Alleyn, Fredrica (34 page)

Chapter Fourteen

W
hen Cassandra went down to breakfast the following morning, she was surprised to find the baron still there. He'd been speaking of visiting his daughters in Austria for the day and was normally gone before breakfast at such times. Frangoise and Rupert were reading the papers as they ate, Giovanni was deep in conversation with the baron, whilst Nicola was sitting at her place looking thoroughly miserable with a glass of pale yellow liquid in front of her.

Before Cassandra could ask what it was, Monique was standing at her elbow and placing a similar glass in front of her mistress. 'What's this?' she enquired but Monique glided quickly away without answering.

'Dieter, what's going on?' Cassandra asked.

He broke off from his conversation with Giovanni and smiled his most angelic smile. 'You and Nicola are going on a forty-eight hour fast, my dear. Neither of you must have anything apart from the glasses of hot water and lemon juice that will be brought to you at regular intervals.'

'But why? I don't think either of us needs to slim!' exclaimed Cassandra.

Rupert glanced up from his paper. 'You've not heard of this before then?'

'Heard of what?' Cassandra was thoroughly puzzled.

The baron frowned. 'Ignore him,
liebling.
I simply wish for you two ladies to be thoroughly cleansed for the very special evening that I discussed with you last night.'

'But I don't see . . .'

'I'm starving!' interrupted Nicola. 'It isn't healthy to fast for so long. We'll become weak and light-headed.'

'Then you must be sure to rest a great deal,' said the baron smoothly.

Looking at his widely-spaced eyes and the boyish way in which he was trying to push a lock of hair away from them Cassandra wondered how anyone with such angelic charm could be so extraordinarily inventive and perverse in his private life.

'I'd better drink it down then,' she murmured. 'No doubt your motive will become clear in time, Dieter.'

'It most assuredly will,' he responded, and then turned his attention back to the Italian, leaving Nicola to continue sitting in sulky silence.

After draining her glass, Cassandra withdrew from the dining room and wandered out of the chateau, across a large meadow and around the side path to her favourite quiet spot, a narrow marble bench which overlooked the lake.

There she gazed across the water and wondered what the future held for her. After a time, Frangoise joined her. 'Young Nicola still hasn't taken her medicine,' she said with a smile. 'Dieter's getting quite annoyed!'

'I can't imagine what he's up to,' murmured Cassandra.

Frangoise, who knew only too well, decided to keep silent and let the young Englishwoman find out for herself when the time came. 'Rupert's going to teach Nicola how to give good oral sex to a man later this morning,' she told Cassandra. 'Do you want to come and watch.'

Cassandra shook her head. "Not particularly. You can tell me how it goes. I hope for Rupert's sake she isn't over-enthusiastic.'

'She's only ever over-enthusiastic where Dieter's concerned,' Frangoise pointed out. 'She won't enjoy having to learn on Rupert.'

'Perhaps not,' conceded Cassandra. Noticing Giovanni walking along the path towards them, Frangoise rose from the bench. 'I'll go and watch then; it should be amusing. Anyway, I wouldn't want to stand in the way of young love!'

'Young what?' asked Cassandra, but then as Giovanni raised a hand in greeting she understood what her friend meant. 'How did you find me?' she asked the Italian.

'I asked Rupert where you were most likely to be. Cassandra, come away with me. Why should you have your life dominated by that man? What right has he to starve you for forty-eight hours? I would let you do anything you wished.'

'I can do anything I wish now,' Cassandra explained gently. 'No one's forcing me to stay here. If I don't want to do as Dieter asks, then I can go. Have you considered the possibility that I wouldn't enjoy being allowed to do anything I liked?'

Giovanni stared at her in bewilderment. 'No, I have not. All women like freedom.'

'Not all; some of us have special needs that I can't possibly explain to you. It isn't something anyone can understand if they aren't that way themselves.'

'You enjoy being his slave? Being bullied and tormented and . . .'

'Everything I do is done because it gives me pleasure,' said Cassandra. 'Dieter has shown me the truth about myself - and I'm grateful to him for that - but it's my own needs and desires that keep me here.'

'You do love him!' Giovanni sounded utterly disgusted.

'I never said that,' responded Cassandra. 'Love is different, and quite separate from need and desire.'

'You love him, at the moment, but in two days' time you might not,' he added cryptically. 'Remember, if you change your mind I am still here for you.'

Almost before he'd finished speaking Giovanni too had left, and Cassandra remained alone wondering what it was that the others seemed to know about and which necessitated the forty-eight hour fast in advance.

The next two days dragged by. As Nicola had anticipated, both of them grew languid and light-headed with lack of food and after a time Cassandra did little except lie on a sunbed beneath a parasol, slipping off into strange half-sleeps where everything seemed unreal.

By the middle of the second afternoon, with only a few hours left to go before what Cassandra knew was to be the final confrontation between the two of them, she was lying on her bed. The shutters were closed against the heat of the sun and her room was agreeably cool. When the door opened she propped herself up on one elbow, knowing that it would be Monique with another glass of the dreaded lemon juice which had certainly served its purpose in thoroughly cleansing her system. To her astonishment it was the baron who entered.

He was carrying a silver tray on which was a champagne bottle and a tall fluted champagne glass. Placing that on the bedside table he pushed her gently back against the bed and ran a hand over her bare body. He started with her breasts, moulding them with the palms of his hands and then softly squeezing the small globes until he felt them expand in his hands.

After that he let his hands wander down her inward curving abdomen and when he pressed lightly against the skin he could tell that there was nothing left in Cassandra's stomach. His fingers dug deeper into the flesh and probed gently above the pubic mound, but there wasn't even the slightest flicker of response. There were no signs of pressure from either her stomach or bladder and he was content.

'Here,' he whispered, propping her upright against the pile of pillows. 'I think it's time we began to add more variety to your fluid intake.' To Cassandra's amazement he then opened the champagne bottle, poured her a glass and placed it in her hand. 'Drink it straight down,' he said with a smile.

'I'll be horribly dizzy!' protested Cassandra. 'I haven't eaten for two days.'

'That doesn't matter. You'll eat later tonight. For now I want to see this bottle empty by the time I get back. Oh yes, and one other thing.'

'What?' she asked.

'I must tie you up. Not tightly, but enough to ensure you don't leave your bed. Nicola's being restrained in the same way.'

He fastened her ankles in two of the metal rings around the bed, but left her arms free so that she could still pour herself champagne and then, with one final caress of her lower stomach he left.

At the same time as the baron was organising Cassandra, Rupert was doing the same with Nicola, except that he spent more time arousing her body once she was fastened. For Nicola it was all totally inexplicable and confusing. Rupert had emptied the first glass of champagne into her mouth himself, and almost immediately her head had started to spin. 'I'll be drunk at dinner tonight!' she protested.

'That won't matter, it might even liven things up!' he replied, an amused look in his eyes.

'I can't wait to eat again,' continued Nicola, who still didn't know about the role reversal that awaited her. 'I suppose this fast was a kind of endurance test?'

'Perhaps,' he murmured, and then his tongue was delving into the indentation in the middle of her hollow stomach before swirling lower to insert itself between the outer lips, gently lapping against the soft membranes until her hips began to squirm. Then he raised his head and nipped softly at the flesh above her hips, which made her breath snag in her throat. 'Is that good?' he asked.

'Yes.'

'I'll remember that. Now, you remember to keep drinking the champagne. There's plenty more where that came from.'

'I ought to have something to eat first,' Nicola protested.

'Not until later,' said Rupert firmly, and he left her just as the baron had left Cassandra; helpless, lightheaded and confused.

At seven o'clock the baron appeared in Nicola's bedroom carrying a white garment over his arm. He poured the fettered girl a glass of champagne from a second bottle that had been left with her earlier and as she drank it he unfastened her ankles and pulled her to her feet.

'Put this on,' he ordered her.

She took it from him and examined it curiously, uncertain as to exactly what it was. 'Do I wear it underneath my dress for dinner?' she asked him.

'No, it's all you wear. You see, Nicola, tonight you and Cassandra will wait on my dinner guests. You won't eat until we have finished everything, including our entertainment, which will also be supplied by you.'

Nicola couldn't believe what she was hearing. 'You mean I have to act as a maid?' she asked incredulously.

'A very special kind of maid, as you'll see once you've put this on. Come, let me help you.'

It was difficult for Nicola to keep her balance after all the champagne on an empty stomach but at last the baron had her in the tight-fitting corselette with an underwired bra, lace sides and back. It displayed a deep v of flesh between her supported breasts and fastened beneath her crotch with press studs.

He stood back to examine her. 'Very fetching! Now, with that all you need are white hold-up stockings and high-heeled white sandals with ankle straps. Cassandra's outfit will be the same except in black.'

Nicola stared at her reflection in one of the mirrors. 'I can't do it!' she said in a low voice. 'I just can't serve you, Rupert and the others looking like this. It makes me feel . . .'

'What?' enquired the baron with interest.

'Humiliated.'

'Indeed? How strange. I don't think Monique and Sophie have ever felt humiliated when they've worn outfits like this at banquets. However, you can always ask them because they will be taking your place at the dinner table tonight.'

Nicola's eyes were like saucers. 'I won't wait on servants!' she protested.

The baron's eyes narrowed. 'Indeed? In that case, my dear, perhaps it's time you returned to England. I'd hate to think you were unhappy with my attempts to educate you as your father wished.'

'No!' exclaimed Nicola quickly. 'I'll do it, it was just a shock.'

He smiled and nodded. 'Of course. Very well, finish your drink and I'll refasten you until you're needed in the drawing room. You and Cassandra will be serving pre-dinner drinks at seven-thirty.'

'I must just use the bathroom first,' said Nicola. 'I've had so much champagne that . . .'

'You remain here,' said the baron, his voice suddenly cold. 'I myself will come and fetch you shortly. Naturally I do not expect any accident to occur during my absence,' he added softly.

For Nicola the next half hour was highly uncomfortable, and it wasn't helped by her tight-fitting costume and the pressure of the corselette between her thighs.

When the baron finally returned he was wearing a burgundy evening suit with a white shirt and burgundy bow tie. She stared at him, thinking that he was the most sexually attractive man she'd ever met and wondering what she would have to go through during the course of the evening in order to make him hers, because she' was beginning to realise that tonight was very special.

At the bottom of the stairs she came face to face with Cassandra, whose all black outfit seemed to be if anything even tighter than Nicola's and whose usually pale face was flushed either with excitement or discomfort.

With a flourish the baron opened the door into the drawing room and his guests turned to stare at the newcomers. Giovanni made a small sound that could have been either appreciation or shock, while Frangoise laughed lightly, like an amused schoolgirl. 'You both look irresistible!' she assured them.

Monique and Sophie, who looked almost as uncomfortable as the newcomers in their floor length, low-cut sky blue silk dresses, glanced at each other in surprise, wondering what was going to happen during the course of the evening.

'Before Cassandra and Nicola serve us with our drinks,' said the baron cheerfully, 'I think they should have a final glass of champagne each.'

'No!' objected the English girls in unison.

'It is necessary,' said the baron smoothly. 'You see, having fasted for forty-eight hours and then taken nothing in but champagne, we will all be able to drink it from you.'

Nicola frowned, still not understanding, but Cassandra understood and wondered how she was ever going to comply with the baron's orders.