Chapter Eight
I don’t see Peach in the morning, not right off.
I charge my way to the breakfast table thinking it will be Tasia and me alone, but there are two genteel lesbians sitting with her, the three chatting conventionally about the flowering plants outside the window.
“Where’s Peach?” I ask.
“Samantha Clarisse is indisposed this morning, my dear.”
I hate the stickiness in her voice. Those eyes of hers that moved me on our arrival are trying their best to woo and calm me now. But I’m beside myself with a thousand worries for Peach, and for me.
“I need to see her now,” I say, demanding.
“She’s sleeping; I wouldn’t want to disturb her.” Tasia returns to her other guests while I turn away.
“No breakfast?” she says calling to me. Her niceness makes me shrivel.
“No,” I say politely turning back. I’m feeling so nervous I’m sick to my stomach.
Tiptoeing along the corridor I look for the back parlor where Peach and Tasia were the night before. The door is closed and I know that she’s still inside because I can feel her essence in me. I always know when she’s this close. I try the knob, but the room’s locked.
“I said, Samantha Clarisse is not to be disturbed,” Tasia calls to me as she suddenly rushes into the corridor. I shouldn’t be surprised to see her.
“I have a right to see her,” I charge.
“Of course, you think you do, but you gave up that right, being the whimpering ninny that you are. You could have given her what she wants but you didn’t, and now I do.”
I want to tear the hair from her head, I’m so angry; but at that moment another woman appears in the hallway. A little wisp of a thing, she slips in and out quickly, giggling softly when she sees the two of us.
She destroys my fine passion for an instant and I have to start again.
“I want to see her now,” I demand.
“Oh? Seeing her last night wasn’t enough?”
I jerk back in shock. I don’t want her to see me react to the stunning disclosure, but I already have.
“You’re a bizarre woman, Cassidy. So unbearably erotic and so cruel to yourself and your lover. I’d be surprised if Samantha Clarisse ever returns to your bed the way you’ve hurt her with your refusals.
“You have no right to comment on what’s between us,” I say. I feel like I’m burning up inside hearing her accusations but I can’t let it faze me now. “I’m not leaving until I see Peach.”
She smiles malevolently. “All right. Suit yourself, but you’ll be disappointed. She doesn’t want you here.” Tasia crosses in front of me and pulls a key from her pocket. The door opens easily and I follow her inside.
Peach lies on a button tufted lounging sofa, her arms bound above her, the collar and chain as they were the night before. Her ankles are also bound to the far end of the sofa, spread so her cunt is wide open.
Tasia picks up her black rod.
“Samantha Clarisse, your slut needs to see you,” Tasia announces. She taps Peach on the thigh until Peach responds, turning her face to us. Tasia then shoves the rod into Peach’s cunt. We both gasp.
“I want to see her alone,” I say.
“No,” Peach shakes her head.
“Please,” I’m begging.
“This is between Tasia and me,” Peach says. There are marks on her breasts like those I received from Cozinne. On Peach they seem so cruel. I’m in tears though I don’t want Tasia to see.
“Tell her, Samantha Clarisse,” Tasia says, as if she’s bored with me. She gives the rod a nasty shove, then drops it, while it’s still anchored in Peach’s cunt. She walks from the room as a cloud disappearing from the sky.
I thought Peach would relent with her rude mistress gone.
“Go away,” she says. “You’re interfering. I don’t want you here.” She says it coldly, so that I shiver from the chill. I think there’s a draft in the room and worry about Peach naked where she lies. But there are beads of glistening sweat on her belly. It’s me that’s frozen.
“Please, just to talk.”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” she says.
When she turns her face away, I leave.
Darting through the hallway and up to my room, I pass a laughing Tasia.
My life is out of control! I can’t imagine how it got this way, a gentle vacation becoming a horror story as the love of my life lies bound in a room below me, refusing to speak with me. Utterly alone, I cry; my tears refusing to stop until my eyes are stinging and swollen. I have no idea what this means, why Peach deserts me and betrays me with this woman. What could I have done to deserve this hateful treatment!
I think of leaving, though it seems irresponsible to abandon her while she remains in the clutches of that woman—even if she’s spurned me.
I moan about my plight until I can’t stand to be in this place any longer. Taking the back stairs down, I escape outside, thinking I’ll walk the beach to clear my head; but on impulse, I climb inside the Jeep and drive north. Still in a daze I’m not sure where I’m going until the picture of Miriam’s face passes through my flustered mind.
I find her cottage easily and stop, hoping I’ll find Miriam there. Her house looks like it’s out of a fairytale, where I can find a welcoming pair of arms.
“Come in,” she says when she answers my knock. Her gracious calm surrounds me the instant her eyes meet mine. She’s not surprised to see me. “You’ve been crying,” she notices.
I begin to cry again, realizing the safety of her gentle counsel. Taking me in her arms, I cry more, feeling foolish with all these ridiculous tears. Yet she caresses me, running her hand through my hair. I’m amazed that I’m aroused by this. Am I this fickle, my love spurns me one minute; I’m ready to fall into another’s arms the next?
She kisses my face tenderly and I’ve still not said a word about by troubles.
“Peach has gone mad,” I finally say. The words come out awkwardly, though they seem to be a perfectly correct evaluation of the situation.
“Has she?” Miriam says, waiting for an explanation.
“I know she’s pushed at my dark side many times. I guess I didn’t read her desires clearly; but now she’s lying bound in the clutches of that woman! She won’t even speak to me.”
“Let her be, dear,” Miriam says, “she knows her own mind well. She must need this. I believe she came for it.”
I don’t understand, but she doesn’t explain.
“What you need is to attend to yourself,” Miriam says.
Her kisses and gentle fondling touch are dangerously close to excitement. I could kick myself for my compulsive s****l needs rising at this moment, when I’m supposed to be in the midst of my greatest agony. I’m kissing her back with my lips on her neck and then between her breasts where her flesh smells of honeysuckle. She doesn’t balk when I undo the buttons on her blouse and reach deep inside to find her pendulous nakedness. I could spend a week in the softness of these womanly mounds. She moans softly as I cuddle them to my face. Her hands caress my hair and then my shoulders. She reaches lower to discover what’s beneath my shift. How convenient that I’m naked underneath, because it takes only seconds for me to be held by Miriam in my natural state.
We move back and forth in pleasure, her hands on me, mine on hers, matching aggressiveness and acquiescence in one tender rollicking passion.
We lie on her couch breast to breast, groin to groin making out like young lovebirds. She kisses my eyelids and lips, the warmth of her breath tickles my face. She’s like a billowy cushion, holding me to her with strong arms and legs. Our cunts rub together as our legs intertwine. I feel her female juices flowing against the inside of my legs and against my labia.
“Ah,” she says softly, as she fingers my cunt, finding the unexpected ring.
“Peach insisted on piercing me,” I explain.
“Ah, a ring of roses,” she says, when she looks down and inspects the etched filigree on my nether jewelry. She says it as if the design is of some significance.
“And are there rose petals on her thigh?” she asks.
“How did you know?” I ask.
“Samantha would think of both,” she replies without answering my question.
“What is she hiding from me?” I ask, drawn to my suspicions.
“What are you hiding from her?” Miriam asks, as if to put me in my place.
Neither of us answers the questions, the arousal going beyond mere play. She seeks her climax as much as I know mine will happen. First times are often awkward. But this one’s not, she’s as easy as Peach was that first time; though there’s a familiarity with this woman, as though I’ve been making love to her forever.
I shudder, cumming sooner than I’d planned, and she keeps going, several well placed light slaps to my cunt and I’m building again like I’d never climaxed at all. I’m amazed at what she’s done, but I don’t take time to consider it. I let her take me to the edge again. Her whole body shudders next to mine when I orgasm. Locked tightly together still, she seems to have timed herself to me. I consider that a near impossible feat that happens only accidentally with other lovers.
She doesn’t finish yet, but climbs from the couch with me, and leads me to her bed. High above the floor, the antique four poster seems two-feet deep with comforters. I think I’ll smother in the feathers; I giggle, wiggling down inside. Miriam smiles, descending on my body again, massaging every inch of me so I’m climbing to another orgasm. The passion wells in me so high I think I’ll scream.
I do scream as she laps at my labia, and engorged clit. She penetrates both holes with easy moving fingers. This takes my whole body end to end and I fall back limp again.
She asks for nothing more, and though I’d willingly give to her again, she shakes me off, in favor of holding me close while I rest.
“I want to taste you,” I tell her.
“You’ll get your chance; I’m not done with you.” She’s smiling as my eyes slowly close and I drift off to a peaceful sleep.
When I wake she hasn’t moved. She’s held me the whole time.
“Shall we have some tea?” she asks.
I think I could stay here forever. I sit on her patio listening to the ocean. It would be perfect if that clouded house down the beach did not exist and Peach could walk through this door wearing a smile right now. I hate it, that my mind keeps leading me back, wondering what she’s doing now, what horrid design that woman has for her. Has she kept her bound, or has she beaten her like a submissive w***e? Has she made love to her body, or just abused it? The question I fear the most: does Peach truly enjoy this treatment?
“You know, Cassidy, she wants to be there,” Miriam says as she walks out with a tray of tea and cookies. She reads my thoughts perfectly. I wouldn’t expect less.
I nod.
“And you, my dear, have to go back and face that.”
“I don’t know how I can,” I tell her.
“You believe in fate and spirit powers and things beyond yourself. You believe in female shamans and feminine witchery. But right now, you’ve disconnected from your source, given into inconsequential jealousy. Read yourself, Cassidy. What have you been hiding that you’re too scared to remember, let alone tell Samantha.”
I flinch at her directness, spoken with such soothing, though penetrating tones.
“Answer me,” she insists calmly.
“A long time ago, Elizabeth…” I say her name as my voice trails off, the memory of the woman appears in my head. After years of deliberate forgetting, I force myself to think of her now. To have remembered her twice in the same month seems portentous. I know Elizabeth reminds me of Tasia. She’s a duplicate of the b***h; it’s clear that I see the two women cut of the same devious cloth.
Miriam wants me to continue; she tells me so with one intent look, like an admonishing mother.
“She played games with me, clawed me once till I bled, I think she was crazy.”
“Was she crazy?” Miriam asks.
“I don’t know,” I tell her.
“Yes you do,” she says calmly. She appears to be probing me with some psychic microscope. “Don’t run from me,” she says, seeing the fear on my face. “Tell me about her.”
Now that the memory is fresh in my mind, it’s useless to avoid it, and it’s clear Miriam will not let me slide away from her query.
“She did things that were crazy to me then. Binding me so I couldn’t move, she poured wax on my breasts, she drew pictures on them through the wax and laughed uproariously as she did it. She burned incense and candles when we made love, laying me out on a marble slab like a piece of meat. She ate me out with my ankles tied to the ends of the table, and pulled my pubic hair until my cunt burned hot. She stretched my ass with larger and larger dildos so I’m now stretched so much, I’m easily penetrated in the ass. She gave me away like a w***e to whomever she wanted. For the year I lived with her, I was her slave. She kept me in chains for days.” There’s so much more I could tell her, but I can’t stomach another memory. “I feel lucky to have escaped her.”
Miriam’s face didn’t change as I spoke, or react in any way. It was as though she knew what I was going to say.
“And you miss her,” Miriam concluded.
I could have said “no” to Peach, or Tasia, or a dozen other lovers, if they had asked that question, but I couldn’t say no to Miriam. She would know the blatant lie.
“How did you know?” I ask.
“Sometimes it’s a shame we’re so transparent,” Miriam says, kindly. “You need to return to Samantha and Tasia. It’s the only way you are going to return to Elizabeth.”
“I can’t return to that.”
“You have to,” she insists.
“But Peach has changed so,” I counter.
“The Samantha Clarisse Sykes I know is as dark as a nightmare, and as bright and fragrant as this day. You cannot deny one for the other, and neither can she.”
Even though I don’t want to hear her say this, she makes such sense. Perhaps in this peaceful place, where my mind is clear, not clouded by my evil past roaring at me, anything can be reasonable.
“Come to me now, and satisfy me,” she says. Holding out her arms, she motions me to her side. I traverse the several feet between us and fall to my knees between her legs. My mouth clamps itself on her sweet cunt. I push away a few wispy soft red hairs so I can taste the juices that rise there, and toy with the soft folds of skin. She likes my tongue in her hole, my finger pinching the bud of her clit. My other hand slips back to her anus and massages her there, though I’m hesitant to probe that place. She seems content for me to do no more.
A wave of pleasure rolls through her. She leans back and cries aloud, a lusty cry that reverberates through my body, too. I love watching her shudder.
There’s no question of staying any longer with Miriam. I tell myself not to even think of it, as much as the prospect would please me. I’ll leave before the sun sets and hope to find things at the B&B more welcoming.
Miriam waves at me as I climb into the Jeep. “Take care of your feelings for Samantha Clarisse,” she says. “And take care of yourself.”
I nod agreeing.
“We’ll be together again,” she adds.
I wonder when. I wonder what bizarre things will take place before I see her again.