The Stallion Read online

  He smelt of expensive aftershave and his body appeared well-looked-after beneath the expensive smoothness of his black evening suit. Being of mature age, and born with privilege and rank rather than achieving it, he was the only one truly dressed for dinner.

  Alistair was not casually dressed, but not formally either. His shirt was made of grey silk that matched his eyes. He wore a tie which must have cost as much as some people would pay for a whole outfit. He looked smooth, well-groomed and as expensive as the neat gold-and-diamond cufflinks that flashed at his wrists. Smooth, she thought, sure of himself, yet strangely ill at ease; and the more he looked at her, the more ill at ease he appeared to become.

  Not that he was the only one who studied her. The expressions of everyone there were symptomatic of the fantasies each one was enjoying in their minds.

  All eyes relished the pertness of her nipples, which were outlined like rare etchings through the thin material of her dress.

  Their eyes travelled down to her waist and over the curve of her belly. Only Reggie could see any further. His eyes alighted on her lap. His breathing was quick and hot, his hand slightly sweaty upon her thigh, but pleasant.

  With daring borrowed from the headiness of the wine, she opened her legs slightly and with one hand hitched her skirt a little higher. She heard Reggie suck in his breath as her own Black Forest came shyly into view; no more than a mass of darkness between the creamy flesh of her thighs.

  Sidelong, she smiled at him, saw gratitude in his eyes and was rewarded for her efforts by his fingers edging stealthily over the soft satin of her inner thigh before tangling amongst her dusky hidden hair.

  His lips were wet now. He licked them dry and smiled at her. Alistair talked to Auberon in the background, Nadine adding her more tart comments.

  Yet somehow their talk was nothing more than a shadow, a mime they were going through as if to put her at her ease, to let her enjoy, to indulge and to arouse. There was more yet to come.

  ‘I raise my glass to you,’ he said with gentlemanly politeness, whilst the fingers of his right hand divided her feathered lips and touched lightly on her throbbing clit. ‘I think you are a charming young woman, a great asset to this establishment and the association.’

  ‘Association?’ she queried. Her questioning tone merely disguised the moan that had escaped from her throat along with the word. She was wet, aroused and couldn’t help her legs from opening wider. He took advantage of the opportunity. There was one finger now either side of her clitoris, each one folding her labia away from her innermost treasures.

  He winked in a boyish way that complemented his handsome patrician features. A gold bracelet slid down his wrist as he raised his glass again.

  ‘To you, young lady – and your association with everyone here.’

  The two fingers slid towards her secret portal, dipped neatly in, retreated, then dipped again.

  She was aware of her own breath quickening, her breasts rising and falling against her bodice, their curving edges peering out from the restriction of her dress like twin crescent moons. She was also aware that conversation had ceased, that she was the subject of silence and all-seeing eyes. But she didn’t care. She was too far gone to care; too far along the road to a mind-shattering orgasm that she badly yearned for.

  He drained his glass, she drained hers. She liked this man. Like Alistair, the power he possessed made her feel good and secure. She lifted her glass and held it to the light so the wine turned pink against the lead crystal and the light from the chandeliers. As she twirled it, rainbow colours shot through each sharp cut prism of glass and threw its beam upon her face. Like people, she thought; or, at least, like the people here. White on the surface, but composed of many colours, with many facets.

  ‘Is she very wet, Reggie darling?’ Nadine asked suddenly.

  Penny gasped, glanced swiftly at Alistair’s sister, then back, almost in a fit of pleading, to Reggie’s face.

  ‘Very wet, Nadine darling, very wet indeed. Just a little more effort, and this little pussy will come.’

  Penny was speechless, as much from her mounting orgasm as from the sudden realisation that everyone there knew exactly what they were doing and, from the sound of it, had done all along.

  ‘Then bring her off, darling. Right now!’

  Like the prisms of light that had reflected so richly from the glass, the faces of those around Penny spun in a blur of colour as two fingers of Reggie’s right hand pushed further into her. Never mind that everyone was watching. She was beyond caring. In an effort to capture the full impact of his fingers, she slid slightly forward on the chair so he could invade her more fully. All the while his fingers dived in, his thumb dancing over her clitoris in short, sharp flicks. Now he used his other hand to hold back her fleshy lips and the sleek black hair of her pubes. And then it came, flooding over her in a torrent of electric release. Her hips lifted against his hands and, crying out, she threw her head back, closing her eyes, her orgasm pulsing with each murmur of breath.

  Reggie removed his hands and washed them in the bowl of water at the side of his fork. The bowl was dark blue. A slice of lemon floated on the surface. It was a relaxed and effective action, emphasising cleanliness, opulence and sensuality at one and the same time.

  Tossing her hair and still breathless, Penny eyed those around the table.

  ‘Splendid, darling!’ exclaimed Nadine, cheroot gripped in her teeth and hands clapping. ‘A splendid effort indeed. If you ride your horses like that, then you’ll get no complaints from me.’

  Auberon just smiled, and Reggie winked at her again, refilled his glass and raised it to her before sipping.

  Alistair was staring at her, his mouth grim set and eyes glittering. She could see him swallowing consistently, and noticed that his lips were dry and that he seemed unable to say anything. Had he not seen enough? Or, perhaps, he had seen too much; perhaps she had blotted her copybook without meaning to.

  At last, he cleared his throat. Then he spoke. ‘Outstanding.’

  Penny flashed her eyes as she savoured the word. That one word clarified exactly what he thought. Not the word itself: there was nothing much in that, it was ordinary, just a word. But she’d detected something else in the way he said it. Deep inside it had come into existence, yet had stuck in his throat, had grated its way to the surface so that when he did say it, its meaning was intensified. His voice had been as low as the depths from which it had come. She knew then that he wanted her; that in time her wager would be won.

  Like liquid fire she returned his stare with her own. When, she asked with her eyes, exactly when?

  Alistair’s gaze shifted, almost guiltily. From the centre of the table he took hold of the half-empty wine bottle – one of three that sat on there – and poured into his own glass.

  But other eyes watched. Other eyes surmised and made plans for these two people.

  Nadine still held the key to her brother’s torment. Thoughtfully she played with the black cross that hung from her ear. It jingled playfully as she touched it. With each jingle, Penny noticed that Alistair’s jaw clenched, and a nerve beneath his eye quivered.

  Nadine saw her look but did not answer the question in her eyes. Nadine was taking pleasure from her brother’s clenching jaw and the nerve that quivered just below his right eye. She knew what he was going through and understood how much the key, which hung behind the earring, meant to him. Only the shadow of a smile played around her mouth as she toyed with the earring and then touched the cold metal of the small key itself. Time and place was controlled by her. Nothing had changed, nothing would change. All in good time, her brother would have what he craved, and Penny would have more than she could ever have bargained for.

  ‘More wine, Penny?’

  Thoughts melted and scattered, Penny looked up into the soft, boyish face of Auberon Harding, another horse rider lucky enough to get a place under Beaumont’s roof together with a wedge of his bank account.

  ‘Yes please,
’ she replied. For some reason, she used her sexiest voice to answer. Perhaps it was because of the burning she felt deep inside; the need to have a real cock inside her rather than just be played with, probed and brought off purely for the benefit of other people.

  She smiled her thanks to Auberon Harding, the Honourable Auberon Harding to be exact, whose family were something in the meat trade and had been for generations. Perhaps they’d been high-street butchers who were suddenly landed with the privilege of supplying Queen Victoria with pork sausages. It didn’t matter. Now, he was an Honourable, and he looked it. He had a look of class about him: thick-lipped with a head-boy type of face and a hairstyle that sat firmly on the fence between fashion and conformity, yet flopped over his forehead. His clothes straddled the same fence. Not too formal, not too fashionable: white shirt; neat tie; neat jacket; neat, sharp-pleated trousers; polished black shoes. Everything about him was neat, correct, pleated and polished. Public school, she decided. She’d met others like him, men who found it impossible to shake off the residue of a rigid regime that had moulded them into a pre-set shape. It was as if they’d originally been made of jelly and now were cast in bronze.

  He looked nice enough, but, although he surveyed her dark hair, her open expression and her gaping neckline, she was surprised and a mite disappointed when his eyes did not linger.

  Fragments of conversation filtered into Penny’s mind as she drank more wine, which was smooth on her tongue and mellow in her head. On top of that, the newness of everything, the excitement of it all and the experience of her dining-table orgasm had lightened her mind even more. Eager to learn and perhaps experience more, she continued to survey those at the table, her dark lashes sweeping her cheeks as her eyes flickered from one guest to another along with the conversation.

  Sir Reginald fondled her knee each time he spoke to her. There was something strangely protective about his fondling, as though he were trying to put her at ease and to make her feel at home. She let him, and tried her best to let Alistair know that she was letting him. After all, there was still the wager to consider, though gradually she was becoming fascinated with this close group of people who had accepted her so easily and so completely.

  For the moment, her massage with the blond angel was forgotten, though if nothing further came off tonight, she would need him again, if only to ease her aching libido with his flexible fingers. Though she would of course prefer his rampant cock.

  But Gregory was not here. Alistair was. She caught him looking at her once or twice. It was a guilty look, as though he were a small boy and had been caught stealing from a sweet shop. So far, she thought to herself, Alistair had disappointed her.

  Adopting an air of indifference to hide that disappointment, she let her eyes study the other diners whilst her mind weighed up each one.

  Sir Reggie was sweet, debonair and highly attractive. She imagined that having sex with him would be a very professional experience. During his life, he would have known many women, would have indulged most readily in every conceivable practice and with every conceivable age, colour and creed of woman. Sir Reggie had been in the army. Sir Reggie had travelled.

  Auberon seemed the height of politeness, the warmth between them like one old schoolmate to another whenever he included her in his conversation. There was no strange guilt in his look like there was with Alistair. His colouring and flickering eyelids came more from shyness than guilt. Of course, she still couldn’t quite work out what Alistair had to be guilty about.

  Nadine was the most intense watcher. Each time Penny chanced to look in her direction, Nadine was staring back at her over the top of her wineglass and, although Alistair dominated the conversation with his talk of mergers, expansion and then the world of equestrianism, she had a distinct impression his sister might be more powerful than him.

  Watching and wondering about her fellow diners ignited new excitement in Penny’s loins. The actions and the scenes she envisaged for each of these people were only in her mind at present, yet she knew that what could be fantasised could also be turned into fact.

  As she sipped her wine, she imagined what each man’s body would feel like against hers, what each cock would feel like in her as each mouth nibbled and sucked at her willing breasts.

  Her eyes darted to each in turn before settling on Alistair. There was something about him that was simultaneously alluring and secretive. She was drawn to him, and everything Ariadne had said only added to her curiosity. Like getting to grips with a new horse, he was a challenge, a creature to be broken and ridden. Vaguely she knew in her mind that whatever it took, she would have him.

  Ariadne had told her he was a voyeur, a spectator. Then, she decided, she would give him plenty to look at. Each and every sexual encounter she had would be within his sight so he would have to take part and would be unable to resist the depths to which debauchery and her own sexuality could take them. She drained her glass. With a smile, Auberon refilled it.

  Food, wine and sparkling conversation were all in plentiful supply. As the wine poured down her throat, she began to wonder who was on offer this evening; who was there for the asking and where Alistair would be when she indulged her desire.

  ‘Lovely meal, my dear, don’t you think?’ The plump-fingered hand of the errant knight squeezed her thigh, his fingers lightly touching the valley at the top of her legs.

  She smiled at him, then over at Alistair. He glanced at her, almost as if he knew what was happening.

  Turning to Sir Reginald, and looking into his face as though he were the lover she had always been waiting for, she opened her legs a little wider. She saw his lips get wetter, the bottom one sagging. Purposefully, she snapped her legs shut. Sir Reggie’s hand retreated and his eyes flickered. He looked hurt for a moment, but only for a moment. His smile returned and he turned his face and his conversation to Alistair.

  A gentle touch on her elbow made her transfer her attention to Auberon. There was a fairy lightness in his fingers, a playfulness that betrayed the strength needed for the sport he so lovingly pursued. Reins were hard to hold on a plunging, rearing animal that weighed something near half a ton, and didn’t she know it?

  ‘It’s nice to have you here. It really is so terribly nice.’ She smiled at him and to herself. He even sounded like a head boy – one left over from some obscure and ancient public school.

  And yet there was sincerity in his eyes and on his lips. She was aware of sudden silence. Conversation, which up until now had flowed almost unabated except when Penny had attracted their attention, had now ceased. Suddenly, she felt as though she were the centre of attention.

  Briefly, she glanced towards Alistair. His eyes met hers before he leant across the table and spoke to Sir Reginald. She couldn’t grasp what was said. She looked from the older man to the younger, then was aware of the eyes of Alistair’s sister, Nadine. They were like pale grey pools amid the heavy black make-up. And suddenly, along with everyone else, there was lust in her eyes.

  Holding Nadine’s gaze and tensing her back, Penny clenched her buttocks in an effort to control the familiar ache surging between her thighs. There were opportunities here, she told herself, and though her vision was blurred and her head was light, she had no intention of missing them.

  ‘Do you think you will like it here?’ Auberon asked her.

  Everyone seemed to be holding their breath for her answer. All, she guessed, needed to know how her earlier sojourn with Sir Reggie had affected her opinion.

  ‘It’s nice to be here. It really is,’ she said brightly. ‘Am I right in thinking you’ve got the room below me?’ She placed her hand on his thigh, felt the iron-hard muscles tense beneath her touch.

  Around the table, there was a sudden exhalation of breath, as though there had been a doubt, which was now discarded.

  But Penny was only half-aware now of what was happening around her. She made no secret of what she was doing at the table, her smile wide, whilst her fingers flicked gently but determine
dly at the awakening flesh just behind Auberon’s zip-fastener. Here was a flower just waiting to be plucked, and she had just the vase to put it in, she thought cheerily.

  He flushed as he nodded, and his eyes flitted briefly around the table. Other mouths smiled, other eyes sparkled, as though they too were experiencing what he was experiencing. Nervously his tongue licked at his lips. As his leg moved, his shaft jumped against his trousers.

  And yet, there was a vulnerability about him, an innocence that seemed strangely irreconcilable with the determined sportsman she knew him to be. She retrieved her hand and smiled.

  I wonder, she thought to herself, head supported on cupped hand whilst her other hand twirled the dark liquid in her glass, whether he’s a bit of a cane man – even a bit gay.

  ‘Time for bed.’ Alistair got to his feet. As if it were a prescribed signal, everyone else got to theirs.

  Sir Reginald coughed and yawned in disjointed unison, and Penny smiled into her wine as the shiny seat of his well-polished dinner trousers came into view.

  Nadine rose in chilly black splendour like a winter’s night, head and shoulders above everyone present.

  She was silent, though her eyes glittered and flitted briefly from one face to another before ending up on Penny. There was no disguising the self-congratulation in her look. As though she’s looking through my clothes rather than at them, thought Penny. It was as if, she reflected, weakly grasping the thought as it circled in her mind, that Nadine knew exactly what was underneath. It was then she remembered her suspicions about the mirror and also about Alistair being a man who watched, not did. There were no guesses as to who he’d be watching tonight.

  ‘I’ll be taking a stroll, if anyone wants to join me.’ Sir Reginald’s now bloodshot eyes searched for an offer.

  No one did join him.

  All the same, Penny was aware of knowing glances passing from one to the other. A curling feeling rose and fell in her stomach. Somehow she knew that no matter where she went to bed that night or what she did, someone would be watching.