French Blue (24 page)

He smiled briefly. “Yes. I suppose I do, though I don’t think I could come out and say it in so many words.”

“It’s a guy thing…” She hesitated, nervous about probing deeper. “When you were ill. What did he do?”

“Put his life on hold, as you did for Abi. When I got the news about the illness, he flew over from Oxford. He was supposed to be interviewing his students, but he left his job and came over for two weeks. He wanted me to come and stay with him in Oxford, but I didn’t want to leave Paris. I had my treatment plan there, and I couldn’t face leaving my home. If something happened…when it happened, I wanted to be there so Alex came back and forth almost every weekend.”

“How soon after you found out about the prognosis did Caro leave?”

“The next day.”

“Oh Jesus. I’m so sorry!”

“Don’t be sorry. Not you. I don’t want your pity, and I didn’t want hers. I have thought about things recently, and now I feel that it was better that she left then. I don’t want a lover who stays out of duty, no matter how much I wanted her to stay then.”

“Maybe she couldn’t cope.”

“She had no duty to cope. She owed me nothing but to get on with her life.”

“I don’t think I would desert someone I loved,” said Lisa quickly. “Do you know what she’s doing now?”

“I heard she was back in Lyons working as deputy director of a big public gallery, but I haven’t seen her and she hasn’t tried to contact me again. We’ve both moved to new phases in our lives.”

Had they? Had Olivier really got over Caro’s betrayal and had he really forgiven her for leaving him when he needed her most? Had she forgiven Jody for breaking her heart and almost wrecking her career?

You did that yourself, Lisa. You chose to get involved with Jody. You knew the risks, and you chose to take them.

That was the truth. Jody owed her nothing; what he had done was shitty, cowardly, cruel, but she had chosen to have an affair with a guy who owned her company, with a man who held that much power over her. She’d taken the chance with Olivier, thinking there was no risk but knowing even at the very moment he’d flamed her with one glance across that gallery that she was stepping into a pit of fire.

She dug her spoon into the remains of her dessert, though her appetite had disappeared.

Olivier glanced at his watch, as much, Lisa thought, to punctuate the conversation as check the time. “Do you actually have a meeting this afternoon?”

He glanced at her, mock hurt in his eyes. “Of course.”

“Oh.” She laid the spoon in the bowl, abandoning half the crème brulee.

His expression changed from teasing to intense. “My meeting is with a certain Lisa Archer at a hotel round the corner from here.”

Lisa felt her breathing quicken as Olivier’s hand crept over her fingers. “You know…” she murmured. “I have a feeling Lisa doesn’t think that’s such a good idea.”

Olivier dabbed his mouth with his napkin. “What she thinks is immaterial. All that should concern her is that her Dom demands her attendance.” He lowered his voice. “And her total obedience.”

Beneath the shelter of the tablecloth, Lisa’s thighs were rammed together. She longed to rub her aching pussy against the seat, while Olivier cast her a look that could set the table on fire. “You have an appointment with your Dom, and it would be unwise not to keep it.”

Under the table, Olivier’s hand rested briefly on her knee before sliding under the hem of her skirt towards her stocking tops.

“Can I get you anything else?” A waitress had appeared at their side, smiling.

Olivier’s hand stayed where it was and one finger teased its way under the lace of her panties. She tightened her thighs and buttocks as his fingertip sought the sticky warmth of her pussy. Any moment, she might pass out from lust.

Olivier smiled while Lisa tried to breathe.

“Only the bill, please,” he said.

“Stand there.”

Lisa waited in the middle of the hotel room while Olivier held out a length of twisted silk black cord.

“While we do this, you will remain absolutely silent, you will do precisely what I ask without a murmur, for once in your life, you will submit to me absolutely without question or hesitation. You understand this?”

A moment of rebellion. She could laugh at him, tease him; she could walk out of here right now. It would be easier in the long run than taking this step, one that would only make her fall deeper in love with him—deeper within his power.

“Even now you defy me?”

She cast her eyes to the floor. “
Oui, maître
.”

“Well, at least you admit it.”

“
Desole
,
maître
. I won’t defy you again. I agree to your terms. Please, I want to submit.”

“Whether you want to submit or not is not the point. It is what
I
want that is important, and I will make sure that you regret your agreement before this is over. There is no point in this exercise if you want it. You need to experience what it’s like to hate what is happening to you but to accept it anyway.”

Lisa’s legs trembled. She hadn’t heard Olivier so determined. She couldn’t detect a trace of irony in his voice. What on earth did he have in store for her? All she knew for certain was that her stomach was in knots and yet her panties were wet. How she’d missed this cocktail of fear and desire. How could she ever have thought she could live without it, without
him
.

“Will any of this be… It will only be
us
?” She lifted her eyes to his face.

His face was impassive. “One more word of question or defiance, and this is over.”

She needed no other threat.

The silence lengthened out, then she decided. Now or never. She couldn’t let him go yet. She had to find out how far he could go; how far she could go. Her focus was the floor, the wooden parquet, the grain, the lines. There was no mention of the safe word. Was it already implied between them that she could use it? Or was she expected simply to endure and accept?

She said nothing, simply stood. Then jumped as the quiet was shattered by sharp hand claps.

“
Bien
. Get undressed quickly. Leave your clothes on the floor and wait for me.” There was a pause, then he added. “In a respectful manner.”

If this was a joke, if he was teasing her, it was an Oscar-worthy performance, because she had no temptation to throw back a sassy reply or laugh. Not because she was afraid of him; she trusted him absolutely. What was making her hands shake and her limbs liquefy was her own desire to submit; her need to do exactly as he asked to the letter. She wanted to be afraid, to lose herself in total submission to him. At this moment, after all the tension and stress of the past few weeks, months, year, this was her moment to plunge into the depths and lose herself, to be a different Lisa and forget the wrongness or rightness, the guilt, the past and the future.

She focused on the floor again. The wood was obscured by the puddle of her dress and thigh-highs. Her heels lay nearby, one on its side, one upright, her panties a straggle of lace by their side.

“Oh.”

A sharp tug on her ponytail brought her chin upright. The whole room was in front of her eyes for a few moments, then snatched away from her again. A thin band of elastic was snug around her skull as Olivier slipped a mask over her eyes. The darkness was instant and absolute. There was no need to cast her eyes to the floor; he had robbed her of sight.

His breath was warm against the nape of her neck. “Nothing to say to me?”

“No.”

“In French and correctly this time.”

“
Desole
.
Non, maître
.”

“Better. Now, before our serious play begins, I have a little game for you. Hold out your hands.”

Lisa stretched her arms in front of her, the palms turned upwards, trembling. Her sex was sticky with anticipation. “What’s that?”

Olivier pressed his forefinger softly to her lips. “Shh. No words for now. Concentrate on your sensation. I bought it in a store in London. The British are so practical and creative.”

The object confounded her expectations. It was heavy, smooth and cold against her hot and itchy palms. It felt a few inches long and about an inch in diameter, the size and feel of a glass paperweight, yet she could tell it was made of metal. By its weight, steel. She rolled it in her hand and felt its shape, bulbous at one end, tapering to a blunt but pointed tip. She counted them as she fingered the fronds. One…two…there were eight, each a thin strip of leather. The tails were long, well over a foot, she guessed, maybe even two feet, soft and sensuous under her exploring fingers. The leather tails and the hard steel plug contrasted deliciously, and her nipples hardened.

She guessed the toy’s dual purpose, and her muscles responded by tightening exquisitely.

“Well? What do you think?”

“I know what it is and what it’s for. But it’s so heavy.” Balancing the steel toy one palm, with her other Lisa’s fingers circled the leather tails fastened into the base. “And these…”

“To help you pay for your pleasure later.”

“Pay?”

“The price will be twenty lashes.”

Gulp. Pause.

“A suspended sentence. Today, only the plug. Before we go on, I must know. Is your obedience to me sincere and full hearted?”

“Of course.”

“Before we start, I’m going to tell you what will happen so I don’t have to interrupt our play. The steel plug will feel strange at first, perhaps a little uncomfortable, but it shouldn’t hurt. It should feel full, illicit, and when I fuck you, more intense than anything you’ve experienced before. You must use your safe word if you’re not okay, and I’ll stop. Do you promise you’ll do that?”

Lisa felt goose bumps pricking her arms and thighs, her stomach, as Olivier took the whip from her hand. There was a soft hiss, and the air moved as he swished it through the air. She longed to remove the mask to see him handling it with his slim, strong fingers.

“I will help you to the chaise. You will lie on your side, and you will remain silent unless I ask you to respond to me. Is that clear?”

With his hand at her elbow, she shuffled and felt her knees gently bump the edge of the chaise. Being blindfold and naked made her utterly helpless.

“Sit down, then lie on your side.”

She sat and lay on her side with her knees bent loosely. She heard him moving, picking up her hands and looping smooth, twisted silk around her wrists. She exhaled as the cords were pulled unexpectedly tight and knotted firmly, securing her wrists together. Next, cords were tied around her ankles, drawn taut and knotted. The hide was cool and smooth against her cheek, shoulder, waist and thigh. She was naked and tied, trussed like a captive animal, absolutely helpless.

And the darkness was absolute.

Olivier had moved away. She could hear his boots on the wooden floor, hear the lid of a box being opened.

“Oh…”

She gasped as a cool, fragrant lotion caressed the skin of her butt cheeks. Gently massaging it over her glutes, caressing, he parted her cheeks and rubbed the lube between them, around her entrance. She tensed. His finger intruded, gently and slowly, but nonetheless, her most intimate place had been invaded, and her muscles protested at the strange intrusion. She tried to hold back her protest.

Olivier laid a hand on her hip. “Relax. It will get easier.”

It did. He eased his thumb inside her, spreading the lube into her cavity and around the entrance to her bottom. She wasn’t sure she liked it, yet her dripping sex told her otherwise. The sensation of his fingers inside her was forbidden, illicit. It was only social Lisa, conventional Lisa who objected. The real Lisa wanted this.

She became used to the sensation of Olivier’s finger and felt empty when it was withdrawn. Almost immediately it was replaced with a new invader, not warm and flexible, but cold and hard. The plug urged its way inside her, and while she desperately wanted to relax, her muscles tried to repel it. Olivier spread her cheeks wider. “
Cherie
. You want this. Let yourself breathe and accept it.”

She tried to relax, loosen herself everywhere to receive it. Then she unclenched, and the muscles relaxed. She wasn’t in pain or discomfort—yet—but there was nothing comfortable. The slightest movement made her glutes tighten round the plug, reminding her of the strange and glorious fullness.

“Oh my God.”

“
Oui
.”

His lips rested on her spine, his breath warm against her skin. “You are very snug now?”

“Hmm.”

“When I fuck you, it will be amazing, but first…”

He untied the bonds and helped her to her feet.

“Stand up and look at yourself. So wanton. So beautiful.”

He pulled off the mask, and she felt lightheaded with desire and a wanton shame. The full-length mirror revealed a naked Lisa, flushed, with the tails of the whip falling from her butt like a feathery mane. It was bizarre yet sexy, wicked and wanton. Her nipples hardened.

“I adore your body, your breasts and bottom, and now I know them more intimately than you do yourself. Your body is mine. I want to take the rest of you now. Do you want that?” Olivier was behind her. He nuzzled her shoulder and gently nipped her collarbone, but the pressure drove her wilder. The hands of the woman in the mirror touched her pubic bone, rubbing and massaging. She pushed her bottom back against him, the tails of the plug pressing against his erection. My God, did he know how much she wanted him? She didn’t want to think how much, or think at all.