Stephanie's Trial (27 page)

She tried to
remember exactly what Venetia had said in their few moments
together. Presumably Amanda had gone to the mainland to order
supplies. She must be going alone or Venetia wouldn't be so
confident about overpowering her. Venetia would drop her off at the
jetty and she'd take the Mercedes into town, arranging to be picked
up again that evening. Stephanie had done the same thing herself
many times. Perhaps she even intended to drive to Perugia. It was
not more than an hour's drive and had a good selection of
shops.

A sudden
depression struck her at the thought that tonight Andrew might not
call her to his room. So far he had done so every night. They
hadn't always had sex. Some nights he had merely made her stand,
watching him eating or fucking Amanda or one or two of the other
women. Other times he'd made her masturbate for him or dress in her
finest lingerie while he merely watched. But so far, every night,
she had been called to his room to perform some service. Venetia
had seemed certain he would do so again.

Stephanie knew
what a sacrifice it must have been for Venetia, not only to allow
herself to be used by Andrew but to pretend to enjoy it. She had
never liked men, never had a man before Devlin had allowed a man to
take her at Gianni's behest. She had sacrificed herself for
Stephanie's sake, and for Devlin's. The first thing they would do
in return was to see that Venetia's file, with all the details of
her elaborate computer embezzlement scheme, was destroyed. What
happened to the other files, the files on Andrew and Amanda and all
the other slaves currently in the castle, the files they had
thought destroyed, was an entirely different matter.

At the moment
Stephanie wanted only to think about escape and how it was to be
accomplished. She saw herself sitting at the back of the speedboat
next to Devlin with Venetia at the controls, heading away from the
castle at high speed in a foaming white wake. They'd take the
Mercedes and drive, far and fast.

Stephanie had
dozed off to sleep when the cell door was thrown open. It was
Venetia, the last person Stephanie had expected to see. She was
wearing a white leotard and a small white pleated skirt like a
tennis skirt. Her eyes looked straight at Stephanie, her expression
terse and controlled. Stephanie immediately saw why. Andrew
followed her into the cell.

Stephanie's
heart pounded, her mind in turmoil. Had something gone wrong?

'I thought I'd
come down and inspect the accommodation. Any complaints?' he said,
pacing the cell. He was wearing a white T-shirt and jeans, his feet
clad in open-toed sandals.

'I haven't got
a mattress, master,' Stephanie said, trying to work out what was
going on. Why wasn't Venetia collecting Amanda in the boat?

'That must be
very uncomfortable,' he said.

'She doesn't
deserve a mattress,' Venetia said, pulling Stephanie to her feet by
gripping the tops of her arms. She took a pair of handcuffs,
twisted Stephanie's hands behind her back and callously slipped the
cold metal loops over Stephanie's wrists, making her wince.

'Careful,'
Andrew said. 'I don't want damaged goods.'

'You promised
you'd let me have her.'

'I promised
I'd let you have her when I'm finished. But I'm not finished by a
long way. You'll just have to be patient. Like I was patient with
you.'

'I was worth
it, wasn't I?' Venetia said, clutching at Andrew's crotch through
the jeans and giving his cock a pinch.

'Oh yes. And
she will be too.'

'You wait till
I get my hands on you, you bitch. He's too soft on you. You won't
be so lucky with me.' Venetia spat the words out right into
Stephanie's face, her eyes full of hatred.

'Hadn't you
better go and collect Amanda?' Andrew said, looking at his
watch.

Venetia had
stopped to unlock the metal cuff at Stephanie's ankle. She got to
her feet again and went over to Andrew. 'Save some for me,' she
said, kissing his cheek and squeezing one cheek of his buttocks in
her hand.

'Don't
worry.'

Venetia strode
out of the room without looking at Stephanie again. It was such a
good performance that Stephanie couldn't help wondering for a
moment if last night had just been a particularly graphic
dream.

'So you want a
mattress, do you?'

'Yes master,
please.'

'Anything
else?'

'No master.'
Stephanie tried to look contrite and obedient.

'We'll have to
see what we can do, then.'

Andrew took
her arm and led her out into the corridor. One of the other cell
doors was open and inside Stephanie glimpsed one of the garden
overseers. He was lying with his hand bound to the metal ring set
in the floor, the ring that usually held the ankle chain, his arms
over his head. One of the former female slaves was crouching over
his head. She was fully dressed, one of Stephanie's flowery summer
dresses with a very full and long skirt which fitted her perfectly.
The skirt had been arranged around his head so it was not visible
at all, though it was perfectly obvious from the expression on the
girl's face what service he was performing under the folds of
colourful cotton. A whip lay on the stone beside her, in case he
should flag in his efforts.

Andrew pushed
Stephanie through the small door to the back stairs and she mounted
the stone steps. Andrew followed her, watching her tight round arse
and her long slim thighs as she walked. He could see the thick bush
of pubic hair between her legs. Despite Venetia's recent
conversion, and Venetia was an extremely beautiful woman, for
Andrew there was no one in the castle to compare with Stephanie,
her raven-black hair draped over her back, her tight cinched waist,
the generous flare of her hips, her shapely calves and pinched
ankles, her firm breasts and iron-flat navel, let alone the glories
of her tight, controlled cunt. He knew every inch of her body like
a map, memorised from the agonising times he had massaged it. Now
it all belonged to him. He had seen it perform for him: he had made
it do everything he could imagine and it still fascinated him. He
had had sex with Amanda and a couple of the slaves, and in the last
three days with Venetia, who had told him he was the only man she
had ever had willingly, but even this thrill did not compare with
the feelings he got with Stephanie.

Tonight he
wanted to be alone with her, to indulge himself with her. His cock
began to stiffen at the idea. He had been stupid, he told himself.
He'd spent too much time with the others, too much energy in orgies
of multiple sex. He was like a starving man faced with a buffet of
food. He'd dived in and eaten everything where he should have
selected the things he liked most. Well, now he would be more
restrained. Now he would eat and savour his favourite food. There
was no hurry after all. The castle had a safe stuffed with money.
They could stay here as long as they liked, for at least a year,
maybe two. They could certainly spend next summer basking in the
sun. Meanwhile Devlin's business empire would come crashing down
without him at the helm, and that would be yet another slice of his
revenge.

Stephanie
stepped into the lushly carpeted bedroom through the concealed
door. The windows out onto the terrace were open and a pleasant
breeze drifted in from the lake. It was warmer than it had been for
days. The sun had almost set, the first time Stephanie had seen it
since the trials, and she thought she could see a great white wake
stretching out across the water in a long arc, the wake of the
speedboat. Her heart missed a beat. It carried all her hopes.

Andrew closed
the terrace windows, pulled his white T-shirt over his head and
unzipped his jeans. The days of indulgence had done nothing for his
already unmuscled body and Stephanie thought she saw definite signs
that he had put on weight. His cock poked through the fly of a pair
of white boxer shorts.

'Get on your
knees,' he said. He'd said it to her before. The words thrilled
him; they represented power, power over the woman of his dreams,
the woman still in his dreams.

Stephanie sank
to the floor a little unsteadily, with her arms cuffed behind her.
She had her plan, knew what she was going to say and do. He held
her head in both his hands and directed his cock, still flaccid,
into her mouth. She gobbled it up easily, taking the whole length
between her lips and his balls until it grew too big and his balls
escaped one by one.

'Lovely cock,'
she mumbled with it still in her mouth.

'What did you
say?'

She pulled her
mouth away. 'Lovely cock, master.'

'You're lucky
then, aren't you?'

'Yes master,
very.'

She was about
to press her mouth back onto his now fully erect phallus but he
prevented her with his hands.

'Do you know
what I'm going to do with you tonight?'

'No
master.'

'I'm going to
fuck you. Long and hard.'

'I'd like
that, master,' she said, trying to make her eyes show excitement.
'I liked it before when you were my slave.' That was the bait. She
held her breath, hoping he would take it.

'You never
allowed me to fuck you then.' He pulled her face up to look into
her eyes.

'Didn't I?'
she said coquettishly.

'When?' he
snapped.

'Don't you
remember? I thought you'd always remember that? Or didn't you think
it was me?'

'When?' he
asked insistently, confused now.

'On your first
day. You must remember. When the Clarkes were here. After Jacqui
had beaten you and teased you. I came to your cell after they'd
gone. Surely you remember...'

'You - that
was you? I thought it was that bloody prickteaser.'

'It was me,
Andrew. I felt sorry for you. No, that's not true. I wanted you.
You felt how I came, I just melted over you. That's why I couldn't
risk letting you fuck me again. I thought I'd lose control.'

Andrew sat on
the edge of the bed. He remembered every detail of that night. But
he had no idea it had been Stephanie that had had him hooded and
released from the pouch, no idea it was her sex that had impaled
itself on his rock-hard erection, no idea it was her who had ridden
him to the crescendo of pleasure he would never forget. His cock
throbbed at the thought.

'You do
remember then,' Stephanie said, seeing the movement of his
cock.

'That was
you?'

'Yes.'

'My
God...'

'Let me do it
again,' Stephanie said quietly and a little breathlessly. 'God, I'd
love to do that again. Take you like that. I'm getting hot just
thinking about it.' There was an agonising pause. Stephanie felt
she'd overplayed her hand and Andrew was not going to be drawn. In
fact he was rapt in thought.

'I even
remember what you were wearing,' he said finally, almost to
himself.

'Do you?' she
said eagerly. 'Tell me.'

'A black lacy
bra, strapless, very low cut, tiny little panties, and black
stockings, hold-ups with wide lacy tops... you had your hair
up...'

'Let me find
them, let me put them on again...'

'You had me
wear a hood, a leather hood, very tight. I couldn't see you...' His
voice was hoarse with passion.

'That's
right.'

Andrew's cock
was twitching so much and looked so hard, Stephanie thought for a
moment he might come spontaneously.

'Get up,' he
said in a harder tone of voice. Stephanie struggled to her feet
again, frightened that the mood had been broken. Andrew got up too
and took the keys to the handcuffs from his jeans pocket. He came
round behind her and unlocked the metal hoops, letting them fall to
the floor.

'Do it... find
what you were wearing. Put your hair up...' he ordered.

Stephanie
rubbed her sore wrists and went over to the lingerie drawers.
Everything had been put back in a different order and it took some
time to find what she was looking for. But she found it. She used
the big bedroom mirror to gather her hair up and pin it to her
head. Her little white porcelain jar of hairpins was untouched on
the dressing-table. Without permission she quickly lined her eyes
with make-up, smeared her lashes with mascara and traced a dark red
lipstick over her fleshy mouth.

Andrew sat on
the edge of the bed again. Stephanie pulled the strapless bra up
over her breasts and reached behind her to fasten the clip between
her shoulder-blades. She drew the silky lace panties, more than two
triangles of lace front and back joined by a black satin cord at
each side, up over her thighs until they nestled over her sex and
halfway over her bottom. Then she sat on the dressing-table stool,
unwrapped the black hold-ups from their cellophane packet and
rolled one up into a pouch around the toe. She extended her left
leg, pointing her foot, and inserted it into the stocking. She
rolled the nylon over her leg, playing it out slowly, suddenly
remembering how she had done this for the Baron what seemed, now,
to be a lifetime ago. As she leant forward the bra touched her
raised thigh. Her hands spun the nylon out, encasing her creamy
flesh until it was high on her thigh and the band of elastic under
the black lace welt held it securely in place. She repeated the
process with the other stocking, not looking at Andrew but aware of
his eyes following her every movement.

'Shoes too,'
Andrew said, '...black high heels.'

Stephanie
found what he wanted and squeezed her feet into them. The lingerie,
soft and silky against her skin, made her feel better and stronger.
It was practically the first time her breasts and sex had been
covered since the start of the rebellion. It made her feel
confident. The plan was going to work. Without asking permission
again she took out a riding crop, carefully selecting one from the
long drawer where the whips were kept. She swished it
experimentally through the air. She felt a sense of elation, it was
all flooding back to her, the old Stephanie, dressed to kill, proud
and haughty on her spiky heels, dominant again.