Wild in the Country

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Wild in the Country ISBN # 978-1-906328-19-1 ©Copyright Portia Da Costa 2007 Cover Art by Anne Cain ©Copyright July 2007 Edited by Claire Siemaszkiewicz Total-e-bound books This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Total-e-bound eBooks. Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Total-e-bound eBooks. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork Published in 2007 by Total-e-bound eBooks 1 The Corner, Faldingworth Road, Spridlington, Market Rasen, Lincolnshire, LN8 2DE, UK. Warning: Warning: This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has been rated Total-e-melting.

WILD IN THE COUNTRY Portia Da Costa

Notice from the author Wild in the Country is an erotic fantasy. In real life, always practise safe sex.

Trademarks Acknowledgement The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmark mentioned in this work of fiction: Whiskas Cat Food:

Mars Incorporated.

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Chapter One A Farewell is Observed

Eyes... Watching eyes... She could feel them tracking over her. Monitoring her every response. Noting every grimace, every movement, every lift of her hips as she squirmed beneath Ian’s steady thrusts. Closing her own eyes, she tried to concentrate on her pleasure, but felt it slip away without those watching eyes. What’s wrong with me, she thought, as Ian began to kiss her neck in just the way he always did. It was pleasant, and sometimes it aroused her intensely, but suddenly she felt her involvement waver and fade. Any moment now, sex would become a chore, just something to be got through, and depressingly, she’d start to act and to fake. No! It mustn’t happen! Winding her arms tighter around her lover, she tilted her pelvis, straining for more contact, more friction, more excitement. No! No! she thought, then saw the eyes again, the eyes that were narrowed now, observing acutely but without any sign of passion. “Damn you!” she muttered, shaking her head. “What’s the matter, love? Are you all right?” Ian stilled, ever the careful and considerate one, and lifted his face to look down into hers. “Am I hurting you, Flor? Shall I stop?” “No! No, don’t!” gasped Flora, not seeing him at all, “Go on, I want it! I want you!” But it wasn’t really Ian that she wanted, even as he resumed his even, measured thrusts. It was the watcher she needed, the watcher in her mind. The one who was now smiling slightly with amusement. Conscious of him, conscious particularly that he was a man, she brought her legs up and let Ian go in deeper. She heard her boyfriend groan as she rocked her hips and curved her back, but all she cared about was what the watcher thought. The eyes in her mind were dark, and the face a mystery, although somehow, she could see the mocking smile. Watch then! Watch this! she thought defiantly, lifting her legs higher and swirling her body slowly, whilst reaching down to cradle Ian’s bottom. The eyes

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brightened, grew hotter somehow, and a new and somehow complimentary heat seemed to surge through Flora and settle in the niche of her vulva. She was turning on now, enjoying her body, feeling the familiar inner sparkling of an orgasm growing closer and closer. Don’t go! she said to the eyes as they seemed to tease her, to hint that their interest was waning. Don’t go, you bastard! Don’t go now! In her panic she thrashed harder against the bed, and heard Ian moan as her fingers brushed the cleft of his bottom. His body liked that, but his mind didn’t, and his pelvis jackknifed crazily, fucking hard as if to punish her for a perverted indiscretion. That’s better! the voice behind the watching eyes seemed to say. Show me more! Go further! Make it darker and dirtier and I’ll stay... I would if I could, thought Flora in her last lucid moment, but she knew it wasn’t worth the effort in this case. Even so, she couldn’t govern her fantasies... In her mind the watching eyes became those of many. She was spread on a bed, being fucked, not by Ian but by the first teasing watcher. She couldn’t see his face, but she could feel his body, bigger and stronger than any man she’d ever before been with. His penis was so thick and so long that her inner channel was constantly being stretched and pummelled. Every thrust, every slight plunge knocked perfectly on her clitoris, and two hands, two big, long-fingered hands were beneath her and caressing her bottom. In her dreamworld, she matched this, and the other watchers murmured softly in approval. Stroking and probing, she sensed them come down from their vantage points and gather around the bed in a close, attentive circle. She couldn’t see their faces any more than she’d been able to see that of the first watcher, but again she was aware that they were smiling, talking and encouraging, their words aimed at both her and her partner. “No! No! Agh! Oh God!” cried Ian as she dug her fingers into him, her nails breaking the skin of his bottom. In Flora’s mind a great cheer went up, a cry of enthusiasm and merriment, and in her body, low low down in cradle of her pelvis, the sparkling became a white flame. A ring of pulsation seemed to expand out of nowhere, and with a long groan, she surrendered to her climax. The voice of the watcher said “well done”...

When Ian had gone, she returned to the bedroom, and one after another peered out of

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its two open windows. Had there really been someone watching them? Had someone really observed what could quite possibly be their last time together? Both windows were quite large for those of a cottage, and in the heat of the afternoon stood open. Even if no one had been watching, it was very possible that someone had heard them... The air was still, and Pennyroyal Cottage wasn’t all that far back from the road. And both she and Ian had cried out loudly at the height of their pleasure. Even now, lurid stories might be flying around the village. All Marwick Magna could be on fire with talk of the new woman from town who made love in broad daylight and with all the windows flung shamelessly wide open. As she considered the idea, Flora liked it. It was just the sort of thing that she’d abandoned her old life for. She wanted to be dangerous now. She wanted to be thought of as a daring woman, a sexual woman. Not just an efficient employee and a very suitable prospective wife. She’d tried so hard to explain this to Ian, to everybody in fact, but all she’d met was blank faces and astonishment. In the end, she’d given up trying and just made her plans without consulting anybody. There had been a furore, but the memory of it was fading. She was here now, free and independent and living in the country. The rest of her life was hers to dispose of as she chose. She was also free to be watched if she so wanted. One window gave out onto her back garden, and then beyond it a long, broad fallow meadow that sloped uphill towards a distant stand of trees. Stepping back to the bed she lay down for a moment then looked out towards the field. They’d need a good pair of binoculars, of course, but anyone standing on the crest of the rise would be able to see a couple making love. Turning her head from the side to look along her prone body, she narrowed her eyes and studied the view from the other window. Again, it was just conceivably possible that she could have been watched from the cottage, or more accurately, the house next door. An upper window of Orchard House looked out towards her bedroom, but the angle was a bit steep for good observation, she guessed. However, if a Peeping Tom were inclined to climb a little, one of the trees the house was named for made a perfect alternative vantage point. It was sturdy and mature, and

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someone crouched in the fork its branches would have a grandstand view of her bed. For one brilliantly illuminated moment, Flora imagined her watcher, in that tree, with his binoculars. She saw him braced, his face intent behind the glasses, his body taut, his crotch clearly swollen as he observed her writhing naked on the sheet. Without thinking her hand stole downwards. So you like a show, do you? she asked the unknown and invisible spectator. She’d got dressed again to say goodbye to Ian in the garden, but her cotton skirt didn’t present much of a barrier, and the pants she wore beneath it were tiny. After a moment, she had her pubis and her thighs uncovered and available; her skirt at her waist and her panties at her knees. Would the watcher like what he saw? she wondered, parting the soft auburn curls at her groin. Was she his type? Did he like leggy, creamy-skinned redheads? Or didn’t the rest matter when she was audaciously showing him her sex? Wriggling, she used her free hand to push her pants down to her ankles, then pressing her feet together, she let her knees fall apart. She was spread now; her pussy on display for him, as wet as it had been before. With one finger, then two, she rummaged through her fleece, and exposed the swollen jewel of her clitoris. There! she told him. Do you like that? Flexing her inner muscles she made her sex pout and jump like the exotic contortions of a strip club performer. The creation, then release, of tension in her vulva made her quiver, and her pleasure begin to mass and roll like thunder. As she tapped her clitoris, she gripped a nipple through her T-shirt, then cried out as a circuit formed inside her, and silvery sensation leapt from one node to the other. Her bottom lifted from the counterpane, and then beat down again as she thrashed against the mattress, her sharp cry piercing the peaceful afternoon. A little while later, she sat up, acutely aware of her exposed state. She reached down, to pull up her pants, then froze at the creak of the bedroom door opening. For a second, she envisaged her watcher walking in and then joining her on the bed. It seemed perfectly feasible that he abandon his looking for touching. Her heart banged in her chest, as the old door slowly moved, then steadied a little when the newcomer finally appeared. “Come here, you rascal,” she said softly as a large, well-fed looking tabby cat sashayed fearlessly into the room, then sighting her, ran lightly towards the bed.

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Peculiarly embarrassed, Flora pulled her pants up quickly and straightened her skirt, then took the cat in her arms as he leapt up. “You’re a naughty boy, Arnold,” she whispered, wondering if all these delusions of being observed were down to the animal. Cats were notorious starers; perhaps her new friend had slipped into the bedroom while she’d been making love with Ian? Maybe the scrutiny had been real? Not human, inscrutably feline. “Are you hungry?” she asked the cat, setting him down as she rose from the bed, “I am. Let’s go and see what your Auntie Morwenna’s left in store for us.” Pennyroyal Cottage’s kitchen appeared period, but underneath was reassuringly modern. With Arnold swirling around her heels, Flora opened up the fridge and took out a small pyrex casserole which was filled to the brim with a rich-looking stew. A yellow post-it note had been affixed to the dish’s lid, and on it were brief but explicit heating up instructions, which were finished off with a large, floridly scrawled ‘M’. Morwenna. “I wonder what she’s like?” mused Flora to Arnold, as she took out another of Morwenna’s welcoming gifts— one of several chilled bottles of white wine. She poured a glass, then set the stew in the oven, gave Arnold some Whiskas, and took her drink through into the sitting room while she waited for her meal to heat through. Morwenna Carfax was a village dweller with whom Flora had been put in touch by the property agent. “Someone who’ll help you settle in’ was the way the man had described her, and the moment Flora had heard that creamy, husky voice she’d known it was one she could trust. One she could warm to. As a friend, or perhaps even more? Shaken by her thoughts, Flora sat down on the over-stuffed chintz-covered sofa. What had made her think that again? She remembered her response when she’d spoken to Morwenna Carfax on the phone. It had astounded her then, and it still shocked her now. It was excitement, a pure sexual excitement, brought on solely by a beautiful low voice. “We’ll look after you,” she’d said, “Don’t worry... You’ll be welcome in Marwick. Especially if you’re pretty and you’re clever.” Loafing back amongst the cushions and closing her eyes, Flora took a sip of wine and tried to picture Morwenna. The voice was sultry, exotic, dark almost, and the first face that came to mind was Morticia Addams. Flora laughed, and stroked Arnold as he leapt up on

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her lap, then felt a little giddy at the strangeness of her thoughts. Her notions about a woman she didn’t know. Morwenna was a countrywoman, obviously, so she could well turn out to be a plump, rosy-faced matron, not a willowy seductress. And yet...the voice and its inflections were pure sex. She imagined a slender body, flashing eyes, a lush mouth— and from her first foolish ‘connection’ a silky, dead straight fall of black hair. Morwenna would be a ‘touching’ person. Someone who laid her hand on your arm as she spoke to you. Someone who thought nothing of putting her arms around you, hugging you, kissing you. Flora gulped her wine, almost feeling those female lips against her own. Soft womanly lips that tasted of apples and spices and honey. She imagined a tongue seeking hers, duelling with it boldly, and tapered fingers travelling slowly across her body. “Jesus Christ!” she exclaimed out loud, causing Arnold to look up disapprovingly. I know I want to experiment a little, she thought, to push the envelope and try new things. But women? Flora would have liked to get more wine, but the enormity of her thoughts— and the settled presence of the cat—seemed to freeze her. She turned the image over in her mind — herself and another woman—and after the first initial jolt, it seemed less shocking. Why not? she asked herself. Especially if this Morwenna was beautiful. There was a flash of colour in her peripheral vision, and she turned towards the polished oaken table. On it was a small, terracotta pot filled flowers—nasturtiums, marigolds, sweet peas—picked and arranged, presumably, by her as yet unseen welcomer. Beside the flowers, there still lay Morwenna’s note. Placing a softly protesting Arnold on the cushion at her side, Flora crossed to the table and began to re-read it. Dearest Flora, welcome to Marwick Magna, it said, in a large and elegantly rounded scrawl. I took the liberty of tidying up the cottage for you, and stocking your fridge and your store-cupboard in readiness. Call it a welcoming gift on behalf of the village. There’s a casserole in the fridge that just needs heating up, and plenty of salad and bread to go with it. Ring me, or better still, call and see me when you’re settled in. Follow the lane back into the village, turn left, then left again and you’ll find us. Looking forward to meeting you and getting to know you. Love, Morwenna. At the bottom there was a hasty ps. Your cat is called Arnold, by the way, and his food is in the cupboard by the sink. He likes his chin tickled and he’s very well behaved. The notepaper was headed ‘Redlake

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House’ and bore both an address and a local phone number. A short while later, Flora sat down to sample Morwenna’s casserole. She’d been a little dubious about such a hearty dish on a warm summer’s day, but the first mouthful revoked her doubts completely. The rich, dark stew was the most delicious thing she’d ever tasted. Redolent with herbs and spices, and what felt like a fair degree of alcohol, every morsel was a delight to the senses. Flora remembered the property agent saying that Mrs Carfax was a professional cook, amongst other things, and if the quality of this dish was anything to go by, she was a preternaturally skilled one as well. Does she put so much love and attention into everything she does? mused Flora, her mind flying back to its earlier erotic tack. Would just being with Morwenna be a feast? she thought, savouring the tang of the exquisitely cooked meat. Would the woman herself be as delectable as her food?

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Chapter Two Dreams and Surprises

The next morning, Flora woke with a start. The sun was shining into her room, its light dense and yellow, its heat stealing across her limbs like the slow sweet touch of a lover. Sitting up, she wondered what time it was, then got a surprise when she saw her bedside clock. Ten fifteen. She never usually slept so late, nor so deeply for that matter. Was it the wine she’d drunk? It didn’t seem so. She had no headache, no whispers of queasiness; in fact she felt better and fitter than she had for a long time. But as she ran her hands down her body, she blushed. Before going to sleep last night, she’d masturbated again, and the memory of it returned to her vividly. The urge had come on suddenly, as she’d lain in bed and felt the resonances of the day in her body. She’d been relaxed, deliciously so, after a long, hot soak in her new bath, and she hadn’t been sure whether it was the water—and what had appeared to be a home-made aromatherapy bath oil—that had mellowed her, or the wine, or Morwenna’s luscious stew. The bed itself had excited her. She’d aired it, but she still seemed to smell the faint odour of sex. She thought of her ‘farewell’ to Ian, then her own pleasure afterwards, and the soft, white sheets seemed to demand that she continue. Slipping off her night-dress, she listened to the night breeze whispering through her unknown neighbour’s apple trees, the sound like obscene nothings in her ear. In need of a focus, she reached for a book, one of a pile of several that lay on the bedside table, presumably left by the cottage’s previous owner. “Oh wow!” she muttered, then smiled wryly, when she realised exactly what she’d discovered. All her adult life, and particularly in the past couple of years, Flora had enjoyed reading anything about sex. She’d sought out glitzy, block-busting novels that contained explicit love scenes; high profile women’s glossies with daring articles; and even—occasionally and trying

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to make a joke of it—she’d slyly perused girlie mags that had belonged to various boyfriends. Recently, however, her secret passion had become easier to satisfy. It was now quite fashionable for women to read pornography, and there were plenty of books and magazines available. Even so, she’d never mentioned it to Ian... Stuff him! she thought defiantly, beginning to flip through the first book in the pile—a paperback volume entitled The Cognoscenti, and written by one Madeleine Reynard. The book was a revelation. Scan-reading some sections, and studying others more carefully, she discovered it to be the story of an inquisitive young woman’s initiation into a secret society of perversity. In a gradual, sometimes graphic, sometimes subtle process, the heroine unearthed what amounted to a parallel world almost; a sexual world that existed within the everyday one, yet separate from it. The concept was unlikely, but the writing was compelling. One passage in particular entranced her; a scene where the heroine was ravished by a biker in black leather. The man was faceless, a cipher behind his deeply tinted visor, but Madeleine Reynard had made him seem irresistible, the very essence of dark sexual menace. Flora had a good idea what was going to happen, and that the biker was going to turn out to be the hero of the book, but she still imagined him to the accompaniment of delicious tremors, and imagined his cock riding her while his face was still hidden... Dropping the book a moment, Flora stroked herself furiously. As she panted, she wished she had three hands, so she could touch both her breasts and her vulva simultaneously, whilst continuing to turn the book’s pages! What if there really is a hidden world, she wondered, one where women get seduced and pleasured by men they didn’t know? She read on a little, entranced by the story’s decadence and mystery, then abandoned it and concentrated on her body, using her fingers to bring herself to orgasm, while her mind pictured the biker between her legs. Her dreams afterwards were peopled with bizarre images... She’d dreamed of Marwick Magna, and a dark figure riding through it on a gleaming black motorcycle. The faceless road warrior now became the watcher she’d imagined that afternoon; only in the dream, she was lying naked on the village green while he observed her. And beside him stood a beautiful, mysterious woman... Morwenna perhaps? Men—and women—approached across the grass and began to make love to her, control her, dominate

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her. Using her body, but giving her pleasure as a reward. “My God,” Flora muttered now, as the recollections of last night made her pulse race. Rising from her bed she stretched her arms and yawned expansively, then stopped, staring across the room in horror. The night being hot, she’d left the windows open, both of them, and the breeze had blown the curtains back against the wall. Even now, the secret watcher might be looking at her, his motorbike parked out of sight down the lane. Reaching for a robe, she shrugged into it, then peered out of first one window then the other. There was no one that she could see out in the meadow, and the apple tree was reassuringly free of spies and mysterious men in black leather. But when she looked down into the next-door garden, and the plot of flower-bordered lawn towards the rear of the house, she did catch her first glimpse of her new next door neighbour; the man the property agent had told her was the world famous artist, Declan McKenna. McKenna wasn’t the long-haired, grey-bearded eccentric that Flora had been expecting. He was youngish, handsome, and muscular, and his straight dark hair was probably about collar length, although it was difficult to tell at the moment. He was cross-legged on a blanket in the middle of his sunny lawn, describing quick charcoal lines on a open white sketch block. There was a coffee mug beside him, and a half-eaten slice of toast on a blue plate by his knee—and as far as she could see, he was sitting there naked, apart from a pair of elegant, metal-framed glasses. Hardly breathing, Flora drew back into her bedroom. For a moment she felt a strange guilt, as if she’d deliberately spied on his nudity, then dismissed it. The man must be fully aware that he was on view to his neighbour, so his naked state was a deliberate provocation. She sensed a challenge, and her body’s mettle rose to it. Feeling her sex tingle delicately, and her nipples begin to harden, she stepped forward to observe McKenna from behind her curtain. His genitals were hidden by his sketch-pad, but every part of him she could see was impressive. His chest was broad, and his gleaming back was massive. His arms and thighs seemed hewn from corded muscle. She imagined him as a pin-up boy, or an athlete, a sexual icon for the new breed of woman, all the more tempting because he had an artist’s soul and a special talent. Pressing her hand against her crotch, she longed to meet him, then wondered

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suddenly, did he ride a motorcycle? Flora bathed and dressed as fast as she could, then appraised herself quickly in the mirror. Her figure was quite good enough to interest him, she decided: her breasts were rounded, her thighs long, her waist slim. She’d chosen a snug, white vest and a lemoncoloured cotton skirt that swirled flatteringly about her legs as she walked. Her face wasn’t very tanned yet, but she had a liberal dusting of tiny auburn freckles—something she’d hated as a child, but now liked. Her reddish, goldish hair was newly cut in a short, elfin crop— which she also liked—and her eyes were bright and her soft, pink lips were full. She had a feeling, well, more a hope really, that Declan McKenna would find her diverting. “Good morning, Arnold,” she said to the cat, as she walked into the kitchen. Her new companion wove himself winningly around her legs while she prepared both his breakfast and her own, then ignored her the instant his dish was down. “Males, you’re all the same,” she murmured, picking up her tea and cereal and heading for the sitting room. Passing through the tiny area that served as a hall and a place to hang coats, she got a surprise. There was post on her mat. She’d told a few friends that she was moving and given them her address, but hadn’t expected anyone to do anything about it. To have mail on her first day here seemed extraordinary. Settling down on the chintzy sofa, she began slitting envelopes. The first was a note from her mother full of advice and admonishments about living in the country. Flora smiled wryly and put it aside to reply to in a day or two. The next two turned out to be junk mail circulars addressed to The Occupier, and the next item was a ‘good luck in your new home card’ from her ex-colleagues at the bank. This too made her smile. She hadn’t realised they all thought so much about her, although she noted the significant lack of Ian’s signature. The last piece of post was puzzling. Turning it over, she saw no address, no stamp and no postmark, so obviously it’d been delivered by hand. The envelope was long and narrow and made of heavy, cream-laid paper, obviously expensive, and obviously high quality. Its only distinguishing mark was tiny flower drawn in exquisite detail on the flap. Intrigued, Flora picked at the edge, then quickly pried it open. She’d half expected the letter to be another from Morwenna, but she quickly realised it

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was not from Mrs Carfax. The paper had the same dense, creamy texture as the envelope, and the printed text was crisp and clear, probably done on a laser printer or a bubble jet, but the words themselves were quite astounding. She felt first her neck, then her face, then the whole of her body fill with a fiery, racing blush as she read them. Welcome Flora, the message began. Or perhaps I should say Wild Flower? It’s obvious you’re untrammelled by inhibition... Yes, my dear Flora, I hope you’ll be happy here in the country, and I hope I can soon get to know you... Very well. I hope it won’t be long before I’m touching that sublimely smooth body of yours... Exploring its every contour; feeling its textures; tasting its tastes... I’d love to press my face between your long, silky thighs, beautiful Flora, and to smell the musky scent of your pussy. I’d love to twirl those soft red curls in my fingers, then open you, explore you, give you pleasure. And I could, you know... So easily. I’d slide a finger inside you—two perhaps?— then I’d massage your swelling clitoris with my thumb. Or maybe I’d lick you instead. Lash you with my tongue until you scream and shout and climax, then go on and on ‘til you pass out with pure sensation. But perhaps you’d like to give me pleasure instead, Flora my Flower? You look like a girl who’s far too generous to be shy... You could stroke my body, use your mouth on me, get to know every last inch of my eager skin... I’d like you to touch my thighs, my belly, my genitals... oh, and my backside too. My crease. Let’s not be coy... my arse-hole. Because you seem to know exactly how to do it. I can just imagine your dainty finger deep inside me... Alas, sweet wild Flora, this is all getting too much for me! Thinking of you, and watching you, has got me all worked up... And I’ll have to do something about or I’ll go crazy. I’ll use my own hand, but I’ll be dreaming that it’s yours... Until next time, the letter finished prophetically. It was unsigned, but below the bottom line—in capitals—was typed THE SCRIBE. Flora hunched tensely on the settee, her breakfast forgotten. Anger swirled inside her, vying with lust and pure shock for supremacy. Her body was hot, embarrassed and aroused in equal parts, and her mind awash with confusion. It must be from him! Declan McKenna. Who else could have been watching her so closely? Who else could have seen the colour of her pubic hair? Who else could have... An even more hideous thought popped to the surface. My crease... My arsehole... You seem to know exactly how to do it...

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Good God, she’d been right! Somebody had been watching... And they’d watched her with Ian—taking notes, by the sound of it. They’d seen her clutching at Ian like a mad thing, touching him and fondling him while his cock was buried deep inside her. But even as she seethed, a subversive inner voice spoke up clearly. And pointed out her own irrationality. You enjoyed it, the devil’s advocate said. It was that sense of being watched that got you off, made it special. You ought to be thankful, not angry, you ungrateful little fool. Whoever this ‘Scribe’ is, he wants you, and in your heart of hearts, you want him to want you! Flora glanced toward the window and the flowering hedge that divided her land from McKenna’s. Her first impulse had been to storm round there and have it all out with him, but that combative urge was now changing. And what if she were wrong? There were two windows in her bedroom, and consequently two directions from which to watch. What if it were someone strolling in the meadow who’d seen her? Someone who just happened to have a pair of field glasses? It wasn’t unknown to carry binoculars in the country. Declan McKenna was a handsome man, a gifted man who she’d tentatively hoped, well, perhaps more accurately day-dreamed, might help her. It would be silly to start out by picking a fight with him. Looking down at the letter, she re-read its sensual message more positively, then realised that she now had just the entrée she needed. Especially now it was more than his artistic guidance she was hoping for. With the letter in her pocket, she made her way down her path, out into the lane, then along it ‘til she reached the next gate. A moment of doubt assailed her as she reached for the latch, but she quashed it and passed through into Declan McKenna’s garden, then walked as quietly as she could towards the rear of the house. Rounding the corner, she found him sunbathing, his magnificent gilded body moist and gleaming. She could smell a strong but not unpleasant odour coming off him, and saw an uncapped, unlabeled bottle on the tartan rug at his side, containing a fluid that looked thin and rather milky. She supposed it was a sun lotion of some kind. He was still completely naked, and his glasses lay abandoned by the bottle. “Good morning, Flora,” said a deep American voice that went well with the solid, Godlike body.

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Completely thrown, Flora dithered. How on earth did he know who she was? He hadn’t even looked up at her yet, much less been introduced. “I... I...” she stammered, her eyes locked on Declan McKenna’s firm, hard buttocks, “Hello, Mr McKenna—” She froze again. He was turning over... “I’m sorry...but how the devil do you know who I am?” “Word travels fast in Marwick Magna,” said the nude man before her, stretching luxuriantly, his musculature flexing and rippling, “I didn’t think it’d be all that long before we met... Would you like some coffee?” He nodded towards his empty mug, “I’ve got a potful on the hob inside.” “N... No, thank you.” It would choke her, she was sure. She couldn’t think about drinking; she wasn’t even sure she remembered why she’d come here; she could only stare at Declan McKenna’s naked body. And the beautiful penis that nestled between his thighs. He wasn’t erect, but he wasn’t completely flaccid either, and even as she watched his flesh twitched and seemed to thicken. “Does my nakedness bother you?” he enquired with a grin. “I can get dressed if you prefer... but it seems a shame on a glorious day like this.” “No, it’s fine. Stay as you are,” replied Flora, managing to claw back a little of her composure despite an awareness of her own body’s responses, “It’s just that where I used to live, people don’t go in much for nude sunbathing... The gardens aren’t as secluded as yours.” “I can imagine,” he murmured, shifting to one side of his rug, “You’re a city girl, aren’t you? Come to the country to escape all the madness... Why don’t you sit down—” He patted the tartan cloth a couple of feet from where he lay, “—and tell me all about yourself and why you’re in Marwick.” Trying not to look at Declan McKenna’s cock, Flora sat down at the extreme edge of the rug and folded her skirt protectively around her legs. What could she tell him that would make sense? Her reasons for being here would sound crazy enough as it was, without her ability to describe them being fuddled by his splendid naked presence. Plucking absently at the grass, she began:

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“Well, as you already seem to know, my name’s Flora Swain, and up until a month ago I worked in a bank. I was a small investments advisor, quite a good job, really, but not exciting... Not very fulfilling to the real me... Do you understand?” Declan nodded, smiling slightly. Of course he understood, he was an artist. Bank work would stifle a man like him. And he’d have to wear his clothes all the time, she thought, managing an amused little smile of her own. “I was fed up. In a rut. Bored to death,” she glanced across at his drawing pad, and saw that he’d been sketching a woman’s shapely torso, the curves rich, the breasts and pubic triangle wildly exaggerated. “Then, out of the blue, I was left some money. Quite a lot of money, actually. And I decided I’d do what I wanted with it, not what everyone at the bank said I should so with it. Investments and suchlike.” She looked up, feeling stronger, and somehow pleased with herself. “I packed in my job, gave notice on my flat, and started looking for somewhere entirely new to live... Somewhere in the country. And I found this place—” She nodded over her shoulder towards Pennyroyal Cottage, “in one of the Sunday supplements. It said “beautiful idyllic surroundings”, “carefully renovated property” and stuff like that. And I just knew in my heart it was for me!” “But what are you going to do here in the country?” enquired Declan softly, his brown eyes intense and challenging. “Tend your garden... Make preserves... Press wild flowers?” A thrilling shiver shot down Flora’s spine and seemed to coil itself like a serpent in her sex. His question had been casual, off the cuff, almost mocking, but did she detect an emphasis on those final two words? “I might do all of those,” she replied airily, “But what I really want to do...” It petered out again. Her aspirations would sound puerile to a man who could do, effortlessly, what she only dreamed of. “What is it you want to do, Flora?” he prompted, regarding her steadily, his hand resting—she noticed—on his thigh, just a couple of inches from his semi-erect cock. “Well, ever since I was a kid, I’ve love to draw and sketch and paint... So I’ve decided that now I’ve got a bit of money to tide me over, I’m going to take art seriously and see if I’m any good. That’s why I came here, to Marwick Magna. The literature about the cottage said the village is a bit of an artist’s community. A haven of creativity and all that... I thought this was a good place to settle. I hoped that with all that artistic talent flying around, some of it

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might settle on me.” It’d come out in an ill-considered tumble of words, and pulling up more grass stalks, Flora waited for the inevitable laughter. “That’s a great idea, Flora,” he said, surprising her. When she looked up, his dark eyes were warm, but quite serious. The mockery of a few moments ago was gone. “You’ll do okay here. There’re plenty of people in the village who’d be willing to advise you... Even I could, at a pinch.” He grinned, but it was an honest, boyish grin. “But I warn you, I don’t pull my punches. If your work is crap, you can be sure that I’ll tell you!” “That’s what I want! An honest opinion...” Flora caught her breath, stunned for a moment, when Declan’s fingertips drifted across his penis, the action natural and entirely unselfconscious. “And is that one of your drawings?” he said, apparently unperturbed by her scrutiny, and the fact she was blushing as red as carnation. Flora was puzzled for a moment, then looked down and saw the corner of the envelope protruding from her skirt pocket. For the past minute, while describing her high hopes and her dreams, she’d almost forgotten about her lewd, exotic letter, but now she drew it out and turned over in her fingers. “No. No, it isn’t.” She hesitated, knowing that to show the letter would bring a whole new set of parameters to their barely nascent relationship. Change it from a flickering, delicate flirtation into an erotic torch that might be difficult to govern. “It’s something someone posted through my letterbox this morning,” she said, taking out the single sheet of paper and unfolding it, “I... I wondered if you knew anything about it.” “What is it?” “It’s a letter, of course?” Was he teasing her again? She held out the cream-white paper towards him, and waited for him to take it. But he didn’t... “It’s your letter, Flora. You read it to me.” “I... I can’t!” It was obvious to her now, that he’d written it. “Then neither can I,” he replied, his voice sounding a little odd and tense, “Words

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aren’t my thing, Flora. I express myself in other ways...” He nodded towards the rough but powerful drawing, then shrugged his shoulders and looked vaguely resigned. For a moment, Flora felt confused. Not only by Declan’s nakedness, but by the letter, its contents, and his strange refusal to look at it. Suddenly a hideous idea occurred to her, something more embarrassing, in a different way, than anything that had happened so far. He can’t read, she thought, feeling a peculiar mix of astonishment, pity and tenderness. He’s intelligent, obviously, and artistically gifted beyond measure, but for some reason, he can’t decipher the written word. Feeling a profound urge to reach out and hug him, she withdrew the problematical letter. “I... All right then,” she said, looking down and blushing again at the rawness of the language. “Welcome Flora,” she began. “Or perhaps I should say Wild Flower? It’s obvious...” It was only one page, just a paragraph or two, but it seemed to take her a century to read. She stumbled over some words, and had others dry up inside her mouth, but eventually she whispered, “And it’s just signed “The Scribe”...’ “So, do you have any idea who might have sent it?” asked Declan, quite calmly, as pornographic letters were read out to him every day. “I thought—” She stopped short and looked at him in alarm, horrified at the thought of facing his illiteracy head-on. Declan said nothing, but just flashed her that peculiar half-regretful smile again. “I’ve no idea at all,” she continued, relieved by his tact, “I don’t know anyone here yet. I’ve spoken to Morwenna Carfax on the phone, but I haven’t actually met her... This could be from anybody...” She looked down at the letter, seeking answers but getting none, “Anybody who’s passed across that meadow since yesterday,” she nodded towards the field at the back of their two properties, “All they’d need is a good pair of binoculars.” “Most country people have field glasses, Flora,” replied Declan, “For bird-watching, for observing wild life—” He grinned again, “I have some myself... And I’m sure there’s a pair somewhere in your cottage too, if you look for them. So I wouldn’t say that owning a pair of binoculars necessarily makes anyone a suspect.” “I suppose not,’ said Flora doubtfully, “But who’d write such a thing? It’s... It’s...” “Sensual? Flattering? A turn on?” suggested Declan, his eyes glittering, “You’ve got to

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admit that he—or she—thinks very highly of you... If I’d received that—” He nodded at the letter, “I’d be making every effort to reach out to the person who’d written it.” Flora fell silent. She felt at a loss, out of control, strangely vulnerable. She did want to meet her ‘admirer’, but she didn’t have the slightest idea how to find them. “Morwenna will help you,” said Declan, breaking her fugue, “Morwenna knows everything and everybody. The whole of village life here seems to revolve around the lovely Mrs Carfax.” “Yes,” said Flora, preparing to get up, but feeling distinctly reluctant to abandon the glorious sight of Declan, “I think I’ll go and see her. Show her the letter...” “That’s great, Flora,” said Declan, darting out to grip her wrist with a big, strong hand, “But before you do go. Will you do me a favour?” “Yes. Yes, of course...” Flora felt something flutter in her mid-section, and her heart begin to race. When she looked downwards, she saw Declan was now erect... “Oil my back for me,” he said, his eyes dancing and his mouth totally wicked. He’d seen her ogling his cock, that was obvious. Releasing her hand he lay down on his front, then gestured towards the bottle of milky lotion. “That’s the stuff... One of Morwenna’s finest concoctions. Complete protection and terrific for the skin.” Flora picked up the bottle and sniffed it dubiously. The scent was powerful and citruslike, with elements of flowers and spices. When she poured a little of the mixture onto her fingers, its consistency was thin, but unexpectedly silky. She shuddered. To the touch, it felt extraordinarily like semen, and to look at it there wasn’t much difference either. “Yeah, I know... It reminds me of that too,” said Declan as if he’d read her mind, “I think Morwenna does it on purpose... Everything she does is provocative, and everything she makes either turns you on, or looks like something to do with sex.” “You sound as if you know her well,” said Flora, tentatively dribbling a little of the lotion onto Declan’s broad back, then smoothing it in with the pads of her fingers. His skin was fine-textured, but so warm it felt feverish. “You could say that,” he murmured, chuckling softly. They’re lovers, thought Flora. The tone of voice gave it away. There was passion beneath the surface, and memories and possessiveness. Her own jealousy was a strong as it

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was sudden. “And what about her husband?” she asked crisply, hoping to score a point as she added more lotion, then slicked it over the plains of his shoulders. “Robert?” Declan settled himself a little on the rug... “You can do my ass, you know... It won’t mean we’re engaged or anything...” Flora slapped a dollop of the white lotion on the crown of each buttock, and massaged it in with a fair amount of force. When Declan moaned softly, she almost tipped the bottle over, feeling the muscles beneath her fingers flex and tense. “God, that’s good,” he whispered, a shudder ascending the whole length of his back. “What about Robert Carfax?” insisted Flora, feeling her own body shake, and remembering the words in her letter. “Robert’s a great guy. A good friend of mine. He’s devoted to Morwenna... But then we all are,” he paused, his thighs stirring and his toes curling on the rug, “You will be too, when you meet her.” Flora couldn’t think about Morwenna. She couldn’t really think about anything, except the naked male flesh beneath her fingers and the uninhibited reactions of the man she was anointing. Declan was sighing now, quivering and squirming on the blanket, rubbing his crotch against the firm earth beneath him. By now, Flora had coated his skin from his heels to his hairline, but almost dreamily she poured more lotion on his bottom, then began working it in in meticulous little circles. My arsehole... My crease... she thought, feeling her consciousness drift. She pressed with her thumbs, and made the snug aperture of his anus stretch and pout. Declan scrabbled at the blanket, then twisted it maniacally between his tightly clenched fingers. “Oh my God,” she heard him mutter indistinctly. “Oh God, please, do it, you beautiful girl!” Do what? Flora asked herself, but even as the thought formed, she knew what he wanted. Clasping hard at one buttock, she slid the thumb of her other hand inside him, the entry made easy by the slipperiness of the lotion. “Yes!” sobbed Declan, the single word cracking with grateful power. Rotating his hips against the mat, he whimpered with pleasure, and the tiny sounds made Flora’s sex respond to him, the very core of her beating like a pulse. He was in her power now, this glamorous, talented man whose company had so

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recently intimidated her. He was a moaning wreck, because she was playing with his bottom. Rocking her thumb, she thought fleetingly of Ian, and how much he’d disapproved of anything like this. He’d been scared, she realised, not man enough to show his abandon. Declan McKenna clearly harboured no such doubts; he could surrender to anything without losing his primal maleness. Feeling his sphincter clench around her slowly thrusting thumb, Flora wondered if Declan were about to climax. His being pleasured like this was clearly a great joy to him, and he might well need no other stimulation. And he was grinding his cock against the blanket. Even so, she leant over him, and whispered, “Do you...you want me to touch you?” She couldn’t quite say exactly what she meant, but Declan understood. “Oh yes, Flora, yes,” he whispered, then rolled over as she popped her thumb out of him. Declan’s penis was a wonder. He was bigger than Ian, bigger by far, and not only in length, but girth also. His fat reddened staff pointed skywards in the sunlight, rising from his groin like a shiny living tower. Flora’s first instinct was to throw her thigh astride him, hitch aside her panties, and just let her wet sex slide down and engulf him. But that was far too much, and far too soon. Good Lord, she hardly knew him! And yet, she’d gone this far now, and made an offer. She poured more lotion on her fingers, then took a hold... Making a ring of her thumb and forefinger, she encircled him, having to stretch around his fat rosy glans. Delicately, but enjoying herself, she worked his foreskin back and forth, smiling mischievously as his tiny love-eye winked. “Harder!” cried Declan suddenly, his teeth gritted and his hands once more gouging at the blanket. “Go on, woman, do it!” he commanded, thrusting up his hips as if to urge her with his body. “All right then,” muttered Flora. Unconsciously, she’d been planning a long, slow rise for him; she’d wanted to show him her skill, what she had of it, and to explore him. But clearly all Declan wanted to do was to come, and come quickly. The bastard! With no further ado, she began to move her fingers jerkily, the action rough as if to punish him for his greed. Declan, however, seemed enraptured. Rising to her strokes, he pushed himself

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upwards through her grip, thus intensifying the length and force of each slick pass. Within seconds, he was shouting—some wordless nonsense that Flora barely heard—and his semen was jetting out into the air. Great droplets arced, then fell back down on him, covering his chest and belly like a string of milky jewels. Flora was dumbstruck. She sat motionless on the rug, watching the white fluid’s pearly, running trails, and feeling Declan subside stickily in her clutching hand. What on earth have I done? she thought, looking down at her semen smeared fingers, and the softening male flesh still clasped in them. It’s probably only half an hour since I met this bloody man, and I’ve just jerked him off! What the hell’s happened to me? How could I do such an insane thing? “Thank you, Flora,” murmured Declan sleepily, “That was incredible... Just what I needed.” He reached down and laid his hand lightly over hers for a second. “It’s going to be quite something having you for a neighbour.” Laughing, he circled his fingers around hers, then drew her hand to his lips to kiss it, his eyebrows lifting as he tasted his own come. “I’m sorry... I don’t know what got into me... I... I...” She couldn’t make sense. She couldn’t think. He’d tricked her into masturbating him, and she should be furious—but all she could do was want what she couldn’t now have. “You’re a wonderful girl, Flora,” he said, turning her hand over and kissing her palm too, then licking it slowly and suggestively. “Would you like me to thank you in return? Properly, I mean?” The inference was unmistakable, and so much what Flora longed for that she almost gave in and let it happen. It would only take the very slightest weakening on her part and she’d be flat on her back on this rug with Declan looming over her, and either his hand, his mouth or his newly-hard cock lodged delightfully and effectively between her legs. “Part of me would,” she began tentatively, then couldn’t help but smile, “And I think you know which part...” Unfolding her legs from beneath her, she stood up, “But I don’t think we know each other well enough just yet.” Declan’s dark brows lifted in mockery, but he didn’t protest. “Fair enough,” he said easily, “But don’t forget to just say the word when you’re ready...” “I will,” replied Flora, smoothing her skirt, then reaching down to pick up the letter. Before she could straighten up, however, Declan clasped her wrist. “Your shoulders are

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getting pink, you know. Do you want me to put some lotion on for you?” “No! No, thanks, I’ll manage!” She pulled herself free, and almost danced away from him. The touch of his hand had stoked fires that she’d hoped were damped. He was so close. So male. So desirable... “Okay, but see that you do something,” he admonished, still smirking. “I couldn’t bear to see that beautiful skin burnt. Although the colour’s interesting...” He cocked his head on one side, his eyes narrowed, as if seeing her suddenly as his model. “Will you let me paint you soon, Flora?” he asked, “You’d make a good subject.” “You’re joking!” “I’m serious,” he said quietly. “And if you like, I’d return the compliment. I’d pose for you, and give you some tips on composition...” Amazingly, he was blushing himself now, “I’m no great shakes as a teacher, but I’d be glad to give it a try.” “I’d like that,” said Flora, stepping away. She could feel her resistance melting. He was too dangerous. Too tempting. “Soon... But I think I’d better be going for now.” She took a couple more steps, and increased the distance between them. “Okay, it’s a deal,” he said, lying down again and closing his eyes. “But promise me two things.” “All right, but what are they?” “One—that you’ll put something on your shoulders immediately. And two—that you’ll go and see Morwenna and show her your letter. If anyone can help you find “The Scribe”, she can...” “I’ll do that... I’ll do both, I promise,” replied Flora, still moving because she was still in deep jeopardy, “Goodbye, Mi— Goodbye, Declan.” He was still laughing as she almost tore down his path.

“Flora, Flora, Flora,” murmured Declan McKenna, stretching contentedly on his rug. His new neighbour was everything he’d hoped for: beautifully naive, but with the promise of profound lasciviousness. Reaching down, he cupped his cock and squeezed it lightly, recalling the novelty and sensitivity of her touch. It had been a great beginning, far more than he’d expected from an initial meeting. But this wasn’t moving matters forward...

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With a last lingering stroke of his penis, he rose to his feet and walked slowly into the house. The coolness of his sitting room was like a balm to his heated body, and as ever, its harmonious aura made him calm. He sat down beside the phone and dialled a number. “Morwenna? Hi!” he said when a familiar and very lovely voice answered, “Get your glad rags on, our new friend is on her way...”

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Chapter Three The White Witch of Marwick Magna

“Well, Arnold, I’ve done it now,” Flora told her cat as she walked into the cottage. Arnold looked up from cleaning his whiskers and seemed to nod, while Flora looked down at her hands. Her fingers were sticky where she’d caressed Declan McKenna. “Is this how you’re going to get to know people, Flora?” she asked herself sternly, running upstairs to wash, “By touching them up as soon as you meet them!” What she’d done with—and to—Declan had been preposterous. And yet on another level it had been the most natural thing in the world. Once she’d abandoned her old self, her old ‘bank and safe boyfriend’ persona, it’d been wonderful. To touch a handsome man, just because she wanted to. To give him pleasure without mind-games or bargaining. She wished now that she’d taken him up on his offer, and let him touch her in return. His hands were big, like the rest of him, but he was an artist and would be capable of finesse. She stared at herself in the mirror. Her eyes were bright, the pupils huge and dilated. She was fully aroused, and between her legs she ached. “You should’ve just gone with it, you idiot, not stalled right on the brink,” she remonstrated as she hunched on the lavatory to spend a penny, all too aware of her heat and her juices. “That’s why you’ve come here... To make a new start in everything, not just to see if you really can draw...” Stripping off her clothes, she washed quickly, then put on clean knickers with her cotton vest and skirt. Her shoulders were a little pink, she noticed, but not as fiery as Declan had suggested. Even so she rubbed on some moisturiser, then smoothed it into her face and hands also. Down in the sitting room, she found her bag, then slipped ‘The Scribe’s’ letter inside it. It did seem logical to show it to Morwenna, if she knew everyone in the village. She’d be bound to have an inkling of who’d written it. “I’m going out now, Arnold,” she told the cat, who was curled up, oblivious, on the sofa, then set off to follow Morwenna’s directions.

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This must be the perfect English summer’s day, thought Flora as she dawdled her way along the lane. The sun was high in the sky, but there was a pleasant light breeze. She could smell flowers, a heady amalgam of the perfumes from the many cultivated cottage gardens, and also from the humbler wild blooms along the lane-side. Everywhere around her was a profusion of natural colour and greenery, and the only sounds she could hear were droning insects. Her understated city flat, and the sterile, null-shades of the bank’s interior seemed like memories of another, distant planet. More than ever, she knew she’d done the right thing. Thinking of the little sketch-block and pencil in her bag, Flora wondered whether to stop and try and capture an impression of the rambling roses that almost covered a garden wall to her left. She’d begun to feel guilty that she’d not even attempted a drawing since she’d arrived in Marwick Magna, but settling in had seemed to consume all her energy. Hesitating by the roses, she made her mind up. She had to get this ‘letter’ business sorted out before she got down to work in earnest, and seeing Morwenna Carfax was a step towards that. Redlake House was a picturesque, characterful, half-timbered structure whose garden was even bigger and more fragrant than the one at Pennyroyal Cottage. Beside it stood an orchard, more mature than Declan’s, and listening carefully, Flora could hear running water, which she deduced was the nearby River Mar. Unlatching the gate, she stepped through onto the path. The front door was painted black, and as she reached for the iron bell-push, Flora realised her insides felt strange. It was stupid to be frightened. She was an invited guest here. But even so she experienced trepidation. Somewhere in the house, she heard the bell chime, then it was answered by a faint set of footsteps. In an instant the heavy door was swinging open... Flora suddenly found herself wrapped in a woman’s warm arms and being hugged against a soft, perfumed bosom. “Hello! You must be Flora!” said a rich, husky and now familiar voice, as soft lips bestowed kisses of welcome. When she was released, Flora stepped back, feeling bemused. Morwenna Carfax did indeed look a little like Morticia Addams, although her skin was

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softly tanned instead of pale. Her hair was a long, blue-black fall, and impossibly shiny, and her mouth was a passionate deep red. Her dark, slanted eyes glittered wickedly. “I’m sorry, Flora,” she purred, reaching out to take Flora’s arm and lead her into the house, “Everybody tells me I’m far too OTT, but I can’t seem to do anything about it... Do come in. I’m cooking at the moment, but I’ll be finished in a jiffy, and then we can have some wine and a lovely long chat.” Thunder-struck, Flora followed her hostess down a corridor, which was lined on either side with beautiful paintings. An antique sideboard she passed was covered with slithery piles of well thumbed art magazines, and several large bookcases were completely crammed with books. “All Robert’s stuff!” said Morwenna cheerfully over her shoulder, “We both have our own special sanctuaries, but my dear husband seems to overflow from his!” “What does he do?” asked Flora, as Morwenna flung open a door and let out a gust of the most fabulous of cooking smells. “Oh, he’s an art historian, technically, but more a gentleman of leisure than anything,” answered Morwenna with a smile as they entered the kitchen. “There’s money in his family, and fortunately some of it’s come his way... He doesn’t have to work too hard to earn a crust.” “And you cook, don’t you?” said Flora, finding her eyes drawn instinctively towards Morwenna’s rounded bottom, as the dark woman bent gracefully to check her oven. She’s gorgeous, thought Flora, watching her hostess closely as she inspected a tray of half-baked pies. Morwenna was voluptuous, but shapely; her breasts full, her waist narrow, her hips generous. She had the body of an archetypal earth mother, yet she was the very opposite of domestic and homely. Exuding an aura of sharp and pungent sexuality, her very presence teased the nerves and the senses, and her muslin dress seemed dangerously insubstantial. “Amongst other things,’ she said lightly straightening up and pulling off her apron. “Let’s have some wine... Some lunch, perhaps? Have you eaten?” “Er... no, I haven’t. But I don’t want to put you to any trouble.’ “No trouble at all,” Morwenna grinned, and as Flora looked on, she opened cupboards, delved in the fridge and gathered crockery, assembling the elements of a meal as they talked.

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“So, Flora, what are your first impressions of Marwick?” she asked, slicing quiche, “It’s certainly the best time of year to arrive... The village looks lovely in the summer.” “It’s wonderful. Everything I’d hoped for,” murmured Flora, her eyes on Morwenna’s rounded breasts. The other woman’s smoke-coloured dress was so thin that Flora could see almost every detail of her body. The thick, erect nipples, the mysterious shadow lower down... Morwenna clearly had no time for underwear. “And the cottage? What do you think of that?” Flora’s hostess was tossing salad now, her unfettered bosom swaying a little as she moved, “I think you’ll find it nice and cool at the moment, but when winter comes, it’s snug. There’s a good deal of money been spent on it.” “It’s very comfortable... I love it! Really!” Flora was aware that she was gushing, but she couldn’t help herself. Morwenna’s sensuous presence was having a powerful effect on her, much as Declan McKenna’s had earlier. She couldn’t stop watching the other woman’s body, breathing deeply to catch her perfume, imagining what she would look like without that excuse for a dress. “And thank you for getting it ready for me. And leaving the food and wine. It was a lifesaver. I was so tired that I just couldn’t be bothered to cook.” “I’m surprised your boyfriend didn’t stay a little longer,” said Morwenna suddenly, her tone innocent, but loaded beneath the surface, “That cottage is a perfect little love nest...” She paused and rearranged some tomato wedges. “And you’re such a pretty girl. I can’t believe that he could tear himself away!” “Oh, he had some meetings to attend—” Flora thought for a moment, then felt suspicious, “How on earth did you know Ian had been to Marwick?” Morwenna laughed. “Oh, this is a very small village, my dear. People notice everything... Somebody passes by, notices something, then at their next stop for a chat, they pass it on... You know how it is...” She gave Flora a very straight, very provocative glance, “You’ll have no secrets here in Marwick, Flora. We all know almost everything about each other...” She paused again and touched her tongue to her full, red lips. “There, that’s everything... We’ll take it to my lair.” Picking up the laden tray, she led the way. “You bring the wine and the glasses.” Yes, and I suppose you know I fancy you, thought Flora, falling in behind her hostess with the wine bottle and two large, crystal goblets. And that I haven’t even the first idea how to do

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anything about it. How do I make a move in a situation like this? What does one do with a woman for God’s sake? Morwenna’s ‘lair’ was much like its owner; a vividly beautiful overload to the senses. A large, airy, garden room, it opened out onto a lawn via an elegant French window, which threw light onto an Aladdin’s cave of wonders. The furniture was a delightful jumble of a dozen different styles: a couple of overstuffed easy chairs covered with multi-coloured throws; two oak desks—one cluttered with books and magazines, the other, surprisingly, housing a computer; a decadent looking Louis Quinz daybed with an embroidered bedspread; a long, scrubbed bench of some kind almost covered with rank after rank of small bottles containing oils and crushed herbs, whose smells seemed to permeate the whole room. Good God, it is a lair! thought Flora, stepping over the threshold. It’s a witch’s den; an alchemist’s laboratory. I’m not safe here... I should run but I can’t! “What about your pies?” she said, snatching at a lifeline. “Oh, don’t worry... The oven has a timer. And Robert will be wandering into the kitchen about now, looking for food. He’ll check on them... He’s rather good like that.” Flora wondered briefly about this art historian husband—he must be quite a man to have captured a handful like Morwenna... “Now, tell me all about yourself,” said Morwenna when they were settled, “and why you came to Marwick Magna.” Her dark eyes were penetratingly intent. Flora knew it would be hopeless to dissemble with Morwenna, so she didn’t even try to. Pausing only to take the occasional gulp of wine—another home-made product, tasting of gooseberries and very, very strong—or forkful of food, she poured out almost the whole her whole story of her life. The bequest; her need to break away; even her dissatisfaction with poor, unimaginative Ian. As the level in her wineglass went down, the story became easier to tell. And her companion seemed more and more bewitching. Almost without noticing, she began talking about sex. “I care for Ian, really, but somehow... I don’t really know how to say this—” Flora paused, put her glass to her lips and realised it was empty. Without speaking, Morwenna leant over and topped it up. “He doesn’t seem enough for me any more. I... I want more. And different things... Ian disapproves of anything kinky.” “Well, that’s a shame, but not a tragedy,” observed Morwenna sagely, “You’re a

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beautiful woman, Flora. You need to be appreciated. Cherished. Indulged...” Her dark, nearblack eyes narrowed. “Have you met Declan McKenna yet? Now there’s a man with imagination...” Am I seeing things, or is she suddenly a lot closer than she was? thought Flora, taking another sip of wine. She was sitting in one of the big easy chairs, with Morwenna sprawled on the floor. The dark woman’s thighs were almost touching Flora’s feet. “He’s very attractive,” said Flora, feeling flummoxed. If she reached out an inch or two she could touch Morwenna’s breasts. “I met him this morning. I went round to ask him about something and he was sunbathing...” Morwenna chuckled again, the laugh as fruity and potent as her wine. “Well, in that case, you’ll know exactly what his best points are.” She put down her glass and placed her hand on Flora’s knee. Flora blushed furiously, remembering her fingers ringing Declan McKenna’s cock. “And I can see that you liked him,” continued Morwenna, her hand almost innocently beginning to stroke. “He’s very attractive,” repeated Flora, wondering how a hand so soft and feminine could feel like a fire through the fabric of her skirt. “So he is,” replied Morwenna, plucking almost contemplatively at a fold of pastel cotton, then edging it upwards along Flora’s quivering thigh. “Did you have sex with him?” she asked, her voice even and normal. “Did he fuck you in his garden, in the sunlight?” “No! No, he didn’t!” gasped Flora, watching the rise of her skirt. She was still holding hard onto her glass of gold-green wine, and she could see the surface of the glowing fluid jittering. It dawned on her that she was being seduced and controlled here just as surely as she had been with Declan, and once again she felt powerless to prevent it. “But you did want him, didn’t you?” persisted Morwenna, her hand stilling, fingers splayed, at Flora’s hip. She’s touching my panties, thought Flora desperately. Any moment now, she’ll slip her fingers under the edge and start touching me. As if it’d heard her Morwenna’s thumb moved slightly. “Flora?” she prompted. “Yes! Yes, I did want him! Of course I wanted him!”

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“That’s good. I’m glad,” murmured Morwenna, leaning forward for a moment and pressing her cheek against Flora’s burning thigh. Her black hair tumbled forward like a wave. “What’s good about it?” cried Flora, longing almost painfully to stroke the silky curtain. “It was the first time I’d ever set eyes on the guy! It was ridiculous! You can’t just have sex with someone you hardly know!” “Why not?” enquired Morwenna, looking up. “I often do... And Declan was a prime example. I can’t think why anyone would want to resist him...” Her face was placid, but her almond-shaped eyes were black with lust. “And you, Flora, what about you?” She glanced towards a small ormolu clock on the mantle-shelf. “It’s what? Less than an hour since you walked into my house? And any minute now you’re going to let me touch you...” “But... but this is different!” Flora’s knuckles were white around the stem of her glass. Morwenna’s fingertips were sneaking upwards, exactly as Flora had predicted. “Because I’m a woman? Because we’re going to be good friends too?” whispered Morwenna, pushing in further and beginning to fondle the soft hair. “It’s no different at all, Flora. I want us to be friends... But I want a helluva lot more than just that.” Flora couldn’t think of anything to say. She doubted if she even could say anything. Morwenna was stroking her pubic hair very lightly, not probing yet, but clearly intending to. She’s a woman, thought Flora again, finishing her wine and letting Morwenna take the glass with her free hand, while below, her other carried on its sensual work. She’s a woman, and she’s started making love to me. “Come on, sweetheart, let’s make things easier, shall we?” said Morwenna gently, withdrawing her hand. “Let’s have all these tiresome clothes out of the way...” Flora sat quite still, mute and submissive, while Morwenna unfastened her cotton skirt for her, then made her lift her bottom so she could pull the garment free. “Good girl,’ whispered Morwenna, “Now let’s have your panties too.” She tugged gently on the thin cotton knickers, and once again, Flora raised her buttocks. “Look how wet they are!” Morwenna pointed to the dark, betraying mark, then touching it with her finger, “Your body wants me, Flora, that’s for certain... Even if your mind still isn’t sure.” It’s true! thought Flora, her heart thudding. Her panties were hanging around her ankles now, and there was no way to deny their fragrant message.

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“But I don’t know what to do,’ she said faintly. “You don’t have to do anything, sweetheart,” said Morwenna, “Not for a while... Just open your knees nice and wide so I can get to you...” Flora complied, the lewd position making her skin turn bright pink. She watched, spellbound, as Morwenna rose to her feet, unfastened a couple of buttons on her dress, then pulled it off over her head in one fluid sinuous motion, before dropping it on the rug with Flora’s abandoned skirt. As Flora had suspected, Morwenna was nude beneath her dress, and her lush body was a unbroken honeyed gold. Someone else who sunbathes naked, thought Flora detachedly, acknowledging the most sublime female form she’d ever seen. “What do you think?” enquired Morwenna softly, posing. With obvious pleasure in her own sultry beauty, she cupped her breasts, then seemed to lift them towards Flora, rubbing the swollen nipples in a slow rhythm with her thumbs. As she caressed herself, her head fell back, and her long gilded throat rippled and arched. Her black hair tumbled down like an ebon waterfall behind her and her splendid hips began to circle and gently weave. Flora’s eyes darted everywhere. The sumptuous orbs of Morwenna’s jutting breasts; her flat belly with its deep, mysterious navel; the glistening triangle of her night-black pubic hair. As if sensing Flora’s scrutiny, Morwenna released her right breast, then set her feet apart and reached down between her legs. Combing her fingers through her wet bush, she parted her labia explicitly, instantly thrust forward with her hips. Flora’s jaw dropped, and she felt her own sex begin to tingle, as without inhibition, Morwenna began to stroke... “Oh yes, that’s so good,” the dark woman groaned, pinching her nipple and her clitoris both simultaneously. Morwenna’s pelvis was beating the air now, but she didn’t lose either her grip or her cadence. Clear juices began to trickle down her thighs. “Oh God, yes! I love this so much,” she cried, her hips jerking and her bare toes gripping the rug. “I think I’d like to come... Ooh, yes!” Her head tilted forward again, and her dark eyes snapped open, “Would you like that, Flora?” she asked, her fingers and her hips still in motion, “Would you like to watch me have my orgasm? Would you?” Flora mouthed the word ‘yes’ but no sound came out of her. She nodded, not sure that her companion had understood.

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Morwenna got the message. Sliding her feet still further apart, she bent her legs to make her sex pout and gape. “Oh, baby...” she murmured vaguely, then with a clever flexion of her wrist she filled her channel, thrusting three fingers inside and jerking crudely. With her thumb she pressed down hard on her clitoris, then twisted her nipple as her hips danced and wove. It took only a few seconds to make it happen. Morwenna cried out, “Ungh! Ungh! Ungh!” her voice uncouth, and her beautiful face distorted. Each grunt was a counterpoint to her humping... “Oh God! Oh God!” she moaned, her knees bending into a deep squat, so her bare sex could get the very best from her hand. From the heart of her trance, Flora realised that she too was moaning involuntarily. She too was touching herself, one hand jammed hard between her thighs. Her clitoris was throbbing as if to mimic Morwenna’s wildness. Her vagina was oozing onto the chair seat beneath her. “Oh, please...” Flora gasped, watching her new friend wring savage pleasure from her climax. “Oh, please, help me,” she pleaded, finally accepting what her body knew she needed. After a moment, Morwenna rose from her farmyard crouch. “Oh baby, I’m so sorry... I’m so selfish,” she whispered, leaning over to kiss Flora’s panting lips, then dropping down again to kneel against her thigh. Closing her eyes, Flora slumped back in the chair, surrendering gratefully to Morwenna’s great experience. She felt the other woman pressing on the insides of her knees, opening her even more, whilst her ankles were still shackled by her panties. The fragile restriction made her feel as if she were bound, trussed up like a helpless victim, and her sex pulsed even harder at the thought of it. “Yes, sweetheart, yes,” cooed Morwenna, as if she were a mind-reader. Flora felt her knickers being twisted somehow, the stricture tightened; then narrow hands were sliding in between her thighs. “Oh, Flora, you’re so wet... So lovely and ready for it...” Skilled fingers dabbled in her juices, coating themselves in readiness, then without warning she was attacked in a way that was unexpected. She yelped, and tried to struggle, but Morwenna’s free hand gripped her hip-bone unyieldingly whilst her other went busily to work.

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Flora moaned in shame, and a dark, unexpected pleasure, as both her vagina and her anus were taken possession of, by a pushing thumb, and a nimble moistened finger. “Relax, my love,” breathed Morwenna, her face against Flora’s twitching thigh as the insulting intrusion continued. “You’ll like it in a minute, I know you will.” Flora had never been gripped like this, both ways at once, and untried, her rectum began to churn. “I... I can’t...” she whimpered fearfully, but just then Morwenna’s finger curved inside her like a hook and found a tender zone that Flora hadn’t even been aware of. She cried out, surprised by an exquisite pulse of sensation in the root of her clitoris, then climaxed heavily, her legs fighting their restraint. While her channel still fluttered, she grabbed her own breasts through her cotton vest and squeezed them roughly. “Clever clever baby,” said Morwenna, from somewhere very close, her warm breath tantalising against Flora’s streaming vulva. “I knew you’d be perfect... Right from the very first moment I heard your voice.” What seemed like a long while later, Flora felt her anus and her vagina become her own again. A moment later, she heard water running somewhere, then she was being wiped, very gently, with a cooling damp cloth, and all her stickiness and sweat cleansed away. “There, that’s better,” said Morwenna, “Now lift your bottom, and let me sponge the underneath of you... Your such a juicy girl, it’s all run down your crack.” Floating, in a daze of contentment, Flora obeyed, then froze in horror as she heard the door being opened. “Everything all right, my—” began a deep, cultured voice, only to stop short in a gasp of admiration. “Oh, my dears, my dears, what a beautiful sight. Please forgive me for interrupting you. I’d better go.” “What is it, Robert?” asked Morwenna imperturbably, continuing with her wiping. Reluctantly Flora opened her eyes. Robert Carfax—in the doorway—was staring directly at her vulva, his face the epitome of male longing. Morwenna’s husband was good-looking in an odd sort of way. His complexion was pallid, and his face rather long, and his brown hair was combed straight back from his forehead. But it was his eyes that made Flora almost forget her predicament. They were a light golden-brown, almost yellow, and they seemed to burn in his face like molten sovereigns.

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“It’s your pies, Wenna,” he said, his voice almost robotic in his obvious distraction. “I took them out and set them to cool in the larder...” “Thank you, my darling,” said Morwenna, turning to smile at him, “I knew I could rely on you... You’re a treasure.” She continued her careful cleansing of Flora’s crotch. “I’ll go... Before I—” He paused, looked boyish and confused. “I’ll see you later, my love.” His remarkable eyes held Flora’s for a second, then he nodded politely, murmured, “Miss Swain...” and left. “Oh God!” cried Flora, turning away and burying her face in the chair arm, her mortification total. Against her will, hot tears began to flow... “There there...” said Morwenna, kneeling up and taking Flora in her arms. Morwenna’s gentle, naked warmth only made Flora sob harder. She hadn’t realised the tension had been building. Sex; the move; her doubts; the letter; Declan; sex again. She’d believed that country living would relax her, but the very opposite was proving to be the case. She was a wound up mass of confusion and turmoil and the relief of weeping was almost as blissful as her orgasm. “I’m sorry. I’m not usually such a ninny,” she said at length, regaining a little of her composure, “It’s just I’m not used to...to all this!” She gestured vaguely, indicating her exposure, Morwenna’s nakedness, and the reverberations of their pleasure all around them. “Don’t worry, you soon will be,” said Morwenna, releasing Flora, then reaching out to pour more wine. She seemed completely at ease playing ‘mine hostess’ au naturel, and Flora got the distinct impression that it was something she did quite often, serving up herself as well as wine and delicious food. “What do you mean, Morwenna?” Flora asked, taking her first, much-needed sip. “Marwick Magna has an effect on people, Flora.” Morwenna slanted her a mysterious, sideways glance. “They tend to lose their inhibitions... Open their minds. The get the urge to try new things...” She turned now, licking droplet of wine from her lips. “Sexual things, usually,” she finished, smiling. “Everyone?” “Well, not every single person... But most. Some of the least expected people have turned into libertines.” “Why? Why does it happen?” Flora was intrigued now, thinking of the sheer volume of

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sexual thoughts she’d had since she’d arrived. “Some say it’s in the water,” replied Morwenna, “A particular combination of minerals. Most of the piped water in the immediate area comes from the local water table.” She drank a little wine, then glanced across at her workbench and her herbs, “Or it could be all the wild herbs growing in these environs. A lot of people use them in cookery. I certainly do.” Flora thought of the deliciously pungent casserole she’d consumed. The lovely flan just now. The very wine she was drinking. If it was the herbs, no wonder she was being affected. “Or it could be magic,” said Morwenna, her voice vibrant as she turned to face Flora, “The village is founded on a pagan temple site... A holy place. They practised fertility rituals here in the druidic age, and they were powerful spells, Flora. Such things have a way of lingering on, even in such modern, technological times as ours.” Good grief, she really believes it! thought Flora. Morwenna’s lips were parted, and her eyes were brilliant. Flora almost expected the other woman’s lustrous dark hair to rise and float in the air, and her fingers to give off silver sparks of energy. Was her new friend a white witch, Flora wondered. And suddenly she had an idea. “This specialness about the village, this eroticism,” she asked, leaning out of the chair to reach for her bag, “Could it have anything to do with this?” She fished out the letter in its cream laid envelope, “It was with my post this morning. It’s unstamped though, so somebody in the village must’ve been around and left it.” She passed it across to Morwenna. “Oh my!” cried Morwenna after a moment, “Oh how absolutely delicious!” She licked her lips again, tracing a fingertip along the printed words, “You lucky thing... You’ve found yourself an admirer already!” Another strange thought struck Flora. Is it you, Morwenna? she asked silently. Are you a writer—and an actress—as well as a witch? “I thought at first it was from Declan,” she said instead, “But then I realised not...for obvious reasons.” Why was it so difficult to mention that problem? Morwenna made a delicate nod of assent, as if she too found it difficult to mention her handsome friend’s plight. “It could be anybody,” she murmured, clearly engrossed in re-reading. Flora noticed that her hand had strayed towards her crotch, “It’s typical of Marwick Magna... Billets doux.

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Sudden affairs... Grandes amours... Like I said, someone’s always falling in lust with someone here.” She looked up, “And if this is the kind of response you inspire, Flora, it’s quite obvious you’re going to fit in very nicely...”

Morwenna grinned, from the window, as she watched Flora Swain walk away down the path, carrying a bottle of wine and a savoury pie in a cardboard box. The girl was delightful, and obviously game—after her first shyness—to plunge in and live Marwick’s strange life. Even though she knew that both the pie and the wine were full of local ‘influence’, Flora had accepted both gifts with evident relish. But what about ‘The Scribe’? thought Morwenna, feeling mischievous. Will she respond to future overtures there just as eagerly? Morwenna suspected that the answer would be ‘yes’. She remembered Flora’s cries of pleasure when she’d let herself be caressed just now. And the girl had even begun responding to the goodbye kiss they’d just shared. Morwenna had been reluctant to let her go, but had given the excuse of more baking to be done, so she didn’t take the girl too far, too fast. “I can wait, Flora my flower,” she whispered, reaching down to touch her vulva through her dress. “Because you’re going to be the very devil of a lover when you’re ready...” “And you, my dear, are the very devil of a lover right now!” said a quiet, amused voice from just behind her.

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Chapter Four Penitence...and More Scribblings

Morwenna spun around and found Robert standing a few feet away from her. She wasn’t surprised that he’d come so close to her unnoticed; his light tread made moving stealthily quite easy. “You’re spying on me again!” she said, mock accusingly. “Someone has to,” he answered, his face mild, his golden eyes intent, “Because otherwise, I don’t know what you’d do.” “I haven’t done anything wrong!” proclaimed Morwenna, enjoying the opening sallies of a game they played often and with pleasure. “Morwenna, you’re outrageous.” He ignored her protest and took her firmly by the arm, “A young woman comes to this house in all innocence, and almost immediately you corrupt her. When will you ever learn to control yourself, woman? You’re an indecent, insatiable predator.” “But you saw her, didn’t you? She is delectable...” She reached out with her free hand, and before Robert could restrain her she touched her fingers to his crotch. To her satisfaction, he was almost erect. “I couldn’t help but see her, Wenna,” said Robert, knocking her hand away, “You’d half stripped her. Now stop this immediately and stand still.” Morwenna had put her dress on again, to see Flora to the door, but beneath it her body began to simmer. Robert’s cool, quiet voice made her nipples rise and pucker and a little river of warm juice filled her quim. She cast her eyes down, to hide her helpless, melting love. “You’re a wicked woman, Morwenna,” Robert observed, maintaining his role, “And undisciplined. Are you going to try and behave yourself for me in future?” “Yes, Robert,” she said quietly, pleating the muslin of her skirt between her hot, restless fingers. It was either that or press them hard against her sex. She adored Robert when he was stern and magisterial; when he acted like a long-suffering uncle. He was only, in actual fact, a

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few years older than she was, but he could play the strict guardian to perfection. “I think, my dear, that as you are so keen to expose young women’s genitals all the time, you should try the experience for yourself.” He looked at her steadily, “Lift your skirt up, Morwenna. Let me see you.” Morwenna blushed beneath her tan, knowing the reaction was ridiculous. A few minutes ago she’d been naked, and happy to be so, but to raise her skirt now was an act of submission. With nervous fingers, she bunched the cloth and pulled it upwards. “Back and front,” instructed Robert quietly. “I think we’ll have your bottom on show as well.” Morwenna obeyed, closing her eyes as waves of lust tumbled through her. Unable to stop herself, she rubbed her trembling thighs together, feeling a little squelch from all the fluid in her vulva. “I’d stop that if I were you,” said Robert, narrowing his eyes. Turning away, he began to walk away down the corridor, “Come along, Wenna, we’re going to my study where I can work and still keep an eye on you. I don’t want any more mischief from you today.” Morwenna could hardly keep herself from groaning as she walked. In a few moments she’d gone from lazy relaxation to intense almost painful arousal. Her engorged sex seemed to bounce with each step, and her swollen nipples were dark and prominent beneath her dress. She wanted to pull them and tweak them as she’d done whilst teasing Flora; she wanted to twist them ‘til she couldn’t help but come. Robert’s office was as elegant and orderly as hers was chaotic, and she could see he was in the middle of a project. A document was still active on the screen of his computer, and several reference books lay open beside the keyboard. Robert was so much more erudite and scholarly than she was, but to Morwenna that only added to his sexiness. She stood quivering and half naked in the room’s exact centre, waiting excitedly while he decided what to do with her... “Well, for a start you can stand in the corner with your hands on your head,” he said, his voice sounding a little bit edgy. Morwenna suspected that he was more aroused at this stage than he wanted to be, and he was cross with himself for his lack of self control. “What about my skirt?” she asked in a small voice. “Let me worry about that,” he replied crisply.

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Morwenna moved to the corner of the room, wondering whether to face the wall, or look out towards Robert. Which would he want to see today? Her lush pubis, or her full, curvaceous rear? She took a chance and presented her naked crotch. Robert opened a drawer in his desk, and took out a number of small metal items, then walked across to her and grasped her filmy skirt. Working silently and neatly, as he did in all things, he pinned the thin cloth in folds at waist level—using safety pins—and left her vulva and her bottom completely nude. “There, that’ll teach you to uncover your guests,” he said, then reached for two other things he’d placed on the sideboard adjacent to her position. Opening the low buttoned neckline of her dress, he eased out a breast and flicked his thumb across its nipple, then caught the tip of it in a tiny silver clamp. Morwenna groaned and wove her hips. “Morwenna!” Robert warned, then drew out the other breast and clamped its nipple too. It was so difficult to control her responses. The clamps were two points of bright fire that were connected directly to her clitoris, and the pain made her throb desperately with desire. She twisted her fingers where they were laced above her head. Robert turned on his heel and walked away from her, his dark-clad line of his back a pure challenge. “Now be quiet, stay still and behave yourself,” he said, checking his monitor, “I want no nonsense from you... I need to work.” Morwenna bit her lips, longing for him. Robert! she cried out inside, as he sat down and began to work. His profile was so elegant, and his skin so smooth and pale... Even the movements of his fingers were evocative. She thought of this morning when they’d caressed her burning core. Slipping into a near trance-like state, she thought of other ways she might yield to the man she loved. She saw herself walking behind Robert through the centre of the village, paraded just as she was now, her body bared and clamped. Her friends would stare at her, point and call out, revel in her shame and her exposure. The thought was so delicious it made her shudder. Feeling her sex pulse, she let her mind enhance the picture. Hanging weights had been attached to tiny rings on the nipple clamps, and gravity

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added another layer of torment. She was clamped in other places too; a pair of swinging pendants were pulling heavily on her labia. “Morwenna,” said Robert softly, not pausing in his typing. Morwenna froze, realising her vision had overcome her and she’d been slowly moving her hips in little circles. “I don’t want to have to tell you again,” he continued, still not turning. The words were authoritarian, but beneath them Morwenna heard his laughter. Her clever, handsome spouse was having fun. Returning to her fantasy, Morwenna added more refinements. In addition to being weighted, there were also objects in both her orifices: front and rear. She bit back on another moan as she almost felt them. In her vagina would be a long, penis-like dildo; it would be thick and pale and ingeniously ridged, and its protruding end would show up plainly against her bush. It would be held firmly in place by a thin white cord that ran lengthways along her sex and this, in turn, would be tied to a leather belt around her waist. The intrusion in her bottom would be enormous and she would feel its hideous presence with every step. It would make her walk awkward, vaguely duck-like and ungainly, and it too would protrude visibly from her body. You’re sick, Morwenna Carfax, she told herself, rolling her pelvis despite Robert’s last injunction. The vision of being exhibited was a powerful one, and the more shaming she could make it, the better it was. Combining this with fantasies of being filled and stretched by inanimate rubber objects—especially in her bottom—was almost enough to make her climax from thought alone. Oh Morwenna, don’t do this! she begged, but once her mind was set in motion she was helpless. Closing her eyes, she pictured a scene that’d really taken place, about a month ago, when Robert had surprised her daydreaming in the kitchen. She’d had a delivery of vegetables, from Patrice at Green Ridge Farm, and a bunch of carrots had been particularly evocative. They were from a beautiful early crop, all thick gold-red and succulent, and though they’d been scrubbed clean they still retained their long green tops. “What on earth are you doing, Wenna,” Robert had enquired, coming up behind her

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and sliding his hands round to cup her breasts. “Declan’s here and we’re both waiting for our lunch.” “Just daydreaming,” she’d answered, catching her breath as his thumbs found her nipples. “It’s these carrots of Patrice’s, they’ve rather got me going...” “I can see that,” murmured Robert, laughing. Her nipples were up like corks beneath her T-shirt. “I expect you were thinking of what Patrice probably does with them...” Morwenna looked down at one particularly sturdy orange vegetable, with its feathery bright green leaves, and imagined the purpose that her friend the farmer might put it too. Patrice was predominantly lesbian, and consequently eschewed the male appendage, but she still had plenty of use for phallic objects. “I was,” she whispered, loving the strum of her husband’s fingers across her breasts. “I was just wondering whether to put one inside me...” She paused, pushing back with her bottom and feeling Robert’s erection nudge her through his chinos. “I thought I might fuck myself with it, and to hell with you and Declan and your lunch!” “You filthy woman,” growled Robert, pushing his penis hard against her crack. His hands gripped her breast-flesh and squeezed. “I’ll show you what to do with your carrot...” His hips rotated and his bulge caressed her cheeks. Morwenna was gasping by the time he released her, then pushed her forward, face down across the work top. “What about your meal, Robert? What about Declan?” she protested, caring nothing for cooking or guests. Her husband was pulling down her leggings now, and bringing the gstring beneath down with them. In a couple of seconds, her rump was naked in the sunlit air. “Food can wait,” replied Robert curtly, his usually soft voice harsh and shaky. Will he beat me, wondered Morwenna dreamily, then saw her husband’s pale fingertips linger on the carrot. Oh, lovely! she thought, wiggling her bottom. “So you like carrots, do you?” Robert murmured, ominously, searching around on the melamine surface with one hand, whilst with the other, he pinched her rounded cheeks. “Well, you shall have one, my dear. In just a moment... And you’re going to have it in a place you won’t forget!” Morwenna squirmed a little, feeling her clitoris twitch and her vulva grow wet. Robert made a small noise of satisfaction—clearly finding whatever it was he was seeking—and in a

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moment, he had both hands on her bottom. One opening her, one rubbing a slippery substance against her hole. “Touch yourself, Wenna,” he commanded, continuing to smear her, and as he applied more and more of what she now deduced was butter. “Oh, Robert, no!” she whimpered, pressing her finger to her clitoris and swivelling it skilfully, as her husband packed melting grease inside her rectum. “Oh Robert, yes!” he told her, and then paused, reaching out again. “Keep touching, Wenna... I want an orgasm from you while I do this.” Something firm and rather cool made contact with her anus, and after an instant began sliding through her sphincter. Morwenna keened at the insulting violation, but nevertheless obeyed Robert’s dictum, caressing her tiny button as the carrot made its entrance. Its very gradual entrance, she realised in desperation. Her beloved husband was trying his best to drive her mad! Inch by painstaking inch, the chunky vegetable slid into her, stretching the delicately sensitive ring as it did so. Morwenna was almost at screaming point by the time Robert had finished, and her innards were alive with wild sensation. “What, no orgasm?” he asked finally, as Morwenna’s thighs quivered with the hot, internal stresses. “I’m disappointed... We’d better put that right now then, hadn’t we?” With no further ado, her reached around beneath her belly, and masturbated her roughly until she shouted. “Oh God! Oh yes, Robbie, yes!” she wailed, her buttocks jerking as the lovely spasms gripped her, making the carrot top dance and bob between her cheeks. “At the risk of sounding clichéd—” said a soft American voice from the doorway, “Is this a private party or can anyone join in?” Morwenna’s orgasm soared up to another level, and Robert’s fingertip continued its wicked work. The pleasure was insupportable—she thought her heart would stop there and then—and the shame was so profound she almost wet herself. Declan, her handsome friend—and also, sometimes, lover—was watching her being brought off with a carrot stuck in her bum. She could hardly bear to think what she must look like. “Morwenna, would you like to tell me exactly what you think you’re doing?” Robert’s soft, even voice brought Morwenna spinning out of fantasy, and suddenly she realised she’d disobeyed him. Her dreams of the kitchen and the carrot had got the better of

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her, and her hands were no longer laced together above her head. One was at her breast, tugging on the nipple clip and the other was hard at work between her legs. “I ought to beat you,” said Robert, his eyes sparkling with amusement as he reached out to dash her hands from her body, “But I know someone who’ll do that particular task far better.’ He paused, then took her right wrist and drew her sticky fingers to his lips. He sucked them briefly. “Mmm...” He reached down and put his hand where hers had been. “I think it’s time we arranged a little session with Crispin, don’t you? You’ve been rather undisciplined of late.” Morwenna’s quim rippled as her husband began to stroke it; fired by his actions—but also by what he’d said. A visit to see the delightfully unremitting Lord Rawnsley was exactly what she needed, but even so she feared greatly for her bottom. Crispin’s hands might be refined and aristocratic, but his arm had all the strength of a navvy’s. After her last visit the marks had stayed for days... “Well?” prompted Robert, his finger on her clitoris, “Don’t you agree? That it’s time to seek His Lordship’s special skills?” “Yes, Robert,” she said meekly, then began to jerk, her knees almost buckling, “Oh yes, Robert! Yes! Yes! Yes!” she wailed, her quim pulsing as she fell against her husband, and felt his powerful arm support her as she came.

Flora spent the rest of the day in semi-shock after she returned from Morwenna’s. Although it’d seemed the only thing to do at the time, her tryst with beautiful herbalist still alarmed her. The full truth of her sexuality took some accepting—and she had to adjust now, to liking women as well as men. Having run a bath when she returned to the cottage, Flora found that after a long period of abstraction, she’d let it go stone cold. Letting the water swirl away, she wondered if there hadn’t been method in her madness. Perhaps she didn’t want to wash the last traces of Morwenna off her? Maybe it was a subconscious way of clinging to her memories? Too restless to draw, to read or to sleep, Flora set off for a walk around the village. Some hours later, she found herself home again, without even really remembering where

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she’d been. She knew she’d met some people; said “hello” and even chatted with a few of them, but the only face she could conjure up was Morwenna’s. The only aura that of her bewitching new friend... It’s true. She really is a witch, thought Flora that night, in her last conscious moment before falling asleep.

The next morning it was the sound of letters dropping onto the mat that woke Flora, and a part of her wanted to race down and see if ‘The Scribe’ had delivered too. The other part of her, however, wanted to remain, warm and sleepy, between the sheets. She’d had a second strange night, with the same sort of dreams, but new images had joined the existing phantasmagoria. In one particularly inflammatory sequence, she’d been back on the village green, and naked again, while both the motorcyclist and Morwenna caressed her. As Flora examined the fragments of this vision, another fact surfaced from her memory. She remembered waking up at some time in the night, and actually hearing the rasping roar of a powerful motorcycle. It was almost as if her mind had made reality out of fantasy. It’d only been the deepest extremes of fatigue that had prevented her from getting out of bed, and looking out of the window, to see if she was imagining things... Did ‘The Scribe’ ride a motorbike and dress in black leather? Flora wondered. Or could it be Morwenna who’d written the raunchy letter? Lingering in bed, Flora imagined that lush, tanned body lying beside her. There was no doubt that Morwenna Carfax was a sensualist of the highest order, and might be that she liked playing word-games as well as games with bodies. And there had been a computer and printer in Morwenna’s workroom. She could easily have written and printed the letter, because even though the content had been detailed and blatant, there had been no concrete indication of ‘The Scribe’s’ gender. Naked and still a little drowsy, Flora rose from her bed. She had to face the post—and possibly ‘The Scribe’—eventually, and having decided to do so, she wanted to act on the decision. Without stopping for a robe, she hurried downstairs. Descending the old stairs with the sunlight pouring in on her, she was suddenly aware of the way her bare breasts were bouncing, and the faint odour of musk on her body.

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There were several things on the mat, but even before she reached them she could see that the bottom-most was a long, cream envelope. Trembling all over, she reached down to pick up the sheaf of mail, then with a supreme effort, she chose an innocuous item first. It was a flyer—one of several—extolling the virtues of a local farm’s produce. The next chit announced a community nature ramble, and the one beneath that advertised the services of one Jack Walters—handyman, carpenter and plumber—who lived in the village and was on call twenty four hours a day. Flora suddenly found herself smiling at this, thinking that with Declan, Morwenna, and the mysterious ‘Scribe’ all showing interest, she didn’t need anyone else to give her ‘service’. “Get real, Swain,” she chided, opening an attractively printed brochure describing a local arts and crafts shop. Reading the brochure brought back a memory from her ‘lost’ afternoon yesterday. She recalled standing before ‘Treasure Trove’ and feeling a faint and rather detached sense of curiosity. The literature announced ‘Art - Images - Books - Everything for the Creative Persuasion’, and Flora wondered, now, how such a specialist outlet could survive in a tiny village like Marwick. And yet now, as her recall became clearer, she remembered seeing customers in the shop, quite a number of them in fact, and a general air of brightness and prosperity. The brochure itself informed her of a mail order service, and contained fulsome quotes from several satisfied customers. I’ll go there, thought Flora, suddenly receiving another memory fragment, the image of a rather beautiful young woman who’d been standing behind ‘Treasure Trove’s’ counter. The girl had obviously been the proprietor, or manageress perhaps, and had been rather striking in a prim sort of way. Flora resurrected an impression of spectacles, a white collar, and an Alice band, and a chin length bob of very shiny nut-brown hair. Dear God, I’m not fancying her now too, am I? she thought, shocked by how clear the picture was. Giving her mind free rein, she imagined going into the shop, flirting with the brown-haired girl, then retiring to a convenient stockroom for some privacy. The idea seemed so natural to her, so free, and so perfectly normal, that it seemed that what Morwenna said was right. The village of Marwick Magna made one randy... “Goddamnit, this is crazy!” Flora muttered, opening the next envelope and sliding out a gilt-edged white card.

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Sir Crispin and Lady Amelia Rawnsley request the presence of Miss Flora Swain to afternoon tea, it was inscribed, and then was followed by a date—the day after tomorrow—a time she should arrive - four thirty - with RSVP and a phone number at the bottom. Flora fingered the golden edge of the card, feeling amused at receiving invitations from ‘the gentry’. Are they sex mad too? she wondered, then imagined a silver-haired Sir Crispin with a prominent erection, chasing a parlour maid around an oak-panelled library. “Crazy!” repeated Flora, throwing the rest of the mail on the tiny table beside the door, and applying her fingernail to the flap of the final envelope. I’ll read this stupid thing, and then I’m going to ignore sex for the rest of the day. I’ll get my gear out and I’ll make a start on some drawing! The letter was printed on the same cream paper as before, and the envelope bore the same little flower. The content was in a similar same vein too... Hello Wild Flower, it began. How do you like our special village? Are you making friends yet? What do you think of the beautiful Mrs Carfax? So, whoever it was knew where she’d been yesterday. Isn’t she luscious? the letter continued. Isn’t she desirable? Aren’t her breasts the most sublime you’ve ever seen? I can just imagine the two of you together, Flora. Your hands upon her body, your fingers in her every fold and crevice, sampling her lushness, her sweat and her juices... Did you lick her, Flora? Did you put your tongue into her pussy and drink her nectar? I would have done... But then again, I’ve already told you what I like. What I’d like to do to your body, pretty Wild Flower... I’d like to see you on a velvet couch, my beauty, with your long legs spread as widely as they’ll go... I’d like to watch a dozen lovers service you one after the other, until your vulva is so aroused its almost painful, and your whole crevice is awash with silky come... I want to push things into you, Wild Flower. Fill both your channels until you’re stretched to capacity, then stroke your clitoris with a feather until you climax. I want to see your juices flowing uncontrollably, and your lovely flesh in spasm around the intrusions... You’ve got me so hot, Flora, just thinking about all that... I feel as if I’m going to explode. One touch from you and I’d be in paradise for hours. I need your hands, Wild Flower, and the gentle touch of your rosy-coloured mouth. I’d like you to sit on my face now, all sticky and stark naked, and ride my tongue until you’ve come a dozen

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times... Oh no, my gorgeous Flora, I’ve gone and done it again. I’ll have to deal with myself to get rid of what you’ve caused... Until next time then, my luscious little Wild Flower... but think of this. All day long, I’ll be dreaming that I’m touching you... So why don’t you dream that you’ve got my hand touching you? “You’re disgusting!” Flora told the absent ‘Scribe’, running her fingertip across the printed nom de plume. She didn’t even feel irritated this time, just amused and turned on by the purple prose. Her intention to avoid sex lay in tatters... Who the Devil are you? she asked silently, re-reading the letter, this time more carefully. Just because Morwenna was mentioned in the message, it didn’t preclude her from having sent it. This was clearly a game that was being enacted here, and it was obvious that Mrs Carfax loved to play... Looking down at her nude body, Flora realised that somewhere in the course of reading the letter, she’d shifted her position. Her thighs were spread, and her swollen sex was gaping. Experimentally, she slipped a hand into her quim and found herself wet and running, as ‘The Scribe’s’ explicit letter had described. Am I going to do it? she asked herself, her fingers tingling in readiness. Here. On the doormat. Where anyone might find me? What if I have a visitor? They’ll just knock and enter... This is the country, and people don’t stand on ceremony. Without answering her own questions she began to rub herself. Working her clitoris rhythmically, she swirled it round and round like a tender little bead. She bent her knees, and opened herself more, thinking of the way Morwenna had performed yesterday; then after a few strokes, she slid her left hand down behind her, and started tickling her anal entrance with one finger. Flora had never felt so depraved, yet so liberated in her life. She was naked and masturbating in her hall in broad daylight, stimulating both her sex and her bottom with no embarrassment. After a few moments, she cried out joyfully as she came. The pleasure seemed to energise her, and feeling light and vigorous, and eager to begin her day, Flora abandoned her mail, and ran upstairs to wash and dress. Thinking of her shoulders, and Declan’s dire warnings, Flora chose a voluminous cotton top in a shade of terracotta, with a tie-dyed skirt that sported the same earthy colours.

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My ‘country clothes’, she thought wryly, doing a twirl and feeling the skirt lift and billow. She’d treated herself to a whole new wardrobe of such loose, light garments, now that she no longer had to ‘power dress’ for the bank. After breakfast, she felt, for the first time since she’d arrived, a real and intense urge to start drawing. Her fingers seemed to itch for a pencil or a stick of conté, and her mind was full of the images she’d create with them. When she’d collected all her materials, she strode out into the garden, towards a little arbour which backed onto the meadow wall. Flora had marked out this particular spot, the minute she’d arrived at Pennyroyal Cottage. At this time of day, the light was perfectly slanted towards the bench that stood beneath the rose strewn arch, and the scent of the flowers that surrounded it was heavenly. Opening a brand new A3 pad, Flora smiled, breathed in, then started drawing. Though she desperately wanted to believe in herself, Flora had always been terrified she was little more than a copyist. This fear was the main reason she’d come to the country; it was a chance to find herself and discover whether she really had a talent. But this morning, however, her doubts were rendered groundless... From the first moment she put crayon to the paper, she felt inspired. Describing one curve, then another and another and another, Flora suddenly realised she was drawing a picture of Morwenna. A naked Morwenna in the stance she’d assumed yesterday; when she’d stood before Flora, in her workroom, and rubbed her vulva. Concentrating intently on the image she was creating, Flora soon realised there was an element of herself in it too. It reminded her of what had happened on the doormat, a little while ago. The figure was more robust-looking than she was though, more pagan. It was a bold expression of every woman at her pleasure, and just to look at it evoked a wonderful feeling of triumph. It was original, it was outrageous...and it was good! Finishing ‘Morwenna’, Flora quickly fixed it, and began a new piece. This time it was a male torso sprang onto the page; another nude, and once again, familiar. Good grief, I can do this! thought Flora with elation as the image of a naked Declan came into being. Working in broad, unhesitating strokes, she exaggerated his musculature a little, and made his penis rampant—although memory told her that he didn’t need much enhancement! She could still feel his hardness, and feel his semen on her fingers. After ‘Declan’ came a series of several other quick drawings, though this time the

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figures were anonymous. Each one was naked, or partially so, and each had a powerful sexual element. They were nothing at all like the rather static life drawings she’d done at her art class; these were dynamic and full of energy and identification. There was something real, from her own persona, in every one. I can do this, she thought again, seeing a sudden glimmer of purpose for her future. Maybe she could specialise? It was a long shot, but there might be a market, out there somewhere, for erotic drawings. Fixing yet another, she started immediately on the next... So absorbed was Flora in her work, that when a shadow fell across her page, she squeaked in shock. The crayon in her fingers jagged crazily across paper, and the stretched out limb of reclining man went wildly awry. “I’m sorry,” said Declan McKenna, looming over her, “Until I frightened you, what you were doing was pretty good.”

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Chapter Five Sun and Roses

“Yes, I thought so too!” snapped Flora, looking up at him, and shielding her eyes against the sun. “Thank you very much, Declan... It would have been the best I’ve done so far.” She was on the defensive, and she knew it, but she wasn’t quite sure how to ‘be’ with him. They weren’t lovers; they weren’t even friends yet; but they’d been intimate in a way she couldn’t ignore. Had he come to repay her for his pleasure? Declan McKenna had clothes on today; if cut-off denims and a tattered vest could be classed as such. His slightly long dark hair was slick and wet from a recent shower, and his tanned feet were devoid of all footwear. Which was probably why she hadn’t heard him sneak up on her. “May I?” he asked squatting down to lift her sheaf of drawings where they lay on the flagstones. His muscular thighs flexed as his body dipped gracefully, and his washed-out shorts moulded faithfully to his crotch. Even with his clothes on he looked positively indecent. “Be my guest,” she replied, feeling nervous. This man was an eminence in the world of art, a genius with a precocious natural talent. She prayed that he’d be both honest—and kind. She’d wanted his advice. She’d even—and she admitted it now—taken this cottage with the hopes of getting it. But at the moment of truth she was scared. “Hutch up,” said Declan, straightening again, and taking a step closer. When she hesitated, he nodded towards the bench. “There’s room for two... Let me sit down and I’ll give you my opinion.” His face was straight, but she sensed an inner Declan laughing. She slid along the seat with a small, nervous frown. Declan was silent for a long, long time, and during all of it, Flora wanted to scream. He hates them, she thought. He thinks I’m a dilettante. A naïf... He’ll tell me I’m wasting my time, and that I should clear off to where I came from! “They’re pretty hot, Flora,’ he said at length, his eyes serious behind the glint of his

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glasses, “You’ve got a nice gutsy style... I like it.” “You’re not just saying that are you?” Flora felt both suspicious and excited at once. “Because... Well... Because of what happened?” For a moment, she imagined she was holding his penis again and hearing his cry of male pleasure. Was he humouring her because he’d made her touch him? Declan laughed softly. “No, I’m not just saying that because you jerked me off. I really do like your stuff...” He paused, then cocked an appraising eye at the drawing on top of the pile. “Although I can see a few ways to improve it... Can I show you?” “Oh, yes, please do!” said Flora eagerly, her heart swelling with a rush of giddy joy. For a moment, all thoughts of flesh and sex were forgotten. The great Declan McKenna was going to help her; and he’d said that her drawings had potential. The alterations were really quite subtle. A line adjusted here; a shading deepened there; a curved area that should be smudged and not hatched. “Now this is great—” he said, taking the conté to the sketch Flora had considered her best. “—but don’t be scared of it. Morwenna has terrific breasts, you might as well exaggerate a bit here... And here. Go for impact. Make her really voluptuous...” He accentuated first one set of curves, then another, “And the same with her hips. Make her an earth mother... Do you see?” Flora did see, and for a moment, she was back in her new friend’s cluttered, herbscented workroom. She looked up to find Declan watching her closely. “Hey! You sly little thing!” His eyes were twinkling dangerously, “This’s from memory, isn’t it?” He touched a finger to the white of the page. “You really have seen Morwenna naked...” Flora blushed. “Go on... Admit it,” he went on, his grin triumphant. Flora said nothing. The more she tried not to think about herself with Morwenna, the less she was able to avoid it, and the memory of their pleasure made her quiver. “She seduced you, didn’t she?” asked Declan more gently, setting sketch-pad aside, and blowing the conté dust from his fingers. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. She’s beautiful, and you’re beautiful... Why shouldn’t you get together?” “But she’s a woman,” protested Flora, knowing her objection was meaningless. She’d

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felt desire for Morwenna; it was a fact. “So?” said Declan, still smiling, “In this screwy place—” He gestured expansively, to encompass the whole of Marwick Magna, “—two girls getting it on is pretty normal... Some of the things I’ve seen would make your hair curl.” Despite her embarrassment, Flora was interested. Declan was a sexy man, who seemed to have few inhibitions. What on earth would it take to shock him? “So?” he persisted again, “Did you get it on with the witch lady?” “Is she a witch?” “Flora, honey, put me out of my misery!” he pleaded, “All this speculation is making me horny!” Without warning, he took her hand and pressed it against him. “Y... Yes, we...did some things...” Flora stammered, not knowing which bothered her most: her own admission or the hard bulge beneath her fingers. “And it was your first time with a woman, right?” he prompted, his hidden penis seeming to leap as he spoke. “Yes.” “How was it? Did you like it?” His voice was changing now, getting gruffer, more urgent. “Did you come?” Flora let out a tiny moan, feeling her sex react, as if his words had caressed it. Between her legs, her thin pants were filled with juice. “Flora!” “Yes, all right! I came! And it was fabulous!” she cried passionately, admitting the truth. “And if Morwenna was here now, I’d do it again. Even if you were watching!” “Lord have mercy, Flora, do you know what you’re saying?” Declan slumped back in the seat as if she’d punched him. “What you’re describing is every man’s fantasy. Two beautiful women making love to each other... You’ve got me so turned on now I’m in agony.” His eyes, which had been closed, snapped open, “Are you going have pity on me?” He grinned. “Again?” Flora was about to refuse angrily and snatch back her hand when suddenly a sly voice spoke up inside her. Her own voice, but sounding subversively different. Don’t be a fool, Flora, it said. He’s gorgeous. He’s intelligent. And he’s available. Don’t cut off your nose to spite your face. She let her fingers press down a little harder.

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“I might,” she said, meeting his look and holding it without blinking. Declan’s reply was to reach out, cup her jaw in his fingers, and draw her face, and her lips, towards his. When their mouths touched, Declan’s opened immediately, and his tongue probed imperiously for entrance. Flora was so surprised by the force of it that she let her own lips part to accept him, enjoying the sweet minty taste of his breath. She felt his penis jerk again beneath her fingers, as if her acquiescence had further excited him, and she squeezed him lightly, acknowledging the reaction, then fought back with her own tongue to challenge his. The kiss, and the smell of roses made Flora’s head spin. The pressure on her lips was so intense it almost bruised her, and Declan’s tongue intent on subduing her. The way he first penetrated and pushed, then licked and cajoled was a self-contained sex act in itself. At her core, her vagina began to shudder. “Flora?” he queried softly, as at last he drew away and freed her mouth. The question in his voice made Flora’s mind up. If he’d simply gone ahead, full of masculine arrogance, she would have balked. But he didn’t. He was just the slightest bit unsure of himself, she sensed, and this hint of vulnerability excited her. Removing her hand from his crotch, she tried to stand. “Shall we go inside?” she asked, trying to project confidence as she made an effort to struggle free of him. Declan grabbed her hand again, his moment of doubt clearly past. “No, let’s stay here,” he said, his eyes dark and fiery, “We’ve got the sun and the roses, it’s perfect...” Gentle but firm, he pulled her down onto his lap. “You mean... Outside?” faltered Flora, torn between misgivings and temptation. “But what if somebody comes?” “Well, for my part, I’m banking on coming...” Declan chuckled softly, plucking at the hem of her skirt, “And I’ll do my level best to make sure you do too. At least once...” “No, I mean a visitor, you idiot,” replied Flora, tensing. Declan’s hand was already well on its way up her thigh now, moving slowly across her feverishly-warm skin. “Don’t get uptight. You’re perfectly decent,” said Declan airily, letting her skirt drift down again to cover his searching hand. Once hidden, his fingers surged higher, pushing quickly beneath the piqué leg of her panties.

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“Declan! Please! No!” she whimpered, as one finger tickled the curls of her pubis. “Declan! Please! Yes!” he mocked, then covered her mouth with own to keep her quiet. This time the kiss was twice as stirring; because each tongue movement was echoed down below. Every time he darted and swirled against her palate and her teeth, his fingertip circled wickedly in her juiciness. She felt him ever-so-delicately bite her tongue, and at the same time, draw back the hood of her clitoris, exposing the tender little bud that lay beneath. He pressed with one finger to keep the tiny thing uncovered, while his thumb settled on it, then rotated. “Oh God,” groaned Flora, her voice muffled by Declan’s tongue, while her vulva seemed to vibrate in a fierce climax. Her legs waved, her feet kicked and danced in mid-air, and her bottom gyrated against Declan’s crotch. “Easy! Take it easy!” hissed Declan, lifting his mouth away from hers, and grabbing her firmly around the middle with his free hand. “Keep still or you’ll have me coming in my pants.” Flora didn’t care. She couldn’t. She felt like a feather afloat on a high wave of pleasure, and she could no sooner keep still than she could keep herself from breathing. Moaning and gasping, she continued to jerk and squirm. “That’s it! I can’t take any more of this!” said Declan, half laughing and half gasping himself. With an abruptness that was shocking, he withdrew his rubbing fingers, and pushed Flora upwards to set her on her feet. “Stand a minute,” he ordered tersely. Swaying, Flora found herself facing out into the calm beauty of the garden, while between her legs a tempest still raged. Too excited to be angry, she clapped her own hand against her pussy, and continued where Declan had left off. Behind her, she heard the harsh rasp of a zip. “I’m sorry, honey,” murmured Declan, and Flora felt his hands join hers beneath her skirt. In a flash he was working on her flimsy, juice-soaked panties, and then letting them slither downward towards her ankles, “But I want to come inside you, not my shorts.” He gripped her hips, let her step out of her knickers, and began guiding her. “Now settle down on me and we’ll both get what we want...” Something hard, yet warm and velvety, bumped blindly against her buttocks, smearing silky fluid along the crease where they joined her thighs. She could feel every detail of the tip

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of him, as it sought its destination, as if her skin had suddenly been endowed with extra nerve-ends. Her wet centre seemed to flutter in invitation. “Guide me,” Declan gasped, his fingers digging into her hipbones, “Put me into you, sweet Flora... Use your fingers.” Reaching around beneath the bunched folds of her skirt, Flora groped for what she could feel against her bottom. Declan’s shaft was thick and superbly solid, its fine skin coated with a heavy ooze of pre-come. As she gripped the crest between her fingers, she heard him sob. “That’s it... That’s it... Find the place,” he gasped, then shuddered violently as she edged him towards his goal. Flora’s thighs were tensed by holding her awkward, spread-legged position, and as she tilted her bottom a little—trying for a better angle—Declan’s glans butted momentarily against her anus. His hips bucked involuntarily the instant his flesh touched her, as if his penis yearned to breach that creased pink rose. Flora swayed again, her mind filled with crude, flagitious imagery. For a second, she considered reaching around with her other hand too, stretching open her bottom cheeks, then lunging downwards for that forbidden dark intrusion. It would hurt, yet something wicked in her wanted it. At the last minute, though, temerity held her back... “Another time, maybe?” whispered Declan, as if he’d been privy to her every halfformed thought. A rebuke rose to her lips, but just then their bodies made true contact. The plump head of Declan’s penis knocked against her vagina, slid backwards, then forwards, and finally lodged accurately in the opening. “Bingo!” he cried, pushing with his hips. An inch of him slid inside her body. Letting him run through her slippery fingers, then withdrawing her hand completely, Flora sank downward until she was sitting on his thighs. Neither of them said anything as her bottom kissed his belly, but Declan made an incoherent sound. Flora adjusted herself a little, feeling his bulk jostle her innards, then groaned herself as her whole sex seemed to bulge. He seemed far bigger inside her than she’d expected, his penis more massive when experienced than when observed. It was pressing upwards and outwards on her every inner surface, and making her clitoris stand

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out like a tiny stalk. “Are you okay?” he asked eventually, his voice sounding as if he were having difficulty breathing. “I’m not hurting you, am I?” “No! Not at all!” Flora answered, her own voice emerging as a startled squeak. The urge to touch her clitoris was like a burning in her fingers, yet against all reason, she felt too nervous to succumb to it. “How do I feel?” This time he sounded stronger, more controlled. His hands settled confidently against the inslope of her waistline, his fingers curving firmly across her rib-cage. “Big,” she answered, then almost choked as his hands moved upwards, under her top, to cup her breasts. “Good,” he said, with a surprising lack of smugness. “Oh Flora, you’re beautiful, do you know that?” His fingers tightened, squeezed, lifted further, and brought a broken moan of passion to Flora’s lips. “You’re beautiful like this garden, Flora,” he went on, his thumbs making contact with her nipples, “Like the roses... So lush, so natural, yet so mysterious. Being inside you feels like having the sun wrapped around my cock... I could die now, and I wouldn’t regret a thing.” Half of Flora wanted to shiver with ecstasy at the strange poetry of his outpourings, while the other half felt dangerously close to laughing. It seemed bizarre that a man whose whole life was spent manipulating images, could be so extravagant and imaginative with words. Suddenly, a black cloud seemed to sail across the garden’s pacific brightness. An intangible sorrow that intruded on her joy. Declan might be able to say these lovely things to her, but he could never write them down. She felt an overwhelming rush of tenderness towards him. An urge to help him salve his secret sadness... “And you feel incredible,” she purred, pushing herself forward into his hands, and downwards onto his penis, then swirling her hips to give the movement extra spice. “You’re touching me everywhere inside, Declan. Really stretching me... I feel so full that I could orgasm any second.” Flora had never been particularly vocal during sex before, but suddenly it seemed quite natural, and very thrilling. She sensed an answering wave of excitement in Declan’s body

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where it touched her, as if he too felt the same increase in pleasure. His lips against her ear confirmed her findings. “I love a woman who talks while I’m fucking her,” he said, nipping at her neck and palpating her swollen breasts. “When she tells me what she likes. What she’s feeling. Or even what she’s done before, with some other guy...” Flora didn’t want to bring another man into their closeness, especially not Ian, the only other man she’d been with recently. But there was someone that she knew Declan would like to hear about... “It was incredible with Morwenna...” she began hesitantly, then knew immediately that she’d said the right thing. Declan’s cock seemed to grow an inch inside her, and his fingertips stopped dead still on her nipples. “She’s so sensual, so exotic... I’ve never met anyone like her in my life.” “What did she do?” asked Declan, his voice low and intense. “She talked to me,” continued Flora, seeing a sudden wicked humour in the situation, “She talked about you, actually, and got me to describe what I did yesterday morning.” Declan laughed, his shaking body making his cock move inside her. “Typical Morwenna,” he said, “Always wanting to know the juicy details. So what happened when you’d talked about me?” Flora tried to concentrate, but found it difficult. Declan’s penis was the ultimate distraction, especially when he moved and it bumped against her G spot. Terrorised from within, her clitoris felt close to bursting, and she could feel the piquant bite of Declan’s short’s zip against her inner thighs. “Don’t fight it, Flora,” said Declan urgently, “Stroke your clit... You know you need to.” It mortified her how easily he could read her, but her clitoris was so agonised she couldn’t resist. Dragging up the hem of her skirt, all thoughts of decency and ‘visitors’ forgotten, she pressed her hand into the wet niche of her tingling sex. Letting one fingertip slide around in her fluids, Flora first touched Declan’s shaft where it lodged inside her, then pulled forward a little to concentrate on her clit. The tiny tag of flesh was standing proud between her sex-lips, freed again from its thin protective hood. Flora was tempted to rub it quickly, almost brutally, for instant gratification, but she resisted and commenced a smoother stroke.

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“That’s it,” murmured Declan, his teeth nipping at her ear lobe, “Nice and easy... Nice and slow...” Flora’s hips began to churn, and Declan’s pulling fingers took up the rhythm on her nipples. “Tell me what happened next with Morwenna,” he ordered quietly, drawing out her breasts from her ribcage like two pointed cones. Flora moaned. The unexpected pain seemed to connect directly with her vulva, and her flesh rippled around the harder flesh impaled in it. “Tell me...” He rolled her teats. “Please!” He squashed them between his fingers and his thumbs. “She masturbated,” cried Flora, almost beside herself, “She put her fingers inside her vagina and she rubbed her clitoris with her thumb... It was the first time I’d seen another woman touch herself...” “Do you touch yourself, Flora?” questioned Declan, still pinching and rolling, “Do you do what you’re doing now when you’re alone and horny? Do you beat your clit until you come and come and come?” “Yes! Yes I do!” Flora was almost bouncing now, lifting and falling on Declan’s cock as he tormented her breasts. She could hear his breathing getting heavier now, rasping harshly against her ear, as her writhings stimulated them both in equal measures. “That’s it! Oh, lady, go on... Ride me,” he groaned, all thoughts of interrogation seemingly forgotten as Flora obeyed him. For her own part, Flora felt her pleasure gathering rapidly in her belly until it reached a critical point and seemed to erupt beneath her fingers. A weird, white, dazzling sensation surged up her spine and down towards her toes in the very same instant, then rebounded and returned to her throbbing clitoris—forcing her to cry out as her vagina clasped and spasmed. As that happened, she felt Declan leap inside her, and his hands slid downwards from her breasts to grab her hips. Holding her tightly, he bucked upwards—once, twice, three times—then he too cried out in the highest pleasure, his voice peculiarly sweet in the sunlit garden air. “Oh boy,” he said shakily, after a while.

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“Oh boy,” echoed Flora, wondering when her legs would stop trembling in delayed reaction. “That was wild, Flora, really wild,” he said, kissing the side of her neck as his penis slid out of her channel, “I knew it’d be good between us... But I didn’t expect to have my socks blown off.” He chuckled and rubbed his wet cock against her bottom. His flippancy irritated her. After such beauty, it seemed crass and so typically American. “You’re not wearing any socks.” She nodded towards his long, bare feet, then set her own feet squarely on the ground. Standing up, she grimaced as something slippery ran down the insides of her thighs towards her knees, then locating her panties, she stepped into them and pulled them smoothly into place. “Aren’t you going to cover that?” she enquired tartly, turning to Declan and observing his naked penis. “If you want me to,” he replied amiably, tucking himself away and sliding up his zip. Frowning, Flora could hardly believe how suddenly they’d become alienated. One minute they’d been sharing the transports of orgasm in an idyllically perfumed garden; the next, she felt annoyed that—yet again—she’d been tricked into an intimate act. “What’s eating you now?” enquired Declan, sliding out an arm with eye-defying speed, and making her sit with him. “You don’t regret what we just did, do you?” “No, not really,” she said, trying to work out what was bothering her, “It’s just that... suddenly... I seem to be ‘available’ to everybody. I feel like a sex doll that everyone owns a piece of...” Her brow furrowed as she tidied her skirt and felt the letter in her pocket. “And I had another of those bloody obscene letters this morning too!” “What did it say?” enquired Declan mildly. God, it would be so much easier if she could just let him read the damn thing! But because she couldn’t, she drew out the single sheet of cream laid paper and picked out a few pertinent phrases. It seemed ridiculous to be embarrassed with Declan—his semen was still drying on her thighs, for heaven’s sake! —but even so she felt herself blushing as pink as the roses. “Well, whoever it is, I like their style,” said Declan as she folded, then re-folded the paper.

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“Well, you would!” snapped Flora, still rankled by his macho shallowness. After a moment’s silence, Declan reached out and took the letter from her, and Flora felt a breathtaking surge of rage. Had he been deceiving all along? Was he quite calmly going to read the letter himself, after he’d manoeuvred her into the embarrassment of reading it aloud? But instead of unfolding the letter, he simply passed his fingers assessingly over the paper. “I’ve seen this paper on sale in ‘Treasure Trove’,” he said thoughtfully, “Why don’t you call in there and ask Lucy who’s been buying it recently? It could be a way of tracing this ‘Scribe’ of yours.” “He isn’t my ‘Scribe,” rejoined Flora, secretly admiring the elegance of his logic. She’d been planning to return to the art shop anyway. “’She’,” said Declan. “She what?” “There’s nothing to say that your secret admirer isn’t a woman,” he commented with a grin. “It could be Morwenna... It certainly sounds a lot like her.” “Don’t be ridiculous!” said Flora, springing to her feet again, and stepping clear of him so fast he couldn’t catch her. She knew he was right, but his male smugness still annoyed her. “Look, you can stay here if you want...I don’t care,” she said, backing away as she spoke, “But I’m going inside to take a bath.” Expecting him to answer with something facile about ‘washing her back for her’, Flora felt decidedly piqued when Declan simply smiled and gave her a facetious little wave. “Be seeing you,” he murmured. Flora scowled, turned her back on him, and began striding, with purpose, towards the cottage. Stuff him, the arrogant bastard! When she reached the door, she looked back towards the arbour, as discreetly as she could, to see if he’d been watching her as she left. “Pig!” she hissed. Declan wasn’t looking—because he was intently studying her sketch-pad. He’d forgotten her, and was absorbed in creating a sketch.

When Flora returned to the garden Declan had gone, but her sketch-pad lay open on the

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bench. Half expecting to find a nude, or a pornographic doodle of some kind, she was astounded to see her own face in profile, sketched delicately with most exquisite of hands. She didn’t touch the paper for fear of smudging the drawing—despite the faint scent of fixative that clung to it—but as she surveyed the described lines, she touched their subject. Running her fingers over her face, she felt awe-struck. And she ceased to be angry with Declan McKenna. There was no hint of male arrogance in the way he’d drawn her. It was an image of respect, of affection almost, a regard that transcended lust and flesh. She half wanted to rush around to Orchard House, and thank him for it, but some cautious instinct told her not to. He’d probably say something flip and transatlantic, and spoil things, and she wanted to be able to think kindly of him for a while. And perhaps let absence make the heart grow fonder? she thought, taking the drawing materials inside, then finding her bag and her sunhat. You’re an idiot, Swain! she chastised herself, stepping out into the sunshine and heading for the centre of the village. He’s just an over-sexed Yank who can draw like an angel—you can enjoy him, but let’s not get sentimental, shall we? And yet as she watched a brilliantly-coloured butterfly career ecstatically over the hedgerows, the glow she felt inside wasn’t all sex.

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Chapter Six The Little Shop of Wonders

TREASURE TROVE. Art - Images - Books - Everything for the Creative Persuasion. To Flora, it still seemed strange that such an elitist shop could thrive in a rural hideaway like Marwick. Yet thrive it obviously did. The shop looked bright, spick and span, and well looked after, and even though the village itself was quiet, there were several customers browsing around inside. The pretty brown-haired woman who Flora had noticed yesterday was currently engaged in changing the window display—with the help of a handsome, but rather hairy young man in surf shorts. Does everyone flaunt it here? thought Flora with a smile, assessing his chunky physique and his tousled sun-bleached pony-tail. As he bent over, to place a pile of books in the corner of the window space, his thin shorts pulled tight across the rounds of his backside, showing that what was hidden was just as tempting as what was revealed. Against her will, Flora felt the familiar serpent coiling, and just at the very moment that she felt herself get wet again, the young man straightened up, turned around, and saw her watching. In the face of her immediate, guilty blush, he grinned broadly and gave her a cheeky wink. Flora’s first instinct was walk on quickly, but as if sensing her confusion, the young woman in the window turned too. Looking from Flora to her companion, she seemed to understand immediately—and gave the pony-tailed charmer a smart clip round the ear. “Come in!” mimed the disciplinarian cheerfully to Flora, before stepping back into the shop to welcome her. “Take no notice of Jack,” the young woman said pleasantly when Flora entered. She held out her hand, which emerged from a lace-trimmed cuff. “He’s a utter pig, but his heart’s in the right place.” She nodded in the direction of the brawny Jack, who continued to labour in the window. “I’m Lucy Douglas and I own this place—” She gestured expansively with her free hand. “Or should I say, the mortgage on this place. You must be Flora, the

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newcomer. Pleased to meet you.” “H...hello,” murmured Flora, taken aback once again at being ‘known’. “Yeah, I know... Everybody knows everybody else’s business in Marwick,” said Lucy, her fingers tightening warmly around Flora’s, “It’s a little annoying at first, isn’t it? But don’t worry, you’ll soon get used to it.” Her grip continued as she spoke, and Flora detected a certain caressing quality to it, something as disturbing as it was unexpected. “Would you like some coffee? I was just about to make some.” Used to the impersonal rudeness of city shop assistants, Flora was quite taken aback by the friendliness of the welcome. “Er...yes... I’d love some,” she answered, then felt a sudden flash of loss as Lucy smiled and released her captive fingers. “Okay,” said the proprietress amiably, “Look around. I won’t be a jiffy...” Feeling slightly off balance, Flora watched her walk away towards the back of the shop, her long pleated skirt swirling around her calves. The shop-owner was as beautifully, almost archaically dressed, as she had been yesterday—in a navy blue skirt and a demure, white, lace festooned blouse—but Flora sensed something else beneath that neat, fastidious elegance. Something quite at odds with white lace and modest pleats. “Don’t let it fool you,” said an unknown voice in her ear. Flora whirled, almost knocking over a display of sable brushes. “What on earth do you mean?” she demanded—of ‘Jack’, who was standing just two steps behind her, with a pencil tucked jauntily behind one ear and what looked like a tool-pouch slung around his waist. His brilliant blue eyes were alive with pure mischief, and—Flora noticed—his furry chest was dewed lightly with perspiration, as if he’d been doing something far more strenuous that a bit of window dressing. “The twin-set and pearls look,” he said, moving closer, as if to let her catch his scent— of sweat and some sharp ‘green’ male cologne, “It couldn’t be further from the truth.” In the face of Flora’s flabbergasted silence, the pony-tailed man laughed softly. “I’m sorry,” he said with what seemed like remorse, and a fair amount of charm, “You’re not used to us yet, are you?” He wiped his hand on the side of his shorts and held it out, as Lucy had held out hers before him. “I’m Jack Walters,” His grin broadened to reveal teeth that were white and very even, “Jack of all trades, master of some... If you need anything done in the joinery, plumbing, or electrical line, just let me know.”

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Unable to do anything about it, Flora allowed her hand to be taken again, and this time squeezed with a force that was unmistakably intimate. “I do decorating and gardening too...” Jack went on, “And computers, if you’re stuck.” His amazing blue eyes seemed to darken. “And any other little jobs you might think of...” Both the intent, and his expression, were so blatant, that Flora was forced to laugh aloud. And Jack laughed too as she drew her fingers out of his. “A man has to try,” he said easily, clearly knowing when to push, and when not to. “Why don’t you do what Lucy says. Look around. This’s quite a place. “The Little Shop of Wonders” we call it. You’d be amazed at what you’ll find in its darkest corners.” The shop being in Marwick Magna, Flora had a shrewd idea what those amazing things might be, but she just said, “Yes, I’ll have a browse while Lucy makes that coffee.” “You do that...” He gave her another wink. “And now I’d better go and see what Lucy’s doing. She’s hopeless with anything electrical. She’s probably blown up the percolator by now. Excuse me.” Then, with a toss of his tangled ponytail he left her, closing the door to the back room behind him. It’s this place. They’re all mad! thought Flora, wandering away from the brushes in search of Jack’s ‘wonders’. She’d just opened a book of etchings, and done a double-take over its subject, when she heard a muffled giggle from behind the closed door.

“So, what do you think of her?” enquired Lucy Douglas, as she heard a familiar softsoled tread behind her. She was standing at the cupboard, in the small kitchen which opened off the storeroom, hunting for a packet of coffee filters. She didn’t want to welcome a new village playmate with just ‘instant’... “Not bad,” murmured Jack, his voice soft but full of male feeling. “I have to agree,” said Lucy, finding the filters and turning round, “Declan said she was a beauty, and he was right.” She smiled, narrowing her eyes, and licking her soft pink lips. “Do you think she’ll like our little games?” She lifted her chin, feeling a tingle of excitement in the region of her solar plexus, and another, stronger stirring, down below.

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“Oh yes...” Jack unfastened his tool-pouch, put it aside and reached towards her. “Watch those paws on my blouse,” said Lucy, placing her arm across her chest to protect the immaculate white fabric and nodding towards Jack’s work-hardened hands. “If you’re worried, take it off,” said Jack, still reaching. Lucy loved his directness. Jack was a rough diamond-rough trade, really—but that was one of his most attractive features. For all her prim appearance, Lucy adored her sex uncouth, and the idea of it made her cream her lacy panties. Suddenly, all she wanted was a cock in her channel, and the feel of Jack using her crudely. Her nimble fingers flew to her throat, and began undoing the pearl buttons of her blouse. As she unhitched the last one, Lucy’s eyes locked with Jack’s, and found a fire there that matched the flames in her. She nearly fainted with powerful lust as he clasped his crotch. Pulling the tails of her blouse out of the waistband of her skirt, Lucy flexed her shoulders and thrust her breasts out towards him. Beneath her virginal white blouse, she wore a spicy uplift bra; a whore’s finery beneath her chaste and sober outfit. Shimmying like a stripper, she dug her fingers inside its flimsy lace cups, then lifted her breasts free, like two fruits on a platter. Jake immediately grabbed them, and she giggled with delight, then worked her hips as he began to knead and squeeze her. “Do you think Flora Swain’s tits will be as nice as these?” she enquired, covering Jake’s hands with her own and digging her nails in. There was nothing she liked more than being handled forcefully. “Maybe,” grunted Jack, gripping hard and using his nails, until Lucy’s breath hissed urgently through her teeth, “They looked pretty good to me in that thin top.” Almost beside herself, Lucy nodded in agreement. Swivelling her pelvis like a houri, she closed her eyes, and saw Flora Swain naked, then imagined the woman’s breasts being fondled. “Harder!” grunted Lucy, as in her mind’s-eye, it was she who was caressing Flora. Jack complied, as he always did, eager to please with both his hands and his body. Whilst palpating her teats mercilessly, he pressed his crotch forward, and gyrated his bulging erection against her belly. Incensed by her need for him, Lucy shook her head wildly, sending her Alice band tumbling to the floor. Her silky hair flew about her face.

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“Oh God, I’ve got to have it!” she croaked, forgetting Flora Swain as desire surged inside her. She could think of nothing at all now except Jack’s hot, searching cock, and the slippery place between her legs that required it. Dashing his hands away, she turned around, and offered her body—using her stiffened arms to brace her against the work-top. “Fuck me,” she said, rotating her bottom beneath her immaculate pleated skirt. “I’d be glad to,” growled Jack, and she heard the rustle of him tugging down his shorts. Almost instantaneously, she felt cool air on her thighs as her skirt and her slip were hiked upwards. Grunting with impatience, Jack didn’t bother to remove her panties, but just pushed the sodden gusset to one side. A second later, he had his rigid cock inside her. “Work it, bitch!” he hissed, and like the perfect slut, Lucy jammed herself backwards, then wiggled her bottom when he was in her to the hilt. “Oh my, that’s good, Jackie-boy,” she cooed as he initiated a rhythm, rocking his penis back and forth inside her body. She loved the coarseness of him, his spontaneity, the fact that he could be so hard, so quickly, when she needed him. And that he’d always—well, nearly always—do her bidding. “Rub my clit, Jack,” she ordered breathily, feeling the tiny knob of flesh swell and pulse. It’d been almost shouting for attention for some time now, since the moment she’d seen Flora Swain, through the window. Accurate in all things, Jack’s fingers slid quickly inside her panties, locating the nexus of her pleasure within a second. Although his hands were big, and proficient at such activities as hewing wood, lifting weights and laying bricks, they were also capable of an exquisite precision. He swirled Lucy’s clitoris in tiny tricky circles at the same time as he was fucking her body powerfully. Lucy felt an overpowering urge to shout, and to howl the obscenest of encouragements, but she was still mindful of the shop and its customers. She imagined Flora Swain hearing her cries, then feeling jealous and coming in to join them. “I bet you’d like Flora Swain here watching, wouldn’t you?” she gasped as Jack pumped her particularly hard. “She could stroke your arse while you’re busy fucking me... Wouldn’t that be nice?” “Don’t do this, Lucy,” growled Jack, his penis jerking, “You’ll make me come too soon if you start talking dirty.”

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Lucy laughed, and churned her bottom. “Dirty? Was that dirty?” she enquired innocently, then bit her lip as Jack played a fast arpeggio on her clitoris. “Of course it was!” he gasped, slamming harder, his hanging balls jostling her inner thighs. “Ah, but you know how much you like it, Jack,” said Lucy creamily, articulating her own movements to his clever dancing fingers. For a long moment he remained still in her vagina. “And think how much you’d like Flora too...” He made a sound, low in his throat, of male distress, “She could kneel down behind you and watch you going into me... She could lick your thighs... Kiss your bottom... She could stick her tongue inside your hole while you shaft me.” “Don’t! Please don’t!” pleaded Jack, his hips moving again, and hammering against her. “She could reach around too, and diddle me while she fondles your balls. She could service us both while we service each other, then when we’d finished, she could stroke her pussy while we watched...” Jack’s long, helpless groan, and his throbbing, jetting penis would have made Lucy laugh if she hadn’t already been beyond it. As her loins burned in a melting climax, both she and he pitched forward, no longer supported against the table by her arms. She’d had to thrust her fist between her teeth to block her screams.

Absorbed in a book of erotic prints, it was a while before Flora realised how time was passing, and that neither Lucy nor Jack had returned with coffee. She’d looked up and towards the door, when she’d thought she’d heard that giggle, but then dismissed it as her own imagination. Surely they wouldn’t be...be up to something, when they’d left her out here waiting? And not just her. There was another customer waiting by the till. Isn’t anyone going to serve him? Flora wondered, then also wondered—immediately afterwards—why it should concern her if Lucy lost some business. She didn’t know the woman. She’d scarcely spoken to her for more than a few seconds. And yet she was worrying. Without stopping to think, she went over to the till. “Hello,” she said, smiling at the man who was waiting, “Can I help you? I don’t know

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where Lucy’s got to, but I think I can work this—” It was true. The till was one of the old-fashioned sort that she used long ago whilst doing a Saturday job. “Here,” she took the man’s selections from him—several rather grotesque Aubrey Beardsley postcards—and then slid them into one of the decorated paper bags that lay on the counter. After a moment’s familiarisation, she rang up the marked prices. But when she looked up, the man was offering no money, just grinning at her. His eyes were bright and his mouth was wide and sexy. Oh no, not another predator! thought Flora, staring back at him as boldly as she could. It wasn’t a hardship. Like of the people she’d met so far in Marwick, the prospective purchaser was extraordinarily attractive. He wasn’t good looking in any obvious way, like Declan, or the patently incorrigible Jack, but he had neat dark hair, a friendly, slightly livedin looking face, and a pair of piercingly intelligent grey eyes. And in fawn chinos, and a cream polo shirt, his body looked lean and wiry, but also powerful in all the appropriate places. The only odd thing was that Flora thought she knew him; there was a sense of recognition but it was too hazy to button down. “Well, I don’t actually have any money on me,” he said, his amiable grin broadening, “I was going to ask Lucy if I could have these on the slate... But now the till’s open I’d better slip in an IOU.” “I...” I’ve landed myself in another ‘situation’, thought Flora. This was obviously one of the shop’s regular and trusted patrons, who was no doubt wondering who the hell she was to be asking him for money? “I bet you’re Flora, aren’t you?” the grey-eyed man said as he scribbled his signature on a note-block, then popped the small square of paper in the till drawer. “The new girl at Pennyroyal Cottage...” “For crying out loud!” exclaimed Flora, gazing skyward, “Does everybody in this whole village know who I am?” In her exasperation, she pushed the drawer shut forcefully—and nearly trapped her companion’s fingers in the process! “Oh God, I’m so sorry,” she gasped, grabbing his hand—which was pleasantly smooth and cool—and checking it for damage, “It’s just that everybody I seem to meet here already

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knows who I am, while I don’t know any of them from Adam.” She let his hand go, realising she’d held it far too long. “We’re the ones who should be sorry,” the dark-haired man said kindly, “We’re such a nosy lot...” He paused, then smiled again, his grey eyes warm, “I’m Marshall Fox, and I live at the Old Rectory... Pleased to meet you.” Marshall Fox. The nebulous familiarity now made sense. Flora had seen his face before, but not in person. She’d seen him once on television, and many times on book jackets. Marshall Fox wrote fast, sexy, well-researched thrillers that always had six, if not seven digit sales figures. She had at least four of his novels on her own shelves. She’d unpacked them yesterday and lined them up on her new bookshelves, never thinking that she’d soon meet their author. “Flora... Flora Swain,” she stammered, holding out her hand and feeling a little gauche, “I’ve read some of your books,” she blurted out, then immediately felt more gauche than ever. A curious expression passed across Marshall Fox’s face as he quickly shook her hand. He looked nervous, Flora realised. Apprehensive. But for the life of her, she couldn’t work out why. “What did you think of them?” he said quickly, “Which ones... Were they all right? Please tell me.” Flora was astounded. The man wrote best-sellers; in W H Smiths he was a legend; yet he was worried about the response of just one reader. She was touched by his unexpected vulnerability. More than touched. She couldn’t say why, but it somehow seemed erotic. She had a sudden flash vision of Marshall Fox lying beneath her: his eyes pleading, his chest bare, his hands tied. “Flora?” prompted the real, unbound Marshall, bringing her back from her strange flight of fancy. His face, and his whole manner still seemed tense. “Oh shit! You don’t like my books, do you? And you’re trying to work out a polite way to tell me.” He shrugged, gave her the most lost puppy, little boy grin she’d ever seen, “It’s okay. Say what you mean... I can take it.” “No, it’s all right. I think your books are brilliant. Especially—” She named a couple of recent titles, “You’re actually one of my most favourite writers.”

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Oh God, I must seem like one of these pathetic gushing fans! she thought. Her face went pink as an inner voice whispered ‘groupie’. As Marshall seemed to blush in sympathy, the devilish whispers continued. How about it, Flora? the voice said. Wouldn’t you like to go to bed with him? “Really?” Unlikely as it appeared, Marshall was obviously surprised by her enthusiasm. “That’s wonderful! It’s such a relief...” He paused for a moment, seemed about to ask a question, then consulted his watch. “Look, I’ve got to be somewhere soon. But I’ll see you around in the village, won’t I?” “Yes. Yes, of course,” said Flora, a little disappointed after what she’d begun to hope for. “Okay, then,” said Marshall brightly, turning to leave, then suddenly turning back again and grabbing her hand. “I’ll look forward to that. Be seeing you!” Before she really had time to absorb the pressure of his fingers, Marshall released her and was heading out of the shop. Flora was left with the till silently accusing her, and she wondered about that scribbled IOU. But owe you what? she thought, reviewing her peculiar few minutes with the famous, but modest writer. Should she add him to the list with Declan, Morwenna and Lucy et al? The tally of new friends who unashamedly desired her? Possibly, she thought. No, hopefully, murmured the devil inside her, as she returned to the book of erotic prints. A few minutes later she had to close the book again. Every page seemed to remind her of someone, and make her wish she was with them, making love. Every beautiful print made her speculate furiously; about the back room and what Lucy and Jack were doing. Flora was just picking out a selection of new conté colours, when Lucy finally emerged, carrying a tray. Of the handsome Jack there was no sign at all. “Here we are!” the proprietress said guilelessly, looking as innocent and pristine as ever, “That percolator seems to take forever. I must get a new one. I have to have regular coffee or I’m useless.” Are you sure it’s coffee you need regularly? Flora felt like saying. On closer inspection, she’d noticed that one of Lucy’s blouse buttons wasn’t quite fastened, and that her soft, shrimp-pink lips looked slightly bruised. She also smelt very markedly of perfume, as if

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she’d sprayed it liberally to mask another scent. “I hope no-one wanted to buy anything while you were waiting,” she said, drawing up two chairs so they could sit to drink their coffee. “Well, someone did actually,” replied Flora, feeling awkward at what she’d done, “But he hadn’t any money, so he’s left an IOU in the till... I hope that’s all right?” “That’d be Marshall, I suppose,” said Lucy, grinning then taking a sip of her coffee, “He’s a bugger, honestly. He’s got more money that anyone in the village... But he never seems to have any of it with him! He treats this place as if it’s a pub and he’s got a ‘slate’.” “Why do you let him get away with it?” “Because he’s cute, he’s intelligent, and I adore him!” Lucy paused and exhibited a little shudder of delight, “If you’d seen his bottom, you wouldn’t say “no” to him either... He’s got the nicest arse in the whole of the county. And that’s including Declan McKenna’s and “Jack the Lad”’s too!” Flora didn’t know what to say. Lucy had just as much as announced that she’d slept not only with Jack and Marshall, but also Declan. The man she herself had been with only this morning. Despite this, as they chatted, Flora found herself liking the pretty shop-keeper more and more. Lucy was bright, funny and disarming, and for all her neat, almost spinsterish mode of dressing, she had a wicked wit and salty turn of phrase. She also loved to gossip, and she was even more enlightening than Morwenna, when it came to the village and its foibles. The only thing Lucy didn’t know was who ‘The Scribe’ was. “My God, this’s horny stuff!” she exclaimed when Flora had handed over the two sheets of cream paper. “I wish I did know who it was... I’d be round there like a shot to see if there was any left over for me.” She licked her pink lips and began to read again... Aloud. “’Lash you with my tongue until you scream and shout and climax’... Ooh, yes please!” Lucy flicked back and forth between the two different letters, clearly focusing on all the juiciest bits. “’Did you put your tongue in her pussy and drink her nectar?’ Oh my, that’s so hot!” Suddenly, Lucy turned a slow, knowing grin on Flora. “Did you?” “D...did I what?” stammered Flora. “Did you lick Morwenna out? I can tell by your face you did something.” “No! Of course not! I didn’t do anything to her...”

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Technically, it wasn’t a lie, but Flora knew it could very easily have been one. She’d been passive with Morwenna, but that was because it had all been new to her. But she didn’t dare predict what would happen next time. “Look, you don’t have to worry,” said Lucy kindly, “We’re all at it in the village, but there’s no harm done. If Morwenna’s had her hands in your knickers, it’s because she likes you, that’s all... She’s a lovely woman, and a good, caring friend. She’d never do anything that you didn’t really want.” “Do you think she’s “The Scribe”?” asked Flora, her face crimson. “Possibly... She buys this paper. And she writes short stories, so she is used to expressing herself in print...” The shop-keeper smirked again, “And she’d certainly do anything that’s down here...” She waggled the creamy pages, “She’s done at least ninety per cent with me alone!” Flora tried to ignore the instant picture, “But I showed her the first letter and she didn’t turn a hair. She liked it, but she didn’t give any indication that she might have written it.” “Maybe she didn’t,” said Lucy, already re-reading again. “Anyone in the village could have written this... Well, almost anyone.” Flora wondered if Lucy meant Declan. “To be honest, I’d say Marshall’s your prime suspect. He doesn’t just write thrillers, you know. He writes erotica too. Under a pseudonym... This could well be an extract from one of his books.” Flora tried to equate the friendly, somewhat boyish Marshall Fox with the purple prose in the letters Lucy held. Talk about ‘butter wouldn’t melt’. It was amazing how appearances could deceive. She continued to consider him as Lucy went on reading. “Could be “His Lordship”, I suppose,” the shop-keeper said as she handed back the letters, “Although, if it is, he hasn’t yet mentioned what he really likes...” A dozen questions rose to Flora’s lips, but just then, several more customers entered the shop. One of them made straight for Lucy, obviously with a query, and with some reluctance, Flora muttered a hasty ‘see you later’. “Yes, I’d like that,” said the shop-keeper, smiling at Flora over the newcomer’s shoulder, before applying herself to the enquiry, “Call again. And make it soon.” “I will,” said Flora, closing the door. Bloody hell, ‘The Scribe’ could even be Lucy! thought Flora perplexedly as she walked

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back up the lane towards her cottage. She could be the one who isn’t turning a hair, not Morwenna. It’s pretty obvious she likes playing erotic games. After assessing the possibilities of Lucy, Flora considered Marshall Fox. Words were his forté, so seduction by letter would be the perfect approach for him. He might be researching his next pornographic book! Then of course, there was Lord Rawnsley, who she assumed was the one Lucy called ‘His Lordship’, and who it seemed, had certain special preferences. There are just too many candidates, thought Flora with a sigh, as she arrived home, and unlocked the cottage door. As the door swung open, Flora became aware of a slight resistance behind it, and as she stepped inside she found a package and a letter. The packet about eight inches long and wrapped in shiny silver paper—and the letter was in a familiar cream-laid envelope. ‘The Scribe’ had paid a visit in her absence. Picking at the envelope flap, Flora did some rapid calculations. Did timing rule out any of her suspects? Not really. Lucy and Jack had both disappeared during the time she’d been in ‘Treasure Trove’, so either one of them could have made it to the cottage and returned. Marshall Fox had left the shop before her, so he too could have come this way and made a ‘delivery’. He’d apparently had only the Beardsley postcards with him when he’d left, of course, but the Old Rectory couldn’t be all that far away. “All right, you pervert,” she muttered, tearing the envelope, “What is it this time?” She felt cross, but her stomach lurched excitedly. Luscious Wild Flower, the note said. Are you settling in yet? Meeting people? Having orgasms? I hope you are... I’m spending a lot of my time imagining you having them. You’re a beautiful blossom to me, Flora. I can just see you in the sunshine, spreading your petals out voluptuously, your juices flowing as your vulva swells and pulses. You smell the scent of roses as you close your eyes and come... Does this happen? Am I right? If not, accept a small gift from a admirer, crazed with lust. And remember, Flora, as you use it, that I’ll be dreaming of the way it looks inside you, and imagining the way your sexy body squirms in climax. Until next time, enjoy! At the bottom was typed—as usual—THE SCRIBE.

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“Creep! Pervert! You were behind the wall, weren’t you?” she demanded aloud, her whole body shaking with outrage and raw arousal. The person who was writing to her was not only a voyeur, but a listener as well. They’d heard her shouts and struggles as she’d bounced on Declan’s penis, and heard her long groan of pleasure as she’d come. And now they’d had the audacity to leave a gift. Flora fumbled and wrenched open the silvered paper. Inside was a plain white box, made of heavy white card, and within that, was exactly she’d expected. A dildo. A black serpent on a bed of snow white tissue. Flora had never had a vibrator, but had often wondered about them. More than once, she’d been on the point of making a discreet mail order, but had never actually summoned the nerve to do it. Now, it seemed, ‘The Scribe’ had presented her with a state of the art example. The gleaming black cylinder was solid and heavy between her fingers, and its siliconised surface felt disturbingly lifelike. Its ‘skin’ was smooth and dry, and there was a subtle impression of veining along its length. The shape of its tip suggested a male who’d been circumcised. “No!” she cried, while her fingers began exploring the evocative shape. Unable to stop herself, she imagined it pushed inside her, knowing all the time that was doing exactly what ‘The Scribe’ intended. “No!” she cried again. Cramming the dildo back into its box, she left it, and “The Scribe’s” letter, on the little hall table. Five minutes later, armed with her pencil and her sketch-pad, she made her way out into the warm and fragrant garden, hoping that this time she’d get some peace and quiet. If not to draw, then at least to sit and think.

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Chapter Seven Assistance Rendered

Flora spend a lot of the afternoon thinking about the dildo. And most of the rest of the time wondering who’d sent it. Well, you’d better think again, whoever you are, if you think I’m going to use the damned thing, she told her tormentor silently, while she doodled a few lines of a sketch. A few lines later, she realised she’d drawn a penis. Adding more detail, she imagined someone, somewhere in the village, masturbating furiously at the thought of her and the dildo. It didn’t really matter whether or not she was using it; it was the fantasy of it that was important to ‘The Scribe’. I bet you’re having more fun than I am, you bastard! she informed her secretive pen friend. Because I’m just stuck here, in the heat, getting angry. The more she tried not to think about the dildo, the more difficult that process seemed to be. She was being driven crazy by curiosity and frustration. She kept seeing the thing in its box, time and time again, a velvet black cylinder on a bed of pristine white. Why not try it? said the imp of sex who’d taken up residence in her belly. You’ve nothing to lose. ‘The Scribe’ won’t know anything for certain. Does it vibrate? Flora wondered. She’d stuffed the thing back into its box so quickly that hadn’t really examined it. It might be more just a simple phallus, designed for passive insertion; it could be a turbo-charged bar of throbbing energy—ready to zap her clitoris until she came and came and came. It would be so, so easy... No effort, no doubts, no aching wrist. Before she realised what she was doing, Flora was on her feet, and heading back inside the cottage, glancing right and left to make sure she wasn’t observed. But where to do it? she pondered, picking up the box from the hall table where she’d left it. Where would ‘The Scribe’ expect her to masturbate? Her bedroom, where she usually did such things? On the landing, she realised that if she drew her bedroom curtains, it was tantamount to announcing what she was doing; so on impulse, she slipped into the

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bathroom, then closed the door as if to contain a secret vice. Her face in the mirror was flushed and guilty, and seeing it, she almost laughed out loud. What on earth was she so worried about? What was she going to do that she hadn’t done before, a hundred times, with her fingers? What difference did a bit of silicon-rubber technology make? Taking the dildo from the box, she twisted the bevel on the plain end, then nearly dropped it when it began to thrum and whirr. Should I undress, she debated, or just pull down my knickers? She twisted the control again while she pondered her decision. Finally, with her heart beating furiously, she slid down until she was sitting on the bath-mat, then flipped up her skirt so she could get easily to her panties. With extreme caution, she slid the head of the vibrator down inside them, pushing and wiggling it to find the moist lips of her sex. When it was resting in the perfect position, she turned it on. “Ah!” Because it was so quiet and well made, the intensity of the dildo’s action was quite startling. The pleasure was instant, powerful and alarming, and Flora’s legs jerked as if she’d been given an electric shock. Her heart racing, she spun the bevel, and slowed the buzz a little, knowing that if she didn’t it would be over in a matter of seconds. With the dildo merely purring, and moved away from the head of her clitoris, she swivelled around and lay down flat on the bathroom mat. The black rod looked obscene the way it poked out of the top of her panties, yet somehow its very rudeness was totally exciting. “Oh yes,” Flora moaned, feeling her consciousness begin to float on a weird, dark wave. She was lying on the floor, in her own bathroom, with a dildo in her knickers, but suddenly she seemed transported to a world of perversion. She could do anything here; no matter how bizarre, no matter how grotesque, no matter how lewd. Adjusting her bottom, she slid two probing fingers through the elastic leg of her panties and found a streaming well of moisture between her sex-lips. Angling the thrumming vibrator, she let it slide back towards her clitoris, tenting her pants and using their waistband as a lever. “Oh yes,” she groaned again, holding off the final contact, but unable to stop her bottom wiggling and churning. Pushing a single finger into her vagina, she hooked it

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around to find her G spot, and felt sensation stab inside her like a thin white spike. Unable to stop herself she jammed the dildo against her clitoris. Then cried out loudly, in a harsh voice she barely recognised. “Please, please, please,” she chanted, knowing in the lucid part of her mind that her words were nonsensical. Her legs waved, her bottom humped, her vagina rippled, and she could feel her love-juice trickling out of her like a well-spring, then flowing across her perineum and wetting her pants. Sliding into a stupor, she rocked the dildo like a woman possessed. After a few blinding moments, Flora found herself sprawled splay-legged and breathing like a bellows, with the vibrator resting loosely in her knickers. Shaking her head, she spun the bevel and switched it off, but felt too stunned and over-pleasured to do much more. For another five minutes, she just lay motionless, taking stock. “Oh my God,” she said softly when she sat up. Placing the vibrator almost reverently on the side of the bath, she stood up and began taking her clothes off. First she removed her dress; peeling it up over her head in one unbroken motion, and as she did so, thinking of Morwenna doing the same. “I bet you’ve got dozens of dildoes, Mrs Carfax,” Flora said fondly, running her hands up and down her warm body. She imagined Morwenna at her pleasure, using a toy just like ‘The Scribe’s’ wicked gift. It could be her gift, thought Flora, as she unhooked her bra, and let it drop to the floor. Cupping her breasts, she discovered that her nipples were still erect. What would it feel like to rub the vibrator against them, she wondered. In a moment or two, she’d might try it. Her panties were saturated, and she kicked them away, half disgusted, and half smug. Nude now, she reached again for the vibrator, then resumed her prone position on the rug. Take it slow this time, she told herself, parting her thighs, then with a shuffle, hooking her raised ankle over the side of the bathtub. She giggled, thinking how abandoned she must look. How lewd. ‘The Scribe’ would love to see her pussy stretched so wide. But there was no way her nemesis could see her. The top light of the bathroom window was open, but it was very high. Lying where she was, on the floor, she was hidden. Hidden, so there was no need to hold back. Starting with her breasts, she began a voyage of exploration, swirling the gently pulsing

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wand in slow circles. Pressed gently against her nipples it produced a burst of inner sparks, that set a light to every part of her body. She could feel the pleasure dart right through her towards her sex. Steadily, fighting her impatience, she trickled the vibrator all the way down her torso, getting a sharp jolt when she let it rest against her navel. She’d never considered her belly button as an erogenous zone before, but suddenly touching it made her arch and flex her thighs. It seemed to be attached, by a cord, directly to her vulva; and as she rocked the dildo her clitoris twitched and jumped. “Mmmm...” she cooed, feeling the urge to vocalise. “Mmm...yes,” she murmured, flicking the vibrator up and down, back and forth, then sliding it slowly along the inside of her thigh. Teasingly, she let it skirt the soft periphery of her pubis. “Soon...soon...” she told herself, sweeping the black tip in a graceful arc across her belly. Shall I put it inside this time? she pondered, getting closer and ever closer to her centre. She imagined slotting the dildo into her channel, while at the same time using a finger to rub her clitoris. That would be good, oh-so good, so very good. Swirling the vibrator against her entrance, she coated its blackness with her juices, and when it was honeyed, she thrust it in and spun the bevel. All at once, the hot ripples started building. Flora let go of the dildo, and left it resting there inside her, while she used her fingers on one breast and between her legs. She both tweaked and tapped in a steady mocking rhythm. “Oh yes,” she groaned as her pleasure began to rise. Abandoning her nipple, she braced her weight between her shoulders and her legs, then lifted her pelvis and began to waft it to and fro. Flora had never felt more savage, or more primitive. With her quim pierced by the gleaming, humming totem, her breasts and her belly seemed to dance to an ancient beat. Gyrating now, she clenched her buttocks to heighten the tension, and felt her vagina clamp down hard on the humming dildo. Closing her eyes, she played weird visions in her fuddled mind. She imagined herself surrounded by a circle of admirers who were first applauding, then assisting her in her efforts. Hands—soft, female ones belonging to Lucy and Morwenna—stroked her heaving, sweating body, while between her quaking bottom cheeks

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another dildo was being inserted. In the fantasy it was Morwenna’s husband, Robert, who was doing this, his pale face intent as he stuffed her, his golden eyes holding hers with effortless power. Pinching fingers attacked her breasts, and she felt her nipples being pulled and twisted in different directions. As she wrenched her gaze away from Robert, she saw it was Marshall Fox and the roguish Jack who were tugging her teats. A wail of total ecstasy rose wildly from her centre, and she completed her dream with Declan’s penis between her lips. Her orgasm was so violent that the vibrator slid right out of her, and as it rolled away, she collapsed nervelessly onto the floor. She was vaguely aware of cracking her ankle on the edge of the bathtub, but the faint pain seemed to belong to another body. Another woman, in some other space and time. From her diaphragm to her thighs, she was one mass of firing nerve-ends, one great pulsation that seemed to melt her blood and bones. Curling like a foetus, she sobbed and gasped and whimpered. It seemed to take a long, long while to come back to earth—but when she did, Flora heard a disturbing noise. It was coming from outside somewhere, through the open top window, and it was unmistakably the yowl of a troubled cat. Arnold! Flora struggled to her feet, then flopped down to sit on the side of the bath. Her knees were weak! Making a second attempt, she felt more stable and managed to snatch up her dress. She pulled it on as she stumbled down the stairs, still listening for Arnold’s plaintive cries. “Oh, Arnold!” she cried when she reached the garden, “How the bloody hell did you get up there?” Her cat was in the largest tree in the garden, perched right at the end of the very highest branch and making ineffectual swipes towards the nearest vantage point. Somehow, in spite of his proven agility, he’d managed to become well and truly trapped. Flora looked around, seeking a way to get to him. He’d probably got up via one of Declan’s apple trees on the other side of the wall, but for the life of her, Flora couldn’t see a way to reach him. Perhaps Declan could help? Although Flora no longer suspected him of spying on her from one of his trees, she had no doubt that he’d be able climb one. Smoothing down her

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dress, she set off at a run to get him. When she knocked on his door though, there was no answer, and both his back and front gardens were deserted. Still painfully aware of Arnold’s increasingly piercing complaints, Flora made her way back into the lane. There was not a soul to be seen out there either. Did she have a ladder anywhere? Hunting around the tiny garage and the outhouse, she found nothing, but when she returned to the cottage, her eye lit upon the post that had been left that morning. The item on top was Jack Walters’ flyer. On impulse, she dialled his mobile number. “I’ll be right round,” the handyman said warmly when she explained Arnold’s dilemma, “Just give me five minutes to put my ladders on the van.” As she put down the phone, Flora had second thoughts. It seemed such a ‘damsel in distress’ thing to have done, tantamount to a come-on, and she didn’t think Jack Walters would need any encouragement. Furthermore, cats were the strangest and craftiest of creatures; by the time the handyman and his ladders arrived, there was every likelihood that Arnold would safe again. A quarter of an hour later, however, when a truly hideous, psychedelically painted van drew up in front of the cottage—complete with a rather more serious looking set of ladders lashed to its roof-rack—Arnold was still wailing pitifully from his perch. “Don’t worry, we’ll soon sort him out,” said Jack, peering at her from beneath the brim of a Star Trek baseball cap when Flora ran down the path to meet him, “This isn’t the first time I’ve had to rescue this little sod.” “I’m sorry to drag you out,” she replied as Jack began unhitching the ladders, “I would have gone up after him... But I was never quite that daring, even in my tree-climbing heyday.” Jack gave her an appraising look, as if assessing her limbs for the purpose...or perhaps for something else entirely. Flora was suddenly acutely aware that she had on only her dress and her sandals. What could he see through the thin cotton fabric? Especially if the sun was right behind her. “You’re probably right not to try,” he said, his voice surprisingly sensible and businesslike. Flora felt suddenly disappointed. “It’s a bitch of a tree... You could hurt

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yourself.” His eyes twinkled, and his wide, firm mouth began to curve, “And we wouldn’t want that now, would we?” Swinging from disappointment to hackles up resentment, Flora said nothing, but just stood back to let him pass with the ladders. Well, you wanted him to make a pass, didn’t you? she tasked herself as Jack set up the ladders with a smooth efficiency which was at odds with his wacky shorts and his off-thewall van. He was obviously some kind of village lothario, and possibly a latter-day hippie like Morwenna—but in matters practical he seemed focused and competent. Within minutes he was up into the tree, climbing boldly yet gracefully, and murmuring soft reassurances to the cat as he ascended. Flora couldn’t help but admire his powerful legs as he stretched and balanced between branches. And his muscular back as he reached his fingertips towards Arnold. The feline resisted arrest, but finally after much coaxing, a lot of advance and retreat, and some very bad language, Jack had the cat in his arms and began descending. Part of the way down the ladder, Arnold decided to go psycho and both cat and rescuer began to come down rather faster. As Jack half-fell towards the ground, he was cursing freely. Flora rushed towards him, and helped him to his feet as Arnold flounced off in high dudgeon across the garden. “Are you all right?” she said, alarmed by the sight of a number of long, red scratches adorning Jack’s shoulders and arms. “I’m so sorry...really. He’s been so good until now. I didn’t realise he had this wild streak.” Instinctively, she touched her fingers to one of the deepest of the gouges, across Jack’s bare and hirsute chest, then snatched them back when he flinched and drew his breath. “I’m sorry... I didn’t mean to hurt you,” she apologised again, feeling disconcerted by the return of Jack’s broad grin. “Oh, don’t worry...you didn’t hurt me,” he said softly, almost whimsically, “and even if you did, I’m sure I’d get to like it.” Now what the hell was that supposed to mean? “Would you like me to get some disinfectant or something... For those scratches?” Flora could feel something familiar stirring inside her. The snake of lust that she’d believed vanquished by the dildo. She tore her eyes away from Jack’s scratched, gleaming shoulders and squared her own, intending to be level-headed, “I believe there’s a first aid kit in the

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house.” “They’ll be okay,” he replied easily, “I’ve had worse...” Reaching out, he laid a hand on her arm, and Flora nearly squeaked with surprise. “But I could do with a wash if you don’t mind? It’s hot work climbing trees in the sun.” The thought of his sweat did something strange to Flora’s innards. She imagined him naked and hairy, standing by her sink, his pose elegant yet fundamentally male. “Oh... Er, yes. Yes, of course,” she stuttered, “I’ll show you where the bathroom is.” “It’s okay, I know my way,” said Jack, following her into the cottage. Against her better judgement, Flora whirled and stared at him. She didn’t know anything about the cottage’s previous owners, but it was clear Jack Walters had known them intimately. “Don’t look like that,” he said, chuckling and moving dangerously closer, “I did a lot of the renovations, that’s all... I know where the bathroom is because I was the one who put it in!” “Of course,” said Flora tightly, “Well, if you know where it is, please help yourself.” “Cheers!” Jack grinned, and tugged off his baseball cap, releasing his hair which had been caught into a ponytail through the hole in the back of it. Flora had never been a great lover of long hair on men, but she had to admit that Jack’s shaggy locks rather suited him. They made him look earthy and desirable, like an animal, a challenge to be tamed. Flora gnawed her lip as he bounded up the stairs. “Don’t even think about it,” she whispered, looking towards the staircase, seeing the image of him washing again. But a part of her knew it was too late. Kidding herself that everything was perfectly normal and that she was only being sociable, she fetched the bottle of wine that Morwenna had given her from the kitchen. Selecting two large semi-balloon glasses, she set them on the coffee table, then attacked the bottle with a corkscrew. “Try this, it’s a concoction,” Morwenna had said, and when Flora sniffed its bouquet she had to agree. The perfume of the wine was so intensely fruity and herbal that she could already taste it without even having sipped it. The scent seemed to fill her head, invade her brain, and make her dizzy. Not only that, but it reminded of Morwenna, and by association, inspired a tingling need for sex.

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No way back now, she thought, pouring two generous measures, then took a large sip of her own to boost her courage. The wine’s flavour was both volatile and stirring—Flora’s taste buds detected berries, apples and honey, and beneath that the mysterious tang of a bitter herb. The whole concoction seemed surge right through her like liquid sunshine, and after the first mouthful, she took a second luscious sip. And then another. And another. After the fourth pull, she was forced to replenish her glass. “Witchcraft,” she muttered to herself, swirling the fluid in the fat-bellied goblet and watching it cling fondly and viscously to the glass. Neither supermarket plonk nor the finest chateau-bottled vintage champagne had the characteristics that this wild brew possessed. “It’s an aphrodisiac, isn’t it, Morwenna?” she observed, holding the scented liquid beneath her nose and inhaling deeply, “As if anybody in this nutty village would ever need one!” “Need one what?” Flora span around and found Jack at the bottom of the stairs again, grinning broadly, and standing with his hands behind his back. “Nothing... Nothing at all. I was just wool-gathering. Would you like a glass of wine?” Jack nodded, still smirking. In fact smiling so devilishly that Flora felt a pang of suspicion. What was so funny? And what was it that he was now, so obviously, hiding behind his back? Oh no! In almost the same moment that Jack revealed his hands, Flora remembered what she’d been doing just before Arnold had started wailing. She couldn’t speak, and Jack didn’t need to; he just held out the vibrator, then twirled the bevel and made it hum. Flora prayed for a cliché to be reality—and that the ground would open beneath her and swallow her up. Jack continued to swivel the control of the vibrator, and seemed to be listening, almost seriously to its pitch. “It’s a beauty,” he said at length, switching off the motor. “Exceptionally fine craftsmanship. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a better one. Where did you get it?” “Oh, for crying out loud! This isn’t the Antiques Roadshow!” “No, really! I’m interested.” Jack’s handsome face was a picture of profound erotic

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amusement. He swirled the bevel again, and ran the vibrator at its fastest speed. Flora’s heart and mind were in turmoil. She’d never felt more profoundly embarrassed in her life—even during the adventures of the last couple of days—and at the same time, she was rapidly becoming turned on. Seeing her sturdy, just-used dildo clasped in Jack’s capable fingers was like watching the way he handled his own stiff cock. “I’m sorry, can we put that away, please, and pretend you didn’t see it,” she pleaded, reaching for the still humming rod. “You’re not ashamed, are you?” said Jack provocatively. Placing the dildo on the coffee table, he sat down and reached for his wine. Flora was ashamed, but part of her knew she shouldn’t be. She was a free woman, living alone. She was entitled to take her pleasure however she chose. And in Marwick, using a vibrator surely wasn’t unusual. “No, not really,” she began, then took a long swallow of wine, “It’s just that I hardly know you...and you’re a man. I’d talk to a girl friend about using a vibrator... And if I had a boyfriend, I might tell him I had one. But you’re not my boyfriend and I only met you a couple of hours ago!” Jack’s candid blue eyes told her that any shortcomings in their relationship could be instantly rectified, if she wished it, but Flora felt grateful that he had the good taste not to press the matter. Instead, he too took a sip of his wine. After a long moment of consideration, he said, “This’s brilliant, isn’t it?” He inhaled deeply, just as Flora had done, “I assume it’s one of Morwenna’s special brews?” “Yes, it is. She gave me a flan too. Are you hungry?” Flora didn’t quite know what’d come over her. One minute she was burning with mortification over Jack’s find in the bathroom, and the next she was relaxing and offering him a snack. “Not exactly,” said Jack slowly, and Flora realised he was still trying to flirt. Unable to help herself she began to laugh softly. “That thing,” she said, nodding towards the dildo, “What do they say? ‘Be sure your sins will find you out’.” “True,” said Jack, quirking his eyebrows suggestively, “Although I can’t see why it should be a sin.” Suddenly he looked contemplative, his eyes far-away. “I love watching a

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woman bring herself off... It’s a beautiful sight... Holy in a way. I just wish I’d been here to watch you.” For a moment, Flora thought of her secret ‘watcher’ and wondered if Jack was ‘The Scribe’, then she realised she half wished what he wished. Feeling a subtle change coming over her, she refilled their glasses. “Take care,” said Jack, looking every inch the imp again, “That’s potent stuff. It can make you do some pretty strange things.” “I don’t care! I like doing strange things!” cried Flora suddenly, feeling the wine like a drug in her bloodstream. Reaching for the dildo, she watched Jack from beneath her lashes. Jack met her look, his blue eyes like twin wells of complicity. He caught his breath as she fiddled with the bevel, then visibly held it as the black wand began to hum. What do I do now? thought Flora, feeling her sudden rush of confidence leech away. She was committed to something, but she knew not what. Her pulse racing, she began fondling the vibrator, tracing its subtle moulding as if it were Jack in the real flesh. No man could ever achieve an erection so unyielding, yet the silicon surface of the device was oddly voluptuous, and it still bore the faint odour of her body. On impulse she kissed the trilling tip, and caught a trace of saltiness, then she lifted her skirt and ran the vibrator up her thigh. The humming resonance seemed to travel swiftly upwards, as if drawn like a polar magnet towards her sex. Jack’s eyes had turned from aquamarine to navy, and his breathing was audible and ragged. Somewhere in the back of Flora’s mind, there was a cool, detached feminist who thought this funny. She’d shown him virtually nothing and he was hers... His rising erection, beneath his shorts, was the living proof. Easing her skirt a little higher, Flora slid the vibrator beneath the hem, still not touching herself but implying that she might. Her own arousal was beginning to disturb her now; her breasts were tight, and her labia and her clitoris were swelling. She felt an overwhelming urge to wriggle about, throw up her skirts, and plunge in the dildo, but a playful impulse made her hold back to tease her lover. Cupping her left breast in her left hand, she let her eyes close, then settled back against the cushions and parted her legs. “Is that what you do?” said Jack suddenly. His voice was half squeaky, half a rasp. “Sometimes,” replied Flora, deliberately vague. Hitching her bottom a little forwards,

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she abandoned her breast for a moment to rearrange her skirt, bringing its fullness to the front so she could hide the dildo. Once that was done, she returned her attention to her nipple, taking hold of it, and rolling it gently between her fingers—which sent a piercing jolt of feeling towards her core. Moaning softly, she pushed the dildo against her sex. “Let me see,” said Jack, “Please!” “No! You’ve got to use your imagination,” gasped Flora, as the throb of the miniature motor begin to plague her. She shuffled again, opening her bottom cheeks and pressing downwards, then inveigled the dildo’s pulsating cock-head between her labia, biting her lips when it found its target with no delay. She was aware of Jack beside her, his own excitement rising, but apart from that he seemed to vanish from her mindview. He was just an attendant, a pair of blue eyes, that reflected her. “Please!” “No! But you may feel...” She rolled her head against the back of the settee, losing her mind to the intense insistent buzzing. Slick juice poured freely from her entrance to her vagina, and beneath her buttocks her thin skirt was soaking wet. From what felt like a vast distance, there came sounds of rustling, and the sensation of weight shifting on the sofa. She felt something cotton brush her exposed knee, then the touch of a hairy, muscular leg. After that a hand settled on her thigh, moved tentatively beneath her skirt, then moved smoothly upwards towards its goal. Spread fingers hovered over her pubis, exploring the soft hair there, the wet groove, and its hard intruder. She felt a single digit settle precisely at the meeting point—the very nexus of living flesh and stark technology, then Jack’s bare thigh slid against hers as he shimmied and sighed. The heartfelt sound made Flora open her eyes for a second. Jack was slumped beside her, his position much like hers. His right hand disappeared beneath the printed cotton of her skirt, while his left was clamped firmly around his penis. His gaudy shorts were in a bundle at his ankles with his briefs and he looked so abandoned that Flora’s vulva shuddered, coming to a sudden searing climax around the dildo. “Oh, baby, yes!” Jack cried as if answering the jumping flesh beneath his finger. Flora was no longer looking at him—she was beyond seeing now—but she sensed his hand was moving on his cock. And the idea of that made her pleasure soar anew.

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Half fainting, she let the dildo drop away from between her fingers, and felt Jack increase his pressure in its place. Her legs kicked uncontrollably as he circled and palpated her, his fingertip rocking and gliding in her fluid. Then with a final gasp, she stilled her squirming and begged, “No more!” For a short while, Flora lay like a panting zombie, her skirt rumpled, her whole body loose and glowing. She was almost oblivious to the moaning man at her side, but eventually she opened her eyes, and turned towards him. Jack was lying much as she must have done—eyes closed so he could tune out stark reality. He was masturbating steadily, rubbing his thick, impressive penis, and his lips were parted as his pelvis slowly wove. Flora felt a strange surge of affection. She and Jack barely knew each other, yet he hid nothing from her, not even this private ritual. Granted, he’d coaxed her into revealing her secret pleasure, but somehow, this surrender of his seemed far, far greater. And all of a sudden, she wanted to grant him a fitting reward. Sliding to her knees on the floor, she leant across him, at an angle, and touched her mouth to him. She dragged her lips, from side to side, over the tip of his cock. Jack’s eyes flew open—their blue depths full of shock and near-childlike joy. Almost instantaneously, he released his own flesh from his fingers, then gently cradled her head with his shaking hands. “Oh, Flora,” he whimpered softly as her lips received him. His flavour was rich, intensely salty, and heavy with musk. Flora felt her mouth begin to water as she lashed him with her tongue, and she listened with delight to his increasingly passionate cries. He grunted and gasped as she probed his stretching love-eye, then wailed loudly as she flicked her tongue-tip along his frenum. When she sucked hard, and clasped his balls, he bucked his hips and shouted, then a second later, he began an ancient pumping rhythm. Flora’s mouth was swiftly assailed by spurts of heat. Jack’s orgasm went on and on with what seemed an unnatural persistence, and after a few moments, Flora realised she was dribbling his semen. It trickled like liquid satin, from between her lips and down her chin, but at last the inundation ebbed and faded. As she swallowed, she felt his erection begin to subside. “Oh God!” Jack whispered fervently as he released her head, then started to caress her. She felt his fingers ruffle her hair, then affectionately touch her cheeks. She heard him sigh

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with content when she set free his flaccid member. “That was incredible,” he said, his voice sounding weak. Flora rose from the floor and slumped down beside him, aware that her own deficit of energy was fast catching up on her. She leant against him, and just let herself be cuddled. “You’re quite something, Flora Swain,” Jack continued, with an admiration that seemed nothing short of awe, “I’m bloody glad that old Arnold went up that tree.” Flora thought about pointing out that even if there hadn’t been an ‘Arnold’ incident, there would doubtless have been some other reason that she needed Jack’s assistance, but somehow she couldn’t work up the energy to speak. With an ‘mmmm’ of pure well-being she snuggled closer to Jack’s strong body, and almost immediately felt the trailing edge of sleep.

“She’s with Walters,” said Declan, speaking softly into his mobile phone. He’d just coasted his bike to a halt, ditched his helmet and jacket on the garden seat, and was gazing towards Flora’s cottage. The sight of Walters’ van had seemed to hit him like a punch, and inside he was a mass of troubled feelings. “And are you jealous?” enquired a seductive voice from the tiny speaker. “I don’t know,” Declan lied, feeling the familiar green eyed monster twist his belly. His discomfort intensified when he heard the noise of plaintive sobbing. The sound of a woman in climax—or getting very close to it—which came tellingly from Flora’s open window. Declan moaned himself as his penis began to swell. “Of course you are!” Morwenna laughed. “Come around and we’ll take your mind off her... Robert’s feeling imaginative and I’ve been a naughty girl.” Without speaking another word, she broke the connection and left him hanging. Declan stared at the slim unit in his hand, and as he did so, a man’s voice cried out too. “Screw you! The lot of you!” he hissed, clicking his phone off and almost snapping it in two pieces. Feeling full of irrational anger, he stormed into his house with his belongings, then set off again towards Morwenna...and sweet release.

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Chapter Eight A Table for Three

Why am I so angry? Declan asked himself, striding down the lane as if a demon—or an art critic—were on his heels. His feelings, he realised, were fast becoming a mystery to him. For months now, he’d taken his women very lightly, and enjoyed pleasure when, and wherever it presented itself. Which was often, and all over, in Marwick Magna. The village, he admitted, had been the saving of him. From almost the moment he’d crossed the parish boundary, his muse—who had absconded—had come back to him. Bringing his fully restored sex drive in her wake, as well as a resolve to avoid heavy relationships in future. Morwenna Carfax had helped along these changes. Declan been astounded at first when she’d come on to him, at a cocktail party she’d held at Redlake House. He’d seen her husband, Robert—whom he’d known already—watching them closely, but even so he’d been unable to resist her. She’d led him out to the summerhouse, and started kissing him, and before he really knew what was happening, she’d asked him to put his hand up her skirt. He could still remember the thrill of that first contact. Morwenna had been completely naked beneath her dress, and the folds of her sex had been awash with slippery juice. He’d never encountered a woman so incredibly wet before, and never touched a pussy so hot and feverish. It’d been the most natural thing in the world to start rubbing her. Within seconds she was writhing, bouncing on his hand, swirling her hips to move her clitoris against his fingers. Almost of its own accord the front of her dress had come open, exposing her creamy breasts to the scented night air. Her nipples looked two garnets in the darkness. Just at the moment Morwenna came noisily to climax, her husband Robert was suddenly with them, slipping silently into the summer house like a ghost. Declan froze, his juice-covered fingers falling still in Morwenna’s furrow, his tongue cleaving to the roof of his mouth. There was no excuse, no justification. He was standing

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with his hand clearly up Morwenna’s skirt, and her naked breasts were just inches from his body. He was clothed, but his erection was very evident. Robert smiled, not just with his thin, rather pallid lips, but also with his peculiar, lightgold coloured eyes. ‘Please continue,’ he said softly, settling into a relaxed stance just a few feet away. He crossed his arms around him in a relaxed and languid attitude, then raised one hand and let his chin rest upon it. “Don’t let me inhibit you, Declan,” he continued, his tone perfectly even and unruffled. “I... I’m...” stammered Declan, about to withdraw his hand. “I...” He got no further. Morwenna began to jiggle again, grinding her sex on his fingers while she reached up to pinch her own naked nipples. Within the space of a few seconds she was shoving her hips back and forward, an uncouth grimace expressing her second climax. Her husband continued his observation for a few moments, then whispered, “My dear...” and approached noiselessly across the room. Declan watched in astonishment as the art historian kissed his faithless wife, then let his pale hand drift delicately across her breasts. “I love you,” he murmured, closing his hand around one of hers and squeezing roughly, “You’re magnificent.” Releasing her, he turned swiftly and strode away, pausing only at the door to give Declan a strange look, his narrow lips curving in another slight smile. “Sweet Jesus!” hissed Declan, retrieving his wet fingers from beneath Morwenna’s floating skirt. “Don’t worry, that was just what he likes,” said Morwenna, regaining her poise with miraculous swiftness, “He’ll probably think you should be rewarded...” She’d unzipped him then, and for the next ten minutes Declan had forgotten being caught, forgotten Robert, forgotten everything. Except the feel of her red mouth on his cock. Returning to the present, Declan blinked, almost surprised to find himself out in the sunshine. His memory of Morwenna had been so detailed and compelling that it’d carried him away from the here and now. He’d almost forgotten his jealousy over Flora. But not quite. He grinned as he unlatched the gate to the garden of Redlake House. In trying to reason with himself, he’d told himself that he hardly knew the girl. But that was a bit of an anomaly, wasn’t it? He certainly had knowledge of her in the biblical sense. In fact he’d

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been with her only that morning, which made her perfidy with Jack Walters even worse. So what was it about Flora Swain? he pondered, ringing Morwenna’s bell and hearing its sonorous note chime distantly in the house. Flora was a pretty enough thing, but Marwick Magna was just bursting with beauty, and Morwenna Carfax was the premier example—a pagan goddess of exquisite perfection. Lost in his ruminations, Declan jumped when the black door swung open. “Come in,” said Robert Carfax evenly, almost as if they’d been speaking to each other only a moment ago, and were right in the middle of something. Which we are, aren’t we? thought Declan, looking at his friend, his lover Morwenna’s husband. Robert was barefoot and wearing a thin, abbreviated robe of wafer-thin black silk. The nakedness of his pale, hairless legs looked exotic somehow, against the shimmering darkness of the robe, and Declan felt an ambiguous but not unpleasant stirring. Robert was an unusual man: refined but not effete, artistic but not fey, profoundly intelligent but with a keen sense of the outré. And he was good-looking too, in an unconventional way. His usually sleek hair was slightly dishevelled today, as if he—or someone else—had been running their fingers repeatedly through it, and his golden eyes looked sensual, almost languorous. His near naked body smelt decidedly of sex. “Am I interrupting something?” Declan enquired as he followed Robert down the corridor, feeling intensely aware of the older man’s near nudity. Robert seemed to ignore Declan’s enquiry, and simply said, “A drink?” as he ushered the way into his long, sunlit office. “Yeah. Er...please,” Declan answered, slightly stunned by the sight that met his eyes. Morwenna was stretched out on Robert’s square-legged, rather narrow mahogany table, her naked body arranged like a sculpture. She was masturbating slowly with a dreamy, drugged abstraction, her long legs flexing and scissoring as she rubbed. Her eyes were closed and her strokes continued as Declan walked in. It was far from the first time he’d seen this spectacle, but nevertheless, he was lost for words in wonder. To watch a woman at her pleasure was one of his greatest turn-ons, and Morwenna was an exhibitionist par excellence. Without breaking her delicate rhythm, she reached her second hand beneath her, to finger her anus while she jerked and swirled her

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clitoris. Declan swallowed as his penis swelled uncomfortably. It was just a week since he’d been with Morwenna, but the sight of her seemed new to him. He could believe how much this display of hers aroused him. “Bring yourself off,” said Robert casually as he poured out two generous glasses of wine. He wasn’t even watching what his naked wife was doing, but it was clear he was attuned to her excitement. “So? How goes it?” he asked of Declan, handing him a drink, then sitting down in one of a pair of leather-covered wing chairs. There were two, set with a perfect view of the table. “In what context?” asked Declan, taking his own seat. He gulped a long grateful swallow of the delicious home-made wine, his eyes never leaving Morwenna. She was near her peak now, and bouncing her bottom against the table. “With our new friend, the lovely Flora?” Robert sipped his own drink, and studied Declan across the glass. Sparks of gilded light seemed to dance in his glowing eyes, and his expression was full of mischief and curiosity. “Okay, I think,” said Declan, drinking again, his loins aching where his erection was fighting his jeans. Morwenna’s knees were bent now, and her slim legs were raised. Between her thighs her rosy vulva gaped open, and she was making the most of increase in access. Her quickly slicking fingers has speeded up to a swift cadence, and Declan could hear her juices squelching. “Yes, things are going great,” he affirmed, only half recalling what he was talking out. “In fact this morning I—” He hesitated, his thoughts addled by a plaintive groan from the table. “I made love to her. In the garden, in broad daylight.” “Really,” murmured Robert, “And I thought Morwenna was being hasty.” He grinned narrowly, mysteriously. “I’ve threatened her with a visit to the Manor...” He looked contemplatively into the golden depths of his glass, “It doesn’t seem fair to let you get off scot-free.” Declan said nothing. He was caught, frozen by his own desire, between Morwenna, and subtle lure of her husband. An attraction that both excited and disturbed him. “I’m joking, of course,” murmured Robert, his voice cryptic, but his eyes speaking

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volumes. “I know,” replied Declan, trying to sound just as calm. Morwenna was working herself passionately now, assaulting her clitoris with a fingerand-thumb pinch. From the steep angle of her wrist, where it disappeared beneath her bottom, it was clear she had a digit inside her rectum. An intrusion she was wriggling and pressing down on. Declan suddenly longed for a sable brush or a drawing pencil. He wanted to capture Morwenna’s contortions on paper, in harsh, dark lines that would exaggerate their crudeness. A woman of great beauty, frigging herself without compunction, and penetrating her own bottom in her search for baser thrills. He mapped out a series of studies in his mind, each one of them more obscene than the last. It would be a visual tribute to his friend’s great obsession—Robert’s devotion to his wife’s glorious backside, and to its potential for both ecstasy and shame. Declan could remember any number of wild nights they’d all spent together, and the use of dildoes, porcelain eggs, and things far stranger... His recollections became a further set of studies. Morwenna’s splendid rear raised and naked; her anal portal stretched by some rude intrusion; the lustre of semen across her cheeks, both his and Robert’s. Lost in his visions, he abruptly realised he was groaning, his harsh gasps blending with Morwenna’s orgasmic yelps. “Are you unwell, Declan?” murmured Robert, the faint aura of smile around his lips. He knows exactly what I’m seeing, thought Declan, swirling the remnants of his wine in his glass. Morwenna’s enigmatic spouse had great powers of perception—much as she did herself—and it often seemed as if he were almost telepathic. “No...I’m fine,” he answered. “But you’re aroused,” observed Robert, his unusual eyes drifting to Declan’s crotch. “You must be uncomfortable. Why not give yourself room to...to manoeuvre?” He wants to see my cock, thought Declan, recognising another of Robert’s peccadilloes. His special fondness for the naked male form. For bodies as fine and handsome as his own. As if exhibiting the very mind-reading qualities that Declan suspected in him, Robert suddenly drained his glass, set it down, then reached for the sash of his black robe. Fixing his eyes steadily on Declan, the older man teased open the loose knot, then said, “Another

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drink?” and rose smoothly to his feet. As Declan nodded, the fine silk billowed and the robe gaped. Robert was erect—unsurprisingly given Morwenna’s lewd performance—his narrow cock jutting up steeply from his groin. Its circumcised tip was agleam with thin juice. Declan felt the grip of strange urges. He wanted to touch his friend, to handle and caress him, to slide that fine-textured skin over its unyielding, rigid core. He was shocked, but in itself that aroused him more. After a moment, Declan his raised head and met Robert’s intensely focused gaze. The other man’s eyes were two pools of melting gold, and desire—full and reciprocal—poured out of them. “I’ll get us those drinks,” he said, then turned away, his cock swinging provocatively as he moved. Declan felt light-headed, as if every drop of his blood was in his penis. His erection was bent and painful in its rigid denim trap, and with a sigh, he surrendered and unzipped himself. As his prick sprang free, he heard another sigh, close by. Morwenna was half sitting up now, one hand still pressed lightly to her crotch. Her luxuriant black hair hung like a cloak around her shoulders and her face was softly pink and beatific. A deeper flush mottled her throat and upper chest. As Declan watched her, her hand began to stir. “Not until I tell you!” said Robert, from where he stood, pouring wine. He had his back to his wife, and there was no way he could see her, yet he clearly knew exactly what she was up to. “Lie down again... Hands on the table. Legs apart.” Morwenna obeyed him, her face a mask of rapture. She was a dramatically forceful woman, full of intelligence and independence, yet obviously these submissive moments moved her deeply. As she settled back onto the table, she seemed to glow. Not with a blush, but an inward fire of joy. Her delight and her arousal seemed to be bursting from her body, and she wiggled her bottom against the brightly polished wood. “And do try to keep still,” admonished Robert. He’d turned around and was bringing Declan his glass of wine. It was Declan’s turn now, to do the blushing, and he was acutely aware of his bare cock. Looming over him, Robert’s eyes narrowed appraisingly.

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“Why don’t you touch it?” he said softly, still holding both glasses, as if Declan’s were some form of reward. Declan looked down at himself. He was so stiff that his flesh appeared inflamed almost, and his glans seemed to be yearning towards Robert’s. To try and govern it, he wrapped his fingers round his shaft. “Wonderful,” murmured Robert, proffering the drink. Declan reached for the glass with his left hand, then frowned when Robert shook his head. He was puzzled at first, but he soon realised his friend’s intention. Placing his own drink aside, Robert knelt down on the carpet, and held the second glass to Declan’s lips. “Drink,” he whispered, “Drink...and stroke yourself.” The rim of the crystal goblet was cool to the touch, and its pressure imperious against Declan’s mouth lower lip. He felt as helpless as Morwenna when he began to move his fingers, and Robert tipped the glass and made him swallow the luscious wine. The sensation of drinking, and handling himself at the same time, was peculiar but far from unpleasant. One experience seemed to compliment the other. The fruit-rich wine, and the silky glide of his gripping hand. His hips began to buck, and the movement made him dribble, knocking his mouth against rim of the hovering glass. “Steady,” said Robert quietly, leaning forward to cradle Declan’s head, and brush his own cock against Declan’s jeans-clad shin. The wine wasn’t Morwenna’s strongest vintage, but suddenly it seemed to addle all his wits. He gulped down the golden fluid like a baby with its bottle, and started rubbing himself faster and ever faster. “Steady,” repeated Robert, and Declan knew it wasn’t the drink he meant now. “We wouldn’t want things to happen prematurely...” He nodded downwards towards Declan’s weeping cock. Declan withdrew his hand as if he’d burnt it. He’d been so close that he could feel his balls crawling; and his very soul gathering expectantly for the spring. He gripped the chairarm like a life-belt, then felt Robert’s hand take hold of his, raising it up and putting the glass within its grip. The older man smiled. “Why not take your clothes off?” he said, reaching for his own glass, and taking a sip before he shucked off his robe. The black silk slid down his arms with

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a ghost of a swish, and he caught it behind him at the small of his back. Robert’s body was lean, and very pale and smooth-skinned. He had almost no bodyhair at all aside from a few wiry, reddish tufts at the base of his belly, and his stance was graceful, like a dancer’s or an athlete’s. Declan was well aware that his friend was neither of these, and put Robert’s fitness down to a plenitude of good sex. “Don’t be shy,” purred Morwenna, from the table, and Declan realised she was watching them closely. Robert threw her a mock-threatening glance, then walked over and laid his fingers across her lips. “Remember what I told you,” he said, bending to put his face close to hers, “If you don’t behave, I’ll have to tell Crispin...and you’re in enough trouble there already.” As Declan watched them, Morwenna suckled Robert’s fingers. Slipping his T-shirt over his head, Declan considered the significance of Robert’s last sentence. He wasn’t quite sure yet whether he was into the games played at Rawnsley Manor, but his cock seemed to jerk at the idea of them. Crispin Rawnsley, the quintessential English aristocrat, was a practitioner of one of the nation’s oldest vices, and a visit to him meant Morwenna would get a thrashing. As he bent to unlace his trainers, Declan imagined her perfect white bottom again, but this time offered naked for the lash. He saw her writhing, heard her protesting; then pictured her cheeks striped with a pattern of livid pink. He imagined Robert stooping to kiss away the pain; then turning her over and making her forget it a different way. Declan had never hit a woman, either in anger or for pleasure, but as he kicked away his trainers he considered it. He looked at Morwenna, and imagined his hand connecting percussively with her bottom. She’d love it, of course, and hate it too; but as he understood it that was the essence of ritual punishment. A exotic blend of two extreme emotions, both for recipient and punisher alike. Sliding down his jeans, he flipped the interior image to Flora, and felt a low electric jolt in his troubled groin. Although they were both free agents—and he probably the freer of the two of them—he still couldn’t help feeling she’d betrayed him. He’d managed to forget his scorched male pride while he was here with Robert and Morwenna, but it was still simmering, in his gut, like a low dark flame. As he skinned down his briefs, he imagined he had Flora across his knee. He’d touch

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her first, stroke her buttocks, and perhaps play with her a little, and just when she was beginning to whimper, he’d start to spank her. He curled his fingers around his cock and savoured the thought. “Declan... Come and join us.” Morwenna’s low, sweet voice broke Declan’s fantasy. She was looking across at him, over the top of Robert’s head, while her husband sucked hungrily on her nipple, and caressed her other breast with just the tips of his fingers. Very conscious of his erection, Declan walked slowly across to the table. It was quite clear that Morwenna wanted both of them, but he was still slightly nervous of Robert’s nakedness. As the older man bent over his wife, sucking and fondling avidly, his own body was tacitly on offer. His buttocks and his thighs made a long graceful line, Declan’s hand itched with the urge to run down it. And he was convinced that Robert would respond. “Declan, please,” prompted Morwenna as he dithered, opening her legs as if to indicate her needs. Moving closer, Declan slid his hands tentatively between her thighs, then pushed one finger into the dark forest of her pubis. As he found her clitoris, she responded, and her hips began to roll. Under her breath, she hissed a joyous, “Oh yes!”

“Oh yes!” hissed Morwenna as Declan’s finger touched her. She was never happier than when naked with two lovers to attend her—especially these two, whose bodies were so different. Robert, with his subtle strength and his skin as fine and pale as a teenage girl’s; and Declan, the classic Adonis, as bronzed and muscular as every woman’s wettest dream. She had one sucking her breast and the other touching her pussy. “Oh yes!” she whispered again, divinely happy. The feminist inside her gloated too. She was a deity being presided over, a goddess on an altar, with two highly-skilled servants to do her bidding. The men might think it was the other way around—especially Robert, who she’d agreed to obey for the duration—but in reality she was the one who had control. Making a sound of pure lust in the depths of her throat, she lifted her pelvis to indicate her wishes. “She’s enjoying this too much,” said Robert suddenly, lifting his head from her breast and looking down at her. “Ease back a little, Declan. Make her work for it.”

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Morwenna whimpered as Declan’s touch receded. She loved the delicate way he’d been manipulating her. He had huge hands, but his fingers were narrow and very flexible, perfect for painting or for caressing a woman’s vulva. “Please,” she whispered, churning her hips again, and lifting her own hands to cup her swollen breasts. Letting her legs loll apart, she exhibited herself, creating a lewd and wanton lure with her opened sex. “You’re a trollop, Wenna,” cooed Robert in her ear, and after a second or two, she felt him start to kiss her. First her brow, then her cheek, and then her jawline, his approach stealthy, but as seductive as her own. He was kissing her face, but it was her quim that was reacting, her warm juices gathering thickly at her core. “Touch me, someone,” she begged as the inner fires flared. “For God’s sake, you two bastards, bring me off!” “Tut tut, my dear, there’s no need to be so crude,” said Robert reprovingly, his mouth printing a chain of kisses along her collarbone. He’s so good at this, thought Morwenna, her sex-flesh throbbing. Robert was a consummate master of the slow, circuitous route. He’d been known to spend hours teasing her like this, bringing her to screaming point before he’d even touched her clitoris. And now he had Declan to assist him, another lover who had rare and special skills. As if thought conjured deed, she felt a pair of lips kiss her left instep and her leg being lifted gently from the table. And while Robert nibbled the tender curve of her shoulder, down below Declan concentrated on her feet. Her breasts and her vulva they both studiously ignored. Enflamed, she redoubled her own efforts, pinching a nipple and rolling her clitoris beneath her thumb. But just as she felt the wave building, her wrists were suddenly gripped by two strong hands. One was broad, the other narrower, but steely. “Don’t!” Robert’s voice was determined but not unkind. “Let us see to you. Put yourself in our hands...” As one they lifted her fingers off her body, leaving her primed and only seconds away from coming. The frustration was agonising, but Morwenna knew better than to contravene Robert’s order. She was desperate to have an orgasm and her clitoris was burning, but she knew now she’d have to wait for her husband’s leave. She wanted to slap his face...or get down and kneel before him.

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“Please,” she begged, her fingers scratching and gouging at the polished wood beneath her. Unable to stay still, she circled her bottom against the table. “Patience, my love,” said Robert, smoothing her tumbled hair out of her eyes, and licking the salty sweat from off her brow. He was covering her face with kisses now: tiny ones, longer ones, licking little darting ones. And when his mouth touched hers, he pried her open and explored her, plunging his long flexing tongue in like a penis, and mimicking the sex act with a skill that made her ache. Meanwhile, at her feet, Declan too was busy kissing. She felt his mouth open over her ankle bone, then suck furiously, while his fingers played up and down her calf. He seemed unperturbed by her manic jerks and squirmings. “Robert, can I hold you?” she whispered when her mouth was released and her husband began to nuzzle her tangled hair. His cock was just inches from her fingers, its red tip engorged and inviting. “Just for a moment then...” Robert’s voice was suddenly less even, and he pushed forward and let his glans touch her wrist. Immediately, Morwenna took hold of him, sighing with enchantment at his heat and his hardness. She loved her husband’s penis so very, very much, because like the rest of him it was noble and elegant; a perfectly proportioned rod, full of power and primal vigour, its shaft long, its head firm and shapely. Carefully, forcing herself to be gentle and contained, she began a slow exploration of his contours. Robert’s cock seemed to have a life of its own, and it pulsed in her palm like a captive bird. The skin on its surface was as fine as hot velvet, and the core within it as hard as seasoned wood. His love-eye wept thin, glassy fluid. He groaned into her hair as she gloved her hand around him, then slowly oh so slowly rubbed his length. As she masturbated her sighing husband, Morwenna wondered what Declan was thinking. He was still kissing her, still placing his lips precisely and measuredly, but he was now moving higher and higher up her leg. Doodling around her knees—first one, then the other—he kept making sorties across the silky margins of her thighs. Opening her legs wider, she tried once again to tempt him. “Have a care, Morwenna,” said her husband, sliding his hand beneath her chin and making her look him in the eye. “We set the pace here, not you.” He bumped his hips and

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made his cock surge in her grip. “Yes, Robert, I will,” she answered, doing her best to keep her tortured body still, and not to squeeze her husband too hard. “But please... May I hold Declan too?” “Of course you may,” answered Robert, “But only if he wishes it...” It was nonsense really, just ritual. How could Declan not want her fingers wrapped around him? He was fully aware of her skills... Her tall, dark friend made no answer, but simply turned and stepped towards her head, putting his erection within reach of her grasp. With another happy sigh, Morwenna reached out and enfolded him, feeling his broad hand settle lightly on her thigh. It was difficult to concentrate, and not being ambidextrous, Morwenna could only managed a little simple rubbing. She closed her eyes tightly and listened to their responses, but was surprised when the pair of them fell silent. Opening her eyes again, she looked up, studying first one handsome face, then the other... Robert and Declan were staring intently at each other, their dreamy, rapt expressions almost alike. For the space of a few seconds, Morwenna forgot her own frustration, and concentrated purely on what she saw in her men. They want each other, she thought, suppressing a smile, and a small gasp of triumph. There was a white-hot desire writ across her Robert’s handsome features, and the same— plus a little confusion—on Declan’s. He was fighting it, she sensed, but not fighting very hard. In a matter of minutes, he’d probably give into it, and the thought of that made Morwenna’s lust soar. Letting her mind jump ahead, she suddenly saw them... First kissing, and then making love. Who would be the dominant, and who the submissive? she wondered, feeling the thin ooze of pre-come in both palms. Who would take? Who would give? Who would roll over and surrender his supremacy? Instinct told her that Robert would play the ‘man’ in this duo, in spite of Declan’s more macho persona. She could hardly wait to see it. It had to happen. But she had to act as the catalyst. “I want you,” she moaned, shimmying her body again, “I want you both... Both at once. Oh Robert, please...” Their two penises were rods of fire in her hands. “And how might that be accomplished?” Robert leant over her again and ran a fingertip along the contour of her brow. “You must tell us, my love... Tell us exactly what

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you want of us.” “I... I want you in my mouth, Robert.” She arched her throat, trying to kiss the hand that caressed her. “And I’d like Declan to put his cock into my pussy.” Gyrating her hips, she drew attention to her emptiness. “Yes. Yes, I think I’d like that,” said Robert, as if contemplating some obscure, philosophical question, “I’d like it very much.” His finger drifted down her face, then circled the red bow of her lips, “I’d like to fuck you here... Make you swallow me... Get in as deeply as I can.” He pushed first one finger, then two, then three into her mouth, making her suck them. As her spittle coated him, he began a shallow thrusting action. “Would you do that?” he asked, even though she couldn’t speak, and he already knew the answer. “Would you let me come in your mouth? Fill your throat with my semen... Would you?” She nodded as she nursed on his fingers. “And what about you, Declan?” Robert enquired, his fingers still in Morwenna’s mouth while she looked up at their friend—whose erect cock she was still slowly fondling. “Do you accept what dear Wenna is offering?” continued her husband archly, as if her were merely a secondary consideration. “Yes. Yes, I do!” Declan’s voice was urgent, and deeply stressed, as if he were being pushed to the limits of his endurance. “Good. Then let’s get to it,” Robert sounded businesslike as he retrieved his wet fingers. Once she’d released their pricks, the two men worked as a team. Without a single word of conference, Robert took hold of her shoulders, and Declan her hips, and between them they swivelled her round on the narrow table; until she was lying crosswise with her head and legs dangling, and her hips resting on the edge at Declan’s side. Morwenna looked up at the two men, her hunger for both of them equal. She saw Robert nod infinitesimally, and step forward. As her husband’s glans touched her lips, then pushed its way between them, she felt two strong hands open wide her thighs. She tried to speak, to express her eagerness, but her mouth was already full of Robert’s cock. Unable to make a coherent sound, she began to work her hips, then felt Declan’s fingers peeling open her labia, and exposing her inner

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vulva, her lushest fruit. Robert’s penis bored steadily inwards, and she gagged slightly, then felt his cool fingers stroke her neck to soothe and coax her. As if by magic, her throat softened and let him in. Simultaneously, Declan’s cock thrust deep inside her. The sensations of dual immolation were transcendent. She was full, packed, bursting with magnificent male flesh. Robert was as deep in her throat as he’d ever been before, and she could feel his balls bumping against her nose. Her eyes were closed—what could she see but a blur of Robert’s thighs? —but with her inner vision she saw the complete picture. A woman arched across a table; her cascading black hair brushing the carpet; one man in her mouth and a second between her legs. As she ‘watched’, the woman’s hands began to move over her own body, seeking out places that the two men were ignoring; pinching her nipples and stabbing roughly at her clitoris. Her orgasm bubbled inside her like an elixir in a cauldron, and her mouth and quim were corked by her two lovers. Both Declan and Robert seemed content to stay motionless, each as deeply into her body as they could get, while she lay suspended between them. She twisted her nipple, and scrubbed her clitoris wildly, then convulsed as the inner cauldron boiled over. Long arcs of sweet sensation flashed instantaneously around her body, bouncing and careening between every site of pleasure. If her mouth had been free she would have screamed. As it was, her muffled cry of ecstasy gurgled uncouthly around Robert, while the pulsing rhythm of her vagina caressed Declan. Both men gasped, and laid fervent, loving hands upon her, and within seconds they each joined her in climax; anointing her with semen and groaning her name as their bodies jerked.

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Chapter Nine Aftermath

It was a while before Morwenna could think clearly again, but even when she could she kept her eyes closed. She could sense an atmosphere forming in the room close by her, something rather delicate happening between Robert and Declan. It was almost as if she’d acted as their conduit. A bridge, as much mental as physical, to connect their wants and needs. Robert had always desired their friend the artist; it was something he’d told her about often enough, and sometimes hinted, albeit subtly, to Declan himself. But this was the first time she’d been aware of reciprocation. It seemed strange that, after all these years, her husband’s lust was finally being returned. So, if she was the conduit, what—or who—had been the catalyst? Flora Swain? Morwenna grinned creamily to herself. Yes, it had to be Marwick’s beautiful new arrival, the innocent but eager neophyte in their midst. So, who was it you were fucking just then, boys? she asked her companions silently, risking a peek from beneath the veil of her lashes. From her vantage point on the table, curled up in foetal contentment, she could see both her handsome lovers with perfect ease, and what she saw made her desire stir anew. Robert and Declan were sitting together. Almost embracing. After the three of them had disengaged themselves from each other, the men had both kissed her, then chosen to collapse onto Robert’s battered old sofa. Their two bodies were less than inches apart. Morwenna so much wanted to see them make love. She loved Robert, and she cared deeply for Declan. They were both adorable. To see the two of them entwined would be beautiful. Oh boys, please! she willed them silently, wishing that they’d lose all inhibition and touch each other. It was something she wanted just as much as she’d wanted them to touch her. And the afternoon was young yet... There was time for all sorts of possibilities when you were healthy and lusty and eager.

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As if by magic, Robert’s drooping eyelids snapped open, and he looked sideways, almost slyly, at Declan. The bigger, darker man was half drowsing still: his strong thighs splayed, his cock quiescent between them. Morwenna saw her husband glance towards Declan’s genitals. He’s going to do it! she thought. He is! He is! Her own sex began to quiver softly. Containing her excitement, and remaining perfectly still, she watched her husband’s tongue flick out across his lips. You’re a devil, Rob, she thought fondly, almost tasting his desire in her own mouth. She saw his fingers flex, almost begin to reach out, then pause. The next instant he looked across and caught her eye. He didn’t speak, or even mime, but she heard his voice in her mind as clear as radio. Help me, Wenna, he seemed to say. Help me out, this is delicate. I need you. Moving as noiselessly as she could, Morwenna straightened and slid down off the table. As she walked across the room, she caught her breath and almost faltered, feeling a rush of trickling liquid on her thigh. Your semen, Declan my darling, she thought as she approached him. Your essence, and now my husband wants more of it. Sitting down beside Declan, she leant against him, and let her long hair drift like mist across his skin. “Mmmm...” Declan made an appreciative sound, then stretched luxuriously, his hardpacked muscle flexing and surging as he moved. Dear God, man, you’re so beautiful! thought Morwenna. She wanted to overwhelm him, run wild with him, devour him; to make his cock stiff, and then leap astride and ride him. But instead, she simply stroked his sweaty chest. Robert gave her a look that was half gratitude and half a warning, an expression that aroused her even more. It’s all right, she told her husband with her eyes. This time he’s yours, but when you’re done, I want the leavings. Letting her hand slide down Declan’s sleek torso, she traced her fingertips over each bunch of bulging muscle. His physique was beautifully modelled but not grotesquely overdeveloped, and his flat male belly was as hard as a slab of oak. As she approached his penis, it twitched slightly and began to rise. “Morwenna,” he groaned, as she let her hand move lower. His eyelids fluttered, then opened, and he turned his face towards her, reaching up a hand to bring her mouth down to his.

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“Relax, darling. Lie back and enjoy,” she whispered, fending him off with one hand while the other brushed his sex. “That’s it,” she told him as he obeyed her, “Close your eyes and leave everything to me.” Oh Declan, she thought as his long, black lashes fluttered down again. Why do you men always make my job so easy? She looked across him and met Robert’s golden gaze. I love you, her husband mimed, blowing her a kiss under the cover of a stagey yawn. “I need a drink,” he said pointedly, rising to his feet and stepping carefully around Declan’s stretched out legs. Morwenna looked up at her slender, pale-skinned husband, and blew a kiss of her own—towards the might of his newly stiffened cock. As an answer, he jiggled his erection with his fingers. Returning her attention to Declan, she said, “Good boy,” as he shuffled his bottom on the sofa, easing himself forward and opening wide his sculpted thighs. His penis was now proudly at attention. Planning her strategy, Morwenna slid down onto her knees on the carpet, then edged closer until she was kneeling between Declan’s legs. Seeing his beautiful penis from the angle of a penitent, she felt a sudden urge to tell Robert he could make his own arrangements. She wanted to pleasure Declan herself, and she was already leaning forward, her mouth relaxed in readiness, when a cool hand fell on her shoulder and gripped it firmly. There were no words spoken—they had to maintain the pretence—but she fell still, in obedience to her master. Guided by Robert’s nod, she put her hand on Declan’s penis, very lightly enclosed it, and then stroked its underside with her thumb. The fine penile skin was very warm, and close-textured, and as she held him she felt a long vein pulsing. “Oh yeah,” he whispered, shifting his haunches, then tipping back his head. “Yeah, that is so good,” he gasped as she squeezed a little, watching the expression that induced upon his face. Holding the very tip of Declan’s cock between her finger and thumb, Morwenna wondered how much he suspected. Was he aware of Robert’s machinations? When the time came would he shake off his usual bias? And let his sex life gain a brand new dimension... As she worked meticulously on Declan’s dripping glans, she felt Robert move close in behind her, and his own cock touch the nape of her neck. Flexing her shoulders, she pushed

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back against him, using her hair as a soft-as-silk caress. He made no sound, but his fingers slid gently around the side of her face, fondling her cheek and then stroking her open mouth. Declan was still moaning, almost crowing with delight, his cock now impossibly stiff and red. He was moving too, rocking his bottom against the battered upholstery, rolling his head frantically against the back of the settee. As she watched her friend’s excitement, Morwenna felt her husband stir behind her, kneeling down and running his hand along her arm. After couple of seconds, they were both holding Declan’s penis, but it was Robert who was in charge of the caress. Brushing aside her thick hair, he rested his chin on her shoulder, so he had an uninterrupted view of Declan’s body. His cock butted against the cheeks of her bottom. Morwenna was finding it difficult to concentrate. She felt as if she wanted to swivel her hips the way Declan was doing, and to reach down between her legs to touch her pussy. The naked presence of the two men was overpowering. When she felt a slight but telling pressure on the back of her stroking hand, she knew Robert was giving her a signal. Switching to her left hand for a second, she withdrew her right, and let Robert take its place with his hand. As his fingers encompassed Declan, she drew back both of her hands, and let one of them slip surreptitiously between her thighs. Captivated, she watched her husband masturbate his best friend, his hand as pale as milk on Declan’s redness. Morwenna had observed her husband manipulating himself on many occasions, but this new twist was unbearably exciting. His expertise...and another man’s flesh. After a few moments, Declan confirmed Robert’s skills by squirming even harder. Morwenna saw him lift his hands, his fingers clenching, then reach out towards his caressor. “Oh no you don’t!” she cried playfully, “No touching!” She smacked his thigh with her left hand. “Lie back and leave everything to me...” Declan frowned and obeyed her, relaxing into Robert’s ministrations. Morwenna looked closely at the prone man’s expression, and saw a fleeting frown pass across his brow. He knows, she thought, watching his face tense as her husband began to pump him. He knows exactly what we’re doing—and he’s worried because he’s realised he likes it. Moving as unobtrusively as she could, Morwenna slid out from between Robert and Declan, and climbed onto the settee to sit beside the latter. There seemed no point in the

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subterfuge now. The game was up. If Declan had been going to protest, he would have done so already. Leaning forward, she kissed his cheek, then stroked his belly. “I... I’ve never...” he stammered, unable to finish his sentence. Morwenna splayed her fingers and slid her hand up to his chest, abrading his nipples very softly with her fingernails. This new Declan, this embarrassed and vulnerable Declan, was a sight and a sensation that inflamed her. She was touching him, but she longed to rub herself... Robert was moving now. His golden eyes were intent and tightly focused, and he was studying the very tip of Declan’s cock. Morwenna saw him lick his lips, as if relishing the sight before him, then blow lightly on the wet and tensioned flesh. Declan made a choking sound, and muttered “Oh God!”, then his hips bucked him up towards Robert. Morwenna bit her lip, and began tickling his nipples in earnest, bringing him to a state of perfect readiness for the next stage. Which was making him so aroused, that he didn’t care who sucked him. Glancing up at her for a second, Robert grinned, then plunged forward. His pale lips made a perfect welcoming ‘O’, then stretched wider to receive Declan’s glans. “Dear God, yes!” hissed Declan, his jaw tightly clenched as he jerked and thrust upwards. Robert had both hands now around the root of Declan’s penis and was rhythmically squeezing him as he sucked the rosy tip. Declan’s heels scraped crazily at the carpet. It was all too much for Morwenna. Much as she would have liked to have helped Robert stimulate Declan, her own needs were suddenly more demanding. Abandoning Declan, she edged her body close up alongside his, then pressed hard between the legs with her fingers, nuzzling her cheek against his shoulder as she writhed. And still she couldn’t stop watching... To see her husband’s mouth stretched around their friend’s penis was an aphrodisiac that rushed to the core of her. It was so raw, so obscene. Robert was dribbling and gobbling like a child with a lollipop, an expression of pure ecstasy on his face. And Declan was gasping and shouting. “Oh God, yes!” he yelled, his narrow hips swaying, “Yes, that’s it! Oh Rob...dear God, that’s fabulous!” It was the name that did it. A pet name... A love name... Her husband. A circuit

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seemed to close and her clitoris leapt wildly; then the whole pit of her belly seemed to surge. Unable to keep still, her legs rubbed against Declan’s, and with her free hand she grabbed hold of one of his. As her climax ripped through her, she felt Declan coming also, and in her mind’s eye saw Robert with his mouth full. His face was ecstatic as he swallowed his friend’s seed. “I love you,” she murmured to no one in particular, and as she stirred, she felt Robert’s cock against her calf. She sighed, knowing it would soon be inside her.

Two men, thought Flora, as she heard Jack revving the engine of his van. Oh God, I’ve had two men in one day! She cinched her robe tight, as if that would hide the evidence and make the deed seem undone. The deeds, she corrected, gnawing her lip then covering her face with her hands. “It’s this bloody village!” she muttered, gathering clean things and a towel for a shower, “It’s made me insatiable. I’ll have to calm down or I’ll get a bad name.” And yet, later, as she step into the cubicle and set the water running, she couldn’t seem to find any significant remorse. Her body was glowing. She felt lazy and relaxed. She’d never been so fulfilled, and in the pink. Her sense of well-being was so strong it was almost tangible. Jack had been fun. It was as simple and uncomplicated as that. And what was more, now she came to think about it, she hadn’t even had sex, as such, with him. They’d played with each other’s bodies, and had orgasm after laughter-filled orgasm—both with and without the assistance of the dildo—but it wasn’t until after Jack had kissed her and pulled on his lurid, floppy shorts, that she’d realised he’d never actually fucked her. She’d enjoyed herself so much she hadn’t missed it, which seemed, in the aftermath, to say a lot about men like Ian—to whom intercourse was the be all and end all. A little shadow sullied her contentment. Ian... Dear God, she’d have to do something about him. Frowning in the water, she smoothed creamy foam across her belly, and remember Jack’s lips as he’d laughed and blown a raspberry there. Her old life was over, that was obvious. Ian wasn’t enough for her now, and to

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continue to see him was unkind. She would have to see him soon and sort things out. Making the decision seemed to clear her slight anxiety. And as for that ‘bad name’ she’d worried about... Well, in a carnal sense, the concepts of bad and good were pretty nebulous in Marwick, and as she realised now that she already considered the village her home, she was happy to accept its social mores. Not to mention the attentions of its over-sexed residents. Stepping out of the shower, she reached for her towel and hugged it around herself indulgently. Declan. Jack. Morwenna. Any one of them would have been exciting as someone’s only lover. But it seemed as if she could have all three. And there were others who were also possibilities... Marshall Fox sprang immediately to mind. Another ‘celebrity’ lover, she thought, massaging her skin with the soft fluffy towel. A man as eminent in his own domain as Declan was in the world of fine art. And he was attracted to her, she knew that. Back in ‘Treasure Trove’ he’d made that pretty obvious, making no attempt to hide the interest in his eyes. His gorgeously dark and twinkling eyes... I wonder what he looks like naked? she thought, then berated her reflection in the steamy bathroom mirror, “Flora, for crying out loud!” She’d had two men today, now she was wanting another! Rubbing moisturiser into her slightly pinkened face, she imagined Marshall walking in this very minute. Would she seduce him? she asked herself. Or would she try to be serious and ask him about his books? “Be honest,” she told herself, smoothing the thin white cream across her cheekbones, and looking herself straight in the eye. She tried again to imagine Marshall with his clothes off, and found it so easy that her body began to rouse. Marshall Fox wasn’t the muscle man that Declan was, obviously, but she was quite certain that he’d have a good body. A well-proportioned one with firm limbs and a sturdy shoulders. However, in keeping with his distinctive, but beau laid attractiveness, he might just possibly have a little paunch perhaps—from all that sitting at a wordprocessor and eating junk food while he worked. But even that would only make him more cuddly. And what about his cock? Would that be like the rest of him? Not too big, not too small, but nice to hold?

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Abandoning herself to her fantasies, Flora imagined Marshall walking into her bathroom right now, perfectly naked and oh so appealing. When he reached her, he’d give her that boyish grin of his, and she’d drop to her knees and kiss his penis. After all, he was a famous writer, he deserved to be paid homage of some sort. And what if she was so good at sucking his cock that she inspired him? Perhaps he might write her into a love scene, in his next erotic book? The one about the city girl who ran wild in the country... No longer fooling herself about anything, Flora let her towel slip down and off her body, then reached down and slid her fingers between her legs. But just as she was about to start rubbing herself, a notion she’d entertained earlier resurfaced. As a writer, Marshall was a natural for ‘The Scribe’... What if it is him? she thought, wiggling her fingertip against its tiny swollen target. What if he was laughing at me, secretly, while we were talking? Flicking the bud of her clitoris, Flora moaned, imagining it was Marshall Fox, ‘The Scribe’, who was touching her, his dark, playful eyes watching her face. “I’ll get you, Mister Sly Fox!” she gasped, rubbing harder as her thighs shook and her knees began to buckle, “You’re mine!” she cried defiantly as she came.

Declan thought of nothing as he walked home, along the lanes, to his house. At least he tried to think of nothing, but it was difficult when his feelings were so confused. The truth of it was, he’d enjoyed making love with Robert just as much as he he’d enjoyed it with Morwenna. He’d finally given in to a force majeure and the outcome had been natural and pleasurable. He realised now that he’d never stood a chance. Robert had wanted him; and what Robert wanted, he almost always got. It had still shocked Declan profoundly, though, when, in the dying spasms of his orgasm, he’d opened his eyes and seen his cock in Robert’s mouth. The rampant heterosexual in him had wished desperately that his seed could be called back into his body, and the whole episode played back to before it had begun... but the new Declan, the changed man with an expanded sexuality, had felt a glorious joy in his ejaculation, and a profound tenderness for the man who knelt before him. But will we still be friends? he wondered, reaching his gate, and clicking open the latch.

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Or is sex going alter the entire picture? Looking up towards a light that shone from one of Flora Swain’s windows, he wondered if the game had changed there too. Could he and she still continue to be friends? Or would he always feel irrationally possessive? Of a woman he had to admit he hardly knew. Walters’ van had gone now, he noticed, so that was at least something. Jack the Lad hadn’t been invited to stay the night, it seemed, even though earlier he’d made Flora scream with pleasure. For a moment, Declan felt like knocking on Flora’s door, forcing his way in, and then making the most tumultuously macho of love to her. Missionary position, thrusting powerfully, in complete control of her... That was what he needed, and he hovered several moments in the still-open gateway, mightily tempted to make need into deed. But it wasn’t the answer. Forcing himself on her now was just an over-dramatic gesture that would just create an ‘issue’ between them; and also there was such a thing as too much sex... For both of them. He was tired now, and so must she be. The wise choice was to bide his time, work through his jealousy, and even test it, maybe? As he unlocked his front door, an idea came to him. The more lovers Flora had, the less chance she had of getting fixated on any one of them. Which meant that any deeper feelings she might have were up for grabs. Perhaps I’ll take you to meet my buddy Marshall tomorrow, thought Declan to Flora as he let himself into his house. And then we’ll see just how long it takes you to get his pants off!

The next morning dawned unexpectedly dull, and Flora felt let down after the last few glorious days. Especially as she’d promised herself she’d draw today, because she was feeling guilty at the lack of work she’d done. A few erotic sketches weren’t the start of a new vocation... The lack of a letter from ‘The Scribe’ on the mat was also an anti-climax, although she felt cross with herself for perceiving it as such. ‘The Scribe’ was a manipulative pest, and what she ought to be hoping for was that he—or she—had become tired of the game, and was now going to leave her alone in peace. But that’s not really what you want, is it? She posed the question to herself as she cleaned

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her teeth. What you’re really hoping is that ‘The Scribe’ knows you’ve been with Declan, Jack, and Morwenna, and is so jealous that he—or she—is busy thinking up something even more outrageous for the next letter! Resolving to wait and see, and not worry about ‘The Scribe’s’ literary vagaries, Flora bundled herself up in a long, swirly skirt in dusty pink jersey, and a button through top in the same cosy fabric, and took her pad and her pencils into the conservatory. If one could dignify the little glass-roofed lean-to at the back of the cottage with such a grand title? Still, it was warm and airy, and the brightest place in the cottage, so with Arnold for company she settled down to sketch. By eleven o’clock, she had at least a few drawings to show for her efforts, although disturbingly they were all of sexual subjects. Something that didn’t disturb her though, was the fact that like yesterday, she’d done everything purely from imagination. This was a talent she’d never discovered back in the city; there, when she’d drawn figures, it had always been from a model, in the life class she’d attended. Here in Marwick, she seemed to be able to conjure realistic nudes out of nowhere. It was a giant step forward, and she was astounded, and grateful. I wonder if there’s a market for this stuff? she thought, looking at study that particularly pleased her, one with a decidedly Declan McKenna-ish feel to it. In erotic magazines, perhaps? Illustrations for stories... How did one set about breaking into such an area? It might be an income, and her windfall wasn’t limitless... A unexpected tap on the glass made her drop her drawing and tip her pencil box over; and when she looked up, annoyed, she saw Declan peering in at her from outside. Flora felt immediately at a loss. She had absolutely no idea how to ‘be’ with him today. They’d made love yesterday, in the garden, and it had been incredible. But their parting hadn’t been very friendly. Her last words had been to call him a bastard, she remembered, although she didn’t think he’d actually heard that. “Hi!” he said, his voice non-committal as he pushed open the creaky door. “Bit of a grey day, isn’t it?” He nodded towards the overcast sky, and shrugged, his broad shoulders lifting beneath his oversize T-shirt, which he wore with paint-stained Levis and a pair of trainers. “Yes, it’s a bit of a disappointment.” Flora kept her own voice studiously neutral. If he

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wanted to play a ‘neighbours and weather’ game this morning, it was fine by her. She was just annoyed with herself for wanting more. And for suddenly feeling so desperately excited, when Declan was clearly quite diffident. “Still, I don’t figure it’ll rain,” he said, looking up at the sky through the glass, his expression indicating that he had far weightier things on his mind than the weather. “On the radio, they said it was going be bright later.” Flora had had enough. “For crying out loud, Declan! Are we reduced to weather forecasts already?” She rose to her feet, and looked up at him. It was quite a long way, even for a fairly tall girl like her. “Maybe yesterday in the garden was a mistake... But we don’t have to behave like total strangers, do we?” She shifted from one sandalled foot to the other, “Can’t we just manage to be friends? We could forget... Well, we could pretend that all that business in the gazebo didn’t happen, if you prefer it that way?” “I don’t want to forget it,” said Declan easily, but with emphasis, “It was great.” He looked down at her and cracked a slight grin. “It was more than great. I’m just feeling kind of preoccupied this morning... I’m sorry. It’s not your fault at all.” “Well, I’m glad to hear it,” replied Flora, still not sure how to proceed. He was more friendly now, but even so, he wasn’t exactly acting like a man who’d made passionate love to her. “I was just going to make some coffee... Would you like some?” “No. No thanks...” He stuffed his hands in his pockets, and scuffed his feet, schoolboystyle. “Actually I was just going to go down to the pub... to meet a buddy for lunch. Want to come along?” It wasn’t the most gracious of invitations, and Flora had a mind to refuse it, but somehow she heard herself say, “Yes, why not? Are you going now?” “Yeah, I’ve just got to change.” Declan looked down at his dishevelled jeans and Tshirt, “I’ll meet you at your gate in fifteen minutes... Okay?” “Okay,” said Flora, a little non-plussed, to Declan’s solid, retreating back. He was already out of the door and on the path... After latching the conservatory, and the door between it and the cottage, Flora walked through into the tiny hall, still musing on Declan’s peculiar behaviour. He hadn’t even told her who this mysterious ‘buddy’ was. “You’re weird, Mister McKenna old love,” she muttered to herself, peering into the hall

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mirror and wondering if she needed a little make-up. “Have I shaken you up, I wonder—” Suddenly, her train of thought was broken by a flash of something pale at her vision’s edge. Whirling round, she saw that the mat that had earlier been bare was now inhabited. There was a cream envelope, and a parcel, in the centre of it. So ‘The Scribe’ had delivered after all. “Sneaky swine!” hissed Flora, lunging for the letter and the package. Whoever had left this had been very very quiet. The cottage was only small; and the conservatory wasn’t really all that far from the front door. The parcel was rectangular and shallow. No sex-toys today, then, thought Flora, recognising the weight and dimensions of a book. Hefting it in her hand she adjudged it to be a paperback, of the mass market variety, and knowing ‘The Scribe’s’ foibles she guessed it was erotic. Placing it on the hall table, she assaulted the cream envelope, tearing it roughly in her haste to get it open. How did you enjoy my latest gift, Wild Flower? the letter began. Did I go too far...or was it exactly what you needed? Of course, you must realise that I keep imagining you using it...or perhaps sharing it with a friend. I see you climaxing violently while an admirer watches you... Or maybe helps you? Stroking your breasts as you squirm... Rubbing your swollen clitoris as your legs kick and jerk uncontrollably... Reaching down behind you to fondle your perfect bottom? Did you put my gift inside you, Wild Flower? Did you? Did you? Did you put it inside you... without knowing that I’d kissed it? Without knowing that I’d rubbed it against my body, and smeared it with the lust I feel for you? Are you shocked, beautiful Flora? Does it bother you? Do I bother you? I hope so... Well then, Wild Flower, where do we go from here? It’s obvious that words turn you on... So here are some more words for you, far more than my mere scribblings this time. You may be familiar with this author, my Flora. Just as familiar as you are with... THE SCRIBE.

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Chapter Ten A Man of Letters

“Bastard!” cried Flora, throwing the letter on the floor, then reaching down to pick it up again. She pursed her lips, thinking she’d have to stop calling people ‘bastards’ all the time. But this letter was the most affecting so far. Not for what it said about the dildo; although the idea of the toy having been used by ‘The Scribe’ as well was exciting in a shivery, half repulsive sort of way. No, what troubled her was what the letter hinted. That it’s sender was someone she’d already met, even someone she’d been intimate with. It was something that she’d suspected—and there were now quite a few to choose from! —but seeing it written down made her hair stand on end. She was appalled at being so effortlessly manipulated. So, what have you left me this time, you bugger! she thought, ripping the cream coloured paper off the parcel. The book was by the same author as some of the books she’d been left by her bedside. A slim, mauve-covered paperback, it was a collection of short stories—entitled Patterns of Power—and written by Madeleine Reynard, the author of The Cognoscenti, the novel that had so affected her the other night. A woman. Did that mean that Morwenna was ‘The Scribe’? Or was it simply a man masquerading behind a female name? Whichever way, both the letter and the book still ruled out poor Declan. He could neither read write one, nor read the other. Fingering the shiny cover—the book was in mint condition, she noticed—Flora considered it as a clue. Were ‘The Scribe’ and Madeleine Reynard really the same person? And if they were, had she made love with that person? Though he had a wicked wit, Jack Walters didn’t strike her as a wordsmith, his major talents being far more manual. Suddenly a light clicked on in Flora’s head, and she couldn’t believe she hadn’t seen earlier what was now staring up at her so blatantly. Reynard. Reynard the Fox. Good grief, this book was by Marshall Fox, Marwick’s own distinguished man of letters! The one she’d already met and found so desirable.

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Marshall was a highly successful and critically acclaimed novelist, but Lucy had said he also used a pseudonym and wrote porn. Although Flora couldn’t see why he needed to; his thrillers had already made him a wealthy man. He writes porn because he likes it, came the immediate answer. Because he uses words as an aphrodisiac, both for the reader and himself, and what’s more he’s so good it really works! But did this also mean Marshall was ‘The Scribe’? It made him the main contender, yes, but it wasn’t the absolute proof. There was no immediate similarity in the writing style, was there? Or maybe she just hadn’t read enough ‘Madeleine Reynard’? Flora bit her lip, still staring at the book in her hands. It was calling to her somehow, wailing like a lorelei, demanding that she open it and read. She was supposed to be meeting Declan at the gate in a few minutes, but if she breached this book, she knew she’d keep him waiting. Just a few little snippets, she told herself, sinking down onto the narrow settle by the phone table. Patterns of Power—as its name suggested—explored the same themes as Reynard’s other book had, which was the exchange of sexual power between lovers. The sorts of games you’re playing with me, Mister Sly Fox, thought Flora, that is if you are ‘The Scribe’. As in The Cognoscenti, the text was littered with erotic punishments, bondage, and domination; the very themes that Flora found most exciting, the very activities she felt a dark urge to explore. As she flicked longingly through the pages, the beginning of one story caught her eye. Don’t do this, Swain, she told herself, but nevertheless slid her thumb between the pages to hold them open. The First Day, the story was called, and knowing she had no time for it, Flora still began reading. On the first day, the narrative commenced, at the stroke of eight precisely, Mignonette set out on her journey. She was dressed exactly as Monsieur had previously specified: a black moiré satin waspie corset, sheer seamed stockings, a pair of stilettos with four inch high heels. For modesty’s sake, she wore her trench coat over these, but following instructions she didn’t fasten the buttons, but just crossed it over her and cinched the belt around her waist. As she stepped up onto the train, she felt her naked sex quiver, her fear arousing her as she

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considered her destination. Reading the spare, strangely remote sounding prose, Flora found herself instantly identifying with ‘Mignonette’. Although sexy corsets and stilettos didn’t figure largely in her wardrobe, she’d certainly felt the same expectations. The awareness of an approaching adventure, the feeling that something so diabolically sexy was going to happen in the next twenty four hours that her whole life would probably change as a result. It was, she realised, the very essence of her new life here in Marwick, a feeling of expectation that was combined with thrilling fear. Reynard’s heroine seemed to have slightly more of an idea about what was going to happen to her, though; there was clearly an agenda, and Mignonette could make choices. As she watched the swiftly passing countryside, Mignonette became aware that she had company. A young man had taken the seat next to her. A very beautiful young man, who reminded her slightly, but excitingly of Monsieur. Glancing at him from under her eyelashes, she imagined herself leaning over, her face pressed against the rough fabric of the seat, whilst this young god pushed his fingers inside her. Monsieur had told her she was just a plaything—a slave to the male sex—and that any man she met had a perfect right to touch her... But by the same token, he’d also said that her unfaithfulness would be punished. A pronouncement that made Mignonette moisten, and the membranes of her vulva swell and pout. Taking her notebook and pen from her handbag, she wrote a message and slipped it to the boy. In the lavatory, awaiting her new lover, Mignonette began to masturbate, her mind alive with dark, delicious fantasies. She imagined leaning over the sink to offer him access to her firm, rounded bottom... or perhaps kneeling so he could use her eager mouth? Her fingers slippery with thick juice, she removed her coat. When the young man finally entered the lavatory, his eyes were wide. Mignonette had arranged herself most temptingly; standing on one leg, teetering like a ballerina, with her other leg raised, her foot on the metal sink. She was holding open her sex-lips with her fingers. Unable to speak, her new companion shed his trousers. ‘Oh Monsieur, oh Monsieur,’ she chanted as he fucked her, her pleasure so intense that she climaxed several times. “Oh God,” whispered Flora to herself, realising just how deeply she’d submerged herself in the story. She was shifting involuntarily on the hard oak of the old settle, and she too was wet and slippery between her legs. Just for a moment, she saw the pleasant,

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innocuously attractive face of Marshall Fox swim before her, and it seemed impossible that he could write a tale so horny. First impressions, she decided, were deceiving: both here in Marwick and in the literary world beyond. Aware of passing time, but unable to stop herself, Flora read on. Mignonette was in a limousine now, on her way to Monsieur’s chateau, but on a deserted back road, his black clad chauffeur had stopped the car... Mignonette bit her lip and squeezed her eyes shut as he whipped her. There was no experience more humiliating than being punished by a servant, especially when one knew how long the lash’s marks would linger. Her bottom would still be pink when Monsieur inspected it...and though that would please him, it would also mean more pain. She whimpered in fear and longing when she heard the chauffeur unzip his trousers, then almost stumbled when he stuffed himself inside her. The chauffeur used her coldly, unkindly, then ejaculated without allowing her relief. She was still swollen and needy when he pulled himself out of her, yet in a strange way, that condition seemed only fitting. “You’re a whore,” he said neutrally, striding away towards the limousine, “Tidy your hair. Clean yourself up. Come on... Hurry!” More sex with authoritarians in dark clothing, thought Flora, remembering the biker in The Cognoscenti, and feeling the same lack of satisfaction that Mignonette had. She was already massaging herself, rubbing her pubis through her skirt, but the compelling urge to take it further was driving her mad. Was there time? she wondered. Or would Declan get impatient and come and fetch her? A glance at the lantern clock, which hung just across from where she sat, told Flora that he’d already been waiting twenty minutes. She cried, “Oh shit!” and raced upstairs to the bathroom. He’ll have got fed up and gone, she thought, cursing herself as she applied a few haphazard dabs of lipsheen and mascara, then swept a comb through her easily tidied crop. As an afterthought, she slid into a fresh pair of panties too. The story of Mignonette had made her other ones sticky, and when she sniffed the air she could smell her own distinctive odour. She sprayed herself with perfume and sniffed again. The scent of arousal seemed to have gone, or at least it was now adequately masked; so she tore down the stairs again, grabbed the book and ‘The Scribe’s’ letter, and crammed them in her bag as she walked

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quickly down the path. “What kept you?” enquired Declan when she reached the gate. His voice was mellow with its usual transatlantic drawl, but Flora noticed a touch of sharpness glinting out from behind his glasses. Honesty, or at least partial honesty, seemed the wisest policy. “The Scribe’s been around again,” she said, opening her bag a little way to show a corner of the sheet of cream paper. “He left a note and a book this time.” She closed her bag again, anxious not to embarrass him by waving reading materials in his face. “What did he say?” enquired Declan as they fell into step beside each other, heading for the centre of the village. “It could be a “she”,” pointed out Flora, taking a sideways peek at her companion and noticing how enticing he looked in a newer, cleaner pair of jeans and plain, and almost dazzlingly white shirt. He’d combed his hair too, and slicked it neatly back from his face, and she could see water glistening on its shiny black smoothness. “So, what did “they” say?” he persisted, placing a hand on her waist, to gently guide her towards the creeper strewn wall as a car passed by them along the lane. Distracted by the touch, and her own immediate response to it, Flora almost blurted out the details, but at the last minute remembered to be careful. It was fortunate for her, she thought when they were side by side again, that Declan couldn’t read the letters. Because if he read them, he’d know all the things ‘The Scribe’ knew. Which seemed to be just about everything. Their contortions in the gazebo; her pleasure with the black silicon vibrator; what had happened afterwards, in her sitting room with Jack. And intimate as she’d been with Declan, there were still some things she wanted to keep quiet, or to herself. “Oh, just the usual,” she said, her voice low, “Provocative suppositions about my sex life... Come ons... Extravagant promises that whoever-it-is probably can’t keep...” “But what if this person could keep their promises?” suggested Declan, taking her elbow again, and directing her towards the lower end of the sloping village green, where The Wishing Well pub stood four-square and inviting, with it’s namesake—an old but still functional well complete with its own miniature pitched roof—in the small beer garden beside it. “In that case, I’d probably like to meet him—or her—after all,’ replied Flora tartly,

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annoyed with her own reaction to his touch. He hadn’t exactly expressed undying devotion to her after she’d allowed him to make love to her, and his current lack of response was rather galling. “Maybe you soon will,” Declan murmured mysteriously. As they approached the beer garden, he lifted his hand and waved vigorously. “There’s my buddy,” he said, as a familiar figure—who was sitting alone at a table by the wishing well—looked their way. “Yo! Marsh, how’re you doing?” called out Declan cheerfully, and the lone drinker—Marshall Fox—stood up, grinned broadly, and waved back. “I didn’t know you knew Marshall Fox?” Declan gave her a penetrating glance. “Well, I do... Is there any reason I shouldn’t?” “No... er... Not really,” stammered Flora, wondering where the suddenly combative atmosphere had come from. “Just because I don’t write myself, it doesn’t mean I don’t hang out with writers.” It was his first really overt reference to his difficulty, his handicap, but when Flora looked more closely at him, he didn’t seem upset at all. A second or two ago, she’d thought she sensed anger in him, but now he seemed quite calm and unruffled. “Of course,” she said in a small voice, pleased that they were now by the gate of the beer garden, and they didn’t have to discuss the subject of literacy. Marshall Fox was dressed for the city, in a dark suit whose jacket was slung around the back of his chair with a fine disregard for its sharp tailoring. His tie, navy blue silk to tone with his pin-striped shirt, was loosened and his sleeves were rolled up. There was a snakeskin briefcase propped against the table leg. “Well, isn’t this an unexpected pleasure?” said the author enthusiastically, leaping up and drawing a chair out for Flora. “What’re you doing being seen around with this hoodlum, Flora? It’ll play havoc with your reputation in the village.” “I shouldn’t worry, it’s probably shot to hell already,” she answered, returning Marshall’s infectious smile. “It’s probably Declan who’s ruining his rep. by being seen with me.” “So, what are you two drinking?” enquired Declan equably, nodding in the direction of the interior of the pub. “A white wine, please,” said Flora, resolving to stick to one drink, and not get so tipsy

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she didn’t know what she doing. As had happened with Morwenna and with Jack. “Same again?” Declan pointed to Marshall’s half drunk lager. “Great,” said the author, pulling his chair a little closer to Flora’s. When Declan had gone, Flora found herself being scrutinised closely by the perceptiveeyed novelist. What’s he doing? she thought. Is he sizing me up as a prospective character in one of his books? “You look very smart,” she said, panicked into an inane observation. “Oh, I’ve been into town this morning,” he said, tugging his tie a bit looser, “Business stuff. All very boring and aggravating, and its muggy as hell up there, really oppressive. Nowhere near as nice as it is here in Marwick.” “It’s not bad...” murmured Flora in answer. She felt uneasy in the presence of Marshall today, full of an awareness she hadn’t experienced in ‘Treasure Trove’. She knew now that he could well be ‘The Scribe’, and she was ninety nine per cent certain that he’d written the subversively erotic book she had in her handbag, and these factors strongly coloured how she looked at him. Yesterday, he’d just been an attractive man who’d seemed to fancy her. Today, he was a talented, but potentially depraved sexual deviant, who was most likely concocting some fabulous and no doubt obscene tale about her, even as they sat here in the innocence of the beer garden. Is he imagining me stretched across this table so he can abuse me? she thought as Marshall’s grey eyes narrowed assessingly. Or maybe he’s picturing a domination and punishment scenario, like in The Cognoscenti, or The First Day? I’m sitting here at this table wearing a cotton top and skirt, but he’s seeing me in leather. Or rubber. Or chains and handcuffs. “What’s wrong?” said Marshall, laughing softly as Flora flinched back to jersey-clad reality. “You’re looking at me as if I’m Jack the Ripper.” He leant back in his seat, and laced his hands behind his head. “And yesterday, I rather thought you liked me.” So like a man, thought Flora, managing to relax a little. Marshall was cocky enough, but there’d been a fleeting hint of a plea in his last sentence. “But I don’t know you yet, do I?” she said evasively, “And I was thinking about something Lucy said about you. Yesterday, after you’d gone.” “There goes my reputation now,” observed Marshall, leaning forward again to take a

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sip of his lager, “Go on, what did she say? Something grotesque and unfounded, I’ll be bound.” “Well, she said you wrote pornography, as well as thrillers, and that set me thinking...” She paused, dug into her bag, and drew out the book, and ‘The Scribe’s’ latest letter. “I’m almost certain you wrote this—” She handed him Patterns of Power. “—and I was also wondering if you’d written this too?” She passed over the sheet of cream paper. “Well, you’ve got me bang to rights here,” Marshall shrugged modestly and gestured with the paperback, “But this—” He opened the folded letter... “—I’ve never seen before.” Reaching into his jacket pocket, he took out a pair of spectacles and slipped them on the end of his nose to read. Just what is it about men with glasses? thought Flora, her heart pounding. After a couple of moments, Marshall looked up again, his eyes alight behind his slightly tinted lenses. “Pretty steamy stuff,” he said, re-folding the sheet of paper, placing it on top of the paperback, and removing his glasses. “Actually, I wouldn’t have minded having written that.” He tapped the letter. “It’s a bit raw, but it does have a certain—how would you say? —immediacy, doesn’t it?” “You can say that again!” said Flora, unnerved by the speculation in Marshall’s eyes. Not knowing what to say next, she glanced around the beer garden, and to her relief saw Declan coming back, carrying a tray with drinks and what looked like a plate of sandwiches. “I took the liberty of getting us some lunch,” he said as he began setting out the goodies, “These looked so good, I just couldn’t resist.” He set a plate before Flora and offered her first pick of the sandwiches. To her surprise, Flora discovered she was famished, and that the crispy bread, fresh salad, and king prawns in home-made mayonnaise were exactly what she fancied. “Thanks,” she said, taking the nearest sandwich, “I’m starving, actually. This is super!” Over lunch, conversation seemed easier. With a fine, wry humour, Marshall described certain hassles he was currently experiencing with his business manager, while Declan outlined the progress of preparations for his latest exhibition. Flora asked a few questions, but mainly listened, feeling a certain awe at being in the presence of two such successful and creative men. She seriously doubted that her own modest artistic efforts would ever merit the employment of a business manager, and if her best hope for the future was in explicit

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erotic drawings, she didn’t think it likely she’d have exhibitions. Strangely enough though, Declan and Marshall’s achievements didn’t make her feel inferior. It was almost the reverse. Their company made her feel good, confident, uplifted. They were both accomplished, but they both wanted her, she could feel it. The glow of this awareness passed swiftly through her body, making her feel aroused, but also rather smug. “What are you grinning about?” enquired Marshall suddenly, his eyes glinting as he toasted her with his lager. “Well, if you must know,” began Flora, feeling herself blush and her nipples begin to stiffen beneath her top. “I was just thinking how high-powered the pair of you sound. Business managers. Exhibitions. All the trappings of glamour and success.” “Your day will come, Flora,” said Declan, his voice quite serious. Flora gave him a doubtful look. “No, I mean it,” he went on, “Those drawings you were doing were very promising. You’ve got a clever eye. You need to do some work on your perspective, but given that, I think you could become quite collectable with...with certain, shall we say, specialist buyers.” Flora was taken aback. It was one thing him flattering her when they were in the garden together and he was trying to get into her knickers, but to praise her so consideredly, and in company, must mean that he’d meant what he said. She said, “Thanks,” feeling rather off balance. “Hey, I’d love to see some of your work,” said Marshall, his eyes keen with interest. “I’m one of those, what Declan so coyly terms, specialist buyers.” “Wait ‘til I’ve got my perspective sorted out,” replied Flora. “And then I’ll show you a whole portfolio.” “It’s a deal!” Marshall’s straight, dark eyebrows lifted wickedly. “Another drink anyone?” He nodded to their empty glasses. “Not for me,” said Declan, glancing at his watch, “I have to be somewhere. Like half an hour ago. Will you excuse me, Flora?” He rose to his feet. “Maybe Marsh could show you his art collection? He has some good pieces. Some of mine even.” Almost before she could register what had happened, Flora found herself heading away from the centre of the village, with Marshall. She had a definite sense that she’d been manoeuvred into accompanying him, and that he and Declan had been conniving, but she

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felt too mellow and too aroused to bother with anger. It might be your scheme, boys, she thought philosophically, as they reached the gate of the Old Rectory, but it’s my choice to go along and play it too. Marshall’s home was a square, rather handsome Georgian building, set behind double gates on a sizeable piece of land. Flora wondered for a moment whether he had a live-in housekeeper, or even a wife or girlfriend to look after him, but felt her spirits lift as he hunted in his pocket for his keys. It was obvious they were going to be alone. Inside, the house was as elegant is its exterior. The entrance hall was decorated in cream and gold, with gleaming oak panelling, and there was a delightful smell of lavender polish in the air. “The paintings you might be interested are up on the landing,” said Marshall gesturing towards a broad staircase that doubled back on itself, “I keep everything downstairs pretty innocent. For visitors who don’t know about “Madeleine”.” He nodded towards the book that Flora still carried. “You go up and have a nose around, and I’ll get us a bottle of chilled wine.” Flora did as he said, trailing her fingers along the polished banister as she ascended. Marshall’s house was quite, quite beautiful, she decided. Distinctive, but not excessively ostentatious. The rare antique furniture was probably worth a small fortune, but then again, Marshall’s success meant he could afford to indulge himself. At the top of the stairs, Flora stopped dead, suddenly understanding what he’d meant about not shocking his visitors. The first painting she encountered was a huge, boldlyexecuted nude, depicting a dark-haired woman stretched out on a chaise longue. The subject of the picture was stretching and flexing like a cat, the very image of perfect abandon. Her head was thrown back, her throat arched, and her splendid breasts seemed to assault the air around them. Her lovely legs were wide apart, to show her sex. It’s Morwenna, thought Flora, almost tingling with the urge to touch the painting. It looked so erotic, so real, so very much like the same voluptuous body that she’d so recently shared her first lesbian pleasure with. There were a number of other similar looking paintings hung a long the landing, but in these the bodies and faces weren’t familiar. In one, a partially dressed woman could have been Lucy Douglas, just about to masturbate, but the angle of the face, in deepest shadow,

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made it ambiguous. The activity was certainly very ‘Lucy’ though. A lot of what was on display was distinguished by Declan McKenna’s bold, fearless brushwork, and as she returned to the painting of Morwenna, Flora wondered just exactly what had proceeded—or come after—each sitting. The portrait was too vibrant to have been painted without involvement. “Gorgeous, isn’t she?” said Marshall, coming up behind Flora. “Yes, she is,” she answered, turning to him. What would he say if I told him I’d had sex with her, she thought. Would it excite him? Most men were fascinated by female to female lovemaking, by all accounts, and it was a recurring theme in the books of ‘Madeleine Reynard’. “Come along,” urged Marshall, gesturing with the bottle he carried, towards a door at the end of the landing. “I need a bath, and you can talk to me while I’m in it.” “Okay. Lead on,” said Flora, shrugging. In Marwick Magna accompanied bathing was probably the norm. Marshall led her into an airy, and rather grand bedroom, where he placed the bottle of wine on a silver tray, which lay on a Chippendale dresser, then poured out two effervescing glassfuls. “Morwenna’s elderflower champagne,” he announced holding out the delicate crystal flute towards Flora, “It’ll kick the shit out that stuff you were drinking at the pub.” “I’m sure it will,” replied Flora, taking her ‘champagne’ and clinking her glass to Marshall’s, “This isn’t the first time I’ve drunk Morwenna’s home-brew.” She drank deeply as her memories made her blush. “Mmmm...” Marshall sipped his own wine and quirked his eyebrows at her—as if to say he knew what Morwenna’s wine often led to—then without a word, topped up both of their glasses. “Right, it’s me for a bath then,” he said, beginning to tug at his tie with his free hand. His jacket he’d obviously abandoned downstairs, but it soon became clear to Flora that Marshall intended to undress right here in the bedroom, while she watched. So, keeping her eyes trained firmly on him, she called his bluff. Pausing from time to time for a sip from his glass, which he’d replaced on the tray, Marshall removed each garment with an unembarrassed naturalness, until finally he stood only in his boxer shorts—which were maroon silk in a rather racy looking print. Sliding his

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thumbs into the waistband, he flashed her a look that was part question and part challenge. This was the moment to call a halt to things, Flora supposed, but the sight of Marshall’s compact, well proportioned body, and the soft, male hair on his chest and his belly, made her want to go boldly straight ahead. She tipped her glass to him and bade him proceed. Without coquetry, he slid down his boxer shorts, revealing a prick that was substantial and half-tumescent. Flora felt slightly piqued that he wasn’t excited enough to be stiff yet; but her disappointment was over in a moment, as inexorably his penis began to rise. “Ooops,” said Marshall, looking down and watching the phenomenon himself. “Don’t worry about it.” Flora smiled. She felt both amused by Marshall’s reaction, and empowered by it. This was one game where men’s motives were always obvious. “I still need a bath,” he said uncertainly. “Go right ahead,” Flora answered, beginning to really enjoy herself. “I can talk to you while you’re in it,” she mocked. Marshall grinned and led the way into the bathroom, picking up the bottle and his glass as they went. The bathroom was as delightfully period as the rest of the house, done out in magnolia and lemon with gold rococo. An antique, claw-footed bath stood resplendent at the centre of the room, and beside it stood a stool piled high with towels. Marshall set the taps running and poured in a generous measure of bath essence, which foamed quickly and produced a pleasant scent of pine. Next to the stool he positioned a shell-backed basket chair. “Why don’t you tell me a story?” said Flora, once Marshall was immersed beneath the bubbles, and she was settled in the basket chair. “No, you tell me one,” countered Marshall, squeezing soapy water over his hair with a phallic loofah. “You’re the writer,” protested Flora, although secretly she liked the idea. She was beginning to feel very frivolous, very daring. She knew a lot of it was to do with Morwenna’s wine, but there was no denying her attraction towards Marshall. It would be a challenge to attempt and match him at his very own craft. “Yeah, and I’m a jaded one,” he answered her, dowsing his hair again, then rubbing it with shampoo, “I need some fresh ideas, something imaginative... From the woman’s angle...” Momentarily, he submerged himself, then popped up again, spluttering. “I’ll

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dedicate a book to you, if you give me something I can use.” “I’d rather have a percentage of the royalties,” Flora shot back, as already the ideas were forming in her mind. She thought of the beautiful portrait of Morwenna, and the strange pleasures she’d shared with her new friend, the herbalist. That would be the last thing Marshall would expect her to tell him about. Could she pull it off? Could she find the proper words? She tried to think of some of Marshall’s own descriptions, the vivid mindpictures he painted as ‘Madeleine’. “We’ll have to see about that,” said Marshall dreamily, sinking down into the water and closing his eyes. “Why don’t you have a go. Be Scheherazade. Entertain me.” He closed his eyes dreamily. “I promise I won’t lop your head off if you fail.” “It’s not that I’m afraid of...” Marshall said nothing, but just sank a little lower. The bubbles above his groin rocked lazily, and Flora wondered if he was still erect, and touching himself. “Okay, then,” she said, adjusting her own position, “Once upon a time...”

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Chapter Eleven Once Upon a Time

“Once upon a time there... there was a young, inexperienced woman who came to live in a new town...” Flora took a sip of wine, aware that her mouth suddenly felt parched. What on earth had she agreed to do? Marshall Fox was a noted writer, winner of plaudits for both his literary style, and his ingenious plots. What could she concoct that would in any way impress him? “And?” prompted Marshall, coming up in the pine-scented water again and reaching for his glass, that was set beside the bath. “Well, she...” Flora hesitated, then thought of what the ‘The Scribe’ had been writing, “As soon as she moved in, she began to receive erotic letters, left on her mat in mysterious circumstances...” There was a whoosh of water as Marshall sank down again, “They were very explicit letters, describing her body...and all the things the person who’d written her the letters wanted to do to it. The young woman was excited by the letters, but she was a bit scared too, because she had no idea who in the village might’ve sent them.” “You need to be a bit more thorough in your descriptions, Flora, more vivid,” said Marshall, staring into the golden heart of his wine, “What’s the name of your heroine and what does she look like? What words did this...this letter-writer use? How excited did he make the young woman feel? And how did that excitement manifest itself?” Flora was annoyed at the rush of questions. He was goading her, and she should have expected it. She took another long sip of Morwenna’s fruity wine, and letting it settle her, she decided to play along. Come on, Flora, think, she told herself. Remember what happened. Tell the truth... It’s quite a story! “Her name is...was...” She paused a moment, and considered. Perhaps she ought not to tell the whole truth... “The young woman’s name was Rose, and she was very beautiful. She was tall, she had long red hair, and she was slim, but had curves where curves mattered.” “Did she have large breasts?” enquired Marshall, his eyes closed again.

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“Not large,” replied Flora, looking down, “But they were firm and rounded... And she had the hardest, darkest nipples you could imagine. Almost purple, they were. As dark as a pair of luscious berries.” “She sounds divine. What was the rest of her like?” “She had a narrow waist, flaring hips, and long, long legs. Beautiful, toned up thighs.” An exaggeration, but not all that much of a one. “Just my type...” The foam was rocking again, and Marshall’s eyes were scrunched up as if seeing an inner picture. “And what about between those toned up thighs?” How to describe it? She didn’t often actually look. “Well, she had a beautiful pussy too. Covered in soft russetty hair on the outside, and inside all rosy pink and moist. Her labia were like pretty crinkled petals and her clitoris was a gleaming crimson pearl. And because she loved sex, she was almost always wet.” “Good...carry on...” I’m getting the hang of this now, it’s fun, thought Flora, feeling the very organs she was speaking of becoming roused. Her clitoris was swollen, just as she’d described it, and there was a well of warm moisture between her sex-lips. “Well, in the first letter, the... the Scribbler told Rose that he wanted to see her naked, and that he wanted to kiss her all over her body, then put his face between her legs and lick her...” “He’s no fool,” commented Marshall, still moving slightly beneath the foam. “And he also said that he wanted to touch her sex too. Put his fingers inside her...” With every sentence that she spoke, Flora’s arousal grew stronger, until the whole area between her legs was one huge ache. Dare she touch herself, she wondered, watching Marshall’s closed eyes. Even a fleeting rub, through her thin skirt, would feel so good. Trying not to make a sound, she parted her thighs, and rocked her hips. “He...he described how he’d slip his fingers into her, and stroke her clitoris at the same time... With his thumb... Round and round and round until she was so worked up that she moaned and groaned and couldn’t keep still.” “The way you can’t keep still now?” murmured Marshall, as he moved himself. “Yes. Just like that,” gasped Flora, circling her bottom against the cushion of the chair, but clenching her fists. If she succumbed too soon, she might not find out what she needed

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to know. “And when you read all that, did you do it?” The stress in Marshall’s voice was almost tangible. “Yes! Yes, I did,” answered Flora in despair, giving in and grinding her fingers against her pubis. “I couldn’t help it, Marshall. I’m only human!” “So am I,” Marshall sighed as the bath water began to slosh wildly to and fro, “Yes, dear God in Heaven, so am I!” Still holding herself, Flora was bewitched by Marshall’s gyrations. He was balanced precariously on one elbow and his heels, beneath the water, while his pelvis lifted in crazy contortions, and every few moments, his erect penis would breach the rocking foam, clasped firmly in his slip-sliding fist. For an instant, Flora was reminded of Declan, that first morning in the garden, but she quickly realised there was little similarity. Marshall was more manic, and far less in control; and Flora grew frightened as his body flailed and the water churned. If he slipped he could crack his head and drown. “Be careful!” she cried, forgetting her own problems and shooting from the chair to kneel beside the bath. Leaning over the side, she prised Marshall’s clutching fingers off his penis, then replacing them, began to stroke his flesh herself. Able to support himself more safely now, Marshall groaned and arched up into her grasp. “Oh Flora, Flora, that’s wonderful,” he whispered, pumping his erection back and forth between her fingers. “You’re beautiful... For God’s sake, give me a kiss!” Riding through her grip in the slick, soapy water, Marshall’s member felt like steel gloved in silk. As his lips met hers, she felt him leap in her hand, and a pulse beat in a hidden penile vein. “Oh God,” he moaned again, into her mouth, and his semen throbbed thickly between her fingers, “You’re an angel, little Flower, you’re an angel...” Little Flower? thought Flora, as she held on gently to his fast subsiding flesh. Didn’t that sound suspiciously like ‘Wild Flower’? For a moment, she considered challenging him, but before she could, Marshall sat up, and she lost her slippery grip on his penis. “You’re a very special girl, Flora,” he said, reaching out to touch her face, “I’ve been wanting that ever since I saw you yesterday, in ‘Treasure Trove’. You’ve got graceful hands, I just knew they’d feel good.” He spoke so sincerely that Flora lost her urge to question him. He was such an

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attractive man, and so genuine-seeming, that her desire for him would no longer be gainsaid. She leant forward into the kiss he seemed to be offering, then whimpered softly when his mouth opened hers. Locked in the most delectable kiss, Flora was vaguely aware that her clothes were getting soaked. Marshall’s arms and torso were running with water, and her own arms were half submerged now. But she didn’t care. She felt his tongue darting about in the softest recesses of her mouth: one moment gently questing, the next stabbing in a blatant fucking motion. Her jaw begin to ache, and she imagined she could see stars, but her body only got hotter and more hungry. “Flora... Oh, Flora,” murmured Marshall into her mouth. Breaking away a moment, he stood up and stepped out of the bath, then grabbed her again and jammed his body against hers. The next thing Flora knew was that they were kissing again, with water sluicing off Marshall onto her. Her top, skirt, sandals, underwear—everything!—were drenched in seconds, although she was well aware her knickers were already wet. She was also aware that Marshall was hard again, his penis probing blindly at her belly. Flora could feel the whole shape of it through her thin, saturated clothes, and as Marshall swung his hips, his shaft caressed her. Flora in turn was massaging Marshall’s back, and the tight, muscular rounds of his buttocks. He went ‘mmmmm...’, low in his throat, as she flicked her fingers delicately along the inner slopes of each cheek, then he bit her lip as she began to stroke his anus. His penis seemed to bore even more determinedly against her as she fondled him, and she felt him stepping from foot to foot to make a rhythm. “You gorgeous girl,” he said hoarsely, kissing her all over her face and holding her head with one hand while the other slid down to her bottom. Mimicking what she was doing to him, he let one finger work its way into her tender anal groove, then palpated her as she palpated him. Her sodden clothing was no protection whatsoever. “Oh yes,” he whispered, then mashed his lips to hers while his finger did its work. The rude caress was unbearable. Unbearably stimulating, and unbearably frustrating. Flora rolled her hips just as Marshall had rolled his, grinding her crotch against the fulcrum of his erection.

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But Marshall’s arousal was not so volatile this time; his watery orgasm had dulled his sensitivity. While his finger jabbed her, his tongue jiggled in her mouth. They remained in this frozen fight for what felt like an age; until finally Marshall growled with impatience. “This’s no good,” he said, his hand scrabbling crudely at her skirt. Within seconds, Flora felt cooler air on her legs and thighs, then Marshall’s fingers pushing down inside her panties. He didn’t bother to take them off, but just grabbed and squeezed one buttock while inside them. “That’s better,” he purred, moulding her cheek, then working it round and round. The sensation of having her bottom manipulated, and of having Marshall’s whole hand inside her pants, was too much for Flora’s self-control. With a long, ragged groan, she smeared her crotch against his hardness, then came violently in a sticky, trembling rush. As the sensations lashed her body, she nearly stumbled sideways, but gripping tightly, Marshall wouldn’t let her fall. “You’re incredible, Flora,” he breathed as she shivered in his arms like a captive dove. “So responsive... So hot... I’ve never met anyone like you.” You’re exaggerating, Marshall, thought Flora, with a smile, as she recovered. Especially if you’ve shared Morwenna’s bed. They stood there for a little while, exchanging kisses and still holding one other. Marshall’s hand remained inside Flora’s panties, and he stroked her bottom and her anus, and the outer lips of her pudenda, until once again, she was almost choking with helpless pleasure. Crooking his wrist, he slid two fingers right inside her. “Oh God, I think I’m going to come again,” gasped Flora, as Marshall flexed his fingers and gently stretched her. She was almost weeping from the tension in her clitoris. “In that case,” muttered Marshall, withdrawing his searching hand, then using both of them to lower her to the bathmat. Before Flora really knew what was happening, he had her panties were tugged off and flung away, her thighs were open wide, and Marshall’s penis was levering its way into her channel. “Let’s both enjoy it,’ he finished, swinging his hips and beginning to thrust with all his might. Flora climaxed immediately, and at the extreme moment, she was aware of only

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Marshall and his erection. The whole house could have collapsed around them and she would barely have noticed. All she could see was Marshall’s image behind her eyelids; all she could hear was his hoarse orgasmic yell; all she could feel was his juddering flesh as he came inside her. “Oh Flora, you’re delectable,” she heard him sob, as her senses dimmed.

“Quite something, wasn’t it?” remarked Marshall, some time later. The room they were now in was just as elegantly decorated as the rest of the house, and Marshall’s bed was particularly imposing. Covered by a soft, chenille spread in diagonal stripes of cream and grey, it had elaborate brass railings at both head and foot. Flora eyed these with a smile, and some suspicions. “Yes, it was,” she said, stretching lazily as she answered him, her body feeling fresh and clean in one of his bathrobes. Her own clothes were tumbling around in his washer/dryer. “But I’m still no nearer to getting answers to my questions,” she continued, wondering whether to drink a little of the wine he’d just poured. The effects of the last bottle seemed quite forgotten. “Questions? What questions?” enquired Marshall quizzically, putting his own glass on the bedside table and rolling over on his side to look at her. “One...” Flora did the same, letting her robe gape open, but really caring, “Are you “The Scribe”, Marshall Fox?” “I thought we settled that one back at the pub?” His wide, mobile lips curved impishly. “Although I wouldn’t mind being “The Scribe”... His approach obviously works a treat on you.” “Ah, but it worked for you this afternoon,” replied Flora pointedly. “I was just the wrong man in the right place at the right time,” replied Marshall, reaching into the drooping neckline of her robe and running his fingertips ever-so-lightly across her nipple. “I owe the man a drink.” He took the nipple between finger and thumb and gave it a tweak. Flora stirred uneasily. The little pain was exciting, and she felt its effect, out of all proportion, between her thighs. Watching her closely, Marshall increased the pressure, then laughed infuriatingly as her legs began to scissor.

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“Are you really into all that?” gasped Flora, amazed to feel herself getting wet with additional stimulation. “Punishment... Spanking and suchlike... Oh God!” Her pelvis suddenly jerked of its own accord. Still rolling her nipple in a fierce, tight grip, Marshall seemed to debate the question very carefully. “Yes... Sort of,” he answered with a diffidence that was patently assumed. ““Madeleine” sometimes practices what she preaches.” He tugged very slowly and very carefully on her breast and drew it out until it was a soft, plump cone that protruded from her robe’s gaping vee. The tension and tenderness was as maddening as it was arousing, and as Marshall leant forward and touched the tip of his tongue to her nipple, Flora squealed and clapped her hand to her crotch. “But she doesn’t like to be too cruel,” he continued between licks, “She’s more into bondage, and playing with toys, than into pain.” “You could’ve fooled me,” said Flora tightly, as Marshall closed his teeth and nipped her very gently. Squirming slowly, she thought of “The Scribe’s” last but one gift—and imagined the feel of the dildo inside her. “Wh...what do you mean by toys?” she asked faintly, as Marshall stopped biting and started kissing, then opened his mouth to encompass almost all her breast. “Oh, long, fat, guided missile shaped things that go “zzzz”,” he said lifting his face, his lips moist with his own saliva, “Little, squat, bulbous shaped things that go in extremely naughty places... Straps, contrivances, widgets... Balls and eggs and rings...” He waggled his eyebrows, then swooped down to her other breast, his tongue moving with all the industry of before. “And the bondage?” persisted Flora, knowing she had to ask before she became too distracted. A condition she was approaching with some speed. Her nipples were like stones beneath Marshall’s judicious licking, and between her legs, her sex was twitchy and engorged. “Does Madeleine like to tie...or be tied?” Marshall chuckled, his rippling breath playing havoc across her skin. “Ah... well... Our Maddy is a little bit schizoid... Sometimes she likes to bind her victims to her bed and play with them until they can’t think straight... And other times, she likes to be tied up herself.” He paused, then bent down to suck Flora’s navel. “It all depends how introspective she’s feeling.”

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Was he saying he liked to be bound? Or was he simply saying he liked to write about being bound? With his alter-ego as female protagonist. Flora’s patience with conundrums was gone. “Stop teasing me!” she snarled, as a filament of sensation streaked away from her belly button and seemed to tangle around her clitoris from within. “Am I teasing you?” said Marshall, looking up, mock aggrieved. “I thought I was giving you what you wanted.” “Yes! No! I don’t know!” cried Flora, her thighs and bottom weaving as he placed his forefinger where his mouth had been. As he swivelled it, the eldritch filament was drawn tight. “Shall we play a game?” he enquired, moving up her, “How about one of Maddy’s favourites?” Sliding his fingers along her arms, he gently pinned her wrists to the pillow, with one hand on either side of her head. As he looked down at her, his eyes appeared much darker than they normally did, their pupils huge and dilated. “Have you ever been tied up, Flora?” He swooped his mouth down, kissed her very roughly for about thirty seconds, then pulled back again. “Did your boyfriend ever tie you up? The one who helped you move in?” “How do you know about Ian? I’ve only just met you!” she protested, then fell silent beneath another fast kiss. “This is Marwick, remember? Word gets round.” “You’re all a set of busybodies,” said Flora, twisting her head to one side, and getting her earlobe nipped for her trouble. “We are, but you like us, don’t you?” he mouthed, stabbing his tongue into her ear. “I’m willing to bet you’ve never made friends this fast before?” It was true, but Flora wouldn’t answer. He was kissing her ear again, then browsing his way down her neck. His thumbs were stroking the inside of her wrists, as if searching for a pulse, and Flora couldn’t believe how aroused that made her feel. “So? Flora, my new friend... Would you like me to bind you?” he asked quietly—and very seriously—as Flora turned her head and looked up at him again. “You’ll be quite safe, you know... I’ve done it before, and I know what I’m doing.” Flora wanted to fling a defiant remark at him, but she couldn’t. Her whole body, and

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especially the pit of her belly, felt weak and melting, turned to honey by the intent in his eyes. She wore no bonds yet, but she was already bound. “Yes,” she said, feeling her will ebb and flow like water. “Yes what?” said Marshall, moving further over her, and nudging her thigh with his erection. “Yes, I’d like you to tie me up.” “And to play with you?” “Yes, I’d like you to tie me up and then play with me.” “Please?” “Please!” “Good!” he said, swirling his penis briefly against her hip, then sitting up on the bed, his manner crisp and businesslike. “You won’t regret this,” he said, touching her arm, which lay where he’d positioned it, in a shallow inert curve across the pillow, “And if I do use this scene... Well, maybe I will give you a slice of the royalties!” His expression was so Mephistophelean that Flora felt a twinge of alarm. And it must have shown on her face, because he leant over her and gave her a quick kiss, “Don’t worry... I won’t name names,” he whispered, sliding lightly off the bed, and opening first one drawer, then another, in a satinwood chest that stood close by. Flora was vaguely aware of objects being tossed onto the bedspread by her feet, but in her passivity, she felt unable to look at them. She kept her eyes closed, and her qualms locked inside her. Marshall chuckled, as if amused by her trepidation, and she heard him rearranging his infernal devices. Judging by the feel of his movements, he seemed to selecting certain items and rejecting others, and when the choices were made, Flora heard the rustling of him shedding his robe. Half expecting him to strip her too, she was surprised when he took a gentle hold on her right wrist, and with something soft, secured it loosely to the bed-head. Satisfied with that, he walked around to the other side of the bed, and performed the same action on her left wrist. The moment she was secured, panic set in. She began to struggle, and her eyes flew open.

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“Easy... Easy...” soothed Marshall, hopping onto the bed, and kneeling over her to kiss her face and neck. “Don’t fret, Flora darling. Don’t worry... You’re safe with me,” he murmured, almost as if she were a kitten he’d rescued from a tree. To her surprise, she immediately felt calmer, and when he unfastened her robe, and drew its two wings apart, she sighed with spontaneous contentment. Looking down at her body she could see how excited he’d made her. Her breasts were rosy, her nipples pert, and between her thighs she could see the glint of moisture, and the swelling pout of her turgid inner lips. Her legs were still free, but Marshall had immobilised one of them, by sitting astride it and pinning it with his weight. “Lord, you’re beautiful,” he said, reaching for her nipples, twirling them this way and that, then flicking the very tips with nails of his thumbs. Flora immediately felt a massive surge of tension. Her vulva seemed to gape and swell, and she feared for the state of Marshall’s bedspread, because her juices were flowing so copiously that in moments they’d soak right through her robe. She started to moan, softly, in her throat, and her free leg worked convulsively against the bed. Marshall’s penis was feverishly hot where it rested on her thigh. “Oh, Flora, the things I’d like to do to you,” he whispered, leaning over her, grinding his cock into her sensitised skin. “I can just picture you... Spread. Gagged. Bound. Blindfolded. Everything laid wide open for me... Oh yeah...” Flora felt a great, great fear in her vitals. A terror that excited her madly. She was a free-thinking, self-determining woman, yet something primal inside her had awoken. The concept of being reduced to mere flesh for Marshall’s amusement was an idea that made her innards flex and flutter. The fabric beneath her was soaked now. Robe, bedspread, beyond even. She could feel a huge sticky patch beneath her bottom. Her free leg was working spasmodically, and her arms were aching with the effort of straining against her bonds. The desire to touch her sex was a red mist before her eyes, and between her legs lay a yawning maw of need. Twisting, she tried to press herself against Marshall somehow, but all he did was laugh at her struggles. This was the very essence of bondage, she realised, and as yet all he’d done was tie her hands. “Nice, isn’t it?” enquired Marshall, still flicking, still playing, still pleasuring his own penis against her leg.

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“How would you know?” demanded Flora, at her wit’s end. “Weren’t you listening?” he asked, then dove down again to suck vigorously on each nipple, “Didn’t I tell you that Maddy was a switch?” As Flora tried to absorb this, and see an image of Marshall lashed to his own bed, the man himself worked determinedly on her breasts. Pulling, delicately pinching, licking and nipping and plaguing; every action affecting her burning sex. “God, I just love these!” he crowed, plucking and tugging at her over-sensitive breastflesh. It wasn’t pain, but it was torture. Heavenly torture. “Please, Marshall, please!” moaned Flora, her voice hoarse, her body writhing. Her cleft was a dripping chalice, overflowing with raging need, and she couldn’t touch it and Marshall was ignoring it. “Please what?” he asked, twisting now, creating a little pain, but still not much. Just enough to fire the torments in her vulva. “What do you want?” “I want you to touch me!” “But I am touching you...” Twist. Twist. Twist. “Not there!” “Where then?” “Between my legs... Oh God, please!” “More detail, Flora. Remember what I said... A storyteller should always paint a picture.” “I want you to touch my pussy.” She had to gasp it out, she could hardly breathe; no one had ever brought her to such a pitch of desire. “Your “pussy”?” enquired Marshall, starting to laugh again, “Oh, my dear little Flora, that simply won’t do...”

She’s such a lovely girl, thought Marshall, surprised at his own feelings of affection, as he crouched over Flora and watched her squirm and heard her plead. Lovelier, perhaps, than she realises, he mused, feeling like a greedy schoolboy in a sweetshop of delights. ““Pussy”“ he prompted, “What kind of a word is that for something so sacred and

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mysterious?” He knew he was being contrary, because he used far cruder words to nearartistic effect in his forays into the world of ‘Madeleine Reynard’, but he couldn’t resist piling the pressure on to Flora. The poor, beautiful, delicious Flora was nearly beside herself with lust and couldn’t do a single thing about it. This was exactly how Marshall liked his lovers: secure, aroused, and in extremis. Aware of his ‘Mister Nice Guy’ public persona, he suspected that this preference would come as quite a shock to some of the women he’d courted in the past. Occasionally, his foibles had sent them running from his home like shy, affronted virgins, no doubt grateful for their lucky close escapes. The ones who stayed, however, were always worth the trouble. These were the ones who relished the experience just as much as he did. The ones who almost always begged to go further. Flora was one of these. She’d come to Marwick Magna as a relative innocent, as most people did, even he himself. But the village had already woven its particular spell. She’d pushed very few boundaries as yet—with the significant exception of her time with Morwenna—but in each encounter, he knew she’d shown potential. She was showing it now, as she arched and wriggled beneath his weight, and it was time to push the envelope a little further... “Use another word,” he said coolly, manipulating her superbly hard nipples. “Jesus wept!” she exclaimed, her grey-green eyes wet with frustration. “Flora!” he admonished, his voice stern even though he already adored her. “Please! Oh God, Marshall, touch my... my... For Christ’s sake, touch my quim!” “That’s better,” he said encouragingly. “Now say “I want you to frig my swollen, pulsating, hungry little clittie and make me come until I scream for mercy”.” “I can’t say that. It’s ridiculous!” retorted Flora, her eyes flashing now, as she so obviously fought her own desires. “You wouldn’t write that in one of your books... It sounds grotesque!” “I did use it once,” he replied with a chuckle, as he released her, then slid his hands around her rib cage, holding her gently and fondling her breasts with his thumbs. The book had been rejected too, he thought wryly, but chose not to let Flora know that. “And if you don’t say it now...I won’t do it.” Lifting her from the bed, he laved his tongue across her nipples.

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“I hate you,” she muttered back at him through gritted teeth, pulling at her bonds and churning her hips like a limbo dancer. “You don’t, sweetheart, not really...” He continued his licking, knowing that circumspection would have the best effect now. “Please say it, Flora... Make me happy. I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Believe me.” Lifting his face from her chest, he looked up at her, savouring the conflict in her delicately sculpted features. She was proud, but she wanted an orgasm, and the fact that he’d seemed to plead himself had released her from her own inhibitions. She could obey him now, and not lose face. Her eyes scrunched tight, she licked her lips and prepared to speak. “I want you to frig my swollen, pulsating, hungry little clittie and make me come until I scream for mercy,” she whispered, her voice barely audible. “What was that? I didn’t hear you,” he said, aware that he was holding his breath. Why did this mean so much more than it usually did? “I want you to frig my swollen, pulsating, hungry little clittie and make me come until I scream for mercy!” she shouted, her eyes snapping open, and her body lurching upwards beneath him, as if demanding as a right what the words seemed to grovel and beg for. Marshall’s heart pounded more with gratitude than triumph. She was a sublime girl, a superb girl, a special find... “Gladly,” he whispered, slipping a hand down her body, then pressing it, with passion, between her legs. And after one rub, she did indeed scream... And after one rub, she did indeed scream. It made a good first line for a story told in flashback, and Marshall smiled as he studied the cool blue screen. What an afternoon. What a marathon. What a woman. And he had to record his impressions of it now, while it was still fresh, even though his body was exhausted and screaming for rest. With a sigh, he reached into the bag of sunflower seeds—his favourite working nibble—that sat beside his computer, and cracked a few open and munched them as he thought. Flora Swain was remarkable. Declan had told him she was ripe and ready for anything, but Marshall hadn’t really believed his old friend. He did now though, and he felt his cock

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stir, unbelievably, yet again, as he reviewed the long hours he’d spent with Flora. Tying her wrists to the bed-head had been only the beginning, although it had been a spectacular one at that. He thought of how she’d looked lying there, her creamy body spread for his pleasure. Everything open. Everything exposed. Everything primed almost to breaking point in readiness. After her first immense orgasm with her wrists bound, and her body weighted down only by his, she’d forbidden him nothing, and permitted him his every wicked whim. “Sweet Jesus, I think I’m in love!” he whispered, remembering how she’d moaned when he’d secured her legs too. He’d fastened them wide apart, but not so much so as to be painful or harmful. Then, when she was spread, he’d prised open her oozing quim too, combing her matted pubic hair with the tips of his fingers, and gently parting her fat, puffy sex-lips. How wet she’d been. He remembered being astounded. He’d always thought that Morwenna would be the juiciest woman he’d ever encounter, but Flora’s pool of nectar had surpassed her. And her clitoris had been exquisitely engorged. Every bit the swollen, pulsating, hungry protuberance that he’d had her describe it as, but not little at the height of her arousal. He recalled touching it, and making her strain madly against her bonds and beg him for more. And when he’d licked it, she’d screeched as if possessed. Her responsiveness had made him wild too, but in a dark inward way that sometimes scared him. In a trance of absorption, and with his cock sticking out like a pole before him, he’d begun to ‘dress’ her vulnerable flesh to suit his liking. First, and with her permission, he’d slipped a ball gag into her mouth, fixing it in place with a little strap behind her head. Flora had very finely shaped lips, that were mobile and rosy, and to see them stretched around the rubber, their soft beauty deformed, had almost excited him too much far too soon. He’d had to fit a strap of his own then, a small restraining harness around the base of his penis, to increase his hardness and control his erection. Flora’s eyes had widened as she’d watched him fit it on himself, and he’d noticed the way her hips rocked and swayed. Yes, she really is into it, he thought now. She’s perfection for me. And for Marwick... After that, he’d simply followed his instincts, using the toys that he’d assembled on the

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bed. Working slowly, and guided by her muffled whimpers of outraged pleasure, he’d taken his time about sealing her other orifices. With her wriggling bottom lifted by a cushion, he’d gradually, oh-so-gradually eased a latex plug inside her rectum. She’d tossed her head, and wrenched at her bonds, but after several pauses to stroke her brow, and to kiss her and soothe her, it had gone in, leaving its broad dark base still protruding. The ivory phallus in her vagina had been easy. She’d almost seemed to welcome it, and the sounds in her throat had been low growls of triumph, as if enduring the immolation was an achievement, a source of pride as well as sexual stimulation. And there had been stimulation for Flora, Marshall had made sure of it. He’d licked her and stroked her to a dozen or more orgasms, and applied vibrators to her nipples and her clitoris. Then, when he could bear no more, and he was sure she couldn’t either, he’d taken the dildo from her body and tenderly fucked her, deliciously aware of the obstruction in her arse. Afterwards, with Flora released from all inner and outer bondage, they’d slept for a couple of hours in each others arms. And now, after consuming a few more seeds, Marshall started writing, keeping the account clear and plain in the spare, erotic style that worked the best for him. When he paused to review a few paragraphs, he admitted ruefully that his promises about royalties would have to be kept—as Flora surely would find the description unmistakable. As he executed the command that sent his current work to print, the phone by his computer trilled sharply. Marshall glanced at the time, and was surprised to see it was after midnight; he’d been writing, and dreaming, for several hours. When he lifted the receiver a familiar voice said, “So?” “We played. And she liked it.” There was silence at the other end of the line. “Dec, are you okay?” asked Marshall, sensing something ominous in his friend’s nonreaction. “Yeah, I’m fine. That’s good news.” “Doesn’t sound as if you think it’s good news,” Marshall answered, fishing in the seed bag, his slight anxiety making him hungry. “It’s part of the plan, Dec... You knew I’d do bondage. And you were the one who brought her to me.”

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“I know!” snapped the American, making Marshall spill his sunflower seeds, “I just wanted to know if she was all right.” “Yes. She enjoyed it... I think,” said Marshall, trying not to sound smug, “She was a bit quiet when I walked her home. Trying to absorb what’d happened, I suppose. It’s like that the first time.” Marshall paused, wondering whether to mention what he’d been going to mention, now he’d sensed his friend the artist’s feelings. “But she kissed me willingly enough at the gate. And promised we could do it again soon...” Again there was a long hiatus without comment from Declan. “Dec? Are you there?” “Yes, okay... Good,” Declan replied, his voice clipped, “I was just making sure it all went well.” There was another weighty pause, “That’s great then... Ciao, Marsh, I’ll see you.” Abruptly the line went quite dead. “Oh bugger,” murmured Marshall wearily, reaching down to pick up his scattered seeds, then retrieving his printout from the hopper. “That’s two of us that’re crazy about her now.”

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Chapter Twelve ‘Sturm und Drang’

It took Flora a long, long time to finally settle down that night, and even then, she didn’t feel a lot like sleep. Was it the nap she’d taken with Marshall, she wondered, that had taken the edge off her tiredness? No, she realised, as she tossed and turned and punched her pillows, it was more her waking mind simply refusing to switch off. It was all the rest of the time she’d spent at Marshall’s that was bothering her, not the brief period she’d spent asleep. Much as she liked him, and found him profoundly attractive, it scared her senseless that Marshall Fox could be two people. The first was a funny, talented, easy-going fellow with whom she could easily become great friends, and perhaps, one day, even more than friends. The second persona was far darker and much less fathomable. The Marshall who tied women up, and did mind-blowing, almost consciousness-altering things to them, was like the hero of one of his own erotic books. He was no less attractive for it; in fact Flora was ashamed to admit that he was even more attractive in that mode. But it was terrifyingly dangerous to fall into his clutches, and deeply disquieting how thrilling his deviance was. What if I don’t like ‘ordinary’ sex any more? she thought suddenly, sitting bolt upright in bed. Everything she’d done in the last few days had been faintly bizarre. Morwenna. Declan in the garden. Jack and that huge vibrator. And now, and most of all, the seemingly mild-mannered Marshall turning out to be as perverted as the weirdest of his own weird creations. She sensed that this afternoon they’d only scratched the surface of ‘Madeleine’ and her exotic sexuality. Closing her tired, gritty eyes, Flora imagined herself back on that bed, mute and spreadeagled, while Marshall loomed over her, his face wild. His hands and his mouth had been everywhere at once, and his delight in filling her emptiness—with hard but well-lubricated rubber—had been so gleeful that in retrospect it chilled her. But that wasn’t all. The sensation of the butt-plug and the dildo had been a combination of loathsomeness and ecstasy. She’d felt stretched, stuffed, violated in the most

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intense and personal way—especially with her mouth full too—but the lack of control had brought with it great pleasure. She’d wept, when Marshall had tickled her clitoris with his fingertip, and she’d orgasmed helplessly again and again and again, but the tears had been of rapture, not horror. She’d loved what he’d done to her, and that he’d temporarily robbed her of her free will, of her sanity almost; but she was frightened that such intensity could be addictive. “Shit!” she whispered, aware that her memories had aroused her. It didn’t take much to do that these days. Just stray thoughts, an image, a sketch; and within moments her body had betrayed her. Think ‘straight’, she told herself, throwing off the covers. It had become unpleasantly muggy in the last half an hour or so, and the air felt as if a storm were on the way. “That’s all I need!” she muttered miserably, aware that thunder had the power to petrify her, and that these country properties—without lightening conductors and filled with flammable materials—could be death-traps in electrical storms. At the very least, the power might be cut. Just as she thought that, an enormous booming roar rang out, and with a wail of fear, Flora snatched back the covers and shot beneath them. After a few moments, she stuck her head out again. The hideous noise was not thunder after all, but the throaty rasp of an engine of some kind. It’s a fucking motorbike! thought Flora, rising from her bed, thoroughly angry. And a helluva big one to make a racket like that! The windows in her bedroom looked out across the fields at the back of the cottage, and onto Declan’s garden at the side, so Flora went onto the landing to look out. What thoughtless idiot would make such a row at this time of night? Her bedside clock had read well after midnight. As she reached the window, and looked out towards the lane, the revving increased in volume slightly, then ratcheted back in a series of three barking ‘throttle’ sounds, and finally, smoothed out as the yet unseen bike set in motion. The night was moon-less, and the country lane without benefit of streetlamps, and Flora was able to see little more than a dark, bulky shape speeding away in the opposite direction to the village. Nevertheless, she was quite certain it was Declan, and that judging by the hunched intensity of his posture as he

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crouched astride the monstrous motorcycle, he too was mad as hell about something. Returning to bed, she wondered what on earth would drive him to go roasting around the rural back roads after midnight. It was downright dangerous, and probably in contravention of any number of parish bylaws or whatever. As she continued to ponder the possible causes of Declan’s nocturnal jaunt, a peculiar piece of serendipity struck her, and she snatched up one of the books that were piled beside her bed. She read again the passage in Marshall’s book where the awesome biker hijacked the heroine, this time seeing Declan in the role of the antagonist. Maybe that was why the dream was so vivid, she thought, recalling her disturbed night after she’d first read the story. Was it Declan I heard in my sleep? A rumble of real thunder made Flora drop the book. Absorbed in her ruminations about her neighbour and his bike, she’d almost forgotten the impending thunderstorm— which gave the first crack of lightening a double impact. “Oh shit!” moaned Flora again, lunging for the quilt and wrapping it around her head. What seemed like only seconds later, there was a second thunderclap, even louder than the first, that seemed to come from directly above her head. The storm had crept upon her from nowhere it seemed; the heavens transforming into a maelstrom in mere moments. Flora’s primal, long-standing terror grabbed her by the vitals, and she shrieked beneath the covers in total panic. The next three quarters of an hour seemed like an everlasting sojourn in Hades. The storm seemed to be hovering right over Marwick Magna, and with each thunderous report she was convinced she’d breathed her last. When she drew breath, that was; she kept finding herself half suffocated from holding it. One particularly loud blast brought her out of the covers, convinced she’d see either flames licking around her, or at least streaming over the roof of Declan’s house. Miraculously, though, the lightening had not hit either of their homes; but what it had done was hit a power line somewhere, and her bedside light and her radio-alarm were no longer working. The absolute inky darkness, riven every few minutes by crackling arcs of electric-blue radiance, made Flora even more terrified than before. “Oh no... Oh please please, no!” she moaned as the cacophony went on and on, and the sheets of searing light rent the sky. This was the worst storm she could ever remember

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experiencing, and the very first one she’d endured all alone. She felt hysteria nibbling at the edges of her consciousness, taking larger and larger bites with each protest from the heavens. Finally, though, another noise sounded out in the pandemonium. A sound that had frightened her earlier but which now seemed the sweetest of music. As the roar of Declan’s bike cut through the latest roll of thunder, Flora didn’t stop to engage rational thought. Without a robe or even her slippers, she tore down the stairs towards the front door. When she reached it, she found Arnold, crouched by the coat-stand, apparently as transfused with terror as she’d been. Pausing only to scoop up the shivering cat, and cuddle him against her chest, she unbolted the front door and charged out into the night. Flora hardly felt the teaming rain, but she did feel the vibration of the next huge thunderclap. She screamed as the lightening forked down from the sky. Running faster than she’d ever run in her life, she pelted down her path, and then up Declan’s and met the man himself coming towards the house from the direction of his garage. In his black, full-face helmet and leathers he looked like a contract killer from another galaxy, but as he slid off the helmet, he was transformed, becoming Declan again, and the very essence chivalry and heroism. “What-” he began, his eyes wide with astonishment at the state of her, but just then, there was another tumbling caisson of thunder. Setting down his helmet on the doorstep and taking charge of the now struggling Arnold, Declan unlocked the door and let Flora stumble thankfully inside. “What on earth are you doing out in the rain?” he demanded when they were all safely under cover. It was even darker in Declan’s house than it had been in her own, but Flora could see his eyes gleaming fierily in the gloom. “I...I—” Another huge thunderclap took Flora’s voice and her coherence, and she simply launched herself towards her tall rescuer. As they made contact, she felt Arnold wriggle free, and go scooting off, presumably in search of a hidey-hole, then Declan’s solid arms were wrapped around her, and her soaking body was pressed against his chest. “Easy,” he murmured, “Take it easy... You’ll be okay...” Flora felt the resonance of his deep voice soothe her, and his body-heat warm her through his leathers, “It’ll be all right, Flora... It’s slackening off now. Listen? The worst’s over, believe me... It’ll be fine.”

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Flora was less conscious of the words than of their tone, and the strong, rock-like man who uttered them. There was nothing patronising or belittling about what he said, or the way he held her, and as she lifted her head from the crook of his armpit, she realised he was neither lying nor exaggerating. Another peal of thunder came, and as if to prove his point, it was far less deafening than the one that had preceded it, and it seemed to come from a far greater distance. “You must think I’m such an idiot,” she said, once the rumble had settled, “I just panicked. I’ve never been alone in a storm like this before... I feel so pathetic...” Declan showed no sign of wanting to release her, in fact he eased her a little closer, setting his legs apart to balance their combined weight. As she leant against his pelvis, Flora discovered he was hard, but strangely enough his next words carried no evidence of it. “You’re right to be scared of lightening storms, Flora. They are pretty dangerous.” His hands moved on her back, as if only now discovering she was next to naked. “When I was a kid I lived on my uncle’s farm for a while, in Iowa, and he had a barn burnt to the ground in a storm like this.” “Oh thanks,” whispered Flora wryly, just as the lightening crashed again, albeit some miles away now. “Oh God!” she squeaked as a second crack seemed to hang on the first one’s heels, then she was silenced as Declan bent to kiss her. Flora hadn’t realised how much she wanted to be kissed. It was like an unction, water in the desert, a blessing. Declan seemed to close himself around her as his lips caressed hers, and the smell of hot, wet leather was intoxicating. The storm seemed suddenly to flee, defeated. Clinging like a vine to her partner’s massive body, Flora enjoyed the kiss’s calming qualities as much as its arousing ones. It was a gentle kiss, a pacifying kiss—but not in any derogatory sense. It just soothed her with sweetness and the lusty joys of life. Opening her mouth, she let Declan’s tongue explore her, then pushed back and used her own tongue between his lips. Opening her thighs, she let him press her to his crotch; his big hands cupping her buttocks and lifting her up to fit her body against his. She moved her hips as she tasted him, enjoying the heat of his erection against her belly. It felt strange and rather frightening to have her feet off the floor, and be solely reliant on Declan’s hands, and her own arms, locked around his neck to support her, but the heavy

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strength of him was a bulwark against all dangers. The kiss lasted a long time, with Flora hanging against—and almost balancing on— Declan’s cock. He felt huge and hot beneath the fine grain of the leather, and from time to time he seemed to pulse beneath its surface. At length however, he gave one last evocative suck on Flora’s tongue inside his mouth, and then set her down, on her bare feet, on the hall carpet. Flora shivered as Declan stared down at her intently. There was something odd in his eyes, as if he were questioning her, angry with her for something. For a moment, she wondered what she’d done, what it was that had come between them, then she remembered Marshall, and before him, Jack Walters. Was Declan jealous? It seemed unlikely, and also quite unfair. He went with Morwenna, and probably with any number of other women in the village—Lucy perhaps? Or maybe the as-yet-unseen lady of the manor—so who was he to deny her other men? “What is it?” she asked, unable to take the intensity of his look. “Nothing,” he muttered, turning away from her, but snatching at her hand. “Come on,” he said, leading her down the hall to what she presumed must be a sitting room. “You’re soaked through. I’ll light a fire to warm you up.” In the darkness, Flora could see little of the hall as she passed through it, just the vague shapes of the furniture and a few prints, or possibly original paintings on the wall. She wondered absently whether Declan did his own housework or whether he had a ‘woman that did’; there was a pleasant smell of furniture polish, and what little light there was fell on gleaming surfaces. Preceding her into the sitting room, Declan moved around quickly to the fireplace and took a small object from the mantel. Flora heard a soft rattle, and realised that it was a box of matches. After a moment or two there was a hiss and spit of one being struck, and then light, as Declan set the flame a number of candles, which were arranged on a metal tray and stuck in little china holders. The soft flickering radiance showed a room that was both charming and elegant, furnished in warm harmonising shades and subtle prints. Declan, in his black leather looked out of place in the homely surroundings, but nevertheless Flora instinctively knew that he’d decorated this room himself. The artist’s eye, she thought, admiring his great skill as he’d

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expressed it in room decor, while she made her way tentatively to the fireside. A fire had obviously already been laid in the grate, because after striking just a couple more matches and prodding things around with the poker, Declan soon had the first stages of a good, steady blaze. Flora was just about to sink down onto the sofa—which stood parallel to the fireplace with a Persian hearth-rug before it—when another roll of thunder made her yelp. Declan was at her side in a second, holding her again. “It’s okay” he said, “It’s receding now... Why don’t you sit down by the fire and get warm.” Flora obeyed him, suddenly a whole lot more conscious of her cotton night-dress, and the way its thinness clung to her. Her nipples were two dark points that showed clearly the bodice, and below, her pubic bush was a dark shadow. She saw Declan shoot a glance at it, then tighten his mouth. Again, she sensed his mood of suppressed anger. “Look, what is it?” she asked, surreptitiously plucking the damp cotton away from where it adhered to her. “You keep staring at me...” She faltered, shifting her thighs uneasily on the floral tapestry of the sofa’s rich upholstery. “And what were you doing blasting about the countryside on your bike anyway?” “I couldn’t sleep,” he said, reaching for the zipper of his biking jacket, “And sometimes a bit of a burn up helps...” Flora was surprised when the front of the jacket gaped apart. Declan was quite naked beneath the leather and his bronzed chest seemed to glimmer in the candlelight. As he shrugged the garment off, she began wondering about his trousers. Was he just as bare beneath them too? “It doesn’t help your neighbours,” Flora pointed out, feeling a little thrown by magnificence of his body. She’d seen him nude before, but that didn’t dull the impact one iota. “I’m sorry,” he said, sounding slightly grudging, as if he considered her to be the cause of his lack of sleep. “I never thought. Pennyroyal’s been empty for a while. I kind of forgot...” Avoiding her glance, he reached down, and worked on the fastenings of his boots. “Well, my presence has obviously made a huge impression on you then,” Flora cut back at him, feeling wounded. “That didn’t quite come out as I planned,” replied Declan immediately, his expression

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softening as he kicked off first one boot, then the other. His feet, like his torso, were now bare. “I really am sorry if I woke you. I can be a selfish sonofabitch sometimes, I know that.” “It’s not your fault. I couldn’t sleep either. And when the thunder started... Well, that finished me completely. I’m absolutely terrified of storms.” “I can tell,” observed Declan with a smile, turning from her to stare into the fire, which was blazing up cheerfully by now. There was a long, pregnant silence, in which Declan continued to study the flames, and Flora tormented herself by wondering if he wore briefs beneath his leather jeans, and whether their kiss in the hall had meant anything to him. He seemed oddly reluctant to touch her now, and there were several inches of clear air between them. “What do you think of Marshall?” he said suddenly, apropos of nothing. So that’s it, thought Flora, recognising an edge in his carefully casual question. He is jealous. He set me up with his friend, and now he’s resentful of what might have happened between us. Why on earth are men so contrary? “I like him,” she said defiantly, “He’s fun. He’s intelligent. And he writes great books.” She cringed inwardly after the last sentence had escaped her. Would Declan think she was getting at him? It was so easy to forget his awful problem. “He’s also a bit scary,” she added, feeling a sudden need to confess, and smoothe the atmosphere that was developing between them. “Like the storm?” enquired Declan, giving her a sideways smile as thunder rolled again. “Sort of...” she conceded. “And are you scared now?” he asked, facing her. A familiar message seemed suddenly to pass between them, a communication that had no need of words. “A little,” she replied, moving towards him, then sighing when he took her in his arms. The kiss this time was muscular and blatant. There was no doubt it was a pre-sexual kiss. Their tongues wrestled, their saliva mingled, and Declan’s hands travelled extensively across her body, squeezing first her breasts, then moving down to her buttocks. After a few minutes of fondling, he pulled back a little way, then reached for the hem of her night-dress and drew it up and off over her head. Flora silently raised her arms to help him. Again, he pressed against her, edging her down onto the wide, soft sofa, then almost

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lying on top of her, pinning her down with his weight. As his tongue forged into her mouth again, and his long fingers cupped her bottom and palpated it, the covered ridge of his zip massaged her mons. Declan was dominating her. But not in the sly, strange way that Marshall had. Declan was simply using his maleness, his straightforward strength and sexuality, the pure power of his magnificent animal body. Easing her thighs apart to get the best from the reinforced strip of double-stitched leather, Flora recognised his actions as an expression of his jealousy—and it excited her. It warmed her blood that this fabulous, talented man could feel envy of her other lovers. He had no real rights over her, he’d staked no claim, but nevertheless the emotion made her quiver. For a fleeting few seconds she considered the fact that it was Ian—the man who still believed he was her boyfriend—who should be jealous. What would he think if he knew what had happened in the last few days? He’d be disgusted and feel furiously betrayed. But Flora knew now that the relationship had always been pale and insipid. Lightening cracked again, but perhaps a county away now, and Declan lifted his mouth clear of hers. “Do you want me?” he asked, looking down at her, his face partially illuminated by the light from the cluster of candles. She nodded, circling her hips against his leather clad groin. “Even after Marshall?” His mouth looked a little grim. “It was only this afternoon...” “Yesterday afternoon.” “Don’t quibble...” “Yes, I do want you. I can’t help it. I’ve turned into a slut.” “No, not that,” said Declan, kissing the corner of her mouth, then pulling back again, “Just waking up, I think... And that’s no great sin.” The hardness of a moment ago was gone now, replaced by a resigned, almost ironic touch of humour. “We’d better get rid of these then,” he went on, indicating his leather biking jeans which were still pressed to Flora’s naked skin. Moving lightly and gracefully, he rolled off her and onto his feet, his fingers at his waistband as he straightened up. “No!” he said suddenly, pausing. He let his hands drop to his sides. “Why don’t we let you do it,” he said, stepping closer to the settee and flaunting his crotch forward. “You want what’s in here...” He nodded towards the bulge beneath the leather. “You can get it out.”

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Flora hid her smile. He was still jealous, and trying to get back at her a little by manoeuvring her into a position of subservience. But what he didn’t perhaps realise was that it was a feeling she liked now, something his friend Marshall had taught her to appreciate. Sitting up, she reached out towards his fly. The fastening at Declan’s waistband was rather intricate: first a substantial hook and eye arrangement, then once that was undone, a heavy metal press-stud. Flora was glad she had no nail polish to massacre. When these fasteners were released came the zip proper, a chunky heavy duty thing, lined within by a neatly stitched, silk-faced flap. A necessary flap, Flora discovered as she eased the zipper down, because as with his jacket, Declan wore nothing beneath his jeans. She prised them open, and his swollen penis rose. At the sight of it, Flora couldn’t contain herself. Impatient of delay, and begrudging even the time to take off the cumbersome jeans, she leant forward and folded her lips around the tip of him, using her fingers to ease his balls out into the open, then caress them and roll them gently in their sac. Declan gasped. Had he been expecting this? Or hoping for it? Flora thought as she mouthed him and tasted his pre-come. His testicles felt very tense, very nervy; they were tight to his body and seemed almost ready to discharge their contents. She’d have to be careful, or he’d come too quickly, before she was ready. Taking hold of his shaft, she slid her finger and thumb towards her lips. It was a trick she’d read about in a magazine. Squeeze, firmly, just beneath the head of the penis, and the wild urge to ejaculate could be tamed. She’d tried it on Ian a few times— he’d often come too soon—but he hadn’t liked it, and implied he felt insulted. Declan, however, made a long low sound of appreciation, pushing with his hips and lifting his hands to cradle her head. “Oh yeah,” he crowed, his fingers flexing amongst the fronds of her cropped hair. “That’s wonderful, Flora... Oh God, that’s great! Keep on doing it... Don’t stop... You beautiful, beautiful girl.” For a moment, Flora thought of Marshall, and how he too had called her a ‘girl’; a gorgeous girl, a sweet girl... Had they both studied seduction at the same academy? The idea made her smile around Declan’s slippery flesh, but after a moment, she renewed her efforts to extend his pleasure, pressing her thumb into the tender groove behind his glans.

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Concentrating yet dreamy, manipulating and licking, yet half drunk on his musky male aroma, Flora allowed her consciousness to rise up and see their tableau from outside her own body. It was an intensely erotic picture, had there been anyone there to see it. Perhaps ‘The Scribe’—who seemed to have access to every moment of her love life, whether it were alone or shared with others—was watching them right now? Observing her in her nakedness, crouched on a sofa to fellate her lover? Studying the thick tower of veined male flesh that jutted from between the leather of Declan’s flies? What did he—or she—think of the way her cheeks bulged as she allowed Declan in deeper? The way she couldn’t help herself making an uncouth, bubbly gobbling sound, as her saliva swirled around her lover’s shaft? Watch this! she thought defiantly, slapping Declan’s glans from side to side in her mouth, then digging in deep beneath the frenum with her tongue. Can you hear that, ‘Scribe’? she demanded silently, as Declan groaned, his head whipping back and forth and his hips doing a slow bump and grind. She held station with him, moving as he moved, never letting him slip from between her lips. Her hands retained their grip on him too, holding his balls and circling the base of his shaft. “Oh Flora,” he gasped, his hold on her head light and caressing, despite his obvious intense excitement, “I’m going to come, baby. I can’t hold on much longer...” It was the first time he’d ever called her ‘baby’ and something about the sound of it appealed to her. You don’t have to hold on, stud, she told him silently, lapping hard at the eye of his prick and his salty juices. Wiggling her finger, she worked into his trousers and stroked his perineum. With a great, incoherent shout, he gave up control, and began to thrust with no inhibition, just fucking her mouth as if it were her quim. As his semen began to spurt, Flora felt the urge to gag and almost panicked, but after a moment, her muscles relaxed and her discomfort was gone. She swallowed a couple of times, letting some of his thick, almost viscous essence slide down her throat; but it kept coming, just as he did, and overflowed from between her stretched lips. She could feel it dribble out of the corner of her mouth, then drip off her chin and land on her chest. “Oh Flora, Flora, Flora,” Declan murmured, falling still at last, his penis subsiding. “That was amazing...” He slipped out of her mouth, then almost staggered. Laughing at his

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own weakness, he collapsed onto the couch beside her, his breathing deep and ragged. “You are one helluva cocksucker, lady,” he said, turning to face her, “And I mean that in the nicest possible way.” He grinned, then ran his hand through his hair, obviously still thunderstruck. “I’ll take it as a compliment then,” replied Flora, licking her lips as she adjusted her position, tucking her legs up beside her on the sofa. “And if you keep doing that,” he said, licking his own lips and reaching out to wipe a little smear of his come off her chin, “You’ll make me want a second helping.” He offered her his fingers and she licked up the thin slick of semen. I rather think it would be me who got the second helping, thought Flora, loving the distinctive and salty taste of man. Declan slumped back against the sofa’s embroidered back and closed his eyes. “Just give me a minute, Flora, to recover,” he said, smiling with pure, lazy contentment, “And then I’m going to pay you back in spades for what you just did.” His arm snaked out and drew her comfortably against his side. “You deserve it, sweetheart, you really do.” Flora snuggled against him, enjoying his warmth, yet realising something very strange. In all the excitement and exhilaration of sucking Declan, she’d almost forgotten her own arousal. She felt quite content just to be held for a while—to relax, to sleep perhaps, and to take some time out to gather her sexual energy. As Declan stroked her hair, and held her closer, her eyelids began to droop and close...

Flora awoke to a delightful sensation. A long flexible tongue licking her inner thigh. Stirring a little, she realised that she’d been moved on the settee and set down sideways, with a mound of cushions against her back and her legs stretched out. One foot was trailing on the floor, and the other was resting against the back of the sofa. Her thighs were spread and she had Declan crouched between them, his body bent double, his face edging towards her sex. His muscular back gleamed in the dancing golden firelight, and he was naked now, his jeans abandoned on the floor. Tentatively, Flora reached out and touched his hair. “You didn’t think I was going to

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sleep through this, did you?” she enquired softly when he looked up from her thigh. “Nope, not really,” he replied, looking up at her, “I just thought it’d be a pretty good way to wake you.” He grinned broadly and his brown eyes seemed to twinkle. For a moment, Flora just stared at him. His bare body was beautiful, and seemed even moreso in firelight than it had in the sun of his garden. The radiance from the flames seemed to dance across his musculature, making it look as if it were sculpted, or cast from living bronze. His form was magnificent, and his handsome face mysterious, as if the magic of the storm had transformed him somehow. “Where are your glasses?” Flora enquired, suddenly realising what was different about him. “They’re kind of awkward with the helmet,” he said, “I’ve got my contact lenses in.” He blinked for effect. “Why, do you want me to change back?” “No!” It came out rather sharply. She didn’t want him to do anything that would delay what he obviously had in mind. “No, you’re all right... I was just used to seeing you in your specs, that’s all.” She shifted slightly on the couch, trying to attract his attention back to the vista that had previously held it. Her sex, opened before him, and so needy. “Great,” Declan murmured cryptically, giving her one more intent, shiny-eyed look, then bending his head back towards her beckoning body. He was such a big man, he looked like a titan crouched between her legs, but the touch of his lips was very delicate, travelling with slow circumspection over her thighs and her belly, before moving to the heart of things, her sex. Parting the soft hair with his thumbs, then prising open the tender folds that it covered, he bent his face even lower to kiss her core. The contact was extraordinarily light, almost ethereal, but immediately it brought her to life. All the desire that had been in abeyance whilst she’d been pleasuring him earlier now roused itself, and every inch of flesh between her legs became super sensitive. She moaned involuntarily as he licked her, thinking for an instant of Marshall doing the same thing, but even in her state of erotic dreaminess, seeing a difference. What Marshall had done had been in the service of teasing, game-playing and having power over her. But all Declan was trying to do was to be good to her, and give her pleasure because she’d given it to him. And he was succeeding, oh dear heaven, how he was succeeding! Each stroke of his tongue was like the benison of an angel, full of power yet as gentle as could be. He was

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cherishing her, honouring her, worshipping her; lifting her high on a wave of joy with his mouth. Sliding his hands under her buttocks, he raised her up so he could work more closely on her flesh. Feeling him holding her, his long fingers flexing rhythmically as he lapped at her, Flora experienced a piercing wave of raw emotion. For all their differences, she perceived Declan as a good man, a kind lover with a true and giving heart. It was this meaningfulness that suddenly made her orgasm, her hands plunging into his black hair to press him closer. “Oh Declan! Oh Declan, that’s wonderful!” she cried out as the deep pulsations fluttered, and the reaction made her kick her legs and jerk. “Oh Declan,” she gasped as he seemed to answer, purring her name against the membranes of her sex. Whilst she was still climaxing, and her legs still waving, Declan rose up, coming forward over her, hooking her knees with his arms and folding her double. When her thighs were pressed up against her breasts, he presented his penis at the mouth of her vagina, then pushed gently to slide himself into her, entering slowly, going in inch by inch. His thighs formed a cradle on either side of her hips, and his cock surged deep into her body. Flora closed her eyes, feeling suddenly too vulnerable to look at him. As if sensing her defencelessness, Declan ran his hands lovingly over her, fondling her breasts, her belly, her flanks. You’re safe with me, his touch seemed to say. I won’t hurt you. I only want to please you. She could almost feel his eyes roving over her too, cruising her body by the fire’s flattering light. A state of wantonness seemed to flow through her, engendered by his scrutiny, and she stretched her arms back, forgetting her vulnerability, and welcoming—in its place—a feeling of gloriousness, a desire to exhibit both herself and her pleasure. She squirmed luxuriously before him, arching her back like a cat’s, and crowing with delight as he circled his pelvis a little and seemed to find new zones of responsiveness inside her. Her climax—which had been simmering oh-so slowly whilst Declan carefully entered her—billowed up from the pit of her belly and turned wild again, making her twist and turn on the living pillar lodged inside her. “Oh God!” she shouted, feeling her face contort in ecstasy, but no longer caring that she might look ugly or strange. Declan gripped her waist, and seemed to pull her further onto him, and as she opened her eyes, she saw his face was twisted too. He was grunting, forcing

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out confused words between gritted teeth, and all the time, thrusting into her in steady shoves. She could feel him hovering on the brink of a stunning orgasm. Suddenly, there seemed to be no refuge, and no respite from pure pleasure. Flora was aware that she screamed, but could no sooner contain the noise than stop breathing and gasping for air. A curtain of white flame seemed to descend right through her body, and from within it and beyond it, she could hear sobbing. As Declan climaxed, she caught the echo of the word ‘love’...

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Chapter Thirteen What Guilt Can Do

By the next morning, Flora was convinced she’d just imagined the word ‘love’. Why would Declan love her, anyway? He’d helped her with her artistic aspirations, and teased her quite a lot; but apart from that, and their various sexual clashes, the pair of them hardly even knew each other. There wasn’t a lot of basis there for love. And yet she felt guilty. Guilty that she hadn’t done more for him; guilty that she’d betrayed him during her long, debauched afternoon with Marshall, and before that, when she’d been with Jack Walters. Most puzzling of all was that she even felt guilty about that afternoon when Ian had been in Marwick Magna. Which was ridiculous really, because Ian was the one she was cheating on now... But she hadn’t thought about Ian at all while she’d lain in Declan’s arms and watched the dawn break. Her neighbour had said very little once the tumult of their coupling had subsided, but companionably, he’d snuggled her against him, shielding her body from the night chills with his own. To finally complete the aura of cosiness, a few minutes after they’d settled against each other, Arnold had leapt lightly onto the settee and curled up with them, tucking his solid, chunky furriness right in behind her knees and purring steadily as the three of them dozed. She’d woken again at about seven, disturbed by the sensation of being licked again, but not this time by Declan. It’d simply been Arnold applying his rough tongue to her face, to remind her that she was in the wrong house, and it was high time she served him his breakfast. Her cotton night-gown had been a soggy tangled ball, thrown down between the settee and a chair, but Declan—who’d seemed disgusting awake and full of vigour—had produced a huge rugby shirt that covered her down to her knees. Then, dressed only in shorts and trainers, he’d picked her up bodily and carried her around to the front step of Pennyroyal Cottage. The door had blown shut at some time during the storm, but as the lock was an old type and not a latch, she wasn’t locked out. And as in Marwick at least some old-fashioned

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values still presided, there had been no intruders in her absence. To her regret, Declan hadn’t lingered. He’d given her nice, sexy, no-nonsense kiss on the door step, then left with a cheerful, “Catch you later!” “Men!” growled Flora, now that she was bathed and dressed, and had fed Arnold but not herself. What have I got to be guilty for? she wondered, frowning into the fridge. He’s the one who dumped me on the doorstep then swanned off without so much as a ‘by your leave’! And yet she still couldn’t shake the feeling off. Or think of a way to assuage it. What could she do, anyway? Promise not to let Marshall tie her up again? Refuse to see Morwenna or Jack? Write and tell Ian it was over? Tear up ‘The Scribe’s’ next letter before she’d even read it? Not one of those things was positive. Perhaps she should offer to do something for Declan? Something useful. She could offer to type some letters for him, or to read to him from a newspaper? Oh no no no! Far too patronising... She could bake him a pie. Clean his grungy paintbrushes. Suck his penis... Unaccountably, the thought of that made her blush. It’d been a potent experience; having a charismatic, talented, and thoroughly admirable man at her mercy. It had aroused her without him even having to touch her. Licking her lips, she could almost taste his flavour. The illusory tang of Declan however, did not take the edge off her appetite. Still musing on the conundrum of her feelings, she began moving a few items around the refrigerator. She fancied a wicked breakfast, a monster fry up: eggs, bacon, fried bread, the works. But in spite of Morwenna’s thoughtfulness in stocking up for her, there wasn’t a lot of food remaining to choose from. You’re a slut, Swain, she castigated herself, taking out a carton of UHT milk, then beginning to hunt for the muesli. You’ve spent far too much time fantasising and screwing around, when you should have been keeping house and shopping. “You can’t live on sex alone, Flora,” she muttered, “No matter how damn good it is!” While she ate her cereal, Flora kept an ear open for the postman; but to both her relief, and disappointment, there was no delivery. I don’t know what you’re waiting for though, she thought, taking her bowl back to the

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kitchen to rinse. Your ‘special’ deliveries don’t even come via Royal Mail. And ‘The Scribe’ might be bored with you by now... With no post to read, no pornographic epistles to be outraged by, and feeling too uneasy to settle to anything constructive, Flora decided to go out and get some groceries. She’d passed a small shop in the village, of the ‘corner emporium’ variety, but she didn’t think it would really do for staple items. A trip to the nearby market town seemed in order, and after locking the cottage—thinking wryly of her wild flight into the storm last night as she did so—she walked a little way down the lane to the prefabricated garage that housed her now rarely-used car. Her expedition was successful, if a little surreal somehow. It seemed strange to be doing something so ordinary. Choosing toilet rolls and teabags when less than twenty four hours ago, she’d been tied to a famous author’s bed being tormented out of her mind with sexual pleasure. Pondering the merits of various over-priced cat foods for Arnold, when last night, both she, and the cat, had slept with a handsome American artist who was as generous and giving in the way he made love as he was in sheltering storm-lashed lunatics. She looked at the shoppers in the supermarket around her—young mothers with their toddlers, blue-rinsed ‘county’ ladies in cashmere sweaters and knife-pleated skirts—and wondered if any of them would believe how much sex she’d had, with different people, and in different locations, since she’d arrived in the fair Marwick Magna. But they all might be at it, she thought with a grin as she drove back home through the leafy, sun-dappled lanes. Marwick might not be unique. What if every seemingly innocent English village is like this? What if they’re all making love beneath their scrubbed oak kitchen tables, instead making raspberry jam and marrow chutney with their Agas? It was a thought that amused her as much as it aroused her, and she was still grinning as she unlocked her front door, and—pausing to pick up her bags of groceries—pushed it open with her hip and backed inside. The first thing she noticed was that ‘The Scribe’ had been by and delivered... Lying on the mat—she’d actually trodden on it—was the usual envelope with another one beneath it. The second was almost a package really: thinnish, A4, and fairly weighty. It felt like a couple of magazines, and knowing ‘The Scribe’, Flora could well imagine what sort. Forgetting her shopping, she tore open the first envelope.

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Now, now, Wild Flower, who’s been a very naughty girl? ‘The Scribe’ began. When I said that I realised how much words turned you on, I didn’t expect their creator to so richly reap the benefits! Flora blushed furiously, her hand shaking so hard it was difficult to read the letter, despite its crisp, clear print. Would you have allowed me to tie you and tease you? ‘The Scribe’ continued. To finger you and possess you while you were helpless? To drive you to distraction and beyond with wicked pleasure. Good God, whoever it is, they know everything! thought Flora, her mouth dry with apprehension, yet at the same time feeling terribly excited. She clenched her fingers to hold the paper steady. I feel a little betrayed, Wild Flower. I feel as if I need to punish you... Yes, I would so like that. Really. I can see you now, across my lap, your beautiful bottom perfectly naked as I spank you. I can almost feel you moving against me. Wriggling because you’re aroused. And wet. Very wet... Your pussy’s running like a river because I’m spanking you... Spanking your perfect peachy little bottom. It’s so tight. So firm. So vulnerable. Oh Flora, just think how nice it would be for me to make it pink. Not so nice for you, my sweet, because I’d hurt you. It wouldn’t be a punishment if I didn’t... But ohso nice for me... I can just see your firm, beautiful buttocks. I’d stroke them first, prepare them with kindness, and perhaps even explore that juicy little slit of yours? Then I’d spank you. Not brutally, but quite hard. I’d make your bottom hot and pink all over. Like cherries. Like roses. Coral pink. Fiery and sizzling. You’d cry, of course. Every real woman does. But between your legs you’d be like an inferno. Hot as Hades and as wet as an ocean. And after I’d spanked you—thoroughly and very severely—I’d turn you over, and make you sit on your pain. And when you were crying again, I’d start rubbing your aching little clit for you, and pretty soon you’d have a different cause to sob. So, what do you think of that, Wild Flower? Could you bear it to give me the satisfaction? Read my gifts if you want to learn more... It was unsigned, but carried the usual identification—‘THE SCRIBE’ typed neatly at the foot of the letter. It’s Marshall, thought Flora, running her eyes down the page for a second time. He’s into all that weird stuff, his ‘Madeleine’ novels are full of it, and he’s the only one who knows what happened yesterday. She thought back to her time with the famous author, trying to imagine him spanking her, and found it difficult. It was bondage and teasing that seemed to do it for him. There

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had been plenty of opportunities, in the bedroom at the Old Rectory, for him to smack her bottom, but not once had he even attempted it. Marshall was by far the likeliest candidate for ‘The Scribe’ that Flora had yet encountered, but somehow, she didn’t see him as a spanker. But somebody certainly was one. Following instructions, and morbidly curious about what was in it, she ripped away the cream paper from the packet. Inside she found exactly what she’d expected: a couple of sex magazines. Specialist publications, celebrating the perversion of erotic corporal punishment, both in pictures and in the written word. The first was called Tourments D’Amour, and the second, slightly thicker one, Discipline Times. They were both quality printed on high gloss paper. Instantly engrossed, Flora sat down on the settle and started reading. Tourments D’Amour was full of line drawings. Very good ones, she had to admit, in a style not dissimilar to the one she’d begun to develop. But whereas her sketches had been of couples, and single men and women, mainly naked and in subtly sexual poses, all the ones in Tourments were girls being spanked. Or about to be spanked, with expressions of fear on their faces. Or having just been spanked, and clutching their punished backsides. There was some humour in the drawings, but Flora could see it was intentional, and mischievously wry. The eyes of the heroines were all rounded with alarm, and their lips were bee-stung cupid’s bows. Their bottoms were all plump and curvaceous. I wonder if mine would look like that? she thought, looking at a well drawn picture of a girl not unlike herself, being spanked by a stern authoritative man with black hair and fierce dark eyes. There was real action in the drawing, a vivid sense of movement, and just looking at it made her own legs feel wriggly, and her bottom not exactly tingle, but feel extra aware. What’s it like, I wonder? she mused. As she understood it from books and magazines, spanking and other corporal activities went on the length and breadth of the country, with thousands of people happily indulging in a penchant for pain—either giving it or taking it. In a place like Marwick, so rife with erotic activity, there was bound to be spanking a cadre somewhere. She reassessed her thoughts about Marshall. Maybe he was into it, but being basically a kind-hearted man, he’d refrained from rushing her. What about Morwenna? Almost certainly game for, and curious about, anything—and the elegant, but mischievous-looking

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Robert had the ideal disciplinarian’s demeanour. Jack Walters might play smacking games too, but Flora doubted if he had a taste for anything heavy. And as for Declan? Who could tell? Flora had a feeling there was much beneath his surface. She had to admit she liked the idea of being spanked by Declan. Surrendering to his strength, both physical and mental. Lying bare-bottomed across his strong thighs. But what would it feel like? She’d always been a baby about any kind of suffering. Scraped knees as a kid, tension headaches as an adult—she didn’t think her pain threshold would be high. How on earth would she cope with a fierce slapping delivered by a substantial male hand? She shuddered, knowing that somewhere deep inside it would thrill her, even though she’d probably end up crying like a baby. Strange. Very strange. Tempted to turn the page, and read on, Flora resisted, remembering the frozen food defrosting amongst her shopping. But while she unpacked she still thought about punishment. Who else in the village could be into it? Lucy, at ‘Treasure Trove’? Well, she certainly looked the part. A veritable ‘governess’, in her prim, sober clothing. What if she was spanking her friend Jack on a regular basis? Judging by what Flora had already absorbed from Marshall’s books and from the magazines, the balance of power could swing either way. Then again, there was also the mysterious Lord Rawnsley, whom Lucy had implied had strange proclivities. He was a prime candidate — for either a disciplinarian or a recipient — and he’d probably been flogged at public school. Thinking of the local landowner, Flora suddenly had an awful, awful thought. Hadn’t she been invited to tea? And hadn’t the invitation specified RSVP? Slamming the fridge door, she raced back into the hall, and grabbed the white card from where she’d tucked into the corner of the mirror. Sir Crispin and Lady Amelia Rawnsley request the presence of Miss Flora Swain... Happily, she hadn’t missed the appointment altogether—it was this afternoon—but not replying would create a bad impression. Feeling strangely fluttery, she picked up the phone. “Hello, Rawnsley Hall,” answered a young, and rather giggly sounding female voice.

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“Yes, hello,” replied Flora, not quite sure what to say, “My name’s Flora Swain, and... um... his Lordship and her Ladyship have asked me to tea...I... I should—” “Oh, that’s all right, Miss Swain,” said the cheery voice, “You’ll be wanting the Mistress. I’ll put you through. Hang on a mo.” The line went dead, and Flora was left wondering who it was she’d spoken to. Clearly the Rawnsleys had a staff, but the person who’d answered certainly wasn’t some dignified, stuffy old housekeeper. She’d sounded far more like some dizzy teenage maid than anything, and Flora had a sudden vision of a short black dress and a mass of fluffy petticoats, worn with a mini-apron and black fishnet stockings. Don’t be absurd, she told herself, listening to various clicks and putters on the line. They only wear those uniforms in stories. Suddenly a new voice came on the line, “Hello, my dear. Flora, isn’t it?” said a different woman, in tones that were plummy yet somehow quite pleasant. “I’m Amelia Rawnsley. I’m so glad you called. Will you be able to join us this afternoon? Crispin is so looking forward to meeting you.” “Er... Yes, I’d love to,” replied Flora, a little non-plussed by the effusiveness of the greeting. “It’s four thirty, isn’t it?” “Oh, just turn up whenever you want to, my dear,” said Lady Amelia, her voice blithe, “We don’t stand on ceremony here—” She paused, and Flora had the distinct impression that her prospective hostess was grinning to herself about some private joke, “—well at least not at a first meeting...” she added, putting a rather peculiar emphasis on the word ‘first’. “Do you know how to find us? I can send a car for you, if you like?” “Oh no, I’ll be fine,” Flora answered quickly, “I passed the gates to the Hall the other day, when I arrived. I can easily walk... It’s not far.” “As you wish, my dear,” said Lady Amelia in response, “It’s certainly a lovely day for a stroll. We’ll see you this afternoon then, Flora. Cheerio!” “Cheerio,” echoed Flora, into the suddenly dead receiving, wondering how such an amiable-sounding woman made her feel tense and uneasy.

At four twenty five that afternoon, Flora still felt uneasy. “Oh well, here goes,” she murmured to herself, taking the big cast iron door knocker in

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her hand and giving it a good, solid rap. Rawnsley Hall was a large and rather elegant Queen Anne mansion; there wasn’t forced to be anyone near the front door to hear her. Surprisingly, the answer to her knock came quickly, in the form of a pretty and very blonde young woman, wearing a peculiar and rather old-fashioned maid’s uniform. Flora knew, even before she spoke, that this attractive, if rather weird apparition was same girl she’d first spoken to this morning. Even with a straight face the maid seemed to be laughing. “Miss Swain?” she enquired, her soft pink mouth curving into a grin. “Come on in. The Mistress is waiting for you... This way.” The bubbly blonde girl held the door open wide and ushered Flora into a cool, highceilinged hall, with a mosaic floor, and pale walls hung with pictures. She would have liked to linger and take a look at them, because they looked very old and rather interesting, but her companion was walking briskly towards a double doorway at the end of the hall, her button strap shoes tapping rhythmically as she went. “She’s on the terrace, Miss,” said the maid pleasantly, as they passed through what seemed to be an equally fascinating reception room of some kind, which opened out on to a broad terrace beyond. “It’s lovely out there.” As they stepped out into the sunlight, a woman rose from where she’d been sitting in a wicker garden chair. She was about forty, but slim and lithe, with pale blonde hair worn up in an exquisite French pleat. Her make-up was perfect and her clothes—a soft cream silk blouse with a stand-up collar and a slim linen skirt a shade or two darker—were immaculately and understatedly expensive. Around her neck hung a single strand of what could only be matched real pearls. “My dear Miss Swain,” said the woman, crossing the terrace to meet Flora, “So nice that you could come. I’m Amelia Rawnsley. Welcome to Rawnsley Hall.” When they were face to face, Lady Rawnsley gave Flora the time honoured ‘air kiss’ a few millimetres from each cheek, then led her towards the garden chairs, and a table set with tea things. “Do sit down, Miss Swain,” said Lady Rawnsley, her manner gracious, but refreshingly unpatronising. “Or may I call you “Flora”? It’s such a pretty name... Do you take milk and sugar?” Expecting to either have to serve herself, or to have her tea poured by her hostess, Flora

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was surprised when the maid remained to dispense tea and hand round the various delicious edibles. Lady Rawnsley plied the usual social questions—what were Flora’s impressions of the village, the people, her cottage, et cetera ?—and seemed the epitome of a relaxed and relaxing hostess. But all the time though, Flora noticed that the woman was watchful. She was observing the actions of her maid very closely as she chatted, her eyes sharp as if looking out for faults. Her smile was charming, and very natural, but held a hint of suppressed expectation. For her own part, Flora felt a little gauche in the presence of this elegant and well-bred older woman. Although Lady Rawnsley’s conservative outfit wasn’t Flora’s style by any means, her beautiful grooming and her obvious good taste were somewhat intimidating. Flora was wearing an item from her wardrobe that she adjudged to be her closest approximation of a ‘tea gown’—a floaty cotton wrap-around dress in a tiny floral print—but beside her ladyship she felt as scruffy as a new age traveller. And yet paradoxically, she found Amelia Rawnsley sexy. There was something about the older woman’s sense of control, her refinement—her discipline, no less—that suggested wildness and savage passions caged beneath. Flora blushed when suddenly Lady Rawnsley looked intently at her, as if aware that she herself was being scrutinised. The older woman smiled slightly, and quirked her finely plucked brows, continuing to stare at Flora as if she were making some kind of assessment. Unnerved, Flora turned away, “These gardens are so lovely,” she murmured; at first as something to say to diffuse the moment, and then, as she really opened her eyes and looked. The terrace they were sitting on was surrounded by a low stone parapet, beyond which lay a scrupulously geometric formal garden, alive with colour and rich with heady scents. Where this ended, the parkland of Rawnsley Hall began; a rolling green sward that was terminated by a beechwood, and the slowly meandering River Mar. “Yes, aren’t they?” Lady Rawnsley responded, “They were laid out at the order of Crispin’s great grandfather... By “Capability” Brown, no less.” Flora didn’t know much about gardening, and was about to say so when there was the sudden tinkling crash of breaking crockery. Turning from delightful summery vista of green and carefully nurtured flowers, Flora looked around to see that the maid had knocked a tea

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plate flying and it had shattered on the hard stone flags. “Oh Jenny, what have you done?” said Lady Rawnsley, her eyes strangely glittering. “That was part of my Queen Anne set, my dear. And irreplaceable. What on earth are we going to tell his Lordship now?” Wherever he is? thought Flora, realising suddenly that Lord Rawnsley’s name had been on the invitation, but he had not, as yet, joined them. “I don’t know, Milady,” answered the maid sounding penitent, but strangely excited. Surprised by the sound of her voice, Flora studied the young woman a little closer. Jenny’s eyes were sparkling too, as intensely as her Mistress’s, and she seemed to be shaking as she retrieved the shards of china. “Leave those. Come here,” Amelia Rawnsley’s cultured voice was soft, yet full of authority. Jenny abandoned the crockery pieces instantly, just was she’d been told, and walked hesitantly towards her employer. Flora realised then that Jenny was not the only one who was shaking. She looked down at the teacup and saucer she was holding, and saw that her tea had slopped over the rim of the cup, she was trembling so hard. There was a genuinely peculiar atmosphere developing on the terrace; one that seemed to encompass not only Lady Rawnsley and her clumsy maid, but also Flora too. She could almost hear the air around her hum with it. “That was a very precious plate you’ve broken, young lady,” said Amelia Rawnsley as Jenny stood before her, “And it had sentimental value... You do realise we’ll have to do something about that, don’t you?” “Yes, Ma’am. I’m sorry, Ma’am,” the maid answered, hanging her head, a picture of remorse. But was it remorse? Flora looked more closely, and thought she saw the ghost of a smile on Jenny’s face. The maid’s look of guilt and dismay seemed stylised somehow, as if it were simply something expected of her, and not a genuine expression of emotion. She’s putting it on, thought Flora, as light began to dawn, and she turned her attention to Amelia Rawnsley. And so is she, Flora added, mentally. This is all for my benefit. It’s just an act. Revelations came thick and fast in the afternoon’s mellow summer glow. Lady Rawnsley is ‘The Scribe’, Flora reasoned, and this is what she was talking about in

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the latest letter. Discipline. And now she’s going to show me how it’s meant to be administered. While Jenny shows me how it’s received. “And what is it you think we should do?” continued Lady Rawnsley, steepling her fingers in her linen clad lap, and looking for all the world like a stern but rather beautiful schoolma’am. “You could dock my salary,” suggested Jenny, flashing a sly sideways glance at Flora, a look full of mischievous agitation. “Don’t be absurd,” replied Lady Rawnsley with a sigh. “We pay you well, young woman, but not that well! It’d would take years to recoup what you’ve destroyed.” Flora thought this sounded exaggerated. The dish had certainly been valuable, but it couldn’t have been all that costly, or it wouldn’t have been in everyday use. Lady Rawnsley’s words were just part of the play. “So, Jenny, have you any other suggestions?” she continued, giving Flora the distinct impression that suggestions from her guest, too, might be welcome. “You could punish me,” whispered Jenny in the smallest of small voices, as she twisted a fold of her black skirt between her fingers. Amelia Rawnsley studied her servant, her face perfectly cool and calm while an indefinable fire lit her eyes. “A reasonable suggestion,” she said evenly, then turned to Flora, “What do you think, Flora my dear? Do you think a punishment is fair? I hope you don’t find such things distasteful...” Flora sensed that the moment was pivotal. She was being invited to participate in yet another of Marwick’s sensual rituals; but she also being allowed to fix her limits. To say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ at a new erotic border. “I...I don’t know,” she replied, her heart beating wildly. She wanted to go forward, but the doubts of a lifetime still hampered her. Lady Rawnsley looked at her steadily, evenly, bestowing the responsibility for the maid’s fate on Flora. “It was a very beautiful plate,” said Flora uncertainly. She studied the plate that she’d been using herself—it was on the table, bearing a half eaten scone—and suddenly had a crazy urge to smash it. “It’s such a shame it got broken...” “Well, that settles it,” said Lady Rawnsley briskly, taking Flora’s ambiguous answer as

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‘go ahead’. “Come on, Jenny, let’s have you in position.” The maid shrank back, “No cringing now. You have to be brave.” Flora almost felt as if she were at the theatre. Biting her lips, Jenny took a step closer to her mistress, then hesitated, still twisting at her skirt. Lady Amelia sat up straight in her chair, edged a little further forward and set her thighs apart, as wide as her slim skirt would allow, then nodded towards her lap. Flora saw Jenny swallow, then attempt to step back again, only to be foiled when Lady Amelia grabbed her wrist. “Now then, Jenny, don’t be tiresome,” she said in a mild tone, then pulled the maid forward until she lay across her knee. As nervous as if she herself had been the one across that linen-covered knee, Flora reached for her teacup and took a sip. The tea in it had gone cool during the course of the preceding small drama, but she drank it anyway. Her mouth and her throat had gone dry. “I think I shall spank you for five minutes, to start with,” said Lady Amelia conversationally as she took the hem of Jenny’s skirt and hauled it up, along with what seemed to be a vast profusion of starched and lacy petticoats. To Flora such a lot of underskirts seemed rather extravagant, but she was fast becoming aware that life here at Rawnsley Hall was even stranger than that in the rest of the village. She was in the middle of a pre-ordained ritual, an erotic game that had little if anything to do with broken tea plates, and the domestic maintenance of a large and lordly household. It seemed appropriate that one of the star players should be wearing a special costume. Beneath the flounce of her petticoats, Jenny wore a pair of equally elaborate panties. They were more like bloomers than normal underwear, and trimmed with rows of lace and fine, threaded ribbons; and what Flora had taken to be thick, dark, serviceable tights were actually stockings held up with crimson garters. Working briskly, Lady Amelia took Jenny’s pants down and left them tangled around her knees. The maid’s plump bottom gleamed white and helpless in the sunlight, and juddered slightly as she wriggled around in fright. “There, there,” murmured Lady Amelia, patting it, “Be a good girl and don’t struggle. It will only be worse if you make a fuss.” The pats turned to lingering touches, as her Ladyship explored her maid’s buttocks, circling her narrow fingers and palpating the soft flesh. Despite her mistress’s recent

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instructions, Jenny squirmed even harder as the examination continued, her movements more sensual than fearful. The sights and scents of this writhing had a profound effect on Flora. They made her long to touch herself. She could smell the maid’s sex-musk from several feet away, and it excited her. There was a faint glint of juiciness in the girl’s exposed slit, and Flora knew that she too was now wet. Lady Amelia was clearly well aware of Jenny’s moistness, and as Flora watched in fascination, her hostess’s long, pale hand slipped imperturbably into the maid’s naked vulva. Jenny kicked in response, and struggled harder, but her mistress merely tut-tutted and continued with her probings, wedging her fingers and invading the girl’s channel. “I’ve warned you, Jenny,” said the older woman softly, almost as if she were oblivious to her hand’s intimate location. “I’ve asked you not to struggle, but still you defy me. If you don’t keep still I’ll have to double your punishment.” Lady Amelia pumped her servant gently, and Flora watch the poor girl strain and strain not to move. Jenny’s hands were bunched into fists and her toes were pointing. Her pretty face was twisted with tension. It was obvious that the casual masturbation was plaguing her, creating a pleasure she was hard pressed to contain. Despite all her efforts, her hips were slowly churning. “Very well then,” said Lady Rawnsley, “So be it, Jenny, don’t say I didn’t warn you.” Businesslike now, she withdrew her fingers from her servant’s crotch, and wiped them fastidiously on the pale expanse of flesh that lay before her. Flora held her breath as her own sex quivered in sympathy; she felt as aroused as Jenny obviously was, and irrationally, she longed to take her place. The first spank arrived on Jenny’s bottom with a sound like a crisp, sharp snap. It was followed by a second of pure silence, then the maid let out a high, plaintive yelp. Amelia Rawnsley was unmoved by Jenny’s cry, and continued her spanking with energy. Her hand cracked down rhythmically across the tender white rounds, creating rosy pinkness at the site of each impact. Jenny, clearly not a stoic, went on wailing as her bottom was briskly tanned, and Flora found herself gripping the arms of her chair, experiencing each smack as if were landing on her body. As the punishment went on she felt a profound awareness of her own buttocks, a super-sensitivity within her thin cotton panties. The skin of

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her bottom seemed to prickle and crawl as if it were exposed just as Jenny’s was. As if it were on show, and receiving spank after spank... Suddenly, the older woman paused in her task and looked straight across at Flora, her eyes very bright and full of knowledge. It was as if she were challenging her guest... Saying “Could you take this? Would you cry? Would you struggle?” Flora knew she would struggle, but from sexual excitement just as much as from the pain. She had a desperate desire to wriggle in her seat. She wanted to reach down and stroke herself between her legs, rub herself to climax while Jenny thrashed and moaned. The punishment continued, and Jenny’s bottom grew fierier and fierier as her cries increased in volume and pathos. Flora could no longer think straight either. She was in just as much of a state as the maid was. Needing to something to do with her hands, she’d picked up her plate, but when she looked down at it, she realised she’d reduced her scone to a heap of mangled crumbs. Her cup of tea had gone cold in her cup. She could feel her panties had become soggy where they pressed against her vulva, and her clitoris was a tiny flaming stud. Surreptitiously, she squeezed her thighs together. “She doesn’t set a good example, does she?” said a voice from somewhere behind Flora. Shock made Flora jerk, and knock against the table beside her, sending yet more priceless crockery flying. Her cup crashed to the flags, with her plate spinning after it, and to her dismay they both shattered irreparably. Her heart pounding, she crouched down to pick up as many of the pieces as she could. “Allow me,” said the same smooth voice that had spooked her, and as she turned, a man bent down beside her and began retrieving the tiny shards of fine china. Flora hardly dare look at him, but when the task was completed, and the pair of them straightened up and placed the remains of the cup and plate on the table, she saw a figure both handsome and imposing, dressed in breeches, tall boots, and a white shirt. “Crispin Rawnsley,” the newcomer said, holding out his hand in greeting, “You must be the Flora we’ve been hearing so much about.” Subliminally, Flora wondered who’d been talking about her, but her main attention was riveted on Lord Rawnsley. “Y...yes, I am,” she stammered, “I’m Flora Swain.” She held out her hand too, and allowed him to take it, feeling transfixed by both his presence and his looks.

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Crispin Rawnsley was clearly a good ten years older than his wife, but he wore his fifties magnificently well. His face was intrinsically patrician with sculpted bone structure and the lightest of light blue eyes that glittered, beneath heavy lids, like living ice. His build was athletic, he was at least six feet tall, and his hair, which was rather long, very thick and combed back from his brow, was a shade of grey so light-coloured it was almost silver. “A good ride, my dear?” enquired Lady Rawnsley, pausing for a moment in her labours, her hand resting caressingly on Jenny’s encarmined bottom, while the maid continued to wiggle and sob. “First rate, my love” said her husband, shoving his hands in his pocket as he surveyed the scene before him. “Are you having a spot of bother here?” “Well, yes, you could say that,” replied Lady Rawnsley airly, her smile twinkling as she caught Flora’s eye, “I was just punishing Jenny for breaking one of my Queen Anne plates, and now Flora has broken a cup, and a plate...” She paused contemplatively, her fingertip strumming the maid’s anus and making her groan and scissor her stockinged thighs. “Flora is a guest, I know, but it does seem unfair...” She let the pronouncement hang, and looked down towards the hot, rounded globes of Jenny’s bottom. “I see your point,” murmured her husband, “Most unfortunate.” He seemed to ponder a moment, “But you do seem to have your hands quite full, Amelia...” He withdrew his own hands from his pockets and made a slight, courtly gesture towards Flora. “Come, Miss Swain. As my wife is rather busy at the moment, I’ll show you around a little.” He turned towards her, and gave her the full force of his icy blue gaze, “And we can perhaps deal with other matter presently?” He stepped back and indicated she precede him into the house. “Sometimes these things are better done in private, Flora,” he whispered, as he fell into step just behind her, and let his hand settle lightly on her bottom. “Especially when it’s most likely the first time.” His fingers hovered, squeezed, then retreated. Oh dear God, thought Flora, suddenly realising that his Lordship was talking about her and not Jenny. He’s going to spank me... Dear God, he’s going to spank me...

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Chapter Fourteen His Lordship Disposes

Rawnsley Hall was beautiful, but Flora hardly saw any of it now. A new inner landscape obsessed her. She was quite sure she’d understood her host correctly. Just as his wife was—still— chastising the maid for breaking a precious china plate, so would his Lordship chastise their guest for the destruction of two equally treasured items. It was archaic, bizarre, and in the real world, entirely unthinkable, but this was Marwick, where a different code prevailed. “And this is my great grandfather, the fourth Earl,” said Sir Crispin genially, directing Flora’s eye to yet another handsome painting. They were in an oak-panelled long gallery, lined with a whole genealogy of fine family portraits, and a selection of choice antiques from many eras. His Lordship had paused before a particularly well executed depiction of an earlier Rawnsley, who with the characteristic prematurely white hair and cool, almost ascetic features bore a startling resemblance to his present day descendant. It seemed that the fourth Earl had also been a keen horseman too, as he was dressed in hunting scarlet and carried a long and rather fiendish looking whip. “You’ll see he shared the family predilection,” observed his Lordship, turning to her, his pale eyes like chips of fractured ice. “For horse riding?” ventured Flora, with a dread feeling she’d given the wrong answer. Lord Rawnsley laughed softly. “Well, we Rawnsleys have always been happy in the saddle...but that wasn’t precisely what I was referring to, my dear.” His smile was charming but also infinitely menacing, and Flora blushed, knowing exactly what he meant. “This’s ridiculous!” she muttered, turning her back on the picture and walking away down the gallery. She was allowing herself to be caught in a web here, letting her mind accept the impossible as possible, but now the old Flora—the sensible, ordinary Flora—was rebelling. Lord Rawnsley caught her up with a couple of long strides, and took her by the arm, not roughly, but not gently.

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“What is it that you find so ridiculous, Flora?” he enquired, making her face him. His eyes were intent, his expression steady, unwavering. “I... It’s...” Flora did not know what to say, how to articulate what she was feeling. To speak aloud of spanking as a sexual game, an erotic pleasure, was to acknowledge it and admit she was aware of it. And interested. Yet to a part of her it was too foreign and too strange. But is it? she thought, inwardly debating as his Lordship’s eyes pinned her, like blue darts fixing her feet to the carpet. Was it really so different to the games she’d enjoyed yesterday with Marshall? The playful writer could have chastised her whenever he’d wanted. She’d been helpless, he could have spanked her, if not worse... Her host seemed to sense her inner reasoning. “Oh Flora,” he said softly, moving her towards him, “Ammie does so love that tea service... It seems so unjust that breaking a part of it should go unpunished.” “Well, if it’s so bloody precious why does she use it for everydays?” The ‘mundane’ Flora made one final stand. Sir Crispin shook his head slowly, then fixed her with a smile of mock despair. “My dear, my dear, my dear,” he sighed, “I thought you realised...” He pulled her a little closer, and for one mad second Flora thought he was going to kiss her, “She uses it because there are other things that she loves even more.” As if to perfectly point up the moment, a piercing cry drifted in through the open casement window, and Flora realised the terrace was just below them. Was Lady Rawnsley still belabouring Jenny’s plump, girlish bottom? Or had they passed on to some other activity? Jenny’s yells spoke more of ecstasy than pain. “She may be getting a reward now,” observed Sir Crispin mildly, as if he’d read Flora’s mind. “For being a good girl and taking more punishment than she deserves.” His free hand dropped gently onto her hip bone, then slid around, his fingers spreading across her buttock. “It’s barbaric,” said Flora, without conviction, as he gripped her bottom cheek assessingly. “On the contrary, my dear Flora,” he said, his face close to hers now, the soft words almost a purr in her ear, “A little corporal punishment is a most civilised way of dealing with these matters. It’s honest. Sharp and swift. It leaves no lingering resentments or

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grudges...and in Jenny’s case, it avoids dismissal.” “But what about my case?” demanded Flora. She was shaking violently now. Sir Crispin was palpating her bottom through the cloth of her skirt, and the scent of him— expensive cologne, male sweat and horseflesh—was filtering thickly into her brain like a truth drug. “We’re going to deal with your case right now, my dear young lady,” he murmured laconically, his fingertips almost touching her vulva, “Would you prefer to be spanked here, or downstairs, in my study?” Flora gasped, and swayed against him, the word ‘spanked’ producing a frisson of pure excitement. Her sex was engorged, her labial folds damp and swelling. She felt a wild urge to pull down her knickers. But she didn’t have to pull them down. This man she’d met barely half an hour ago was going to pull them down for her, then swing her across his knee and spank her bottom. He was going the make her naked buttocks burn, and her legs kick and wave. He was going to hurt her; yet when he did, she’d have an orgasm. She’d never been more aroused, or more confused. “Here!” she gasped, almost choking on her own lust and fear. “Please, here!” “How impatient you are,” he whispered, gripping her bottom cheek hard, and twisting slightly, as if assaying the resilience of her flesh, “A moment ago you were resisting... Calling us barbaric... You’re a fickle little thing, Flora Swain, aren’t you?” Flora sobbed, wanting it to begin, but still afraid of what would happen when it started. Sir Crispin let her go, then looked around. There was a chaise longue covered in gold brocade a few feet away, and he strode over to it and sat down, his long legs parted. He fixed his cool blue eyes on Flora, then pointed to a spot a little way in front of him. Without demur, Flora moved forward and stood on it. “Now, Flora,” he said quietly, looking up into her already tearful eyes, “You’ve seen how my wife does things... But I prefer a little more formality. A sense of ritual, one might say. I think it adds a certain spice to the proceedings.” Touching her thigh briefly, he smiled a narrow smile, “What do you think, my dear?” Flora nodded. She was so keyed up, she could barely think or speak. “Is that a “yes”?” he persisted.

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“Yes,” whispered Flora, almost fainting. “Now then, you must repeat certain phrases after me,” he went on, letting his hand drop loosely onto his own thigh, his fingers tapping, “Say “Crispin, please will you punish me”.” “Crispin, please...please will you punish me...” With the few remaining fragments of her faculties she noted he’d called himself simply ‘Crispin’. They were no longer a middle-aged aristocrat and his impressionable young guest; they were a man and woman engaged in a sexual challenge. “And now... “Please, Crispin, will you take down my panties and bare my bottom”.” She wanted to say, “I can’t, I can’t, it’s stupid!” but his glacial blue eyes controlled her tongue... “Please, Crispin, will you take down my panties and bare my bottom,” she murmured, so softly she wasn’t sure he could hear her. ““Please, Crispin, will you smack my bottom until it’s as pink as a summer rose and it hurts so much I can’t stop crying”.” “No!” she keened, tears in her eyes already as her body seemed to burn with fiery shame. She was at breaking point and he hadn’t even touched her. “You must,” he said softly, almost kindly. “Please, Crispin, will y...will you smack my bottom until it’s...it’s as pink as a summer rose and it hurts so much I can’t stop crying...” “With the greatest of pleasure,” he said archly, reaching up to briefly touch her blushing cheek. “Why don’t you show me your panties first, my dear. I’m sure they’re extraordinarily pretty...” “What do I do?” she whispered, shuddering violently, aware that the crotch of her knickers was soaking and this cool, distinguished man had barely touched her. “Just lift your skirt to your waist, hold it there, and let me look at you.” Flora obeyed him, feeling clumsy as she bunched her flowing skirt. The panties she was wearing where white cotton, with a little lace insert; very flimsy, very feminine...and very musky. “Delightful,” said Crispin, sounding pleased. He reached forward, pressed one finger against the gusset, just where they were wettest, and Flora moaned as her intimate flesh

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quivered. “Now turn around,” he continued, drawing back the exploring hand. Flora complied, intensely aware of the swell of her buttocks in the tiny, inadequate cotton garment. She moaned again when Crispin eased her knickers down a little way, letting the elastic rest in the crease between her bottom and her thighs. Just leaving them there for what seemed like an eternity, she felt him scrutinise the naked globes of her rump. “Exquisite,” he said, his voice slightly breathy, then she felt his fingertip touch the inner slope of one buttock, “Keep very still now, my dear,” he instructed, then explored her anal crease with same single digit, lingering long at the rosy hole itself. Flora felt her knees on the very edge of buckling, as for a moment, he pushed against her anus, then withdrew the finger, and used both hands to stretch her cheeks apart and make the tiny portal gape. “Very pretty... Very pretty indeed,” he murmured, his breath like a hot breeze against her flesh. She almost thought he was going to lean forward and actually kiss her bottom, then he let her go again, and told her to turn around. Again, he made her wait for several interminable moments, and Flora wondered if it were a different kind of strategy. Was he allowing her now to scrutinise him? To see him for the attractive man he was, so she might know the one who punished her was desirable. Swaying a little, her palms damp with perspiration where she held on to her skirt, she tried to be bold and to study her ‘master’. Crispin Rawnsley looked better to her with every minute that passed, his face seeming suddenly younger than the original impression she’d formed. His blue eyes were mesmerising, and his mouth firm and strong, and his skin had a slight outdoorsman’s tan. His body was wiry and powerful in his pale elegant riding clothes, and his tall boots only added to his authority. Glancing at his crotch, Flora noticed a large bulge. “And now we begin,” he said solemnly, just as Flora’s gaze skittered away from his erection, then snapped back to it, her mouth watering at its size. “Come here, Flora,” he instructed, adjusting the set of his knees, then gripping her free hand and pulling her towards him, “That’s it, my dear. Over my knee. That’s a good girl...” He was talking to her as if she were a nervous, recalcitrant child, or a skittish filly, but Flora was too far gone to care. She felt a little precarious, draped across Crispin’s lap, but after a second he adjusted her position slightly, disposing her limbs and her weight with great care, until she was perfectly balanced across his spread thighs. When he had her

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arranged to his liking, he folded her skirt neatly over her back, then turned his attention to her partly rolled-down panties. “Let’s have these out of the way, shall we?” he murmured conversationally, tugging them down until they were bundled at her knees like a makeshift hobble, “There, that’s better... A free, untrammelled target area... Just the way I like it... How about you?” “I don’t know,” breathed Flora, the whole of her consciousness seeming to settle in the bare lobes of her buttocks. The acute sense of exposure made her squirm. “Of course, this’s your first time, isn’t it?” he said, bending over her, almost tenderly. “Yes...” “Oh Flora, dear Flora, what a gift you give me,” he murmured, his lips brushing the back of her neck. “A virgin bottom is a rare and precious treasure... Your first taste of pain is a sacrament. Something wonderful that no other man may savour...” She felt him straighten up, and then touch her naked bottom, as if marking it as a target for the first smack. When the first blow did fall, Flora yelped and kicked out helplessly. The impact itself seemed a strangely blank experience, then a second later she felt a clap of fierce sensation. “Oh God!” she cried out on the second blow, not believing it already hurt so much. Another blow fell, and another; each one in a slightly different place but just as effective. Flora didn’t know whether it was the surprise of the pain, or the pain itself that was having the most effect on her, she only knew she was forced to rave and struggle. Crispin spoke to her softly as he hit her. Not much in the way of words as such, but more encouragements, coaxings and soothings. “There there...” he whispered as he used his left hand to open her bottom crease, so his right hand could spank her anal vent. “It’s all right, my sweet,” he cooed, tipping her further forward so he could slap her on the underhang, using his full hand in a lazy cracking rhythm, striking again and again until she was panting it hurt so much. After what seemed like the virtuoso portion of the spanking had finished, Crispin settled into a long, steady pounding, letting the strokes land repeatedly in the same two places. The very crowns of her left and right cheeks. The pattern of the strokes, and the even tempo, had a peculiar lulling effect, a soporific cadence that was as consoling as it was painful. Flora felt the intense heat in her bottom sinking through the abused bands of muscle

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and pooling like melted honey in her sex. She was acutely aroused there in a way she’d never been before, and as each slap jolted her, it seemed to fall right on her clitoris. Wriggling a little, she parted her legs without altering her position too much, and as the next stroke landed, it knocked the little bud against Crispin’s thigh. Flora wailed as a massive orgasm grabbed her, making her pussy clench, and her arms and legs wave. Both her bottom and her vulva were on fire now, and her shrill voice soared as she ground her crotch in frenzied circles. Crispin spanked on, working through her pleasure; and as it began to fade, he slipped his free hand around and underneath her, then nudged her clitoris until the bliss surged up again. Three times, he brought her back up to the pinnacle, but after the last one she was a whimpering, wrung out ruin. It took her several moments to realise that he’d stopped spanking her, and that she was just lying on him, face down, and quietly moaning. “There, isn’t that better?” Crispin said, withdrawing his hand from beneath her body and drawing it lightly and caressingly across her shoulders. “B...better than what?” gasped Flora, her breath still coming jerkily as she began to regain her senses. Her bottom was flaming, it seemed, and she could imagine it was visibly pulsating, but she still couldn’t think clearly enough to move. “Just better,” replied her chastisor, with a soft laugh. “Well, for you, at least...” Adjusting his knees, he caused her to move a little way across them, and so her belly was positioned directly over his cock. “Serves you right!” she said defiantly, then hissed as he touched her throbbing bottom. “Now, now, don’t be ungrateful, Flora,” he replied, his fingers strumming her pain, “You had an orgasm, didn’t you? That doesn’t happen to every woman, you know... Even her Ladyship has to be finished off afterwards with a dildo.” As he made this extraordinary statement, he thrust two fingers into Flora’s streaming vagina, and her interior membranes leapt in one last tender spasm. “Please, let me up,” she pleaded as he withdrew his hand, “I’ve had enough... I don’t think I can take any more... Please... I can’t...” Flora bit her lips as he helped her to her feet, and her skirt fluttered down and covered her redness. The agonising soreness in her bottom was very real, and she wasn’t sure she how she was going to sit down for the rest of the day, but within the pain, there was a

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different kind of glow. It seemed ridiculous to her, as her mind slipped back in to its normal, rational processes, but her overwhelming emotion was one of towering pride. She’d taken what must have been a fairly serious spanking from expert practitioner, and though she’d yelped and shouted, she not once bade him stop. Her simmering bottom felt like a badge of endurance to her, and she had a lunatic urge to march downstairs, raise her skirts and show both Lady Amelia and Jenny just how much she’d suffered at his Lordship’s clever hands. “You’ve done wonderfully well, you know,” said Crispin, once again showing his uncanny perceptive abilities. “Not many girls can take so much at the first session... Most are pleading for me to stop after less than a dozen smacks.” He reached up, cupped her face, and kissed her lips, very gently, just once, “I’m very proud, Flora, to be the one who got you started...” To Flora’s amazement, there was finally warmth in those chill blue eyes. Yet again, Flora felt that peculiar pride. And gratitude. Weird as it seemed when her bottom was hurting like the very devil itself, she wanted to thank her handsome companion for what he’d done to it. “It...it was a pleasure,” she said sincerely then started to laugh. “I’d say thank you... But my bottom feels as if it’s in flames.” “That’s exactly how it should feel,” said Crispin cheerfully. Taking her hand, he gave it a gentle, courtly kiss. “Now then, are you going to pull up your panties...or would you really like to thank me?” The warmth in his eyes was suddenly an electric light of lust. Flora’s mouth dropped open. What did he want? To fuck her? Or maybe oral sex perhaps? He might reserve intercourse for the wife she suspected he loved dearly. “Don’t worry,” he said, still smiling, “Nothing too strenuous with a sore bottom like yours... Just a little relief for an old man with an aching cock.” Flora wanted to say that the term ‘old man’ was total nonsense. With his twinkling eyes, and his roguish grin, Crispin Rawnsley looked particularly vital and ageless, but she felt embarrassed by a sudden pang of affection. Instead she said, “What is it you want me to do?” Crispin rose to his feet, and gestured to where he’d been sitting. “Hop up on the chaise for a moment, Flora, there’s a good girl.” Flora complied, and once again, let her host dispose her limbs. “That’s it, my dear,” he

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said, turning her so she was half crouching, half kneeling with her face was against the cushion, “Lift up that glorious backside of yours...” Again, she followed instructions, then felt cool air on her heated bottom as her skirt was raised. “Good Lord, that’s a beautiful sight,” she heard him mutter, and after that there was the rustling of a button fly being unfastened, and the linen within it being pushed aside. What on earth’s happening? thought Flora, in a sudden panic despite the assurances she’d just received. Nothing strenuous, he’d said, yet now she felt more vulnerable than she had done across his lap. Her bottom was up in the air, every part of her anal furrow and her genitalia was on show. He could take her, fuck her, bugger her even; she was presented to him like a female beast in heat. “Oh Flora, you’re so lovely,” he whispered, “I’ll try not to make this hurt... But you’re such a gorgeous girl I might not be able to help myself...” Flora felt a powerful urge to fling her skirt back down, jump up and get away from him, but as her muscles tensed to spring, he moved up closer. Laying a hand on the small of her back, he held her steady, then simply pressed his rigid penis against her bottom. The heat on heat of his flesh laid against hers made her wince a little, but once again, he whispered kindly soothing words. After a moment or two, Flora relaxed into the slight resurgence of pain, then began slowly rocking as she divined his true intention. Without knowing precisely how she knew it, she sensed that for his pleasure Crispin required no penetration. All he needed was to rub himself against the warmth that he’d created, to wank his stiffness against the punished crimson of her bottom. It took about sixty seconds. Gripping her by the hip, Crispin swirled his cock in the channel between her buttocks, then let out a harsh cry as his flesh began to jerk. Flora felt a warm, silky wetness pulse out over the inner curves of her bottom, then trickle slowly and sensuously down her thighs. “Thank you, sweet Flora, thank you,” he murmured, almost falling over her, and rubbing his face against her neck. It was only afterwards that she discovered she’d forgotten the pain.

She remembered again, however, on returning to the terrace and finding a cushion had been placed thoughtfully in her seat. The maid Jenny was nowhere to be seen now, but Lady

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Amelia looked serene and rather pleased with herself, and the top button of her silky blouse had come undone. “Where is that girl?” enquired Sir Crispin of his wife as he helped Flora into her seat. “I gave her the rest of the afternoon off,” murmured Lady Amelia, looking a little far away for a moment. But she glanced across sharply when Flora was forced to gasp. She knows, thought Flora, trying to grit her teeth and yet look quite unperturbed. Her bottom was still stinging furiously, and though her knickers were now tucked in the pocket of her dress, because she couldn’t bear them on her, the act of sitting down was uncomfortable to say the least. “Are you all right, my dear,” enquired Lady Amelia gently, her sleepy eyes suddenly glowing with amusement. “Yes, perfectly, thank you, Milady,” said Flora, struggling to sound normal when she couldn’t decide which cheek to rest her weight on. Sir Crispin had dealt too thoroughly with them both. “Do call me Amelia, my dear,” the other woman urged, her smiled widening, “I feel that you’re quite one of us now...” “Er...thank you. Amelia,” said Flora quietly, a little taken aback by such a tacit acknowledgement. It was obvious that Amelia Rawnsley didn’t mind her husband spanking their young female guests. Did that largesse extend to other activities too? Flora wondered. Giving them orgasms and masturbating his penis against their castigated bottoms? In this crazy village it was probably the done thing. “Don’t worry, Flora... It’s all right,” said Sir Crispin, who still stood beside her, leaning over and swiftly pecking her on the cheek. “My wife understands my little ways, my dear,” he whispered confidentially, “Because she has just as many “little ways” of her own...” “If you say so, sir,” replied Flora, starting to blush under the scrutiny of both of them. “’Crispin’,” he prompted, smiling broadly, his former iciness all melted away by sex. “Um... Yes, Okay, Crispin...” Flora puffed out her lips, not quite sure of what to say or to think, now it appeared she’d passed some kind of ‘entrance’ test. “And now,” he said briskly, rubbing his hands together, “I think a glass of champagne is in order. And as my wife has rather naughtily dismissed Jenny for the afternoon when it’s

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also the butler’s day off. Something for which I may take her to task later...” His eyes flashed half threateningly and half promisingly in Amelia’s direction, “It seems it falls to me to go and fetch it.” With a cheerful shrug, he walked away across the terrace. With no teacup or plate to fiddle with, Flora felt nervous left alone with Amelia. The older woman was studying her closely, her classic features formed into a knowing, complicit smile. “So? What do you think?” Flora was almost certain that Amelia meant the spanking, but she sensed her Ladyship shared her husband’s love of teasing. Flora was tempted to call her bluff, and say, yes, she thought having her bottom smacked was sensational, but at the last moment, her nerve failed and she chickened out. “It’s lovely... You have a very beautiful home. Amelia,” she added her hostess’s name as an afterthought. “Don’t flirt with me, you little ninny,” said Amelia, chuckling good-naturedly, “What I meant was what do you think of what Crispin did to you? Up on the long gallery, I expect... He often takes a girl up there for her first time.” Flora’s mouth went completely dry, and she longed for coming glass of bubbly. She’d known that Amelia must almost certainly be au fait with her husband’s recent activities, but to casually discuss them—here on an open terrace, in the gilded light of late afternoon—was a different matter entirely. I’m not like them, thought Flora, her heart beating fast as nerves plagued her. At least, not yet. I’m getting there, I’m getting to know Marwick’s wicked ways, but it’s still not all that long, really, since I was...since I was ordinary. Boring. A bit of a prude. “I’m sorry. You’re embarrassed, aren’t you?” said Amelia more gently, “Well, that’s nice. It means you’re fresh... Not blasé...” She rose from her seat and came over to kneel by Flora’s. “You’ll get used to us all here, Flora. We don’t mean any harm... It’s just that we all enjoy sex so very much. And we like to share it. With all our friends. And well...” She shrugged, and Flora smelt a waft of a sweet, rose-based scent, “We like to play little games with each other.” She took Flora’s hand and squeezed it. “I’m sure that Crispin and I aren’t the first who’ve made advances, are we?” “No, you’re not,” replied Flora, feeling a confession rise inside her towards her lips.

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“I thought not,” said Amelia, her eyes bright as she looked up at Flora. There was an exquisitely fine down on the smooth skin of her pale cheeks, a peachy bloom that made Flora want to kiss her. “So which of my friends have you...you enjoyed so far?” Considering the ever-lengthening list, Flora blushed again, and Amelia reached up and stroked her face. “Don’t be shy,” she whispered. “Well, it started with Declan McKenna, next door,” Flora began tentatively, “It wasn’t real sex at first, not... Not...um... Not intercourse, as such. Just sort of fondling. And I don’t really know how that came to happen. He asked me to rub some sun lotion on him, and things sort of escalated!” She sighed, then turned to Amelia and grinned, seeing the humour in what had happened. “It was a bit of a cliché, really... But it was nice.” “Declan’s a very beautiful man, Flora. No woman in her right mind wouldn’t want to touch him...” Amelia paused, then gave Flora a sly look from beneath her carefully mascaraed lashes, “But you have also fucked him now, I suspect?” “Yes, I’m afraid I have,” replied Flora. “I wouldn’t say Declan was a man to be afraid of...” said Amelia thoughtfully, “He’s a man to be enjoyed, yes, but there’s nothing to truly fear about him. He’s too honest and too generous to do harm.” Flora thought about that. “I agree... That’s the impression I’ve formed too.” Amelia rose from her knees, pulled up a nearby chair and sat down. “What about others? Surely there are some?” “Morwenna...” Amelia’s eyes flashed. “And was it good?” “Wonderful,” replied Flora with feeling, remembering the experience of pleasure with a woman. “Another first?” Amelia probed delicately. Flora nodded. “But not the last,” she said boldly, responding to the other woman’s interest. Amelia said nothing, but just smiled and sat forward in her seat, looking expectant. Flora shifted in her own chair, then gasped, her bottom still burning. “Then there was Jack Walters...and Marshall Fox too.”

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“At the same time?” her Ladyship queried, her face perfectly straight, as if being taken by two men was quite normal. “No! Just separately,” Flora replied, feeling distracted by the hot glow of her buttocks. A subversive heat that was still affecting her in other ways. “Quite an interesting list,” observed Amelia thoughtfully, “And all friends of mine, of course.” She reached out and patted Flora’s hand, “You have excellent taste in lovers, Flora Swain... Now tell me, did you enjoy my husband?” Flora squirmed again, without thinking, and cried out softly. The cheeks of her bottom were hurting her badly, and she couldn’t think of a single way to answer such a question. “Never mind,” said Amelia cheerfully, “I expect you did enjoy him... Most women do. Now would you like me to rub some ointment into your bottom? I have an excellent concoction of Morwenna’s that I use when Crispin’s taken his favourite whip to me... It really works. The pain will be completely gone in no time.” “No! It’s all right... Thank you. I’ll be fine,” Flora babbled. She knew that once Amelia Rawnsley started touching her, it would lead to only one thing—and right now, a clear head was in order. There was so much to think about. To consider. To mull over... “Of course, I understand,” said Amelia, unperturbed. “I’ll give you a jar of it to take home with you. Then you can apply it yourself...or perhaps let Declan do it for you?” As she struggled to keep still, and minimise her discomfort, a stray thought surfaced in Flora’s mind. “There’s someone else too,” she said, not sure whether or not to continue, but then deciding she ought to, “Not someone I’ve had sex with as such... It’s someone I’ve been getting letters from... Erotic letters. It must be someone from here in Marwick, I think, because they’re hand delivered. But I don’t know whether it’s a man or a woman who’s sending them... They’re not signed. The just have the words “The Scribe” typed on them.” “Now that’s intriguing,” said Amelia with interest, “Do you have one of these letters with you? I’d love to see one.” “No, I’m afraid I don’t...” “Never mind. I’m giving a dinner soon. Just a small party for a group of our mutual friends.” Her perfect eyebrows quirked expressively, “Perhaps you’d care to come along? You could bring the letters with you then, perhaps?” Flora first imagined the embarrassment of having all her Marwick lovers around her at

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one dinner table, then immediately found the idea exciting. As the newcomer, she’d be the centre of attention. She could spend the whole evening flirting, and wondering who’d make the strongest play for her favours. “I’d love to come to dinner, L—” She checked herself, “Amelia. And I’ll make sure I bring the letters too.” “Which letters are those,” enquired Sir Crispin, as he strode out onto the terrace with promised bottle of champagne, and three crystal flutes. “Flora has been receiving erotic letters, my dear,” replied Amelia, as her husband deftly uncorked the foaming wine and poured it out. “And she believes they’re from someone in the village.”

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Chapter Fifteen Treatment

Flora had half hoped that one of the Rawnsleys would own up, over the champagne, to being ‘The Scribe’. No such luck. Both Crispin and Amelia had seemed interested in the letters, certainly. And both had stressed several times—as they all drank the delicious vintage wine and the late afternoon grew increasingly mellow—that Flora should bring them with her to the dinner party. But neither one of them had given any indication of having penned the damned things, despite all Flora’s suspicions. Spanking. Naked bottoms, strong hands, sweet submission and humiliating pain. I can’t believe I let that happen to me, thought Flora, safely back at the cottage, having been driven home by Crispin in his Bentley. The Rawnsleys seemed to think nothing of giving— and receiving corporal punishment—and had spoken of the activity quite naturally in their general conversation, as if it were a normal and everyday occurrence. Something common in every household, and every marriage. Perhaps it is? Flora mused, reaching around to feel her bottom gingerly, and assess how much soreness still remained. Amelia had spoken quite unruffledly of her husband taking a whip to her, and had looked both excited and fearful at the thought of it. Maybe they had an organised regime of discipline? Perhaps her Ladyship had to bend over the marital bed and take a good thrashing every night, before her husband made wild and passionate love to her. It sounded like the basis for one of Marshall’s more kinky literary outings, but having met the Rawnsleys, Flora was convinced it could be real. But regardless of what they did, it was her bottom that was still pink and glowing. In the bathroom, she stripped off her clothes, then looked over her shoulder into the mirror to see the fiery results of Crispin’s handiwork. A certain amount of the heat had faded, but there was still a soft coral haze across each buttock. It was ruddiest in the centre, and faded gradually towards the periphery, and to Flora’s surprise, she found her hard-won markings pretty.

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I wonder if Jenny’s bottom looks like this? she thought, running her fingertips over the rosy ovals, and feeling a frisson of transferred sensation between her legs. And what about Amelia’s? The thought of the self-contained and unremittingly elegant Lady Rawnsley being made to cry held a strange, rather thrilling power. “I should like to see that one day,” Flora murmured, feeling dreamy and in a state of light arousal. She saw again the image of her hostess, rendered helpless in some way, and having her smooth, pale posterior belaboured. She could almost hear the cries, the ‘whish’ of some cruel implement, and the report as it landed on bare flesh. “Oh God,” whispered Flora, aware that she was squatting slightly, her knees gaping, and while one hand gripped her stinging, smarting bottom cheek, the other was stealing around towards her sex. Searching for an even more extreme image, she put herself into the picture instead... She was face down across a table, her hands being held—one by Declan, one by Marshall—while Crispin whipped her buttocks with a switch. She couldn’t imagine the pain—only feel the shadow of it, already fading—but the excitement and the wanting were very real. Her vulva had suddenly come alive again; her sex-lips were puffed and slippery, and her clitoris was a swollen, throbbing knot. “Please... Please...” she whimpered, barely aware of the actual words, as she reached down into her crotch and began to rub. Moaning softly, she wove her hips to match the movements of her fingers. The tension rose and rose as she paraded increasingly bizarre pictures through her mind. Pictures from Marshall’s decadent novels; snap shots of the real games they’d played together; visions of Crispin, Amelia and Jenny, from this afternoon; and imagined scenarios with Declan and Morwenna. Just as the shining high point seemed to float within her grasp, and her whole sex was clenching itself ready to orgasm, the sound of a loud rapping crashed into her consciousness. Someone knocking—with a fair degree of force—on her front door. “Goddamnit to hell!” cried Flora angrily, her trance-like state shattered, but her arousal still gnawing between her legs. She passionately wanted to ignore the caller and complete her stolen pleasure, but the need to know who it was had destroyed the precious mood. Flinging on a robe, she ran downstairs, muttering darkly and nearly tripping over Arnold,

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who was curled up and fast asleep, half way down. When she opened the door, she discovered Declan on the step, dressed for biking in jeans and a battered leather jacket. He carried his gleaming black crash helmet beneath his arm. “Can I come in a minute?” he said, almost sheepishly, as if her fierce expression had in some way subdued him. “Er... Yes. Yes, of course,” replied Flora, a little confused herself. She’d been thinking of Declan just a minute ago, imagining him doing obscene and painful things to her body, and his real presence still carried the flag of fantasy. She felt almost as if she should strip naked and kneel to him. They passed into the sitting room, the atmosphere between them thick and tense. “I’m going up to London tonight,” said Declan, lowering his massive form gracefully onto the chintz-covered settee, when Flora gestured for him to sit down. “I just thought I’d let you know... In case... In case you wondered where I’d gone.” “Thanks, I...I might have,” replied Flora, feeling increasingly unsettled. Why did he think he had to account to her for his movements? she wondered, realising that she liked the idea. During the events of today, last night had been just a nebulous memory, but she’d never entirely forgotten their closeness. “That’s very good of you,” she added, sinking down onto the sofa herself, then grimacing at the twinges in her bottom. Declan’s eyes narrowed. “Are you okay?” he asked, his voice sharper. “Yes, I’m fine,” replied Flora, striving to sound carefree, but knowing she hadn’t succeeded. The pain in her buttocks was lingering far longer than she’d expected from just the attentions of Crispin’s narrow hand. “You’re not. You’re in pain, aren’t you?” Declan demanded, “I can tell. I can see it in your eyes.” “Don’t be daft,” snapped Flora, edging away from him, furious at herself for gritting her teeth. “It’s nothing, really,” she conceded when he continued to stare at her intently, his contact lenses making his eyes as bright as glass. “You’ve been up to Rawnsley Hall today, haven’t you?” he challenged, taking her arm, and beginning to gently but steadfastly pull her towards him. “What’s that got to do with anything?” she demanded, as her mind screamed he knows,

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he knows! “I’ve seen that expression before... That wince.” She was right next to him now, and conscious of the flimsiness of her robe and the way it was gaping. “It means Crispin’s been pursuing his lordly pastimes... Either that or Amelia’s had her way with you?” “What is it with this stupid village?” Flora cried, resisting him at the expense of her own soreness, “Is the bloody “Scribe” sending round a newsletter about my activities or something?” There was total silence for a moment while Flora absorbed her thoughtless gaffe. She felt more angry with herself than she did with him now; she’d promised herself she wouldn’t draw attention to his ‘problem’... Declan looked at her steadily, his eyes level, then gave the faintest of resigned, phlegmatic shrugs. “I’m sorry... And you’re right. I have been to Rawnsley Hall,” she said, looking at the pattern on the rug and no longer resisting Declan’s hand. “Come on, let me see it,” he said, urging her to her feet, then down onto his lap, “I know Crispin is usually gentle with a new girl... But you’re so beautiful, he probably got carried away.” A huge wave of emotion seemed to pass straight through Flora as she lay across a man’s knee for the second time that day. It wasn’t quite shame, or humiliation, but there were elements of those two states within her. What she felt was more difficult to define. It was a sort of weakness, a meltingness, a sense of relief at no longer having to struggle. She was surrendering, at the most basic level, to her partner. And she let out a groan of pure submission as he uncovered her. Declan tucked the thin silky fabric of her robe at her waist, then said nothing for a few moments, as if studying every detail of her pink, chastised bottom. To Flora, just the scrutiny itself was like a caress; it felt as if she were receiving dozens upon dozens of stiff, arousing smacks that were pouring their heat down into her vulva like liquid fire. Unable to stop herself, she circled her hips against Declan’s thighs. “You must like it then,” he said thoughtfully, still not touching. Flora was too embarrassed to speak. She felt wound up by lust, and so out of control that she couldn’t even still her own body. Grinding her pelvis against the rough cloth of

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Declan’s denims, she was fully conscious of the lewdness of her movements, but quite helpless to contain her own excesses. “I wonder... Would you still be this horny if he’d whipped you?” Declan’s cool hand settled on her bottom, and she almost choked as desire clogged her throat. There were still traces of Crispin’s semen on the naked skin of her buttocks, and she wondered if Declan could feel its texture, and smell its sharp, distinctive scent. His hand flexed a little, but he seemed totally unperturbed. “I’ve seen him take a birch rod to Amelia—” he continued “— and bring her to screaming point.” His finger settled in Flora’s anal crease and she sobbed. “But the minute it’s over she’s begging him to fuck her... Down on her knees and kissing his feet, with her bottom a mass of scarlet weals...” Flora felt the same. Thoughts flashed again across the screen of her mind. Thoughts and pictures, and desperate ravaging wishes. She wanted to be thrashed, molested, and abused, reduced to weeping before a vast audience of decadent watchers... Then fucked, without let or mercy, until she came. “You look very sore,” observed Declan, almost detachedly, pressing the pads of his fingers into the patch of greatest colour. “Oh God,” groaned Flora, aware that the juice that had been welling in her vulva was running down and soaking the legs of Declan’s jeans. “Does this hurt?” he enquired, sounding a touch ironic as he pressed again at the other side. “Yes,” croaked Flora, almost beside herself. “And here?” He rubbed his thumb firmly up and down the inslope, next to her anus. “Oh yes,” gasped Flora, still frictioning her pussy against his solid muscular thigh. “Yes, he’s given you a pretty good going over,” he murmured, still palpating the various portions of her hindquarters with a thoroughness so arousing she longed to scream. “Did he use his hand? It looks that way...” Declan made his own hand flat, and laid it over one buttock. His fingers were long, and almost covered the entire pink cheek. “Yes,” she whispered, her sex so tightly wound she was finely quivering. “How many strokes?” “I can’t remember... Quite a lot.” “Did Amelia or any of the servants watch?”

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“No...” But I wish they had done, she thought, imagining again being whipped for an audience, her naked bottom reddening as her haunches flailed and scissored. “No, it was just me and Crispin, alone in the long gallery.” Silently, she begged Declan to take over where Lord Rawnsley had left off. She couldn’t imagine what the pain of a fresh spanking would be like on top of the existing one; but although she knew it would be terrible, she still wanted it. “This needs soothing,” said Declan, giving her right buttock a slow, assessing squeeze. “Do you have any cold cream or anything?” he asked, as she squirmed and started moaning. “Yes,” she said, her breath coming in short gasps. “Amelia gave me a tub of ointment... Something that Morwenna made. She said it would take the sting out of...of where I’ve been spanked.” “Well, go and get it then,” said Declan briskly, tipping her off his knee and setting her on her feet. “And I’ll massage some in for you.” Clutching her flapping, half-fastened robe, Flora fled the room in search of the soothing cream. She tried not to think beyond the task in hand, and she tried not to speculate. She focused her mind on the simple jar of ointment. Morwenna’s patent concoction had a slick waxy consistency, much thicker than the sun lotion that Flora had rubbed into Declan’s skin the other day, and a subtle perfume of peppermint and roses. It looked to Flora more like something to eat than something to rub on externally, and sniffing it dubiously she took it downstairs to Declan. Back in the sitting room, she found that he’d removed his heavy boxy jacket to reveal the thin white T-shirt that he wore underneath it. Once again, Flora was caught unawares by the sheer size and muscularity of her companion’s imposing shoulders, and the glowing tan of his bare, sculpted arms. He looked like the hero of one of those neo-porn jeans adverts, the stereotypical answer to every woman’s prayer. She walked towards him and handed him the jar. Immediately he swirled off the lid, and lifted the container to his nose. “Good enough to eat,” he observed, then dipped one finger into the creamy, yellowish goo. He pulled a face. “Perhaps not.” Placing the pot on the little table beside the sofa, her turned again to Flora, his eyes glowing. “Now, how are we going to do this?” he mused, staring at her, then glancing again towards the sofa. “I know,” he said, before Flora had chance to gather her

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thoughts. “Slip off your robe, Flora. Then kneel up on the couch with your bottom in the air.” Why am I letting this happen again? Flora demanded of herself, as—without speaking a word—she obeyed him. The room was warm, but vulnerability made her shudder, as she shucked off her inadequate robe and flung it aside. Once nude, she had the strangest urge to cover her breasts and her pubis with her hands, even though she and Declan had been lovers. It seemed as if with a pink, well-smacked bottom she was twice as naked. The punished glow announced her submission, the fact that sexually, she was prepared to abase herself. It was a badge that marked her out as willing. Taking her hand, Declan led her to the settee and helped her onto it, placing her limbs and torso in the position he’d requested. Flora experienced a sense of detachedness, and unreality. This wasn’t about applying ointment at all, she was simply being arranged, displayed. Her be-crimsoned bottom was up in the air, rude and available; her breasts hung down like two soft pears; and her thighs were nudged apart so her sex, and its moist condition, were clearly visible. Closing her eyes, she felt a wash of shame roll over her, whilst at the same time, she wished the room was filled with watchers—all studying her nakedness, and the arousal of her flesh. To complete the image of a female beast on show, Declan began by gently fondling her neck and ears, and without even thinking about it, Flora pressed her head back against his hand, almost cooing with the deliciousness of giving in. Declan was reclaiming her, she sensed as she knelt there before him. Taking her back after her caprice with Crispin, just as he had after her visit to Marshall, at the Old Rectory. And he had a right to, she realised. Of all the lovers she’d enjoyed since her arrival in Marwick, Declan was the one she cared the most for. She’d been attracted to the others while she’d been with them, experienced a fondness for each and every one; but between her and Declan there was more feeling, and more emotion, a stronger bond than the simple ties of lust. “That’s good,” he whispered as she swayed on all fours, sucking his fingers as they curved around her face. “Relax, Flora, we’ll soon make you better,” he promised her, running his hand along her spine towards her rump. She’d almost forgotten about the pain in her bottom, but when he squeezed again, she

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uttered a tiny cry. “Yes, it still hurts, doesn’t it?” he said, bending down to murmur in her ear, “But don’t worry, we’ve the remedy for that...” Lifting his hand from her body, Declan reached for the open jar and scooped up Morwenna’s scented unction. “This’ll be cold,” he warned, then plastered two dollops of the cream on Flora’s buttocks. The chilliness of the ointment was almost a pain in itself, and Flora cried out and swung her hips. Declan, however, ignored her protest and began doing exactly what he’d promised, massaging the soft sweet cream into her cheeks. After the first shock, and the initial discomfort of having the contusion in her buttocks stirred anew, Flora soon discerned a tangible effect. The scented ointment seemed to lift the pain right out of the bruised and battered tissue, and replace it with a milder kind of glow. Even when Declan worked his thumbs in deep powerful circles, really moving the aching muscle to and fro, the sensation was a pleasant one, and Flora soon found it affecting her gaping sex. Burying her head in her folded arms, she lifted her bottom higher, hoping her exposed vulva would be a lure he couldn’t say no to. But Declan continued only to massage her, concentrating solely on her buttocks and upper thighs. “Better?” he asked as she began to moan and gyrate her restless hips. “No!” she muttered, parting her legs a little further and dishing her back. She knew he could now see the whole expanse of her, every intimate fold, cranny and orifice. Her anal groove lay open and displayed to him, the tiny rosette nestled within it like a jewel. “Do you want another coat?” he enquired, nodding towards the ointment jar, his hand resting motionless on her buttock. “Yes!” she cried, infuriated that she couldn’t spit out her request that he fuck her. She was showing him everything, groaning like a bitch in heat, and yet the remnants of her old shyness still plagued her, and she couldn’t ask—outright—for what she wanted. This time, Declan was less accurate in his application of the ointment. Ladling out great dollops of it, he plastered it across her buttocks, rubbed it down over her thighs, he slicked a handful of it in between her legs, mixing the cream with her fast flowing juices. Charging his fingers in the jar again, he pushed them first into her vagina, then pressed a single digit

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against the tight ring of her anus, wriggling it lewdly until one joint went right inside. “Better?” he murmured again, leaning into the intrusion and making her sphincter slowly open, until the whole finger was lodged inside her arse. Flora was beyond speech. All she could do was grunt and jerk uncouthly, her reason shattered by the perception of being filled. All she could do was feel: the slight tingle of the ointment as it acted on delicate inner membranes, the hard, wicked mass of the obstruction in her bottom, Declan’s warm breath as he leant over her shaking body. “Do you want me?” he whispered, twisting his wrist and creating a mortifying sensation. Oh no! Oh no! screamed her mind in reaction, as her voice—hoarse and yearning— groaned out “Yes!” “Good,” said Declan decisively, continuing the wicked swivelling of his finger. Experiencing a mortal horror that she might soil him, Flora was fully aware of what it was she’d just agreed to. It was an act she’d never performed before. A form of sex that had terrified her until recently, when her new lovers had brought her alive to darker yearnings. Declan withdrew his finger out of her, then holding her hips turned her bodily on the sofa until she was kneeling with her bottom facing outwards into the room. She remained motionless, exactly where he’d placed her, and simply listened to the small sounds of preparation. She heard him kick off his boots, unbuckle his belt, unzip his jeans. After a moment, she heard the rustle of coarse fabric, and out of the corner of her eye, saw him fling his denims, and his bikini underwear away from him. She wanted to turn around further, and look at his penis—which she knew would be rampant—but her sense of capitulation made her bow her head and wait. There was a short pause, then Flora heard the heavy sucking sound of more ointment being scooped out of the jar. Seconds later, there was a slicking, slapping sort of sound, the same creamy goo being applied, with some care, to hard flesh, then Declan was plunging his fingers back into the jar again... And Flora knew exactly where the unction would end up next. She grunted a little as he packed the viscid stuff inside her, using his fingers to push the cream into her rectum, but carefully avoiding the soreness in her pink nether cheeks. She

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moaned again, tossing her head from side to side, when her innards began to churn again, but as if sensing her discomfort, Declan halted briefly in his task. “Easy, sweetheart,” he whispered, stroking her thighs and her lower back, while leaned over her and kissed the nape of her sweating neck. “Just relax... You’ll be okay. Nothing’ll happen.’ His hand slid under her, touching her breast, exploring her navel, ‘It just feels that way... Believe me, you’re perfectly safe.” Flora wasn’t so sure she could believe him, but his gentle words and soothing hands made her forget to care. She began crooning again as he inserted a final dose of ointment, but her cries were eager now, and not expressions of fear. And then Declan was standing behind her, the head of his anointed penis brushing her thighs. “You don’t have to do this,” he said suddenly, his fingertips delicately stroking the base of her spine. “If you’re not sure... If you’re frightened or anything... We can just do it the regular way. I don’t mind.” “Do it!” Flora commanded, pitching forward, her face half buried in the cushions, as she reached around, grasped her tender buttocks, and dragged them apart. “Just do it, Declan,” she mumbled from amongst the upholstery, feeling the pain in her punished cheeks, yet somehow enjoying it. “Oh God,” Declan gasped, as if he too had caught her sense of wildness. Flora felt his fat slippery glans butt against her, prodding blindly at her stretched and open anus, then almost choked as it began to push inside. The sensations were a magnification of the deliciously horrid delight that Marshall’s anal dildo had imparted, but the fact that it was part of a living man that was forging into her added a strange element of backwards-about tenderness. As her vitals roiled, and messages of panic shot crazily to her brain, Flora experienced a peculiar feeling of pride and loving fondness. Declan was special, and she was permitting him something special. He felt like a warmed and buttered poker sliding slowly inside her rectum, and though it was uncomfortable, she felt a rush of true affection. “Are you okay?” he whispered as she dished her spine and began to push backwards. “If it hurts, just tell me and I’ll stop.” There was pain, because she was tight and no amount of lubrication—herbal or otherwise—could alter that. But as with the spanking, the pain was transforming and

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mutable. One second, she was being stretched and opened, and packed hard by an unyielding erection, and the next moment she was sighing and begging for more. The pressure inside her was building as if Declan were the cork on alchemist’s magic bottle. Reactions, chemical processes, transmutations were taking place inside her; a veritable philosopher’s stone of pleasure and darkest sex. “Go on!” she cried, twisting around to watch his face. As Declan inched into her, his expression was one of concentration. His eyes were closed and his mouth was a set line; his neck and shoulders were taut with stress and tension. He was holding back, she realised. Containing his lust in an effort not to hurt her. “Are you sure?” he gasped, his teeth clenched. “I can stop if you want...” “No! Keep going! I want you,” Flora encouraged, even though a python seemed to be coiling inside her belly. Her whole pelvis was one mass of agitation, and the further he plumbed her the more precarious it felt. Breathing raggedly, Declan inclined himself across her. Taking his weight on one hand, he reached beneath her with the other, stroking her body, from breasts to pubis, as he thrust. The gentleness of his caresses relaxed her. She felt her innards glow and her resistive spasm fade. The awareness of him in her bottom was still strange and quite disquieting, but she was looser now, and more able to let him in. After what seemed like an age of slow, careful shoving, Declan’s penis was totally sleeved inside her rectum. As if sensing her body’s acceptance, and obviously knowing that he could get no further, Declan fell still, his belly pressing against her buttocks. “Oh God, Flora, you feel incredible,” he murmured, kissing the side of her face then gently nibbling at her ear. “You are one special woman, you know that, don’t you? You feel so hot and tight, I could explode at any moment...” Flora didn’t want him to explode—at least not just yet. The turmoil inside her was changing again, becoming the wildest and most indefinable of delights. A response more intense than she’d ever achieved before. There was a sense of expectancy in the very tissues of her body, a pure excitement just waiting to boil over into ecstasy. She felt a great fear that when it did, her heart might stop. As their passion built and built, she and Declan—somehow mutually—ceased to speak. Both of them moaned, sometimes quietly, sometimes aggressively, as together their spirits

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climbed and climbed. Flora continued to press back against Declan, swirling her bottom and clasping him tightly with her innermost muscles; while he, with increasing fervour, ran his free hand voluptuously all over her. He touched her breasts, her navel, and her mount of Venus, then with a curious, almost manic uncertainty, slid his fingers towards the niche between her legs. His first contact with her clitoris was like the first time it had ever been touched, and Flora cried out at the newness of the feeling. It seemed so cool and clear, and right at the centre of everything, that she began to climax before she really knew it was happening. Her little female cry became a shocking shout of savagery, as every muscle and membrane in her pelvis and belly seemed to convulse in the same ferocious instant. Flora experienced a strange and vertiginous sensation of falling, as if she’d plunged forward, through the cushions and the sofa, into a star-spangled void. The heat in her loins and bottom made her feel like a comet, racing through the heavens with a angel of fire clinging to her back. Somewhere in her firmament, she was aware too that Declan was yelling, almost screaming out his own bliss, while within her his penis leapt and surged. As her own pleasure quickened anew, she felt his teeth graze her neck in a bite.

The whole room was extraordinarily quiet in the shell-shocked aftermath. Declan took her in his arms, slid to the floor, and just held her a while; their sticky bodies trembling as if they’d been in a major car wreck, and had scrambled free of it, amazed that they were both still alive. When calm finally came, he led her upstairs and they showered together. Or more accurately, he showered her, washing her body solicitously with a flannel, soaping all parts of her, sexual and otherwise, with a tender carefulness but not a single trace of lust. He shampooed her hair, and when he’d towelled her dry and applied talc and moisturiser— something she would never have expected a man to think of—he supervised all the remainder of her toilette, every last personal intimate act of it, with a gentleness and lack of sensationalism that astounded her. Not even her mother had ever looked after her so well. “Shall I stay a while?” he asked, sitting on the edge of the bed, once she was tucked into it. Flora looked at him, wondering whether he actually wanted to stay or not. When he’d

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arrived he’d been intent on going to London. She wanted to be casual, say ‘no, it’s okay’, let him go his own sweet way. After all, this was Marwick Magna, wasn’t it? The unexpected home of sexual liberty. People didn’t hang on when desire had been resolved. But considering him, she found she didn’t want him to go. Wrapped only in one of her towels, which looked fairly small on his large body, he appeared delectably young and boyish. His thick black hair was dangling endearingly in love-licks, and his eyes, devoid of his contact lenses—which he’d removed to shower—had a faintly myopic and appealingly vulnerable look to them. Yes, she did want him to stay—but not for sex this time. What she wanted was his warm protective body next to hers for a while, a strong sure presence while she drifted into sleep. “Yes, please... If you can,” she answered, lifting the sheet and encouraging him to get into bed beside her. “I’ll have to leave in the small hours though,” he said unwinding the towel then tossing it across a chair. “I’ve to see lots of people about an exhibition, but there’s stuff I have to do before I meet them.” Sliding his long, powerful body between the bedclothes, he hutched down then drew her to him, cradling her close in against his broad, naked chest. “I could set my alarm,” offered Flora, her eyelids drooping already, her tiredness accentuated by his fresh-skinned warmth. “’S okay,” muttered Declan, reaching over her to shut off the bedside lamp, “I’ll know when it’s time...” He settled her more comfortably in the darkness, “And I promise not to wake you when I leave.” “Mmmm....” purred Flora as she nodded, and the next morning she realised he’d kept his word.

The few days that followed were very quiet for Flora. She spent them alone, enjoying her own and Arnold’s company. It was like being a boat that was temporarily becalmed after a season of storms. On her arrival in Marwick she’d been launched headfirst into turbulent, sex-tossed waters, and now she was just grateful for a spell of peace and quiet. A chance to consider how much she’d changed, and whether she liked her new persona.

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After a morning spent musing and idly doodling, she realised that she felt no regrets. Declan, Morwenna, and the others had brought her alive in a way she’d never been before. Just looking out into the garden, she seemed to see more, and far vivider colours, and smell the scents of flowers with a near-painful acuity. The idle scribbles on her drawing pad were promising, and richly vigorous, and though a little weary still, her body felt filled with health. On the second day, she wrote a letter to Ian. It was difficult, at first, to describe what had happened to her, especially in a way that avoided references to sex, but eventually she produced a cogent document. Her instincts told her he would be half-expecting it anyway. If they’d really loved each other, she wouldn’t have left her old life. The very fact of her departure had meant the end. Not exactly ‘The Scribe’, she thought, reading quickly through the letter before slipping it into its envelope. Far too understated for him. Or her... As she sealed the letter to Ian, it occurred to her that she hadn’t heard anything from her epistolary nemesis for the last couple of days; which surprised her. She would have thought that he—or she—she would most certainly know about her visit to Rawnsley Hall, and if running true to form, would have had come up with an outrageously explicit commentary. “It’s perhaps as well,” she murmured, reaching down to stroke Arnold, who was winding himself about her legs. Her bottom was unblemished now—and smoothly cool again after Crispin’s fierce attentions—but in her mind, she could still feel the spanking’s heat. Every now and again, she allowed herself to think about Declan, who was presumably still making plans for his exhibition. She felt as if she’d passed a boundary with him now. While he’d been pleasuring her, and sodomising her, she’d experienced a profound closeness with him that her other amours in Marwick had largely lacked. Their night together had been meaningful in a way that slightly scared her. Could it be, she mused, because I lost a new virginity? Possibly... But that wasn’t all of it—and it was the remainder that was the most frightening. On the third day of Flora’s solitary hiatus, Morwenna came to visit, with a blackberry pie.

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“Try this,” she said gleefully, wafting the golden crusted masterpiece before Flora’s eager eyes, “I’m trying a new spiced pastry...and I think I’ve found a winner.” As they consumed wedges of the truly celestial pie, washed down with Blue Mountain coffee, Morwenna chatted of innocuous village matters. She made no mention of the pleasure they’d shared, nor of the sexual proclivities of the population of Marwick. No verbal mention, that was. Morwenna’s whole body, her whole being it seemed, was a continuous discourse on the erotic and the sensual, and sometimes the way her green eyes flashed was quite dangerous. She made no overt moves, but her presence was still stirring. “I think I’ve been invited to a dinner party,” Flora said presently, licking a droplet of blackberry juice off her lower lip, and noticing Morwenna’s eyes follow the tiny motion, “At Rawnsley Hall... Lady Amelia asked me, but I haven’t received word of when it is yet...” She paused, as her companion tensed in a new way, something that had nothing to do with licking lips, “Will you be there too?” “Oh yes, I’ll be there all right,” replied Morwenna, her voice edged with excitement, “There’s no doubt whatsoever about that.” She gave Flora a look that was cat-like, smug, and perplexing; as if there was some great and secret specialness about her presence at the Rawnsley’s dinner, something Flora wasn’t yet ready to be privy to. “Good,” said Flora, itching to press the point, but sensing she wouldn’t get an illuminating answer. Morwenna smiled and almost immediately changed the subject. The night after Morwenna’s visit, Flora slept badly again, revisiting her dreams of the village green and the masked biker. This time though, the imagery was even more explicit than before, and enriched with characters that she hadn’t met the first time. She found herself naked at some kind of gathering presided over by the tall, helmeted figure in dark leathers, who she now knew to be Declan, but for some reason couldn’t acknowledge the fact. Her hands were tied behind her back, and from time to time, Marshall, who was standing beside her, would reach out and caress a part of her body. First her breasts, then her crotch, then her bottom. And this last he’d squeeze and pummel with great zest. But even though Flora was the only fully naked woman at this dream gathering, she was not the centre of attention. Laid face down across a finely polished antique dining table,

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which for some reason was placed on the greensward outside the Wishing Well pub, was Morwenna, clad in a rich gown but with her buttocks exposed. Behind her stood Crispin Rawnsley, in a morning suit, and flanked around her were all the other members of the Marwick erotic community. Robert Carfax, tall and grave, his golden eyes glowing with inner fervour; Lucy, from Treasure Trove, in a demure Victorian day dress, but brandishing what looked like a birch whip; Jack, grinning in his baggy shorts and T-shirt, with his baseball cap reversed like an American rapper; Amelia Rawnsley in silk and pearls; and finally the masked and forbidding figure of Declan, at whose nod, Crispin Rawnsley took a pace forward, raised his hand, and revealed that he was holding a narrow riding crop, bound in leather. Declan nodded again, and Crispin struck Morwenna’s bottom. And as the punished woman screamed, Flora woke... Muddled by the dream, she sat up in bed, aware that it wasn’t really her friend’s piteous cry that had wakened her, but the faint rattling sound of her letter box. Dragging on her robe, she made her way down the stairs, still rubbing her eyes and yawning, but when she reached the mat, she really did wake up. There were two envelopes there. And one of them was of the distinctive, long, creamtinted variety...which could only mean a letter from ‘The Scribe’.

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Chapter Sixteen A Sense of Occasion

Flora opened the smaller envelope first, already with a fair idea of what it contained. Sir Crispin and Lady Amelia Rawnsley request the presence of Miss Flora Swain at a dinner party at Rawnsley Hall, to be held for the benefit of Mrs Morwenna Carfax, the card read, and beneath that was today’s date, the time of eight o’clock, and a cool, succinct decree of ‘Black Tie’. Brushing quickly over the fact that she didn’t have such a thing as an evening gown, Flora returned her attention to the cryptic phrase ‘for the benefit of Mrs Morwenna Carfax’. Why hadn’t Morwenna mentioned this when they’d discussed the dinner party yesterday? This was certainly what had prompted her mysterious smile, and probably the hasty change of subject. It was all very mysterious. Especially as Morwenna didn’t seem the sort of woman to be nervous, or shy about anything. The second envelope seemed to throb in Flora’s hand as she picked it up. What outrage did ‘The Scribe’ have in mind this time? She hoped it would be nothing to do with Declan... To her surprise the letter was short, almost sweet, and fairly chaste—until the last line. My dear, beautiful Wild Flower, it read. By the time you read this I predict that you’ll have received an invitation, and I’m hoping with all my heart that you’ll accept it. The thing is, sweet Flora, I’ll be at that dinner party too, and I long to see you, and to speak to you in person... Not that we haven’t already spoken to each other... We’ve much, much more than spoken...but never while you’ve known me for who I am. Wear something pretty, Wild Flower, something that’ll make me crazy, and show off that perfect, adorable body of yours. And one last thing, before we meet... please be kind to me, and leave your panties in the drawer. It ended, Yours in anticipation, and frustration, THE SCRIBE. “Pervert!” muttered Flora, flinging the letter on the hall table and stomping through to the kitchen, where Arnold, having heard the commotion, looked up enquiringly. “Sorry, Arnie,” she said, hunkering down to stroke him and rub his ears, “It’s not you,

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you’re lovely... Come on, boy, let’s get you your breakfast.” For her own part, Flora had lost all interest in eating. Making a pot of strong tea, she took her post into the sitting room, and re-read both items several times. Oh God, I’m going to find out who ‘The Scribe’ is at last! she thought as she absorbed the full impact of what was written. Perhaps it’s Morwenna? Maybe the dinner’s being held for her so she can make a big show of ‘unmasking’ herself? But the ‘unmasking’ and the ‘Morwenna’ might be two separate issues. Everybody knows everybody else’s business here, Flora reasoned, so it wouldn’t be hard for him—or her—to know that I’ll be at that party. Especially if it’s one of the Rawnsleys themselves? she mused, her mind winging back to Crispin, and his Long Gallery. It could well be him. He was the ‘Lord of the Manor’, so to speak, and his lines of communication would most likely be extensive. He could have been tracking her movements from day one, either by means of servants, like Jenny, or by doing the observation himself. A country landowner would certainly have the kind of powerful field glasses which would have enabled him to spy on her that first day with Ian. The trouble was the same circumstances also applied to his wife, the ‘Lady of the Manor’. “Damn! Damn! Damn!” she cried out, returning to the kitchen for more tea. She was scared, excited, confused...and aroused. It was hard enough managing any one of those emotions individually, without experiencing the whole lot of them at once. And on top of that she’d to find herself an evening gown!

A dress the easiest of her problems. It could be solved by the simple application of a little time and money, neither of which were in short supply since her windfall. When she’d forced herself to eat a small breakfast, Flora showered and dressed, then set off on her second shopping expedition in two days. Once in the car, she headed towards Salisbury, noticing—as she pulled out into the lane—that Declan’s motorbike was standing on its props on the stone flagged area at the other side of his house. It seemed strange that she hadn’t heard his arrival though, because it was a big machine and she knew it was noisy.

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My masked biker, she thought, as her car sped along. I wonder if he’s invited to this dinner party too? By the sound of it, he knew the Rawnsleys well enough. The drive to Salisbury was uneventful, and while at first she was a little perplexed by the one way system, she managed to find a parking space quite quickly. Feeling pleased with herself, she set off to do some serious shopping. It would have been easy to have become distracted. The streets of the city were filled with handsome gabled houses, and buildings of many different periods, all set together in a happy juxtaposition, but Flora stuck firmly to her mission. In a small side street, close to the High Street Gate she happened upon exactly the kind of shop she’d been hoping for—a boutique full of painfully fashionable party frocks. Once inside, it didn’t take her long to find the perfect dress, although at first glance she nearly passed it over. The dress was ankle length, with no sleeves and a plain rounded neck. The cut was close, uncluttered, almost minimalist, but it was the fabric that made the dress quite extraordinary: a high sheen satinised lycra material in a show-stopping print of huge, multicoloured flowers. The flowers really were immense, as big as dessert plates, in shades of coral, saffron, jungle green and cerise. The dress should have been an eye-sore, a hideous, garish monstrosity, but when she got it on, she discovered it was sensational. Wild flowers for the ‘Wild Flower’, she thought, loving the way the stretchy fabric smoothed over her body, clinging seductively from shoulder to hip, while the stunning print made the tight fit look less sleazy. Pleased with her purchase, but slightly alarmed by its price, Flora left the shop and treated herself to a leisurely wander round the centre of the ancient city, admiring the soaring Cathedral and its remarkably pretty Close. Captivated, she would have liked to stay longer, but she decided to leave exploration for another time. She didn’t want to be tired and footsore at the Rawnsleys mysterious ‘special’ dinner. Back at home, Flora spent a long time trying on, and re-trying on, her brilliant flowery dress. She’d realised in the boutique that the undies she was wearing weren’t suitable, but now it seemed she hadn’t any that were. ‘The Scribe’s’ wishes, it appeared, were going to be granted; the only underwear that looked any good was nothing. Flora felt both daring and vulnerable in just the dress and her skin, and found the slick

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texture of the fabric intensely arousing. It seemed to slither over her body like a giant, moistened hand, and make her every slightest movement a self caress. Her nipples were erect and in a constant state of hardness, pushing out beneath the lycra and plain to see. But people might not even be looking at me, she thought, as finally, she had the dress on and was ready for the party. Standing before her mirror, she fluffed up her short gamin hairstyle, pleased with its bright red-gold shine, and checked the make-up she’d just applied—a slightly more dramatic version of her usual subtle shading. This ‘do’ is for Morwenna, she reminded herself, turning to check her back view, and half frowning, half smiling over the way the vivid flowers embraced the contours of her bottom, and seemed to make it look far perter, and more prominent. Two huge blooms, one yellow, one scarlet, appeared to cup each rounded cheek like a pair of grasping hands. She wore no stockings, because all the bumpy paraphernalia of suspenders would spoil the silky lines of the dress, but her ankles were tanned, and looked slim and sexy in strappy gold kid sandals. The sandals, though exquisite were also problematical. Flora had no idea how she would manage to walk all the way out to Rawnsley Hall in their spindly three inch heels. She supposed she could phone Morwenna, and ask how she was getting to the Hall, but a diffuse, and strangely fluttery nervousness made her resist the idea. She was just about to dial the village’s one and only taxi service—which she suspected was probably run by the ubiquitous Jack Walters—when the phone rang, and made her jump and catch her breath. “Are you ready?” enquired Morwenna without preamble, as if there was nothing else happening in the whole world tonight except the dinner party. “Yes,” replied Flora, checking her bright-eyed self in the hall mirror. “I was just about to ring for a taxi. I can’t walk all the way to the Hall in my best shoes...” “You won’t get a taxi tonight,” said Morwenna emphatically, her husky voice heavy with excitement, “But not to worry, Robert and I will call for you. We’re picking up Declan too... See you in a few minutes.” The line went dead before Flora could make her “thankyous”. A second or so later, while she still had the receiver in her hand, there was knock at the door.

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It was Declan. He stood smiling on her doorstep, in sharply tailored dinner suit, looking like every woman’s wet dream of a fantasy escort. His eyes widened behind his glasses, as he took in her appearance, and after a long up and down look, he softly whistled. “Flora, you look fabulous,” he said, almost boyish in his sincerity. “You don’t look so bad yourself” replied Flora quickly, stepping out onto the porch and making herself busy with the door key and her tiny gold kid shoulder bag. She felt embarrassed, and she didn’t know why. She had no secrets from this man, they had been naked and made love together, but she felt as nervous as a girl on her first date. In spite of his muscles, and his rough hewn appearance, Declan looked quite at home in formal evening dress. The snowy whiteness of his pin-tucked shirt made his tanned skin seem darker, and the sober black suiting enhanced the body that it covered. His glinting gold framed glasses added just that extra touch of style. There wasn’t a lot of time for them to admire each other, because within seconds, a navy blue Volvo came speeding up the lane, and when it slid to a halt, Morwenna leapt from the passenger seat. Flora was astounded by the sight of her friend. She’d expected some kind of floating gown, in Indian muslin, a caftan with mirror beads and embroidery and the like, but instead, Morwenna wore a chic, and very clinging ‘little black’. The dress was far, far tighter than Flora’s own new dress, and it had cap sleeves and a scooped neckline. It’s hem was a good eight inches above the knee, and with it Morwenna sported red stilettos, their dagger-like ‘fuck me’ heels even higher than those on Flora’s sandals. Morwenna’s hairstyle also ran counter to Flora’s preconceptions... Instead of wearing her hair loose and flowing, as she usually did, Morwenna had swept up her long black locks to form a topknot; a beautiful, involved coil with a number of stray, floating tendrils that dangled artfully around her face and her neck. “Oh yes,” purred Morwenna, moving forward to take Flora’s free hand. “This is just right,” she went on, her eyes cruising Flora’s body just as Declan’s had, but if anything with a far more predatory gleam. “A perfect flowerage...” She released Flora’s hand and let her own settle on Flora’s left breast, her fingers flexing lightly to hold both the fabric and the flesh it contained. “Morwenna!” said Robert sharply, watching his wife from the driving seat.

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Morwenna abandoned her hold on Flora as if she’d been burnt, but her green eyes seemed to flash with suppressed excitement. “Come on, you two,” she said briskly, holding open the back seat door for Flora and Declan, “We can’t be late if we’re the main attraction.” Sitting beside Declan, and intensely aware of his clean male cologne, Flora pondered this last statement. Morwenna had said ‘we’, not ‘I’... What had she meant by that? Did ‘we’ include her, Flora, or was the other woman referring to Declan? And in either case, what the devil was involved? There was no time for conversation on the journey to Rawnsley Hall, because Robert was a fast, almost reckless driver. The others were obviously used to careening along hedgelined country lanes with him, and plunging wildly into completely blind corners, but to Flora the speed was unnerving. She was grateful when Declan took her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze; but much happier when they pulled up outside the Hall. “You’re ridiculous, Robert,” said Morwenna gaily, slipping out of the car and showing most of her thighs. “Driving like a lunatic and frightening Flora. There was no need to go quite so fast.” “Have a care, Morwenna,” said Robert quietly, his eyes threatening. “Remember why we’re here...” As Morwenna looked chastened, he turned towards Flora, “I’m sorry, my dear... I didn’t frighten you, did I?” “No, of course not,” lied Flora, as Declan helped her courteously from the car. She noticed him glancing at her ankles and her legs where she’d raised the tight skirt, and when she turned to Robert, she saw that he too was ogling the same thing. It’s only because I’m a novelty to them, she thought as they ascended the shallow steps towards the front door. Morwenna’s showing far more leg, and looks ten times sexier than I do, but they’re used to her, and I’m a new arrival. They were shown inside by Jenny—resplendent in a lace trimmed, ‘best’ version of her maid’s uniform—and she escorted them to the terrace where aperitifs where being served. Flora knew everyone on the terrace except one rather beautiful but eccentric looking girl, with short, straight, heavily gelled hair, and wearing leather trousers with a matching bra-shaped top. Her one concession to conventional evening dress was a rather cheeky black leather dickie-bow. “That’s Patrice,” whispered Declan helpfully as he followed Flora across the terrace,

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“She runs a farm and market garden...and she likes girls.” “Oh great!” mimed Flora as they reached the assembled party and Patrice gave her a long, appraising look. The other members of the small group, all talking softly and drinking flutes of champagne, were Sir Crispin and Lady Amelia, Lucy Douglas, Jack Walters, and Marshall Fox. ‘The Scribe’ is here, thought Flora as she accepted a glass of champagne from an unusually young and handsome butler. Her hand shook, and she had to put her other one around it to steady it, drawing a curious glance from Declan. “Are you okay?” he enquired, stepping closer. “No,” she whispered back to him. “I’m not. I had another letter today, from “The Scribe”... And whoever he or she is... Well, they’re here.” She scanned the small assembly, but saw no clues, “Do you think this is everybody that’s coming?” “Yes,” said Declan quietly, sipping his champagne, “Everyone who matters is here.” Flora was just about to question his curious statement, when Amelia stepped forward to greet her and she was swept up in a round of largely unnecessary introductions. Patrice Langdon was the only person she hadn’t yet met, and the leather-clad woman’s handshake was very firm, and very lingering. What if she’s ‘The Scribe’? thought Flora as they went in to dinner, in couples, herself teaming almost automatically with Declan. She could have been hanging back, biding her time, watching me being passed, one after another, between her friends? Despite the escalating tension, that only she appeared to feel, Flora enjoyed her delicious dinner. As she consumed chilled soup, sole in a delicate sauce, and then perfect roast beef, she listened to, rather than took part in the conversation. The atmosphere was innocuous and normal, as bright and sociable as any dinner party she’d ever been to, yet beneath it something less urbane was stirring. Across the table, Morwenna’s dark eyes were brilliant yet nervous, darting incessantly from one face to another as if waiting for some sign, some gesture. When she caught Flora’s eye, she smiled complicitly, her whole expression saying ‘just wait...it’s almost time!’ Other faces were animated too, and other eyes were full of expectation. Flora estimated that approximately half the attention of the party was focused on Morwenna, and the other

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half on herself. It became increasingly difficult to concentrate on eating, but no one admonished her for leaving her food. “That was a beautiful meal, my dear,” said Crispin finally, rising from the table, and unfastening a button on his unexpectedly flamboyant waistcoat. “Please convey my compliments to Mrs Dulverton.” He turned from his wife, to the rest of the company, “And now I think a brandy is in order, plus a chance to let our dinners settle, before we turn our attention to other matters...” His cool blue eyes settled significantly on Morwenna, then snapped immediately, to Flora’s horror, in her direction. The party broke up a little, whilst brandy and other liqueurs were sipped, some people moving to the library to continue previous conversations, whilst others returned to the terrace, and mellow twilight. Flora found herself with Declan, looking out over the parapet, trying to calm her nerves with the sunset vista of the Rawnsley parklands. “What’s going to happen?” she said suddenly, feeling brave from the wine and the brandy, and aroused by growing air of tension. “Don’t ask,” replied Declan, sounding distracted. There was a quality in his voice that Flora sensed reflected her own feelings. The confusion, the growing desire, the anticipation. But there was anger in Declan as well, and she wasn’t sure whether it was with her, with himself, or coming from some other source. “I have to,” she answered sharply, then took a short, agitated sip of her brandy. “I don’t care what it said on that invitation... Everybody’s looking at me, as well as Morwenna. Am I part of the entertainment too?” The word ‘‘entertainment’ seemed to galvanise him. “I don’t really think Morwenna will see it as entertainment,” he answered, staring at Flora, his eyes set and hard behind his glasses. “What do you mean? Tell me!” she demanded, but just as Declan pursed his lips, then seemed about to speak, a gong rang out—the same one that had summoned them to dinner—but this time sounding sonorously from the library. When Flora looked around, she saw everyone else was gone from the terrace, and that ringing summons was for she and Declan alone. Inside the imposing library, the other guests had all taken their places, and were sitting on a semi-circle of chairs of various kinds which faced the long edge of a dark Jacobean

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dining table. Before the table was spread a Chinese antique rug with a design of willows, and mythic birds in flight; and on the rug stood Morwenna, eyes cast down. “Ah, there you are,” said Crispin, rising from his own seat, next to the table, and indicating two spaces on a smallish leather covered settee set directly facing Morwenna, “Now we can begin...” Morwenna appeared to be shaking slightly where she stood, or it could just have been the natural sway of a woman in high heels. Her face was pink too, just over the cheekbones, although Flora could hardly imagine her new friend being embarrassed over anything. It seemed out of character in one so fearless and bold. “Our good friend Robert has decided that it’s about time his dear wife got her comeuppance,” Crispin nodded to Robert Carfax, who was sitting next to the table on the other side, his eyes intent on his wife’s black clad body. “A humbling in the true Marwick style... Before her friends, both long-standing and new—” His attention flicked briefly to Flora, who blushed even more than Morwenna was doing, “—for the pleasure of all, and for her instruction.” He paused a few moments, as if for effect, and to allow Jenny, who’d been standing in the corner, next to the sideboard with its well stocked tray of drinks, to move along the seated semi-circle and top up people’s brandies. “So, Robert,” began Crispin again, “What crimes has Morwenna committed...and what punishment would you like to be administered?” Robert Carfax eyed his wife, then the assembled company, almost sleepily, “Well, it’s all the usual things,” he began, “Greed. Licentiousness. Making free with innocent young women, before they’re really ready for it...” His golden gaze turned in Flora’s direction, and her face went as rose-coloured as some of the flowers on her dress, “And as for the punishment... I’d like my wife to exhibit herself, then submit her bottom to a caning,” He ran his tongue along his pale, well-shaped lips, still looking very fixedly at Flora, “And any other chastisement your Lordship thinks fit.” “I’m sure I’ll think of something,” murmured Crispin, taking a step towards Morwenna, then tilting up her face with one long finger beneath her chin, “Now, my dear, are you ready?” he asked softly, then, without giving her chance to answer, he kissed her full on the mouth, quite savagely.

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Flora watched the act, and again, felt aroused and bewildered. She was jealous, she realised, as Crispin’s tongue visibly probed Morwenna’s mouth, and his questing hand squeezed first her breast, then her bottom. But which one am I envious of, thought Flora, as Crispin pulled back, laughing softly into Morwenna’s lipstick-smeared face, then wiping his own face with a pure white handkerchief. “Now then, dear Wenna,” he said, standing to one side of her, so as not to restrict the view, “You know what to do... Let my guests get a good look at what they came to see.” Morwenna appeared to be in a state of half-rapture. She was looking at Crispin Rawnsley as if she might have an orgasm on the spot, regardless of the fact that her own husband was sitting a few feet away, watching. Her nimble hands dropped to the hem of her dress, then peeled the form-fitting skirt upwards, revealing first her thighs, then her hips and her belly. Beneath the black frock she was wearing only a triangle of black lace, and her pubic hair peeked round its edges, twice as black. “I’m disappointed, Morwenna,” said Crispin, his voice casual, “I would have expected you to be naked for us.” He ran his finger along the ribbon that passed across Morwenna’s hip. “Now someone will have to remove this...” He plucked at the narrow black band, “And you’ll have to pay for that on your beautiful golden bottom.” Morwenna gave a little sob, and reached for the G-string, but Crispin Rawnsley stopped her. “No!” he said quietly, yet with power, “Someone else must do it...” He glanced around the semi-circle, “Flora, I wonder if you would be so kind?” Flora felt as if she were a wild animal, immobilised by the headlights of a juggernaut. She stared around the group, and found all eyes on her, all faces smiling, almost gloating. Only Morwenna was ignoring her, but the other woman was ignoring everybody: her eyes were closed, her lips were parted, her head tilted back. She looked for all the world like a martyr on fire in blessed torment. Panic-stricken, Flora turned towards Declan, and to her relief, she saw understanding in his expression, as well as excitement and a fast-growing lust. He nodded, almost infinitesimally, towards Morwenna, as if encouraging Flora to feel no fear. Flora rose, feeling unsteady on the heels which up until now had presented no problems. Glancing uncertainly at Crispin, she saw him nod too, although the gesture was

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far cooler than Declan’s, the vibe imperious rather than encouraging or supportive. Stepping forward, she reached for the thin, elasticated ribbons that stretched over Morwenna’s sleek hips and began to pull the tiny garment downwards. It was difficult not to touch the other woman’s body as she performed this task, but Flora tried not to, almost afraid of how Morwenna would react. “That is sufficiently far,” said Crispin precisely when the G-string was dangling at Morwenna’s knees. “Well done, Flora... Would you like to touch Morwenna as a reward?” “T...touch her?” stammered Flora, realising she was being manoeuvred into exactly what she’d feared. “Yes, of course, silly girl,” his Lordship said, laughing, as if she were a particularly stupid pupil being asked the very simplest of questions, “We’d like to see you touch her cunt—,” he continued, placing special emphasis on the obscene word, “—to see if she’s wet. She’s not supposed to be enjoying this, but I’ve a definite suspicion that she is.” Morwenna’s eyes were still closed, but as Crispin spoke, her hips began weaving and pushing forward towards Flora. The scent of arousal began to drift upwards from her crotch, and as she caught the smell of it, Flora’s own sex seemed to answer. She felt a sudden, juicy outflow between her labia, a wetness so lush it began to trickle down her thighs. Taking a deep breath, and almost giddy, she reached out. Morwenna parted her legs obligingly as Flora’s fingers made contact, and the insubstantial black G-string made a lewd bridge between the swaying woman’s knees. “Oh, oh...you sweetheart,” she purred, then Flora felt her fingers being heavily borne down onto, as they sank into a well of heat and fluid. “Go on,” murmured Crispin, making Flora jump as she realised he was right beside her, “She’ll be punished anyway, so make it worth her while...” As he spoke his cool hand settled on her bottom, mounding one cheek through the sleek fabric of her dress. For a moment, time seemed frozen, but Flora could hear the others in the company moving around, and adjusting their seats a little—presumably so they wouldn’t miss anything. Flora’s hand was being both soaked and massaged; she hardly needed to move a muscle to incite Morwenna’s pleasure. The other woman was grinding herself against the wedge of Flora’s fingers, her clitoris so prominent it felt like a small, hard fruit.

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“Oh God! Oh yes! Oh god!” Morwenna chanted, her hips swirling rhythmically, her thighs slack and gaping. As Flora rubbed, she watched the rapturous woman before her reach up to pinch and pummel her own stiffened nipples, tugging and tweaking them through the fabric of her dress. “Rub harder,” whispered Crispin, his fingers tightening on the left cheek of Flora’s bottom, his breath warm and urgent against her ear. “You won’t hurt her. She loves it.” Flora obeyed him, jerking her hand back and forth in Morwenna’s dripping groove, using the edge of her fingers in a rough, sawing action. “Oh dear God!” wailed Morwenna, abandoning her breasts and clamping both hands round Flora’s wrist. “Oh do it, love, do it do it do it!” she chanted, her vulva fluttering as it poured out sticky fluid. Flora could feel the other woman’s orgasm, and its deep, dark, wet pulsations, and her own sex seemed to jump and throb in time to it. As Crispin continued to caress her bottom, Flora became aware that Morwenna was almost falling. She seemed to waver on her feet, and lean over the hand that plagued her, but before she could tumble, two fellow guests were there to hold her. Jack at one side, and Marshall at the other, held her shoulders and kept her standing upright. Flora withdrew her hand, gently prising Morwenna’s fingers from around it. The whole of her palm and her wrist was wet and glistening with silvery moisture, and as she studied it, she had a crazy urge to taste it. “Make her clean you,” instructed Crispin, still massaging her bottom, “Make her lick her own lewdness off your fingers.” Flora lifted up her hand to Morwenna’s lipstick-smeared mouth, and felt the other woman begin to lick her like a she-cat, using her tongue to search out all her own rich juices. Flora felt ready to faint. The delicate suction, the lapping action; it was all so evocative, so sensual. She imagined Morwenna kneeling, her shiny hair unbound, and her red mouth open. The dark haired woman’s tongue was still questing, but not over Flora’s fingers. It was her sex that was being licked and lapped, her juices hungrily consumed. With no thought at all for their audience, Flora moaned. “Later, my dear. Your turn will come,” soothed Crispin, disentangling the pair of them, and prising Morwenna’s lips from their prize. “Declan?” he said, summoning the artist, and within a second or two, Flora was back in her chair, led there by the strangely silent Declan.

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Crispin returned his attention to Morwenna. “Well then, Mrs Carfax,” he admonished, his smile wide but somehow threatening. “Now you have even more to be punished for... Are you ready to make retribution?” “Yes, I am,” said Morwenna formally, though her breathing was still ragged, and her face and her throat were red and flushed. “In that case, I think we may complete the preparations.” He cocked his silver head on one side, studying her, “I think a little more exposure is in order... Robert,” He inclined towards Morwenna’s husband, “I’d be grateful if you’d bare your wife’s breasts.” Robert Carfax stepped forward from his seat by the table, and without unfastening Morwenna’s dress, dragged it rudely down over her shoulders, then reached into the bodice, and prised her breasts clear of it. The tightness of the unnaturally stretched fabric acted like an instant form of bondage, holding her upper arms close against her body, and thrusting up her breasts like two fruits on a shelf. Morwenna groaned when Crispin pinched her nipples, making their already hardened state harder. Robert stepped back and watched the proceedings quite impassively. “Across the desk, please, Morwenna,” instructed Crispin, his fingers lingering a second before he turned away. There was a collective indrawn breath of heady anticipation, and Flora felt her own nipples puckering. Trussed and exposed within the confines of her twisted dress, Morwenna shouldn’t have been capable of being graceful. And yet she was. She turned like a wood nymph towards the heavy, menacing table, then draped herself across it like a bolt of living silk. Her raised and exposed bottom was stretched taut and succulent, the twin lobes as inviting as a peach. Beneath it her pursed sex was just as nectarous, the moisture glistening, the flesh as pink as coral and visibly puffy. Crispin walked to and fro, considering his victim from every angle. It was clear to Flora that Lord Rawnsley was in charge here, and that he’d be the one to do the punishing. She just wondered what it was he was going to use. After a moment or two, her question was answered, when he called out in a stern, peremptory voice. “Jenny, bring my cane, if you would be so kind.” Flora was shocked. She hadn’t realised that the maid was still in the room, and it

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seemed to exacerbate her feelings of embarrassment that the young servant had seen her touch and rub Morwenna, and watched Crispin rub her bottom while she did it. The room was perfectly still and silent for a few minutes while they waited. Morwenna lay across the table, as still as a sculpture, her only movement the occasional ripple of her sex. Flora watched, enthralled, as a single glistening droplet of lubrication crawled slowly down the other woman’s inner thigh. She wondered if Morwenna could feel it, then felt a profound longing to crouch down, and lovingly lick it off her. Eventually, Jenny returned to the room, with a narrow school cane on a silver tray. The young woman’s face was a picture as she gravely held out the implement to her master, whilst all the while trying desperately not to grin. His Lordship’s look in answer was vaguely warning, but he said nothing, and picked up the cane with a nod of thanks. ‘And so we begin,’ he said, flexing the implement slowly between his fingers...

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Chapter Seventeen The Scribe

Morwenna’s cry of pain seemed to echo around the library, leaving her lips a full half second after the first blow fell. Flora watched in fascinated horror while her new friend squirmed, her curvaceous hips rocking against the highly polished table as if the rhythm would grant ease to her buttocks. To Flora—whose practical knowledge of erotic corporal punishment consisted of one spanking—it seemed as if his Lordship were tempering his strokes, and not hitting as hard as he was able. Even so, Morwenna was creating quite a commotion, throwing around her splendidly formed body like a crazed thing, and shrieking and whimpering as if the Devil himself were beating her. But if Morwenna was doing this all for effect—and the strokes of the cane were as much a pleasure to her as a punishment—she was magnificently achieving her objective... All along the semi-circle, the audience was responding. Seats, and much more, were being exchanged. On Flora’s left, Lucy, so demure in a lavender coloured Victorian day dress, was writhing almost as vigorously as Morwenna. Mainly because her voluminous broderie anglais petticoats were bunched crudely around her waist, and between her legs was crouched the predatory Patrice, her face pressed into the other woman’s vulva. The leatherclad farmer-girl was licking her companion very thoroughly, dragging her broad pink tongue over even pinker flesh in strokes that were lingering and luxurious, while Lucy grabbed and ruffled her friend’s gelled hair. To Flora’s right, beyond Declan’s strangely passive form, was an even wilder sight. Two men kissing. Marshall Fox was leaning sideways in his seat, and grinding his mouth very slowly against Robert Carfax’s, while his hands massaged the other man’s genitals. Robert himself looked just as vulnerable as his wife. As the cane swished again, and then Morwenna jerked and groaned, Flora looked away from the two men, and back towards the left...to Lady Amelia, with handsome, willing Jack.

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The peeress, too, was embroiled in a liaison. She was sitting on Jack Walters’ lap with her back against his chest, to all intents decent, but with her hips gently rocking and weaving. The floating skirt of her long, gunmetal blue dress—a Jean Muir, Flora guessed, detachedly—was spread over both her legs and Jack’s, but her parted lips and heavy breathing gave the game away. He’s inside her, Flora thought, observing the tiny, almost tortured movements of Lady Amelia’s pale, fine-boned face. He’s stretching her; he’s in deep... But is he in her vagina or is he buried in her bottom? As Amelia groaned, Flora imagined it was the latter, and remembered Declan and herself thus conjoined. Watching the couple closely, she felt almost desperate to know if she was right. She recalled the feeling, the rich and terrifying sense of being plundered, of being filled in such a deeply submissive way. She saw Jack begin to caress his partner, to fondle her crotch through the fluid fabric of her designer dress, and she too relived that curious sensation; a empty sex while her rectum was being stuffed. Suddenly, Amelia began tossing her head from side to side and panting wildly, while Jack pulled up her dark, elegant skirt. Flora caught a glimpse of elaborate and beautiful underwear—French knickers in navy blue, pushed halfway down Amelia’s thighs, and lacetrimmed lower edge of a basque—then she looked away as Jack’s fingers went to work, burrowing crudely through her Ladyship’s blonde bush. Helplessly aroused, Flora sought an escape from stimulation—but there was no direction where the view was not exciting. Feeling apprehension rise, she glanced nervously towards Declan, just as Morwenna cried out under a particularly well-aimed cut. Declan stared back at her, his eyes level behind the glint of his glasses. He didn’t say anything, nor did he make any gesture, but his whole demeanour, seemed to say to her ‘Well?’ Flora snatched a quick look at Morwenna, whose bottom was peony-pink now, in most places, with crimson stripes. She was hitching her body from side to side against the hard edge of the desk, and the wood glistened with the evidence of her desire. Crispin had stopped beating her and had put aside his cane, but Morwenna yelped when he pressed a finger to one bright weal. Flora turned away again when the cries of pain became moans of desire.

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Declan was still looking at her, his face solemn and watchful. What do you want? thought Flora, afraid to smash the ambience by speaking out. It was obvious that she and Declan were supposed to perform somehow, to join in and complete the erotic circle, but suddenly, in spite of everything, she knew she couldn’t. She couldn’t make love in the presence of all these others yet; even though their attention, in most cases, would be distracted. “I can’t,” she whispered to Declan. “That’s okay,” he answered softly, taking her hand and squeezing it. “You don’t have to.” Flora felt even more confused. She was excited by what she was seeing, and her sex was ready, oh so ready, to participate. But something, some lingering attitude from her old, uneventful life held her back. She couldn’t understand it, yet it’s presence was deeply frustrating. How was it that she could manage to make love with any one of these people individually, but she could let her guard down and join their orbit of shared pleasure. “But I want to,” she whispered to Declan, before she could stop herself. The heat of his hand, where he held onto hers, only stirred her even more. “Come on then,” he said, standing up, suddenly decisive. Flora rose too, then almost panicked when he swept her effortlessly off her feet. “It’s okay,” he said again, “Just relax...” and the sound of his voice made Crispin look up at them, temporarily distracted from his intimate study of Morwenna’s bright bottom. An understanding seemed to pass between the two men, a wordless agreement that Flora could vividly sense. Crispin nodded once, then turned back towards Morwenna, already unzipping his flies...while Declan, without another word, carried Flora from the room, still in his arms. It was obvious that he knew the house well, because with no hesitation, he made straight for a bedroom. Flora buried her face against the solid, muscled pillow of his massive black-clad shoulder, only vaguely aware of the remarkable house around her, but looked up again when they stopped before a door. It was slightly ajar, and Declan nudged it open. “Just us now,” he said, setting her down on a wide, inviting bed, which had damask counterpane, and matching pleated hangings. “Is that better?” Inclining over her, he brushed his thumb across her lips.

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Flora thought for a moment. “Much better,” she said, looking up into his eyes, and trying to nibble the thumb. “God knows...I’m not a prude or anything...” Declan said nothing, but grinned in affirmation, “But I think that all that... Down there... Well, it was just a bit too much for me, and a little bit too soon.” “This’s Marwick Magna, honey,” Declan observed gently, “People like to party...” “Yes, I’m beginning to realise that,” Flora answered, aware of Declan’s imposing body moving over her, pressing her down onto the bed with its sinewy bulk. His erection was a knot of steel against her groin. “And I do too,” she added, swirling herself against it, and feeling it twitch and throb, “But I’m going to have to work up to things gradually. I’m not really ready to perform in front of others...” “That suits me, Flora,” said Declan, raising himself up a moment, and shrugging off his jacket. “For the time being...” He pulled off his bow tie and flung it across the room. As he leaned over her again, Flora tackled his shirt buttons, her fingers inaccurate and fumbling in her haste. “Sod it!” she cried, as one defied her, popped off, and went flying away after the bow tie. Declan laughed softly, took hold of the shirt and wrenched it open, bursting off the rest of the buttons in one tug. “Shall we wreck my pants too?” he enquired, reaching behind his back to unfasten his cummerbund. “I’m sorry,” muttered Flora, slithering on the bed and trying to reach her long back zip. “No, leave the dress on,” ordered Declan, pulling off his glasses, then tossing them on the bedside table. He plunged over her again, and pinned her hands to the bed at either side of her head, “I like the feel of it...” With that he kissed her mouth very long and very thoroughly, exploring its soft interior as he rubbed his chest against her frock. Flora wanted to scream with frustration, but her ability to vocalise was denied her. Declan’s tongue seemed to fill her entire mouth. The thin, slippery fabric of her dress seemed to act like a subtle, tantalising lubricant. She could feel the shape of his musculature through it, the solidity of his body against her nipples, and lower down, a more insistent kind of hardness. Struggling, Flora tried to free her hands, but she was no match for the power of her companion. “Take it easy, honey,” he said, the scent of brandy on his breath as he lifted his lips just an inch above hers. “I want this to happen slow... Real slow...”

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“But I want it fast!” protested Flora, in the split second before his mouth pressed down again, and he began to shimmy his hips and massage his crotch against her pubis. “Really?” he enquired, breaking the kiss again and substituting a series of smaller, more teasing kisses, which he placed over her face in a pattern of his own devising. “Then I’ll have to see if I’m ready do oblige you.” He loosed one of her hands, and reached down between their bodies, testing the quality of his erection as if he wasn’t already aware of it. He grunted with satisfaction, the Flora heard—and felt—the unfastening of a zip, followed the soft rustle of him pushing aside his linen. “Is this what you want so much?” he enquired, jabbing his hard penis against her lycra covered thighs. “Yes,” Flora gasped, incensed by the heat and the size of him. “It’s all yours then,” he said with a soft laugh, rolling onto his side a moment to deal with her tightly clinging dress. Flora lifted her bottom from the bed so he could slide the slinky skirt up over her hips, then parted her legs so he could lever himself between them. She wanted to reach down and guide his penis in between them, but Declan seemed fully capable of managing that all on his own. The blind eye of his member homed in accurately on her entrance, and within seconds he was pushing his cock inside her. Entranced by the feel and the weight and the girth of him, Flora groaned and drew up her knees so he could slide in deeper. She crossed her ankles at the small of his back, conscious as she did it that she still wore her spike-heeled sandals and might scratch him. Even so, she jerked her pelvis to encourage his thrusts. Declan responded in kind, driving strongly into her, and swirling his hips on each instroke to arouse her. Flora felt that she had never ever been so thoroughly penetrated, so taken, so laid waste to. So...so wonderfully and so magnificently fucked. And yet, beyond reason, somewhere in the build-up of her pleasure, a still small voice spoke inside her. She was tossing her head, the whole of her belly and her loins seeming to gather themselves in readiness for orgasm, when suddenly she wondered: Who’s ‘The Scribe’? Who the Devil is it? Which one of them? Declan paused, his penis as far inside her as it would go, and looked down on her, directly into her eyes. “What is it?” he demanded, his voice ragged, and Flora realised he’d sensed that she

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wasn’t quite ‘with’ him. “It...it’s “The Scribe”,” she gasped, her hips lifting of their own accord as if her body had its own agenda, and was dead set on having a climax even if her mind was otherwise distracted. “I got a note... it said that “The Scribe” would be here tonight... That I’d meet him... Or her... Was it a lie?” Declan stayed still, his eyes intent, even though the tension in his face showed that he too was closing fast on the pinnacle. “Oh no, “The Scribe” is here,” he said, his breathing laboured as if the effort of controlling himself was huge. “You know who it is!” cried Flora as Declan began to move again, his lunges short this time, and infernal; little stabs with the sole intention of tipping her over. “You bastard!” she shrieked, as rapture grasped her loins in its beneficent golden hands and her vagina in turn grasped Declan’s penis. “Goddamn you, you’ve known the answer all along!” Declan didn’t reply, but his lips swooped down and kissed away Flora’s protests, while inside her his flesh leapt and juddered. She felt his climax with both her mouth and her body... His spasms were all but synchronised to hers. In the afterglow, Flora experienced a strange inversion of her emotions. While she’d been climbing towards orgasm, she’d felt angry, almost, and that antagonism had augmented her responses; but now she felt radiant, loose and amiable. So what if Declan did know who ‘The Scribe’ was? What was the big deal if he was even a part of it all? ‘The Scribe’ hadn’t harmed her. On the contrary, the mystery and the game were exciting... And positive. She’d had more fun in the last few days than she’d ever had in her life. And she’d certainly had more sexual satisfaction. “So, who is it?” she asked lazily, as Declan sat up beside her and reached for his glasses. He smiled. A strange, boyish, half-indulgent smile that lit his face and made Flora feel all shivery. He really is the most incredible creature, she thought, realising that she could gladly give up her marvellous new sex life entirely if she was allowed to keep just Declan McKenna. “Well?” she prompted, when he seemed disinclined to answer her and began fastening his trousers. “Straighten your dress, Flora,” he said gently, leaning over to give her a quick kiss, then doing up the very few buttons that remained on his shirt, “Then we’ll go downstairs and all

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will be revealed.” A few minutes later they re-entered the library. Flora felt nervous, and not a little dishevelled, but having Declan hold her hand gave her confidence, and she managed to smile at the waiting assembled company. And they were waiting for her, it seemed. Crispin rose from his seat when she and Declan appeared on the threshold and came forward to greet her, his expression genial. “Are you all right, my dear?” he said kindly, leaning towards her and giving her a kiss on the cheek, then gesturing to the little sofa for she and Declan to sit down. “I’m fine,” replied Flora, moving to take her seat, with Declan close behind. “In fact I’m more than fine,” she added, realising how true that was, “I’ve never felt better,” she proclaimed, sitting down. There were several murmurs of approval from the rest of the semi-circle, and Flora marvelled at how normal they all looked. The only discordant note was Morwenna, who was sitting in an extra chair that had been pulled into the arrangement, with her skirt around her waist and a soft cushion beneath her bottom. Her glistening black-haired pubis, and the streaks of red on her bare, golden thighs were a bizarre sight when the others looked so ordinary. “Champagne?” enquired Crispin, indicating the clutch of dark bottles that nestled in a large cooler which stood on the table. Flora nodded, and accepted her drink gratefully when Jenny came forward to serve them. Bobbing a curtsey the maid then retreated towards the sideboard and picked up her silver tray bearing what looked like a leather-bound folder this time. This she carried, with some reverence, to Crispin, who opened it and seemed to read its contents. He smiled. “You’re one of us now, Flora,” he said, looking up at her, his ice blue eyes strangely warm. “You’ve watched our games... Played some of them... Proved yourself to be imaginative, and liberated.” Without breaking his eye contact with her, he snapped his fingers, and Jenny raced forward again and handed him a stainless steel fountain pen. “And we’d like to give you a little something to mark this auspicious event—” He paused. “Well, a little something else...” He smirked momentarily at Declan, who to Flora’s astonishment actually seemed to blush. “It’s just a simple document,” continued Crispin, holding the black leather folder in his

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spread left hand while he wrote something inside it with the narrow gleaming pen. “With a message in it from all of us... Your new friends.” He finished with a flourish, his signature, Flora guessed, then Jenny took the folder to Amelia. One by one they wrote messages on what Flora could now see was a sheet of paper within the folder. A sheet of that heavy cream paper that she’d now become so intimately familiar with. Some of the annotations were obviously just a few words, while others were longer, but as Jenny carried the folder around, taking it to the various members of the group in turn, Flora felt a strange tightness building in her chest. What would Declan do? It seemed a rather thoughtless sort of ritual, given that one of their number couldn’t write, and Flora’s pulse began to race when Jenny handed the folder to the very final signatory, and Declan took up the thin steel pen. He stared down at the cream paper for a moment, twitching the pen between his fingers, then raised his eyes again and looked directly at Flora. For a long, long instant, he carefully studied her face—as if seeking inspiration—then lowered his gaze again and put the pen against the paper. And began to write. Quickly, fluently, and at some length, his face tranquil and unstressed as he did so. It’s him. He’s ‘The Scribe’, thought Flora, realising just how thoroughly she’d been duped, and yet to her surprise, feeling no trace of animosity. He lives next door. He can watch me, chart my moves, get to know me... and it’s just so easy for him to leave the letters. From the angle at which she was sitting, Flora couldn’t quite make out what Declan had written, but as he appeared to sign his name, then add something beneath it, she thought back and tried to remember precisely what had made her think he couldn’t read and write. He’d never actually said so himself; and neither had anyone else, for that matter. Declan had said he ‘didn’t’ write, not that he ‘couldn’t’. ‘Couldn’t’ was something she’d assumed... And that first time, when he’d made her read ‘The Scribe’s’—his!—letter out loud, it had been sexual teasing, rather than his inability. Having finished his penmanship, Declan looked up at her again, and Flora had the distinct impression that he was reading her thoughts on her face, and that he understood everything about her misconception. Suddenly, he quirked his fine black eyebrows,

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questioningly, and then smiled. I didn’t mean to fool you, he seemed to be saying. It was just you who started jumping to conclusions. Flora realised she couldn’t feel angry. She held out her hand for the leather-bound folder, and smiled back as Declan passed it to her. Her eyes flicked over the messages, briefly taking in their content. Some were naughty, some were warm, some were intriguing. But it was the few lines at the bottom that really mattered... Welcome to our number, beautiful Wild Flower, Declan had written, in a crisp square script that seemed to leap up towards her from the paper. And please forgive me for having to deceive you... I’ll make it up to you in any way you choose. Any way at all... Just say the word, and I’m yours to command. His signature was large, bold and almost as muscular as he was. Declan Patrick McKenna, it said, and beneath it he’d written, also known, for several days, as THE SCRIBE. “Am I forgiven?” he said quietly, when Flora looked up again, closing the folder, and placing it to one side. She sensed the whole of the party waiting for her answer. Wanting to know if she was really one of their number... Really ready to live their life and play their games. “What do you think?” murmured Flora huskily, leaning towards him and sliding her hand behind his head, so she could bring his strong mouth down on hers for passionate kiss.

“It’s a game we’ve all had played on us, in one form or another,” said Declan drowsily, later, when they were in bed. The party had broken up not long after Flora’s presentation, and the subsequent kiss; and while there had been no specific promises or assignations made, she’d left Rawnsley Hall knowing there were wild times ahead of her. When the Carfax’s Volvo had drawn up outside her cottage, it had seemed natural to ask Declan to come in with her. They’d made love very gently, very tenderly and very normally; embracing in bed, under the covers, just like a long-married couple, not a pair of virtual strangers who’d only known each other a week. Now they were lying together, relaxed and set for sleep.

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“I was the latest victim, the one before you,” Declan said, fondling Flora’s breast lightly, as much to soothe her as to arouse her yet again. “And it was Patrice who left my letters.” Flora stirred in his arms, realising that although she had felt sleepy a moment ago, Declan’s skilled fingers were making her feel more than wakeful. “Did you suspect her?” she asked, edging her thigh towards Declan’s groin, and finding that, fortunately, he wasn’t as tired as he seemed either. “No, not at all,” he replied, rolling towards her, and pressing himself against her belly, “I’d thought she was a hard line lesbian, and that she despised all men... It was only afterwards I found out that she can be bi-sexual when the mood takes her.” “And does it take her often, this mood?” asked Flora, as Declan manoeuvred his body over hers and prepared to enter her for the third time that night. “Not too often,” gasped Declan, driving home and making Flora gasp with pleasure. “Why, are you jealous?” Flora thought about it. Or thought about it as much as was possible with all that she was feeling. “A little,” she admitted, then moaned as Declan swivelled and gripped her buttocks, “But I can live with it...” “Then so can I,” panted Declan, working his hips in a slow, steady rhythm. “What do you mean?” demanded Flora, hovering right on the edge of being able to reason. “I mean... I mean I’ll try not to go crazy when my Wild Flower is out making it with other men,” said Declan, his voice jerky as his body rose and fell. Wild Flower, thought Flora hazily, as the soft white light of orgasm rippled over her, and a plume of pure sensation shot up her spine. I’m Wild Flower, running wild in the country... But I’ll always run right back to this sweet man.

About the Author Portia Da Costa is a multi-published and award-winning British author of romance, erotic romance and romantic fiction. Her novels have been published in the US, the UK, and across the world, and translated into many languages including German, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Norwegian and Japanese. Best known for her ten novels for the pioneering British publisher Black Lace, she has gained high praise and a strong reader following for her intense, sensual, character-driven fiction and the vivid emotional depth of her novels and stories. She enjoys writing books with contemporary, paranormal and occasionally futuristic settings, and has also written some historical-themed short fiction. Portia has been writing for publication since 1990, and has had over twenty novels, for Black Lace and also for houses such as Scarlet, Heartline, X Libris, Headline Liaison, Ellora’s Cave and Phaze. She has also had over 100 short stories published, and she has contributed to many different short story anthologies and women’s magazines. Portia lives in the heart of West Yorkshire, UK, with her husband and her cats. When she’s not writing she enjoys reading, watching TV and movies, web design, blogging and online life in general. She was formerly a librarian and has also worked in local government. Email: [email protected] Portia loves to hear from readers. You can find her contact information, website and author biography at http://www.totalebound.com.

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