The Bracelet Read online

  Kristina began to walk towards the chair and then stopped. Suddenly her legs refused to move and she started to tremble. Tarquin came up behind her and she felt one of his long-fingered hands in the small of her back. ‘I’m told all quiz show contestants suffer from last-minute nerves. I do hope you’re not going to run out on me?’

  ‘No,’ she said hastily. ‘Of course not.’ He reached out and tugged softly on her gold bracelet. ‘The delights of obedience,’ he whispered, and immediately she shivered with desire and hurried to the chair.

  Once she was seated she stared straight ahead of her. She could just make out Tarquin’s face, but Estelle was virtually invisible in the shadows. He picked up a card.

  ‘You have to name the play from which each of the quotations I give you comes, Kristina. Here’s the first. “To be, or not to be, that is the question”?’

  Kristina smiled in relief. The game wasn’t going to be as hard as she’d feared. ‘Hamlet,’ she said confidently.

  ‘Correct. “I will do anything, Nerissa, ere I will be married to a sponge”?’

  Kristina stared blankly at him. ‘I’ve no idea,’ she said honestly.

  ‘You’re meant to say Pass. That’s two mistakes. Please stand and take off your skirt.’

  Kristina obeyed, and her legs were trembling so much they would hardly support her. The whole atmosphere in the room was charged with erotic electricity, and she knew that all three of them were in a state of high sexual tension that Tarquin’s measured tones only increased.

  When she sat back in the chair she was very aware of the soft leather against her bare buttocks as her blue G-string style panties rose up high between them. She glanced down and saw that her jacket just covered her pubic area at the front.

  ‘“Now is the winter of our discontent”?’ asked Tarquin briskly.

  ‘Richard the Third,’ she said with relief.

  ‘Correct. “O thou weed”?’

  ‘What?’ asked Kristina in astonishment. Tarquin repeated the words. ‘But that’s not a full quote. It could come from anything!’ she protested.

  ‘But it doesn’t, and arguing with the quiz-master is an error. Answer please.’

  ‘Pass,’ she whispered helplessly.

  Tarquin sighed. ‘It’s from Othello. Remove your jacket.’

  Again Kristina stood, and as she peeled off the jacket she heard Tarquin’s sigh of pleasure at the sight of her small breasts thrust upwards by the cleverly wired bra she was wearing.

  She sat again, and the next question was easy, but after that she was totally lost. As pass followed pass she felt her hands grow damp and there was a sheen of perspiration on her forehead because, despite all her mistakes, he continued to ask questions, and she knew that her degree of punishment was increasing all the time.

  At last he stopped. ‘Fifteen passes to date. Not very good for a literary agent. Time to administer some appropriate punishment. Please rise and stand to the right of the chair.’

  When she was in place, Tarquin came over and sat in the leather chair himself. ‘You do know you deserve to be punished, don’t you?’ he asked gently.

  Kristina remembered the bracelet, and understood what she had to say. ‘Yes,’ she agreed submissively.

  ‘Good. Then bend over my knee, but first remove your bra. The panties can stay in place for the moment.’

  She felt incredibly vulnerable as she took off her bra and then bent face-down over his knees, keenly aware that Estelle was watching them from the darkness. She tensed her buttocks, but to her surprise he started to stroke them with a gentle hand.

  ‘You have lovely buttocks,’ he said quietly. ‘I adore your body, it’s so soft and smooth. For perfection I’d like larger breasts, but that’s a very small quibble.’

  As he continued to stroke her bottom and talk soothingly and admiringly about her, Kristina started to relax. She still felt humiliated because Estelle was watching, but it wasn’t as bad as she’d feared. Surprisingly this almost disappointed her. After such a high degree of sexual tension it was something of an anticlimax.

  Then, with no warning at all, Tarquin spanked her hard on the buttocks with the flat of his hand. She felt a burning sensation and gasped with surprise, but immediately he began to run his hand over the area he’d just struck until once more she relaxed against his knees.

  As soon as her body was limp and pliant again, he struck once more, but harder this time and along with the stinging sensation Kristina felt other nerve ends reacting. Her breasts began to swell and her nipples hardened, while her stomach muscles tightened and ripples of pleasure ran from her navel down to her pubic bone.

  This time Tarquin bent his head and licked the burning area he’d previously struck, and the feeling was so delicious that her whole body felt swollen with desire and she wriggled against his knee to stimulate the tight little bud that was throbbing between her thighs.

  ‘Keep still,’ he warned her, and then he slapped her a third time, causing her whole body to jerk with excitement, and one of her shoes fell to the ground. She was incredibly aroused, the contrast between the slaps and the soothing that followed was driving her mad and she knew that she could climax easily if only he’d touch her in the right place.

  ‘Say you did badly,’ he whispered against her ear. ‘Say you’re a disgrace and must try harder next time.’

  Kristina gabbled out the words. ‘Louder,’ he commanded, his fingers kneading at her sensitive bottom until she thought she’d go out of her mind with frustration as she teetered on the edge of her climax.

  ‘I must try harder next time!’ she screamed and then, just when she was certain she could take no more, he reached beneath her and softly stroked between her sex lips until the tip of his finger brushed her swollen clitoris. She climaxed instantly, her body convulsing over his legs, squeezing them together with the force of her muscular contractions.

  She heard herself moaning with delight as the wonderful melting heat swept through every part of her and the desperate tension of the previous half hour was at last dissipated.

  ‘Good,’ said Tarquin, standing up so quickly that she almost fell to the floor. ‘Sit back in the chair and we’ll try again.’

  It wasn’t until Kristina sat down that she realised how sore her buttocks were, and they burned as they touched the chair. She winced, but then the coolness acted as a balm and slowly she became comfortable again.

  She was so caught up in the sensations that she failed to hear the first question, and had to ask Tarquin to repeat it. ‘That’s an error,’ he stated, before giving her the quote for the second time.

  The words meant nothing to Kristina. ‘Pass,’ she whispered, and as she spoke she was startled to feel a sexual thrill pass through her, tightening her breasts and quickening her breathing. It was the realisation that she was once again storing up a punishment for herself that was so arousing.

  ‘“Love is blind, and lovers cannot see the pretty follies that themselves commit”?’ quoted Tarquin, and Kristina almost smiled.

  ‘Merchant of Venice!’

  ‘Correct, and very apt too, I feel! “Villain and he be many miles asunder”?’

  ‘Pass,’ she murmured, and again the thrill of sexual excitement lanced through her tight, swelling body.

  After six more passes Tarquin stopped. ‘Eight passes, time for the punishment. Estelle, it’s your turn to sit in the chair, but first you must be naked too.’

  This was something entirely new, and Kristina watched as Estelle walked into the glare of the spotlight and with easy grace discarded her ankle length crinkle-cotton overdress, then peeled off the T-shirt that was beneath it. She was wearing no underwear, and her lightly tanned legs were also bare.

  ‘Stand up and let Estelle take your place,’ said Tarquin, watching Kristina’s reaction to this new development. As soon as Estelle was seated he pressed a release lever at the side of the chair and partially reclined it, which meant that Estelle was lying back at an angle.

/>   ‘Perfect! Now you sit on her lap and then lie back against the front of her body,’ he ordered Kristina. She looked at him and wondered whether to do as he asked or not. She’d never been involved sexually with another woman before, and wasn’t certain it was her scene, but she reminded herself that if she didn’t try she’d never know. Without further delay she slid on to the other woman’s lap and lay back carefully, feeling Estelle’s full breasts pressing against her naked back.

  The two women’s legs were one on top of each other and Tarquin knelt down and parted them both. This meant that the muscles in Kristina’s buttocks were pressing hard on Estelle’s pubic bone at the same time as she herself was opened up to Tarquin’s attentions.

  He pushed the front of Kristina’s panties to one side and slid his right hand inside, pushing down on the fleshy area to the side of her pubic mound. The pressure sent sparks through her entire vulva and she felt her clitoris begin to tingle and swell. Tarquin’s hand eased further inside the panties and now he slowly massaged over the outer part of her vaginal area, skilfully stimulating the sensitive tissue beneath until she could feel the clitoris throbbing behind the covering of her sex lips.

  Tarquin was in no hurry to progress further, and the longer he kept stimulating her the more Kristina’s need for a climax increased until she began to make whimpering sounds in her throat and her body moved restlessly.

  ‘Remember, this is a punishment,’ pointed out Tarquin, watching her breasts swell and the veins in them become more prominent as a pink sexual flush suffused her upper chest. ‘You have to wait for your orgasm until Estelle’s had hers.’

  ‘Estelle?’ gasped Kristina.

  Beneath her, Estelle smiled. Already her nipples were hard from the movement of Kristina’s body during Tarquin’s clever manipulations of her body, and she too was very near to climaxing, but she was determined to postpone the moment as long as possible in order to keep Kristina waiting.

  ‘You have to help,’ said Tarquin. ‘Press down harder with your buttocks. Grind against her pubic bone, and move yourself up and down. That will tug on the skin around her clitoris and should give her some delicious sensations, sensations that I’m sure are familiar to you.’

  His words were an aphrodisiac in themselves, and Kristina felt she was going to burst, she was so full and needy, but she remembered the bracelet and knew that she had to obey.

  Estelle felt the other woman’s buttocks moving as instructed, and now it was her turn to feel the delicious hot tingles of an approaching climax as all her pubic area became suffused with heat and she too started to whimper.

  The whimpering almost drove Kristina mad. She knew the feeling of being close to orgasm so well that to hear another woman’s cries of desire was unbearable.

  As Estelle pressed her aching breasts harder into Kristina’s back, Tarquin ran a finger over the outside of Kristina’s panties, along the line between her outer sex lips, and he laughed to himself. ‘You’re very damp, Kristina. I wonder how damp Estelle is? Reach between your thighs and find out for yourself. I want you to tell me if she’s moist and ready for me.’

  Kristina wriggled harder. She felt that this torture was unbearable, to have to touch Estelle when it was her own aching, throbbing clitoris that needed to be touched, but just the same she reached tentatively down between her spread-eagled thighs and then hooked her fingers back towards Estelle’s body. This meant that she put more pressure on her own pulsating clitoris but she fought frantically to ignore that as her fingers parted Estelle’s sex lips and slid upwards to the tiny bud, slippery with Estelle’s excitement.

  ‘Good,’ said Tarquin approvingly as he heard Estelle’s sharp intake of breath. ‘Now circle it with your finger, but slowly. Tease it, torment it like I’m tormenting you.’

  Kristina wanted to rush, wanted to feel Estelle spasm beneath her so that she too could come, but Tarquin’s wishes were what mattered and she slowed her finger movements so that she was doing as he wanted. When Estelle uttered a gutteral cry of excitement Kristina began to take pleasure in what she was doing.

  Suddenly she was enjoying making Estelle wait. Her own need was still there, but the thrill of feeling Estelle’s thrusting, aroused body heaving helplessly beneath her as she encircled the slippery nub was incredible. When she felt Estelle’s hips rise higher she knew that the other woman was close, and so she stopped circling her clitoris and turned her attention to the side of the shaft instead.

  Estelle groaned aloud with thwarted need, and Tarquin sighed with delight. ‘Excellent! Take your time, let her come when you’re ready.’

  ‘No!’ said Estelle fiercely. ‘I want to come now, Tarquin. Tell her to make me come, please.’

  ‘But the longer you wait the longer she has to wait. That was what we planned, Estelle, remember?’

  ‘I don’t care about that,’ cried Estelle. ‘I’m ready now.’

  ‘I still care,’ he said calmly. ‘Carry on, Kristina.’

  Kristina had never felt such power. She massaged the side of the exquisitely tender shaft until Estelle’s hips rose once more, and then she managed to push her fingers lower and swirl them round the entrance to Estelle’s vagina, driving Estelle into a frenzy of fury as the elusive climax kept ebbing away just as it was about to peak.

  Estelle’s body movements grew more and more jerky as her tormented nerve endings went into overdrive and she twitched and writhed silently as Kristina continued to take her to the edge and then reduce the level of stimulation.

  Finally, when Estelle was more slippery and swollen with excitement than she could ever remember, Kristina’s own need for an orgasm forced her to allow Estelle to come. She drummed lightly beneath the stem of Estelle’s clitoris until Estelle was gasping and moaning, then suddenly flicked at the tip of the clitoris itself.

  When Estelle’s rigid, frantic clitoris received that flick it exploded into a paroxysm of pleasure and Estelle’s legs shot out in front of her, lifting Kristina’s legs higher too, and she sobbed with relief and gratitude as the cruelly delayed climax finally crashed down on her.

  She was still shuddering beneath Kristina when Tarquin pulled off Kristina’s panties and then used his tongue on her. He licked slowly at first, moving upwards from the entrance to her vagina, but once he reached the rigid clitoris he began to lick across its tip in a series of swift brushing movements that so stimulated her that the clitoris retracted. Carefully he eased back the hood, drew the little hard nub into his mouth and sucked rhythmically until with a cry of ecstasy Kristina too was convulsed by a fierce, muscle-wrenching orgasm.

  Tarquin watched the two women lying in the chair with their heads back and their eyes closed, their bodies finally at peace and he nodded to himself with satisfaction. Then he lifted Kristina off Estelle, laid her on the soft carpet and took Estelle upstairs with him, so that he could at last have his own climax in the privacy of his bedroom.

  Watching them leave, Kristina felt a terrible ache of loneliness. She was physically satisfied, and had revelled in the whole evening, but with a shock she realised that she’d have traded it all if only she could have been the one to leave with him and share his night.

  She was still lonely and confused when she fell into the taxi that Lydia got for her after she’d dressed again, and she spent the rest of the night sleepless in her own bed. She knew then that she had fallen into the same trap as Jackie. Her feelings for Tarquin were becoming too personal. She loved their adventures, and the absence of responsibility that accompanied their times together, but she also wanted to get to know him as an equal. She wanted to play both parts, to be both the women in his life. Estelle seemed like an intruder, and Kristina resented her.

  Chapter Nine

  THREE NIGHTS LATER, after a particularly difficult day at work when Kristina, for the first time ever, had lost a client to another agent, she was preparing to go to a publishing party the prospect of which didn’t excite her in the least.

  Lucretia’s publishers had
moved offices, and tonight they were throwing a party to let everyone see how tastefully they’d wasted their money. There would be over a hundred people there, many of whom Kristina didn’t know and had no interest in knowing, but she had to attend because Lucretia was their most successful author, and Lucretia herself was unable to go.

  Kristina had tried hard to persuade Lucretia to go with her, but had met with no success. ‘I’m finishing my new novel,’ explained Lucretia. ‘They’ll understand. After all, a lot of the money that’s gone on the new offices has come through me, so I’m sure they’d rather I kept writing and missed the canapés!’

  ‘But I’d rather you came with me,’ protested Kristina.

  ‘Take a nice young man, or better still a young man who isn’t nice!’ laughed Lucretia, and that was that.

  After spending fifteen minutes debating what she should wear, Kristina settled on a wine-coloured, velvet dress, mid-calf length, dressed it up with a pearl choker and pearl earrings, slipped on a pair of matching high-heeled shoes with straps that crossed over the arches of her feet, and decided that would have to do. She guessed that most of the other women would either be in the obligatory little black dress or wearing long, ethnic-style skirts and shapeless tops, but tonight she didn’t feel like conforming.

  What she really felt like, she realised on her way there, was seeing Tarquin again. Ever since their sexual version of Mastermind she’d longed for him to call her, but there had been total silence.

  She arrived late, having had considerable difficulty parking her car, and after she’d tasted the cheap champagne and tried one of the mini cheese biscuits with two tired-looking prawns on it, she wondered how long she’d have to stay.

  ‘Kristina!’ called Lucretia’s editor. She was a rather formidable young woman who, as far as Kristina could remember, had graduated from one of the big universities three years earlier and had fully expected to be editing the Booker Prize winner by now, rather than Lucretia’s pot-boilers.