Highly Strung (7 page)

“You’re so wet,” he whispered. “I think you’d let me fuck you right here in the cinema. I think you’d let me put you on the stage at the front and have you right there while they all watched. What if the film was us, fucking, for all to see?”

The combination of his touch and his words did their unerring work. Lydia jolted forward and ground against his hand, gasping as quietly as her orgasm would allow, squeezing her breasts hard.

“Mmm…” He chuckled quietly, removing his hand. “You’re a fast learner. I didn’t think you’d let me do that.”

Lydia felt at once oddly proud and ashamed. Should she have said no? Did Milan think better or worse of her for going along with his depraved plans? Was she uptight or permissive? No, she berated herself, she was simply a woman who adored a man and wanted him in every way. What was wrong with that?

“I’m not as prim and proper as you seem to think,” she whispered back.

“Well, I know that after the other night. Mmm, taste?”

He put one of his fingers to her lips and she allowed him to push it in, tasting and smelling her own arousal mixed with the hot popcorn cinema aroma.

He didn’t allow her to button her jeans back up until the film ended and she sat, feeling her own juices chill against her skin, her nipples still hard as pebbles, letting him knead at her denimed crotch and kiss her willing mouth until the credits rolled.

“It’s a good thing I’ve already seen it,” she remarked as they stepped out of the cinema into the brisk, bleak air of the winter Saturday afternoon. “I didn’t have a clue what was going on there.”

“Oh, you didn’t say you saw it before,” he said, taking her hand and striding purposefully towards Covent Garden. “It only came out this week. You saw it yesterday?”

“Um, yes.” Lydia felt a change of subject might be in order. “So where are we going now? Are we really going shopping?”

“Yes. Who did you see it with?”

“A friend.”

“A girl friend, I hope. I am terribly jealous. Strangely so, for a man who enjoys threesomes and group sex. But if you are going to fuck other men you have to have my permission.”

“Yes, a girl friend,” said Lydia, a mite cross and uncomfortable at having her sex life dictated to her in the middle of the street.

All the same, the irritation was ameliorated by the way every other person stopped to gawp at them, pointing and whispering.

That’s Milan Kaspar from
The Next Big String, she imagined them saying.
Phwoar, I fancy him rotten. Who’s that lucky cow on his arm? Must be his girlfriend. Oh, I wish I could be her.

She held up her head and threw back her shoulders, imagining herself gliding down the red carpet with him at some glitzy televised event.

“Which girl friend? Vanessa, I suppose.”

He didn’t sound happy.

“No, not Vanessa.”

“Good. Because she hates me and will try to get you away from me.”

“Why does she hate you?”

“Never mind. Give me a name. Your friend at the cinema.”

“Are you really this paranoid? You don’t believe me, do you?”

“Her name, Lydia.”

“Uh, Mary.”

“And who is Mary? You studied with her?”

Lydia swallowed. “Mary-Ann.”

Milan’s fingertips pinched her arm.

“Not…the Mary-Ann I know?”

Lydia didn’t answer and Milan stopped dead, swinging her around to face him while the crowds tutted and stepped around them.

“Mary-Ann McKenzie?”

Lydia made a face and looked away.

“It is! What is this? Whose side are you on?”

“I’m not on any side,” pleaded Lydia. “I like her and I like you. Can’t I be friends with you both?”

Milan tipped his head to one side, considering this.

“You know, perhaps you can,” he said thoughtfully. His lips curved in a devilish smile and he squeezed her hands. “Perhaps that would work very well. Come on. Let’s get you dressed.”

He grabbed her by the upper arm and began to walk even faster than before, parting the sea of shoppers and tourists like a torpedo cutting through water.

The shop was called Maximum Vamp, and Lydia scarcely had time to admire its window display—of multicoloured feather boas and glittery scanty things—before they were through the door and inside its sartorial carnival of sex.

“This was Tilda’s favourite shop,” he muttered. “They know me here.”

“Milan!” exclaimed a voice, as if in confirmation. A saleswoman, who looked very much like a more mature version of Liza Minnelli in
Cabaret
, emerged from the rails of velvet and satin, teeth agleam.

“Tilda? Really?” muttered Lydia, rather surprised that Milan’s ex, with her polished exterior and conservative little skirt suits, had ever set foot in this place.

“Hidden depths. Like you, Lydia. Hello, Maxine, how are you?”

“Can’t complain, dear man, can’t complain. The season isn’t our friend, of course, but we had a terrific Christmas. Now, what can I do for you? Hello.”

She offered Lydia a belated nod and a smile that owed more to curiosity than genuine welcome.

“This is Lydia. She needs intensive re-styling. From the inside out.”

“Hmm,” said Maxine, too polite to agree but not polite enough to demur. “We can do that, of course. So you want the full service? Underwear to outerwear?”

“Yes. The full service. I trust your exquisite taste.”

She simpered, then beckoned to Lydia sternly.

“We had better go into the back room. I’ll send Lily out front.”

They went into a room that was, if anything, even more overstuffed with sparkly fabrics than the shop. A younger woman finished her task of labelling the stock and disappeared out to the front, leaving the three of them alone to embark on Lydia’s transformation.

“I’ll need you to strip right off,” said Maxine briskly. “Chop chop. Milan, come and have a look at the rails with me. I have some ideas, but I’ll need your input.”

Lydia took a deep breath. She was expected to stand naked in front of this intimidating woman? A woman, moreover, who had dressed the immaculate Tilda Fox-Boyce? She felt small and inconsequential, an inferior shop dummy, but she began to tug off her parka all the same.

“Don’t worry about Maxine,” said Milan over his shoulder, fingering a pile of corsets. “She has seen every beautiful woman in London out of her clothes.”

But I’m not beautiful
, thought Lydia woefully.

“And you
are
beautiful,” said Milan, as if reading her thoughts. “You just need some help to bring it out.”

She gasped, flushed and suddenly felt super-confident.

The hiking boots, woolly socks, cheap jeans and fleece were soon piled neatly on a chair, leaving Lydia shivering in sensible cotton underwear. She was very aware of the congealed essences from her cinema adventure that stained the gusset of her knickers.

Milan and Maxine emerged from the clothing jungle, laden with pieces. They exchanged a glance and smiled while Lydia hugged herself, trying to forget that she was nearly naked.

“You will be a dream to dress,” exclaimed Maxine. “A lovely figure, and perfect skin.” She put down the clothes and reached out a bony finger, touching Lydia’s cheek. “English rose. You can carry off so many colours.”

Lydia, who mainly wore brown and blue, simply raised her eyebrows.

“Thanks,” she said.

“Simple white cotton suits you, but we’re not about dressing down here. We’re about glamming up. So take off those undies, my dear, and let’s find that sex kitten inside the shy girl.”

There isn’t one
, thought Lydia reflexively, but then she had to reconsider. What shy girl would have sex with a man while his male lover looked on, cock in hand? What shy girl would let herself be fingered to orgasm in a public cinema? She had never known this side of her existed, but it was there, and now it had seen the light it wasn’t going back inside.

“I’ll do it for you, if you like,” offered Milan, stepping up behind her and unhooking the bra.

“Don’t—” She shivered, afraid for a moment that he was going to caress her breasts in front of Maxine, but he simply took the bra off and added it to the jumble of drab clothes she had already removed.

His hands whipped her knickers down with brisk efficiency. She hugged herself, trying to cover her tendrils of pubic hair, embarrassed at the hopelessly amateur job of clipping and shaping them she had done before her date. She was going to have to investigate wax, as much as the idea dismayed her.

“I know a marvellous beautician just around the corner,” said Maxine airily.

Lydia wanted to curl up and die. She stepped out of the knickers.

“Is okay,” said Milan unexpectedly. “I prefer a woman to look like a woman. Is natural, there’s nothing wrong with it.”

Lydia turned and beamed at him, adoring him one more percentage point, bringing the total to at least three hundred and forty five per cent.

“Well, it’s not the fashion, but to each their own,” murmured Maxine, rummaging through a pile of the wispiest, silkiest things Lydia had ever seen. She alighted on a pair of knickers that gave the illusion of transparency, and were only visible because of the printed birds of paradise in brilliant blue and gold and the scalloped lace edging. “What do you think of these?”

She opened her mouth to speak, but it was Milan’s opinion Maxine canvassed, not Lydia’s.

He picked them up.

“They weigh nothing,” he remarked. “I like that. She can have them.”

Putting them on was like having her legs breathed on. The silk fluttered upwards and came to rest about her hips, but she could barely feel the tissue-thin fabric. It was the closest to going commando achievable with underwear and it looked so pretty, as if her own skin bore the exquisite pattern of the birds.

“Turn around,” instructed Maxine, and Lydia twirled, self-conscious as she presented her bottom to the stylist and her lover, but unable to defy them.

“Lovely,” said Milan.

The matching bra was of a heavier silk, the cups just crossing her nipples teasingly while the same scalloped lace covered the rest of her breasts.

“We also have a suspender,” said Maxine. She clipped the gauzy silky belt on, then, once Lydia had put them on, attached it to five-denier, nude, seamed stockings.

“Walk up and down,” said Milan. “Up to that mirror. Look at yourself.”

Lydia saw a person she didn’t recognise, with traces of herself lingering here and there. She was glad Milan had not gone for the full vamp in red or black—that was not a look she felt ready for yet, if ever. But the combination of sexy and sweet, tasteful and naughty, made her feel more feminine and fuckable than she had ever done before.

She laid her cheek against Milan’s hand when he loomed up behind her and took hold of her shoulders, leaning over her to gaze at her reflection. For that moment, Maxine melted away and they were the lone lovers, enjoying their desire for one another.

“See what a difference it makes,” he whispered, then he growled in her ear, causing her to shudder and visualise herself melting into a puddle on the floor. “If I could have you right here…”

He let his palms brush down her upper arms before stepping back.

“A dress,” he said to Maxine. “Something to bring out the curves, yes?”

“Like this?”

She handed over a halter-necked piece in royal blue satin, polka-dotted and ruched across the chest.

Milan grinned. “Just like that.”

“She’ll need petticoats.”

Lydia stepped into two layers of stiff netting before slipping the dress over her head. Looking again in the mirror, she was open-mouthed with awe at the sudden appearance of dangerous curves, swelling above and below her nipped-in waist.

“Every man is going to want you,” said Milan. “I’ll have to watch out.”

“She looks fabulous,” said Maxine admiringly. “She needs a strong lipstick and something doing with her hair. And some heels, of course. How could I forget the heels? Let me find some.”

She returned with beautiful shoes in a Mary Jane style, but with a thickish high heel and a slender ankle strap above the T-bar, in the exact shade of blue to match the dress.

“I never wear heels,” said Lydia nervously.

“You’ll need to practice your walk, then,” advised Maxine. “Come on. Strut. Wiggle your hips. Put one foot exactly in front of the other—it gives you a sashay.”

“It’s hard—I have to concentrate,” said Lydia, frowning at her feet.

“Don’t
look
at your feet. Shoulders back. Chin up.”

Feeling as if she were performing a military drill, Lydia paced the floor until Maxine was satisfied she had acquired the skill of walking in heels.

“Perfect!” Maxine applauded at last. She tied a blue polka-dot scarf in Lydia’s hair, which she flicked out to cover her shoulders. “Gorgeous. You recognised the potential there, Milan. Congratulations. But it’s far too cold to go out without a coat, and that thing she was wearing before is far too offensive to the eyes. How about this?”

She held up a long black coat in some kind of matted velvet fabric, with faux-fur at the neck and cuffs. Milan shrugged and put it on Lydia, who found that it fitted quite snugly once buttoned, and was both warm and striking.

“My
goodness
, you are going to
slaughter
them out there,” exclaimed Maxine. “Shall I just throw the old things away? Burn them?”

“No!” protested Lydia, but Milan was laughing at the suggestion and nodding his head.

“Keep them,” he said. “If she ever wants them back, she can come and collect them.”

Outside the shop, Milan put his hands either side of Lydia’s nipped-in waist and gave her a long, hard look.

“Maybe I could get my hair done,” said Lydia timidly, too aware of being a sex bomb only from the neck down.

“Hair done? Why?” Milan seemed lost in a world of distant thought, disconnected from reality.

“For the opera?”

“Opera? We’re not going to the opera.”

“Oh, but I thought—”

“The time for thinking is over. I have one thing on my mind and one thing only.”

“The tickets…” But her heart wasn’t in it.

“I have to take you to bed. Now.”

He hooked an arm around her waist, hand tapping her hip impatiently. Then he dragged her through the Saturday shoppers and tourists, so fast she had to run, which was difficult in the unfamiliar high heels Maxine had put her in. The long velvet coat flew out behind her, net petticoats swished around her knees, and Milan bore her away to a place that now seemed ten times more appealing than the Royal Box at Covent Garden.