Other Colors Ch. 15-16

He smirked, "Be wise as you are cruel, milady."

I watched him wrap his hands over the edge of the footboard, and blushed.

"Haven't we heard enough from Hamlet, sir?"

"The sonnets, actually," he cocked his head, correcting me. "Perhaps you were thinking, I must be cruel," he leaned closer, "...only to be kind, Miss Foster."

I blushed deeper. I was. He was insufferably pretentious sometimes. I guess in that sense we made a half-decent match.

He lowered his blue eyes, and smoothed the duvet with the flat of his palm, "Who was it?"

I furrowed my forehead, confused; it took me a moment to realize that he meant my phone call.

"A friend," I breathed.

"Mulgrave?"

I raised a coy brow, but his eyes were still on the bedspread.

"What if it was?"

He stopped, and stared into me. I pushed hard to suppress my shudder. Whenever he looked at me like that, I had the distinct impression that he could see, if not the content of my thoughts, then at the very least their shadows, and color.

He shook his head, "It wasn't."

"...No," I admitted, "It was Marie."

"You're tense. Did she say something to upset you?"

I shifted, burning up beneath his gaze.

"No," I lied. "I think... I'm just adjusting to all of this."

"I am too," he smirked, and stepped away, opening up a little cellaret in the corner, "You kept distracting me at work today. I nearly left in the middle of a meeting." He set out two snifters, filling each with a splash of some noxious and unnamed spirit. "It's a deadly temptation, Penny," he turned back, "knowing right where you are at all hours."

He passed me a glass, and clinked his against it.

"Your first day, Miss Foster," his eyes flashed, "Seems we both survived."

I smirked. La nuit est encore jeune. I felt a sting the moment the stuff touched my tongue. It burned like brimstone. He smiled wryly, watching me as I struggled to swallow it.

"So," he took a second sip, and sat down along the edge of the bed, "Why don't you tell me what you did today."

"I'm...not sure there's much to tell," I choked. My eyes were still watering, "I did what you told me. I wandered around a while. I sketched... I—"

"No," he cut me off coolly, and set his hand on my pillow. "Start here. The moment you woke up."

Is he serious? My cheeks reddened. They always did when he took that scolding tone with me.

"I...woke up late," I thought carefully, "Later than you wanted. But it was still dark out."

He nodded calmly. My eyes lost focus as I strained to summon up the details.

"I could smell the fire burning downstairs. I forgot where I was at first," I drew my knees up under my chin. "I was sore."

"Sore..." he ran the back of his hand down my calf, over the ankle, and across the tips of my toes—I felt the tingle travel clear up to my eyelashes. "Are you still sore, Penny?"

I quivered a little as he leaned closer. The drink he'd made me was a strong intoxicant, but it paled in comparison to the scent of him.

"...No."

He moved in even nearer; we were almost touching. He looked me once over, and wetted his lips.

"Liar."

I flinched. But he didn't attack me. All he did was lay a fatherly and unsatisfying kiss on my forehead.

"Go on, then," he rested back against the footboard, and drew my legs up over his lap. "Tell me the rest."

Peloteur... Is there a circle in hell set aside for men who tease? I sighed, and tried to remember the remainder of the morning, but my efforts were frustrated both by the excruciating degree of detail he demanded, and by the mild, scintillating agony of his touch. I squirmed as he traced his hand along my shin, and I confessed that prior to dutifully dressing myself in the clothes he'd left out for me, I'd spent at least half an eternity in the shower.

He nodded, "Were you feeling unclean this morning, Penny?"

His hand wrapped round the ball of my foot, softly stroking the arch with his thumb; and though it tickled terribly, he held me still. I suffered in silence, biting down on the insides of my cheeks. I was almost crying when he finally quit.

"This ankle's healed up nicely," he bent it gently in each direction. "Has it bothered you at all?"

"Only in heels," I batted the moisture from my eyes, and gazed down to my unpainted toes in his lap. "You know... you forgot to leave me some shoes this morning."

"Did I?" His brows arched in mock surprise, and he raised my leg a little higher. The sensation was unbearable. With each word, the dark wires of his stubble bristled against the tips of my toes. "Did you need shoes today, dear girl?"

"...No," I cringed, working hard not to squeal. "I... I really didn't."

He caught my eye for one charged and wordless moment. It was no small seizure on his part; to dress me, but deprive me of shoes. Our arrangement as I understood it hinged on the condition that, at any time and for any reason, I could walk out the front door, and be free of it. But in Montreal, in December, in the snow, to do so barefoot was not something any sane person could describe as viable. Probably, I could have told him off for it, and perhaps I should have. But I kept quiet, until he pressed my first toe to his lips, kissed it softly, and let go.

I tucked my knees once more beneath my chin, and he made me resume my tedious recollection. My head was in a haze though, and I kept getting things out of order. I told him about the blossoms and the ivy I'd sketched, and how I'd chanced upon the glasshouse. I told him how I'd wandered the halls that morning, salivating over his collection.

"I'm curious," he drained his snifter, and set it aside, "what did you stare at the longest?"

"Longest?"

My brow wrinkled, and I braced myself. His so-called curiosities were seldom idle, and it had become clear to me by now that the more innocuous his question seemed, the more predaceous and deliberate its subtext.

"...Danaë," I breathed.

A dark grin fell across his face, and right away I regretted telling him the truth.

"Show me."

"What? Right now?"

"Finish that first," he tapped my glass, and rose up from the bed, adjusting his cuffs and collar. "It ought to loosen your tongue a little. I won't tolerate tight lips tonight, Penny."

I flushed, "You're mocking me..."

He leveled his gaze, "I'm not."

"I've been right here all day," I frowned. "Nothing I could say could possibly interest you."

"It could."

"Well," I shook my head, "...I still don't see how."

"And I don't need you to. All I need," he leaned forward, eyes flashing, and forced me flat on my back across the bed, "is for you to listen, and do as you're told." I trembled beneath him. The liquor made his breath sweet, and astringent. "Is that utterly, perfectly, and empirically clear, Penny?"

I gave a panicked nod, a pair of red flames licking at my cheeks. He kissed each one of them, and bared his teeth at me before retreating.

"Good girl. Now hurry up."

I sat up slowly, still shaking as he handed me the dreadful glass. 'HURRY UP PLEASE IT'S TIME...' I shut my eyes, throwing back the last gulp like a foul ecbolic; then let him lead me, half-choking, into the hall. My head began to buzz as we made our way downstairs. Once or twice, to steady me, he snatched hold of my arm just above the elbow. I grinned tipsily, wondering what he would do if I fell. Half of me had a mind to find out.

"Tell me why."

His voice was frosty and dry. He stood behind me, his arms loosely wrapped around my waist, and together we gazed at Schiele's painting. I wanted to answer, but between his whiplash-inducing advances in the bedroom, and the amber poison swirling round in my stomach and skull, I knew that whatever paltry analytical powers remained inside me were best kept to myself.

"I don't know..." I shrugged. "It's sweet."

"Bourguereau's girls are sweeter," he turned me to the left, where Biblis was lying nude near the water. "Courbet's are more real. Matisse's more modern." He piloted my eyes. Epitomes of each one hung all around us. He spun me back once more, "Why her?

"Because she isn't ugly," I blushed, "He always turned his women ugly."

He drew me closer, "So?"

"So... it means she's special," I glanced up at him. "He could have painted her all sordid and distorted like the rest. But he didn't. Look," I wriggled out of his arms, and pointed to the girl's demure and half-hidden face, "She's blushing. Schiele's ladies never blush." I turned to the canvas. "I...don't think you really know what you've got here. This piece is priceless."

"I own it, Penny," he stepped closer, recapturing me. "I assure you, it isn't priceless."

"Well," I murmured, folding my fingers against his chest, "It still doesn't seem right—you keeping her here, all to yourself."

"No?" he cocked his head, "and what would you have me do with her?"

I shook my head. He was right. The drink had loosened my lips. It made me bold.

"...Give her away?" I dropped my eyes, "To the Musée des Beaux Arts, maybe? She ought to be out somewhere everyone can enjoy her."

He smirked coolly, "Is that what you would do, Penny?"

I bit my lip, and nodded.

He bent closer, and leveled his gaze.

"So take her."

I squinted at him, certain I'd misheard

"Um... come again?"

"Go on," he nodded, "Take her. Give her away to the museum."

"I-I can't," I stuttered. "She doesn't belong to me."

"No. She belongs to me," his voice dropped. "And if she's still hanging here tomorrow morning, I'm going to throw her on the fire."

My entire chest constricted. I glared, and he glared right back at me.

"...You wouldn't."

He said nothing, but his eyes were answer enough for me. My teeth chattered, and my veins iced over as he broke away to check his watch.

"Allez mon petit chat cambrioleur," he took me by the wrist, and led me away down the hall with him. "Dinner is waiting."

I don't remember what we ate. It was something rare, savory and rustic, I suppose, with antique wine and large, serrated knives. That tended to be the trend at Lacoste. But I recall that when we came in, the food was on the table, and the candles already lit. Jules was nowhere to be seen.

Dmitri drew the doors shut, and dropped the needle onto the gramophone. I flushed as Billie Holiday's voice began to croon the first few bars of 'Mean to Me'. It could have been a coincidence, but that same song was on the radio the first night he brought me back to Lacoste. I sighed. It seemed like half lifetime ago. Already, almost everything did.

He pulled out my chair, and I sank into it like an automaton. I felt so strange; like I was watching myself in a silent film, acting out the tightly scripted role he'd written for me. My real self was seated elsewhere, on a red velvet cushion most likely, perhaps, in the flickering ghost-light of some empty cinema. That girl was perched on the edge of her seat, eyes wide as she watched it all unfold. But the Penny at his table endured dinner like one half-hypnotized. She was pliable and obedient; essentially silent until spoken to—a perfect picture of feminine passivity; flattened out, fearful, and defeated. I hardly noticed that we'd finished until he touched the napkin to his lips, and tossed it to the table.

"I'm curious..."

There it is again... I shivered.

"When you were little, Penny, did you like to dance?"

I sank a little lower in my seat, running my finger around the rim of a wine glass, "I guess so... I took ballet for a while—until I quit growing."

"Do you miss it?"

I shrugged, "I wasn't very good."

"Do you miss it?" he repeated coolly, and I winced.

"Not the blisters, or the ankle sprains," I bit my lip. "But...yeah. It was fun to feel graceful."

He stood up slowly, and rounded the table, "You still walk on your toes sometimes."

I do. I remembered that first time he kissed me in the kitchen, when I'd stood en pointe for the sole purpose of rousing his ire.

"Muscle memory," I shifted in my chair, and watched him set a fresh record on the gramophone. "I think I could still chassé in my sleep."

The needle fell, and Billie's thin voice gave way to the sultry contralto of Etta James. My cheeks heated. The musical motif was not subtle. He'd put on her rendition of 'Teach Me Tonight'. He loomed over me, and held out his hand.

"Prove it."

I flushed furiously as he pulled me from my chair, and wrapped his arm around my waist. It didn't help my nerves in the least that he turned out to be a decent dancer, and it made me doubly self-conscious of my missteps. But he seemed so at ease; so pleased to be with me. His eyes were bright and blue. He was grinning—without any sign of immediate malice. And before the second verse, I gave in. I laid my cheek against his chest, and let him lead me in smooth little spirals around the dining room. A piano interlude picked up, and he lowered his head to look at me.

"Did you dream last night, Penny?"

I did. I always dreamt vividly after sex. But I didn't want to tell him. I was afraid he might try to interpret me.

"...Yes," I answered softly, "but I can't remember it."

He squeezed me closer, "Liar."

Christ. My cheeks heated. How does he always know? He spun me halfway around until our arms were crossed, and my shoulder blades pressed close against him.

"Go on," his breath was warm against my ear. "I'll tell you mine, if you tell me yours."

I confess that offer piqued my interest. Besides, there seldom seemed much profit in resisting him. Somehow, he always had his way with me.

I sighed, "...I dreamt I was buried alive."

He missed a step. We were right in the middle of spinning me back around to face him. Though miraculously, he managed to avoid stepping on my toes—which was lucky. I was, after all, still barefoot.

"A nightmare?"

"Not exactly," again, I laid my cheek against him. It was easier to speak to him when I couldn't see what was in his eyes. "I was definitely trapped. But it was warm, dim, cozy..." my voice trailed off. "It wasn't so bad, really."

"Thanatos," the word rumbled darkly in his chest. "And you didn't feel frightened?"'

I shook my head, "I did, a little. But I didn't think I would die." I glanced up, "the man who put me there—I thought if I was patient, and if I behaved myself," my eyes glazed over, "well...he had to come back for me eventually."

"Urszene in utero," he smirked, "Tomb, womb. Womb, tomb. What a lovely, twisted little mind you have."

"I knew you'd say something like that," I blushed. "You probably think all dreams are about sex."

"Most," he nodded blithely, and spun me around, "But not mine, Miss Foster."

I raised an incredulous brow, "Oh?"

He shook his head, and stopped us cold in the middle of the song.

"No. I dreamt that I was fucking you."

His eyes cut into me, and my heart went still. I could feel his hand gliding lower in the small of my back.

"Yes. I had you on stage at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal, hanging from the rafters, like a marionette," he spoke slowly, letting me feel the full weight of each word. "You wore nothing. Just a band of black silk to cover your eyes. But your wrists. Ankles. Thighs. Breasts—I had them all bound in coils of red rope."

He ran his fingertips across my temples, and I trembled.

"And you," his voice lowered, "You were my perfect, little puppet, Penny. We heard a piano playing somewhere in the distance. Debussy, it seemed. I made you dance this way, and that. I moved you in dizzying circles, all up and down the stage. Then at the climax, I pulled your legs wide apart. I fixed you in a permanent grand jeté for me."

He bent his head closer, eyes flashing and teeth bared.

"I stood beneath you. Your hair was wild. Your chest heaving. Your tethers tight. I lowered you like a fallen angel, and let your lips part for me, Penny," he brushed my lower lip with the tip of his thumb, "...and I split you open."

I didn't move. I couldn't. In part, it was because his gaze had all but pithed me; piercing clear through the core of my brain, where it left me not numb, but paralyzed. But also because I was afraid that if I tried to move, my body, by some autonomic reflex of the pelvis, might give itself up to him. It was degrading, really, realizing how much his dream aroused me. I bit my lip, straining to imagine how it might feel; to be blindfolded and floating, my legs spread to the feather-edge of their breaking point.

"I, um..." I choked, "...I thought you said it wasn't about sex."

"I'm not convinced that it was, Miss Foster," his mouth split into a wry grin, and we kept dancing, "If our dreams were to taken so literally, I think Gala Dalí would have had her husband committed."

I sniffed, still burning up inside. I remembered the bayonet, poised and ready to pierce her through in his Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening. Bizarrely enough, at that moment, a bayonet didn't sound so bad to me.

"Well," I breathed tremulously, "what was it really about, then?"

He shrugged, "Qui sait? Birds. Bees. Being buried alive..." He dipped me, "Perhaps someday I'll let you explain it to me, darling."

I giggled. It eluded me entirely, how easily he could maneuver between carnivorous and comical. The horns blew a bit louder for the final verse, and we danced the last dozen bars or so in silence. It was almost charming, actually. I'd dare say tender. Certainly, the baroque pornography of his dream was still seared into my mind, but so were the twinkling white lights of chandelier, and the snowflakes outside the window, still floating from a soot-black sky. I watched him, and he watched me. We stood close even after the song ended, and the record crackled and hissed beneath the needle. At last, he let go of me, pushing open the dining room doors with his palms. But his eyes never left me for a moment.

"Alright, Penny. It's time."

He snatched me by the wrist, and pulled me out into the foyer. I stumbled, flustered, and more than just a little afraid.

"Um...time for what exactly?"

He turned, "Upstairs. There's something I want to show you." His eyes flashed, "but you'll need to keep an open mind for me. I'd hate to frighten you off before you've even had a chance to unpack."

An open mind... My stomach sank a little lower with each step. It was silly, but I was all but certain he was leading me to that dank and dreadful dungeon my imagination had constructed for me that afternoon, and which I simply assumed all houses of this grandeur and antiquity must come equipped. I shuddered, lagging behind a little, but when we reached the base of the stairs, he stopped. I watched him drum his fingers anxiously along the bannister.

"Understand, Penny," once more, he turned to me, his face somber, almost ashen, "whatever it may look like, and however it may feel—you'll always be safe inside this house." He drew me up onto the steps with him, "There will be times when I hurt you. It's inevitable. But I will never, never allow anything to harm you," he waited for my gaze, "Do you understand the difference, Penny?"

I couldn't speak. I could barely breathe. And if I'd been in my right mind, I might've asked him for a little clarification. But I was not in my right mind. I nodded solemnly, silently, and let him lead me onward up the stairs.

Chapter 16

There was not the slightest doubt in my mind that intended to fuck me. My limbs began to quiver as we reached the landing, and he led me by the wrist down the hall to his study. My eyes darted anxiously over those several fixtures in the room, still so sharply imprinted in my head: the very thing that started all of this, my massive painting, now mounted on a nearby wall; the sprawling desk where he'd torn apart my pea coat; and the edge of his low, leather daybed, where he'd both bruised me, and made me beg for more.