Robin Schone (17 page)

More scribbling. Less oxygen.

“A woman, mademoiselle, is not afraid to explore a man’s body to find out what it is that pleases him.”

Michael and Gabriel had been friends.

The key to Gabriel, Victoria thought, lay inside that friendship.

“Is Monsieur Michel as well endowed as Gabriel?” Victoria asked recklessly.

Danger charged the erotic tension.

She was going too far, those silver eyes said.

Every nerve inside Victoria’s body agreed.

The metal tape dug into Victoria’s right shoulder. “They are both reputed to be built like
des etalons”
—

the measuring tape crawled down her spine to her waist, was held firmly in place—”like stallions.”

The heat of madame’s fingers dissipated; it was replaced by the scribble of figures.

Victoria’s breasts shimmied with the force of her pounding heart.

There was nothing Gabriel could not see in her position: the lift of her breasts, her unprotected armpits,

the ribs that stuck out too sharply, the protruding bones of her hips, the dark triangle of hair between her

thighs.

The dusky rose lips that peeked below.

What had been dormant before was now swollen with desire.

Did he see her?

Had the modiste seen her?

“Is it necessary for a man to be large in order to satisfy a woman?” Victoria asked, heart inside her

throat.

“Non.
But a man who is
un prostituee
is not expected to be an ordinary man. Women do not want to

pay for
une bite
that is no longer than their own fingers, mademoiselle.”

Une bitte.

Victoria had no problem identifying the modiste’s French.

Did Gabriel refer to his member as
une bitte?

Had he spoke French to the women who had purchased him . . . or English?

“How large does a man have to be,
madame,
in order to be compared to a ... a stallion?”

The metal tab dug into Victoria’s left shoulder. Madame René’s fingernails traced the tape, imprinting

the inches into Victoria’s back while she audibly counted.

“One inch . . . two inches . . . three inches . . . four inches ... five inches ...” The sharp fingernails

trailed over her shoulder bones. Victoria felt the measurements deep inside her vagina. “Six inches ... seven

inches .. . eight inches ... nine inches ...”

Victoria couldn’t breathe. The silver eyes inside the mirror were overlaid by the vision of a man’s

member—of
Gabriel’s member
— eight inches long,
nine inches long. . .

“A man must have at least nine inches to be compared to
un etalon,
mademoiselle,” Madame René said

decisively. Her measuring fingers suddenly skimmed down Victoria’s back and pressed the tape into her

waist. And then they withdrew—the vision of a man’s burgeoning member, madame’s fingers, the

measuring tape.

The silver eyes did not withdraw.

The manual measurement of Victoria’s flesh was reflected in his gaze.

Gabriel had said that he was more than nine inches.

How much more? she wondered.

“Has a man ever begged you for release,
madame?”
Victoria asked, body so brittle that it felt like it

would crack.

Gabriel’s molten gaze froze into silver ice.

“That is what
un prostitute
does, mademoiselle—give pleasure.” The modiste scribbled down

measurements, seemingly impervious to the significance of Victoria’s question.
“Le plus
pleasure, the

better,
oui?

The more pleasure, the better.
Yes.

“Has a .. .a patron ever caused you to beg, madame?”

A garrote closed around Victoria’s neck.

“Non, non,
do not move, mademoiselle. I must take this final measurement.
Voila.”

Victoria stood still.

The measuring tape tightened about her throat—

“When there is mutual respect and affection”—warm breath tickled Victoria’s back—”there are a

thousand methods by which a man and a woman can make each other cry out with pleasure.”

—and then
Victoria was free.

The modiste made a notation, a quick grating of lead on paper.

The silver eyes inside the mirror held Victoria’s gaze.

“And when there is no respect...” Victoria dryly swallowed, “or affection?”

“It is a rape of the senses.”

Madame René stepped back.

“Whereas seduction, mademoiselle, is a teasing of the senses. It is painting naked images with words. It

is creating the anticipation
of... un baiser,
a kiss .. .
une caresse,
a caress ..
. un embrassement,
an embrace... That is the art of seduction,
n’est-il pas,
Monsieur Gabriel?”

“Out,
Madame René,” Gabriel agreed neutrally.

Beneath the coldness inside his eyes was the imagery the modiste had deliberately implanted.
Un

baiser,
a kiss.
Une caresse,
a caress.
Un embrassentent,
an embrace.

Victoria imagined Gabriel’s masculine flesh—his
bitte
—kissing her, caressing her, penetrating her. Eight

inches,
nine
inches . .. Gabriel imagined Victoria’s feminine flesh embracing his, inch by inch by inch.

The modiste had skillfully forced them to confront their desires.

“I will send clothes for mademoiselle
immediatement,
monsieur,” Madame René said with satisfaction.

“Au revoir,
mademoiselle.”

In the mirror Victoria watched the back of Madame René’s tasseled bustle saucily sway, recede.

Gabriel suddenly stepped out of Victoria’s sight; the French modiste disappeared through the doorway.

Leaving behind her a fully clothed man who denied his desires and a naked woman who had openly

revealed her wantonness.

Victoria dropped her arms. Cold, damp hair tumbled down her back.

She pivoted, hair pitching over her naked shoulders.

Gabriel stood beside the door. The shadow that had enveloped his face in the mirror was nothing more

than the dark stubble of beard. His facial hair was the same color as his eyebrows—brown instead of

blond.

He wore the white silk shirt he had worn the night before. It was minus a collar. Cuffs. Studs.

The shirt was rumpled, as if he had slept in it. Dark hair the
color of his eyebrows and beard stubble

curled through the open V of the white silk.

Victoria stared at the dark curls of hair. They would tickle a woman’s breasts, surely.

Without warning, a picture of the combination bath and shower flashed before her eyes. The two sprays

that had been angled downward had been hip high. Had they been lifted, and the cock turned, water would

have sprayed directly between her thighs.

Her clitoris throbbed in sudden comprehension.

Victoria’s head jerked up.

Gabriel’s silver gaze waited for her.

“The Liver Spray... It is not positioned to massage the liver,” she said inanely.

He did not pretend to misunderstand her.

“No.”

Victoria thought of the staid, respectable people who viewed the combination bath and showers at the

Crystal Palace. Did they know that a spray that was advertised to massage the liver, was in fact used for

so-called self-abuse?

Her gaze instinctively dropped down to Gabriel’s thighs.

“Is the spray stimulating for men?”

The black silk throbbed in time to the pulsations beating through her own body.

“Not to the extent that it is for women.”

His voice was cool and composed.

Victoria’s gaze snapped back up to meet his.

“Yet your shower has that accessory.”

“It came equipped with it.”

“Was Michael the man whom you outbid?”

Victoria’s hair stood on end at the electric tension that emanated from Gabriel.

“No,” he said politely. “The man who bid on you was not
Michael.”

“But Michael was there in the saloon,” Victoria persisted.

“Michael was in the saloon,” Gabriel agreed lightly.

There was no lightness inside his eyes.

Les deux anges.
The two angels.

They are rivals,
Victoria had said.

They are friends,
Madame René had corrected her.

“The man whom you outbid ... Is he the one whom you thought sent me to you?”

“Yes.”

If I had not bid on you, mademoiselle, you would die a far worse death than any caused by

corrosive sublimate.

Victoria’s rapidly rising and falling breasts belied her outward calmness.

“Is he the one whom you think will kill me?” she asked evenly.

“If I do not keep you safe, yes.”

But he did not know if he could keep her safe.

“How long did you eavesdrop?” Victoria asked before she shattered with the brittleness of danger and

desire.

“Long enough, mademoiselle.”

Long enough for what?

“Do men want to be loved?”

“I would not know, mademoiselle,” he politely evaded.

Neither did Victoria.

“Do you refer to your . . . male member ... as a
bitte?

The electric light was too bright.

“No, mademoiselle.” He did not acknowledge her impertinence by so much as a flicker of an eyelash. “I

refer to it as my cock.”

“Do you get erect when you are with women?”

“I have not been with a woman in over fourteen years,” he said flatly.

“I am not ignorant, sir.” Victoria’s nails dug into her palms. Pleasure.
Pain.
“I am fully aware that a

man does not need to have sexual intercourse with a woman in order to get erect.”

“Perhaps you should rather ask, mademoiselle,” Gabriel said, voice suddenly, dangerously, provocative, “

if I get erect when I am with men.”

The coldness inside his eyes took Victoria’s breath away.

She took her life in her hands. “Do you?”

Gabriel strode toward her.

Victoria’s heart leaped up inside her throat.

Gabriel halted in front of the satinwood fireplace.

Hunkering down, he grabbed the black-iron shovel from the bronze poker stand and pushed aside the

ashes from the night’s previous fire. Leaning over, he grabbed one stick of wood from the wood bucket,

two sticks, three, shirt alternately stretching—revealing the corded play of muscles—and then bunching.

He was hiding.

Victoria knew that because she had spent her entire life hiding.

“Why is it, Mr. Gabriel, that Madame René refers to an orgasm as
voir les anges,
yet you refer to it as

la petite mort?”

Gabriel abruptly rose and reached inside the obsidian urn on top of the satinwood mantel. Squatting back

down, his knees yawned widely.

The taut globes of his buttocks were clearly delineated inside the black silk trousers.

A safety match ignited; sulfur fumes burned her nose. A tiny yellow flame nibbled on a log, spread in a

sheet of blazing blue and orange fire.

Victoria did now know how much longer she could stand naked in his presence. And then she did know.

She could not stand before him naked one second longer.

Victoria pivoted on bare toes that stuck to the wooden floor. Righting herself, she stepped toward the

lifeless brown wool dress.

“If you pick up that worthless rag, mademoiselle, I will take it from you.”

She halted, buttocks tensed.

The silver eyes reflected inside the mirror were above her own: Gabriel had soundlessly stood up.

“You wanted to know if I get erect when I’m with men.”

There was no emotion in his voice; so why did pain suddenly squeeze the breath out of her lungs?

“Yes,” she managed.

“Turn around, mademoiselle, and face me if you want the truth.”

Victoria slowly turned, bare toes mashing polished wood. Squaring her shoulders, she met his gaze.

It was as flat as the mirror behind her.

“A man, mademoiselle, does not need to feel desire in order to have sex, all he needs is a stiff prick.”

Bitte.
Cock.
Prick .

“I don’t”—she tilted her chin—”understand.”

“You were aroused by Madame René’s touch.”

Victoria sucked in air. “How dare y—”

“—because you imagined that it was
I
who touched you.”

Yes.

But she did not say it.

“Sexual organs, mademoiselle, are apparatuses.” Cynicism tarnished the silver of his eyes. “Like my

bath or my shower. If you turn a valve cock”—he paused, allowing the double entendre to sink in, valve

cock,
cock
—”it releases water. It does not care whether it is a man or a woman who turns it.”

If that were the case, then why were his eyes so bleak?

“You are saying that there need not be emotion, or feeling, in order for a man to ...” Victoria struggled to

find the words, she, a governess who had never even heard the word
cock
until six months earlier, “to

sexually perform—”

“That is correct.”

“—and that the . .. that copulation is merely a reflexive response, a matter of cause and effect.”

“Yes.”

She would
not
look away from his gaze.

“Are you saying, then, that you did not orgasm when you were with ... a patron?”

“No, mademoiselle, I am not saying that,” he said frankly.

And when there is no respect. . . or affection?

It is a rape of the senses.

“You do not enjoy sex,” Victoria said.

Gabriel did not deny it.