Diamonds and Toads: A Modern Fairy Tale (3 page)

Delilah took the diamond and squeezed it
tight in her trembling hand. “I—” Oh, God. She couldn’t breathe. “I
need to sit down.” Her head swam and her knees wobbled as she sank
down onto the sofa once more. “
Belle-mère
—Oh, God,
Belle-mère
. Something very strange is going on.” She shook
her head and met her stepmother’s gaze. “I didn’t steal this
diamond, I swear.” She rubbed her dry throat. “A-a—A few days ago,
I was standing in front of the downtown library when a beggar woman
walked by. I offered her some food.” She leaned forward. “Then, all
at once, there was a loud explosive sound—everything turned
rose-hued—and
glitter
swirled in the air.” She opened her
hand and looked down at the diamond. “Then—this. Not this one
exactly, but the same thing happened. A diamond appeared in my
mouth, nearly went down my wind pipe.” Her brows drew together.
“One other thing: before she disappeared, she—she called me ‘Lila’.
It was creepy, unsettling. She said ‘bless you Lila dear.’” Delilah
looked at her stepmother. “How could she have known my name?”

Her stepmother’s eyes held a light as bright
as the diamond in Delilah’s hand, her shoulders heaved with the
effort to take air into her lungs. “The fairy. It must be.”

* * *

“Isadora, come
home
immediately.”
Delilah’s stepmother slammed the receiver of her Victorian-style
phone onto its cradle and stormed back to her chair. “I have
no
idea
why
the fairy chose
you
to bestow her
blessing
upon, when it’s
clear
as clear can
be
that
Isadora
is the more
deserving
of you. But,
that
will change, I’m
sure
, once Isadora
returns
and meets the
fey
creature
herself
.”
She took a long drag from her gold-tipped black cigarette before
saying, “I
had
to leave a
message
. Of
course
the
girl’s
phone was turned
off
.”

She marched over to Delilah and held out her
hand. “The
diamonds
.
Give
them to
me
.”

After nearly choking on both of them, Delilah
was more than willing to hand them over. She quickly retrieved the
other from her purse and dropped them both into her stepmother’s
hand.

Her stepmother mewed with pleasure. “These
still
hold
magic
in them, I’d
bet
my
life
on it!” She lifted them in the air and said, “MAKE THE
PERRAULTS THE MOST ADMIRED FAMILY IN SOCIETY!”

Silver smoke rose in long tentacles from the
diamonds and in the next instant, sparks flew. Eudora lowered her
hand and looked, eyes wide with expectation. “Aargh! They’re
worthless
!” She stormed over to Delilah and slapped her
across her face. “
What
did you
do!
” her stepmother
yelled.

Delilah cried out, nearly toppling from her
chair.

Soothing her burning cheek with her hand,
Delilah lifted her watery gaze to the virago towering above her.
 Insides trembling, she said, “N-nothing
belle-mere.”

Her stepmother jammed her hand under
Delilah’s nose “These are
nothing
more than
worthless
pieces of
coal
!”

“I-it must be the fairy.” Delilah’s heart
tripped in her chest but somehow she got the next past her closed
throat. “S-s-she must not have wanted you to h-have t-them.”

* * *

An hour later, red-eyed, sniffling and still
unstrung, Delilah settled into her favorite chair in her living
room, took a long swallow of wine, and dialed her mentor. After the
tongue-lashing she’d just received from her stepmother—not to
mention the unprecedented physical abuse—all her bright feelings
and burgeoning self-confidence had crumbled into dust. She was in
desperate need of a power boost and an ego cocktail. And she knew
just how to get it. Paula answered on the third ring.

“Hey!”

“Hi, Paula. It’s me, Delilah.”

Paula chuckled. “I know.”

“Oh, yeah. Caller I.D.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be at work?”

“I took a week of vacation.”

“Do you have a cold? You sound funny.”

No way was she going to admit to what she’d
allowed her stepmother to get away with. Even if she was determined
it would be the first and last time the woman ever did. “No—umm…I’m
fine. Must be the phone line.” More tears welled in her eyes, but
she took a deep breath to keep them at bay. “I need a fix.”

“Wow! That was fast. You’re usually good for
at least a week between sessions.”

“I just had the conversation from hell with
my
belle-mère.
”

Paula snorted. “Say no more. She’s really not
good for you, you know.”

Delilah had introduced the two one day at the
gym, and they clashed immediately. Paula, a.k.a. Mistress Olympia,
was too self-assured for Eudora’s liking and Eudora was too haughty
to be taken seriously by Paula.

“I know, but she’s the only mother I’ve ever
known. I can’t just blow her off.”

Presently, Delilah heard the
swish
of
pages turning on the other end of the line. “Hmm,” Paula said after
a minute, “I’ve got a nine o’clock that might be good for you. He
likes the whip. Just pretend it’s your stepmother.”

Delilah ran the pad of her finger over her
bottom lip. “When is this particular type of assertiveness training
supposed to start seeping into my real life situations? I’ve been
doing it for three months now, and even though I enjoy the work, it
hasn’t made me strong enough to stand up to her once she starts in
on me.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Delilah. I’ve
seen some real improvement in how you handle yourself with others
since you began this thing. But it’s always hardest to change our
behavior towards those we’re closest to. There’s a groove that gets
set early on and moving outside it is harder than keeping pounds
off. Baby steps. That’s the best advice I can give you at this
point.”

Delilah nodded, even though she knew Paula
couldn’t see her. “Okay. Thanks. You’ve been great. I guess I’ll
see you this evening then.”

After hanging up with Paula, Delilah poured
herself another glass of wine and ran a bubble bath.

Her day, which had started out with such
exuberance and promise, had quickly turned ugly and hollow with her
stepmother’s wrath.

Delilah sighed. Why had she ever thought the
news of her engagement to Chas would please the woman? What would
it take, Delilah wondered, to prove her own intrinsic worth?

* * *

At seven-fifteen, she dragged the silver
metal zipper up her thigh-high red latex boot. Time to let off a
little steam. But this would be the last time. She knew she
couldn’t keep this secret life of hers going now that she was
engaged to Chas, even if this form of assertiveness training had
become a guilty pleasure for her as well. No, she’d explore
 her dark side one more time and then say goodbye to it for
good.

She swiveled around and gauged the amount of
butt crack showing between the lace-up back of the tight as seal
skin latex dress she wore. Good. Just enough to give ‘em a taste
without portioning a full bite. She sighed. If only her ass wasn’t
so big. She smoothed her hands over the area in question and gave a
Gallic shrug. Her clients didn’t seem to mind. Which, she supposed,
was another reason she liked doing this. No criticism, only
praise.

Her gaze flickered up and stilled on the
stockbroker papers stacked on her dresser. Her shoulders drooped.
It didn’t surprise her a bit that her stepmother had twisted the
positive outcome of Delilah’s recent business decisions into the
newest chapter in the so-called Perrault fairy legacy. Nor that
she’d instantly set a course for furthering her own daughter’s
chances at a blessing from the fey folk as well.

She took a deep breath and shook her head.
Nope.
None of that. Not tonight.
She jutted her
shoulders, jutted her chin, jutted herself into the proud stance
expected for the coming night’s activities.

With a swift turn and a sweep of her hand,
she grabbed up her riding crop and leather mask from the rose
damask chaise next to her bedroom window and strode out. Her
friend’s dungeon was located about twenty minutes from Delilah’s
quaint 1920’s pier-and-beam house. It wouldn’t be long now before
she’d once again feel in complete control.

* * *

Chas took a right turn onto one of the
eclectic streets common to this part of town, where businesses and
residences sat side-by-side. Old, three-story red brick houses,
turned into duplexes, lined either side of this one.

It was the strangest thing. He’d been stopped
at a traffic light a few minutes ago on his way home from the
office when he’d seen a yellow cockatoo—the rare kind he’d first
been introduced to on his trip to Australia last year—sitting on a
telephone wire right in front of him. Just as the light changed,
the bird flew in an arc toward his windshield and then took off.
He’d followed it.

It hadn’t gone far. In fact, it stopped and
waited for him to catch up to it. At least, that’s how it had
seemed. Because they went through the ritual several times more
before the bird finally settled on a streetlight in front of one of
the houses.

He was careful when he opened his door not to
make too much noise, for fear he’d scare the bird off into the
stand of trees at the end of the cul-de-sac. As he approached, in
steady, quiet steps, he heard a car door slam nearby and, on
reflex, turned to look in that direction.

He blinked.
Delilah?
He shook his head
to clear the shock-webs off his synapses.
Dear God. It
was
her.
In six-inch spike-heeled hot-sex boots.

He took off at a hard run.
“Delilah!”
She’d only managed a half-turn before he grabbed hold of her upper
arm and hauled her the rest of the way around.

“Cha—!”

“
What the—!”

“Chas!” She tried to wrench out of his
grasp, but he only clamped down harder.

He flipped open one side of her trench coat
and got an eyeful of the getup underneath. His heart did a triple
beat, sending a rush of blood to his groin. Heat flamed his cheeks.
Lust turned to alarm before he managed to channel it into something
he could deal with: anger.

“What the
hell
do you think you’re
doing?” He did a quick scan of the front of the house. “What is
this place, anyway? Who lives here? Are you fucking somebody?”

“No! There isn’t anyone else. I swear. Let me
go, and I’ll explain everything.” Her tightly wound French twist
had come undone, sending sweeps of dark sable hair over her flushed
cheek and finely defined collarbone. When her rose-petal tongue
darted out to moisten her bottom lip as she tried again to loosen
his grip, his heartbeat kicked up again. He was so zoned-in on that
cherry-slice mouth of hers, in fact, that he didn’t even realize
he’d dropped his hand until it bounced off his hard-on. He sucked
air into his lungs in a bid to gain control over his potent
physical responses to her.

“It’s truly not as bad as it looks to you.”
Flustered, she bent down and picked up the riding crop from the
sidewalk where it had fallen.

Which reminded him of what she wore—what she
might have been up to if he hadn’t caught her. It made the
momentary lust rebound back to anger. He shifted his gaze to scan
the area.
No one else around. Yet. Time to move it.

He shoved his hands onto his hips and jabbed
his head in the direction of his Beemer. “Get in. We can talk
there.”

She jerked a nod and walked in front of him
toward his car. As she moved, for the first time, it registered
just how easily she glided across the pavement in the heels. Yet
another wave of feral anger swept across his solar plexus,
clenching the muscles of his abdomen into taut, fierce, painful,
fireballs.

Clearly, this wasn’t her first time in
six-inch spikes.

But if he had anything to say about it—and he
did—it’d damned sure be her last. At least until the deal with the
creditors went through.

He yanked the car door open and pressed her
inside, then jogged around the front of the car and got in himself.
In seconds, he was facing her full on. “Okay, spill.”

* * *

Delilah moistened her lips again. She could
tell that Chas was not in the frame of mind to listen to reason. To
deal with her perfectly legal, really quite benign, means of
coping. Even if she did know that she was risking his reputation by
doing this tonight.

He deserved an honest answer, though, so she
took in a deep breath and said, “About four months ago, I met a
woman in my yoga class—a therapist, of sorts. We became friends.
I—I was so stressed—pent-up anger, not sleeping, eating more than I
should—anyway, she told me about a particular type of assertiveness
training that she’d been teaching for awhile and invited me over
for a free tutorial. I did, and it’s been part of my weekly workout
ever since."

Chas’s eyes narrowed.
“Workout?”
He
pointed at her outfit.
“In that?
What the hell goes on in
there?”

She tugged on the hem of her dress and
coughed. “You can’t tell?”

His eyes tracked from her face down her body
and back up again. The knuckles on his fists turned white as he
twisted them around the steering wheel. She only hoped it wasn’t
her neck he was imagining there instead.

“S and M?” he said, more as a snarl than a
question.

“Nn—not exactly.”
Okay, here goes.
“It’s more a master-slave thing. You know. Giving commands that the
other person follows.”