Guilty Pleasures (30 page)

“These oysters . . . okay, I know, it’s the fantasy, blah, blah, blah!”

“Thank you, Serge. Hendricks is arriving soon, so let’s get it together. It’s been a long week.”

Serge arranged the half oysters in a pyramid on a cut-crystal platter filled with crushed ice. After skilfully seeding six of them with rosy pea-sized pearls, he decorated it with rosettes of lemon. A stack of hot buttery toast and chilled brut champagne accompanied it on its journey into the salon.
 

“Hendricks, don’t forget to signal so I can do the Camembert. It’s got to be piping hot,” Serge said. He arranged the Lakka berries in their leaves and misted them with droplets of water.

“Can you believe this, Will? Here we place fake dew on berries, for people who sell fake dreams and pay real money so they can eat real food without anyone knowing. Amazing. They go out and eat macro/micro/molecular or whatever is in fashion for the week, when their bodies crave something fat and rich . . . we are like a dirty secret. They come and eat with their hands and they lick their fingers. Here is the world.”

Lance laughed and shook his head.

Serge waved the spray mister about. “People are ashamed to eat good food in decent portions in public, but you get a two-bit whore teaching bored housewives how to give great head on morning TV.” He sighed and shook his head. “And let me tell you, she didn’t know what she was talking about. Best practitioner of fellatio in the world was the Empress of China.”

Lance’s jaw dropped. “Empress of . . . are you serious?”
 

“What an artist . . . the man could make a stone come. He was a eunuch, a real
pure from birth
, reared in the Forbidden City. He trained us—the new arrivals—decided on our speciality, and our look. He was an old, old man when I knew him, but he still had all his own teeth, and was limber and graceful as a gazelle. A very wise man. He told me I had to decide, as a freak, if I’d rather be a clown or a demon. He said we oddities—and he spoke from experience—attracted the cowardly and the cruel. Easy targets for the unimaginative, you see.”

Lance nodded soberly. “A wise man, your friend.”
 

Serge smiled grimly. “Yes, he was. So I was the demon, and Yusuf was the angel. What a spectacle we were, Will. Food for the gods’ lust, or the devils’. Yusuf was a hermaphrodite, see. Beautiful, Will. Never have I seen a more beautiful face. He had breasts and a body to make Aphrodite weep with envy, and a man’s prick he had, but the Empress always presented him fully clothed in a long white virginal shift, his hair loose like an angel’s, and then he’d wet the shift down. It would cling, see, the breasts of Venus, the prick of Mars. Some bastards would
pay
to see us freaks together.”

“My God, Serge, how did you stay sane?”

“Willie, things are simple. You do what you do to survive. We all pander to the powerful’s desires, don’t we? Only today, it’s even worse. Since survival is practically guaranteed, these people obsess over the basic things that signify survival—food and fucking. My father said that when the few value our art the most, is when the many are the most hungry. He was right.”

At that moment, Hendricks whirled in and swept away the molten cheese in its golden crust and the dewy berries.

“You almost never mention your father.”

“My father is precious. I talk a lot, Willie Wanker, but I never,
ever
waste my father’s words.”

Finally the guests left, allowing Lance and Serge to finish up and tidy the kitchen in readiness for the weekend break.

Lance walked into the small salon, still filled with red roses and candlelight, to find Millie putting away the hand-painted porcelain.

“Are you in the mood for dinner, Millicent Deafly?” Lance asked.

“God, I don’t think I can face food just this minute.”

“Good.” He placed a bottle of wine and wineglasses on the empty table. “Because I’m in the mood for
you
.” Lance poured the wine, walked over to the hidden console, and slipped in a CD. Nazareth’s pain-racked song, “Love Hurts” filled the room.

Millie smiled at him in nervous anticipation as Lance stepped up to her, placing his fingertips lightly on her hips, allowing her to choose her distance. He nuzzled lightly at her ear and started humming along. “Tell me, Millie, does love hurt?”
 

Millie shivered and drifted closer, laying her arms along his, pulling his hands to cross behind the small of her back. “I’m sorry . . . I’m so sorry, Will . . . I’m so afraid.”

Lance leaned down to whisper in her ear. “I was very angry, Millie. I told myself that we could
be
something. I staked a lot on a hunch. You talk about trust, then you acted as if you could foresee an ugly ending when we haven’t even begun yet.”

Millie pressed herself closer, her body warm and pliant, moving against his as they drifted to the slow beat. “I’m frightened. All my choices go wrong, Will. I have a talent for disaster. Also, maybe I was trying to get away, to make
you
push me away. I’m sorry. I don’t know . . .”

“I readily accept your apology, Miss Deafly. Maybe one day I’ll need you to forgive me, too.”

“That depends . . . I make no promises!” She sighed. “I’m a freak, Will. A cowardly, freakish, sick, little woman. Maybe you should run.”

“No running, Millie. That’s too easy. I propose we experiment. We are going to try something very new. We are going to go very, very slowly . . . I want to know you inside and out. No sex. At least, not yet. But we’ll do lots of talking, lots of dancing, picnics, and old movies. You know, that old and rusty-trusty way; the road no one travels by anymore.”

Millie pouted. “No sex?”

“Nope.”

“What about kissing or touching?”

“Some kissing, some touching. We’ll feel our way.”

Millie snuggled her soft, inviting hips to his erection. “You don’t seem to
feel
that way.”

“What I feel and what I do are two very different things. I
do
know that I’m not coming inside you until I’m ready. I don’t want just sex from you, Millie, I want everything. If that scares you, go.” He opened his arms and released her from his embrace.

She quickly snaked her arms around him and pressed closer, leaning her head on his chest. “I am scared, but I’m also staying. The
no coming
thing I don’t think I agree with. I liked what happened, and I want more.” She slanted a seductive smile up at him. “Please, Will, can I have some more?”

Lance laughed. “Dickens! I’m beset by Dickens! I don’t know, Miss Millie! Can you take more?”

She inched up to press her opened mouth to his, flicking her tongue out to trace his lips languorously.
 

“Can
you?
I’m going to do my best to make you break the rules.”
 

Lance groaned and shivered. “Really . . . well, here is a new one. One of us has to have his or her clothes on all the time. No full nudity,
ever
.”

“No showering together?” Millie asked.

Lance grinned. “I had this dream about you and a shower—no showers.” He nuzzled at the soft hollow beneath her ear. “Although . . . let’s have some wine. I’m taking you home and giving you a long bath.”

Dizzy with the red wine and his kisses, Millie opened the front door to her house. She shooed Horse away, and led Lance upstairs, watching bemused as he ran the taps to fill the tub and poured iridescent scented oil into the churning water.
 

He stepped out and returned a few minutes later with a heavy, five-armed candelabra from her dining room table, wine from her kitchen, and two glasses. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“No.” The intoxicating scent and the steam were filling her with a strange sense of unreality.

Lance lit the candles, poured the wine, and switched off the bathroom light. He handed her a glass. “To us, Millie. To starting over. To coming clean . . .” He watched amused as she drank down the wine in one gulp and shivered. “Now, Millie, let’s get you naked.”

Slowly he unbuttoned her shirt, stroking his fingertips deep into the succulent valley between her breasts. He reached behind her to unsnap her bra, slipping the thin straps off her shoulders. Her rounded breasts sprang free, her pink nipples eagerly puckering for his touch.
 

Lance slid a caressing finger around her right breast, dipping his head to tongue at her nipple, revelling in her hoarse gasp. He pulled her skirt down, tugging at her underpants, running his hands down her back to cup the soft, generous buttocks. He dipped his finger briefly into her cleft, grinning at her moan of pleasure. “You like that?”

She nodded.

“Tell me. I want to hear you say it.”

“Oh, Will, I like . . .”

He lifted her into the tub and soaped her down slowly until her slippery body glistened in the candlelight. Teasing her to the point of madness, he brought her to orgasm again and again, until she cried out, begged for him to stop, and screamed his name.

From the Diary of Millicent Deafly:

It’s two twenty-five and there is a man asleep in my bed right now.

I’m a slut, and I love it. My mouth waters and I soak right through my panties just from having the bloody man whisper in my ear. Every other man in the whole world wants to get a woman into bed five seconds after they meet. But not Will; he wants to take things slow, get to know me, and talk. He says sex can wait.
 

Am I shallow?
 

Frankly I just want to fuck like a frantic ferret.

Can you believe it? He gave me a bath. I came like a comet and screamed like a banshee. God, I’m falling for this man.
He’s driving me crazy . . .

I did not expect this ending to the evening.

But in case you’re tired of hearing about my sex life, last night at work was wonderful. Jane and Jake came over for their anniversary dinner and they were adorable as always! He is so in love with her! It’s so cute, all the little things he does to please her, the pearls and all that. As for Jane, she shamelessly asked after Will. She smirked a lot, right in front of Jake!

I didn’t like that. Did she and Will have a thing, a fling? Was he
pruning
her bush too close to the bud? I’m jealous, definitely. Weird thing is, I quite like the feeling. It makes me feel alive, awake, and almost in love.