless under your body. Why don't you do what you really want to do? Why don't you put your big hard cock inside me and fuck me?" Deliberately, wanting to shock him, I moved my body under his suggestively.
"You whore!"
"You're not paying me, so I'm not a whore. I'm giving it to you, Hank. Because I want you, too-and I've wanted you for a long time."
"This whole weekend-you planned it all, didn't you? Even that drunk act you put on. Why, you-"
"That ought to flatter you, sweetheart! Yes, I planned it. Even the drunk act. But you wanted me, too; you told me you've wanted me for a long time. Only you didn't do anything about it and I did. Was that so wrong?"
"God damn you, Marina! You've got me so screwed up I don't know what to think-or do-about you!"
"Then don't think! And you know what you can do about me ... Please, Hank, just fuck me! Fuck me!"
"Stop saying that! Stop using that word, damn you!"
But even while he swore at me he was moving on me, releasing my wrists so that he could guide himself inside me.
We fucked, and his hands were everywhere on me, gouging into me, hurting me. Even his kisses hurt. The words he whispered at me were alternately obscene and pleading. And then all words stopped, our bodies moved, together, faster and faster, and there were only short, animal cries from our throats as everything was forgotten but feeling.
Afterwards, rolling away from me, Hank said: "If you're going shopping, I guess you'd better hurry into some clothes." I kissed him as I slid off the bed.
"What will you do?"
"Come with you, so I can fight off the wolves, I guess."
I glanced at him quickly, but his face, for a change, was unreadable. All the same, I felt that I had won some kind of victory.
Shopping with Hank was very different from shopping with Burden or Jed. For one thing, Hank is very possessive! If any man so much as glanced at me twice, Hank would glower at him while his hand would clench around my hand or elbow until I'd be forced to protest. Also, while Burden and Jed would have me try on everything, Hank wanted me to take the first gown or pair of slacks that caught my imagine. We rushed through my list (which included all kinds of groceries as well), and caught a cab back to the hotel.
Inside the hotel I insisted that I was thirsty and needed a drink. Hank, not too willing, was finally persuaded to accompany me to the bar, where we had several drinks in quick succession instead of the one we had originally planned. I guess the drinks relaxed us both. Hank, certainly, was in a better mood as the elevator took us up to my suite.
"Why don't we order dinner brought up here?" he suggested, surprising me. "But not yet, because I want to-to fuck you first." I noticed he was still hesitant about saying "fuck," but he was learning, bless him!
Hank led me over to the writing desk that stood by the window and bent me over it so that I stood with my back to him. I felt him push my skirt up to my waist, and then, with a quick, impatient motion he ripped away my flimsy panties.
"This is the way he had you that night-and I didn't want to watch, but I couldn't help myself, I couldn't move. God, how I wished I was in his place that night! And now I am-I'm going to fuck you this way, with all the lights on so I can see how I disappear inside of you..."
He unzipped his fly and I felt his hardness against me a second before he jammed himself all the way inside me, making me squirm against him. I tightened my cunt around him, making him gasp. Hank learned fast, however, for he was taking his time, using slow, deep strokes. I twisted my head around so I could watch, too, and he grinned at me.
"You really are wild-a wild, dirty bitch! You want this, too? You really like this, don't you?"
He spread the twin globes of my buttocks apart with his hands, while I wriggled and pushed myself against him. Teasingly, he pushed his forefinger against my anus.
"You sure have a pretty little one, you know that? All puckered up too, like it's begging for attention."
"Oh, Hank..." I moaned, and heard him chuckle.
"That turn you on? Okay, baby, I'm going to give it to you." Almost viciously, he drove his finger inside my ass, drawing whimpers from me. It must have turned him on, too, because his strokes became fiercer and faster. I came once, and he was still not ready for his climax. Withdrawing, he pushed me down onto the rug on my hands and knees.
"Marina, I'm going to fuck you every way there is," he said thickly. I felt his hands caress my buttocks, slide between them to press inside my wet and still-throbbing cunt, then up to my buttocks again.
"Wonder what it would be like to go in this way-you ever been had that way?
"Yes, yes I have."
"You've done everything, haven't you? Bet there ain't nothing you haven't done in bed, you little slut. Wish I didn't want you the way I do..."
"But you do, and I'm yours, all yours, this weekend. You can do anything you want with me, Hank!"
I felt him spread me open, felt his prick press against the small, puckered opening between my buttocks, and tried to relax as Jed had taught me. Hank was unusually big, and I hoped he wouldn't hurt me too much.
He pressed harder, and I felt myself open for him. Then harder still, as he started to slide in me despite my protesting muscles. With a last, savage thrust he went all the way, and I swear I could feel him down to my very bowels.
"God, but it's tight this way!" he marveled. "Does it hurt?"
"A little," I confessed, feeling myself filled to splitting point.
"I want it to hurt you-I want you to remember." His hand went under my body to catch at my breasts and tweak painfully at my nipples.
"Hank-please, don't!"
"That hurts too, huh? Well, you hurt me. And I'm going to make you remember me, like I just got through saying." He had one hand at my breasts, and the other found my clitoris.
"Don't Hank, don't!" I begged him, for he was really hurting me. But he wouldn't stop, and I couldn't stop him. And now he started to thrust inside me painfully, and the pain and the pleasure were all mixed up-almost like when I was with Frangois. I cried out as loudly as I dared, and I sobbed, and I writhed against him, goaded by his cruel, hurting fingers. At last I could feel him come and I cried out with him, my climax following his within a split second. His body fell on mine, pushing me down until we lay flat on the rug with him still inside me, and me still sobbing, shaking now with the reaction of my climax.
"I'm sorry, Marina," he said after a while, and I felt him move away from me, stoop over, and pick me up. "Will you stop crying? I didn't really mean all that about wanting to hurt you, you know. I-it just happened!"
I forgave him, and he put me to bed, undressing me with gentle fingers. Already I could tell that he wanted me again-also knew that he would have me! This time we let our bodies take over and it was sweet and very good. And afterwards we lay in bed, dinner forgotten, and found we could talk without anger or hurt.
I told Hank about me, about my life before I met Burden, and about some of the things that had happened after I'd met him. I was trying to explain our philosophy of life, and I don't know if he really understood-or if he understands yet, for that matter-but he said he loved me and could accept anything about me as long as he could keep having me. I assured him that he could, for my husbands are restless individuals and being in one place too long, like inactivity, bores them. There would be plenty of opportunities, I told Hank, for us to be together. More trips like this, and even, if we were very careful, times at the house.
Poor Hank! In spite of being an apt, even eager pupil in bed, he has never learned not to be jealous! When we are together now he alternates between being very tender and considerate and being harsh and hateful. I never know how I will find him, and perhaps that is what adds spice and savor to our relationship.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
It has been almost six months since that first weekend I spent with Hank. Since then, my life here at the Place has formed yet another pattern; for now Hank, too, is one of my men. And he alone of them all is mine alone, for he does not share Maria. And he is jealous, although he tries to control it. I find his jealousy flattering sometimes; at other times it is tiresome and makes me angry. And then he becomes angry too, and hurts me while he is fucking me.
We expect Frangois on a visit next week, and I cannot help but wonder what Hank's reactions will be. Maybe he will not have to know. Or maybe, if telltale marks or bruises give me away, he will combine some part of Frangois's brand of lovemaking with his own. Hank, as I have said, is a good and fast learner. Jed, who watched Hank make love to me on my big bed, on a day when he was supposed to have driven to pick up supplies, with Burden, swears he does not know how I made such a fierce and active lover of the once-shy and woman-fearing foreman. He added, however, that I've been good for Hank. He is much more sure of himself, more authoritative now, and even the men have noticed it.
Burden, who introduced me to real sensuality, does not say too much. He knows, of course, about Hank, and is tolerant-even slightly amused. And I feel even closer to him now that I know how it feels to introduce someone naive and untutored to the pleasures of the senses and the body. There is still, and always will be, a deep love and empathy between us. I am his wife. He wants me to be happy. His lovemaking is, as usual, passionate and yet restrained.
Except for Hank, my life has not changed much. I am pampered and spoiled. I am both a vessel to be used, and a user. It is an equal exchange, and I am happy with it. I feel, at all times, wonderfully and gloriously aware of myself, and alive. Whether Maria is rubbing scented oil into my body or caressing me with her hands and lips, or whether I am holding an erect prick in my mouth and ministering to it or being ministered to by one, I am woman, and I am wanted, and I want, and I feel.
I am never bored. If I want to ride, there are horses at my disposal, companions to ride with. If I want to drive, I have my choice of cars or pickup trucks. And I am even learning to fly. I used to think, long ago, that any person whose every need is taken care of would die from ennui, but I know now that it isn't so! I have everything I want-anything I want, and I am happy and satisfied. I would not change this life for anything in the world, and am not-likely to be asked to do so. Next year Burden has promised we will go to Europe. Frangois says, when he writes to me, that he is already looking forward to my stay in Paris, where we will meet his friends and have many parties to attend. Jed will stay behind, but he swears the following year will be his turn to take me. I have not told Hank yet, of course, but he will survive! And in the meantime I will enjoy him as he enjoys me.
In a little while now he will be coming to me. Burden and Jed are away for the afternoon and the house is deathly quiet. Hank will come striding inside and will knock impatiently at the door of the library where I am sitting writing this. He will be upon me almost the same moment that I open the door. I am wearing nothing but a brief and bare sun dress, one that can be pulled over my head in seconds. And once he has done this, his hands will be rough and impatient as they travel over my body.
He has had to wait at least a week for this opportunity, and he will have had time to brood jealously, so I know he will be harsh at first, and will call me names, as he pushes me down on my knees so that I can take his prick in my mouth while he presses my head close with his hand. But afterwards, when my lips and tongue have soothed him, he will become gentle again and tell me how much he has missed me and how mad he is for me. He'll push me back upon the same chair that I am sitting in now and bury his face between my legs, his tongue burrowing deep into my cunt while his teeth bruise my clitoris. And he'll make me come for him-many times-before he finally takes me and fucks me while his clever-cruel hands make me writhe and twist beneath him. Oh, yes-I will miss Hank when I go to Europe! I suppose, in my way, I love him too, for in part he is what I've made him. Perhaps he will wait for me? We will have to see, when the time comes.
Now it is time for me to put this away and wait for Hank. And after he has gone, I will have the night to anticipate, and the two men who will be sharing my bed and my body. We are animals, I suppose, all of us; but it is good to be animal sometimes-to put away the mind and feel and find each other by touch. There was fucking before there was talking, before man had ever thought about finding words for actions. And thank God there will always be this basic and beautiful way of communication. I have a glass of wine by me and I lift it in a silent toast to us-and to all the other magnificent animals.
