Cassandra's Conflict (7 page)

'This is just for you,' Katya snarled.

'You're free to drop out of the game,' the baron reminded her, and now his eyes were cool. 'Is that what you want?'

'Of course not.'

'Then go; you can always have Peter for the night. I may join you later.'

As a furious Katya left the room, the baron turned back to the heavy-eyed Cassandra lying semi-sprawled in the chair. 'Now my dear, one more sip of the wine and then we'll try again, yes?'

Cassandra was beyond protest. This time she reached towards him almost greedily as he put the goblet to her mouth, but before he let her drink he dipped his finger in the liquid and carefully inserted it between her lips, running it round the velvet softness of her warm moist mouth and mentally comparing it to the other lips, the other entrance, that would one day be his too.

For a moment she was taken by surprise, but then she found herself sucking on the finger, delighting in the feel of her tongue round the wine soaked smooth skin. She heard him give a sigh, then the finger was withdrawn and the glass was there again.

'Drink deeply, Cassandra,' he urged her. 'Open your throat wide, take it all.' He poured the liquid slowly at first, but as he saw the muscles of her throat relax he tipped the glass more sharply and Cassandra felt the wine flooding her until she began to choke. 'Relax, savour it, the taste, the feel, all the sensations should be appreciated,' he whispered. His voice calmed her so that she was able to swallow it all, and when it was gone she felt a sense of loss.

Slowly she lifted her head again and found that the baron was sitting on the arm of her chair, his wide brown eyes softer than usual as he nodded his approval. 'That was good. So good that I'd like to give you a reward, but the rules must be obeyed.'

'Rules?'

He laughed. 'You have to ask for what you want, remember?'

Cassandra nodded, and her eyes went to the baron's hands resting lightly on his knees. He followed the direction of her gaze. 'Say it,' he urged her. 'Tell me what you want me to do.'

'I want you to do what you did to Katya.'

He shook his head. 'That's not enough.'

Cassandra's breasts were so painful that she couldn't bear it any longer.

'I want you to touch my breasts,' she gasped. 'Please, please do it now.'

He didn't smile any more, his expression was almost grave. 'You see, it wasn't so hard was it? But how can I touch them while you're in that ridiculous dress?'

Cassandra stared at him, her brain dulled by the wine and the sexual frustration of the evening. 'I don't ... I hadn't thought.'

'Take it off.'

Her eyes filled with tears. 'I can't! Katya didn't have to take hers off.'

The baron put out a hand and let his fingers brush lightly against the material encasing her. Her skin leapt at the touch. 'It isn't the same like that, is it?' he asked quizzically.

Cassandra shook her head. 'No, but ...'

'Lean forward,' he told her quietly. Almost collapsing with relief that she did not have to do it herself, Cassandra did as he instructed. She felt his hand tug at the top of the zip that ran the length of the dress, then he put his hands under her arms and pulled her to her feet so that the dress slithered to the floor, leaving her standing in front of him wearing only a pair of cream French knickers. He caught his breath with excitement.

Gently he pulled the pins out of her carefully arranged chignon until her hair tumbled freely about her face and down past her shoulders, then he stepped back to look at her more carefully.

Cassandra watched him, her breasts rising and falling, her tiny nipples standing erect and pink and hardening even more beneath his gaze. She followed his eyes as they swept down her, and was proud of her small waist and narrow hips but she wished that her legs weren't trembling so much.

The baron felt a hard lump of emotion in his throat, something he couldn't identify but which he knew he'd experienced long ago, before life had become so boring, and suddenly he didn't want Katya to see what was going to follow. This slim, unawakened girl in front of him would never take pleasure in the kind of scene he and Katya had played out that afternoon, and suddenly his own part in that sickened him.

In his temper he'd only pandered to Katya's deep-rooted masochism, and it had been a mistake. Well, if she was masochistic enough to enjoy being deprived of seeing what was about to happen he'd be astonished, and it was with great delight that he turned and flicked the switch on the tiny remote control box set beneath the coffee table. Now they were truly alone.

Cassandra had begun to shiver. She had never wanted a man's hands on her before, never had any desire for Paul to touch her or even kiss her, and yet now, virtually naked in front of a man she'd only just met she was almost frantic with longing while he stood there totally calm, simply watching her.

The baron saw the indecision on her face and moved towards her. 'Lie down on the rug,' he said quietly, and his hands pushed on her shoulders. She sank down gratefully, at least now he wouldn't be able to see the way her legs were shaking. He sat down next to her and reached for the opened bottle of wine. Automatically, Cassandra opened her mouth.

'Not again, greedy one!' She stared up at him as he tipped the bottle slowly and let chilled wine splash onto her breasts, making her gasp as it landed on her hot, aching flesh.

Almost idly he ran a finger round both nipples, spreading the wine over the whole surface area of the breasts. Cassandra wanted more, and pushed up towards him. 'No, lie still. You must always lie still during pleasuring. If you move, I have to stop.'

'Why?' she whimpered.

He shrugged. 'It's more fun that way. Now, I shall drink some wine myself.' She watched his head descend to her breasts and as his warm tongue lapped at the liquid where it was spilling from her breasts and down to her ribs she groaned with pleasure. The tongue was feather light, almost as though he were a kitten licking a saucer of cream. After a time he cupped her breasts with his hands, pushing them upwards and closed his whole mouth over each of the breasts in turn, sucking very carefully to begin with, but then increasing the force until the tugging became almost painful.

Cassandra's head began to move from side to side with excitement. In some strange way the baron's sucking and tonguing seemed to be making things worse rather than better, so that her whole body was screaming for attention, but Cassandra knew instinctively that it wouldn't receive it. Whatever it was she needed, she would have to ask, and at the moment she didn't have the words and besides she didn't want him to leave her exquisitely sensitive nipples.

The darts of pleasure grew and turned to flames. She felt as though her upper body was on fire and without realising it her legs began to move restlessly against the thick pile of the rug and the touch of the material helped her. Automatically, she began to move as much of herself as she could so that nearly all of her bare back and legs were being caressed by the long strands of the rug, heightening her senses so that her body was more alive than ever before.

The baron knew what was happening, but it was only when she began to move her hips that he put a restraining hand across her stomach. 'No, not tonight, Cassandra. Keep still now,' he murmured, lifting his head from her engorged creamy globes. Noticing the flush of sexual excitement on her neck and chest, he knew that he could bring her to a climax within a few seconds.

Cassandra felt his hand on her bare waist and her hips stopped moving, but the effort needed to keep still was tremendous and it was only because she so desperately wanted to please him that she was able to do as he ordered.

He looked at the delicate buds that topped her breasts, and marvelled at the childlike innocence they seemed to represent, but there was nothing innocent in the glazed look in her eyes or the ragged way she was breathing.

He drew back from her for a moment to touch a bell set in the control panel and then he put a hand down, took her left nipple between a finger and thumb and began to pinch it. At first the pinch was so light she couldn't feel it, but then the pressure increased until it began to hurt, and she gave a small cry.

'Hush!' he said soothingly. 'Wait, trust me, Cassandra. This will be good for you.'

Cassandra moaned fretfully. The unattended breast longed for his mouth while the pain in the other was distracting her from the pleasures of the past half hour. Then, suddenly, the quality of the pain changed and it turned into a different kind of pleasure from before, a red-hot pleasure sharper than anything that had preceded it and her head went back hard against the floor.

Seeing this, the baron quickly bent his head and took the other nipple into his mouth, grazing it lightly with his teeth before clamping his lips firmly round the glorious hard roundness of her and sucking with all the force he could muster while at the same time the fingers of the hand holding her other nipple closed together hard.

The sensations flooded through Cassandra. She closed her eyes and flashes of colour exploded behind her lids, the tightness in her abdomen increased and it was only his restraining hand that kept her hips still, then suddenly her whole body was rocked by an explosion that sent electric currents tearing through her so that she actually screamed aloud as sweat poured from her body and a trickle of liquid escaped from between her thighs wetting the fabric of her French knickers.

The baron sat back and watched Cassandra as her eyes opened and she stared at him in bewilderment. Her breasts no longer ached, they were tender and slightly sore but the dreadful pressure had gone, and her whole body felt limp as though she'd swum thirty lengths of a pool or gone for a long run.

'I take it I did it right?' the baron said sardonically, and his change of expression, the lack of tenderness in his eyes, made her feel terrible. Her head was clear now. She was no longer dizzy or disorientated and she couldn't believe what she'd let him – no, asked him – to do.

She was about to speak, to apologise or something, anything to help her through the moment, when she realised with a shock that there was someone else in the room. She gave a gasp and put her arms across her breasts, but the baron moved them firmly away.

'It's only Lucy. Servants don't count.'

'You rang, sir?' Lucy said politely.

'I believe I did. A pot of tea, China I think, with lemon.'

'Very good, sir.'

There was nothing on Lucy's face to indicate that she was seeing anything unusual. Cassandra was horrified. She felt humiliated and betrayed and tried to scramble up. The baron reached out a hand and caught hold of her elbow.

'There's nothing to be ashamed about. You were sexually aroused and wanted me to give you an orgasm. I obliged. If you were hungry, I'd feed you. There's no difference.'

Cassandra opened her mouth to tell him that she would never have let him touch her if she hadn't been given too much to drink, but the words wouldn't come out.

'Have you ever had an orgasm before?' he asked intently. She tried to wrench herself free of his grip but she wasn't strong enough. 'Tell me,' he insisted, 'and don't lie. I'll know if you lie.'

Cassandra's head dropped. 'No,' she said miserably. 'I never have.'

'What a clod your husband must have been,' said the baron dispassionately. 'You're made for sex, Cassandra. I knew it when I first saw you, and what happened tonight was nothing, nothing at all. There's so much for you to learn, so much to experience, and you'll love it all.' His eyes began to shine with excited anticipation.

'I want to leave,' Cassandra said quietly.

The baron merely laughed. 'Of course you don't want to leave. How could you leave me now, when your body's just starting to come alive.' He put out a hand and slid it up the leg of her French knickers, trailing a finger through her moist-ness. 'Don't you want to know what it's like to be kissed there? To be touched all over your body?'

As he talked he kept his eyes fixed on hers, and to her shame Cassandra felt the liquid begin to escape from her again, and saw him smile as his fingers felt it too. 'You're special, Cassandra, very special. You can't leave now. You need someone like me, someone to teach you what your body can do, and how to discipline it.'

The last words made her shiver with a strange excitement that she couldn't explain and she was still staring at him when Lucy re-entered the room with the tea tray.

'Put it on the table, Lucy. Don't you think Cassandra's got a beautiful body?' he added casually.

Lucy smiled cheerfully at Cassandra. "Very beautiful, sir. I wish I was tall and slim.'

He laughed. 'I think you do very well as you are. Run along now. You can go to bed, you won't be needed any more tonight.'

Cassandra stared at him. 'Why do you want to humiliate me even more?' she asked, and to his surprise he felt almost moved by the distress in her eyes.

I'm not humiliating you, Cassandra. I'm showing you that there's nothing to be ashamed of in sex. Later on, you'll understand more about sharing, now is probably too soon.'

Cassandra wished he'd take his hand away from between her thighs. It agitated her, making her flesh feel hot and tense. He saw the signs of fresh arousal beginning on her face and suddenly realised why. At once he withdrew his hand. She'd had enough for tonight, and normally he would have sent her up to her room by now but there was something about her that fascinated him. Once he knew what it was, her spell would be broken, but until then she was more intriguing than any woman had been in a long time.

'Go to bed,' he said and his voice was so kind that Katya would never have recognised it. 'In the morning all this will seem like a dream.'

She sat up, looked around for her dress then began to try and struggle into it. The baron shook his head, helped her to her feet and then slid it down over her body himself, smoothing it carefully over her hips and small tight bottom until he felt the flesh leaping in response.

'I don't understand,' Cassandra muttered, her eyes suddenly beginning to close as exhaustion, drugs and alcohol began to catch up with her. 'I thought ...'