Nature Of Desire: Mirror Of The Soul Read online

  As Leila slowly came down, shuddering, Marguerite withdrew her fingers, cupped her palm over the quivering clit and mound, making Leila writhe with the sealing in of the aftershocks under her Master’s avid gaze. Roland’s head was down, his sides shuddering like a horse after a long run. The plug still vibrated in his ass, making him jerk periodically in short convulsions.

  In the corner, Violet turned her body in a lithe movement to face her husband and discover his eyes on her. Her lips twisting in a smile, she leaned forward and kissed him, biting his lips in reproof at his disobedience. Her hands went up to his bound ones, lacing her fingers with his. Her lips moved, whispering to him as his large body trembled. Catching her bottom lip in a flash of teeth, he tried to shove his cock up against her, but she laughed, though the laugh was more like breathlessness. Slapping his organ playfully, she rose off him, giving his bound body a thorough appraisal. “You lie right there and get that cock hard for me again,” she purred. “Let Mistress Marguerite look at you. She’s invited me to a cup of tea.”

  Joseph rose, his dark eyes like coal fire, skin drawn taut over his expressive features. “Jesu Christo, Maria Madre.” He laid a hand over his heart, nodding to Marguerite. “I am overwhelmed and honored to have witnessed such expertise.”

  As Marguerite politely withdrew, Joseph bent and guided Leila’s hands onto his shoulders to pull her with fierce tenderness from beneath Roland. Holding her naked body against him, he filled his hands with her generous bottom. “Come, querida. You’ll be fucked by my cock now. On your hands and knees by the water, while I watch the sunset.” He caught her chin, pulled her face out of his neck. “Thank Mistress Marguerite for the pleasure of serving her.”

  Leila flushed. Marguerite waited until Leila raised her head, brilliant green eyes meeting hers. There was a wealth of meaning in the air between them in that moment. Not bad or hostile, simply full of the mystery of their world of bondage and submission and the complex relationships it created. “My thanks, Mistress, for the great privilege of serving you.”

  “The privilege was mine and I thank your kind Master. You serve him well.” She watched Joseph leave them, stopping at the door to lift Leila in his arms to carry her.

  “Marguerite.” It was Tyler who spoke, whose voice commanded a warm shiver down her spine.

  Marguerite turned and saw him extend a hand to her. Every movement toward him felt heavy, sensual. The swing of her hips, the sway of her breasts were all stroked by his gaze, making her react by swinging out her hips further. She drew back her shoulders so her breasts were even more prominently displayed, wanting the pleasure and desire in his gaze stoked to raging by her deliberate provocation.

  Take me if you dare, it said, and she knew it. She couldn’t divide the Mistress from the sub with him. She didn’t know if she needed to, or even wanted to do so.

  When she got to him, he caught her hand by the wrist, the one that had brought Leila to climax. Putting those fingers to his lips, he began to lick them. One by one, drawing each finger in, he sucked on her, taking Leila’s scent off her hand while she stood aching and wanting his mouth all over her.

  When he was done, he kissed the back of her hand. “You please me very much, angel.”

  “I want to please you even more, Master.” She said it softly, without thinking of the words. From the flare in his eyes, she realized it was the first time she’d spoken it before others. When she would have drawn away, he held her fast, held her gaze with his own, steadying her.

  “Then go have your tea with Mistress Violet. And I’ll be pleased just to be near you, for now.” The look he gave her had all sorts of images coming to mind. As if he knew it his gaze caressed her body again, moving over her jewel-encrusted bosom, the nipples hard and erect, her navel, the low cut of the tight pants, their firm fit at her crotch. “I should have put you in the kind that lace up the back, so I could see the lovely crease of your ass, imagine driving into it deep and hot later tonight.” His attention lifted. “But perhaps I’ll just rip that seam down the middle, take care of it myself.”

  “I’m yours to command,” she whispered, lost in the visual. Just lost, adrift as only he could make her feel, now that he’d somehow managed to open a fortress she thought she’d reinforced past invasion.

  With the thought, the uncertainty came in, the worries. How real could this be, happening so quickly, so powerfully? Then she remembered his head against her breast at the pond as she drew his pain into her. The desire between them was powerful, but it was powerful because it rested on something else, something against which she feared the lust was merely a shadow.

  Violet had taken a seat on the wicker sofa, her knees pressing against Roland’s side, her arm along the back of the sofa in a deceptively casual position which allowed her to keep her peripheral vision on her husband. But it was obvious that her main focus at this moment was Marguerite.

  Despite the rapport of the past few moments, Marguerite knew things were far from friendly between her and the other Mistress. Tyler’s love had apparently won Violet’s forgiveness, but not her trust. Marguerite didn’t blame her. She didn’t trust herself either. But it was time to clear the air with the person she knew Tyler considered his best friend.

  “Mistress, with your permission…” Roland interrupted her thoughts. “I need to be excused for a few moments. The call of nature and all.”

  Marguerite nodded, removed the plug and helped steady him to his knees, though male pride kicked in and he made it the rest of the way to his feet despite a stifled groan as she closed her hand on his cock. It moved eagerly beneath her touch, telling her he would be ready for whatever she had in mind next in little time.

  “You may take fifteen minutes. Drink a glass of water to re-hydrate. Come back soon. I want my tea.”

  A tremor ran through his body and he dared a glance at her. The expression in his eyes was somewhat dazed and she felt that familiar tightening in her body, a Mistress’s recognition that she had successfully swept the rug from beneath his reality, taken complete command of him in a way he had not expected. She passed her fingertip just along the edge of his lashes, a whimsical, ticklish touch, and he swept them down.

  “Yes, Mistress.” He inclined his head. “Thank you, Mistress. It’s…it’s a pleasure to serve you.”

  “You’re a pleasure, Roland. Hurry back.”

  When he nodded, she watched the virile body as he strode toward the end of the poolhouse, exercising the haste that respect for her command required. He disappeared through a door she assumed held a bathroom. Knowing Tyler, probably communal showers and a hot tub as well. The thought conjured some interesting scenarios that heated her blood further.

  Sarah appeared at the entrance to the pool house, tea tray in hand as if Tyler had a way of telepathically summoning her. Again, Marguerite wouldn’t put it past him. He rose and met her at the door, took the tray so she did not have to come all the way in. Marguerite noted the way Sarah studiously kept her eyes only on Tyler’s face, though when she turned, her gaze inadvertently swept over Mac. She tripped on the threshold. Tyler steadied her, murmured his thanks.

  Marguerite’s amusement gave way to surprise when Sarah postponed her retreat until she’d found Marguerite and inclined her head, a courteous acknowledgement that might have been offered the lady of the house. Marguerite nodded in return, somewhat amazed and warmed. The woman smiled, retreated up the walkway to the house.

  Tyler brought the tea tray over to the two women and gave Marguerite a wink. “She’s tough to impress. I think she might decide to keep you and throw me out.”

  “Probably a wise decision on her part,” Violet observed dryly, but Marguerite noted her eyes were thoughtful at the exchange. She herself felt absurdly bolstered by Sarah’s vote of confidence.

  As Tyler settled the tea tray on the side table next to Violet, Marguerite reached out, touched his arm. “I’d like to ask you to give us some privacy for a bit. I want time with Mistress Violet.”


  Violet looked surprised that Marguerite herself had initiated the confrontation, but she quickly recovered. “A good idea. Go play over there.” Violet nodded across the pool, to a grouping of lounge chairs. “Read one of your tedious industry magazines. Marguerite and I want time for girl talk without your busy nose in the middle of it.”

  Tyler raised a brow. “Last time I checked, this was my home.”

  “Last time I checked, I could probably kick your ass.”

  He snorted, straightened as Violet regarded him with dancing eyes, but there was a firm determination to her mouth that made his eyes narrow in return.

  “Do you promise to play nice?”

  “Tyler, there’s nothing here I can’t handle.” Marguerite interjected it before she could respond. She locked gazes with Violet in direct challenge. Violet dipped her head, a grudging smile tugging at her lips.

  Tyler at length nodded, passed a caressing knuckle over Marguerite’s cheek. He did in fact circle to the other side of the pool, but once he was there, he apparently decided he preferred a more active use of his time than Violet had suggested. Stripping off his shirts and slacks, he revealed that he wore a pair of thin swimming shorts underneath them. The movements of his body lithe and male, he dove cleanly in the pool to begin a series of laps.

  Violet cleared her throat. Marguerite pulled her gaze back to her, saw a flash of humor in the woman’s eyes. “Men shouldn’t be that beautiful, should they?” She tilted her head toward her husband, not looking directly at him, but from the gleam in the Caribbean blue eyes, Marguerite was certain Violet had perfected the art of perusing him at her leisure while driving him mad with the feigned indifference. An indifference she was sure Mac knew was illusion, driving up the sexual tension between them. His attention was riveted on her every movement. Even as his head rested back on the lounger, his fingers gripped the straps holding him with tension. Marguerite noted his cock was rising again, noted that Violet had not completely cleaned him. Apparently she preferred to leave the stain of his semen dampening the trimmed thatch of dark pubic hair beneath the stiffening shaft, the thin point of dark hair running down his hard lower abdomen.

  She was right. Men should not be that beautiful. Marguerite forced herself not to look back at the pool, at the sight of Tyler completing a turn, his lean body swift and powerful, the water gleaming on the length of his arms and breadth of shoulders as he stroked across it. She took a seat in a chair, crossed one leg over the other, folded her hands in her lap as if she were in her tearoom. “We have our privacy. Cut to the chase, Mistress Violet. Say what you’ve been wanting to say since the night at The Zone.”

  Violet sized her up with that measuring gaze, a cop’s eyes. “All right then, I will. You know how his wife died.”

  With those few words, she’d effectively narrowed the room to just the two of them. Violet kept her voice low, obviously not intending Tyler to catch a snippet of the conversation, which Marguerite was certain would have ended it abruptly.

  “I do. She should have been there for him, as much as he was there for her.”

  Violet inclined her head. “Amen to that. I know it, you know it, but guys like Tyler and Mac, they don’t believe in therapy sessions and psychoses. They come from this medieval age bullshit that says if they aren’t a hundred percent together for their women, they aren’t men. So if I hadn’t known him as well as I do, I’d have said he went to Europe to prove something, not because he loved her and truly wanted her back. But he did love her.”

  She paused. “He was going to surprise her. He bought a ticket to her performance, but was too late to get the good seat he wanted. He hoped to let her see him, let her know he was there.”

  Marguerite’s hands tightened together as she realized what she was hearing was firsthand, what Violet had learned from Tyler himself and now interpreted with the love and outrage of a close friend. She leaned forward so Violet would not have to raise her voice further, wanting to hear all of it.

  “He bought her flowers, planned to go to her hotel that night. He walked in about ten minutes after they found her. That, like nothing else, nearly killed him.” Violet’s eyes were vibrant. “Because he genuinely believes if she had seen him there that night, known he was there, she wouldn’t have done it. And the bitch of it is, he’s probably right. She couldn’t handle being without him, but she also couldn’t handle being with him when he had to break down and be fucking human.”

  “And you think I’m like her?”

  “No.” Violet surprised her with the immediate answer. “You’re like Tyler. Whatever happened to you, you pulled it together on your own, kept on going. That’s a point in your favor and why I’m telling you this. When he came back from Europe, he stopped writing, producing, stopped going to The Zone. Got drunk a lot. I was the officer who arrested him after he went looking for a bar fight and fortunately was too blind drunk to kill anyone.” A grim smile touched her lips. “It’s funny how friendships get started. But then he pulled it together one more time. I don’t know how often a person can do that before he’s got nothing left.”

  You’d be surprised, Marguerite thought.

  “He loves you, Marguerite. With all of him. It’s so plain that it hurts me to see it, to worry that it might not be enough for you, because he has so much to give.”

  Marguerite held Violet’s penetrating gaze. “I never wanted to hurt him. I’ve tried to say no in every way I could.”

  “He doesn’t know the word no.” Violet sighed, considered Marguerite. “You’re not who I would have chosen for him.”

  “I know that. I wouldn’t have chosen myself for him, either. I know a relationship with me is likely to bring any man irreparable harm.” She turned toward the teapot, intending to use the ritual she knew to cover the misery that Violet’s words provoked in her own heart, disquieting her mind. It made the jewels chafe, made her feel suddenly like she was playing dress up in someone else’s clothes.

  Violet’s hand touched hers. “You love him, too.”

  Marguerite raised her lashes to find the woman looking at her, not with distrust and dislike as she expected, but compassion. Even kindness. She tried to find an answer, failed. The emotions filled her chest, making it hard to breathe.

  Violet blew out a breath. “Don’t answer such an obvious question. Despite the worries of my husband and Tyler, I do know when to stop being a hard-assed bitch.” Her gaze shifted to her husband who was watching them closely, as if he knew what being discussed. This time she met his gaze directly, let him know she was looking at him. Marguerite saw something soft come into those vivid blue eyes. “There’s nothing irreparable when it comes to love. If you want him, you love him and he loves you, you don’t have any choice. You fix it, you figure it out or it kills you.” She shot Marguerite a sideways glance. “And here comes our very tasty table.”

  Violet withdrew her hand as Roland returned to them. Marguerite had to recover quickly from the flood of reaction that the sincerity in Violet’s eyes had caused in her. As she bade Roland return to his position as their table, she had no idea where Violet would go from this point, only that she was intrigued to find out. And Violet did not disappoint her.

  “Let’s get down to the really important things. How do you get your hair to stay that smooth and silky in Florida’s humidity?”

  Tyler pulled himself from the water, toweled off and took a seat in the chair where he’d left his clothes. Though he couldn’t hear what they were saying except for the occasional word out of context, he’d followed the gradual transfer from serious discussion to girl chatter. It intrigued him to watch Marguerite ease her toe into that end of the pool, the way her eyes widened in surprise when Violet gestured her forward so she could fix a section of the jeweled top that had gotten twisted. Then she touched a lock of Marguerite’s hair, let it flow through her fingers as she obviously complimented it.

  He also watched with amusement, sympathy and admiration as the women managed to integrate their idle cha
tter with highly effective torture of poor Roland.

  Violet moved to the chair opposite Marguerite. With a quiet command, Marguerite bade Roland prop his chin on that chair, putting his nose and mouth no more than an inch or so from Violet’s pussy, readily outlined and visible in her Brazilian bikini bottoms. Marguerite idly played with the plug, caressing Roland with her fingertips as they discussed things any women might discuss over tea. Though they took pains to appear indifferent to the two men they were teasing, Marguerite knew both of them were aware of every shift from Mac, every rasping breath from Roland. And she was hyperaware of Tyler, of his regard. Of the desire she could feel emanating from him.

  With occasional sweeps of her lashes, the posture of her body, the upward curve of her breasts with the pink nipples framed by the jewelry, she conveyed the body language of a woman who was stimulated though she was not being physically touched in any way. And through all of those things, she wanted to let him know it was his regard that was causing it.

  Marguerite had played so little with others, staying one-on-one for so long, she was amazed at how enjoyable this was, the many different dynamics to arouse them all. So her next question surprised herself as much as her tea companion.

  “May I touch your piercing?”

  At Violet’s smile and nod, Marguerite reached forward to touch the woman’s recent navel adornment. Conveniently, she had to lean forward so her knee insinuated itself between Roland’s thighs, pressing on his testicles. She brushed her fingertips over the tiny pair of handcuffs dangling from Violet’s navel, taunting Roland as much as the position taunted her husband, who looked as if he was going to erupt from the lounge chair any second.