The Art of War Pt. 02

She paused to smile, her expression distant as memory overtook her for a moment.

"Then you came along Izzy, and mummy was so thrilled, but she never really recovered. She was so weak after you were born, so sick. It wasn't your fault, baby, there was something wrong with her; all those miscarriages should have been a clue, and the doctors couldn't help her. I was eighteen when I got married, daddy didn't like it, because I was so young, we both were, and James is a distant cousin, too, so daddy and mummy were not too happy about that, either; they said we were too young, but of course I knew it all and we got married anyway, in Chelsea Town Hall. And before you ask, his name was Bartlett too, so I got to keep my name; yay, lucky me..."

Izzy took her hand, her anger and resentment forgotten, wiped away by Carol's obvious distress.

"What happened...Carol, what happened to our parents?"

Carol squeezed her hand so tightly she almost gasped at the sudden pain.

"It was the day after your birthday, Iz, the day after we took that picture. Where that supermarket on the corner is, there used to be a big Georgian mansion there; it was patched up after the war, but they didn't know the foundations had been badly damaged and undermined by all the bombing during The Blitz; it was dangerously unstable, but Daddy didn't know that, the papers said it had been made safe, and he went down there into the basement to take a look around, because he and granddad had bought it; they were having the place pulled down to build the supermarket, and he wanted to look at how they were going to do it safely. He was only supposed to be there for a few minutes...I watched him from the road as he went down the stairs, next thing I knew the whole thing collapsed. Daddy was killed, my dad was killed..."

Izzy stared in silent shock at Ollie, who looked equally as stunned.

"Poor mummy, she was bad enough already and that was pretty much the last straw. She collapsed, they rushed her to St. Thomas's, but..."

She blinked back her tears, and took Ollie's hand in her other hand.

"The last thing mummy did was to give me you, both of you. She made James and me your guardians, almost the last thing she said was that I was to be your mum now, so I took you, and you, Ollie, and I did what she asked; I became your mum. Mum knew I couldn't be your big sister; you needed parents, a mum and dad, so she made me promise I'd be your mum, that James would be your dad, and that we'd bring you up as if we really were your parents. I promised her I'd only to tell you the truth when I thought you were old enough. So here we are, kids..."

Izzy slumped back in a daze, absorbing what her...sister had just told her; her first reaction was to scream 'why did you keep this to yourself, we had a right to know!', but she held her tongue; something told her Carol was in no condition to handle her smart mouth.

Ollie, meanwhile, was leafing through the papers Carol had dumped on the bed; his birth certificate, showing his parents as John Oliver and Carol Isobel Bartlett, so that part was true, ditto Izzy's birth certificate; at least now he knew where their names had come from. Other papers included mortgages, lease and rental agreements, and lots of papers covered in dense print that seemed to be some sort of financial statements and legal documents.

As he was leafing through the papers, it suddenly struck him that he was looking at the deed documents for building after building, at least a couple of dozen of them, on the street where they lived and on several adjacent streets. This couldn't be right, surely?

"Mu...Carol, what are these?" he waved a handful of the papers at Carol, who took them from him.

"These are the title deeds for the properties you own, baby, you and Izzy. These are copies; the originals are in a bank vault, your lawyers look after them."

'I have a lawyer?' thought Ollie, 'news to me...'

"Mum, what does it all mean? You tell me you and dad are not my mum and dad, and now you tell me I own all this property? Are we rich then? Where did all these houses come from?"

Carol smiled wistfully as she shook her head.

"I told you, baby, granddad bought properties all around here, over in Pimlico, and across the river in Wandsworth and Battersea after the war. He rebuilt and refurbished them. He thought they'd sell for enough to cover the costs and have a little left over to leave to daddy, but they didn't sell, not then; no-one was buying houses in the 1950's, but that all changed in the sixties and Seventies. This used to be a solid working-class area, then all the people who wanted to live in the West End but couldn't afford Chelsea, Mayfair, and Knightsbridge, and wouldn't live in Notting Hill or Maida Vale, at least not then, began to move here, and property prices and rentals went up, and up, and up, and granddad decided not to sell. On paper, you and Izzy are very wealthy, but there's no actual money, James saw to that..."

She smiled bitterly, her mouth twisting as she shook her head.

"What happened...' murmured Izzy, and Carol took her hand.

"Your...dad, my...husband, thought he was an expert in property investment, he wanted to invest your income from all these houses in other properties, but he didn't know what he was doing, he tried playing the sharks at their game and he lost it all. He couldn't touch the property; that was held in trust for you, but he lost everything I had kept safe for you, all the accumulated income from all those rentals over the years, the deeds and rights to that supermarket down the road that granddad left for me, all the money daddy left, his insurance, and everything granddad and I had put aside from the business for the two of you, plus everything granddad left me from the sale of his business."

She leafed sadly through the pile of financial documents.

"James left me because I wouldn't let him borrow against your inheritance, but I couldn't risk him losing everything you had, too, not after what he did to me. That's why he left. Didn't you ever wonder how we could afford to live in the West End of London even though I don't have a job, and why neither of you has any student loans? Your trust manages your income from those properties, and pays for our daily living costs, household expenses, and your education, not your father; he gambled and lost everything I had, and then he left me because I wouldn't let him gamble everything you had as well."

She leafed absently through the sheaf of deeds and documents, her eyes far away.

"Now we live on a portion of the rental income from all those houses granddad and daddy bought and renovated. There are a lot of them; houses around here were cheap after the war. Not anymore, though. We have to pay for the upkeep of all those houses, and it's not cheap; what comes in mostly goes straight back out again, or into the trust to be held for the two of you in-trust, and I can't touch any of it, nor can you. These are all Georgian and Regency-period buildings, and English Heritage won't let me repair with modern materials, I have to use the exact same materials as the original builders, like hand-cut Welsh slate, and Portland stone, and things like replacing all the lead plumbing with copper and plastic, because of health and safety regulations, is cripplingly expensive, so I have to keep rolling the rental income back into repairs and maintenance, and after your portion goes into the trust there isn't much left over for luxuries. It's ironic, really; you own some of the most valuable properties in the South-east of England, and I had to pawn mum's engagement ring to buy Izzy her new laptop..."

Ollie frowned.

"If we own all this property around here, why don't we just sell a few houses? I know what houses sell for around here, we sell a couple and we're set for life!"

Carol shook her head.

"It's not that simple, baby; the trust stipulates that none of the holdings can be disposed of until Izzy reaches her twenty-first birthday; granddad set it up that way so she'd have a voice in what happens to her inheritance; she had to make an 'informed choice'; I'm sorry, but those are the words of the trust deeds, and I have to abide by them. Eighteen more months, baby, that's all, just sit tight..."

Ollie's forehead furrowed in thought, Carol noting, as she always did, how much like their father he looked when he did that.

"Look, there has to be a way to...I don't know, get some of the property released, something? This is ridiculous; we're sitting on a goldmine and yet you say we're practically living hand to mouth? How is that even possible?"

Carol's lip twisted bitterly, a harsh, cynical smile flitting across her face.

"You can thank my wonderful husband for that. All the money granddad and our parents left me, and the funds we set up to make your life and mine easier, he pillaged them all; that flash car of his, that swanky office, that fat slut he's taken up with? He paid for all that with my share, and the money I set aside for us, not the trust; 'If you're going to play with the big boys, you have to look the part, sweetheart, blah, blah, blah...', and he only left because I wouldn't sign-over your share to him too. And before you go calling and asking him for money, he won't listen; as far as he's concerned, you're not his children, and he feels no obligation to you at all; he's not your father, and you're not his problem; those were his exact words when he left."

Izzy felt it was time she made a contribution.

"So what do we do now? Why do we need to do anything? According to you, the trust is paying our tuition, we're not starving, not yet, and in eighteen months it's all academic. Surely we can keep doing what we're doing and wait for my twenty-first to roll around? And why did you wait 'til now to tell us?"

Carol smiled at the question.

"I wasn't actually planning on telling either of you anything until Izzy's twenty-first; that was one of the conditions Granddad set for the trust, so I had to abide by it; he left me enough for us to live comfortably, you know what happened to all that. The two of you plotting to blackmail me kind of forced my hand, Iz; now that you know, though, you're still bound by the terms of the trust, you too, Ollie. Until Izzy is twenty-one, the trust stays untouchable, no matter that you'll be way past twenty-one, Ollie. I'm sorry, Ollie, but Granddad was kind of old-fashioned; in his day, twenty-one was the age of majority, not eighteen, so that's how he set it up. For now, we keep on doing what we're doing. Come on, it's not so bad! If you hadn't forced my hand, you'd never have known, so just think of it as something to look forward to one day not too far off..."

Ollie grinned, winked at Izzy, and plumped back down on the bed.

"Suits me fine, I can wait. How 'bout you, Izzy, or you still in the mood for a little blackmail?"

He grinned as he said it, to show there was no sting intended, and for once, Izzy didn't bite. Instead, she smiled back, and this time it was a pleasant, open smile, not that malicious smirk of hers that so irked him.

"Oliver Bartlett, I may be an amoral little bitch, according to you, and I may have the brains of a woodlouse, which I heard by the way, I do have ears you know, but I really don't think I'm going to fuck-over the big sister I only just discovered I had. Why don't you go and take a shower, you smell funny, and not in a good way, while my big sister tells me about my mum. Go-on Ollie, piss-off, use the family bathroom and take your time, there's a good boy!"

Ollie grinned again at her dismissing him, started to wrap the sheet around himself then thought 'what the hell, she's seen everything, wake up, Ollie-Boy!' so just stood up and stretched mightily, well aware that both his sisters watched him hungrily as he did so, then padded naked out of the room.

"Don't do anything I wouldn't do!" was his parting shot, and he grinned as Izzy's voice came clearly through the door. "Fuck off Ollie!"

*

Both sisters watched their muscular, handsome, and wonderfully well-endowed brother leave the room, then waited for a second or so, until Izzy made the next move.

"Right, now he's gone..."

With that, she slid her short skirt past her hips and wriggled until it dropped to the floor, and began tugging her tight top over her head, smiling slightly at Carol's expression.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't you say something earlier about me joining you? Well, now that Bonehead's cleared-off, I think I will; it's time you and I had a little us-time, Mommy Dearest..."

With that, her top dropped to the floor; she was bra-less, her nipples stiff and engorged, two pink points staring directly at Carol. Izzy hooked her thumbs into her lacy little panties and tugged them past her hips, giving a little shimmy to drop them to the floor so she could step out of them, all the while watching her 'new' older sister through hooded eyes.

"OK Big Sister," she murmured, smiling seductively, smoothing her hands over her body, before lightly pinching her nipples and licking her lips, "this is where it gets interesting..."

*

Omnia Vincit Amore, Et Nos Cedamus Amori:

From his vantage point across the road, Tommy watched greedily, lust for Izzy steadily clanging through him, almost making him forget the pain in that place he didn't like to think about, but which still made sitting down a cautious operation. His hand crept down almost involuntarily to unzip his trousers and give himself a quick rub and squeeze.

"You can do that later, you idiot, keep your mind on what we're doing here!"

The voice of his co-conspirator jerked him back to reality, and he was grateful the only light in the room was from the street light far below, otherwise the other occupant of the room would have seen him flush beet-red.

"So what do you think, boy, are you ready for a little revenge?" asked his companion. "Just get her to me, and that thick-headed brother of hers, and when I'm finished with them, you can do what you like with all three of them. Think of them as my gift to you. Just grab them, I don't care how, and I'll do the rest. I'm counting on you, boy, don't fuck this up, there's too much at stake!"

"Don't worry, it's all set for tomorrow morning," replied Tommy. "Everyone knows their places, so it should all go off without a hitch. Their mother will have to be grabbed later, when she goes out to pick up the papers; we've checked it out, and everyone on that side of the street works, but as tomorrow's Saturday, they'll probably have a lie-in; we should be able to grab her with no witnesses."

"You better be right there, boy!" snarled his co-conspirator, "if this goes tits-up I promise you it won't be another cocktail-shaker I'm going to ram up your arse!"

"Quit worrying, and don't threaten me, you don't scare me!" gritted Tommy Millsom. "We've practiced this a dozen times, we have our timing down to a T; it's all good, so back the fuck off!"

*

Ollie took Izzy at her word; considering what he'd been doing, a thorough shower was probably a really good idea, and the hot water, as hot as he could stand it, was invigorating and relaxing, as well as relaxing his throbbing scrotum. He still hadn't forgiven Izzy for breaking his stride just when he was on his vinegar strokes, but the hot water soothed the ache, and for once, with no Izzy hammering on the door, he luxuriated in the heat, the steam, and the feeling of being really clean, his mind free-wheeling in neutral while every trace of what he'd been doing was power-showered away. He checked his watch and noted almost with a start that he'd been in there almost thirty minutes, but it was so wonderful it had felt like ten. His fingers were pruning-up, so he regretfully shut off the water and towelled off, humming to himself, perfectly at ease for the first time in a very long time.

'Time to finish off...' he thought jauntily as he soft-footed back to Carol's bedroom, to stop and take in the scene in front of him.

*

Izzy slid into bed next to her sister, brushing her lips with her own, smiling inwardly at Carol's mixed expression of puzzlement, shock, and not a little arousal, too.

"Relax, Sis, and don't be scared, just let me do the work; I think you're going to like this, just relax..."

Carol smiled tentatively, roving her eyes over her younger sister's tight, alluring body, unable to suppress the little frissons of arousal thrilling through her whenever she locked eyes with Izzy. She closed her eyes and tried to slow her hammering heartbeat, wondering what was coming next even as Izzy cupped her magnificent breasts.

"Is it your turn to seduce me, poppet, or am I getting a freebie?" murmured Carol, attempting to lighten the mood a little, then her eyes widened and her lips curved in a silent 'O' as Izzy's thumbnails scratched lightly across her nipples, erecting the sensitive little nubs of flesh once again and making her gasp with the sensation.

"Oh yeah, you liked that, I can tell!" breathed Izzy, closing her hands over her older sister's breasts, fondling the firm flesh and palming the nipples even as she bore her over backwards, to land on top of her with their lips almost touching, close enough for a kiss.

Carol had no defences against Izzy's brand of seduction, something Izzy picked-up on almost immediately, so without missing a beat, she deliberately squirmed on top of Carol, bringing her hairless labia into contact with her older sister's, sending a bolt of pleasure through the older woman and wringing a squeak of pleasure from her.

"Liked that too, didn't ya!" gloated Izzy, doing it again just to hear her sister's soft, breathy squeal, to see her writhe in pleasure, completely under her control.

Now Izzy's hands crept down even as her teeth gently scraped Carol's neck, her suddenly throbbing nipples making her gasp and try and pull away, but Izzy's weight on her prevented that. Another squirm from Izzy, grinding her pussy even harder against her sister's still tender labia, made Carol forget all about the sensations from her swollen nipples as yet another bolt of pleasure flashed through her. Izzy's fingers, as yet unnoticed by her sister, slid between their tightly-pressed bellies, and a single finger slid between her labia, teasing the damp, tender flesh. Carol jumped like she'd been scorched at the feel of her sister's finger teasing her inner labia.

"Oh my God, Iz, what are you doing to me?!!" she gasped, before whining through her clenched her teeth as another almost unbearable wave of pleasure spread through her as Izzy tweaked her clitoris, just a little touch, but enough to electrify the older woman.

Izzy leaned up over her (without removing her finger from its warm lodging in Carol's pussy) and gently scraped her teeth on Carol's chin, the softest possible love-bite.

"All we're doing is Lezzing-out a little, sweetie; don't tell me this is your first time?"

From the vague, slightly scared expression on her sister's face, Izzy knew she'd scored a bulls-eye.

"Really, never? Not even a little snogging-session in school? Oh my God, with all this going for you, tits like yours, an arse from here to Friday, and never a bloke in sight, you should have had every Diesel and Lipstick from here to Scotland and back queuing up outside the front door, lubed-up, dripping like Niagara, tongues hanging out, and fifteen-inch double-enders ready to go!"

Izzy shook her head in mock sadness.

"Look, I get the 'no blokes' thing, after Dad...sorry, 'James' fucked off, but looking like you do, seriously, you could have gone down to 'Lesbians 'R' Us' night at 'The Fridge' and been swamped in the fucking stampede! Don't tell me you never even once thought about 'tipping the velvet' with a dirty little hottie or two? No? Not even after a couple of gins on a Saturday night? Where's your sense of adventure, woman, don't tell me I'm the only one in this whole family with a complete set of balls?"