Odalisque (31 page)

“Constance looks vivacious and happy because she’s married to my brother and they’re sickeningly in love,” teased Satya, smiling between them. Like Mason, Satya had suffered a heartbreak in the previous year. Constance had a sudden thought, watching the two of them together--Satya’s bright eyes and Mason’s easy-going smile.

She turned to Kai and signed, “Why don’t Mason and Satya get together? You can tell by the way they act around each other that they’re halfway in love.”

Kai raised an eyebrow and looked between Mason and his sister.

“What did she say?” asked Mason.

Kai brushed at a spot on the lapel of his suit jacket, smothering a smile. “She said she thinks you guys would make a great couple.”

Mason and Satya both started making barfing, choking motions in a simultaneous show of disgust.

“Ugh,” said Satya. “I grew up with Mason. Or should I say
Darwin
. It would be like hooking up with my brother.”

“Incest,” Mason agreed, pretending to barf again.

Constance turned to Kai with a daunted look that had him laughing out loud. He put an arm around her shoulder.

“Well, if your disastrous matchmaking attempt hasn’t completely demoralized you, it’s about two o’clock.”

Panic clutched at her chest, but Constance pushed it down. “I’m ready.”

“I’ll be right there with you,” Kai said. “But you’ll be fine. You’ve been preparing for this your whole life.”

Constance’s knees shook as she climbed the five stairs to the temporary platform that had been erected for the Center’s opening ceremonies. She looked out at the large, informally gathered group of charitable givers, child advocates, and various politicians and well-wishers. There were also a few young faces in the crowd, youth in need who were already starting to wander in off the street.

Constance felt a new surge of purpose. Familiar, supportive faces encouraged her. Satya, Mason, Jeremy and Nell. She looked behind her to see Kai arranging his notes at the podium.

Then her husband looked up at the crowd. His eyes seemed to catch for a moment at the back of the audience, his lips going tense in surprise, or perhaps recognition. Constance searched to see what--or who--he was looking at so intently, but then he seemed to recollect himself. He straightened the corners of his notes and smiled at her expectantly. There was nothing to do but begin.

Constance took a deep breath, focused on the faces before her, and launched into the act of giving her first speech. Her fingers felt stiff at the outset, her arms held tensely to her waist. But at the nods and smiles that met her words, she relaxed and began to sign with more confidence. Confidence turned to emotion and emotion to zeal.

“In this city most of all,” she signed, “homeless youth need a place to find shelter. A place to feel safe. Young people come here seeking a dream career, only to find a harsh reality. Exploitation, abuse, a spiral of helplessness and addiction.” She paused for effect. “But every life is worth saving. Inside every person is a spark that can be rekindled even when it’s nearly extinguished. That’s what we hope to do here.”

She stopped as the people before her started clapping. She knew they only understood her words because Kai was reading them out behind her. She turned back to him and he gave her a furtive thumbs-up. She smiled and turned around to deliver the last of her speech.

“In closing, I want to thank you for being here today,” she signed. “For sharing in my dream becoming a reality. Once I was a youth in crisis too. I had nowhere to go, but I found a place where I was welcomed and nurtured and it helped me arrive at this place I am today. With everything you give, with everything you share, with every dream you nurture, you help someone like me make a difference in the world. And when enough people make a difference, wonderful things can happen.”

Her final “thank you” was met with another round of applause. She turned from the clapping guests in front of her to look at the magnificent complex behind her, and then her eyes fell on Kai. “Thank you,” she signed softly, her fingers to her lips. “I can never thank you enough.”

Kai gave a tiny shake of his head and signed, “You already have.”

*** *** ***

Their story had begun at a charity event, Kai remembered. A charity event for underprivileged children, no less. How unhappy he’d been then, slumped at his table in the back, listening to maudlin music. Smashing chocolate cake in mute fury.

This was so different. Constance’s face was alight with happiness, and he--he was practically bursting with it. He was content to stand on the sidelines and let her enjoy her moment, the fruition of her long time dream. He’d hired a professional ASL translator to stay with her so conversation could come easily and so she, not Kai hovering over her, could take the credit for what she’d done.

After a half hour or so she made her way back to his side, glowing with excitement and pride. He gave her a crushing hug. She was wearing a smart little ivory business suit that begged to be ripped off.
Later. Let her savor all this first.

He drew back to drop a kiss on her forehead. “My delicious little--” he began. But Constance’s gaze was fixed on something over his shoulder. Kai turned to see a group of three teens. Fourteen, fifteen years old. Maybe younger. They were Indian, two boys and a girl. He had seen them earlier in the back of the crowd. For a moment, as he’d seen them buffeted in the squeeze of people around them, he’d thought of those three glossy heads bobbing under the waves.

“Hello,” he blurted out. He reached out his hand. “Kai Chandler. This is my wife, Constance.”

Only one of the kids, the oldest, reached out to shake it. The other two looked pretty bad. Drug addicted? Malnourished? He could see Constance looking over at him from his peripheral vision, but he couldn’t take his eyes off the kids. They weren’t the age his kids would have been, and they didn’t look like Veronica at all, but...

“We need help,” the oldest one, the brother, said quietly. “Can you help us?”

Help, help!
The words in a shrill childish voice echoed in his subconscious. It was all he could do not to grab the three kids to stop them from scattering out of his reach. But they weren’t running from him this time. They were here and they needed help. Constance stood beside him, looking at him encouragingly.

“Yes, we can help you,” said Kai, finding his voice again. “Of course. Please...” He pointed toward the entrance to the center. The kids let themselves be guided, the second brother drawing his sister along when she looked like she might pull away.

Kai followed them inside, taking Constance’s hand and squeezing it almost unconsciously.
This is your life. What do you want it to be?

The door closed behind them in a whisper whirr of a slide that sounded almost like a dream come to life. Almost like a second chance.

In case any readers are wondering, the
Code d’Odalisque
actually exists and is now in its fifth edition, although Maison Odalisque and Agt. Sebastien Gaudet are products of my own imagination. I must express my deepest gratitude to Mr. Charles Molyneux, a tireless steward of the
Code d’Odalisque,
whose website http://codeodalisque.blogspot.com played a great part in inspiring this book.

While this book’s version of the code borrowed heavily from the real thing, other aspects were completely made up. If you’d like to read the actual
Code d’Odalisque
, Mr. Molyneux and his group of volunteers have graciously offered to forward free PDF copies to any who are interested. They can be contacted at [email protected]. Their mission is to spread the word about this lifestyle to provide an alternative to those attracted to a more sensual style of slavery.

As for the signing and lip-reading which takes place in this book, it is very difficult to do justice to a deaf person’s true experience in communication. No disrespect was meant in trying to give Constance and Kai’s sign language and lip-reading conversations a “spoken language” feel. This was merely done for the convenience of the reader.

Finally, if you enjoyed this book, I hope you will also read the first book set in this world,
Comfort Object
, which tells the story of Jeremy and Nell, and the second,
Caressa’s Knees
, about Kyle and concert cellist Caressa.

Many thanks to all my readers for your continued support. Please subscribe to my website to keep up to date on coming stories, re-issues, contests and blog appearances.

http://annabeljoseph.wordpress.com.

Other erotic romance by Annabel Joseph

Mercy

Cait and the Devil

Firebird

Deep in the Woods

Fortune

Lily Mine

Owning Wednesday

Comfort Object

Caressa’s Knees

Erotica by Annabel Joseph

Club Mephisto

Coming soon:

Cirque du Minuit

The Edge of the Earth

Kelsey was lost
again
. She couldn’t believe it.

Four months at Cirque du Monde’s Paris headquarters, and the mazelike corridors of its training facility still flabbergasted her sense of direction. The hallways met at strange angles and the numbers followed no system she could discern. Some walls were glass, while others were painted concrete. A small meeting room might be nestled next to a cavernous rehearsal space, a dressing room next to a director’s office. She was looking for a trainer’s office at the moment.

She was pretty sure she was in the “J” corridor, but she needed to be in the “I” corridor. She opened the next door she encountered, hoping to cut across, and found herself in a dimly lit, crowded storage room. The ceiling soared above her, dotted by skylights. She had just enough light to navigate through the densely stacked boxes, but she still managed to trip over a low-lying obstacle. Her gymnast’s reflexes were the only thing that saved her from a total pratfall. She rolled and came to a stop with her back against the side of a crate, rubbing her aching shin.
Graceful, Kelsey. Thank God no one saw that.

Then she heard voices, a man’s deeper voice and a woman’s soft one. The man sounded angry. She stood and peered around the crate in front of her in the semi-darkness. The couple was perhaps twenty yards away. Minya, a gorgeous Chinese trapeze artist, and
him
.

Theo Zamora, her soaring fantasy. Her gypsy king.

Kelsey had noticed Theo Zamora the first day of her auditions. He’d strolled through the studio around ten in the morning--she even remembered the time. Just the way he walked, the casual flick of his wrist as he passed them, arrested her. She’d been unable to look away until he’d left through the other door. She’d seen him a couple other times that week, and each time his presence had affected her in the same visceral way. When she was hired a week later, her first thought was
Now I work in the same company as him
.

Kelsey was always watching for him, stealing peeks into practice gyms and company meetings in hopes of a glimpse of his tall strong body, his dark eyes. She stared at him each night backstage as they performed in the show
Tsilaosa
. Not once--not one time--had they exchanged words.

Exchanged words? Ha. Theo Zamora didn’t even know she existed. He was unapproachable to her, a sleek and powerful idol to be admired from afar. Even now, her heart was racing to be in such close proximity to him. She pressed her hand to her mouth and stood perfectly still as she watched the couple in profile. He was scolding his trapeze partner. Kelsey couldn’t hear his words, but she picked up the inflection of French, his native language. He towered over Minya, his face a menacing mask.

How would you feel if he looked at you that way?

Dark-haired Minya shrank away, fell to her knees. Theo pulled her up again, not roughly but not gently either, and pushed her face down over the edge of a box. Kelsey waited for Minya to pull away, but the quivering woman stayed still, her legs pressed together and her face buried in her arms.

Kelsey knew she shouldn’t witness this private moment, but she couldn’t look away. She watched with horrified fascination as Theo rummaged through his gym bag and then straightened. Some kind of belt or strap dangled from his hand.
Oh my God.
Kelsey felt traumatized and yet aroused by the menacing way he stood, his stern expression. She sucked in a silent breath as he put his hand on the small of Minya’s back. The sound of the strap’s impact made her jump.

Kelsey dug her nails into her palm, shocked that Minya didn’t try to get away. But she didn’t. She actually seemed to be enjoying it, squirming and pressing her hips against the edge of the box. Kelsey could hear her low, erotic moans each time he brought the strap down again. How did Minya stay so still? The only sign of any distress was a small kick of her feet--and those muffled moans.

Kelsey stared as Theo wielded the strap without mercy or hesitation. He was clearly enjoying himself too, from the aggressive pleasure written on his face. She’d read about people doing this kind of stuff, but to see it going on right in front of her eyes...to hear the cracking sounds of impact and Minya’s intimate noises...

Kelsey’s knees gave out. She huddled behind the crate and hugged herself, listening to the sound of the steady blows and Minya’s whimpers. She slid her hand between her legs, trying to soothe the shocking, unexpected bloom of lust. Her stomach was in knots as the strapping continued, but her clit signaled something else altogether.
You like this. This violence against her.

You want it yourself.

At last the sound of the blows stopped. Kelsey scrambled to her feet and peered over the top of the crate. Theo squeezed and patted Minya’s ass cheeks through her leotard while she remained submissively draped over the box. A snap of his fingers, and she was down on the floor again. Kelsey’s pussy seemed to pulse in time with the petite woman’s movements. How would it feel to lie at his feet, conquered by him, her ass burning hot from his strap?